A Cheer Up Bunch.

Hello everyone: As always, I hope you and your families are still healthy and safe, I've been saying for a long time that the only way to avoid ending up in a hospital, sick or worse, is by taking all the precautions and follow the guidelines.

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Anyway, the RETRO RUBBER has this picture to inspire you to come and play along with so I hope to see you in our gallery.

This is my card.

This is the inside.

And this is what I used.

Every single flower and greenery was stamped and cut with the Stampin' Up! set called "Beautiful Bouquet (2017-2018)

The sentiment on the little tag is from a Flourishes set called 

"Zinnias" (2011)

I embossed the panel with the retired Stampin' Up! embossing folder

called "Quilt Top".

The sentiment inside is from a Power Poppy set called 

"Always Here" (2018)

I hope you come and play along with us over at the RETRO RUBBER

Challenge, hop over to our challenge blog and check out what my teammates have created to inspire you to join us.

Until next time, stay healthy and safe.

XO
Maria.

 

Pink Stocking.

 Hello everyone: I hope and pray you and your families are doing well and taking care of each other, please, don't forget to wear your masks.

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I have a very cute Christmas card that will be on it's Merry way to Mexico for my sweet little niece Regina, who is 9 years old, she is one of my brothers' little grandaughter, (my brother Carlos is 3 years younger than me which makes him 66).

Anywho, here's the card.

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This is the INSIDE 

This is what I used to create this card.

Power Poppy "Poinsettia", stamped with Memento black ink,

fussy cut and colored with Prismacolor pencils.

Vellum from an old Stampin' Up! pack

Power Poppy set called "Glitter House Village" (snowflakes)

Power Poppy "Merry Littles" (Tree)

I want to play with these challenges.

Mojo Monday

Send A Smile 4 Kids

Thank you for visiting today.

Stay healthy and safe.

Hugs,

Maria.

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CAS and Vellum.....

Hello dear friends: Is my wish that you and your families are well, taking care of each other, supporting each other in these very difficult times of uncertainty and pain, I pray for strength and peace.

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Welcome to another SHOPPING OUR STASH challenge, the theme is CAS or KISS=Keep It Simple Sister!!
There was a time when this style of card making was not at all my favorite, I felt that there was a lot of unused card stock and to me, that was kind of wasteful but, since then I've come to appreciate the elegance and simplicity of the CAS style and learned that I can still add some images to utilize the space better.
I browse Pinterest for inspiration and there I found THIS CARD by Janet a.k.a Swanlady 21 and decided to CASE it, thank you, Janet.

Some of the details you can use are a little pop of color, dry and heat embossing and, some thread or ribbon, in my card I added some silver metallic thread.

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This is the INSIDE of my card.

I chose to leave the inside without a sentiment, this could be a Wedding or Aniversary card too.

I hope you come and join the SHOPPING OUR STASH crew in our gallery with your CAS cards, for more inspiration, check what the rest of the team has prepared for you.

I want to play with the following challenges.

The Paper Players

"Less is More"

This is what I used to create this card.

Altenew "Beautiful Day" and "Peony Bouquet".

Stampin' Up! "Flowering Fields"

Stampin' Up! "Delicate Details"

Power Poppy "Dynamic Duos: Peonies and Tulips"

WOW Pearlescent Embossing Powder.

Gina Marie Designs Enamel Dots.

Metallic thread from my stash.

Thank you for stopping by.

Stay healthy and safe.

XO

Maria.

Have a Very Vellum Christmas.......

Hello everyone: I hope you and your family are doing well, staying healthy and safe. 

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I don't work with vellum often and that's weird because it always adds a very beautiful and soft touch to your cards.  Last year I bought a GROOVI PLATE with these beautiful Christmas ornaments and I couldn't believe how easy it was to create beautiful images using a stylus, parchment paper and these plates, it's really fun and it goes fast.

I used two of the ornaments on this plate, then I added Inka Gold paint to them, super easy, below is a picture of the golden detail on these pretty images.

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This is the inside of my card.

I apologize for the yellowish color of this picture, I had a really hard time photographing this card, the sun was covered by thick clouds and my lamp was not working well.

