Don't Have a Cow!!! Three is Better!!...

Hello dear friends: I have a card to share with you this very, very stormy morning made with on of the cutest sets of critters I own.  It's from My Favorite Things and it's called The Whole Herd.

I mean, can this cows be more adorable?  I stamped them onto a water color paper oval die cut with Stazon black ink and colored them with Prismacolor pencils and Distress Inks in Shabby Shutters for the grass, Broken China for the sky and a bit of Spun Sugar for their cute little snouts.

The pattern papers are from a retired collection from Lili of the Valley, the sentiment from the set.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card.

I just glued a scrap strip of the pattern paper and stamped the sentiment and the cow from the set.

I'm linking this card to the following challenges.

Pause,Dream,Enjoy Challenges #182 "Down on the Farm"

Cheerful Sketches Challenge  for July

(I turned it on it's side, hope it's ok)

Happy Little Stampers July challenge "Animals"

The Crafty Addicts Challenge #38 Anything goes/Something Humorous.

(I think this cows are hilarious)

Crafty Animals Anything Goes/must have animals.

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.

RAINBOWS!!!!!

Hello everyone: We at RETRO RUBBER, have a new challenge for you to have some fun with, this time we want to see RAINBOWS!!  Here is this card I made to inspire you to join my teammates and I in our gallery.

This sweet little Hedgehogs are from a Penny Black stamp set called "WONDERFUL" I bought it back in March of 2014.

I stamped this two cuties onto a panel of water color paper with Stazon black ink, sponged the sky and grass with Distress Inks in Shabby Shutters and Tumbled Glass, die cut the balloons and added some embroidery strings using a glue dot to attach them to the hands of the little Hedgehogs. The sprigs of grass and flowers are stamped with a couple of Art Impressions stamps.

Now, I'm going to show you another card I made with Rainbow colors.  I saw THIS VIDEO by Nicole Picadura that encouraged me to give this technique a try.  I always love seeing cards with gorgeous water color washes but, every time I attempt to make one, I end up with a muddy mess. 

This is not all the pretty I would have wanted but at least the colors are not completely messed up.

I kind of like the colors on the left, with the reds and orange tones but, it starts getting bad after the yellow and blue, the purple at the end was saved because I soaked the puddle of water that was mixing the green and blue and overtaking the purple.  I need A LOT more practice, this is kind of ok for my first try.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my first card.

The sentiment is from Hero Arts and I inked it up using my SU markers in Real Red, Daffodil Delight, Old Olive, Tempting Turquoise and Elegant Eggplant.

So stop by the RETRO RUBBER to see the awesome cards my teammates have there for your inspiration and please join us in the gallery.

Please remember to use at least ONE OF YOUR STAMPS that is older than ONE YEAR and, 

please mention the age of your stamps or how long you've had them.

Only new work, no back linking please.

You can enter up to 10 challenges including ours.

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria. 

The Warm Glow.....

Hello everyone: This week over at SHOPPING OUR STASH, we have a new challenge for you to have some fun with. The theme is "You Light Up My Life" which means we want you to use any kind of light source image on your cards.  It could be a lamp, flash light, lantern, etc. you get the picture. Here is the card I made to hopefully inspire you to join my teammates and I in the gallery.

This pretty image is from my old stash of Flourishes sets and it's called "S'more Fun".  I stamped it with Stazon black ink onto a die cut piece of water color paper and colored it with my Prismacolor pencils. I applied a bit of Hello Honey with a sponge dauber for the glow.

The background is done with the retired SU embossing folder called "Woodland", I applied a thin coat of Baked Brown Sugar to the side that is not raised and ran the card stock through the Big Shot.

I sponged a bit of Broken China between the trees for a sky and I stamped and die cut the little Cardinal Birds with a teeny tiny cardinal die from a collection from Paper Tray Ink called "All Through the House".  The sentiment is from the Flourishes set, stamped onto Vellum.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card.

The sentiment and corner flowers are from a Power Poppy set called Sunny Harvest, stamped with Hello Honey ink.

I hope you come and play along with us over at SHOPPING OUR STASH, don't forget to visit the blogs of my teammates for even more inspiration.

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.

Orange Crush!!!!!

Hello everyone: Once again, it's time to send out a little reminder to you to join us at THE FLOWER CHALLENGE.   In this challenge we want to see you create your cards using either DRY EMBOSSING OR HEAT EMBOSSING or both.  Here is the card I made to inspire you to join my teammates and I in our gallery.

The other day, I saw THIS VIDEO TUTORIAL from StampTV., about how to "color" with Bleach. I was intrigued, I never thought of Bleach as a stamping tool, 😲 sheeesh!! I just use it for the laundry!!! but non the less, I decided to give it a try,  the results were awesome!!  So, for my card I picked this beautiful bouquet from a Power Poppy set called Countryside Bouquet Deluxe.  First I sponged some Distress Inks in Spiced Marmalade and Ripe Persimmon on a panel of water color paper, then I stamped the flowers with Versmark ink and heat emboss it with white embossing powder.  Then I went over the flowers with a small brush dipped in the bleach and just touched some areas, the color immediately started to fade so I was real careful not to do to much.  I love the way this turned out, and the best part of all, is that there is no bleach smell when it dries. 

