Fun With the Wreath Builder System & Many Cards

 Hello and Happy New Years Eve to all,

I watched this video by JMI a few weeks ago and loved the look of the finished stamped cards. Earlier this week, I decided to see if I could create some of these cards worthy of Jennifer's. They turned out beautifully, if I do say so myself, so I sent them off as a gift set to my bestie and she received them yesterday. 

These were super fun to make, and if you haven't tried the Gina K Designs Wreath Builder System, I highly recommend it as a great card making tool. All of the cards with flowers use the Wreath Builder system. The leaf cards do not. A stamp positioning tool like a Misti is essential for using the Wreath Builder system, fyi.

All of the stamps used for these cards are from Gina K Designs. For the most part, so are the card stocks and inks, although, the white craft ink is from Hero Arts and I used a couple of Stampin' Up card stock colors.

The die cut sentiments and the embellishments really make these cards pop! Die cut sentiments are from GKD, SSS and Concord & 9th. The pearl and rhinestone embellishments are from my stash. I just picked things that worked well with each card.

Thanks for looking in. I want to wish everyone a very happy and healthy 2023!

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Doodled Autumn and Zenflowers (orange card only) stamp sets by Gina K Designs

Paper: card stocks from Gina K Designs, Stampin' Up and Concord & 9th

Ink: White craft ink pad from Hero Arts, all other inks from Gina K Designs

Sentiment dies: Thanks and Hello from Gina K Designs, Just A Note and Celebrate You from Concord & 9th, Swoopy Thanks from Simon Says Stamp

Other: Master Layouts 1, 2, 9 & 10 die sets by Gina K Designs, Misti, Largest Size Wreath Builder System, Big Shot, many pearls and rhinestones, Connect liquid glue from Gina K Designs

Merry & Bright

Hello all,

Well, I'm finally home from visiting my mom and back in my crafty space. I drove the long road home on Monday, about 14.5 hours total time. My visit turned out to be about 2 weeks longer than planned due to having to replace mom's refrigerator. The new one finally arrived and was installed, so I felt comfortable leaving her.

Since it's the last Paper Players Challenge for 2022, I wanted to be sure to play along. Ann has a nice Christmasy color challenge this week for us. I had all of my holiday cards made that I needed, but I went ahead a made another. Actually, I made two more, but the second will be in a separate blog post later. I've used this week's Freshly Made Sketch for the layout.

This card is made with the November Scrapbook and Cards Let's Stamp Together kit. If you haven't checked these out, they are great. They come with a stamp set, dies and a stencil. I used all for my card.

The stencil is a falling snow pattern. I taped it to my vanilla card base and smooched VersaMark ink using a Tim Holtz blending tool then sprinkled on some Brutus Monroe Alabaster Sparkle embossing powder and heat embossed it. The top ornament uses the stamp set. There are three stamps that make the pattern and I stamped them in Ann's challenge colors, heat embossing the gold with Brutus Monroe gold sparkle powder. The other ornament is one of the dies. The background is cut from Evening Evergreen card stock and the top from SU gold glimmer paper. The greenery is from a Honey Bee Holiday die set. I cut the fir sprigs from vanilla card stock and used a blending brush with Evening Evergreen ink to color them. The sentiment die is part of the kit. I cut it three times from Cherry Cobbler card stock and glued them together for dimension. I then brushed them with a Nuvo clear glitter pen and added Shimmery Glossy Accents over the top.

Here is the inside with sentiments from a Simon Says Stamp holiday stamp set.

