Skipping Stones Sketch Challenge & Blog Hop!

Time for Skipping Stones' end-of-the-month blog hop - this is my last post as a guest designer, too.... it's been fun, but it's time to step aside and let some new guests and team members play. Huge thanks to Heather and the rest of the team for letting me hang out with you for these last 2 months! Enjoyed it!

If you just happened to be popping in on me today, and have a hankering to hop, you’ll want to go back and start at Skipping Stones Design so you don't miss a thing! If you arrived here from Alice's blog, you're on the right track. This is Maren Benedict's final sketch for Skipping Stones Sketch Tuesday! If you'd like to play along, link up your card over at the SSD blog. Remember to add keyword SSD035 if you are uploading to any online galleries. Here's my card:
These are stamps from the Friendly Fruit set, which came in my stack of packages last week. The set is full of stippled fruit designs and punny sayings to go along with them. I stamped the watermelon image in Rouge chalk ink, masked the first image and stamped again, then colored it in with Neopiko markers and Prismacolor pencils. Here's a closer look.
Want to win this set? You can - just fill in the form below and you'll be entered! I'll pick a random winner Friday at midnight EST (Sept. 3rd). The next stop on the hop is Jen's blog, Just Jingle! Thanks for hopping by!

housekeeping

Just wanted to mention that I replaced the Cbox over to the right... Cbox is a mini chat box where you can ask questions or leave glowing comments, and we can interact a bit. I had taken it off because of some spamming, but just discovered the control panel where those messages can be deleted and evil spam bots blocked.... so it's back. Use it, ok? :)

It's a busy blog week for me.... 3 hops in 3 days! Get ready...

Flower Soft & CPS

Guess I have some news to share.... I've been invited on as a guest designer for Flower Soft! I'm excited to be able to play with some of their products and to hang out with such an awesome team for a few months. Just so happens that Flower Soft is sponsoring this week's Card Positioning Systems challenge (#182)...... here is the sketch: I used a stamp from Art Impressions for my focal image, watercolored with Derwent watercolor pencils and a fillable brush. The sentiment is from Skipping Stones Design, and it has a companion sentiment inside... "From your '110 pound' friend!" Hilarious.
Don't know about you, but I cannot look at this little lady's face without cracking up! She has some fluffy Polar White Flower Soft hair - I actually applied a second layer of the Flower Soft there after the first layer dried for extra foof. This was my first time to use the Polar White and I was surprised at how different the texture is from the other solid colors. Love.
Here's another close-up angle so that you can see the Flower Soft on the birthday boy - his fluffy eyebrows and that little tuft of chest hair! (tee hee!)If you'd like to play along with the sketch challenge for a chance to win a prize from Flower Soft, remember to post a link over at the challenge post at Card Positioning Systems!

Birthday Tag

This was one of my CHA projects featuring newly released stamps from Impression Obsession. Since this was a Fall/Winter release, I imagine the gifts are *supposed* to be Christmas gifts... but I thought it would be fun to show their versatility by making them more birthday-ish. The gifts are colored with Neopiko markers... the tag is stamped and sponged around the edge using Versamagic chalk ink.

I was kind of amused earlier to read a post from someone contemplating the purchase of a tag die, and it was shaped like this... this type of tag is a simple rectangle with the corners cut off. Once you cut one corner off, you can use that triangular corner piece as a guide to cut the other side, lining up right angles. Can't really see how a die would be practical.......... but that's me!

Stamps I used:
Gifted Trio
Solid Tree Leaves Trio
If You are Grateful

I stamped leaves on the wrapping paper of the second gift, masking off one section at a time. This would be a great image for paper piecing as well.

The ribbons are just threaded through the hole, then tied around once to hold them together. That's it! Simple gift tag.

Hope you're having a great week - we've been passing around a stomach virus so that's sort of set the tone of my week, but other than that... heh... it's been a neat week - lots of opportunities for stretching and growth. Good things!

Skipping Stones Sketch Challenge

Here's this week's sketch from Skipping Stones Design......!I used another stamp from the soon-to-be-released set, Always Here. The image is stamped on book paper backed with cardstock for extra stability, and the wings were brushed with Ice Blue Shimmerz. I created a faux watercolor scene with chalk inks (Versamagic) on watercolor paper - the blue and green areas are sponged and spritzed; the grass is a stamp from smARTworks that I inked and misted before stamping. The sentiment comes from the Birthday Donuts set. I also used the script stamp from the Garden Stamp Kiss set - the Denim ink I used helps to break up the brightness of that blue panel.Pop on over to the SSD site to see what the rest of the team has created! There are incentives for joining us, too... but you can't win if you don't play along!

Have a great week!

Just be.

Took some time to play this morning... broke out some new stuff and found some challenges to get me going, too! Here was my color inspiration from the Color Throwdown blog (challenge #106):

Turns out this color combo fits with the Color Create Challenge this week (#51), too! Bonus. I used the Sweet Sunday Sketch for inspiration as well (challenge #81)...just flipped and squished a bit.

This is one of the new House Mouse designs available through Joanna Sheen (UK). I watercolored it with a combination of watercolor crayons, watercolor pencils, and reinkers mixed with Shimmerz. All the other stamps I used are from Impression Obsession. I stamped Cover-a-Card Screen in a light blue chalk ink, then stamped Cover-a-Card Roses and colored lightly with pastel and regular colored pencils. The edges are sponged with Sand ink. The text stamp can be found in a clear set called Life and Flowers.

I filled the flower center with Flower Soft, just for a touch of texture. This is Ivory Flower Soft dyed with a drop of Lemonade ink from Ranger.

