JOYFUL WISHES

I've been trying not to get too invested yet into Christmas cards until I get my Thanksgiving designs worked out, but I decided this morning to temporarily set aside the fall colors and images to play a bit with the current challenge at Christmas Kickstart #67 - "Poinsettias and Posies". I'm slipping this in just under the deadline!

I've had this old rubber background stamp forever without ever using it. I came across it while digging through my Christmas supplies and stamped it on a piece of ivory cardstock with PTI "Pinefeather" ink. I stamped it two more times with the same ink onto red iridescent vellum and dark green cardstock and fussy cut some leaves and poinsettia petals and layered them over the background after die-cutting it with a stitched rectangle. This was adhered to a red vellum mat and layered with dimensional foam over a green card and die-cut stitched rectangular mat. The final step was a gold heat-embossed sentiment stamped on a tag and tied with gold ribbon.

Christmas Kickstart Challenge: Reminder Post for Challenge #67

Added November 7, 2022: 

 

H IS FOR HALLOWEEN - SISTERHOOD OF SNARKY STAMPERS

I thought I was finished with Halloween for a couple of months, but then I was asked to Guest Design for the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers and today's challenge is #221 - "H is for Halloween". You can see that Edna has gotten herself caught in a real bind!

I've been wanting to use a particular sentiment from Impression Obsession's #CS1082 "Zombie Sayings" but it just didn't happen, so I decided to use it for this last card. 

I started with a black side-folded A2 card base. I cut a gray cardstock rectangle and stamped the mound of grass from Whimsey Stamps #CWSD388 "Zombie Party" with Memento "Tuxedo Black" die ink and over-stamped the zombie hands emerging from underground (I have no idea who manufactured the zombee hand - it is on a random stamp sent from years gone by). I added some White Tim Holtz splatters and white heat embossed the "happy halloween" sentiment. I decided to mat this with a lightweight cardstock that's about the color of a dirty diaper! I stamped the zombie sentiment on white with PTI "Saffron Spice" to match. To add a bit of embellishment, I punched a hole in the sentiment panel and pinned a couple of lengths of crochet cotton that I had colored with the same ink and mounted this to the face of the card with some dimensional foam. I customized the envelope with a scrap of "dirty diaper" paper and added a hand and cobweb before lining it. 

This was a lot of fun. I'm hoping you'll all give this challenge a try before putting your Halloween stashes away for the fall.

SoSS #221 H is for Halloween (snarkystampers.blogspot.com)

FUSION CHALLENGE

I hadn't really intended to play along with the Fusion Card Challenge - "Kitchen" this month, but I was going through my fall paper stash and decided to give myself a break from Halloween cards to participate. Obviously, I decided to play with the sketch and use a pumpkin and garland from the photo.

A couple of years ago I bought a large sheet of heavy paper with a deckle edge. I didn't really have a plan for it, so it's been in one of my plan file drawers since. I cut a slice of it off for an A2 card and top-folded it so the deckle edge would be along the bottom. I stamped a pumpkin from an old fall set with PTI "Ripe Olive" on a tan strip and colored it with my Copic Markers. I die-cut a stitched circle into a 2" wide strip of orange textured paper to lay over the pumpkin. I used the corner of a stitched rectangular die to make the V on the bottom edge and stamped the sentiment. The final steps were to mat the tan strip with orange paper, mount everything to the card front, cut out a colored pumpkin blossom to overlap the circle, and add a small orange gem to the center. I didn't have an envelope that matched any of the papers so custom made one with olive green cardstock and lined it with a plaid paper scrap.

 Fusion Card Challenge: FUSION - Kitchen 

LOVE BIRDS

A quick post this morning in response to the challenge over at Just Us Girls Photo Week #655, hosted by Cécile. What a sweet photo!

I took a fairly literal approach on the photo but used beige-toned birds for the primary image - dies from My Favorite Things and tiny gold-embossed hearts from Hero Arts Valentine stamp set #DC175. The branches/flowers are from Alexandra Renke. I started with some ivory cardstock and printed lightweight American Crafts paper from my stash. The sentiment is from Hero Arts #CM351. 

  

I wanted to bend the wings of my birds slightly for definition but ended up creasing the paper - bummer! Next time I want to do that, I'll curve them slightly before gluing them to the birds. 

"Just Us Girls" Challenge: Just Us Girls #655 - Photo Week (justusgirlschallenge.blogspot.com)

Added November 3, 2022:

WINDING DOWN ON THE HALLOWEEN CARDS!

Well, I went to the post office today and mailed all of my Halloween cards - except this last one that is going to a relative here in town, so I'm not so concerned that it won't arrive on time. I used the current Addicted to CAS Challenge #231 - "Layered" for the inspiration on this card. 

