Floral Challenge Card

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's 11th Anniversary Floral Challenge. I started with a piece of white cardstock and used a tape runner to affix a piece of translucent vellum to the front. I stamped a few flowers from the Daydreamers set, as well as a sentiment from the same set, on the vellum. I used blue and purple inks, blended a bit on the stamps themselves to add interest.

Papertrey Ink Sketch Challenge

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's 11th Anniversary sketch challenge. The sketch I worked off of is this one by Dawn McVey:

I used regular white cardstock as the base and cut an oval out of a textured heavy weight cardstock. I then embossed it with a trellis design. I used a tape runner to attach the oval and then stamped leaves from the Daydreamer stamp set around 2 edges. I stamped some flowers from the same set and fussy cut them out, then used foam adhesive to attach them to the page. I used the Beautiful Butterfly die and cut out of four paper butterflies (vellum, medium shade purple, dark textured purple, and the same white as the oval). I stamped 'Birthday Wishes' from the Up, Up and Away set in purple on the second butterfly (thinking you would be able to easily see it through the vellum), then glued the layers together. Once they were dry I decided to stamp the sentiment again in a light purple ink on the vellum to help it stand out more. I also added some purple rhinestones before using foam tape to attach it.

 Here you can see a close-up of the butterfly layers:

Birthday in the Clouds

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's Make it Monday Challenge: Background Stamping with Sentiment Stamps.

I stamped "It's Your Day" from Think Big Favorites 2 on a white card base in blue ink. I didn't want the sentiment to be too overpowering, so I used a piece of blue tinted vellum as a sky overtop. I stamped one of the planes from the Fly Away mini set, along with the banner and sentiment and fussy cut them out. Just as I glued the plane to the vellum I realized I should have used pop dots to attach it. Ah well. I punched out clouds from white cardstock and thick vellum and glued those down as well. Finally I used glue under the clouds and airplane to attack the vellum panel to the card base. 

The vellum clouds are hard to see in the picture above, so here's a side detail.

Transformation Card

For their 10th Anniversary Papertrey Ink's set up a series of challenges, one of which is to transform a card you weren't happy with into one you are.

This is the original card using the Simply Jane stamp:

While I liked the Valentine's Day colours, I didn't like what elements I made each colour and the layout was not the best.

Here's my transformed card:

I made it an easel card. I die cut two frames in addition to the stamped frame. I also added some stamped flowers from the set (the bouquet) in light pink to the base cardstock. The easel is held open with a heart button.

Nail Polish Marbling Background

I made this card for 2 challenges, Papertrey Ink's Make it Monday nail polish marbling and Simon Says Stamps' making your own background.

I took a plastic container from a frozen item, washed it, and half filled it with water. I then added drops of nail polish on top and carefully put a piece of cardstock (2 white & 2 black) on it, marbling the cardstock. You have to be quick or the nail polish will start to harden (well, it created a film that didn't transfer properly anymore).

I found that some of my nail polishes worked great for this, spreading out or streaking, while others didn't want to drip into the container at all or sank to the bottom.

Here are the 4 panels I did:

For my card, I stamped a sentiment from the Daydreamers set by Papertrey Ink in black ink into the bottom right corner. It got lost in the nail polish, so I stamped it again on a piece of vellum and folded the vellum around the back of the card to attach it to the panel. I then mounted the panel onto a blue card.

Bookish Spinner Card

I made this card for the Papertrey Ink Make it Monday challenge to make a spinner card.

I used a light pink card base and a darker pink topper. I die cut a large circle out of both layers for the spinner to go. I stamped 2 images from All Booked Up on white cardstock (the woman reading in the photo below and the boy reading under the tree) in dark grey ink and die cut them out. I attached the 2 circles with the string between them. I then used double sided tape to attach the string to the light pink layer before putting the dark pink layer on top.