OK! Better go do something productive.....

packages. love.

Crazy thing happened yesterday... I have been waiting for months for packages that were sent back in May and June - we'd checked at the post office quite a few times, and each time were told that nothing was there for us.

Yesterday our co-worker went to check for packages (they'd been getting the same answer too for months, and were waiting for school books)... and got chewed out for not picking up mail for the last 3 months! It's not his responsibility, so he was a little confused by this, but anyway, yesterday felt a bit like Christmas, because all those packages - some purchases, some sent in exchange for design work - all. arrived. yesterday. All 12 of them. Maybe it was more like my birthday than Christmas, because all of them were for me...! tee hee...

Anyway, to enable you, here are some happy customer plugs and links... :)

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Vintage seam binding from etsy seller Caramelos - lots of colors to choose from, and packaged in sweet little rolls....

Summer release stamps from Impression Obsession -sweet stuff, grunge backgrounds, solid stamps... Organza and satin ribbon from Ling's Moments - lots of gorgeous colors to choose from, super prices on bulk rolls, and the shipping was really reasonable. Great customer service and communication, too. Stuff from Inchie Arts for an upcoming blog hop - stay tuned!! New release stamps from smARTworks and Skipping Stones Design... Waterbrushes from Marker Supply - BrusH2O by Zig... excellent customer service here too!

Flower Soft... Kayak stamps (my designs - woo hoo!) from Heart & Soul Rubber Stamp Co....
A stamp I won from the House Mouse challenge blog...thank you Sue D.!New unmounted House Mouse stamps from Joanna Sheen - free international shipping, gorgeous products, and Joanna Sheen. What's not to love?

OK, I think that's a full tour! Thanks for letting me emote, and if you were enabled in the process, um... well, I know you'll be as pleased as I am with what shows up in your mailbox. Now for some time to play... hmmm......

Impression Obsession DT Challenge: Simple Stamping

Time for some simple stamping from the Impression Obsession team... we're taking a break from embellishments, and creating clean and simple cards that just show off beautiful stamps. Here's my card... there's something about this sweet, whimsical Teacup image by Leigh Hannan that I just love... I used a Flourish image to simulate steam, and added some swirls of my own with a pencil. I used 2 Cover-a-Card stamps to create my background panels - Dots (stamped several times in Sand ink on kraft paper), and Newsprint (stamped in Cocoa ink and sponged along the edges). I cut the small scalloped border with a Fiskars rotary trimmer. The sentiment is a partial stamp from the Sing Loudly set. I only wanted to use the words, so I inked them with a marker.

Remember you can enter these challenges too, using your Impression Obsession stamps! See the I.O. blog for all the details - you might even win a $25 gift certificate!! We'd love to have you join us. Be sure to check out the other designers' blogs for inspiration - their links are to the left!

Skipping Stones Sketch Challenge

It's time for another sketch from Skipping Stones Designs! Maren Benedict is our sketch artist for the month - here's her new sketch challenge for us this week:Clean and simple! Here's my take on it, using stamps that will be released soon! I love this flourished butterfly, which I stamped on a book page. The other elements were in my red scrap stash - I keep my paper scraps in heavy-duty page protectors, sorted by color. Remember you can win prizes if you play along with the Skipping Stones Sketch! Visit their site for more details.

Thanks for stopping by!

Ladies meeting

My turn came this past Sunday to host the church's ladies' meeting, and they asked me to teach a practical skill rather than teaching something from the Bible... so I showed them how to make 2 kinds of paper flowers (the roses I made for a wedding in May, some scrunchy flowers made from mini muffin papers), and some simple paper baskets - here are a couple of pictures, and you can see our projects in process! I think there were about 20 ladies altogether, from 2 different churches. Fun stuff... I always enjoy showing them things they can make with simple supplies that are available here.

Tuesday is Independence Day, and all the area ceremonies and games are going to be held at our campus... yesterday they came and erected a flagpole at the edge of our soccer field... anyway, should be a crazy but fun day. Hopefully safe and happy too - never know with so many people in one place, especially in our area! Hee hee... I'll see if I can avoid the karaoke... our family and our Australian coworkers almost had to sit up in front and judge all the parades and presentation of colors, but thankfully that plan was changed. Whew! Surely it would have been an honor, but still... from my perspective it seems a little odd to put the foreigners in that position on your own independence day. Just sayin'.

OK! I'll be back to check in tomorrow!

Roses and other plants

Thought I'd share this card today - it's sort of a modified gate fold card, with the opening slightly off-center. These are Impression Obsession stamps (Roses, Live Your Days) and the rose image is watercolored with Derwent pencils. I used Basic Grey paper on the card base - I wanted it so badly to match, but it didn't match *quite* so I used a pencil to add some peachy tones to the edge.Here's a view of the opening, and the inside...Wanted to show you one of my plants out front too - this rooty stalk thing I suppose would normally be underground, but it's outgrowing the pot - look at all the new little shoots on there! So cool to watch it grow. This seems to be some sort of spider plant - not exactly sure - but I love the color of it, plus it was a gift. Have a great week.......remember you have until Wednesday to enter the I.O./ Flower Soft blog hop drawings - don't miss out!

etsy orders

Just so you know, I have the opportunity to send mail home with new friends to be mailed Stateside at the end of this month...... this is one way you're able to save money on postage on orders from my etsy store, so if you're interested in ordering, take a look in the next week or so! I have stamps, cards, hang tags, and gift tags for sale right now, and I always tuck in a freebie as well!