Enjoy your Friday and thanks for looking in,

Colleen

Supplies

November Let's Stamp Together/Scrapbook and Cards kit created by LDRS Creative

Other stamps: Joyful Season set by Simon Says Stamp

Paper: SU Very Vanilla, Evening Evergreen and Cherry Cobbler card stock, Gold Glimmer paper

Ink: SU Evening Evergreen and Cherry Cobbler, VersaMark

Other: Winter Bouquet dies by HoneyBee, White and Gold embossing powder from Brutus Monroe, Nuvo glitter pen, Shimmery Glossy Accents, Misti, Big Shot Switch, Heat tool, Connect liquid glue, SU Dimensionals 

Happy Birthday

Hello,

Happy last day of November. I hope everyone, in the US, had a very nice Thanksgiving holiday and weekend. I'm at my mom's in northern California hanging out. I didn't bring any crafting supplies with me  because I intended to stay only until yesterday. However, my mom's refrigerator decided to die on Saturday night. Great timing with all kinds of left overs in it, not that any time is ideal for your refrigerator to die. We went shopping for a new one on Monday, but it won't be delivered until around Dec. 8! We have 5 ice chests in the garage and I'm fetching ice every morning from the gas station down the street. Because I don't want to leave my 86 yr old mom to deal with all that on her own, I'm staying until the new refrigerator arrives to get the ice chests unloaded.

On my way up I stopped in Sacramento to visit my best friend, and then she came to mom's on Wednesday evening to spend Thanksgiving weekend with us, which also happens to be her birthday weekend. We played lots of cards, went to a couple of holiday craft fairs and watched some Christmas movies. 

I made this card for her birthday a few weeks ago, but didn't want to post it because she does read my blog. This is a shaker card made with Gina K Designs stamps, stencils and dies. The monthly mix challenge for November is shaker cards.

This is a side to side shaker and I recycled some stamp set packaging to make it. The background is the Daisies Forever stencil and I used the layering Lilac and Orchid ink pads for the flowers and Jelly Bean Green and Fresh Asparagus inks for the leaves. The sentiments are sentiment strips and wishes die.

Here's the inside of the card.

One of the fun things we did the weekend in Sacramento was take a cookie decorating class. This is the second time I've taken one, and from the same teacher. This is her website and here is a picture of my decorated cookies. The cookie in the bag on the right I won. Jodie, the instructor, made it. All of mine look pretty good, except the door is a bit wonky, but okay for a second try and 12 months apart.

Have a great week and thanks for checking in.

Colleen

Supplies

All Gina K Designs except the sequin.

Daisies Forever layering stencil, Lilac and Orchid Layering inks, Jelly Bean Green and Fresh Asparagus inks, Sentiment strips, Wishes die, Layering Weight and Heavy Weight white card stock, Black Onyx card stock, Connect glue

Peace - Love - Joy

 Hi and TGIF to all,

If you're reading this Friday morning, I'm currently on the road driving most of the length of California to spend Thanksgiving week with my mom and my bestie. It's become a tradition over the last 4 years. We talk, play a lot of cards. A LOT! and eat good food. It's a 645 mile trip for me, so it takes pretty much all day. I'm planning on leaving my house here in Encinitas (San Diego) by 6:00 am in order to get through Los Angeles before the morning commute traffic gets horrible.

I have my card for Jaydee's color challenge for this week's Paper Players challenge. I may have gone overboard, but I was having so much fun with foiling. These cards all have foiling, but instead of using my Spellbinders Glimmer hot foil system, I used Deco foil, Deco paste, toner paper and a laminator machine. I ended up with four very shinny cards to add to my Holiday card stash. 

These first two use Gina K Designs stencils, dies, embossing folder, and sentiments. The card on the left started by ink blending three blue shades of Distress Oxide inks on a white panel. Following this inking technique by Jennifer McGuire I brushed some Pearl Ex Silver powder over the inked panel to give it a shimmery effect. Once the ink was dry, I used the Gina K Designs Snowflake embossing folder on it. Next I die cut the GKD Triple Snowflake dies from toner paper and used some silver Deco foil and a laminator to hot foil them. The toner paper is from Brutus Monroe and has a "hashtag" finish, so there are foiled and then white spaces on the snowflakes. It's pretty IRL. The sentiment is heat embossed with silver embossing powder on black card stock and I added some turquoise sequins for even more sparkle.

