More Punch Art Challenges!

This week on Paola's Punch Art card swap thread on Splitcoaststampers (http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/cards-f107/%2A-u-postal-yet-%2A-pleezz-check-punched-art-%2Adue-april-2-2012%2A-t545218.html) Melina challenged us to make a card using one punch 3 times.  In addition we needed to emboss our punched pieces either dry or wet embossing.  I love embossing so I decided to do both and here's my creation:

If you've known me long you know I love anything with butterflies so naturally when Melina challenged us to use one punch 3 times I knew I had to use one of my butterfly punches.  This one is from Martha Stewart.  The butterflies were punched out with Stampin' Up's Bermuda Bay paper which had been dry embossed with Cuttlebug Swiss Dots folder then rubbed with Versamark pad sprinkled with black embossing powder and heat set.  I felt the butterflies needed a little more definition so I punched more in black cardstock, trimmed and adhered to the embossed butterfly punches.  The butterflies were attached to the panel with designer papaer from Graphic 45...Love the colors and the butterflies on that paper!  When it came to choosing a focal image I couldn't resist using C.C. Designs Ima Butterfly.  I was so fortunate to win this cute image in a recent reveal of their Swiss Pixie's stamps for March.  You can see them here: http://www.allthatscraps.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=650_1412  I colored this adorable Ima Butterfly with Copic markers, enhanced her ribbon, wings and boots with Stickles.  The panel was cut with my Spellbinders Nestibilities Labels One, sponged with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in antique linen and edged with Copic Marker YR23. The Bermuda Bay panel was embossed with the CB Swiss Dots folder.

The layout for this card is from {FreshlyMade} sketch #28 (FMS28):

Another Punch Art Challenge Card

Every Tuesday someone participating in my friend Paola's Punch Art card swap on Splitcoaststampers (SCS) chooses a punch art theme challenge.  Since no one else stepped forward I decided since it was the first day of spring to challenge my fellow punch art enthusiasts to create a card featuring flowers created from punches.  Here is my creation:

Paper: The Paper Company Metallic Cover Kiwi, Bazzill  and Stampin' Up cardstocks
Designer Paper: Crate paper Neighborhood Collection
Ink: SU Cameo Coral, Momento Pear Tart, Copic Markers: R22, BG10
Stamps: SU Flower of the Month, Happy Birthday Frame
Punches: Martha Stewart, Fiskars, Marvy, Carl Carla Craft, McGill Craftivity
The sketch is this weeks Mojo Monday MOJO233:

This card is going to one of my dear friends who is celebrating her birthday this month. Hope she likes it!



One for the Money, Two for the Show....

Remember that old ditty?  For some strange reason it was running through my mind as I prepared to upload two new cards.  My first card is for today's Dueling Darling Challenge, "St. Patrick's Day"!  The Dueling Darlings are two teams, the Divas (my team) and the Dazzlers who create around a theme from a kit supplied by their team member.  Each month one team member from the Divas and one from the Dazzlers get together to choose a theme for their month.  From that theme they individually create a kit using stamped images/sentiments, paper and embellishments and mail to their team mates.  On the 15th of the month we reveal our creations.  Often there is an additional challenge.  Here is my card created from the fantastic kit sent by my teammate Barb:



 The Kit Contained:

Whipper Snapper Designs
4--Images—Irish Luck-stamped in Memento Black
4--Sentiment—Happy St. Patrick’s Day
it is stamped in Memento Black-2 & Cottage Ivy-1 and Stampin Up Garden Green-1

Patterned Paper:
Reminisce Lucky Me
--St. Patrick’s Day—clovers/swirls
--Lucky Stripe—stripes/clovers
--Micro clover—small clovers/stripes
Reminisce Shenanigans
--Shenanigans--Words and outline clovers

--Various Ribbons and Twine--White Buttons

--Shamrock and Leprechaun shoe Brads

--Various pearls, rhinestones and foam stickers

I LOVED all those papers and had a hard time choosing which to use so I cut strips, layed them diagonally along withe the green ribbon on a card stock panel then zigzag stitched each panel and around the edges of the panel.  This darling leprechaun image was colored with Copic Markers, die cut with Spellbinders' Nestabilities Labels Eleven and enhanced with a shamrock brad, rhinestone and shiny green adhesive embellishments.  The final touch was those sparkly green foam shamrocks in opposite corners.

