First Summer, Then Winter?!

Hi, everyone!

Hope you all had a chance to play with paper and ink yesterday during World Card Making Day. My sincerest thanks to everyone who stopped visited here and at Words 2 Scrap By from the Operation Write Home WCMD blog hop. I spent the afternoon playing with paper and ink, but not hopping. Hoping to check out the OWH hop tomorrow. 

Well, today's post pretty much sums up weather in my neck of the woods. Here in Ohio it was 80 degrees on Wednesday afternoon and sleeting on Saturday morning. Seemed only appropriate to do summer- and winter-themed cards.  :)

Card #1: An Homage to Summer

This week's challenge at Shopping Our Stash is to make a card featuring clouds or the Sun. Thought I'd give that uber-cool Tim Holtz rays stencil a try.

Distress Ink core paper, Recollections white cardstock colored with Distress Inks
Tim Holtz Collection stencil in Wendy Vecchi white paste colored with Distress Inks
Stampin' Up! See Ya Later sentiment in StazOn jet black
circles: SU owl builder punch, edges inked in DI black soot
Creative Memories oval cutting system
Recollections foam adhesives
circles and 3/4-ellipse coated in Glossy Accents

While the general design was in my brain from the beginning, the actual execution took a while. The sentiment also includes, "when skies are gray." However, I didn't like the colored rays on gray. So, I decided to go with DI milled lavender and masked off that part of the sentiment. Next, for the "Sun", I played with various DI papers before deciding to do a blend of spiced marmalade and mustard seed on white. Then, I played with lots of different embellishments before deciding on the punched-out circles. For a short time, I considered going with black circles. But, I didn't want it to feel Halloween-y, and I wanted a happier/brighter feel. So, I stayed with spiced marmalade, brushing the edges with DI black soot for a little definition. While it took a while to get here, I'm pretty happy with the results.

Card 2: A Wish for a Mild Winter

Authentique glistening; Distress Ink core
Memory Box wesley bear in DI pumice stone on Crate Paper rose garden
background: Hero Arts background stamp in Versamark
sentiment: SU snow day
small heart: SU owl builder punch; snowflakes: EK border punch
lines and dots on scarf: Creative Memories burgundy pen, Uni-Ball Signo white
adhesives: Recollection foam squares, Zig glue pen

The card above was made for this month's OWH Our Daily Bread Design challenge to make a winter (non-Christmas card) that features snowflakes. The card looks so simple -- in a good way. So, why in the world did it take me so long to make it? I knew I wanted to use the Authentique paper and the Memory Box stamp. Also knew pretty early on that I wanted to make the snowflake background on one of those pretty Authentique papers. But, it wasn't until I looked at secondary colors in the dp and decided to use DI tattered rose that the card really came together -- incorporating the tattered rose color in three places. Then, I took an itsy-bitsy page out of Sandy's book and added a little hand-drawn embellishment to the scarf. The final decision was what color and/or pattern to make the little snowflakes in the upper right corner. Turns out sanded DI pine needles was just the right choice.  :)

Parting Thoughts

Again, my thanks to those of you who visited from the OWH blog hop.

This Month's Prize:
stamps and colored images
from Sandy Allnock!

We have a paw-print-inspired challenge going on this month at Words 2 Scrap By in honor of adopt-a-shelter dog month. However, any pawed pet can be the muse for a card. Hope you will join us for a chance to win our awesome prize.  :)

Enjoy the rest of your weekend! Thanks for stopping and happy scrappin'!