I stamped my sentiment, also from All Booked Up at the bottom of the card, the decided that the top panel looked too empty, so I used some stamps from the Daydreamers set to simulate a garden where the two people on the spinner are reading. At this point I realized my sentiment had smudged, and so die cut a label and stamped the sentiment onto that. I used double sided tape to attach the ribbon, and then put the label on top with pop dots. I also added 2 punched mini butterflies.

Pointillism card

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's Pointillism challenge.  Instead of using circles, I decided to use a small flower from the Simply Jane stamp set.  I started by using one of the beautiful butterflies dies to create a soft impression on the paper for a template (I put the paper on a foam sheet, then pressed on the die with my hand to create the outline).  I then used two purple inks with the small stamp to create the butterfly.  To add some details to the butterfly I took a dot stamp from the Foodie Fun set.

I stamped a stem ending from Daydreamers in green then used the small flower stamp to create a flower.  I was going to use the Daydreamers stem itself, but I thought that would be cheating, so I got the dot stamp and created a stem and leaves with it, and some grass at the bottom of the card.

The sentiment is from the Hello Sunshine set, stamped in the two shades of purple I used for the rest of the card.

Drips and Splatters Challenge

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's challenge on mastering drips and splatters for Stamp-a-faire.

I used a piece of watercolour paper and then did several techniques for splattering ink/watercolour paints on the page.  For the strips I put a piece of string (because I don't have wool) in ink and laid it on the paper.  I used different sized paint brushes for the other splatters.

The sentiment is from the Daydreamer stamp set and was stamped on a separate piece of watercolour paper, then attached with pop dots.  The whole card was mounted on dark purple cardstock.

Starry Night Challenge

Papertrey Ink is doing their Stamp-a-faire on painting masters, and I made this card for their Starry Night challenge.

I started with a piece of watercolour paper and inked it with a variety of colours (black, dark blue, medium blue, red, purple, and pink) using some make-up sponges.  I spritzed the paper with some glitter and water, then added some more ink with a paint brush.

I dried the paper with my heat gun then used black ink to paint on the horizon line.  I stamped some foreground greenery with stamps from the Daydreamer set, then did some not very good pine trees in the distance with a mix of a paint brush and the edge of a sponge.

I covered the black inked areas and then used some wet acrylic paint to spray on stars (I forgot to wash the black ink off my paintbrush so my first batch of 'stars' are a mix of black and silver) in silver and white.

The sentiment is from the Up, Up and Away set, stamped on black cardstock and heat embossed with glow in the dark embossing powder.  I decided to add some glow in the dark stars, and so dabbed the panel with my embossing pen before applying and heat setting the embossing powder.

I mounted the panel on black cardstock, and used a strip of foam tape to attach the sentiment.

 Here's the card in the dark (enhanced so you can see the effects better).

Papertrey Ink Alphabet Challenge

This is another card I made for Papertrey Ink's Anniversary. For this one they printed an alphabet of rules and you make a card using at least 3 letters of your first or last name.  I went with:

J - incorporate a few jewels or rhinestones
E - incorporate an emboss resist technique
SS - incorporate some stitching, real or faux
I - use an impression plate or do some sort of dry embossing
C - use at least 5 colors total
A - add a border

Well, 5 out of 6 ain't bad.

I stamped and heat embossed my sentiment and flowers (using Daydreamer + Simply Jane), then I used a white pen to add the frame and faux stitched border.  I dry embossed a second frame/border around the stitching.  I then rubbed a bit of white ink around the saying and flowers (resist technique) and added the turquoise jewels.  I mounted the panel on a piece of cardstock matching the jewels.

Papertrey Ink Sampler Square Challenge

I've made this card for the Papertrey Ink Anniversary challenge to:

Create a new card that features nine 1-1/2" squares, each altered in a different way. Mount them all onto a 5-1/2" x 5-1/2" square card base.

My squares feature the following techniques/media, from left to right, top to bottom.
1. heat embossed resist with watercolours
2. heat embossed resist with gelatos
3. faux stained glass technique with Copic markers on acetate
4. stamped clouds with ink coloured embossing paste
5. collage elements (Sorry, it's hard to see the world map under the clouds and plane due to the high contrast photography I had to use so the black squares were visible.)
6. overlapping ombre
7. perfect pearls (hard to see on the photo but brilliantly shiny in real life)
8. ink blowing (didn't work quite as well as I'd hoped)
9. white stamped on black cardstock, coloured with pencil crayons.

