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Showing posts with label flourish thinlits. Show all posts
Showing posts with label flourish thinlits. Show all posts

Sunday, October 1, 2017

Autumn Blooms PP364

Happy Sunday, everyone!  Sunday is fun day because it's the start of another challenge at The Paper Players.  My dear friend Sandy has some gorgeous inspiration to get our mojo going for her theme challenge of Autumn Floral:
This card took waaaay longer than it should have.  Not because of the theme of the inspiration photo, because I could not translate the image in my head to paper!  I tried numerous stamp sets but couldn't capture the blended hues I wanted with just a single color of ink.  In the end I went with an old standby image and found my happy place in watercolor! 
I also used the fantastic sketch at the Global Design Project as my starting point--sure do love a sketch challenge and this one is great!  The first thing I stamped was the leaf from the Colorful Seasons stamp set.  I inked it in Crushed Curry and lightly kissed the inked stamp with Cajun Craze.  When stamped it gave a two-toned color to the leaves and no two are exactly alike, just like real leaves!
I am really liking the Fresh Fig in color for fall projects.  The gorgeous flower from Birthday Blooms was stamped in Basic Gray archival ink onto cold press watercolor paper.  I colored the image in layers starting with Sweet Sugarplum, adding a few layers of color to rich the intensity I liked.  Fresh Fig was washed on to shade the flower and add dimension.  I washed the center of the flower with Crushed Curry with some drops of Cajun Craze.  I wanted to mimic the color of the leaves in the inspiration photo as well as my stamped ones, so I colored these with a blend of Old Olive, Crushed Curry and just a hint of Cajun Craze.  The whole image was actually stamped twice--once to provide the base with leaves and the second to cut out and pop up just the flower.  I added some looped copper thread and a bitty die-cut stem in copper foil paper from the Flourish thinlits.
By this time, I was running out of light to snap a pic of my card so the inside was a quick 1, 2, 3 stamp job using a sentiment from Thoughtful Branches in Fresh Fig, the Birthday Blooms flower in Crushed Curry and some [retired] Gorgeous Grunge splatters in Sahara Sand ink.  There were a TON of stamp set and dies on my desk by the time I finished this card, lol!  It took me awhile to get there but, in the end, I am pleased with the colors and final result.  I hope you are too!

Here's the awesome Global Design Project sketch--thanks for the inspiration GDP!
Please go check out the rest of the lovely autumnal inspiration from my teammies at The Paper Players.  Maybe you'll be inspired to play along with us before the challenge closes on Friday, October 6th at Noon (PST).  Thanks for stopping by!

The Paper Players Design Team 

Sunday, October 16, 2016

Woodgrain Flourishing Leaves PP317

So, I have a thing about leaves...the colors, the textures, the patterns, the amazing symmetry of nature.  This week I am hostess at The Paper Players and we are celebrating Leaves with a Clean-and-Simple challenge:
It seems as though Clean-and-Simple is all I've got time for lately so this challenge was perfect for another busy week.  Here's my creation:
The hardest part about making this card was deciding the colors and the spacing of the squares!  The card is small notecard sized--just 3.5" x  5"--so the squares needed to be proportional.  I used the 1.25" square punch to pop out squares of Island Indigo, Cajun Craze, Crushed Curry and Always Artichoke.  When I ran them through the Big Shot with the Woodgrain embossing folder, I laid them out as I wanted them on the card.  This allowed the embossed lines to continue seamlessly across the 4 panels.  The leaf stem was cut from Copper Foil paper with a Flourish Thinlit and some Copper Thread wound behind it.  The only stamping is the Early Espresso sentiment from the coordinating Flourishing Phrases stamp set.

I have a bit more stamping to show you, albeit not really clean-and-simple but does feature leaves:
You might remember the Halloween candles I shared with you in this post.  This time I made a fall version that I gave to a friend as a hostess gift for the SU party she booked with me.   I heat embossed some images from the Vintage Leaves set onto vellum cardstock using copper embossing powder and clear embossing powder with Cajun Craze, Old Olive and Rich Razzleberry inks.
Here's a view of the vellum before I wrapped it around the candle.  After all the leaves were stamped and embossed, I stamped the back with the [retired] Dictionary stamp in Crumb Cake.  I am really pleased with how it turned out and my hostess loved it!  I'll have to make a few more in other fall colors, starting to get a little addicted to making them!

So there you have it....two leaf projects...one clean-and-simple and the other, well...not!  Do go check out the inspiration from my friends on the design team at The Paper Players.  We hope you will join us before the challenge closes on Friday, October 21st at Non (PST).  Thanks for stopping by!

The Paper Players Design Team


Sunday, September 4, 2016

Grateful for Pumpkin Spice Season (PP311)

Happy Sunday everyone.  For my US friends, I hope you are enjoying the long Labor Day weekend.  We're still cleaning up around here from Hurrican Hermine that passed through north Florida early Friday morning.  Fortunately, no major damage for us and we all even got a day off from school and work--a Florida "snow day"!  Jaydee is our hostess-with-the-mostest this week at The Paper Players and she has a fun theme challenge for us:
So, I really wanted to make a shaped circle card--not something I do very often.  This being the start of September and the official beginning of Pumpkin Spice season, I wanted to make a shaped pumpkin card.  My first attempt ended looking more like an orange so I hope Jaydee doesn't mind that my card uses an enlongated circle....
OK, so it's actually an oval but what is an oval really?  Just a circle stretched out!  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.  I used my largest Oval Framelit to cut the pumpkin from Naturals Ivory [retired & hoarded] cardstock.  I cut another, smaller oval and popped it up with dimensionals.  I sponged all the edges with Sahara Sand ink to add shading and dimension.
The pumpkin stem was cut with the tree stump die from the Thoughtful Branches set.  The leaves were cut from Copper Foil paper and Always Artichoke cardstock with the leaf die from Flourish Thinlit dies.  The twine is some [retired] Baked Brown Sugar Thick Baker's Twine.  Lastly the sentiment is from the Acorny Thank You stamp set and punched out with the Washi Label punch.

I really like the way my pumpkin shaped card turned out.  Although, I must admit, I didn't finish the inside because I have no idea who I will send it to!  I'm going to wait for just the right moment.  

But don't wait to go check out the rest of my pals on the Paper Players design team.  I know they have lots of circular inspiration for you!  If you want to play along with our challenge, just remember that it closes on Friday, September 9 at Noon (PST).  Thanks for stopping by!
The Paper Players Design Team