And in addition to creating your card, Michelle and Barb  requested us when we post our cards to "please tell  if you have a tradition relating to St. Patrick’s Day. Do you crave a type of Irish food? Do you prepare something special or go out to a certain place to eat that day. Do you have any special memories of that holiday from the past that you want to share?"  I'm married to a man with the name Patrick McMullen. So what do you think?  Of course, we celebrate St. Paddy's day usually with him preparing Corned Beef and Cabbage.  This year we're delaying the celebration by one day.  We belong to a Gourmet Club and it so happens this month the dinner in falling on the 17th and our hosts have decided the theme should be Vietnamese food.  Go figure!

Please visit the rest of the Diva team here:
Kelly: http://sandcastlestamper.blogspot.com/
Carol: http://lostinmycraftroom.blogspot.com/
Barb:  http://inkingintoretirement.blogspot.com/
Jamie: http://butterflystamper71.blogspot.com/
Joan:  http://msearlgrey.wordpress.com/
LJ:  http://buckygirl.blogspot.com/
Tami:  http://blueinksdesign.blogspot.com/

And also visit the Dazzlers starting with their leader Jeanette here: http://creativeplayischeaperthantherapy.blogspot.com

My second card of the day is for a challenge on my friend Paola's Punch Art swap thread on SCS (http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/cards-f107/pleezz-check-%2A-swaps-due-soon-punched-art-%2Adue-april-2-2012%2A-t545218.html).  Each week one of the participants in the swap chooses a challenge using punches.  Here is this week's challenge from Rosie in her own words: 

"Use DP for the background of your card, sounds easy right. Ok here is the twist, you must use a solid color paper on the top, make a frame using punches.

You will be layering the card with DP and then place your punched solid color over the top to see the DP through your punched frame.

You may decorate how ever you would like......after the first steps are done"

Here's is my card (sorry the lighting was so dim!):

Several months ago I received a surprise package in the mail from my dear and generous niece.  Inside was a treasure trove of Martha Stewart punches, all with a snowflake image.  So may punched panel was made with the punch anywhere large snowflake and the "punch around the corner" snowflake corner and border punches.  The background paper is a freebie digi paper from Lauren Meader's My Time Made Easy store.  I used some blue grosgrain ribbon from Michael's.  I stamped the "peace" sentiment in SU's Bashful Blue and used Bashful Blue cardstock for the base of the card.  I think this card also qualifies for this week's Clean And Simple (CAS) challenge on Splitcoaststampers (SCS): White with Shades of Blue.

I would love to know what you think.  Wishing you many blessings and Hugs!

Punch Art Challenge, Week Two

My friend Paola is hosting a Punch Art card swap on SCS.  For those participating and friends she decided to add a special weekly challenge using punches.  Each week one of the swap participants presents a challenge and this week my paper punching pal April has challenged us to create a card using non-border punches to create a border.  Almost immediately I thought of using a punch  I rarely use to create a border of four leaf clovers on a card celebrating St. Patrick's Day and here is my card:

The designer paper is from Best Creations, St. Patrick, Base and layering paper is from Stampin' Up, four leaf clover was punched from Bazzill cardstock as where the scalloped hearts that create the shamrock embellishment.  The smaller hearts on the shamrock are from some scrap d.p.  I added a button with lime twist twine from My Mind's Eye and a trailing ribbon stem.  The "Happy St. Patricks Day was cut from SU cardstock on my Cricut.  The used this week's MOJO Monday sketch 230 here:
 

Paper Punch Art Challenge

My friend Paola is currently hosting a swap featuring punch art cards on Splitcoaststampers.  She is now having a weekly challenge Tuesday through Thursday for those taking part in the swap and friends that features punch art cards.  This week the challenge is to make a punch art card using the negative space left by the punch.   I used a butterfly punch along the lower border, a Martha Steward Punch Around The Page butterfly punches for the gold panel and a single Martha Stewart punch on one side of the the panel.  The panel has an overlay of vellum with the sentiment stamped on it fastened with a butterfly brad and a yellow rhinestone brad.  A little black and gold fringed ribbon is wrapped around the bottom of the black panel that is mounted on the gold metallic cardstock.  To find out more about this swap check out this link:
http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/cards-f107/new-punched-art-swap-%2Adue-april-2-2012%2A-t545218.html

Dueling Darling's "Let Me Call You Sweetheart"

It's the 15th of the month and time for another duel between the Divas and the Dazzlers.  This month Diva Carol and Dazzler Debbie, aka Lildj, chose the theme "Let Me Call You Sweetheart" and isn't that appropriate for the month of February.  I'm part of team Divas and was awestruck with the beautiful kit I received from Carol.  Carol was afraid she didn't sent enough embellishments.  So not true!  I have enough left over after making this card to create more cards.  The only item on my card that wasn't in the kit is the base cardstock and the metallic silver die cut framing the image.  