I also tried overlapping heat embossing, but the embossing colours I have didn't fit the overall scheme of the card, so I replaced that square with the embossing paste one.

The stamp sets I used are:
Up, Up, and Away
Fly Away
All Booked Up
World Map
Daydreamer

Blue Butterflies Card

I made this card for another Papertrey Ink challenge, to create a blue ombre effect.  For this card I tried something I've wanted to do for a while, make stamps out of die cuts.  I cut the four butterflies from the Beautiful Butterflies die collection out of craft foam.  Because the foam was thin, I decided to ink it up on my desk with some scrap paper underneath and use my fingers to apply the stamps rather than put them on a stamp block, which would likely have transferred ink from the edges onto my card.

Before I stamped the butterflies though, I inked my sentiment, from the Daydreamer stamp set, using white pigment ink and then heat embossed it with white embossing powder.

I used 4 shades of blue dye ink, starting with the lightest at the bottom.  To make the sentiment stand out a bit more I wiped a tiny bit of ink on a make up sponge over that part of the paper.

The foam stamps performed beautifully, making great impressions.  Indeed, the foam held the ink much better than I expected.

Birthday Airplane card

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's use an unused stamp challenge.  I can't believe I've never used my map background stamp, so I used several water based markers to ink it up (with some shading) and stamped it on a white cardbase.  I stamped their airplane and the happy birthday sentiment (again with markers) and fussy cut them out.  I attached the plane with pop dots.

The card seemed a bit plain, so I added score lines to make a frame and tied some thread through 3 small red buttons and hot glued them on.

Admire & Love You card

I made this card for the Papertrey Ink challenge to make a card inspired by the work of Maile Belles (one of their designers).  So I decided to case her "Wishing you a lovely birthday" card.  I liked that there was a space between the panels and started with that.

I started with a piece of pink cardstock and stamped the couple from the Papertrey Ink Simply Jane set in red ink.  I then used a paper trimmer to cut the straight line around shoulder height and fussy cut around their heads.  I trimmed the bottom so it would fit on my white card base and lined up a second piece of pink cardstock with the heads tucked under.  I stamped the frame in black ink, so it slightly overlapped on their feet but, with the heads covered, not their heads.  I then trimmed the top of the second piece so it would fit the card.

I stamped the sentiment, from the same set, on the bottom of the card in black ink.

I used a tape runner to stick the top piece on first, then the panel with the figures, with the heads stuck to the top piece.  For accent I added a few sequin hearts.

Rainbow Wishes

This card is for Papertrey Ink's 7th Anniversary Timed challenge.  You have 7 minutes to grab supplies and 17 to craft your card.

I started out by grabbing my supplies - and some extras just in case I wanted something extra I hadn't thought of when planning my card.  I stamped the sentiment on the bottom of my cardstock, then stamped the balloon on a separate piece.

I masked the bottom of the card and stamped some grass using a flourish piece and the bottom of the bouquet (turned upside down) from Simply Jane, and the tips of the grass from Daydreamer.

I stamped the left cloud, masked it and decided where to put the other cloud and masked that one too. Then I stamped the rainbow.  I was starting to panic about my timing and so grabbed the wrong red marker when colouring it (I should have used a lighter shade) and wasn't as careful about the lines as I'd have liked.

To finish off, I fussy cut the hot air balloon and used pop-dots to apply it to the card.

I considered adding another hot air balloon behind and to the right of the first, but looked at the time and decided I didn't have time for it.  Though, thinking about it now, had I stamped it on the card instead of cutting it out I would have...  Ah well.

The rainbow, clouds, sentiment and balloon are all from the Up, Up and Away set.

I made the card in 13:25.

