Welcome Die-Versions Friends!

Dear Die-Versions Fans,

In honor of National Scrapbook Day and Mother's Day we on the Die-Versions Design Team have come up with a fun Blog Hop and Card Challenge.  The Mother's Day Card Challenge will begin on May 5th and run thru May 11th and the winners will be announced on the Die-Versions Blog on May 15th. 

The Design Team will be picking 5 winners from the Mother's Day Card Challenge.  The theme for this Challenge is to make a Mother's Day Card.  To be eligible to be one of the 5 Lucky winners you have to comply with the following:

*  Your card must be newly created and PLEASE, no back linking

*  Please be a follower of the Die-Versions' blog along with the Design Team Members Blogs (listed below)

*  You need to leave a comment on the Die-Versions' blog and each of the Design Team Members blogs (listed below)

*  You must link your Mother's Day card with the inlinkz link on the Die-Versions' blog  

*  We would love it if you used a Die-Versions die in your card, but that is not mandatory!

I love the Whispers - Vase of Roses die, so for this card I die cut it twice, so that I would have green leafs and red flowers. I cut the red flowers and glued them over their green counterparts.   

I created my scalloped opening by die cutting the Whispers - Daisy Chain Scallop die from my background pattern paper.  The mom die cut comes from the Sweet Spot #1 Mom die.  

Here's a close up of the card:
   


For my second card I used the beautiful font called Magical to spell MOM and framed it with the lovely Daisy Frame.

Thank you for stopping bye. Your next hop should take you to Patti's blog.  The list of Design Team Members Blogs:

Anne

Archana

Emilia

Lisa

Lori

Mary (you are here)

Patti 

Have fun hopping and don't forget to leave a comment on the Die-Versions blog and the DV Design Team members listed above blogs!!  We look forward to seeing all your beautiful creations!!  

Happy National Scrapbook Day and have a wonderful Mother's Day!!

Inspired by Wendy

Hello crafty friends,

I have a layout for you today scrap-lifted inspired by Wendy Antenucci​'s "My Baby Girl" layout, which you can find here.   I used products I had on hand, so my layout doesn't have the same products her's does.   

My sewing machine is not working currently, so I ended up using a stitch die (Paper Smooches "Dots & Dashes") to get the look of stitches down my white hearts.

I feel my layout has a heavier feel to it than Wendy's, but I think it matches my darker photo. I love how it turned out and thank Wendy for the inspiration.

      

 

Tiddly Inks Design Team Submission

Hello crafty friends,

I'm so excited to show you the card I made for the April 2015 Tiddly Inks Design Team call.

I hope I make the team, because I love working with digital images probably more that physical stamped images.  For me the ability to print a digital stamp in whatever size I want/need is a very good things to quote Martha Stewart.  

I own several Tiddly Inks digital and physical stamped images, but for this design team call I wanted something a little different.  I tend to buy girl images, but I wanted to work with a boy images, so I went shopping and fell in love with the Mad About You - Madhatter image.

Using Adobe Photoshop Elements 7, I printed my Madhatter in several different sizes varying from 3" to 5 1/4".  This is what I LOVE about digital images friends.  I wanted him to have a big presence on my card, so I went with the largest image.

At this point, well honestly I knew the direction of my card when I went shopping. I had this idea of Yankee Doodle Dandy, so I tweaked my digital image to fit my theme. I gave him stripped pants and a stripped hat.

I used Copic markers to color him Red, White and Blue. I'm not an expert in Copic coloring and I struggle with whites. For this image I didn't apply color to the white areas. They are just the raw card stock white.

As a finishing touch, I covered his hat and jacket with clear Wink of Stella (so glad my photo captured some of the shine) and gave him a flag to hold.

I added dimensional tape behind him and set him aside to work on my card base. I cut out the zig zag (chevron) red, white and blue pattern paper with the largest of the Dotted Elements Die from Avery Elle. The pattern paper is from the Liby Bee Design 6x6 Destination pad. The other pieces of pattern paper were from my scraps pile. The little flag, fireworks and Happy 4th of July are all stamps from the Stampendous Perfectly Clear - Patriotic Pair set.

