I Have Missed You All

 Hello my sweet friends!  

I have missed you all. I have missed the friendships. I have missed the inspiration. I have missed the support. Make no mistake, I have been seeing everyone's beautiful creations around social media, and it has kept me in the loop.  I never really stope creating, but it was definitely on a low scale and mainly for Christmas and birthdays.  

The world's current events have left me with a lot of time that needs filled.  I have been working from home since the second week of March and I spent my spare time during the growing season, outside working in the yard.  When it turned cold I was desperately searching for something to take that space.  Enter me familiarizing myself again with the passion I once had for creating.

I am loving all of my new stamps, dies, and ink pads from Pink Fresh Studio.  This beautiful set is called the Daisy Wreath Layered Set. I played around yesterday with various color combos and this was the first one that made it into a full card creation.  I am absolutely addicted to this background stamp and I am sure you will be seeing it a lot.  

I look forward to reacquainting myself with you all again.  I can assure you that I am much better at posting on my Instagram regularly, than I am with blogging.  There you will see other bits of my life and passions, such as gardening and houseplants.  I have nearly 100 houseplants!!  

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather 

Framed Flowers

Hello and Happy Saturday.  I made this card for the PTI Make It Monday challenge and posted it on Instagram, a few days back.  Unfortunately I am just now getting a chance to post this on my blog.  I used an assortment of frame dies as well as stamps from Gran's Garden as well as Farmer's Market Florals from Papertrey Ink.  

I wish I had more time in my day to craft and post, but that never seems to happen.  I stay connected to the stamping community through Instagram and post regularly there.  If you'd like, you can follow me there.

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Quick Birthday Card

Hey!  It's Friday and we've had some snow flurries!  I am not ready for snow.  Heck, the trees just started turning for fall, now its snowing.  Ugh!  I do in home care for seniors during summer breaks and on Sunday's.  I have an elderly lady that I have been working with since last June, and her birthday was yesterday.  She loves her coffee, so I thought this was fitting.

I used all scraps for this card, expect for the die cut coffee cup and label.

I am entering this into the Seize the Birthday.

Have a great weekend!

Heather

Make it Monday

Hey there!  Told ya I had several cards to share.  This one was created for PTI's Make it Monday.  I have to admit, this didn't turn out like I had hoped.  Something I realized after making this is, that I do better with less restrictions on my creativity.  I like my cards best when I am creating for myself, or for an occasion, not a sketch or specific challenge.  When you are new to cardmaking you need these challenges to help you create.  It is the trial and error process that makes you learn your style and likes.  For me, I like the elements of this card separately and individually, but not how this ended up when put together.  

For the first time I tried the shadow effect for my sentiment.  I now see that it would have been better if I had not only moved it down, but over slightly as well.  The sweet butterfly background was stamped alternating each solid and open butterfly group pattern.  I stamped this background several months ago and it had been sitting in my basket, awaiting to be used.  I have to say that hands down, butterflies and flowers are my favorite and go to for stamps.

I am also not happy with the lighting for the photo of my card.  I did spend the money and buy a light tent, but it was absolutely not what I had hoped for.  Unfortunately I let it sit in my craft room closet too long to return it to Amazon.  I'm totally kicking myself in the butt!!  It looks much better IRL.  I may try and add a thin Melon Berry frame around the circle window.  I think that it needs it to ground the middle of the card.  Heck, I am way too hard on myself!  Story of my life.  Haha

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Humming Along Birthday

Hello and Happy Sunday!  This sweet little card will be added to my birthday stash that I'm working on  building up.  It never fails, when I need a birthday card at the last minute, I never have one on hand.  

The darling little Humming bird and flowers comes from the stamp set called  Humming Along from PTI.  PTI inks used: Kraft, Honey Nut, Spring Moss, Aqua Mist, and Mint Julip were used.  Cardstock: PTI White, Honey Nut, Black

This was based off the sketch at Freshly Made Sketches.

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Coworker's Birthday

Hello, and Happy Thursday!  I have a couple coworker birthdays this week and quickly whipped up these two cards.  The recipients are both males, so I kept them CAS.  I ordered the balloon bash cover plate with my last PTI order, but had not used it yet.   I sponged some TH Distress inks on white CS and spritzed some water on it, for the background behind the die cut panel.  

This card was quick and easy to make, just a one stamped layer.  The stamps and dies used are from My Favorite Things.

Both cards we created for the Seize the Birthday challenge with the "toppings" to be balloons.  

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Sending you Sunflowers and Sunshine

Good morning!  It's the beginning of September and the shorter days and cooler temps have me thinking of fall.  I adore this set Simple Sunflower stamp set from PTI.  I have used it countless times over the years, and it continues to be one of my favorites.  I was playing around with my Tim Holtz Distress markers with this set.  I colored the stamp and misted with water, which gave it this pretty washed out look.  I played around with different colors for the sunflowers trying to decide which one I was going to go with.  Well, I decided that I loved them all and made three different cards with varying color schemes.   

