Red Dragonfly in Autumn

Good morning!  I posted this card over on the Art Neko Galleries blog a couple of days ago, and I thought I'd share it here as well.  I was inspired by the sentiment to stamp the dragonflies in a red ink.  The rainbow strip is sponged with the rich earthy hues of autumn.  Please check out the post over on the Art Neko Galleries blog to read more about this card.  :-)

CAS394 At One with Nature

Good morning!  I am hosting this week's CAS394 challenge over on SCS, and I am asking you to be At One with Nature.  Make a one layer card with a nature theme.

I decided to go with a rustic Christmas theme for my cards, and I'm sharing two ways you can do this challenge.  You can use just stamps for your card, or you can use a combo of stamps and dies.  On my first card, I just used stamps and some linen thread on my kraft card.  On the second card, I used a snowflake stamp and a sentiment stamp and then added some die cuts of greenery and pinecones and a big red bow.

I used the new Christmas Pines stamps and dies from Stampin Up for both of my cards.  These are going to be great for mass production, as these cards came together very quickly.  I can't decide which one I like better, so I'll just have to make a bunch of both, right?  LOL

Come play along with us in the CAS394 challenge.  When you upload your card to the SCS gallery, make sure to use keyword CAS394 so we can see what you've created for this challenge.  Have a great week!

Washi Paper Weaving with Kanji

Hi everyone!  Are you enjoying your weekend?  Today has been wonderful - it almost feels like fall outside, which is sooooooo not normal for this time of year in Texas.  I'm really enjoying this little cool front!  :-)

I belong to a Yahoo group called Oriental Stamp Art, and this month's technique challenge caught my eye.  We were challenged to do any kind of weaving on our artwork, so I pulled out some washi paper and some gold cardstock and cut them into tiny strips.  I wanted to be able to see the gorgeous artwork on the washi paper, so I did some minimal weaving with just five strips of gold cardstock across all the strips of washi paper.  

The sentiment, from Art Neko's Japanese Kanji sheet, was stamped with Versamark onto some black cardstock and then embossed with gold embossing powder.  I cut it out with a circle die and adhered it to my paper weaved background with some foam tape.

If you would like to join the Oriental Stamp Art group, please visit the Yahoo group page here.  Click on the "Join" button and follow the directions.  After you've been approved, you can join the fun and share your Oriental artwork.

CAS393 Imagine with Books

This week's CAS393 challenge is "Back to School."  I had to look around for a stamp of a book or books, and I finally found this one in my stash from Unity.  I stamped it onto some hot press Fabriano Studio watercolor paper with SU Archival Black ink.  Then I played with my Zig Clean Color markers by coloring the books with the markers and then going over them with a wet brush. I loved being able to go back over some areas with more color and adding more water here and there. Such a fun experiment! 

After the books dried, I cut them out and set them aside. I very lightly stenciled my white card base with whatever green was on my sponge (great way to use up leftover inks that are still on your sponge) and then added the books over the stenciled area with foam tape. A skinny black strip was added to the side and it is my little "nod" to those old composition books we used to have for school. :-)

The sentiment is from JustRite's Whisper of Wings set, and I stamped it with the same SU Archival Black ink.  CAS stands for Clean And Simple, so I decided to stop there before I piled on some baker's twine or some enamel dots or something else.  If you would like to play along, please use keyword CAS393 when you upload your card to SCS.  You can see the beautiful samples in the gallery here.

Have a great week!

Watercolored Chyrsanthemum

I posted an extra card on the Art Neko Galleries blog today.  This gorgeous Framed Stained Glass Chyrsanthemum stamp from Art Neko was colored with Gansai Tambi watercolors.  I had so much fun just taking my time and experimenting with blending colors and creating highlights and shadows. 

Please head over to the Art Neko Galleries to read more about my card there.  While you are there, please check out what the other Art Neko Artists have created.  There is some beautiful eye candy for you to drool over!  :-)

CAS392 Just a Nuvo Note

This week's CAS392 challenge is to use diagonals on your clean and simple card.  I pulled out a stencil and very lightly sponged some pink ink onto my white cardstock.  I then added the die cut "note" near the bottom.  I stamped the "Just a" on a separate piece of white cardstock and cut it out and adhered it next to the "note" with foam tape.  I added some pink and clear Nuvo glitter drops around the sentiment and set that aside to dry.  The whole piece was added to a black card base.

Check out the CAS392 challenge over on SCS.  There are some very clever ways to use diagonals if you check out the gallery here.  Hope you have a great week!  Come on back on Friday when I will share an Art Neko project with you.  :-)

Medallion Framed Life

Howdy!  My card is up on the Art Neko Galleries blog today, so please head over there to check it out.  I've created a fun and easy card using medallion stamps from Art Neko.  I love this fresh new color combo as well - I was just playing around and came up with these three colors (Emerald Envy, Pumpkin Pie, Dapper Denim) by accident.  Love those happy accidents!  :-)