Once my card base was ready, attached my patriotic Madhatter digital image and added a few silver sequins.  I absolutely LOVE how the Mad About You - Madhatter turned out and I hope you do to.   Here's a close up...

Thank you for stopping bye my blog. Wish me luck in the design team call.  Until next time, take care.

My 1st Art Journal Page... EVER!

Hello crafty friends,

As I posted on facebook, I broke the seal on my new art journal.  It was a very scary, but highly rewarding thing.   I started w/an idea of what I wanted my first ever art journal page to be about, but ended up far from my original idea... LOL

I feel like I found a new crafty love.  Unlike scrapbooking or card making, art journaling will allow me to just create.  I don't have to worry about printing photos, or finding appropriate pattern paper, working within a set theme, like birthday.

So drum row please... here's my 1st Art Journal page:

If you ask me how I could start with the idea of rain drops keep falling on my head and end up with this, I wouldn't be able to tell you.  All I know is that this page just came together as I was working on it.  And honestly, declaring my love for art journaling on the first page in my book is somewhat fitting, don't you think?

Now, let me tell you some stuff that I found while making this.   Gesso, it's basically paint or paint primer.  It even smells like paint.  Gel Medium, is basically glue.  

I don't think you can even see it, but I started the page by using Gel Medium to glue a large piece of music and text tissue paper.  Remember I started w/a song in mind.  My application of the tissue paper wasn't the greatest, so I had areas that didn't get glued and areas that wrinkled.  I continued on thinking the Gesso would cover up my mistakes, but it didn't.   The areas not glued down lifted and I ended up peeling them away.  But even w/missing sections I kind of liked the look.  

Once the Gesso dried (with help from my heat gun).  I added color to my page w/gelatos, but since I only had four colors to work with my pallet was limited.   I started by coloring the top third of the page Acqua Dolce (a teal blue) and middle third Squid Ink (a dark gray).   I stopped, because I wasn't happy w/the colors.  I should have flip the color order, so I added some Squid Ink to the Acqua Dolce and vice verse.  I ended up w/an ugly gray color and I was NOT happy, but strangely I was not stressing out.  I took a baby wipe and tried to tone down the ugliness of the gray and something wonderful happen... the baby wipe clean the area I was trying to tone down.   Live and learn... LOVE IT!  So I went to town on the whole page and petty much took off all the ugly gray.

It was at this point that I decided to embrace my love of red.  It is one of my favorite colors, so why shouldn't my first art page not have red (lots of it) in/on it.  So I put my Blood Orange down and blended it w/my finger.  That felt really good, but I'll tell you a certain amount of muscles are needed... can I conciser this exercising?  I covered the bottom w/a light covering of Acqua Dolce.   I let things dry a bit while I went looking for stamps.

I stamped the flowers and the word quotes w/Archive black ink and it took a long time for them to dry, even having used a heat gun to help it.  While looking for stamps I found a "this is love" stencil and decided it was perfect for my title w/the insertion of "a new".  I used Distress black ink and marker for the title.

Next I sprayed the centers of the flowers with Dylussions Fresh Lime Ink Spray and using a Tim Holtz stencil the top of the page w/Postbox Red.  I let this dry while I punched out a few hearts.  I "glued" them down w/Gel Medium and even thou they are looking a little flat to me, I'm calling my first art journal page DONE!

      
Thank you for stopping bye and letting me share with you how my page came about.  I'm so excited to start my next page and let some of  the ideas running though my mind out.  Until next time take care.

Birthday Bunny

Hello crafty friends,

Spent the morning in my craft room doing some water coloring (a recent obsession for me) using distress inks.

Started with this cute Bebunni stamp called Hip Hip Hooray that I got last fall at the Scrapbook Expo and my stash of tiny Distress ink pads.

Ended with this.  Petty happy w/how it turned, but I can tell that the Memento black ink I used to stamp the bunny bleed a little.  Will have to try a different kind of ink next time.  

 

I haven't done a video in a long time, so I think I'll do a water coloring video next time. Thanks for stopping by, hope the rest of your Sunday is a good one.

