Inspired by Challenges

Nothing like a good challenge blog to get the creative juices flowing in the ole craft corner ... and this week has been full of a few ... I combined the Stamping 411 Color challenge of Island Indigo, Pool Party, Coral Calypso and Lucky Limeade with the Friday Mash Up use Pastels on a Birthday themed challenge and finished it up with the Just Us Girls layout sketch challenge to come up with the following offering!

 

The Inspired by Nature stamp is so fun to use the pastel chalks on ... the cone flowers just pop right off the page!

The new stamp set Take it to Heart has a little ribbon stamp that I just LOVE as a sentiment accent for a card. I can see myself using this on a scrapbooking layout too! 

The Loving Thoughts stamp set in the Occasions mini was designed to fit perfectly inside this which is awesome! However the other great thing about Stampin' Up is our coordinating products - cause it fits so many of our other sentiments neatly inside it as well so if you do not have the Loving Thoughts stamp set yet - not worries ... I used the Wish Big sentiment from Short and Sweet stamp set and added some pearl accents to balance it off.

The paper piercer is also a marvelous tool - my card felt a little 'lopsided' to me so I added some subtle paper piercings up in the corner - which helped to balance it out for my anal mind!

I am just loving this color palette of the Sale-abration Everyday Enchanted paper .... if you love it too you can earn it FREE with a $60 order as of January 24th or you can book a workshop during Sale-abration and you can earn hostess dollars AND free Sale-abration products ... win win! 

In the mean time hop on over to the following blogs and check out the wonderful offerings other card designers have come up with using these challenge inspirations!

The Friday Mashup

 Just us Girls

Stamping 411

Happy Stampin'
Margaret

Doing the Monkey Mash ....

Having fun this week combining The Friday Mash Up color challenge of Aqua, Chocolate and White...

With the A La Card Monkey Challenge layout below ....

And coming up with the following Tempting Turquoise, Early Espresso and Whisper White / Silver offering!

 

 I used the branch from the 2 Step Bird Builder punch to create the Glimmer wreath and than I created my own Tempting Turquoise glitter for the berries on it ... how cool is that?

All you need to create your own glimmer paper is some Versamark,  Heat and stick powder and glitter of your choice - I made up a 2x2 square of this and than punched out my berries as well as a tag for my sentiment!

Happy Stampin'

Margaret

Mashing Up Stamping 411

Had fun this weekend creating some challenge cards .... great way to stay warm on a cold rainy weekend ... there are so many inspiring challenges out there that I combined a few to come up with my card creations!

Started by Mashing up a snowflake inspired easel card for the Friday Mashup ... feel free to click the picture to see how others were inspired by the challenge ....

Then I hopped on over to the Stamping 411 and was inspired by their layout and incorporated it into my card as well ... I did flip the orientation a bit to make it work with the easel ... feel free to click the photo to see the wonderful inspirations others had from this layout!

And finally my color combination was inspired by this months Goldstar Ink team challenge  ... make a card using grey, blue and red in a card to share with the team ... and here is my final inspiration combining these three awesome challenges.

I love how the embossing powders of silver and iridescent ice really make this card 'sparkle' and I used the silver cardstock as well which is a shade of grey and adds  some additional dimension and glam to it ...almost used our new silver glimmer paper but restrained myself otherwise people might have needed sunglasses to view the card!

And the final Piece De Resistance that makes this card so yummy for me .... a little Doily snowflake accent, rhinestone bling and dazzling details were added to the snowflakes and sentiment! 

Thanks for stopping by and taking time to leave a comment - your support and encouragement means a lot!

Happy Stampin'

Margaret

Mash it up!

Being away on Friday did not stop me from coming back to be inspired by an awesome Friday Mashup Challenge ... create a Black and White & Square card ...

Which was an awesome challenge to pair with the Create with Connie and Mary Challenge ... which was also a square card challenge!

So here is my final inspiration .... Black and White Fabulous Florets .... the more I play with this set the more I just LOVE it! I paired the black and white stamped images with a little bit of embossing powder for some pop factor and used the Heard from the Heart Sentiment and a Rosettes as finishing touches!

I cut out the stem and a black embossed with white floret and popped them up on dimensional's for a bit of added dimension ... I just love the way this one turned out and hope you do to!

Friday Mashup!

Ok - so the craft room has had a tragic accident - the three shelf wall storage unit that I had over top of my workspace came crashing down the past week despite the 300 pound wall anchors holding it!

Fortunately the universe was looking out for me and neither I nor anyone else was IN the craft room at the time having just momentarily vacated it to head upstairs for lunch with the kids!

However the proceeding mess and lack of storage has made it a little less than workable in there - so no traditional cards until I can carve out sometime to shop for new storage solutions!

So for this weeks Friday Mashup I had went to my trustee much loved My Digital Studio to get creative with the layout and color scheme ... and had so much fun I created not one but THREE entries and finally had to tell myself to stop and go make dinner!

Entry number one makes use of the Blueberry Crisp DSP, Baroque Motifs stamp set which I think matches the DSP perfectly when accented with some Flower Brads with some Pearl Accents

Entry number two was inspired by a desire to create a more masculine care so I went with the new Nautical Expedition Designer Series paper and matching Open Sea stamp set with the sentiment from the For All You Do stamp set.

Finally entry number three uses the Filled with Love stamp set to create the background paper and paired it with the Just Believe floral image and sentiment of the Elements of Style sentiment.

Stength & Hope Hybrid Mash Up

Playing along to the Friday Mashup Challenge again this week! Which is awesome cause I was looking for a nice clean and simple card for an upcoming Stamp a Stack and this layout was perfect!

I am so loving the upcoming new set Strength and Hope that will be in the new Summer Mini catalog ... both the traditional and the My Digital Studio download - which has many awesome patterns of DSP to coordinate with the set - which is what I have used here in this card to create my 'strip'.

Turns out that the mind is an amazing thing! Creating this card over the weekend with the layout above I must have subconsciously CASED it from over on Splitcoaststampers ... such a pretty card it must have been in the back of my mind from having been over there looking for inspiration from for something else - so thank you to the original inspirer!

I added a different sentiment, changed the placement of the butterfly and of course added some 'bling' to mine with some half back pearls - such a simple card but so elegant at the same time!

Hope the ladies at Saturdays Stamp a Stack enjoy this one as much as I do - and if you are looking for something fun to do this weekend I still have a couple of spots left for the Stamp a Stack so come on out and enjoy some great company, hilarious conversation and some awesome cards for your collection!

St Patricks Day Hybrid

St Patrick's Day is just around the corner and here is a sample of a card we made at last weekends Stamp a Stack to help celebrate the day!

This card had NO stampin' (gasp I know) but packed a lot of punch instead ... it was still loads of fun to make ... it featured the Square Lattice emboss folder for the background in Wild Wasabi, the large Heart punch in Garden Green for the Shamrock and the rainbow is made up of Real Red, Daffodil Delight, Pumpkin Pie, Marina Mist, Certainly Celery and Concord grape punched with the scallop edge punch!

The sentiment was created in My Digital Studio from the Calandar Basics and the Circle Circus stamp sets in Wild Wasabi and Garden Green colours and than printed out and punched with the 1 3/4 circle punch.

( the glitter paper is not Stampin Up - we have some gorgeous Real Red glitter paper and my fingers are crossed that they choose to sell some more colours in the future)

ETA .. a blog I follow participated in the following Blog Challenge on their blog recently - so I went over to check it out and thought this card would be a perfect one for the challenge - so wanted to share it and am looking forward to new challenges to play along with - love the challenge sites they help me think outside the box!