Then, I made a cut on either side of the stems and wrapped some twine a few times and tied a bow.

I stamped part of a sentiment from the Power Poppy set called Azaleas and die cut the word "Amazing" with an Elizabeth Craft Designs die.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card.

The sentiment is from an old Flourishes set called "Dahlias", it was also die cut with THIS Spellbinders die set.  The flower at the bottom is from the same set as the front flowers.

I colored it with Prismacolor pencils.

I hope this card inspires you to join us in THE FLOWER CHALLENGE  gallery.

Please add our challenge banner to your post when you enter our challenge.

Please check our rules, there are simple but important.
So, pop over THE FLOWER CHALLENGE to see my teammates amazing inspiration cards and join us in the gallery, we can't wait to see what you create.

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.
Until next time, happy stamping.
Hugs from Maria.

You Are The Bomb!!!!!

Hello everyone: I made this card yesterday but, as it's usually the case, LIFE got in the way and I couldn't take pictures or write the post until this morning so, here  it is, hope you like it.

I will link this card to a few challenges at the end of this post.

This beautiful image is from the Power Poppy set called Dynamic Duos:Peonies and Tulips.

I stamped with Stazon black ink on Strathmore water color paper and colored it with SU markers,  an aqua painter and Prismacolors for added shadows.

The black die cut is from Spellbinders, pattern paper from my stash.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card.

I don't have a smaller image of a Peony for the inside so I just stamped the same image but with Spun Sugar Distress Ink, the sentiment is from an old Flourishes set called "Tulips for Friends"

I would like to enter this card onto the following challenges.

The Sisterhood of Crafters "Where in the World?" I live in Indiana and the State Flower is the Peony.

Peonies are also called "Bombs" hence the sentiment. 

The Paper Shelter Challenge #302 "Punches or Dies"

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.
Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.

CAS Tulip for SOS #311.....

Hello dear blogging friends: I love the CAS style of card making but sometimes I find it a bit difficult to leave a lot of empty space on my cards but, none the less, once in a while I venture into making this very elegant and, well.....simple cards to get used to the guidelines for CAS.

This week over at SHOPPING OUR STASH we want to see your interpretation of this style of card making, so I hope my card inspires you to join my teammates and me in our gallery.

I love SHOPPING MY STASH of very old and retired stamp sets, I have a ton of Flourishes sets that I absolutely love, this image is from one of those retired sets called "Tulips for Friends" that came out back in 2013. I stamped it onto a die cut piece of watercolor paper with Stazon black ink and colored it with some of my Sakura Koy watercolors. I always save the negative piece of die cuts, I have a nice stash of them in a box ready for when I need them.  I really wanted to color this Tulip and leave it alone but, as I was finishing adding some shadows to the petals, my aqua painter decided to jump off of my hand and it landed on the bottom left side of the flower making a big smear of paint on it.

I gasped!!!😨, my first impulse was to just start over but, I really loved the colors I got on this flower so, I decided to fix it somehow. I tried to remove the ink with a small brush and water but, all I achieved was to make the ink bleed so, what the heck!! I went around the whole image with my brush dipped in water and that was that!! 

A small sentiment and a couple of Nuvo drops completed this card front.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card.

The sentiment is from another Flourishes set called "With Gratitude", the little tulips on the bottom, from "From the Garden", colored with Prismacolor pencils.

So I hope you give this challenge a try, go check out the SHOPPING OUR STASH challenge blog to see my teammates awesome creations.  And, for your 411, July 12th. is Simplicity Day, CHECK OUT THIS LINK to this blog and find out how you can simplify your life, there are some awesome quotes there that I've been implementing in my craft room. 

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.

The "Dreaded" OLC.....

Hello dear blogging friends: I love, love all kinds of styles for making cards but there is one style that always intimidates me a bit.....CAS!!  Yes, yes, I know, what's so hard about it?? Well, I often need to fill up the space and that is a BIG No No!!!   But, none the less, I enter this challenges just to be able to practice and learn, how else am I going to get any better in teaching my brain it's ok to leave empty space around so, here is this card I made for the Less is More Challenge #336 & 337, which is collaborating with the AAA Cards and the talented DT's are asking us to make a "One Layer Card" with the added "bonus" of using colored card stock, anything but white is to be used.

This image is from the retired Flourishes set called "Zinnias", the butterfly is from a set I've had for years but I don't know it's name or where it came from, it has 9 gorgeously detailed images. I stamped the flowers and the butterfly onto a single, yellow card base first with Stazon black ink, color them with my Prismacolor pencils, easy peasy, and once it was finished, I stamped it again with Versafine black ink and heat embossed it with clear embossing powder to make the lines visible again, the pencils kind of made them look opaque,  I just left the images on my MISTI so I could stamp them again in the exact same place.

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Here is a picture of the finished inside of my card, I also left this with no layers.

Both the sentiment and the butterfly are from the same sets.

I'm linking this card onto the following challenges.

"Less is More"

AAA Cards: CAS game #94 A collaboration with "Less is More" 

International Art and Soul Challenge #12 "Elements of Nature" 

(Flora, Fauna, Water, Sky, People.....)

Thank you for stopping by, I always read every single comment you so kindly leave on my posts, I want you to know I appreciate them more than words can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.