Freshly Made Sketches #583

 

Bonnie and I traded a few more washi blossoms!  She was kind enough to send me the new Tuberoses from Pinkfresh Studios! I had a card made within hours of receiving them - then found a fun place to plant them:
Freshly Made Sketches #583

First, a closeup so you can see all the glorious gold-foil in this tape:

When I saw another company introduce a 'tuck it' die,

I remembered this little lovely from PF: Noteworthy Frames - it was just the right size for my gold heat-embossed sentiment [PTI] and place to tuck those 

beautiful Tuberoses...

Quick, simple, and CAS - just the way we like it!  I hope the FMS583 host is okay with my rendition of her fun Sketch!  Thanks, Narelle - and a great big thanks to Bonnie!  I think she'll be posting her cards using them today, too!  Can't wait!

=] Michele

More Tulips?

More, and more, and more when it comes to tulips, I can never have TU-many!  

I will only take a smidgen of your Friday evening but really wanted to share these sweeties - they've been waiting so patiently for their premier...

Most definitely in the 'hand deliver' category, right?  Here's her money shot lol...

Have a great weekend, everyone!  

=] Michele

The Stamp Market 3D mini tulips

Waffle Flower Crafts: Nesting Square Frames

Pinkfresh Studio: Happy Dance stamps and dies 

Doodlebugs Friday!

Happy weekend eve my friends!

My head is filled with butterflies - and so are my cards this week!

Beautiful neutrals and WHITE foiling come together today!

Hope my little sneak peek inspires you to stop by the Doodlebugs Blog today!

Thank you!

=] Michele

It's a Party!

 My friend, and boss, at Doodlebugs is celebrating her birthday and YOU are ALL invited!  

Happiest birthday, Cathy!

My card was created with that fabulous Spellbinders' Wonderful Tulips hot foil/die combo set that I shared with Marcia last week ... stenciled, die-cut, and trimmed then mounted on my new Pinkfresh A2 Slider Die.  I cut it first from 80# white card I had layered with patterned paper - also used on my card front.  

Hope you have the best birthday yet!

Thanks, my friends for your support of this wonderful small business!  Don't forget the discount code: PARTY!!

=] Michele

Sharing stencils and lunch with my friend Marcia!

Hello, my friends!  So glad you stopped by!

Yes, Marcia and I did have another play day... we're making up for the long Winter this Spring and are grateful for every moment!  I was the host this time!

As many new products as we have to share, we both love stenciling so much, we made a day of it!  I had a new set from Spellbinders, and I asked Marcia to share her gorgeous Dahlia from The Ton!  That was just the beginning of our sharing!

Ready? set. go...

If you are familiar with stencils from The Ton, you will know that they are known for their LARGE flowers.  ONE was big enough for TWO cards - it killed me to cut it in two!  Here's a fun illusion...

Here are my pretty pinks from The Ton - I borrowed two greens from Marcia:

Pinkfresh Meadow, and Mint

It was such a treat to get my inks on another gorgeous layering stencil set from The Ton: Precious Poppies...

I kept them soft and bright - like Icelandic Poppies - here are my inks:

Marcia brought a few dies that she knew I'd love... that simple lattice in the background adds just the right amount of lift for my Poppies - see that greenery peeking through?  It's a stencil from Lavinia Stamps that I picked up at Buffalo Stamps and Stuff - I'll share more of it soon.  [Marcia, Bonnie, and Leslie would have flipped over the HUGE display of all things Lavinia!]

There was one more set in Marcia's basket: Spring Meadow from The Greetery!  I kept my card simple as I just loved how this stencil filled the front of it!

Don't you love this sentiment?  Also, from The Greetery - I think?

It was a great day of stenciling, chatting, sharing - and our lunch together was so delicious, too!  I spoiled Marcia with a bluegill dinner, and she provided the perfect coleslaw to accompany it!  [soo good - with apples - maybe she'll share her recipe!]  [For those of you non-fishermen, bluegill is a small freshwater fish lovingly caught in our favorite inland lake nearby, expertly filleted by my husband - I'm so ready for our season to begin!]

