A Year In Review....

As the year draws to a close, and our holidays come to an end, I  decided to take the time to pause and reflect upon my achievements and failures, the highs and lows of maintaining a blog,  the excitement of being part of challenges and the disappointment of losing some of  them, applying for Design Teams,  rejections, publications........

As I went through my blog, and my work over the months,..I decided to do a  top 15 cards of 2012.. a review of sorts, a list of favorites... just so  that I would have something to compare and look back  down the years!

Warning-Picture heavy 

To start at the top would be....

Thanks For All You Do

  Love the way this got translated from a book cover to a card.

 Tidings of comfort and joy 

Love the punch of red color against the faded grey house in the background

 Season's Greetings

  Love the  fairy tale house against the perfect blue sky!

 Zen Doodle

 This one I love because I was forced to learn something new-(Zentangle)- just because I was away from home and my craft supplies and all that was needed to doodle this beauty was a black fine tip pen!

 On Cloud 9

  My first time Guest designing for CAS-ual fridays..a huge honor!..I gave them  a card that says me all over it!

 Two Shall Become One

  A very popular card of mine, received a number of emails about the stamp set and the text on the leaves was the highlight of the card.

 The Magic Of Christmas
 
 A recent favorite..love the suede look !

 Peace . love. joy

  Lots of die cutting  and embossing ... a pretty involved card!

 Sending A Smile

 My very first attempt at digital stamps..not a huge fan of all the downloading and resizing, but went for it for a guest designing gig over at Do You Stack Up and was pretty pleased with my attempt.

 The Red Door

 My very first print publication..Simply Handmade -Holidays 2012..was I thrilled!!

I often Think Of You 

  A winner all the way!..love the layering of stamps here.

 Let's Chat

  Love the vertical  lines and the design in general.

 A Bird

 A Papertrey Ink blog hop inspired card..love the touch of green.

 Father

 Love this card for it's design, the die cut silhouette and the  circular sentiment .

 Simply The Best

One of my earliest attempts at using watercolors on a card but with a mixed media effect.

So well that's my top 15 for this year, I could have gone on with more, because every single card   is a  favorite, but to quote ....

"Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes.  Art is knowing which ones to keep. " ~Scott Adams


After much thought and review, I come to the conclusion that  creatively, 2012,  opened new vistas, brought me in contact with like minded people and made me create  beautiful pieces of art, I never  would have imagined I could .

 I start the New Year designing for Faber Castell, and hope to inspire  you all to create and just enjoy the process.

Thanks for all the support and the wonderful comments you all leave me...those are much appreciated.

"HAPPY NEW YEAR"
..See you in 2013!

A Year In Review....

Papertrey Ink December Blog Hop

Time again for a Papertrey Ink blog hop and this time around we have white on white!
,,,perfect for this time of the year!

 I used a burlap sack to cut out the couch for a touch of neutral and some silver glitter cardstock for the frames.

here is the inspiration pic...I was inspired by the framed look of the picture as a whole and also by the chair in the first pic.

 a close up of the burlap couch..

On the couch stamp set by PTI and Framed out die by PTI-i cut the frames and used the negative.

Also sharing with Simon Says Stamp challenge - anything goes

Off to hop now..thanks for stopping by.

Papertrey Ink December Blog Hop

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Hope everyone is enjoying their time with family and loved ones ....
....I got into my craft room this morning to make a  last minute card .....

 Sharing this card with CAS-ual fridays- Dashing through the holidays and 10 minute craft dash

...this card was done in 9 mins 47 secs..phew that was close!

stamps by PTI and Inkadinkado, used watercolors for coloring and a tiny bit of stickles.

Also sharing with Simon Says Stamp challenge.

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful holiday!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

2013 !

 Update- this card was chosen as Favorite over at 10 min craft dash!


Am back..!
..and thank you so much to all  those who sent me get well wishes...it was well appreciated!

  I am back today with a CAS card for CAS-ual Fridays-Dashing through the holidays challenge combined with 10 min craft dash. This weeks challenge was just what I needed , something quick and simple and done under 10 mins. I am still not up to sitting  for long and my cough has yet to say goodbye, which in turn is tiring me out!

So here it is .....

 This card took me 9 min 12 secs. The stamping itself took me  just 2 mins , the coloring took the rest. I used Copics, but stuck to some simple filling in of color, nothing fancy here!

The  sentiment and holly leaves are by The Crafts Meow and the number stamps are an old set of mine, and I seem to have lost the original cover.

Thanks for stopping by.

2013 !

Just A Note.....

If my regular readers are wondering if I vanished from the face of this earth......
..then no am here!
.....just been down with the flu. What started out as a simple throat irritation , ended up being Bronchitis with raging high temps over 103!  I have been totally flattened out, nothing of the kind I have seen all of these years.. after almost a week now , I have been able to sit up a bit today , and decided to write a short update.

 I should be back soon in full form by the end of this week!