For the card on the right, I used the new GKD Graceful Snowflake stencil with Deco Blanco paste on black heavy weight card stock, and once dried, it was foiled with silver Deco foil using the laminator. I cut it down with the GKD ML 2 dies and added some silver pearls as embellishments.

Cards three and four use the Simon Says Stamp Rustic Snowflake stencil and Blanco Deco paste, one with white card stock and one with black card stock. On the white panel, I ink blended six shades of Distress Oxide blue inks over each star point. The card base is stamped with four of the same inks using the Concord & 9th Snowflake Turnabout stamp. The sentiment is heat embossed with black embossing powder on vellum.

For the snowflake on the black card stock, I did a similar color scheme but using foil instead of ink, although there are two shades of blue foil and silver foil. The greeting on this card is from a new Simon Says Stamp Holiday greeting and die set. It's heat embossed with white powder on turquoise card stock.

I decided I'd use this card for my PP Challenge entry.

Enjoy your Friday and weekend, and thanks for lookin in,

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Gina K Designs, Simon Says Stamp, Concord  & 9th

Card Stock: Gina K Designs

Ink: Gina K Designs Black Onyx and Embossing Ink

Other: Gina K Designs and Simon Says Stamp stencils, Gina K Designs dies, Deco Foil, Deco paste, Laminator machine, Gina K Designs embossing powder, WOW embossing powder, Deco foil, Brutus Munroe toner sheets, Gina K Designs sequins, Trinity silver pearls, Connect glue, heat tool, Misti, Big Shot Switch 

OCC Holiday Workshop 2022 Day 9 Cards

 Hi again,

OCC Holiday Workshop 2022 day nine cards here. This day is all about snowflakes. Kristina showed how to make a card with stacked snowflakes. I gave that technique a try using two Gina K Designs snowflake stamp sets and dies with an ink blended background, as well and making a card with a large Gina K Designs snowflake stencil and glitter paste, and a mini-slimline card using a Gina K Designs silhouette stamp and ink blending. 

Here they are.

I believe all of the supplies for these three cards, with the exception of the gems on cards 1 and 2, are from Gina K Designs.

This is as far as I've gotten in making card examples for this two week class.  Not to say I won't go back and do Day 3 and Day 10 projects later, but for now, I'm busy making a quilt for a late November birthday present. 

This is the third On Line Card Class that I've taken and I highly recommend them. The format for the classes is great with two instructors each day. Thanks to all of the instructors for making the time to put this awesome class together and teach each technique.

Colleen

OCC Holiday Workshop 2022 Day 8 Cards

 Hello,

Day eight of the workshop was all about hot foiling. Hot foiling is very addicting to me. It seems when I pull out my Spellbinders Glimmer machine, I just cant stop and end up with many pieces. If you have not tried it, fair warning, but you really should. 

I actually made 20 Holiday cards this year with variations of my four examples in this post. (I really do have a hard time stoping.)

Yana Smakula was the instructor for the Glimmer hot foiling section and she had two tips for us that I absolutely found very helpful. They have to do with foiling the negative foil and oh my gosh, perfect results where before I was getting good foiling only sometimes.

Here are my four card examples. Each pair is made with the positive foiled image and the negative foiled image.

Foiling plates and products from Spellbinders and Pink Fresh Studio. Card stock from Gina K Designs and I used Stampin' Up Glossy white card stock for foiling the negative pieces. Worked perfectly and I have tons of it that I bought years ago. I'm happy to have another use for it. Other background dies and embossing folders from Gina K Designs and Simon Says Stamp. Colored images done with Copic markers.

Thanks all,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 7 Cards

 Hi and here's my Day 7 cards for the OCC Holiday Cards Workshop 2022. 

Day 7 lesson is using embossing folders.

Details for card one. I die cut two sizes of circle dies in mylar to use as a stencil to ink blend several overlapping circles. Inks are several shades of greens, reds, and blues of Distress Oxide. After the panel dried, I ran it through an older SU Quatrefoil Tile embossing folder. The stamped and die cut images are from a recent Holiday stamp set by Simon Says Stamp. It's totally sweet! The images are colored with Copics.

