Summer means many things to many different people. For me it means quite a few things, boating, vacation, and fresh local fruit. Having just received my stamp set with peaches from MayMay Made It I decided to CASE a card she showed when the stamps were released. What is more summery than fresh fruit? This is my version of what she did. I used Inktense pencils to colour it and deliberately left in the lines so it would look fuzzy as a peach would do. Using another of her stamp sets called Tiny Faces I added a face underneath the sentiment. I also added some bubble gems here and there hoping they look like drops of water. Although the local peaches aren’t in yet, they are certainly something we are looking forward to. Our season is slow as we’ve had much cooler weather than last year but hopefully the local ones will arrive soon. The strawberries are delicious so far, but I heard from the blueberry farm that his crop is not going to be ready until August. As well he wasn’t sure if he would have his normal crop quantity so we hope we can get our usual large order and freeze them for the winter months. Have a fun weekend and thanks for taking a look.

A while back a friend helped us out with our boat and I made this card to say thank you. At the time I didn’t post it although I always meant to, Yesterday I was going through some of my older photographs I came across it and realized that it fits the challenge at Colorful Options. I figured I may as well enter it into the challenge even though it was made some time ago.

The papers are all from my stash and the one with the anchors was a gift from a friend who purchased it at Michaels. The sail boat is a from a Hero Arts set and was stamped on to the die cut panel. The white frame is something that was left over after I had die cut the center piece and I thought it was good enough to frame the smaller layer allowing all the PP to show through. The sail of the boat has a bit of sparkle added but it looks kind of smeary (is that a word) in the photo. The die cut thank you is from an old Sizzix set of word dies. Thanks for taking a look and hope you are having a fun day.

One of my birthday gifts was an embossing folder by Open Studio (Memory Box) that was an under the sea scene. I embossed the white card stock and carefully added colour using Q’Tips. Then I added the layer to the dark blue card front. Once that was done I ran it through with the Memory Box reef die making the hole shape. I kept the fallout so I could use it on the fun fold section. In retrospect I should have done what Jen McGuire does and run it through the folder again as cutting flattens the embossing a bit. The inside of the card uses sets by Inspired by Stamping and the little sea horses are a die but I can’t remember which brand. They were cut from a background piece I had set aside after inking. I added a gem for the eye on one and a bit of sparkle to them as well. The little fish on the floating panel is from Newtons Nook and was coloured with gel and glitter pens. I added some pop of colour dots to this panel and some tiny bubble gems to the card front. I’m really happy with how this turned out and proud of myself for creating the fun fold after viewing a brief guide online. I measured it out myself and believe me that is a feat for someone who can’t make figures work and still has no clue on reading a ruler. I shall have to make an envelope for this card as it isn’t a standard size. It was a fun card to make and I hope you like it. Thanks for spending time with me today.

A sketch challenge and a new stamp set seemed destined to be partners so using my new (sale purchase) Hero Arts Bubble bath set I created my card. Starting with the stamping of the 3 images I then coloured them with a mix of gel pens and Inktense pencils adding small amount of Nuvo Crystal glaze to bubbles, water and bottles. While waiting for it all to dry I added the background paper to the card front. DSP all from StampinUp, and then I die cut the images using a scalloped circle set from Sizzix. I messed up the larger image, as paper slipped during cutting. I really didn’t want to start again so I used one of the smaller circles to cover up the poorly cut part and added a hand cut sentiment to the right to cover up the rest. Mental note to myself is to buy some oval dies as I don’t have any decent ones. As well I shall see if I can get the matching dies to this stamp set.

Some of my new supplies arrived yesterday and today so I decided to play with them. My hubby is pleased my Birthday gifts arrived and that I’m happy with them and I am pleased as well, but also because some sale purchases arrived and I now have new stuff to fool around with. I used a new Sissix Tim Holtz folder on the card front to give it texture and then I stamped the white layer with a new Woodware set Little Festive Branch for the garland and sentiment. Using red, blue glitter and gel pens as my main colours I coloured in the garland and hanging images. I wanted it to fit all three challenges and managed to make it work. Added the gingham bow at the top and went around the card edges with a black pen I then added it to the card front. I’m almost out of black CS and paper so doing it with a pen helps me to keep some handy until the order arrives. I chose to keep this card simple but have some ideas for the future using the same stamp that maybe more elaborate.

The challenge at Anything Goes embossing has a twist with wings and I chose to use a butterfly leftover from a previous project that used velvet paper in two colours of purple which I also embossed using a dot folder. The darker purple doesn’t show the dots on the photo unfortunately. The main panel used a folder from Spellbinders called Carved Tile. I had done it a while ago and wasn’t happy with the embossing at the time so it sat on my desk until I decided whether I wanted to use it. In the end I decided to swipe Mustard Seed and Fossilized Amber inks over it and decided it was not a disaster. I added some pops of colour dots in the debossed circles of the design. I backed the panel with a black piece and added the sentiment underneath the butterfly. Sentiment is from a new set just acquired from MayMay Made It called Tiny Faces and I used a sparkle pen over the words with a tiny gem for the dot on the i. The card turned out better than I expected and I’m quite pleased with it even though the embossing wasn’t quite as defined as I had wished.