Purple Polychromos Flowers

Hi everyone!  I'm back with an Art Neko card to share with y'all today.  A friend hurt her back last week, so I popped this in the mail to send her a virtual hug.

I stamped this gorgeous framed flowers stamp from Art Neko (A408 Geishas and Framed Flowers sheet) with some gray ink onto white cardstock.  I wanted a softer look, and stamping it with gray ink instead of black is perfect.  The image was then colored with Polychromos pencils.  If you look closely, you may be able to see that I colored the background with a soft yellow pencil.  It's a nice little contrast to the purples.

Once I was finished with my coloring, I filled in the center of the flower on the left with some White Blizzard Glitter Drops from Nuvo.  I love that little glittery touch.  That makes this card perfect for this week's CAS413 challenge, which happens to be all about glitter.  Some Lilac twine wrapped around the top and tied into a bow is the final accent on this clean and simple card.

Check out the gorgeous images on this A408 Geishas and Framed Flowers sheet from Art Neko.  Those flowers are beautiful, and the geisha images are stunning.  I really like the sentiments and I'm looking forward to using them soon.

I hope you have a wonderful week!

CAS412 Icy Snowflake Day

For this week's CAS412 challenge, Lee wants us to use something that looks frozen.  It could be a stamp, a technique, glitter, or a color.  Since this is a CAS challenge (Clean And Simple), you can't get much simpler than this.  I sponged some blue ink on one corner of my white card base, and then I stamped the snowflakes and the sentiment with the same blue ink.  Some rhinestones were added to the centers of the snowflakes for that extra icy touch.

It was weird to use wood mounted stamps on this card!  LOL  Both of these stamps are old, old, old wood mounted stamps.  The sentiment is from Penny Black and the snowflakes are from Rubber Stampede.  I've been using my MISTI with all my clear and plain rubber stamps for a while now, and it was just strange to stamp with a wood mounted stamp.  I'm glad I can still remember how to use them!  ROFL!

Come play along in the CAS412 challenge this week!  We'd love to see what you create!

Trio of Hearts Valentine

Hi everyone!  I hope you had a wonderful weekend.  I'm sharing this sweet CAS Valentine card with y'all today.  I stamped this cute little heart from Art Neko's A405 Valentine and Love Stamps sheet with a sugarplum ink and cut it out with a square die.  I stamped this heart two more times so I could have three of them on my card.  Look inside those hearts.  They have tiny little hearts inside them!  How cute is that??  

I cut out three larger squares from white cardstock and adhered the hearts to the white layers with some foam tape.  I carefully arranged them in a row onto my card and glued them down.  Then I stamped the sentiment - from the same A405 Valentine and Love Stamps sheet - with sugarplum ink below the row of hearts.

This is a fun and easy card to make.  Just think about all the different color possibilities!  You could stamp in blue or green or even brown to make this a masculine card to give to your husband.  You could stamp with a fun purple or orange to give these to your kids.  You could even make each of the hearts a different color and make something really original!  :-)

Check out all the Valentine stamps in the Art Neko store.  I think you'll fall in love with their stamps just like I did!

Love You Always

Hi everyone!  Are you ready for some Valentine cards??  LOL  I have several Valentine cards ready, and I'm sharing this one with you today.  This one can actually be used as a Valentine card or an anniversary card.

I stamped this floral frame from Art Neko onto some white cardstock.  You can position the flowers on any side.  The most common way to use this frame is to have the flowers at the bottom, but I wanted to try something different, so I put the flowers on the left side.  I then stamped the sentiment inside the frame.  Both of these stamps are from the A405 Valentine and Love Stamps sheet from Art Neko.

I had some of this red and white polka dot paper in my Art Neko stash, and I thought it looked great as a background to this white frame.  This paper is actually part of a special bundle from Art Neko called Santa and Papers.  This bundle includes this paper, a fun snowman paper, and a Santa stamp.  I love being able to use things like Christmas paper on non-Christmas cards.  :-)

I cut out the floral frame and adhered it to the polka dot paper, but the flowers needed a little something extra for that "oomph."  So I added some red rhinestones to the centers and that really brought the flowers to life.

Are you inspired to work on your Valentine's cards??  Go shopping at Art Neko and enter in "Valentine" in the search box.  You'll see a ton of stamps and papers that will be perfect for your project!

CAS410 New Blue Hello

Happy New Year, everyone!!!!!!!  Did you have fun ringing in the new year?  I tried, but unfortunately, I fell asleep around 11pm.  LOL!

This week's CAS challenge is to show us your new stuff.  It could be a stamp, new sequins, new ribbon, whatever you bought recently and haven't used yet.  So for CAS410, I pulled out this new stamp set from Concord and 9th called Hello Lovely.  I bought it during a fabulous Christmas sale over at Ellen Hutson along with some new Daniel Smith watercolor paints.

The flower was stamped with SU Archival Black ink onto some cold press watercolor paper.  You can tell the difference between hot press and cold press by looking at the paper.  If the paper is smooth, it is most likely hot press, whereas cold press is bumpy and uneven.  I knew I wanted to watercolor this image, so I wanted to see how it stamped on the bumpy cold press watercolor paper.

I used my MISTI tool to help me stamp this a couple of times.  Love that MISTI!  I let this sit for a few minutes so it was totally dry before I colored it.  While this was drying, I pulled out my Daniel Smith watercolor paints and decided on the colors I wanted to use.  I used a couple of blues, a couple of greens, and a pale pale yellow.

I started by painting around the flowers and leaves with the pale yellow paint.  I just wanted that soft wash for a hint of yellow around the bouquet.  Once that was dry, I painted the flowers with the two blue paints.  I went slow and let some flowers dry before I colored the next one.  I repeated this process with the leaves.  I went for a loose watercolor on this, so I left some areas white.  If you know me, that's really hard for me because I always "colored inside the lines."  I'm experimenting with other ways to color, and this actually turned out to be more fun than I thought.  :-)

After this piece dried overnight, I put it back into my MISTI and stamped the sentiment.  I adhered this to an olive green card base for that extra pop of color.  Because this is a CAS - Clean And Simple - challenge, I did not add anything else to this card.  I'm keeping it embellishment free so it adheres to the CAS rules.  :-)

Come play along in our CAS410 challenge and show off your new stamping toys with us!  Here's to a wonderful 2017!!