WOYWW #779

 Good morning, crafty friends!

Wednesday is making an appearance once again... as are the rain and storms. We're forecast for more this afternoon then I think we get a couple of days break before we're looking at rain every day next week. 

Before I forget, I'd love to ATC swap with you. Please send your email to KellyH (at) artlover (dot) com

Please do NOT use the contact for on the blog. I seldom check that LOL

I have two desks to show this week.

The actual desk:

Not super exciting. Just my art journal on top of my new mixed media mat I picked up at a church rummage sale last week. I've been tearing pages from it to work on various projects in the Art & Junk Journal on-line retreat this week. Today is the last day for the Free Pass but I bought the All Access so I have the All Access Pass Extravaganza yet tomorrow. 

Here's where I've been doing some of the work:

This is the ironing board platform at the end of my work table. I've been doing most of the wet stuff here. The bat at the bottom is actually a silicone baking/ pastry sheet I picked up at Menards (home improvement) for under $4!!!  I have tissue papers pulled to redo the collage class. I'm discovering I am just not a collage person  - at least not in an art journal standpoint but I'm going to give it one more go. 

That's it for my desk (and story) this week. Who's Miss Julia and why am I here?  When you are done visiting me in the Ozarks, please hop on over to Stamping Ground for all the details. Miss Julia has a long list of other studios you can peek into. No standing on an up-turned milk pail to look in the window. We open the doors wide and welcome you.  Please leave your number and you'll be among the first on my list.

 Creative Blessings!

~ Kelly

MAKE IT - MAIL IT MONDAY! - Catching Up On Cards

 Good morning, creative friends!

NOTE: I had this drafted to post February 26th but it never posted so I'm ahead of the game this week! LOL

I finally feel as if I'm back on track. You know, because we're almost through the first two months of the year!

My first goal was to get caught up on swap cards for the Missouri Stamp Group I belong to. I'm determined to stay on track this year. I was behind on December, January then this month so I have three cards to show you today.

All of the cards used the same technique: stenciling with my new 5x7 Geli plate. I don't remember who's video I first saw the idea but she was using her geli plate to HOLD her papers in place while she worked with them, NOT as a base for applying ink or paint. When I saw the video I immediately went in and ordered the 5x7 from Spectrum Art Creations. Keep in mind, I have a large one that hardly ever sees the light of day... twice, maybe, since I bought it almost 12 years ago. 

Click HERE to purchase

All three stencils were purchased from Spectrum Art Creations. If they are still available, I will link them beneath the photo.

All the sentiments were from Tim Holtz - Noteworthy

You will find the video where I showed how I applied the backgrounds to all three cards HERE.

I started with the December card:

I started with a Real Red card base and mat for the sentiment. I used Real Red ink and a stencil from Ciao Bella.  I thought the image resembled a poinsettia.

For the January card, I went with a winter theme.

This was also a Ciao Bella stencil called Fluid Art. I used Uncharted Mariner ink, Seas Side Spray cardstock (SU retired) and a dual punch from SU (also retired)

Now that I'm caught up, here is the February Card of the Month (COTM):

I used a Powder Pink card base (retired Stampin' Up!), Picked Strawberry Distress Ink and a floral stencil from Spectrum Art Creations (Their own design). The heart is from the dual heart punch set from Stampin' Up!

I have all of my posts and videos for the rest of this month and into March as I get back on a posting track. The second and fourth Tuesday of each month I'll be taking part in #tryittuesday. I have the video uploading now to show you a tag book I created for the Spectrum Art Creations and Friends FB group - winter themed challenge. I'll drop the video link in here tomorrow morning.

Creative Blessings!

~ Kelly

WOYWW #524

Good morning, everyone!

No time to play for a few more weeks. Too many things to do with the grandgirls.   This is my post for Stamping Ground this week.

I did want to take a moment and thank Angela aka Felix the Crafty Cat for her ATCs and little extras:

Scans of some of her matboards plus the ATC

Her matboards always inspire me and we share a love for Tim Holtz.

The ATC

Then yesterday I received this lovely surprise from Sandra de in Australia:

Sandra knows I've long admired her paintings and am blessed to have received this beautiful rose.