Details for card 2. The large snowflake is a stencil from Gina K Designs. The inks are three shades of blue from Simon Says Stamp. When this panel dried, I ran it through the 3D Layered Snowflake embossing folder from Altenew. This is a very large image, so I cut it down to make an A2 size card.

Thanks,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 6 Cards

 Hi and I'm back with my "homework" cards for Day 6 of the OCC Holiday Workshop 2022. This class is all about using tiny stamps to make cards. Finding the stamps was very easy for me as I have a bunch of old Stampin' Up sets with tiny stamps. I think the most recent date on the three sets I used is 2004. 

Card one is tone on tone. The green panel is SU Shaded Spruce and so is is the ink.This stamp set has 3 images each of a star, a tree and a light. After stamping the panel is die cut with a SSS Arched die. The mat is cut with the next size in the set of dies. It's stamped with a long retired SU Lace background stamp.

The images in card 2 are all stamped in black ink and colored with Copics. The set for card 3 are solid images of candies stamped in various bright shades of ink.

All of the sentiments are Concord and 9th dies. I used some C&9th Sparkly Glossy Accents over the sentiment in card 3.

Supplies today: Papers and inks from Gina K Designs, stamps from Stampin' Up, dies from Gina K Designs, Simon Says Stamp, and Concord & 9th.

Thanks,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 5 Cards

 Hello,

Day 5 "homework" cards. Today's lesson, using saved scraps of card stock or paper. Jennifer McGuire was the instructor today and I totally CASE'd her projects, but I don't think she'll mind. I made four cards for this class, they were just too much fun to stop, LOL.

I actually did use scraps of card stocks. I don't save everything, but if there is enough to stamp a sentiment or cut out a die, I'll save it. If you look closely at the cards, you notice there are images on the card stock pieces. Prior to cutting out the circles and squares, I put pieces together on a sticky mat and used  snowflake and holiday foliage turnabout stamps to add the stamped images.

Again, many products from many companies. Background stamps and arched die are from Simon Says Stamp, embossing folders are Gina K Designs, inks and card stock are GKD and SU, holiday sentiments strips from GKD, wooden snowflakes are SU and the wooden moose are from Paper Source. I've had both of the wooden embellishments in my stash for years and thought they added a little somthin' somthin' to the folk art feel of these cards.

Thanks all,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 4 Cards

 Hi and here's my Day 4 "homework" card for the OCC Holiday Workshop day 4. 

Ink blending was the lesson for day 4. It happens to be one of my favorite things to do. For this card, I started by blending four shades from Gina K Designs, Tranquil Teal, Fresh Asparagus, Jelly Bean Green and Key Lime onto a white card panel. After the ink dried, I cut out small trees from Concord & 9th and the Gina K Designs Master Layouts 6 die set in various areas on the panel.

The background is made with the Master Layouts 11 die set from Gina. I masked off each rectangle and blended red ink up and down from the center. The greeting is from Concord & 9th and I heat embossed it with white EP on black card stock.

Card stock is from Gina K Designs, the Gold Glimmer paper is Stampin' Up, Dies and stamps from Gina K Designs and Concord & 9th, inks and white embossing powder from Gina K Designs.

Thanks,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 2 Cards

 Hello,

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 2 lesson was all about making plaids. I have MANY stamps that make plaid and they are all so much fun to use. I used some single stamps to make my own plaid for card 1 and a plaid Turnabout stamp to make the background for card 2.

For these cards, the card stocks including the glimmer paper are from Gina K Designs and Stampin' Up, the inks from Gina K Designs,  the dies and stamps are from Concord & 9th, and the embossing folder used on the tree in the second card from Stampin' Up.

To make the background on card 1, I used a gold Sharpie pen to draw lines between the stitched diagonal lines to make a more festive background for the ornament. 

Thanks,

Colleen

OCC Holiday 2022 Day 1 Cards

 Hello,

Today, I have day 1 "homework" cards for the 2022 Online Card Classes Holiday 2022 session. 