Just A Note.....

Tying The Knot

A knotty card for CAS-ual Fridays #81.

 When I saw this challenge , I immediately remembered this  free downloadable card , I had bookmarked a while back , so I set out  to print it and give it a bit of my own touch..but it was not meant to be!
...... despite several attempts I just could not get it to print across the center of the card as in the sample..so well, I just trimmed the printed sentiment and went from there.

A bit of stickers and stamping and a knot tied using burlap twine.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tying The Knot

Every single day..

As promised in this post, am back with yet another chalkboard card!
I took a break from my holiday cards and made a wedding card instead .
 Sharing with Papertrey Ink MIM#94-detail Glitter technique

 A pretty involved card.. I shall try and give a fair idea of how I went about it...

               OUT FOR PUBLICATION

 To start with..
...... I die cut the silhouettes and frame from Simply Jane by PTI, then added some texture to both with different embossing folders,-argyle and damask , Also I cut the original frame in half and  inked it up so that the raised texture would stand out a bit. Die cut the leaf branch-Sizzix and cut it into smaller pieces. and finally added a touch of red with a punched heart  and  some gliitter

 Now for the sentiments, followed the same steps as in Betsy's tutorial...ie... stamp, emboss in white and stamp again in white, a bit off, to get that shadowy effect. The stamp above the frame is from Movers and Shakers-sentiments by PTI whch is pretty skinny , so I could curve it and stamp.

Drew a frame with a  Faber Castell white pastel pencil  and kept it loose , just as we would on a chalkboard!
 
Phew!..still with me?
Congrats..we are done!

Thanks so much for stopping by and leaving such wonderful feedback..appreciate it!

Every single day..

Happy Holidays!

Another one  for Papertrey Ink- MIM#94- detail glitter technique, 

..... I am reaching for my glitter more often than I though I would this holiday season!

..........am loving all the glittery goodness on my clothes, paper and scissors!!

An interactive card using PTI Door To Door die,

A tiny touch of glitter

Stamped and fussy cut the doors

an inside view...

Stamps By Papertrey Ink- Door to Door and Stylish Sentiments -Holiday, Die PTI- Door To Door

Thanks so much for stopping by.

Happy Holidays!

Chalkboard

I have finally got on the chalkboard  bandwagon!
....been wanting to give it a try like forever, but needed a Betsy tutorial to help me get going!
..yes... Betsy Veldman from Paper, Scissors and Superheroes has so very kindly shared a brilliant tutorial on her blog and I just had to give this technique a try.

Here is my take on the technique. in fact I made quite a few cards, but have not been able o photograph them, so for today it's just this one!

 Sharing with Papertrey Ink MIM#94-Detail Glitter Technique

and 10 min Craft Dash

 I have always wanted to time myself as I create and this challenge gave me that perfect opportunity!. I got this card done in 9 min 22 seconds. It was pretty straightforward  though, just a whole lot of stamping in white and some embossing. the red strip was a scrap piece that I had leftover from another project.A tiny bit of glitter on the tree and I was done.

All  sentiments are from PTI Stylish Sentiments-Holiday

 Image by TPC studios

 Glitter and embossing pdr by Martha Stewart.

I am loving the look of this card, will be back with more!

Thanks for stopping by.

Chalkboard

The Magic Of Christmas

Today's card is from my personal stash of holiday cards, this is the one I will be sending out this year for Christmas. I went for a more elegant looking card, with gold and silver embossing.

    Although this card looks pretty time consuming, in reality it took me just 8 mins to get it done !

I masked the sentiment area with a post it strip and stamped the snowflake ..removed masking, applied gold embossing powder.... stamped sentiment ...applied silver embossing powder and heat embossed both together. Also I generational stamped the background with a different snowflake stamp to give it some added interest. I love the way it ended up looking like suede!

sharing with Simon Says Stamp-Snowflakes

and Catered Crop- Gold /Silver

 And PDCC#160

 

 Gold , silver embossing pdr,- Martha Stewart, Stamps by Inkadinkado and TPC studio

 Sharing with the Moxie Fab World Tuesday Trigger- Shimmer and shine

love the silver and gold with the snowflakes  in the trigger pic!

Thanks for stopping by.

The Magic Of Christmas

Time Of Love and Cheer!

 A holiday card with some totally non traditional colors!

Inspired by RIC#25
I went with the bright orange in the inspiration picture..love that bold orange!
and added a touch of the blue from her headgear. The background in the picture looked like wet glossy embossing to me,  so  I embossed my  flowers using glossy black embossing powder by Martha Stewart

Also sharing with Papertrey Ink, MIM#94- Detail Glitter technique

 added a touch of  holiday glittery goodness to the branch!

 Sentiment by Papertrey Ink- Stylish Sentiments - Holiday

Bird and branch die by Memory Box

Thanks for stopping by and leaving such wonderful comments!

Time Of Love and Cheer!