Owl My Love

Hello crafty friends,

It's been a while since I posted anything on my blog.  It's taken me a while to get caught up after the holidays and to start creating just for me.   After dinner last night I went into my craft room and created these three love theme cards and since today is LOVE day, it's the perfect day to post them here.

My first card was super easy... no I really mean it this time :)  I used the Die-Version I LOVE YOU Corner Concept die, which I cut four times and arranged on my kraft card front.   This is my first top fold card.  I used a 8.5x11 sheet of kraft card stock, which I cut in half the long way and folded in half.  I added one of the cute owls from the Owl My Thanks stamp and die set, which I colored in green to match my card stock and popped up w/foam for a little dimension.  Super easy and super fast card.

My second card has a few more components, but just as easy to put together.  I used the other half of my 8.5x11 sheet of kraft card stock for my card base, once again making a top folding card.  I matted it w/a piece of pattern paper leaving a small kraft border.  Next I die cut the Die-Version Smile Sweet Frames, manually trimming off the smile for a clean look.   I also die cut the Die-Version Heart Pops Whispers balloons, which I tucked into the bottom of the frame.  I added the same little owl from the Owl My Thanks stamp and die set, this time colored in yellows and added some tiny hearts from the same Owl My Thanks stamp set.

My third card was a little more involved and I have to admit it's my favorite :)

I covered my card front with a distress blue pattern paper and die cut three hearts into the front though both layers of paper.  I used smallest and second smallest dies from the Little B Heart die set.  I love that these dies also have heart stitch dies in the set.

The last thing I added to the front of the card was the "Owl My Love" sentiment from the Owl My Thanks stamp set,

The next thing I did was lightly trace the heart openings w/a pencil to get placement from my owls on the inside of the card.  Are you ready to see the inside?  Drum roll please :)

I stamped all three of the owls from the Owl My Thanks stamp set and colored them all.  Next came the hard part... at least hard for me, because I have zero drawing skills and I wanted to draw some tree branches around the stamped owls.   If I was smart I would have done the inside stamping on a separate piece of paper, which I would attach to the inside, but NO... I didn't stop to think and just started drawing and you know what?  I think I did a pretty good job.  I LOVE how it turned out.  I didn't draw the leafs, they were from an old stamp set I had (sorry, have no idea of the brand).

The last thing I added to the inside of the card was the "Owl My Love" sentiment and a few of the hearts from the Owl My Thanks stamp set.

That's it.  Three cards in under three hours on a Friday evening... not bad.  Thank you for stopping bye to look at my cards.  I love comments and try to reply to all of them, so leave me a comment letting me know which card is your favorite.

Happy LOVE day crafty friends!

Happy New Year

Crafty friends,

I can't believe 2014 is coming to an end.  It's been a good year and I'm looking forward to making 2015 even better.  So with that in mind I created this spinner card to celebrate:

I'll be giving this card to my Sister-In-Law and Brother-In-Law along w/a cute New Year's Eve hostess gift :)

I started this card by die cutting the LIFE IS GOOD onto a piece of 5x6.5 black card stock.   Next I die cut two circles into the black card stock to house my Sun and Earth stamped and die cut elements. The Sun and Earth stamps are from Die-Versions' newly released Out Of This World Stamp Set and Out Of This World Die Set.  

I took my die cut black card stock element and lifted it off the card base with foam squares.  I took the middle black card stock ring that was create when I die cut the two circles and glued that directly onto the card base.  Next I took the center black card stock circle section and attached it to the card base on foam squares.  

I took my stamped and die cut Sun elements and attached it directly to the center black card stock circle section.  I took the stamped and die cut Earth element attached it to a penny and inserted it in-between the two lifted sections of black card stock.  The penny helps it spin and move within the channel.  

Next I die cut the GOOD TIMES in red glitter paper and inserted it behind my sentiment.  I added a foam square lifted die cut Star Cluster from the Out Of This World Stamp Set and Out Of This World Die Set.    Here's a close up of the spinning element:

I LOVE how this card turned out and I know my crafty Sister-In-Law will love it too.   Have a safe and fun New Year's Eve everyone.  See you next year :)