Celebrate You, FMS280

It has been a little while since I've posted to my blog.  Life has just gotten in the way for awhile. But it was a good thing.  We had good friends stop and stay in their coach.  We spent a lot of time showing them the sights, and just visiting.   Any time left over I needed to recoup, I am far from where I would like to be with my energy and strength yet.

So, this week at FMS the sketch is so open to most anything. I had several ideas in my head, but this is something I haven't done in some time so I went with it as we do have the perfect stamp set for it.

When I first started stamping, way, way back in the dark ages, we used to make our own backgrounds, there was no (gasp) pattern paper.   I choose 2 leaves and one flower for my background, then looked over the colors until I found 3 I liked together.

Here is the sketch for this week:

The leaves have 2 stamps each, one for the base and one for the veins in the leaves. I used the same color for the veins, after I was done stamping all the elements. You could use a darker color, up to you, but I liked the subtle effect here.

I used a bit of black twine for some contrast and a stitched oval framelit for my sentiment.
There is a die set for this as well and I thought about cutting one of two pieces to layer under the sentiment piece, but it seemed busy enough to me.   I generally keep my on the simple side.

I hope you enjoyed, please check out all the cards, they are all wonderful.

Suite Sayings Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$21.00

Botanical Blooms Photopolymer Stamp Set

$17.00

Basic Black Solid Baker's Twine

$3.00

Stitched Shapes Framelits Dies

$30.00

Layering Ovals Framelits Dies

$35.00

Table by StampinBuddy. Try it FREE.

Stampin Up, PPA 319, They say it's your birthday

Color challenge week at the PPA this week.  Here are our colors:

I did use seveal products to get this one like I wanted it, but some are easy substitutions.
The main set is Grateful Bunch stamps and punch.  I stamped the leaves around the white piece, then just used my Aqua painter, picking up a bit of ink from the ink pad and lightly added in color without coloring in all the space and smearing the stamped image.

A bit of grunge was added, stamped in the butterfly and added the stamped and punched flowers. The DSP is from Blooms and Bliss and the ribbon from a new 3 pack in the holiday catalog.

The choice of colors this week comes from Peggy Noe, she does such lovely things on her blog, go check her out, she is our featured stamper this week.

Click on any image below to see the product in my store.  Thanks so much for stopping by.

Suite Sayings Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$21.00

Grateful Bunch Photopolymer Stamp Set

$21.00

Blooms & Bliss Designer Series Paper

$11.00

Timeless Textures Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$20.00

Ribbon 3/8" (1 Cm) Trio Pack

$11.00

Blossom Bunch Punch

$18.00

Table by StampinBuddy. Try it FREE.

Stampin Up, Pals Paper Arts challenge # 298, Smile

Wow, where did April go?  It seems like it just started and it's almost over, that is what happens to the wonderful not too hot and not too cold months here in AZ.

Todays challenge for PPA is a sketch challenge. I like for my cards to me meaningful to me. So, while it takes me a lot of time sometimes, I just have to find a way that works the sketch so that it makes sense to me.  The sentiment is from Suite sayings, and I really love this set, so many really good sentiments. This one is good for so many things, from a card for a loved one to maybe a card for a friend you care deeply about who might be going through a tough time.

That is what this one is for, I have a friend who lives a bit too far to see her very often and she has been going through a very tough time for over 2 yrs. I know that everytime I send a card it perks up her day and I can just picture her smile as she opens it.   She is a stamper who hasn't done much in those too years because of what is going on, so she does love the hand made cards.

My colors today are Rose Red, Blushing Bride, Whisper White and Crumb Cake.
Retiring products as of May 31st are, Love Blossoms DSP stack, It's my party enamal dots, and the 1/4" cotton ribbon, all of the colors are retiring, and the Floral Frames dies.  If there is anything here that you really want, I urge you to place an order really soon, most stuff is likely to be gone very quickly.

Our sketch today at PPA, is by Ginger Toivonen and here is what it looks like:

 Just click on the link above to check out what the rest of the team has done with this sketch.  And please feel free to join in.  Click on any product shown  below to be taken to my store.

Love Blossoms Designer Series Paper Stack

$8.00

Floral Frames Collection Framelits Dies

$27.00

Tags & Labels Framelits Dies

$27.00

Suite Sayings Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$21.00

It's My Party Enamel Dots

$4.00

Blushing Bride 1/4" Cotton Ribbon

$6.00

Pansy Punch

$16.00

Pearl Basic Jewels

$5.00

Table by StampinBuddy. Try it FREE.

Stampin Up, Pals Paper Arts Sketch challenge #288

I decided to do a chalk board effect on this card, but it's not showing up will. You can see just a little in the center of the sentiment.  I was afraid to go too much with it, but it did need a little more I think.

My sentiment today came from the Suite sayings set in the 2016 Occasions catalog.  You have until May 31 to purchase from this catalog, but only until March 31st to also get free goodies from the SAB catalog for every $50 you sepend in any other current catalog. 

I used the Pool Party glitter ribbon from the Holiday catalog (retired) over my strip of black.  And I used my dots embossing folder for a little more texture. 

I first stamped my sentiment with VersaMark ink, then embossed using Whisper White embossing powder. I cut that out using the 2" circle punch, added it to a slighter larger circle in Smoky Slate that was cut using the Circle framelit dies,  then I cut another scalloped circle with my 2 3/8's punch.  I cut that in half and put part on top and part on bottom for a little different look.

It's a pretty clean and simple card, and I like that it can be used for either male or female.  I seem to make most of my cards very  flowery, I need to do more masculine cards to have on hand.

Thanks for stopping by to see what I've been doing.   
If you would like to place an order, you'll find my store HERE. 

Click on the link on my right hand side bar to check out the rest of the cards and of course the team's cards.