Autumn Leaves

One of the first signs of Autumn or  Fall is that the air gets crisper and soon the leaves turn colors and begin to fall. I think this time of the year is my favorite as it usually gets colder at night but then in the daytime warms up to a nice temperature where one can not be too hot or too cold. So on this soon to be Fall day I made a card to represent the Autumn leaves.

I stamped the leaves from Impression Obsession with a variety of Fall colors onto white vellum by using the Misti. I wanted to do Jennifer McGuire's technique of using a stylus on the vellum to outline the leaves and design but for some reason my stylus kept breaking through the vellum so I instead went to a white paint pen and added my white that way. I die cut the vellum panel out with a die from The Greetery and then placed it onto a peach card base.

I hid the broken areas in the vellum with the sentiment which was a freebie from Crafter's Companion and was already printed on white vellum. But before adding it to the card I layered it to some Cranberry card stock.  Next I stamped some of the leaves onto white card stock and then I fussy cut them and placed them here and there to cover up where I had added some Connect Glue to fasten the vellum layer. The last step was to add a bunch of brown rhinestones. I thought that dressed it up a bit more.

I am entering this in the Mod Squad Challenge which calls for Fall colors or elements.

Well, thanks for the visit everyone and for the nice comments. Have a great weekend.

God bless,
Verna

Cowboy Up!

I realized that most of the Get Well cards I had on hand were pretty much feminine styled so I decided to make one that was more masculine. I used the Gina K. Designs Wreath Builder Stencil template to make a scene using two different Gina K. Designs stamp sets, namely Out West and Out West 2 which are both designed by Theresa Momber.

It was a spur of the moment idea to make a card with a western theme and I think I like how it turned out. All the inks used were Gina K. Designs and I also added a bit of gray Prismacolor pencil to the horse shoes.

Well, guess this will be entered in the monthly challenge at Gina K. Designs. They are asking for masculine cards.

Thanks for visiting and I hope your Sunday was as productive as mine. Just so fun to stamp cards and especially so on a rainy day. Take care all and see you next time!

God bless,
Verna

Blinged Up Holly Card

This afternoon I worked on a card for the Double D Challenge-Pearls, Gems or Rhinestones and used a Christmas design. I also tried out some new inks for it.

The first thing I did was take a layered weight piece of white card stock and then with sponges added colors using the new Gina K. Designs Electro Pop Neon Inks. These are a collection that her daughter Rina has out now. The colors I used were Screamin' Green, Loud Lime and Blaring Blue. I just sort of blended them all together and in the process ended up with a varied green look. This panel was then ready for me to die cut using the Taylored Expressions Holly Cutting Plate. I then added that die cut cover to a white card base.

My next step was to stamp the sentiment from the Gina K. Designs A Very Merry Christmas set which has so many wonderful large sentiments. These sentiments can also be made into Christmas ornaments but I chose to use it just as it was. I then die cut it with a Gina K. Designs Small Double Stitched circle die and before I removed the die I sponged on a bit of red lightly around the sentiment. Now I placed this on the holly design.

Finally all that was left to do was place rhinestone gems here and there for the holly berries on the card. And, yes, it took a lot of gems but I do like the way it looks.

Thanks for stopping in and I always love to read your comments. Have a great day!

God bless,
Verna

August Rudolph Days

For my entry into the August Rudolph Days Challenge I chose to use the Stampendous Ice Skates Stencil for my focal design and then backed it over a die cut background using the Taylored Expressions Snowflake Cover Plate.

I used white pigment ink to stencil the design onto the royal blue card stock and it was then that I noticed it was almost a true match to the lighter blue card stock I had on hand. So I used that lighter blue as the card base and then added the white snowflake die cut design over the top before I placed the ice skates design over that. I will be using this as a winter holiday card but for now I am leaving the sentiment off of it so that I can use it for any of the winter holidays if needed.

Thanks for visiting and for the comments. I wish you a wonderful new week.

God bless,
Verna

Clean and Simple Thank You Cards

I needed a few more cards to thank my kids for all the help they gave me for our party so today I made up a few CAS cards using all Gina K. Designs Products except for the first flower arrangement one which was colored in with Prismacolor pencils without the use of any Gamsol. The other two were two step designs which I am not very good at.

I wanted to see how things would look by starting out with colored card stock. I think my favorite one is the Prismacolor pencil design. It looks like a no line image. I stamped the design in with yellow ink and then colored it in with the pencils.

Well, tomorrow is back to taking care of garden produce. It will be time to freeze the second half of the beets. The first half of the crop was made into pickles earlier in the week. And I think the bean crop will be starting in again soon. We are enjoying fresh cabbage as well as fresh cucumbers and onions. And the potato crop is looking good too and they taste so yummy. Nice clear skin and I mostly bake them now. So we are being blessed. The only issue is trying to harvest everything when it is so muddy from all the rains we have been getting this summer. But at least we are not flooded out like some are.

