Stay healthy

I've been very distracted lately and haven't been very creative.  I lost my good friend and faithful dog recently.  He lived a good life, but had a difficult time this spring.  Cancer strikes again and he crossed the Rainbow Bridge the end of June.  I miss him a lot.

I did find myself making a belated birthday card recently.  This was for a man trying to stay healthy while this pandemic is keeping him at home.

Independence Day

Tomorrow is the day that we celebrate freedom in the USA.  I made a couple of cards to celebrate.

Flowers and bees

I've been playing with more new dies and created a couple more cards.  When I made this background die-cut with a new Studio Katia die, it looked like a honeycomb, so I searched for some bee dies and found this one by Memory Box, called Sweet Honeybees.  Next, i needed some flowers, so I found some I had for some time and cut them out of bright colored cardstock.  The bees wings are cut from some new holographic cardstock from Simon Says Stamp.

I have more dies to play with, so I'll keep trying to use them.

Playing with new dies

I created a few more cards from new dies.  This first one was for a female relative with many problems right now.

The 2nd card was just to try out some fun new dies.

The background is done with alcohol inks.  The leaves are by Poppy Stamps and the daffodil from Simon Says Stamp.

New dies

I have quite a few new dies that I'm beginning to play with.  There will be more to come, but here are a couple of cards.

Masks and die cut card

I've been spending a lot of time making masks for friends.  I ordered some great elastic cord from Simon Says Stamp.  My friends liked the elastic so much that I'm been making lots of masks.  This elastic cord is so soft that it doesn't hurt their ears.  I also learned to add wire twistem to the nose portion to shape it around the nose.  This keeps your glasses from steaming up.  The masks are 2 layers of fabric, with the twistem inside the top seam. I don't know how long we will need to wear masks, but they are required at some places here in town.

My neighbor had a lot of fabric from her mother, who was a quilter, so I've been making masks from many of these fabrics.  You can't really tell from these photos, but it's a simple rectangle with pleats on both sides.  There are many different fabrics.

I did take some time to make a card from one of my new dies.

This die is from Waffle Flower and called Herringbone Panel Die.  It has a diamond shaped solid area in the center.  I used a very old Martha Stewart punch for the center, the cut it out with a Spellbinder scalloped square.  I added some gems on the center piece.

Now I just got a shipment of more new dies to play with.  Hope to make some cards with them soon, between making masks.

Playing with dies

I recently bought some new dies, so I've been playing to see how to use them.  This one is from Waffle Flower and called Vine Frame Die.  It has a lot of detail and required a metal shim to cut it completely in my Big Shot.  It also has some dies for words to place in the banner.  For this card, I used an alcohol ink background and placed the die cut vine on top.  It's a bit busy, but fun.

On the second card, I kept the cardbase very plain and used an inlay technique to fill in the leaves.
The die in the center is by Memory Box and called Lavender bunch.

Spring Birthday

Time to make another family birthday card.  I used one of my alcohol ink backgrounds that I made earlier and added the die cut from Simon Says Stamp called Tulip Collage.  I added some color to the tulips with colored pencils to make them show better.  Sentiment is another die cut.

Watercolor flowers

While I was in the mood to make cards, I decided to make another get well card.

The flowers are from a set by Simon Says Stamp, called Look for the Rainbow.  The sentiment is from a set by Crafter's Companion, called Get Well Soon.  I stamped the sentiment on vellum with Versamark ink and embossed with Alabaster White embossing powder from Brutus Monroe.  The image was colored with Distress ink and water on watercolor paper.

Passing the time

With this pandemic going on, I've been staying home and wasting time.  I decided it was time to make some cards.  This first was made with watercolors.

scan

photo

My computer was updated recently and I can no longer use my old camera to post photos.  I tried the scanner, but it's so flat and the gold paper looks like a matte brown.  The photo was taken with my phone and doesn't do as good as my old reliable camera.

I stamped and embossed the floral image and watercolored the flowers and leaves.  Then I added the watercolored background.  The sentiment was stamped last.

scan

photo

Since this card is very flat, the difference in the scan and photo are less noticeable.  I used a variety of small stamps to create this card.  I masked the mountains and blended some Distress Oxide inks for the sky.  I used Stormy Sky and Peacock Feathers inks.  I then colored the rest of the image with colored pencils.