The sentiment is from a Power Poppy set called Glistening Paperwhites, which happens to be on sale right now, Woo Hoo!!!

The little Christmas tree is from another Power Poppy set called Merry Littles.

I'm linking up with these challenges.

CAS Mix Up Card Challenge

I added Inka Gold paint and a stamped sentiment.

Christmas Craft Creations

I die cut the golden bow and the sentiment tag.

Thank you for visiting me today.

Stay safe and healthy.

XO

Maria.

Gold Embossing on Vellum.....

Hello everyone: It's time for another fun challenge over at SHOPPING OUR STASH, the theme is EMBOSSING, dry or heat or both.

Here's my card and I hope it inspires you to come and play along.

This image is from the Stampin' Up! 2019 SAB catalog.

I really love the lace look behind the lovely flowers.

I stamped the image on vellum with Versamark ink and heat embossed it in gold then, colored it on the back with Prismacolor pencils.

The sentiment is from a retired SU set called "Itty Bitty Banners" (2012).

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The sentiment is from a retired SU set called "Touch of Kindness" (2011 Summer Mini)

Hope you find a bit of time to join my teammates and me at the SHOPPING OUR STASH gallery, we can't wait to see what you create.

I'm playing along with the following challenges.

Papercraft Challenge

#46 "No DSP"

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

Hugs.

Maria.

A Little Reminder.....

Hello everyone: Well, we are halfway through September already, the Holidays are around the corner and I'm happy to say I have a good stash of cards ready to be mailed soon to friends and family.

But today I have another card created with the other flowers from the beautiful
"Painted Petals" set from My Favorite Things.
We have 2 fabulous prizes of $25.00 to give away this month generously provided by our amazing sponsor MY FAVORITE THINGS.
All of us at THE FLOWER CHALLENGE, including our fantastic Guest Designer Michele Ferguson from "I Card Everyone" are using their products on our cards.

I stamped the flowers and leaves (on green card stock) with Versamark ink and heat embossed them with white embossing powder, I sponged some pink and blue on the flowers and then, fussy cut all of them.

I embossed a piece of vellum with the "Quilted Top" embossing folder, (SU retired).  The die-cut sentiment is from my stash of dies that have no name, sheeeesh!! I apologize.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The border is from SU "Delicate Details" (retired), the sentiment is from SU "Whimsical Words) (retired too). 

I hope you come and check out THE FLOWER CHALLENGE for more inspiration from my awesome teammates and then, come and play along with us in our gallery.

Remember to make FLOWERS the main focus of your cards, you can enter 6 other challenges, including ours and please upload our banner to your post when you enter our challenge.

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

Hugs.

Maria.

There's More Fish in the Sea.....

Hello everyone: The SHOPPING OUR STASH challenge has a fun, "fishy" one for you, this time we want you to "Go Fishing" and show us some fishies on your cards, big fish, little fish and everything in between.
 Here's the card I created to inspire you to come and join my teammates and me in our gallery.

This card was made using a beautiful Stampin' Up! set called "All the Good Things" that came out one year ago last June. I love this beautiful Koi fish and the other images plus, the sentiments are amazing. The Lily Pads and flowers are from a 2009 Flourishes set called "Peace Within" and the bubbles are from a set by Designs by Ryn called "Water Effects".
I placed a piece of vellum on top of the fish to give the appearance of water and to have the Water Lillies look like they are floating on top.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The sentiment is from the SU set and the little fish in the corner from the Flourishes set.

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

Hugs.

Maria.

Heat Embossing and Prismas.....

Hello everyone: I'm really having fun coloring on dark card stock with my Prismacolor pencils, I think the colors get more intense because you have to apply a bit more pressure on the paper and you can always smooth the lines with paper stumps dipped in Gamsol.

My teammates and I over at the RETRO RUBBER CHALLENGE, have a fun Tic, Tac, Toe board for you to play with, it's one of the favorites because you have a lot of choices to pick from to play.

I chose the middle vertical line, RIBBON OR TWINE, FLOWERS AND EMBOSSING, EITHER HOT OR DRY.

Here's my card.

This flower is from The Crafts Meaw and was gifted to me by a dear friend of many years, Patti Willey.  She is one of the many, wonderful people who I'm blessed to call FRIENDS, we exchange cards often and we love it.