I've been a little under the weather for over 3 weeks now.  Either dealing with a severe cold and sinus infection or having to have oral surgery last week for an infection.  I'm still in recovery mode and have to admit I'm not operating at full capacity so my card is a little late in getting posted and is rather simple in style. Without further fanfare here it is:

This darling image is from Mo Manning called "Young Love" and isn't it sweet?!  So perfect for the the theme!  It's colored with Copic markers and die cut with the Blossom Nestabilities and framed with a metallic silver die cut trimmed with pearls.  The beautiful heart embossed background paper is called Sweet Cakes from the Doodlebug's Heart to Heart collection.  I used one of the gorgeous ribbons in the kit to create a bow, attach it to a glittery silver punched heart and added one of the very pretty pink ribbon flowers in the kit.  Below the image I created a panel with the satin fuchsia ribbon placed behind the fantastic sheer heart ribbon.  I attached one of the small glittery silver punched hearts to the middle heart of the ribbon and trimmed the remaining four with the bright pink heart shaped rhinestones.  Well, that's it. What do you think?

 Please visit the rest of the Diva team here:
Kelly: http://sandcastlestamper.blogspot.com/
Carol: http://lostinmycraftroom.blogspot.com/
Barb:  http://inkingintoretirement.blogspot.com/
Jamie: http://butterflystamper71.blogspot.com/
Joan:  http://msearlgrey.wordpress.com/
LJ:  http://buckygirl.blogspot.com/
Tami:  http://blueinksdesign.blogspot.com/

And also visit the Dazzlers starting with their leader Jeanette here: http://creativeplayischeaperthantherapy.blogspot.com/

Below I have several cards I managed to make with a valentine theme:

This card was made using Card Patterns Sketch 152.  We R Memory Keepers makes this bright and fun heart designed designer paper. I used one side for the background and the reverse side for the strip beneath the oval layer.  Those hearts were the inspiration to stamp hearts in similar colors around the oval which was created using oval Nestability die and mounted on another scalloped oval Nestability die cut.  I used an SU punch to create the two hearts out of another d.p. and attached buttons trimmed with twine. The candy stripped twine wrapped around the heart strip has a tag attached that was stamped from a Clear Stamp.  Corners were punched with a scalloped corner punch:

This card was delivered to my next door neighbor who is originally from the South Pacific.  I've had the pleasure of watching her perform the hula and sing with her ukulele so I thought this adorable image for The Greeting Farm was really appropriate. It was colored with Copics, cut out and mounted on the card with dimensionals  Sorry I can't remember the name of this beautiful d.p. I thought the lacy heart in the design was appropriate for the day.  It's trimmed with some beautiful prima flowers with rhinestone brads and a heart punched strip layered with green and pinky-plum satin ribbon.

Hope you all had a lovely Valentine's Day. Mine was quiet except for the big excitement of a brief snow storm here in the AZ desert.  It isn't often we get snow let alone rain here so it's a big event when it happens.
Today we're back to blue skies and sunshine and just a bit cooler than normal temps.

Wishing you a blue skies and sunshine day wherever you are! Sending you HUGS AND KISSES!!

Butterflies and Belleek

It's been awhile since I've made a card for an SCS challenge.  I loved the "Try A New Technique" challenge posted today called "Inspired by Belleek Pottery".  The challenge is to create the look of this pottery by using the negative embossing technique.  We were challenged to emboss a piece of white or light colored cardstock with an embossing folder that has the front or top of the folder inked with a light colored ink.  I used ivory cardstock and Stampin' Up's River Rock with a Cuttlebug folder featuring butterflies.  Here's my card:

The embossed panel was matted on River Rock cardstock and attached to the card base of Blush Blossom cardstock.  The sentiment "Thinking of You", from Stampin' Up's Friend to Friend, was stamped in Blush Blossom, die cut with Nestabilities oval die and sponged with Blush Blossom.  The oval was attached to a tag of River Rock cardstock cut with Spellbinders Fancy Tags die.  To strips of eyelet bordered ivory satin ribbon I added prima flowers and butterflies cut with a Martha Stewart punch in shades of peachy pink cardstock.

It's my birthday today and I think this card suits me to a tee. I love butterflies and love this shades Peachy Pink!!