Well, take care and I hope you have a good weekend. Time is flying by and it is feeling more like Fall already here,

God bless,
Verna

Are You Ready For Some Football??

Yes, the season is upon us and all the football fans will be watching their favorite teams play whether it be in the national leagues, high school or college games. In that honor I created a football card and  as most of my family are Vikings fans my card is promoting them. I had to fussy cut my own horn for the helmet so please excuse the crude design.

The pattern paper I had in my stash is from years ago and it was bought at a clearance sale when a store went out of business so I have no idea who made it but it was perfect for a football card. I used the Cheery Lynn Designs Football Helmet die to make the focal image. As you can see it is a nice looking helmet and one could make it for any team but I chose to use mine as a Vikings helmet. I wish my purple had been a bit darker though but this was the best I could do with what I had on hand.

I am entering this in the Scrapy Land Challenge-Anything Goes #120 and Dies R Us Challenge #127-Sports.

Thanks for visiting. And I hope your week is going well.

God bless,
Verna

Hanging Ice Skates

With my Stampendous gift certificate I also added this ice skate stencil to my shopping cart. I thought it might come in handy for winter designs and it arrived just in time so that I could enter a card into the Dies R Us Challenge #127-Sports!

I used Eggplant card stock to stencil on the ice skates with Gina K. Designs White Pigment Ink using sponges and then I added Gina K. Designs Fine Detail White embossing powder and heat set it. Next I die cut the skates panel out with a Spellbinders A2 Distressed Edges die and placed it onto a lighter plum card stock base. The snowflakes were die cut from glitter paper using dies from the Spellbinders Create a Flake 3 set. Instead of layering them I used the flakes individually. The last step to the card was to die cut another distressed edges panel from white card stock and add that inside.

Nothing fancy but I still think those skates are a great design and look wonderful on my card. At least I had some fun!

Well, here we are at the beginning of another week and August is over half done. Time sure has a way of fleeting by. I hope your weekend was a good one and that you have a great new week too.

God bless,
Verna

It's A Jungle Out There

I recently won a gift certificate to Stampendous and with that I applied it towards some goodies and this darling stamp and die set which is just perfect for the jungle theme at Double D's Challenge this time. So this is the card I made with it.

I used my blending brushes to create a background using Gina K. Designs inks and then I stamped the trees and added the black card stock die cut panel over the top of that colored background. This panel was then layered to an ivory card base. Next I stamped the giraffe on ivory card stock and then colored it with my Copics. Using the dies that came with the set I cut out the giraffe and placed it over the top of the die cut scene area. Lastly I stamped the sentiment with black ink and then with a scissors cut around it and added that to the card. Voila! I have my jungle theme card complete.

Now on a personal note: We had a wonderful visit with all our kids and their families for several days following the early 50th anniversary open house we had in our remodeled room in the shed. We had a guest book and 98 signed in and I am sure a few slipped in without signing too. So many wonderful friends and family were there and we enjoyed it very much.  Being it was advertised as an open house we had no idea as to how many we could expect so we planned for 150.  We were glad we did so that we had plenty of food on hand to feed them. We used the leftovers then to feed our immediate family who stayed to visit longer. Since our son and his family don't come often from Japan to visit we tend to do this when he does come back to the US. The girls all take their vacations during that time. And since Joe could not come home in October when our anniversary really is he requested we do an early celebration.

Then both Arlin and I had doctor appointments for check ups after all left and then it took a long time for  us to recuperate from the late nights and early mornings involved during the visits. The family helped with meal planning so that was a big help. But I can tell you we sure had a lot of showers taken and towels to wash and I was afraid we would run out of hot water but we managed to keep ahead of it. Our son and his family stayed in a hotel so that was a few less using the water. It was easier for them as they had more of an adjustment with jet lag to contend with.

Well, right now our WiFi is out and for some reason the internet has not been too great either this summer. I believe it is the weather as it quits as soon as it rains or if it is too humid. So I ask you to forgive me if I did not always leave comments on your blog posts. Hopefully, we will finally get caught up around here. We have a new router ordered so I hope we can get WiFi up again soon.

You all have a great weekend now. Until next time God bless.
Hugs,
Verna

Bright Colors

Once again I made a card with some snippets and some pattern paper. I needed a card making fix before I started cleaning again. So I chose to make a birthday card as I can always use a lot of them. I am entering this in the Dies R Us #126 Challenge- Bright Colors.

I took a Dusty Rose card base and to that I added some Gina K. Designs pattern paper. I found I had previously die cut a lacey circle and also a plain circle and so I layered them together and placed them over the pattern paper. And, when rummaging through my snippets I found the Heart Flower die cut which I colored with Zig water color brush markers and then placed that over my circle backgrounds. The last step I did to the card was to add a sentiment at the top and also a thin strip of the pattern paper inside the card.

Dies  used:
Cheery Lynn Designs Circle die
Spellbinders Lacey Circles Die
Die-Namites Heart Flower Die

Thanks for visiting and for the lovely comments. I hope your day is a great one!

God bless,
Verna