Happy Halloween everyone!!!!!

I’ve been away for quite a while and to tell the truth I’ve been going into withdrawal from not creating any greeting cards, as that is my passion!!! I’ve been busy working on a project for Pazzles, as well as creating some files, but I can’t talk about them just yet. I’ve also been experimenting with some techniques as well!

Well, today I broke down and created a Christmas card using the Splitcoast Sketch Challenge (SC200) for my inspiration. I used some “faux metal” that I made and I really wanted to use some handmade paper that I had recently purchased at Hobby Lobby. I also used some gold spray paint to spray my base card gold! I will have to tell you this….this has been one of the most difficult cards to photograph!!!! I think I’ve taken like 50 plus shots and I’m still not happy with the one I’m posting here, as it really does not do justice to the beautiful colors and textures of this card….but here it is.

I’ve also taken a close-up of some of the “faux metal”.

Finished Card Size: A2/4.25"x5.5"

I just came across this while reading a newsletter and decided to share it with everyone!

Blessings in Stone

Two friends were walking through the desert. As the day wore on and they became hotter and wearier, they had an argument and one friend slapped the other one in the face.

The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, he wrote in the sand, Today my best friend slapped me in the face.

They kept on walking until they found an oasis, where they knelt beside a pond, eager for a long, cool drink. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning, but the friend saved him.

After he recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone, Today my best friend saved my life.

The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him, “After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write on a stone. Why?”

The other friend replied, “When someone hurts us we should write it in the sand where the winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it.”

Let’s learn to write our hurts in the sand and carve our blessings in stone!

Supplies

Papers: GA Pacific White CS (card base & square frames that are spray painted gold) & The Paper Studio “Handmade Paper Pack”
Stamps: Hero Arts & Plaid All Night Media “Winter Holiday” (sentiment)
Tools: Pazzles Inspiration, Range “Heat It”, Cuttlebug
Ink: Ranger “Queen’s Gold” & Old Town Crafts “Ultra Fine Silver”Accessories: Offray “Gold Metallic” Ribbon, Michaels Gold & Silver “Rhinestone Stickers”, Premium Brilliant Finish "25 Kt. Gold Spray Enamel"

Celebrate...................

This is the card that I made for yesterday's Splitcoast Stampers Technique Lovers Challenge called "Black Magic". For this technique you start with a dark cardstock and stamp your images with white or vanilla craft ink. I was not having very good luck...I think I need to purchase a reinker for my Moonlight White as it did not stamp very well and I wound up adding some "Detail White" embossing powder and using my heat gun and then I used my Prismacolor pencils and "Goo Gone" to color the cart. The rubber stamp of the "flower cart" is one that I purchased years ago from a stamp store that is no longer in business.....and I don't think that I've ever used it before!

I knew that I wanted to use some flowers in the cart and I decided to use a cutting file that was designed by Jennifer {aka/pokrplyrjn} at the Yahoo Pazzles Inspiration Group. I altered the file so that I could use my pen tool to make an inner line that I could emboss with gold embossing powder after the Pazzles cut all the flowers out for me! After they were cut out I used my Prismacolor pencil to color them and I used my embossing stylus to "sculpt" them. I punched some little yellow circles, dotted them with my brown Sharpie, "sculpted" the circles with my embossing stylus, glued them to the centers of my flowers and added "Crystal" Stickles to them. The leaves I used were some I had left over from another project. I used my Nestabilities large petite ovals. I used my Cuttlebug and my "Leafy Branch" embossing folder to emboss the blue metallic cardstock and then used my Scor-Pal for the embossed lines. I added the green ribbon flat bow and adhered the "faux" metal "Celebrate" sentiment, which I made some time back using a Studio G stamp. I want to add that because of the metallic elements on this card, it was rather difficult to get a really decent photo. Below is a close-up of the "faux" metal.


Finished Card Size: Custom/5.5"x5.5"

Stamps: Parked on Rubber (Flower Card), Studio G (sentiment)
Inks: "Queen's Gold" by Ranger & "Moonlight White" Brilliance
Accessories: Pazzles Inspiration, Cuttlebug, Nestabilities, Ranger "Heat It", Scor-Pal, Offray Ribbon