I've been making cards pretty much every day, but I've not blogged any so far. This morning I took pictures of cards for eight of the classes and got them edited. I had planned to post them to the class galleries through IG instead of my blog, but for some reason I'm not having any luck with getting my pictures to post through IG. I'm sure it's me doing something wrong. Luckily, I can write blog posts and I know the link will work fine.

Day one's class was on Die Cutting. Jennifer McGuire showed a fun faux laser cut technique that I tried out on two cards.

I've used many, many different supplies from many, many different companies through out the two weeks to make my cards. I'm not listing exact products, but listing the general companies used for each day in each blog post. If you would like to know exact supplies I've used for a particular card, just send me an email to cbegley@cox.net.

Todays products are from Concord & 9th, Gina K Designs, and My Favorite Things.

This faux laser cut technique is super fun to do and works with a with a variety of dies.

Thanks,

Colleen

Give Thanks

 Hi again,

I have one more quick post for this morning. I made this card last night using Jen's sketch for the "just about to end" Freshly Made Sketches challenge, and the theme challenge from the new Paper Players Challenge. Claire is this week's hostess with a Thankful theme. 

I started by ink blending a square card panel with four ink colors then spraying some water over the panel to get the water reactive effect. Using the GKD stamp set called Painted Autumn, I stamped the layering flowers and leaves in fall colors then cut them out using the set dies. The sentiment is part of the stamp set. After stamping it in black ink, I cut it out using a double stitched circle die and cut a single stitched circle for the layering. After cutting the ink blended panel per Jen's sketch I glued it to a black mat and put them onto a white card base. The images are glued with liquid glue and some are popped up with dimensionals. All in all, pretty simple.

I made a second card, even easier, using GKD patterned paper and pre-printed images. The sentiment is also from the Painted Autumn stamp set. This time I layered the circle onto a scalloped circle die from Spellbinders.The size of this card is much smaller, 4.2 5 x 4.25 inches.

Enjoy your afternoon, and thanks again.

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: Painted Autumn stamp set by Gina K Designs

Paper: Gina K Designs Layering Weight White, Black Onyx, Fresh Asparagus card stock and patterned papers from the Autumn Splendor Card Kit

Ink: Gina K Designs Sweet Tomato, Prickly Pear, Fresh Asparagus, Tranquil Teal and Black Onyx

Other:Gina K designs Double and Single Stitched Circle dies, Spellbinders Scalloped circle Nestie die, GKD black and gold gems, GKD pre-printed fall images from the Autumn Splendor kit, Connect liquid glue, SU Dimensionals

Happy Holidays

 Hello Peeps,

I hope your weekend was a good one. I made several holiday cards over the two days, gaining some ground. 

I received a new Gina K Designs order and used some of these new goodies to make this card. I also used the colors for the current Color Throwdown Challenge. Lori's colors this week are green, pink and yellow, perfect for this new Poinsettia Layering Stencil.

After completing the stenciling, I cut the image and black mat using ML 1 dies and layered them to a kraft card base. The sentiments are also new from GKD. The Holiday's word die and shadow and the Happy is from new pre-printed holiday sentiments. A quick and fun card to make.

Have a fab Monday. We may get some stormy weather this afternoon into tomorrow. Great crafting weather! Thanks for checking in.

Colleen

Supplies

All Gina K Designs: White layering weight, Black Onyx and Kraft card stock, Poinsettia Layering Stencil set, Innocent Pink, Sweet Corn and Prickly Pear ink, Holiday word and Shadow dies, Holiday pre-printed sentiments, black pearl gems, Connect glue, Master Layouts 1 dies, foam tape 

Thankful/Grateful

 Hi all,

I have a Thanksgiving card for you today, made using Anne Marie's Tic-Tac-Toe grid for this week's Paper Players challenge. I went with the diagonal of yellow and/or orange, texture, Fall/Thanksgiving.