Butterfly Window Screen Card

I made this card following the video for Papertrey Ink's Make It Monday challenge to make a window screen card.

I wanted to do something a little different, so I made my window using 4 wing tip to wing tip butterfly die cuts.  Since the butterfly design wasn't obvious, I used a different die from the same set (Beautiful Butterflies die collection) and alternated it upright and upside down several times to make the die cut panel in my patterned paper.

I stamped some flowers from the Daydreamer stamp set in complementary colours around the frame, cut my parchment screen and layered them.

At this point I realized I didn't have room for a sentiment and my frame was quite large, so I took two of the die cut butterflies I'd used to help space the frame cuts and glued them together.  I added a sentiment - also from Daydreamer - and glued the butterflies to the card.  I finished it off by adding 3 mini flowers.  They're officially for nail art, but I thought they'd word well as rhinestone substitutes.

Simply Jane Background Card

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's Make It Monday Challenge: Stamping Random Background Patterns.  I only used stamps from the Simply Jane set.

I started by stamping a light blue frame on blue cardstock.  I wanted the girls to show up a bit more, so I used a darker blue ink for them, masking the bottom of the frame so their skirts wouldn't go over it.

I die cut this piece out using a slightly too large Spellbinders oval.  I decided I wanted some contrast with the panel, so I inked the inner rim of the die and put the oval through again, getting a nice rim around my piece.

For the card back I used the same blue cardstock and light blue ink.  This time I used the bouquet stamp (minus the stems) and a small single flower image to do a random background.

The label is another Spellbinder's die with a Jane Austen quote in the dark blue ink.

To finish the card I added some self-adhesive rhinestones.

The Sky is the Limit

I made this card for Papertrey Ink's Make it Monday Challenge: Overlapping Ombre.  I recently bought a set of coordinating inks in a mix of turquoise and blues, and so pulled those out for this card.  I used 5 of the 6 colours in the set (the last one's more purple and so didn't go with the theme).  I used one of the hot air balloons and a sentiment from Papertrey Ink's Up, Up and Away.

Papertrey Ink Blog Hop: Tilted

I originally planned to do a biplane card for this challenge/hop, but I saw someone else do that, so I decided to come up with another idea.  Here it is:

I started out with a light blue card and a second piece of cardstock in a darker blue.  I scored the darker panel how I wanted to cut it (so I wouldn't need to add pencil lines, and I kind of like the bits of scored edge you can see on the panel pieces).  I cut the panels and then using the off piece in the centre, drew pencil lines where my stamping would have to go (I did the same thing for the sentiment).

The stamps are all from Papertrey Ink's Daydreamer's set.  I used black and grey ink for the dandelion heads, and a green Crayola marker for the stems and leaves.  The flying dandelion seeds were done with a fine tipped black marker.

I attached the panels with pop dots and voila.

Watercolour Stamping Plus Embossing

This card was made for the Papertrey Ink Make It Monday Challenge #109: Watercolour Stamping Plus Embossing.  The sample card was just gorgeous for this challenge, so I really wanted to try it.  My first attempt used the Hello Sunshine set and turned out great.  BUT, as I was heating the embossing powder I realized I'd just stamped the images, and didn't use any watercolour, making it ineligible for this challenge.  So I made the card below. :)  Look for the other card next week.

For this card I put a few drops of re-inker ink on a piece of acrylic (blue and green for the stems and grass, and then red, purple and blue for the flowers) and used that to ink my stamps instead of a stamp pad.  The ink soaks into the paper like watercolours.  Then you stamp a little to the side with versamark and add embossing powder.  I love that the flowers (from the PTI Day Dreamers set) inked en mass but only embossed the circles.  I like seeing the stamped colours underneath.  The sentiment is from the same set and inked in black.  In retrospect it might have looked better between the stems.  Ah well.  The panel was tape runnered to a piece of matching green cardstock.

For the butterfly, I die cut it out and then dipped it in the leftover inks.

 Here's a close-up of the embossed flower and butterfly.

I love how this turned out, so I'll probably do more of it in the future. :D