myasperations 4-21-22

This is my first entry into the current Butterfly Challenge, which is one of my favs! Each

offers several colors and themes we can use on our cards, plus provides instructions for a creative fold that we can use if desired.  The current challenge is to create a Folding Strip Card, which I learned is really easy to make! The card front for this Folding Strip card is a beautiful garden scene from the “Creative Haven Country Gardens Coloring Book." (A few years ago, I signed up for a weekly newsletter from Dover Publications. Since then, regularly receive emails with links to a half dozen coloring books, each offering 4-5 pages that are available for a short time as free downloads. This scene was one of the freebie pages available this past week. Sign up for the HERE to start getting your own treasures!] After copying the image, I used my Word program to reduce it in size to fit an A2 card. After printing it, I used the instructions HERE to create the floating strips. My card features all four of the colors: Fuchsia, Fawn, Flax, Flame, and all three themes: flowers, floating strip card, and butterfly, which I printed on acetate, embossed with fine line black embossing powder, and colored with markers and white gel pen.)  

I’m entering this card into several challenges including Double D's: Buildings (if you look close you can see a pretty house beyond the beautiful flower garden); Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Rain or Shine (I’m being a little creative in my interpretation of the theme. Thinking of rain as April showers… that bring out all these beautiful May flowers!), The Paper Shelter: World Book Day (I’ve been an avid reader for as long as I learned to read! Today I prefer audiobooks as I can color while I listen. Usually, I color stamped images or digis, but sometimes I reach for a coloring book! Hope that fits into the parameters of this challenge?); Path Of Positivity Challenge: Celebrate Something Special about your Pets, or Animals in general (the birdhouses in this scene remind me of how birds have been part of my life for many of the last 60 years. In childhood, we always had at least one budgie (aka parakeet) chirping away in the background. In my adult life, I’m blessed to live with a birdwatcher and have enjoyed learning about the many types and their beautiful songs/calls. Since moving to Wisconsin we’ve especially enjoyed watching cardinals visit our feeders, and love their very distinguished chirps and trills. You can see and hear them HERE!); Outlawz “Crash Your Stash” Challenge: Buttons (I inherited a large collection of vintage buttons from my sweet mom, but seldom use them on my cards because it seems like I never have time to take them to the Post Office for additional postage and hand canceling. So I was thrilled to find a sheet of pretty vintage buttons on the Free Pretty Things For You (FPTFY) site. They are pre-colored in lovely pastel shades. So, I just had to print, fussy-cut, punch out the ‘eyes’ with a mini-punch that I use for brads, add a bit of thin cord and adhere them to the card with foam tape. Since the front of the card is already "busy" with layers and patterns, I just put a few small ones there. The inside of the card is a different story. I layered the pretty buttons on and took a close-up pic of the one that matches the sentiment- a sweet little cherub in a nest with baby bluebirds. My mom would have LOVED this card… so I’ll give it to one of my sisters in her memory. Actually, I think I’ll make a few more so that both of my sweet sisters and my sister-in-law can enjoy being reminded of how blessed we were to be given such an amazing mom/mom-in-law, and how much we were loved! Precious memories of my mom in her later years occurred when I helped her to create a scrapbook to turn the hundreds of photos she had saved during her 83 years of life into an heirloom. As we worked on pages for her 6 kiddos, she shared so many wonderful stories about each of us. I don’t know if I’ve shared these with my siblings, so think this might be the way to start that sharing. And, I’d better include a few tissues with each card as they hear, once again, how much they were loved!)

PS I did include a closeup pic to try to show how the acetate makes the scene look like it is floating.  Sorry 'bout the blur, but I couldn't capture what I wanted without that! 

Supplies: 

·   Front digi scene-Dover Publishing’s “Creative Haven Country Gardens Coloring Book.”

·   Butterfly Digi-Fred She Said (Butterfly and Blossoms)

·   Colored with Spectrum Noir Classique markers and Sakura Gelly Roll white gel pen

·   Front Sentiment- Freebie from Handmade by Paula (Thinking of You)

·   Inside Sentiment “Happy Mother’s Day” from Beccy’s Place Digi Set (My Mama)

·   Button Digis- Free Pretty Things for You (Vintage Altered Art Buttons Collage Sheet)

·   Transparency sheet, black EP, cardstock, and other items from my stash.

Entered into:  Dover scene and FSS butterfly

Butterfly Challenge- #169 F is for Floating Strip Card       

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge- Rain or Shine

The Paper Shelter #508 World Book Day

Di’s Digi Stamps- Welcome Spring  

Cute As A Button- April: CH #79 Anything Goes + (Option) Butterfly

Path Of Positivity Challenge- Challenge #100                   

Double D’s Challenge- Buildings 

Outlawz Challenge- Crash Your Stash- Buttons

Here is a fun card made with a silver charm, a circular sentiment, and a sweet gingerbread cookie digi and sentiment from Beccy’s Place. The yummy cookie image was set up in a Word document in several sizes (one reason I love working with digis). I then printed them onto Kraft cardstock and added shading and highlights with markers and a white gel pen. The background for the card was created with the “paint chip” type squares from a box of plaid cards/envelopes I picked up on sale at Hobby Lobby a few months ago. I love that the little collection of plaid patterns resembles a quilt.

PS Beccy’s Place will be retiring many digital stamp sets at the end of April. Until then, you can pick up some of my favorites, including the one with this cute little gingerguy for 50% Off! (that’s just $2.92 US$.) You can see the entire list HERE.

Supplies: 

·   Gingerbread Cookie Digi- from a Beccy’s Place Digi Set (Gingerbread) Now 50% off 

·   Colored with Spectrum Noir Classique markers and Sakura Gelly Roll white gel pen

·   Front Circle Sentiment- “You’re Sweet” from Bugaboo (Company no longer in business)

·   Inside Sentiment- “Hugs and Kisses and Gingerbread Wishes” from Beccy’s Place Digi Set (Gingerbread Wishes)

·   Pioneer Clear Photo corners- available from several sources

·   Silver Gingerbread charm,  all other items from my stash.

Entered into:  

Christmas Craft Creations challenge- Tartan Plaid  

Lil Patch of Crafty Friends- #180 Anything Goes

Word Art Wednesday Challenge- #539-540 Anything Goes                   

Crafty Hazelnut’s Christmas Challenge-#590 AG (optional-Building)

Polkadoodles Challenge- Week #16 Anything Goes                                           

Beccy’s Place Challenge- April         Since I’m a Contributor for Beccy’s Place, I’m entering just for fun!

Outlawz Challenge- Festive Friday-Christmas 

Outlawz Challenge- Inlinks Challenge