I started by ink blending a white card panel using GKD Prickly Pear, Tangerine Twist and Tomato Soup inks and running it through the Falling Leaves EF for texture. Next, I cut it out with the ML 2 stitched and mat dies. Finally, I used a VersaMark ink pad and lightly swiped it over the raised leaves to make them sticky then used a small paint brush and dusted some gold Pearl Ex powder over the leaves.

For the focal leaves in the center, I stamped them in GKD Honey Mustard, Prickly Pear, Tangerine Twist and Tomato Soup. The veins are a separate stamp which I stamped using VersaMark and heat embossed with gold EP. They are cut out with their dies and popped up over some gold twine twirled in a circle in the middle of the card. 

For sentiments, I cut two small tags from white. The tag die is part of the GKD Stitched Ovals set. The Thankful and Grateful sentiments are stamped using VersaMark and heat embossed with gold. I tied them with the same gold twine and stuck them down with a couple of mini glue dots.

For the inside, I started with a panel of SU So Saffron card stock and ink blended PricklyPear and Honey Mustard inks around the edges then cut it out with the ML 2 stitched die.  The sentiment is stamped using black ink and the small leaves with Tomato Soup.

TGIF tomorrow. Enjoy!

Colleen

Supplies

Stamps: All Gina K Designs sets, Layered Leaves, Beautiful Leaves, and Everything Nice mini

Paper: Gina K Designs White Layering, Black Onyx and Stampin' Up So Saffron

Ink: Gina K Designs Black Onyx, Prickly Pear, Honey Mustard, Tangerine Twist and Tomato Soup; VersaMark

Other: Gina K Designs Master Layouts 2 & small tag dies, Gina K Designs Falling Leaves embossing folder, Pearl Ex powder,  Gina K Designs fine detail gold embossing powder, heat tool, Big Shot Switch, Misti, Gina K Designs gold pearls, stash gold twine

Cheers to You On Your Birthday

Hello and Happy Friday,

It's a coolish but sunny day here on the Southern California Coast, kind of perfect actually. I probably should be out for a walk, but instead I've been rummaging through my fabric stash looking to see if I have enough fabric to make a quick tree patterned quilt that I found on Pinterest. I'm looking for ideas for a birthday gift. 

I made the birthday card using Jen T.'s sketch for this week's Freshly Made Sketches challenge. I pulled out some older SU DSP and a couple of  older Avery Elle stamp sets to make this card.

The background is the Floral Backdrop cover plate from Pink Fresh Studio, and how about those sweet scallop shell embellishments from Trinity? So Cute! I had to use them on the inside of the card too.

The stamped images are colored with Copics. I used some Fruit Punch Stickels glitter over the drink to make it look even more tropical.

I also made a Holiday card using Jen's sketch as inspiration. This die set is from Simon and it's called Berry Wreath. The background is hot foiled with the Waffle Flower Triple Line Diamond plate and the greeting is hot foiled with the Pink Fresh Studio Perfect Sentiments Holiday set. This is a fun die set to play with.

Enjoy your day!

Colleen

Supplies Card 1

Stamps: Aloha and Simply Said Hugs sets by Avery Elle

Paper: SU Basic White, Black & Pumpkin Pie card stock, SU retired DSP

Ink: Memento Tuxedo black and Copics

Other: Avery Elle set dies, Gina K Designs single and double stitched circle dies, Pink Fresh Studio Floral Backdrop cover plate die, Trinity Scallop Shel embellishments, Misti, Big Shot Switch, Connect glue, SU Dimensionals

Supplies Card 2

Berry Wreath Die set by Simon Says Stamp, Triple Line Diamond Hot Foil Plate by Waffle Flower, Perfect Sentiments Holiday Hot Foil set by Pink Fresh Studio

Paper: Gina K Designs Layering Weight White, Black, Jelly Bean Green, Tranquil Teal, Fresh Asparagus, Passionate Pink, Innocent Pink

Other: Spellbinders gold foils, Spellbinders Hot Foil System, Big Shot, Connect glue, SU Dimensionals