You're Always In My Heart

Hey all,

I ordered a set of Lisa Horton Cloud 9 inks during Black Friday sales and finally got around to playing with them. They are so interesting in how they react on different colors of paper. After playing. I ended up with two cards with the exact same design and using the same Lisa Horton ink pads. The only difference is the card stock colors.

Elizabeth has the first color challenge for2025 at the Paper Players this week, orange, pink and green and one of my cards works perfectly. 

Notice the bottom of the heart die is orange, then notice that the background panel is green. Both of those are using the same ink pad, Cloud 9 Ripe Mango Shimmer "direct to paper" technique. The ink is orange on white card stock and green on dark card stock. The upper part of the heart is another Cloud 9 color called Tropical Paradise.

The heart die and the sentiment are from Concord & 9th. The sentiment is heat embossed using black EP.

I think that the second card works for this week's Just Us Girls  Word Week "Masculine" challenge. I used the same Ripe Mango ink on this card with three different dark card stock shades from GKD. They are black, dark sage and Christmas green. The die cut heart is the Christmas green after using the ink pad direct to paper. The background black panel is stenciled using the ink and a blending brush, and the mat for the black panel is a piece of dark sage with the ink direct to paper. On this shade, it looks gold, which is why I used the gold accents in the enamel dots and gold embossed sentiment.

Here are the insides for both cards. 

If you're looking for some fun inks, these fit the bill. I didn't mention how sparkly they are, but I think you can see that in the photos. I don't usually do swatches for my supplies, but I did with these inks, stamping each color with a silhouette style stamp on both white and black card stock. I think that will come in handy for future use.

Hope your day is going well. I have a dental appt this afternoon and I'm watching the Australian Open tennis matches.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Hugs of Happiness set by Concord & 9th and Friendship Hearts set by Gina K Designs

Paper: Gina K Designs and Concord & 9th

Ink: Lisa Horton Cloud 9 Shimmer inks, Gina K Designs Embossing pad and Black Onyx ink

Other: Concord & 9th Stay Cozy stencils and Knit With Care dies, Gina K Designs Master Layouts 2 dies and Gold embossing powder, Brutus Munroe black embossing powder, gold and orange enamel dots, blending brushes, Connect glue, SU Dimensionals

I'm a Sucker for You

Hello all,

I'm adding another card to my Valentine's Day stash and playing along with this week's Freshly Made Sketches challenge. 

Most supplies are from Concord & 9th.

 

In place of the circle element, I've used this fun candy jar die from the Sweet on You stamp and die set, cut from some Valentine's Day pattern papers. The sucker and heart dies are from the same set. The background is done using the C&9th Stitched Heart Card Front die.

On the inside, I added a strip of the patterned paper down the edge and then stamped the greetings.

Enjoy what's left of the weekend, and thanks for checking in.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Sweet on You stamp set by Concord & 9th

Paper: Concord & 9th and Gina K Designs card stock, Crate Paper "Love Notes" patterned papers

Ink: Concord & 9th and Gina K Designs craft white

Other: Stitched Heart Card Front die and Poppy enamel dots from Concord & 9th, Gina K Designs white embossing powder

To the Moon and Back

Hi Peeps,

How about another Valentine's Day card? (Although this one could be for any occasion, I'm calling it a V-day card.)

For the first 2025 Color Throwdown challenge, the colors are black, white and gray. I decided on using this Sun and Moon Letterpress set from Spellbinders. I did some masking to ink the center in black, then again to ink the rays in gray. The sentiment comes in this die set.

The card base is embossed with the Spellbinders  3D embossing folder of the month for December. For embellishments, I've added some GKD silver dots.

I've used the same sentiment from Spellbinders that I used on the card in my previous post. (I like it.)

Happy Monday, and enjoy your week!

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps/Dies: Spellbinders Sun & Moon Betterpress plate and Forever Yours stamp set

Paper: Gina K Designs card stock, Spellbinders letter press porcelain card stock

Ink: Betterpress Black ink, Gina K Designs Soft Stone

Other: Spellbinders 3D Hearts embossing folder, Gina K Designs Master Layouts 2 dies, silver dots

Love You

Hi and Happy New Year Crafty Friends!

I'm happy to see the challenge blogs are starting their new challenges for 2025 this week and I'm ready to play along. I managed to make a card that works for three of them. I'm using the colors from Color Hues, Red and Kraft, the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches, and the Just Us Girls die cut challenge. 

Since the next card making holiday is Valentine's Day, I'm getting started on my V Day stash.

The stitched letter dies for Love, the You die, and the Strawberry dies are all from Spellbinders, as is the embossing folder. The Stitched square die and the tiny hearts on the strawberries are from GKD.

The word "love" is stitched with red floss but the word "you" is faux stitching that I used a white get pen over. I thought the faux stitching would stand out better. I cut the strawberry elements from white card stock and ink blended the colors for a softer look.

The inside is very simple with just a couple of stamped images, also from Spellbinders.

Wishing everyone a great week. If you're in those blizzard areas, stay warm and safe. We are sunny and dry here in SoCal.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Forever Yours set from Spellbinders

Paper: Gina K Designs Kraft and Layering Weight white card stock, SU Real Red card stock and SU kraft heart DSP

Ink: Gina K Designs

Other: Heart Swag EF, Stitched Love die set, and Faux Stitched Sentiments die set, 2023 Advent Calendar dies from Spellbinders, Double stitched square die and tiny heart embellishments from Gina K Designs, white gel pen, red embroidery floss

Happy Holidays

Merry Christams,

I hope everyone is enjoying the day with family and friends. I was visiting my mom and sister last week in northern California so my family time was a little before the holiday, but just as sweet. I even got to see my nephew who lives in MN and my niece who lives in OR.