I am entering the top card in the Sisterhood of Crafters for the "anything goes" challenge.  

I used several PTI dies for each card, and some pretty foiled vellum accents.  The flowers were inked using Tim Holtz Distress markers, misted with water,  and stamped on Tim Holtz watercolor paper.

This one turned out to be my favorite.  I am also entering this one into the Seize the Birthday challenge.  

Thanks so much for stopping by,
Heather

Birthday Balloons

Happy Saturday!  I am back with a card to share that I created using some of my new PTI stamps and dies.  I layered this darling little tag and topped it off with a couple balloons.  I was going for a more CAS card as the recipient is a no frills kind of gal.  Even the colors were outside of my comfort zone.   

I am entering this into the Seize the Birthday "anything goes" challenge.

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Make A Wish

Hello, and happy Sunday!  I am back to share a cute little birthday card I made using some new PTI stamps that I ordered myself for my birthday.  I used the current, pretty color combo from Color Throwdown.  This Confetti Toss stamp set gave me a run for my money.  Figuring out how to stamp it so it looked random, was no easy chore.  I used PTI inks in Lilac Grace, Sweet Blush, and Aqua Mist.  

Color Throwdown

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather

Garden Party

Hello, and Happy Sunday!  It's few and far between that I blog.  I recently bought some PTI stamps and have been playing around, stamping various flower color combinations.  One of my new favorites is PTI's Garden Party by Dawn McVey.  You can always count on Dawn for beautiful stamp sets.  I used my new i Phone 7 Plus to take my photos, so we will see how well these look on my blog.  I didn't do any kind of touch ups or filters, these are just as they were taken.  Tell me what you think.


For my first card I played along with a sketch from Fusion Card Challenge.  I followed the sketch and somewhat used the color palette provided.

My last cad wasn't using any sketch, just something that I put together.

Thanks so much for stopping by,
Heather

Just A Few Cards

Hello and happy Sunday!  I wanted to pop in and share a few cards that I have made over the last couple weeks.  Creating and not having any kind of pressure as to what and when I blog has been nice.  I found that the creative process is a lot more enjoyable.

This first card is using MFT dies.  The retired butterfly die set from Mona Pendleton, aren't they adorable?!  The layers are cut using Wonky Stitched Rectangle die STAX.

This second card is using PTI Noted: Scalloped A2 die collection, and Brushed Blooms stamp set.

Finally, the third card is using the same Scalloped A2 die set as above, and the darling Graceful Greetings stamp set and coordinating dies.

Thanks so much for stopping by,
Heather

Floral Sketches

Good morning!  I told you I would be back.  I was home sick with a sinus infection, yesterday.  I went to the doctor and he prescribed me an antibiotic and steroids.  Let me tell you...I came home and cleaned for a couple hours then proceeded to sit down and craft for several hours.   I can't believe the energy I had within forty-five minutes of taking the steroids.  Then I was up half the night as well. Sigh

I played along with two different challenges with this card. A color challenge and an inspirational challenge.  Links and graphics are below.

I stamped the background in the back using PTI's Tin Types, the script was stamped using Background Basics: Text Type, and the stripe is from an MFT set that is no longer available.  Those pretty flowers from one of my favorite new floral sets from PTI called Floral Sketches. Various inks were used on the flowers and leaves.  I am building my ink pad collection at the moment.  The majority of my previous work was coloring with Copics, so I didn't need too many ink pads.

Here is the gorgeous graphic for the color challenge I participated in.

The Color Throwdown

And here is the pretty inspiration photo for the other challenge.

Inspired by All the Little Things

That's all I have today, but I have several other cards to post as well.  I'll be back soon! 

Thanks for stopping by,

Heather

Retro Sketches 136

Two posts in one week!  Can you believe it?  School was canceled today due to a water main break outside of the building, so I decided to head to my craft room and create.  I pulled out my MFT stamps, found a sketch and color combo that inspired me, and got busy.

 No patterned papers were used on this card.  The pink chevron pattern was stamped using a patterned stamp.

SUPPLIES USED:

LJD Bitty Banners	LLD Jumbo Mod Borders	Die-namics Happy Birthday	Die-namics Award Seal	Die-namics Stitched Circle STAX
Die-namics Triangle Screen	Die-namics Pierced Traditional Tag STAX	Heavyweight Cardstock Grape Jelly	Heavyweight Cardstock Grapesicle	Heavyweight Cardstock Bubblegum
Snow Cone Cardstock	Heavyweight Cardstock Sweet Tooth	Heavyweight Card Stock Berrylicious	Heavyweight Card Stock Sampler	Hemp Cord
Premium Dye Ink Pad Berrylicious	Premium Dye Ink Pad Bubblegum

InLinkz.com

I used the sketch at Retro Sketches.

Melissa always has the prettiest color palettes on her blog.  I love purple, almost as much as pink, but you can never find purple patterned papers. 

Thanks so much for stopping by,

Heather