I also have an ATC from CARO but that seems to have vanished off the dining room table. As soon as I unearth it amongst the girls crafting supplies I'll show it off! 

that's it for me this week. Thank you for stopping by. I'll be back in full force August 1. In the mean time, I am trying to keep up my SU blog a couple of days a week so feel free to drop by there Tuesdays and Fridays. 

Creative Blessings!

Kelly 

Magazine Monday - Horse Frame

Welcome to Monday!
I'm just back from a 4-day writers conference in Eureka Springs AR. I look forward to this weekend every Oct. Unfortunately, Abby's birthday will almost always fall the same time and I won't get to go as often - breaking a 19-year attendance streak. But my Cupcake and Tootsie pop (Adrian) will always come first.

I spent part of World Cardmaking Day working on supplies from swap envelopes. I belong to a group on SCS. Each month we take a turn at sending out an envelope of goodies to everyone else on the list. We combine the components of the envelope with our own stash to see how many cards we can make. Sadly, I am WAYYYY behind (like 2 years worth!) of getting cards made. I decided to start with my most recent envelope and work my way backwards. Well, except Sept. envelope should have been from Amy and I couldn't find where I had put it when I carried it in from the mail box. All the other envelopes were filed where they were suppose to be so I started with August - from my friend Shell.

Shell and her daughter, Jaydin, are becoming quite adept at horse riding. Jaydin is a natural and loves horses. So Shell kept to a horse theme and sent us lots of goodies to play with. I came up with six cards from her envelope... one of which I'm showing off today.

Shell sent the twine, the brad (Spare Parts) and the green embossed background. I ran a piece of SU Chocolate Chip through my Paper Studios EB to mat the horse oval. I used Derwent WC pencils to color in the horse (Clear $ Stamps - Just Horsin' Around) . I think of it as a remembrance tribute to a faithful friend.

This card also applied to the SCS Sketch Challenge SC48

Magazine Monday

Bet you thought I'd be a no-show today, huh.

Well, we had unseasonably warm temperatures of 80 degrees in southcentral MO. I took the opportunity to get the storage shed straightened up, moved all 6 of the tubs of clothes Adrian has outgrown (each tub holds a different size from 12 mo. - 4T) to the shed as well as the Halloween decorations tub. Oh yeah, and a load of laundry on the line to beat dry in the gusty winds.

It was only after dark when I could sit down and make a card. I had one in que but then I remembered it's just like last week's card but with different papers so decided you needed something different.

Our SCS card kit swap group is still going strong. Sadly, as my freelance writing has picked up I've not had the time to play as much as I'd like. But when I began seeing what everyone was doing with this adorable scarecrow image by Whiff of Joy, I couldn't wait to play with him. My friend Maggie was this months packet person and she stuffed the envelope with all kinds of goodies. Check out her blog to see what a creative person she is!

I used my Derwent Watercolor pencils for the image and combined two of the papers Maggie provided. They are from the SU Autumn Vine DP collection. I added the paper twine, Jesse James corn stock button and the orange brads. To bring the stark white oval up a bit, I inked the edge with More Mustard.

I think this little scarecrow is just the cutest image!

Tomorrow I'll have a special Birthday card to share with you on Tea Pot Tuesday.

Creative Blessings!

Kelly

Teapot Tuesday!

Yep... I'm on the ball today.

This week's card destination is to a lady in Painsville OH (so appropriate at the moment) who has several foot surgeries and is unable to travel to Arizona to see her granddaughters. It sounds as if it is something she was doing on a regular basis until this whole foot thing started.

Sharon loves Purple and Hydrengias. I had plenty of purple on hand but the prettiest flower (other than my favorite Stipple Rose) I had to work with was this Iris I got from a recent image swap.

My inspiration came from artist AJ Otto's card in the Fall 2011 issue of Paper Creations Magazine (pg 55). AJ did a Halloween themed card but I really liked the layout. Where I've used the strip of DP, AJ had used some black scroll work tucked under the top left corner of her image mat. She also did not mat her sentiment and I added the pearls.