Here at home, it's a very low key couple of days, but we do spend Christmas Eve and Christmas evening with our good friends for yummy dinners and wines for celebrating.

I noticed that Amy's December Woodblock Wednesday challenge is up, even thought it falls on Christmas Day, and since I'm just hanging out today,  I had time to make a quick card for it.  This is one of my favorite older SU holiday stamp sets and I've used it a lot over the years. This time I kept things super simple with a little background ink blending and layering. The images are simply stamped with black ink and cut out, then layered as the focal images.

Merry Christmas to all and best wishes for a wonderful and crafty 2025!

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Stampin' Up 

Paper: Stampin; Up and Gina K Designs

Ink: Gina K Designs

Other: SU black enamel dots, Gina K Designs Master Layouts 2 banner die, SU dimensionals

Winter Wishes and Happy Birthday

Hello to all,

The year is winding down for challenges and blog posting, and so I'm finishing up the last of my challenge cards until the new year. 

This post has a couple of cards that I made using an embossing folder / inking technique that is super fun to do and fairly easy. You can find the instructions on a few of Jennifer's videos if you want to see how it's done. Just search embossing folders on her YouTube or blog.

First up is a birthday card made with the Spellbinders 3D EF called Rosette Burst. Truth, I made 6 half sheet panels using different color combos because the first one was so pretty and I couldn't stop playing. The inks I used on this one are SSS Pawsitively Saturated inks. The butterfly with flowers is the latest incentive stamp set from Gina K Designs, and the sentiment is hot foiled using navy foil. This card uses the current Color Hues challenge colors of purple and blue. 

My second card is made using the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches and the color challenge from the Paper Players. Ann's colors this week are Cherry Cobbler Red, Pretty Peacock and Gold.

The circles are made using the inking technique with the SSS Holly Branch 3D Embossing folder and the SU Cherry and Peacock inks. I cut the circles using Spellbinders dies.

Wishing all of my fellow crafters a very Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a Peaceful New Year. I hope you get to enjoy the season with family and friends.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Gina K Designs Blooming Butterfly Mini and Seasonal Greetings Mini sets

Paper: Gina K Designs Heavy Weight white, Lovely Lavender and gold card stock, SU Cherry Cobbler card stock

Ink: SSS Pawsitively Saturated, SU, Honey Bee Gold, and Concord & 9th Black

Other: Spellbinders Rosette Burst 3D EF, Simon Says Stamp Holly Branch 3D EF, Tim Holtz Brayer, Spellbinders circle die, Gina K Designs Gold embossing powder, Pink Fresh Studio Fancy Script Words Hot Foil plate, Spellbinders Navy Hot Foil, Glimmer system, Blending brushes, Gina K Designs corner punch, foam tape, SU Dimensionals, Connect liquid glue

Happy Holidays

Hi again,

I decided to do one more post today since I had this card finished. It's made using the current Color Throwdown challenge colors of Red, Green, and Cream.

I started with a cream card base and used the C&9th Plaid Turnabout stamp with two shades of red and two shades of green.  The center oval is from Spellbinders and it's cut from the same vanilla card stock and ink blended with the brighter red shade and the two greens. It's a landing space for the tree dies from Gina K Designs, cut from glitter paper and backed with green card stock. The sentiment is from an older Gina K Designs mini stamp set.

For the inside, I've used a sentiment and small tree image from the 2024 GKD-SSS Stamptember promotion.

Thanks for looking in today, and enjoy your Friday evening!

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Plaid Turnabout stamp by Concord & 9th, Seasonal Greetings Mini set and Stay Cozy set by Gina K Designs  (2024 Simon Says Stamp Stamptember set)

Paper: Gina K Designs Vanilla card stock, Concord & 9th glitter paper, SU green card stock

Ink: Simon Says Stamp Pawsitively inks

Other: Ornamental Tree dies by Gina K Designs, Oval die by Spellbinders, blending  brushes, SU Dimensionals

Just for You

 TGIF everybody! 

I hope you have some fun plans for the weekend. I am going to a holiday party tomorrow afternoon hosted by my former manager for her current team and I've been invited. I can't wait to see everyone as it's been 3.5 years since I retired. 

My card for this post is for LeAnne's theme challenge at the Paper Players. LeAnne wants us to use a deer on our projects. I realized that I have way more deer images than I can ever use, although it might be fun to make it a theme one year for my holiday cards and use each set for one card. (Hmmm, that could be a fun idea.)

Anyway, I chose this cute Simon Says Stamp Holiday Ornament set for my card today.

All of the images used are from the SSS stamp and die set. The background patterned papers are from my misc. bag of papers, so I have no idea of the company. I liked the collage for the background to the ornaments. The ornaments are colored with alcohol markers, both Copic and OLO.

There are five ornaments in the set, and I used another for the inside.

Enjoy the rest of your Friday! I need to do some chores, one being getting my car washed.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Holiday Ornaments by Simon Says Stamp

Paper: Gina K Designs Cherry Red card stock, X-Press It blending card stock, misc patterned paper

Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copic and OLO markers

Other: Gina K Designs Master Layouts 12 stitched rectangle die, Gold, Silver, Green and Stardust Stickles, Gold enamel dot, white gel pen, SU Dimensionals