Okay you know we're already planning our next playday - but let's go see what fun Marcia had with the stencils she borrowed from me, shall we?  I can't wait!

Love you, sweet friend!  Can't wait for next time!

=] Michele

Freshly Made Sketches #582 and Peace on Earth #38

 

Karren had me scratching my head with her Sketch this week - but I persevered, and actually ended up with a pretty cute Christmas card!

Thanks, Karren and Freshly Made Sketches #582 and Peace on Earth #38 for the cute inspiration!

Reverse Confetti - no longer available but still cute as can be - atop a wonderful PF cover die {Geo Tiles} borrowed from my friend Marcia!  More to share soon!

Let the weekend begin!

=] Michele

Thanks POE!! Much appreciated!

Doodlebugs Friday!

I've gotten my Prismacolor pencils out recently and rediscovered how relaxing they can be - and my arm is getting adjusted to it, too!  

Here is the gorgeous image I'll be coloring - from Concord & 9th: Blended Petals - I stamped it onto a panel of Bristol paper on the most 'toothy' side.

I'm pretty happy with the results - hope you'll stop over at the

Doodlebugs Blog to see the finished project!

Thanks so much!

=] Michele

Wonderful in Every Way!

I made two more cards using my Pinkfresh Studios' Wonderful in Every Way set of stamps and dies.  This time I used my Copics to color them - hope you like them!

Adding thin foam squares to the back, each floral branch was added to a panel of Lil' Inkers Dip Dyed Ombre cardstock [sadly no longer available] that had been debossed first.  I think I'll send one of them over to the Triple B Challenge!

Thanks for stopping by - always appreciated!

=] Michele

More fabulous Pinkfresh Washi!

My generous friend recently shared some of her stash with me - included in the bag was the fantastic Lemons and Blueberries washi tape suite from Pinkfresh Studio.

I had such a fun play time spurred on by my playdate with Marcia, Bonnie, and Bobby recently... hope you like them!  [a personal thanks to my friend Michelle Two Ls for these two beautiful green cardstocks from PTI]

The first two are made with the gorgeous washi tape - die cut and arranged in a circular fashion.

This next card was sent to a wonderful friend for her birthday!

It features a little snippet of that green that just couldn't be wasted - and a sentiment stamped in shades of her favorite color: purple!

The water-colored no-line look of the washi is my favorite - but I had to have a 

go at stamping and water coloring a few lemons and blueberries, too!

Two wonderful layers of white topped with a wreath that anyone might be 

happy to hang on their front door!  This sentiment is an oldie from EH stamped on one of my favorite Altenew labels.

Simple Copic coloring is such a simple but enjoyable way to add color to any stamped image.  I really love the sentiments in this set, too!

Thank you, Marcia for your generosity - you are always welcome to take them back home any time you want to! 

If you could have seen all the four-letter-word-stuff falling from our skies today, you'd appreciate even more why I wanted to share these cards with you today!  YUCK!  Thank goodness it isn't sticking around!  But if YOU did, thanks a bunch!

=] Michele

Card 1:  Pinkfresh Ornate Medallions, Fancy Circles, sentiment: PF Wonderful in Every Way?

Card 2:  Pinkfresh Mini Slimline Essentials - for circle, SU subtle texture embossing

Card 3:  Altenew Labels, Pinkfresh Stitched Rectangles, Daisy Chain background die, sentiment EH

Card 4:  Pinkfresh Braided Tag, seam binding, HoneyBee Holiday Pearl stickers

Color Hues #62

My friend Cindy Beach is the host with the most beautiful color combination for us at Color Hues #62: Purple and Green!  Okay, I know, and you know the first thought is to reach for florals as did the entire CH team - and they are absolutely  gorgeous!  But I had a different idea - are you surprised? lol.

