Hi Everyone. Happy Friday night.
I hope you are all geared up to kick off the New Year tomorrow!
I have a quick card for you tonight. As my regular blog readers may remember, I have been in a bit of a stamping/creating funk recently and couldn't really work out how to get out of my rut. I decided that trying techniques and doing something different might be the way to get my mojo flowing again. Well, I am not sure if my mojo is flowing yet, but I sure have had fun playing around with different techniques, techniques that I don't normally use – or new ones!
I decided to do the emboss resist technique for tonight's card. I love the Love and Care set and don't often use it. I needed a thank you card for my 2nd line manager. She sent a Christmas card with a Starbucks gift card. Now… there's a woman who knows what I need to get me going in the morning. The Christmas card was hand-written, too and I really appreciated that she had gone out and done this for all of us that I wanted to make a thank you card.
I used a piece of Whisper White card stock (you can use glossy paper if you want to make it easier for the resist piece), but I wanted a matt finish. I embossed various flowers from the Love & Care set around the piece of card stock and then heat embossed it with white embossing powder. All that was left to do was to use my inks to ink around the embossed images.
I knew that I needed a flower and played around with making a flower from my scallop circle punch, but then decided I would create a paper fold flower instead. I cheated and used my new die, but this is really easy to do with your Simply Scored board. I sponge daubed the edges of the flower with Pumpkin Pie ink and added some Dazzling Diamonds to the inside of the flower. The last step was to color a Basic Pearl and add a sentiment and mount my image onto Pumpkin Pie card stock.
Here's a closeup of the flower:
And here's the card
So, what do you think? It's so rare that I use Orange, but was desperate to get away from red and green and the colors of Christmas! I like the matte of the card stock against the shine of the embossed image much better than the glossy card stock. It takes a little longer to blend the colors on plain card stock, but there is something therapeutic about it! 🙂
On a personal note:
Lou and I had a very busy day yesterday. We were up early and drove the two hours to see the progress on our new home. They have framed the basement level and cleaned up the site. It really gave us a fabulous view of how things will look and the position of the house. The views from the basement are fabulous – right onto the wetlands. It was amazing to stand outside where the walkout patio is going to be and realize that this will be our view in a couple more months!
We then went and did a little window shopping up in Minneapolis and drove the two hours back. I download podcasts from iTunes for some of our favorite radio programs and a couple that we discovered from the BBC. History is a major passion of mine and I discovered that there is a program called History Extra. The podcasts are fabulous and incredibly varied in terms of content. It really does help the time go by very quickly on this 4 hour round trip.
We then went off to see yet ANOTHER movie. Yep…. we have officially seen more movies in this last week than we have in 3 years. It has been phenomenal. Last night we went off to see the Adventures of Tin Tin. It was a rollicking, good fun film that really took me back to my childhood.
Today, I managed to spend some time playing around with more techniques and making a couple more cards. It felt really, really good to get my hands inky again!
As always, thank you so much for spending time in my little area of the stamping blogosphere. Your visits – and your comments – are always much appreciated. I hope you Saturday is a wonderful day.
Warm hugs and prayers to those of you who need a little lift tonight.
Hugs
Jaydee
Supplies used – all Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted:
- Stamps: Love & Care (retired). Sentiment – Papertrey
- Card stock: Pumpkin Pie, Very Vanilla
- Inks: Early Espresso, Pumpkin Pie, Versamark
- Accessories: Dazzling Diamonds glitter; Basic Pearls
- Tools: Big Shot;Flower Die (Tim Holtz); Stampin' Dimensionals
9 Responses
I hope you will post some photos of the progress of your new home. Happy New Year to you!
What a beautiful card! I love the orange and am going to make a card using the orange today! Thanks for the inspiration. Say “hello” to Bilbo Baggins for me!
Hi Jaydee! Oh, what a pretty card! I like this stamp set with the emboss resist technique. I haven’t done that in years. I forget about it really and it is a shame as it is so lovely. I like your flower too, the perfect touch to finish the card.
Glad your movie was good. We got to see Mission Impossible and that was fabulous if you like action. My husband and I were trying to think of the last time we saw an adult movie and it was in 2010. lol.
Has Bilbo rested up from the little elf Buzbee’s visit? Or are they kicking in the New Year together? Hope you and Lou have a very wonderful New Year celebration!!
Lovely card that you have shared with us. Thank you!
Oh isn’t it exciting the closer it gets to the house bring finished. I sure hope that you all get a light winter, so they can stay on schedule with the finish date.
As for me, I have been relaxing a little and catching up on, well just things around the house. Now planning a party for tonight with some friends here. Wishing you a great, healthy, wonderful and HAPPY NEW YEAR!
This is just gorgeous! Love that color too. So pretty.
And…..a very special Happy New Year to you.
Lynn
I love the orange card and the flower is beautiful!! Have a Happy New year!
Happy New Year to both of you! May it contain health and happiness! Hugs from Ohio!!
Your card brought back memories of my childhood. There were 4 kids, Dad taught school and Mom had given up teaching to raise us.
In the 50’s we didn’t have much money but Mom always found something for us to do. I enjoyed taking a cardboard box with white paper in side, with a leaf or “Queen Anne’s Lace” (flower), placing a screen over the box, using an old toothbrush dipped in water and food coloring..brushing the screen. The watered foodcoloring would spray/splatter on the paper. Then when you removed the leaf or flower you had your design. Your card it truely lovely and I thank you for the memories!
May you and Lou, fur babies and Busbee have a Happy, Healthy and Safe 2012! God bless you.
You don’t do a lot with orange, and maybe you should do more–this is WONDERFUL! I was reading Ruth Ann’s comment, and remember doing something similar when I was little. I loved the feel and sound of rubbing that toothbrush over that screen. :o)
I’m insanely jealous of that movie watching you’ve been doing. :oP But, I’m grateful you and Lou have had the time to do so and be together. :o)
I have downloaded a couple of the History Extra podcasts (thanks for the tip) since I too am a history junkie. I’m really intrigued by the social side of history–how did those historical events impact the everyday lives of those living then?
I think you may have one more card I haven’t checked out yet so I’m off. :o)
Hugs!