I used Lavender Lace as a base and matted the flower and sentiment with ValuCS deep purple. The sentiment is stamped in Lovely Lilac. Derwent Water color pencils were used to color the image and a white ribbon, pleated, softens the look.

I'm about done crafting for the next couple weeks. I have cards done up so that wherever I am, I hope to be able to upload and keep on track.

Creative Blessings

Kelly

Magazine Monday - Really!

Happy Monday Everyone – Oh wait… it’s Tuesday (and evening at that). Monday was just nuts! I’m still trying to get the garden situated and the heat lately has been crazy hot. We were 103 yesterday… didn’t drop below 100 before 9 p.m. Tired of this already.

Add to this I have a visiting teenager. I’ve not seen Kassie in two years so we have lots of catching up to do. Luckily she likes to craft with me – still at 14! I’m so proud of her. She got in late Thursday night and we’ve been on the constant go doing stuff since she got her. Which means Monday was my catch-up day for business. All I managed to accomplish toward today’s post was to cull the magazines for the card I wanted to do.

My inspiration for the card this week came from a swap I’m in. Our challenge is to create a card showing our favorite things. I love flowers. Not necessarily daisies, though they are very pretty. My favorite is actually roses or lavender. But I loved the stamp set I bought and thought it would fit perfectly.

I LOVE Crafts n Things magazine. I get so many cool ideas. This week’s card came from the April 2008 issue and has been changed very little. Tracy Sauer’s card is called Twinkling Daisy. She used linen background, stampng the harlequin image in the same place I did with Certainly Celery. For her main image, she used a single large daisy

flower stamped using Twinkling H2Os in white and yellow against a harlequin patterned paper (the pattern is shadowed on a black background then the white daisy stamped in the middle). She matted the image on Certainly Celery CS then on black CS. Where I used the Pear Pizazz Ribbon Seam Binding (SU spring mini 2011), she used a sheer green swiss dot. I replaced her black accent knot on the beaded safety pin with a snag of white to offset the white mat.

I chose So Saffron as my base, stamping the harlequin image from SU Background Sampler in Certainly Celery. The image is from Studio112, a $1 stamp line distributed by K & Co. It’s called Love Grows in my Garden. Rather than brads, I let Kassie add the light green Stickles in a diamond pattern – her idea – to mimic the diamond pattern in the harlequin design. Told you she was crafty!

I’m really happy the way this card turned out and I hope the recipients in the swap are too. What do you think?

Magazine Monday

Happy Tuesday, Everyone.

I hope everyone had a safe extended weekend and took time to remember the importance of the holiday.

For the final card from the Welcome Baby Swap I fell in love with a card by Julie Ebersole.

It’s “Welcome Little One” from May 2005 CardMaker Magazine.

Julie used a white CS base. She matted it with a pale yellow which she had cut a 1-3/8 window in the top left corner – for dimension.

I opted not to do a window. But I did want to keep it just as simple. I chose to center my image and added the embellishment to the sentiment.

I used Barely Banana, a misc. stripe DP, Tuxedo Black and Barely Banana inks. The baby stamp is a Dollar General stamp I’ve had for years and the Oh Baby is from Katie & Co. I accented with a flower punch and brads.

I think this makes the perfect 'baby' card to have on hand.

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday!

It's a Boy!

I also took the baby boy card for the BOY category of the Welcome Baby Swap from the 2005 StampIt!

Designer Bonnie Lotz did a beautiful card using a variety of materials and techniques. For the card base, she used a Navy blue matted with white CS. From the sketch below you’ll also see she used stitching, buttons and two different styles of ways to showcase the words WELCOME and BABY.

I took the design a bit simpler and utilized what I had on hand. I didn’t have a large enough handprint so I substituted the pair of foot prints from StampCraft. The letters are from EK Success. I used Bordering Blue CS with Bashful Blue ink. The blue DP is from a misc. slab.

The neat thing with doing swaps is you send out 4 alike and you get 4 different ones back, making for a nice ‘All Occasion’ set always on hand.

Next week – the Neutral card, using up the last of my Barely Banana CS.

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday - on Tuesday

Good morning friends.

