Card Sketch Challenge and Black Belt!

I am sharing the pictures below of my son for my friends and family however if you come here for cards only enjoy my swap card :)


I will start with a card I made for a swap, I tried to make this card somewhat easy since I had to make several of them for a swap. However, I still wanted it to have some nice features and layers to it so I chose this stamp to ease up the coloring process the stamps like Tilda and such take. I colored the stamp directly with markers and stamped. I used the rock and roll technique where the edges are colored in a darker (or some other) color but it didn't show up real well. There are Stickles on the center of the flower also. I used a Cuttlebug folder to emboss the white background and used the Nestabilities dies for the oval. The sketch for the card is from Techno Stamper.

Now for the black belt! My oldest son started Taekwondo when he was 8 and went to an Olympic style TKD school. He had his last belt - red/black or Bodon as they called it and was ready for his black belt training when the school pulled a few bad tricks on us and I chose to remove him from that school. He was 10 then. We recently found a new school by our new house and it is an ATA martial arts school. It is wonderful! I can't say enough good things about ATA as a philosophy and training for Taekwondo. Very positive, character building, professional schools. Master Wegman was willing to "re-train" Brian and get him into his black belt and 8 months later - last night, at age 17, Brian received his black belt! We are so happy for him. He worked hard on getting back into shape and getting back into forms and weapons training, sparring and board breaking - one of the pictures I posted caught the moment his foot hit the board, look for it :) He is proud of himself too and that is an accomplishment in itself.

Way to go Brian!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have a great day!

Lori

Hearts for Tilda

Good morning! Back from vacation and ready for my birthday tomorrow :) I am going to a Copics class taught by Sally Lynn MacDonald from Copic, it is an acrylic album and looks like we are going to use the airgun and all kinds of fun and messy stuff. I like the subtitle "leave no surface uncovered" LOL!

Today's card is one I made for the sketch challenge on Splitcoast for this week. I was having withdrawals and had to make a card yesterday even though I had 5 loads of laundry to do and myriads of other things waiting for me when I got back home. Also had to pull out the adorable Spring Tilda again.

The designer paper was a freebie in an order I received so I cant tell you who makes it but the card stock is SU bayou blue and riding hood red. The hearts are buttons with twine tied in them, same MS butterfly I like to use with some gemstones in the center and some dew drops in blue in the corners. I used my Prisma color pencils with Gamsol on this one. I am getting better with them! I also found and used my white pen I ordered from KL Stampin N Scrappin Store, she has some Magnolia Tilda's and such by the way. Anyway the white dots on her blouse, boots and cheeks are with that pen and I must say it really rocks! I had so much trouble getting gel pens to write and at the right moment. Hope you like her!

Lori

Beach Scene Again

These are two more things I have made with the beach scene stamp. They are both colored with chalk! I haven't used them in a long time and for some reason this stamp called out to use chalk LOL! It is such an easy medium to use really. It just looks soft and weathered, sort of beachy I guess. I really liked the shells from another set (by Stampin Up) stamped on the kraft with choc. chip ink and covered in diamond glaze so I used them again on both of these. Fun and adds some interest.

The first one is an ATC, since ATC's are generally stored like baseball cards in plastic sleeves you have to keep the thickness down on them. This just seems to need more but for now it is done. The sand dollar is threaded through the hemp twine that is wrapped around the image. The second one is a card with those beachy colors I like so much! Groovy guava and taken with teal or not quite navy, not sure which I tend to get them mixed up. Thanks for looking and I will make some cards and post with the other beach stamp set I got coming up in a few days.

Oh, and if you are wondering since some of you know I am going on vacation to FL this week these posts are set up to publish automatically :) I really like blogspot (blogger)!

:)

Father's Day or Masculine Cards

Just two, I did these cards at a workshop, they are CASE's in "case" you are wondering :) It is hard to come up with Father's Day cards so I love going to stamp classes that have this theme! I don't have much to say today but these are all Stampin' Up products :)

Have a nice day!
Lori

Beach Scene

I ordered this stamp after seeing it on a blog last week, oh I am bad! However it is gorgeous! It is by Impression Obsession. No matter how you color it, it looks great! I love beach related stamps and always look for them. I happened upon another set from a different company and well that is another post :) Apparently I am on a beach stamp set spree! This uses soft sky, taken with teal and close to cocoa for the layers. I stamped the silver dollar on kraft with choc. chip ink and cut it out, applied crystal effects and put a jump ring through it. I hung it from the hemp twine that is wrapped around the card through the brads. The other shells are stamped on kraft also and put on using pop dots. There is a bit of Stickles glitter here and there to make it sparkle. I used my Prisma colored pencils to color it in, the sky is sponged on with ink, and all of the edges are distressed too. I love this card! I hope you like it too :)

I won!