She gave me this set a good 5 or 6 years ago, thank you Patti.

So I stamped the image with Versamark ink on a piece of dark gray paper and heat embossed it with Pearlescent embossing powder then I colored it with my Prismacolor pencils.  This paper has a bit of a shine and that's why I had such a difficult time taking this picture. 

The butterfly was stamped on Vellum and color with the pencils too.

The sentiment was stamped with Versafine ink.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The border is done with SU "Delicate Details", the sentiment is from Power Poppy "Pure Prairie Spirit" and the flower on the corner from Power Poppy "Simply Camelias".

I hope you get inspired to come along and play with us at the RETRO RUBBER CHALLENGE, make sure you visit the blog to check out my teammates' beautiful creations.

Remember to use stamps that are OLDER THAN ONE YEAR, and if you can, please let us know how old they are or how long you've had them.

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

Hugs.

Maria.

Just My Style.....

Well, when I saw the mood board over at Double D Challenges (I'll put the board at the end of the post, it's so beautiful) a faint memory of a really fancy hat, with feathers and flowers came to my mind, I thought about it and decided to look for it on a box where I keep my plain rubber stamps.  I found it, all the way at the bottom and it looked like I've used before perhaps when I bought it? Who knows, it's been a long while since this stamp was inked up, this stamp is from Blank Page Muse and, as you can see, it's really very pretty.

I decided to stamp it on Vellum with gray Stazon ink and colored on the back side with some SU markers and Prismacolor pencils, but when I saw the front the colors were not as bright as I was hoping so, I braced myself and colored it on the front, you can maybe see the outlines of the pencils, I really tried to be careful going over them from the stamped image in the back. 

After I finish coloring it, I sponged some distress inks around to try to hide the score tape I used to glue the Vellum to the card stock, the sentiment was also in this box but this one I don't know where it came from. I placed some enamel dots from Gina Marie Designs to give the panel a little bling.

I also went with sponge daubers around the feathers to make them more feathery.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The punched detail is done with a Fiskars punch, the sentiment is from a Power Poppy set called Sassy Succulents and the little shoes from a super old stamp from Katie and Co. but they might be out of business because the only place I found this stamp is on Ebay so you can check it out there.

I want to play along with the following challenges.

Double D Challenges

Gorgeous Mood Board.

 

Aud Sentiments

Challenge #226 "Feminine"

SheepSki Designs Challenges

Challenge #26 "Flower Power"

The Paper Shelter

Challenge #382 "Colour It"

Simon Wednesday Challenge

Simon Says "For a Special Lady"

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

Hugs.

Maria.

Vellum Embossed Iris.....

Hello everyone: So we've arrived at the halfway point on our "Anything Goes" Challenge so here's a little reminder to inspire you to come and play along.

These pretty flowers are from the Altenew set called Enchanted Iris and it's beautiful.  I love these flowers, in real life, their petals are almost transparent so that's why I decided to stamp them on Vellum. But Vellum can be difficult at times, especially if you wet it, (don't ask me how I know, tee hee!!)

After a few futile attempts, I decided to heat emboss it hoping that the raised edges would help a bit with the warping.  

To my delight, they did, still had a little bit of twisting, especially on the petals and the leaves but, after the watercolor was dried, I used my bone folder to gently straighten them up.

I used my Sakura Koi watercolors, a bit of water and a very thin brush, I die cut the frame with THIS Spellbinders die set.

I added a few sparkly enamel dots from Gina Marie Designs.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The sentiment is from a Power Poppy set called Dynamic Duos: Peonies and Tulips, the frame is from an old Flourishes set called "Country Charm Labels" (2011), the butterfly is from THIS Stampendous clear stamp set.

I hope you find some time to come and play along with us over at THE FLOWER CHALLENGE, this challenge will close on the 25th. of March.

I'm playing along with the following challenges.

As You Like It Challenge

Favorite Dies or Stencils and Why.

Love these dies for the Iris, it cuts perfectly on the edge of the image.

CRAFT ROCKET CHALLENGES

Challenge #57 FLOWERS

Addicted to Stamps and More

I used Sakura Koi watercolors.