I'm sorry I didn't get this posted yesterday. I spent the entire day in a funk. I thought it was because I'd gone back to bed at 5 a.m. and not gotten back up til 10. Going back to bed in the mornings will give me that 'drugged' feeling so I try not to do it. I found out later, it was probably had more to do with a soul visit from a dear friend.

A couple months ago I posted an eagle 'get well' card that I'd made for my friend, Wally Bailey. I've known Wally, his wife Sonja and their families (both immediate and extended) for over 20 years. Yesterday we all had to say goodbye to the husband, father, grandfather, our friend. It's a difficult time and my heart aches for them. The only thing I know to do from this distance is to offer up prayers of healing and to pour my feelings into my art.

We had been told on Friday it was about making Wally comfortable. So the first card I made yesterday morning was a sympathy card I knew I'd need. I just didn't realize how soon.

The card was inspired by the March Card Kit Swap Soni and I both belong to on Splitcoaststampers. The Kit Hostess for March 2011 was Dody and she sent a great envelope of things to play with. I came up with 7 cards mixing and matching Dody's items with my own images and paper scraps.

The design idea came from the April 2003 issue of Crafts n Things Magazine and artist Melanie Douthit. She is a talented freelance artist who morphed into using scrapbook supplies in her art. I hope you'll take a few moments to click on her name - linked to her blog.

Here is the sketch from the inspiration:

And here's what I came up with from Dody's kit. This is the only card of the seven I didn't add anything to except Wild Wasabi card stock to accent the yellow and the scalloped circle Dody included.

I'm going to miss Wally. All of us who knew him, will. But it seems appropriate the items to make this card came from within Soni's circle of card artists to send her comfort and love.

Magazine Monday! - On Tuesday

Yep... a day late and I apologize. I took off yesterday to make use of the WiFi connection in town so I could work a little quicker in getting caught up. Left the house with out the flash drive holding all of my pics.

So here we are today - Tuesday. I'm showcasing another one of the items I created for the Babies Are A Blessing swap on SplitcoastStampers This one comes from PaperKuts - Pure Girl 2003 Page 24. This was a special issue from PaperKuts that if you held it right side up on one side - it was all Girl pages half way through the book. Then turn it over/ flip it up and you had all Boy pages coming at you from the other direction. I fell in love with the Angel page for a single photo layout... something I don't normally do. I like to put lots of pictures on a page but this one just grabbed me.

Their ANGEL and live joyfully quotes came from Deja Views. Not having the items, I recreated them in my Print Shop Program.

I chose Marina Mist (current) and Blush Blossom (retired) SU CS/ DP for my color pallet. The vine paper in the middle is from my scrap drawer.
The 'a' was cut from Base Camp, the scalloped mat from Lacey Labels and the flowers from Recollections Boutique Fleur. The butterfly in the top of the ANGEL quote is a Martha Stewart image stamped in Marina Mist and given dimension with a Pop Dot. You can't see it well in the photo but to create the antenna, I dyed a 1.5" length of paper twine by coloring it with a black perma marker, bent it in half and secured with a glue dot.

I hope to do an Adrian page very soon to show you what this layout looks like with a photo of my ANGEL of a granddaughter.

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday!

This week I'm going to give you a peek at a swap I took part in over at SplitcoastStampers. The swap was entitled "Baby's Are A Blessing", inspired by the hostess who will become a grandma for the very first time on Feb. 11 of this year. She's so excited. They've just closed on a new home so she's in a decorating frenzy, she's going to be a grandma... her year is off to an awesome start!

Anyway, since I've not actually STARTED my grandtoddler's book yet, the swap seemed like the perfect fit for me. It was the largest swap I've ever taken part in, object wise. I normally stick to ATC's, Tags, Cards, Images - that kind of thing. But this one just called to me to play. There were three categories: Card Candy, 2 pg LO - components only (no background page) and a 1pg LO all inclusive.

For the Card Candy category I found the CUTEST project in ScrapbooksEtc - Baby 2007 on Page 29. It's 1.75 x 3 mats - one for each month of Baby's First Year. Great for doing an 8x8 album.

The items at the very bottom were bonus for the packs. But I love this set and can't wait to put them to use.