Last But Not Least...

Of all of this week's shabby squares, today's is the most heavily embellished.  I started with papers in grey and white, and added orchid purple as an accent color. I continued to use those colors in the embellishments, and added the dusty aqua leafy flourish as what I call the "resting color," the place where you eyes take a break from the same three colors used on the card.

I double-cut the large doily die on the top half of the card - once in palest grey and once in darker grey - and offset the darker one below the lighter one to provide some contrast and dimension to the shape. The smaller Wilton paper doily was colored with Distress Inks to get it to the shade I wanted to blend with the other orchid colors...

Here are the closeups around the front...

At the center of the cluster is a rose pendant made from air-dry clay. I used a stiff brush to apply the light grey acrylic paint around the outer edges, and I was able to "shabby" the edges of the clay this way. It's a subtle effect, but a fun one...

Supplies:

Patterned papers:   My Minds Eye Lost & Found/Antique

Dies:   My Favorite Things Leaf-Filled Flourish;   Tim Holtz Distressed Doily

Flowers:   Wild Orchid Crafts          Pearls:   Recollections

Rose pendant:   Martha Stewart mold and air-dry clay          Punch:   Martha Stewart Braided Ruffle

Miscellaneous:   Hug Snug seam binding, Wilton doily, cheesecloth

Thanks for visiting today...have a fun weekend!

Soft and Sweet Shabby Square...

Hey, hey, hey....happy Hump Day! (I've often wondered - those of you not in the U.S., do you call Wednesdays/mid week "hump day," too?)

While Monday's card was bright with summer colors, today's card is very softly shaded in subdued mauve/pinks and beiges, with only the green leaves and a single deep plum flower to break the monochromatic feel of it all...

It's very subtle, but there's an area on the top right, and another along the left side of the cluster, where I've applied some texture using modeling paste and a chickenwire stencil. 

Here are some close-ups around the front...

There's a twine "wreath," surrounding a small die cut doily, that anchors the floral cluster...

The die cut to the right of the cluster is the top only of a larger frame die...

Supplies:

Patterned papers:   Maja Designs Vintage Summer Basics

Stencil:   The Crafters Workshop Mini Chickenwire Reversed

Dies:   Memory Box Woven Circle;   My Favorite Things Leaf-Filled Flourish;

Spellbinders Twisted Metal Tags & Accents

Lace:   TheFunkieJunkie.com (tea-dyed)          Flowers & stamen cluster:   Wild Orchid Crafts

Pearls:  Recollections          Miscellaneous:   modeling paste, jute twine

Thank you for visiting today!

Simply Shabby Squares...

Happy Monday, everyone! This week, I have a few square shabby chic cards to share with you.

Today's is probably the most colorful, in shades of bright golden yellow accented with deep turquoise and coral-pink...

The paper edges are distressed and torn in places, and some shabby stitching added. Since there's no mixed-media layers on the backgrounds, I'm calling them "simply shabby."  

Under the flowers, there's a small air-dry clay frame that I colored lightly with watercolors to get the sheer, "drippy" color I was looking for (vs. a more opaque coloring that I'd get with acrylic paint). Here are some close-ups around the cluster...

Supplies:

Patterned papers:  My Minds Eye "Sky's the Limit"

Dies:   Memory Box Quinn Flourish;   Poppy Stamps Massa Leaf Background

Punches:   Martha Stewart Medium Branch and Rose Leaf

Frame:   Martha Stewart mold and air-dry clay

Roses:   Wild Orchid Crafts          Pearls:   Recollections          Sentiment stamp:   Hero Arts

Miscellaneous:   lace, burlap ribbon

Thank you for visiting today...I hope your week is starting with a smile!

A Little of This, A Little of That...

Happy day, all! Today's card is a shabby chic eclectic combination of materials, from corrugated cardboard to pearls. :)  I've left off any sentiment...I seem to want to do that more often these days, to leave the possibilities open-ended for later use. Instead of patterned paper as a base, I took a small piece of corrugated cardboard, and dry-brushed on some dark cream and rose pink craft paint. I did the same with the wavy-corrugated cardboard used to die cut the hearts...

A side view shows a bit more how the cheesecloth falls off the edges on both sides...

Here are some close-ups of the florals and embellishments that sit on top of the two die-cut corrugated hearts (although the smaller of the two hearts is pretty much covered with flowers)...

The small round frame was made with air-dry clay and a silicone mold...