Oh my gosh I am sooooo excited! I won the Magnolia-licious blog hop challenge! It was a random number pick and I was the lucky one :) It is an awesome prize too - 3 stamps! Tilda's here I come. Here is the link to it: http://magnolia-licioushighlites.blogspot.com/2009/06/magnolia-licious-summer-notes-winner.html. I just can't tell you how happy and excited I am.

I happened to make another post-it note holder and gift box because I liked the first one so much! I think it is fitting to go along with this post to show you the latest one. This Tilda is standing in water like at the lake or beach. So cute :) Thanks for stopping by!

Lori

Two Things Today!

I have two things for you today! First the blog I follow with many wonderful cards (ok I go for the donkey pictures and stories too LOL!)she is having some wonderful blog candy! So here is a link to it Stamps, Paper, Scissors and Donkey Smiles and I am hoping for a chance to win her prize :) If I had the land to keep them I surely would buy a couple of her miniature donkeys! At between 3 and 5 hundred thousand an acre here (without the house) that isn't likely happening soon. (Home lots are 1/5 acre or less and go for 90-100K in my town which DH will not move more than 3 miles from work LOL!). OK enough said :) Now onto my card!

I mentioned Jacque in my previous post and her blog candy and the blog hop etc. but she also designed her first sketch for Friday's Sketchers. So of course I had to participate in that also! This is my card from her sketch and if you want to see her blog post again here it is: Jacque's Joie de Vivre. I used a card swap kit from a Magnolia swap on SCS (here is the link to the third round) the kit is from monkeymama, thank you Angela - I love the paper! It is sparkly. This is the Tilda she sent with it called Tilda with Lilacs. I went back to using colored pencils since my last use of markers was not very pleasing to me but the yellow here in her shirt was a bit strong. So I hunted down the Stampin' Up yellow that matched and used it for the mats on this card - I think it works ok with the paper. It compliments the lilac though so overall I am very pleased with it! Thanks for stoppin by!

Lori

Post It Notepad Holder and Gift Box

I found out about this contest on one of my new SCS friend's blog. Jacque is on the design team for Magnolia-licious and is participating in her very first blog hop and she has done a fabulous job! Here is a link to her blog stop on by and check out her gorgeous creations (she has some great blog candy too!). The contest is by Magnolia-licious and their design team is having a blog hop. The contest is to make this Post-It notepad holder and gift box and link it to this blog magnolia-licious-dt-blog-hop to enter for a chance to win 3 stamps from the Magnolia-licious web store - oh I am so there! So here is my entry. I am so happy with how it turned out, it is so cute! I love this Tilda by Magnolia, I think she is just called Spring Tilda.

I had to re-do the measurements of the gift box as the instructions are written for use with a Scor-pal (which if you go to the blog link above you can get the instructions) and it is way confusing when you are trying to use a regular paper trimmer with a scoring blade. I fixed it though :) I used Stampin' Up paper, both the designer paper and card stock. The main card stock is Groovy Guava and the brown is actually the cocoa printed designer paper from Bella Rose paper pack. I no longer have the name of the blue designer paper pack. I used the Nestabilities dies to mount Tilda on and some paper punches for the butterfly and flowers. The adhesive pearls and ribbon are the rest of the embellishments.



notepad and gift box



notepad in the gift box



gift box



notepad holder

Verse Card

First I have to say I had a hard time trying to get a picture of this card. The purples would just not come out right! I tried adjusting it in my imaging software but it is not the right color and looks so much better in person! You can't really see that there are Stickles on the butterfly either.

My stamping buddy and friend came over today and oh it was so much fun! I wanted to CASE this card and you see what we came up with. Let me just say that Becca is an amazing card artist and her details are incredible! My card didn't come close to hers but you can see where I got the ideas from. My friend brought the paper and stamps and she has a great eye for color so between us we found a verse to fit and the coordination of papers. I don't however have enough variety in ribbon but this cute chocolate chip with dots ribbon doesn't look too bad. There are pop-dots between the layers and under the butterfly which makes it look better in person also. Overall I am very pleased with how this turned out and more so that we got to chat and get caught up while doing it :)

The butterfly is from CTMH and the verse is from Verve.