Ellibelle"s Corner

March Challenge: "Think Spring or add some Green"

Sisterhood of Crafters

One for the Ladies/Girls

Thank you for stopping by, your comments always make my day.

XO

Maria.

Baby, Baby for Retro Rubber.....

Hello crafty friends: My teammates and I at the RETRO RUBBER challenge blog, have a fun and fabulous new challenge for you, one that is always a favorite because of the many possibilities to play with. I hope you have some time to join us in the gallery, although I know how hard it can be to have some "alone time", with the children and grandchildren out on Summer Break, I tell you this because our own grandchildren are on vacation and you know what that means, right? 😊😉

 For my card, I chose the middle horizontal line on the Tic Tac Toe diagram, "Embossing, Pattern Paper and Baby".  The sweet images are from a long discontinued Flourishes set called "Hello Baby" that dates back to 2012, the Teddy Bear and Ducky are from another beloved set called "Baby Love", this set dates from 2009.

I stamped the Onsie and the Baby Booties on watercolor paper and colored them with "Coastal Cabana", I added a couple of yellow brads for the booties buttons.

I cut a piece of Lili of the Valley pattern paper (discontinued) and a piece of Vellum the same size, I embossed the Vellum with a retired SU embossing folder called "Filigree Frame" and stamped the Teddy and the Ducky with Stazon black ink and colored them on the back with SU markers.

The sentiment is from the "Baby Love" set.

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This is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The sentiment and the Baby Rattle are from the "Baby Love" set.

I hope you can find some time to come and play along with us at RETRO RUBBER, we can't wait to see what you create.  Please stop by the blog to check out my teammates' beautiful creations.

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.

Vellum Golden Garden.....

Hello everyone: I'm sharing a card today with you for THE FLOWER CHALLENGE, this time the theme for this month is ACETATE/VELLUM.  I hope you come and join my teammates and me in our gallery, here's my card to inspire you to play along.

I choose to work with Vellum so I stamped this flowers from the Altenew acrylic set called GOLDEN GARDEN, I like the sketchy look on all of these images.

I grabbed a piece of pink Vellum and stamped the images with Versamark ink and then heat embossed them with White Pearl embossing powder from WOW.  I've been having a lot of fun coloring with my Prismacolor pencils so I decided to use them to add some shading and color to these flowers. After they were colored I fussy cut them and using a mask, stamped the greenery and berries on my panel, the sentiment is from an old set from Flourishes.

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Here is how the INSIDE of my card looks like.

The decorative border is from a retired SU set called "Delicate Details", the flower is from the Altenew set and the sentiment from the Flourishes set.

I hope you feel inspired to come and play along with us at THE FLOWER CHALLENGE, please remember to read our rules and don't forget to display the banner for this challenge on your blog when you upload your cards to the gallery.

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.

EMBOSS IT!!!!!

Hello everyone: July is here and with it comes a new challenge for you to play with over at THE FLOWER CHALLENGE.  I want to thank all of you amazing crafters who participated in our June Challenge "Anything Goes", we had a fabulous turnout, over 182 entries!!! which made my teammates and I, very happy.
So for our July challenge we want to see some EMBOSSING, heat or dry, which ever you'd like or even both techniques, we can't wait to see what you create.
Here is my inspiration card for this month, and I hope you join us in the gallery.

This lovely Azalea image is one of my first purchases from Power Poppy back in 2014, this set is called Azalea. I stamped this image onto a piece of water color paper with Versamark ink and heat embossed it in gold then, colored it with my Sakura Koi water colors and my fixed Wink of Stella.

I embossed a piece of pink card stock and a piece of SU retired vellum with a retired embossing folder, (I forget the name of this one, sorry).

The sentiment is from the set. I added a few Nuvo Drops and a triple bow made with some organza ribbon.

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

I embossed just the top of the pink card stock with the same folder, the sentiment is from a retired Flourishes set called "Tulips for Friends"

So go ahead and join us in the gallery, please check my teammates amazing creations HERE, I'm sure you will get even more inspired.

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

Please, only new work, no back linking.

Please you can enter only 6 challenges including ours.

You might enter this challenge up to 5 times but each entry must be different.

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 works can express.

Until next time, happy stamping.

Hugs from Maria.