You'd have to see that I've taken artistic license with the star of my card - and Cindy probably won't see a Crane in this color - but she did give an order to have fun...

I've taken my cloud color cues from my husband's photos of our lighting last night!

These are the inks I've used with an old MFT cloud stencil:

This gorgeous Altenew Red-Crowned Crane is going to collect frequent flier miles

at my place - isn't he just fabulous??

A few Spellbinders dies [GLP-366 and S5-527] came into play with a duo of greens to create my marshy area.  A third green: CP Melon Ice, was used to stamp this 

PF Perfect Sentiments stamp and die set.  

 Hope you have had a great weekend and there was a little bit of crafting involved!

=] Michele

FMS581 Second Helpings!

 Don't say I didn't warn you about making more than one card while I have all the mess supplies out on my desk!  Second helpings for Freshly Made Sketches #581 coming up!

Here are those stamped Eucalyptus leaves I talked about...

This gorgeous green from Stampin' Up tried to look black - I fixed that...

I should have saved this next card - you just have to know the Color Hues colors will be peach and green next week, right? lol

There's something very old-time-y about this gorgeous set from The Stamp Market

But it's just too pretty not to share! 

=] 

The Flower Challenge Reminder #79

I had that fabulous win over at Pinkfresh in January - guess what was included in that prize?  BACKGROUND STAMPS!!  I'm happy to remind you today that you have plenty of time to create a FLORAL card focusing on background stamping for Challenge #79 at The Flower Challenge!

When using a new stamp for the first time, I often follow the wonderful example of color combinations offered by Pinkfresh - they are the pros!  I didn't have the exact colors, or the Pinkfresh inks, but I got pretty close:

Then I took it one step further and added a little blue sky behind their blooms!

Let's see if you can find the final treatment my background was treated to...

It's soon going to be graduation season around here - one word says it all!

So. Have you treated us to your background stamping yet?  There's still time, and there is plenty of inspiration from The Flower Challenge team!

=] Michele

Pinkfresh Studio: Poppy Mix and coloring stencils

c. 2015 SSS Congrats die

Cuttlebug embossing folder - OLD

Playing Cards with Friends - April 2023

Hello, my friends!  I'm Playing Cards with Friends again and am very excited to have Jen Timko whose blog, Stampin' on the Fly - fits her lifestyle perfectly as she is a pilot!  Yeah - how cool is that!?

Jen is also one of the fabulous designers on the Freshly Made Sketches team - you all know how much I love to play cards there, right?

As I looked for an assignment for us, I found this one at National Holidays: Husband Appreciation Day is today - who knew?  I know we all appreciate our husbands - I sure do appreciate mine. 

Okay!  Here's our assignment:

                Make a card for your husband.  Something silly, or serious - your choice!               Let’s include masculine colors:  shades of blue, and greens.

        Add alpha dies or die cut words!

Playing Cards with someone who makes a living on a 'winged-thing' and showing appreciation to my husband who loves ALL the winged things was a perfect fit!  Of course, it HAS to be butterflies!  Here's my card:

A slimline card gives me lots of 'real estate' for a garden full of Pinkfresh butterflies

for my guy - these happen to be cut from the negative-foiling from another Glimmer day.  Then I brought in a rainbow of inks to color in the white lines.

The dark steely grey gives my card a masculine feel - naturally these flutterbys needed a garden - mine is embossed using Spellbinders' Four Petal Floral folder.

My words of appreciation will be added inside - for our anniversary in May! But I found the required die-cut words from Altenew's Versatile Greetings.

I have had little luck foiling onto colored cardstock - this greeting was gold foiled on white then Hickory Smoke oxide ink was added.  

Okay!  My playtime has come to an end and I truly cannot wait to see how Jen brought our assignment to paper... let's go, shall we?  

Thank you so very much, Jen for accepting my invitation to play - btw I'm still waiting for your detour to our Muskegon airport! Maybe someone could just drop you there for a three-day furlough? wink!

=] Michele