Supplies:

Patterned papers:   Maja Designs Vintage Summer Basics

Dies:   Xyron ShapeZ/Hearts;   Sizzix Flowers Branches & Leaves

Frame:   Martha Stewart mold and air-dry clay

Lace:   TheFunkieJunkie.com          Pearls:   Recollections          Flowers:   Wild Orchid Crafts

Miscellaneous:   twine, cheesecloth, corrugated cardboard, craft paint

Thanks for visiting today!

LOTV - Just For You...

Happy Monday, all! Today's card started out to be a masculine card, with the papers in tones of dusty aqua, dark tan, and black. But once I laid out the pieces and took a step back to see where I wanted the design to go, it didn't just look masculine, it looked too dark.  So I tried playing with a piece of red washi tape and that's when the card took a turn. Bright red and gold flowers and red gems were added, and now the card was bright and cheerful, but no longer a masculine one!

With the sentiments from LOTV's Set 10, A5 Verses and Set 25, Handwritten Phrases, this card could be used for so many different occasions, or for no special reason at all. :) The muted shades of papers come from three different LOTV paper pads - Baskets and Bunnies, with snippets of pieces from  Pressed in Time, and Father Knows Best - and blend together perfectly for a soft and muted background to the bright floral accents...

I used a bit of foam tape on the vertical paper pieces to add a bit of dimension. The wooden clock face on top of bright white cheesecloth centers the floral clusters, and a few drops of Glossy Accents in strategic places keeps the silver chain wrapped around the clock face and draped at the bottom of the card...

I found the small silver bar in my stash, so I used it as a rod to drape the top edge of the sentiment piece over. Once again, Glossy Accents beneath the square cubes at either end keep the rod in place, and foam tape beneath the sentiment piece keeps it level...

Supplies:

Patterned papers:   LOTV Baskets and Bunnies (stripe), Pressed in Time (green & tan), 

and Father Knows Best (black stripe)

Stamps:   LOTV Set 10 / A5 Verses and Set 25 / Handwritten Phrases

Punch:   Martha Stewart Cornice Edge          Dies:   Sizzix Flowers Branches & Leaves

Clock face & red gems:   Recollections          Silver bar:   7Gypsies

Flowers:   Wild Orchid Crafts 

Miscellaneous:   washi tape, silver chain, twine, pewter gem, cheesecloth

Thank you for visiting today...I hope your week starts with a smile!

Happy Fathers Day, Take 2...

Happy Friday the 13th, everyone! I prefer to think of today as a "good luck" day instead of the traditional outlook...so I hope good luck follows you all day and night long.

To end the week, here's one last Father's Day card that could actually be used for any occasion requiring a masculine card, since the sentiment here is on a tag. I first saw the idea for the triptych-like map paper treatment on Pinterest a while back, but I didn't pin the project, just wrote "triptych map paper" on my ideas page in my little notebook. So I can't take credit for the idea, but now I can't find the original project or pinner to credit them here.

Once again, I used contrasting textures, along with deeper shades of teal, kraft and black, to give a masculine feel to the card. I ran the teal Kraft Core cardstock through a paper crimper, then sanded it to make the core show through the raised lines...

On top of the twine bow, I used a sprocket piece from a prepackaged embellishment set, and added a couple washer-like doodads (yep, that's what I call them. I don't know the proper names of most of the hardware I picked up in Home Depot years ago to use in my crafting. All I know is that I have lots of "doodads" and "thingies" in my crafting hardware drawers LOL). I used Glossy Accents in the centers to make sure all three pieces were secure, then added a tiny bit of teal craft paint in the center to blend it all with the rest of the card...

Scattered around the card is some Aged Silver Frantage embossing powder...

These large berries on the stem were purple when I purchased them...a coat of teal craft paint made them the perfect match on this card...

Supplies:

Papers:   DCWV (burlap paper);   7Gypsies (map paper);   Tim Holtz Kraft Core/Coredinations (teal)

Sprocket:   Hobby Lobby/The Paper Studio           Berry branch:   Petaloo

Embossing powder:   Stampendous Frantage          Miscellaneous:   twine, silver hardware

Thanks so much for visiting today...have a wonderful weekend!

Watercolors Meet Mixed Media and Shabby Chic...

Hello, again! Today's card is loaded with techniques and fun...I hope you agree! I have a very special use in mind for this card.

It started with a text stamp on watercolor paper. The next step was to color with bright watercolors in orchid, turquoise, and green. Then cheesecloth was adhered using gesso to secure it, and once dried, the cheesecloth/gesso areas were spritzed with homemade sprays in turquoise and light green. Then, crackle texture paste was added using a stencil. Once the base was done, it was time for embellishments! :)

Here are some closeups around the four corners...

