Tuesday, May 26, 2009

one more re-purposed card for southern breezes challenge


this one was made by attaching many many pieces of tan masking tape to a piece of cardstock in a random fashion.......i remember doing that in the 70's with empty chianti bottles....

pouncing several inks right onto the masking tape...(mustard, red, green, brown)...

then inking the whole surface with versamark embossing ink and covering that with clear embossing powder....heated it placed it on a chocolate brown card base....

looks like leather and is very shiny.

the printed image is from a used notecard that i cut into thirds, popped the bird out and i think it makes a fine masculine card...those are tough for me.

no sentiment....will save that for whatever occasion comes up.

Monday, May 25, 2009

alaska, the "great land"




the pictures do not do justice to the scenery....but it is at least a glimpse into the beauty of the area.

glaciers are blue !! and the little chunks of ice near them are called bergie bits. good thing they dont run the movie Titanic while cruising !

the large mountain is Mt Edgcombe, an inactive volcano in Sitka

we were on the Holland America ship, Zaandam, it was small enough to be able to get into smaller ports and close to the glaciers in Glacier Bay.

everyone should see this beautiful place at least once.....unfortunately, pictures do not capture the majesty

Sunday, May 24, 2009

re-purpose challenge





now this one was easy for me. i have two to enter in this weeks challenge and maybe by the end of the week i will have another. (saw a new technique using wax paper...)

for this southern breezes challenge i needed to use something from around the house and give it a new purpose in life...


the first is made using a little snack baggie....i cut out 2 nestability labels for the base of the purse and made the handles using two oval nestabilities. the sentiment....CB embossing folder.....attached the sides of the purse to the baggie (cut down to fit)...makes a neat gift bag

the second is a pop top can....it is for my DD's birthday...inside are some nifty ribbons....i cut the bottom of the can off using a safe can opener....then i put ribbons inside and decorated the outside using my CB birthday embossing folder....glued the bottom back on to the can so the pop top still works ! she has seen this before, but anyone new to it is amazed. and it is sooooo easy to do !!

Sheila's challenge


finished unpacking and doing laundry...so i made time to complete Sheila's challenge. and what a challenge it was for me !

ingredients: 3 buttons, ribbon, NO STAMPS, flower soft or flocking and a sentiment.

well, this was really difficult for me......used my CB to make the flowers and leaves....sentiment from a small CB embossing folder on the flower pot....used the ribbon for flower stems and flower soft for the centers of the flowers....finally threw in the buttons on the lower right. whew !

Saturday, May 23, 2009

back from Alaska

we had a fabulous time on our Alaskan cruise aboard the Zaandam. we visited Juneua, Sitka, Ketchikan and Glacier Bay. WOW. what scenery. our weather was perfect, sunny skies for the most part...Juneau was our only cloudy day but we made up for it by seeing a ton (no pun) of whales.

we glided by two glaciers in Glacier Bay.....watched calving (ice falling from glacier....accompanied by what they call white thunder...a loud cracking noise) spotted many whales, dahll porpoises, seals, otters, eagles.....it truly is a majestic area. everyone should see it at least one time !!

have lots to do today as we got home around 1am last night....it was a long day on a cramped flight ! but at least we HAD flights....lots of folks were cancelled when we got to Atlanta last evening....so we consider ourselves very fortunate....the drive from airport only took 1 hour....! almost a record for us.

i will get back to making things soon.....and will post one or two majestic pix as soon as i download them and figure out which are the best respresentatives of Alaskan beauty. i fear that the pix wont do the area justice though !

it is nice to be home again.

Friday, May 15, 2009

arrived in Seattle

got here without major problmes....will board the Zaandam early this afternoon. the ship leaves port around 5pm Alaska bound. first day will be at sea....then we arrive in Juneau on sunday. hope to see some whales on our whale watch excursion there.

then we will visit Ketchican, Sitka, sail through Glacier Bay arriving at our last port, Victoria, BC on thursday. back in Seattle friday and off to the airport and home.

hope eveyone has a great week.....ahoy now, mateys !!

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

stuck on flower pot cards !



here's another...this is for a challenge on southerbreezes.com. the inspiration was from a tropical tablecloth, with lots of vibrants colors. we were to use that color scheme...i ran the flower pot thru a CB embossing folder to give it some texture....

Saturday, May 9, 2009

teensy wreath card


i used my nestie circle die and cut the hole in a that i attached to the card front after it was embellished........punched many flowers out of scraps and adhered them around the opening...popping some up. some of the flowers are cut from a top of a peanut container that i ran thru the CB with an embossing folder and colored with alcohol inks.

i water colored the background using brilliance inks and an aqua pen. in the opening i put a piece of acetate with names of flowers i ran thru my printer and then quickly embossed with clear embossing powder so they wouldnt smudge. stuck this to the back of the wreath and then mounted on the card front.

the whole card is only about 3 1/2 inches square....lot of work for a little card !

flower pot card



a flower pot card.....small but i think it packs a punch . made the flowers with my nestie flower die....found the directions on dawns site...a treasure trove of ideas

http://dawnsstampingthoughts.typepad.com/dawns_stampin_studio/2009/05/flower-pot-card-video-.html

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

recipe card challenge


well, now i know what a recipe card is ! i have seen the term and thought it was for cooking recipes. duh.

anyway, this is a challenge from southernbreezes.com.
ingredients include:
one button
one flower
three papers
one metal embellie
two stamps

sounded easy, but i find that i use way more buttons or flowers or brads or papers !!

this is a faux quilt technique. i made six 1.5 inch squares out of scraps from three papers and glued them to a piece of cardstock and then cut the shape with a nestability label die. edged it with a gold paint pen and stamped a crackle background stamp over it. the background paper (one of the three) was run through my CB script embossing folder and highlighted with white brilliance ink. the paper has writing on it and i thought this would be an interesting addition for the background

the flower is made from one of the papers cut with a nestability die, button in the middle and popped up

the SU stamp "sparkle" is on the faux ribbon made from a bit of one of the papers and a tiny butterfly brad was heated and dipped into EP and reheated to make it stand out. you have to look closely but it is on the right above the word sparkle.

i also edged the paper (one of the three mind you) with gold embossing powder to make it stand out a bit. another challenge, albeit self imposed, was using scraps....so i had to make do with the bits i had

whew! this was tougher than i thought it would be.....obviously i have a hard time making things simple

Friday, May 1, 2009

using something from around the house challenge


this was hard for me.....but i finally came up with something. wrapped aluminum foil around a piece of CS, ran it through my CB with the floral fantasy embossing folder. then inked it with alcohol inks. the strip of candles is another CB embossing folder....with some diamond dust in the flames for some zip