The white rose is made using Spellbinders Rose Creations die...

The butterfly was double-punched, with clear coarse glitter added to both layers...

Supplies:

Text Stamp:   Inkadinkado          Stencil:  Memory Box Rings & Puddles

Dies:   Memory Box Whimsy Circle;   Poppy Stamps Massa Leaf Background;   Spellbinders Ironwork Motifs;

Spellbinders Rose Creations

Punch:   Martha Stewart Monarch Butterfly Double Punch         

Flowers:   Melissa Frances (white pompom);   Prima (branch and seeds);   Wild Orchid Crafts (sweetheart blossoms)

Dotted muslin strip:   FreshLemonBlossoms on Etsy           White burlap:   TheFunkieJunkie.com

Pearls:   Recollections;   Queen & Co.            Watercolors:   Sakura Koi 

Studio 490 Crackle Texture Paste          Miscellaneous:   eyelet trim, gesso, cheesecloth

Thanks for joining me for the watercolor fun this week. Tomorrow I'll end the week with one more Fathers Day card before Sunday's holiday.

One Technique...Three Looks...

Happy "Hump Day!" Today I have three cards to share that all are made using the same technique...another one I learned during the Watercolor for Cardmakers online class.  It's a pretty simple technique using stencils in a different way, and definitely one that's fun to experiment with!

They're all Clean and Simple, and two have a bit of Shabby Chic added to the mix. With this first one, I was inspired by a beautiful photo I saw of a morning sunrise, and that gave me the idea to use the particular stencil I used. So I loaded watercolors in a couple different purples, a bright golden orange, and a deep orange, and here's what I got...

I added a small heart, machine "stitched" it without thread around the edges, and used a combo of stamping and a die cut for the sentiment. Here are some close-ups...

I was happy to see the way the watercolors blended as they dried, and the design of the stencil was perfect for the "sun rays" I was hoping to get. I followed the placement of some of the lines caused by the stencil to machine-stitch some lines to the bottom of the card front...

Supplies:

Sentiment stamp:   Winnie & Walter "The Big, The Bold, And You"

Dies:   Technique Tuesday "Say It-Fabulous";   Papertrey Ink "Limitless Layers-Heart Stitches"

Stencil:   Memory Box "Texture Brilliant"

Orange gemstone:   EK Success            Watercolors:  Sakura Koi

This next card uses a chevron stencil, turned on its side, and very *bright* watercolors. :)  I highlighted the straight lines of the chevron edges and center with machine stitching. The splatters are actually stamped...I didn't trust my splattering technique that day, and realized that I had an ink that matched the bright pink watercolor, so that's what I went with!

A couple close-ups...

Supplies:

Stamps:   Winnie & Walter "The Big, The Bold, and The Happy";   Stampin'Up! Gorgeous Grunge

Stencil:   Tim Holtz Chevron            Gems:   Kaisercraft

Watercolors:  Sakura Koi

The last card for today is actually the first one I made. It's very close to the card that was taught in the online class, and actually allowed me, for the first time, to see the difference in the different brands of watercolors. The watercolors I used for this card are a bit paler, softer, and leave a more "chalky" finished look than the other two cards...still pretty, but a different look that you may not be able to actually see in the photos...

Supplies:

Sentiment stamp:   Winnie & Walter "The Big, The Bold, and You"

Stencil:   Tim Holtz Chevron            Watercolors:  Loew Cornell

Miscellaneous:   silver sequins, white twine

Thanks for stopping by today. Tomorrow I'll be sharing a "fully loaded" mixed media and watercolor card. Until then, have a great day!

I Will Never Forget...

You're not seeing things...I'm here two days in a row this week! In fact, there will be a post every day this week, since I want to squeeze in one more masculine-looking card at the end of the week before Father's Day on Sunday.

Today's card is another Sanketi inspired card. I was so intrigued with her free-flowing style when she taught a segment of the Watercolor for Cardmakers class over at Online Card Classes (you can still sign up and take this class if you're interested), that hers was the first technique I played with once I had time to sit down and create. There's no question I still have a long way to go, but it sure is fun working my way there!

And just a couple closeup views...

Supplies:

Stamps:   Penny Black "Flower Garden" ;   My Favorite Things "LJD Forget Me Not" (sentiment)

Watercolors:   Koi Sakura

Thanks for visiting today! I'll be back tomorrow with a multi-card post showing another watercolor technique. Have a great day!