I started with a gray stitched edge die that I stamped a cobweb onto (Tim Holtz) with Ranger Distress Ink "Hickory Smoke". I layered an Impression Obsession sentiment (#CS1082 "Zombie Sayings") over the cobweb with white heat embossing, 2 die-cut zombies (Whimsy Stamps "Zombie Parade") and a Tim Holtz ghost. The final detail was a tiny spider in the web. All of this was attached to a top-folded gray card base.

Addicted to CAS: Challenge #231 - Layered

GRATITUDE

A real quick CAS card this morning before I go outside to the garden. This card is inspired by the challenge at AAA Card Game #226 "Sketch + Thankful".

I started with a stitched rectangular panel and a very old fall stamp that I've never used. (I'm not entirely pleased with the quality of the stamp - it's either the stamp or a slight ink bleed. The paper is a very high quality 110 lb. ivory card stock, so I don't think it's the paper.) I stamped the sentiment twice, the second time on a strip of yellow-gold scrap, cut it in half horizontally, and over-laid that on the original brown sentiment. I added two more strips of coordinating cardstock per the layout and colored a couple of the leaves orange on the yellow-gold strip. It seemed a bit too CAS, so I added a tiny die cut leaf with gemstone and a brown twine bow before attaching all to the top-folded card base.  

Now, to the garden!

AAA Cards: Game #226 Sketch + Thankful

ZOMBIE BIRTHDAY

What kind of birthday card do you make for a friend who collects Lon Chaney memorabilia and whose birthday falls on October 28th? Well, answering my own question, a Halloween-themed card for sure! I was inspired to participate with the most recent challenge at Seize the Birthday #249 "Faces - Human or Animal", not knowing where on the human-animal spectrum a zombie lies!

 

A couple of months ago I purchased this rubber background stamp from Whimsy Stamps ("Zombie Faces" designed by Deb Davis), not knowing how I would use it but not being able to resist. I started by stamping it in black on a white cardstock panel and trimming it down. I inked the edges with my black ink pad, matted it with red-orange paper, and attached all of that to the face of a white card base. I colored in two of the faces with my Copic markers and attached fussy cut birthday sentiments (Avery Elle #ST-19-08 "Peek-A-Boo Pets") with dimensional foam. The envelope is custom-made from my current most favorite Halloween paper.

Seize the Birthday: Seize the Birthday #249 Faces-Human or Animal

Added October 28:

CONTINUING WITH MY HALLOWEEN CARDS...

Spoiler Alert: This is a long post!

As I shared previously, I've been really cranking on the Halloween cards to get enough made by next week. I'm running on three tracks here - one track of Edgar Allen Poe cards for my Poe relatives, one track of "creepy" cards for my snarkier friends and family who will appreciate them, and a final track of cards created specifically for challenges (to be sent to everyone else). 

I made a Poe card last week and posted it here and today I have a second one:

My real passion this Halloween season is the red-orange, black, and white printed cardstock from Park Lane "Boo". I made a bunch of envelopes from the 2-sided stock, and I've been working on coordinating cards with what's left of the 12x12 pad. This image and sentiment are from a new Clearly Whimsey Stamps set "Poe Boy" - CWSD427. I started with an A2 side-folded card base and die cut a stitched rectangle and an oval from it. The oval was backed with a coordinating paper and the sentiment was stamped in Memento "Tuxedo Black" ink. EAP was stamped in black, colored with Copic markers and die-cut with a stitched oval, and attached to the face of the card with dimensional foam.

Inside is a panel of coordinating paper, and the oval that was cut from the front panel. I colored the candle flame and raven's eye with Copic markers for a bit of accent.

____________________________________________________________________

Here's my second track - "creepy/snarky" cards - for your enjoyment. Those of you who follow me on a regular basis are already aware of my love of snarky cards, and when better to get my snark on than at Halloween?!

I have all of these mauve paper scraps in my stash from Halloweens past and decided to see what happens if I go for a purplish monotone card. I started with a black A7 size card because I have some matching black envelopes. For the primary background, using the lightest tone of mauve cardstock, I blind embossed the sky portion with a swirling snow embossing folder, glued it to the card base, and started layering on die cut stitched curves. The house and tree are die cut from printed stock (Sizzix/Tim Holtz #664194) and tucked in between layers. The sentiment (Impression Obsession - #CS1082 "Zombie Sayings") was white heat embossed, die cut, matted, and glued to the face of the card. The final step was to add two die cut zombies sludging through the snow (Whimsey Stamps "Monster Parade Die Set" #WS0488). I think this card is far too complicated to duplicate (even if I had enough mauve leftovers), so I probably won't make more of them. I'll see if I can figure out how to simplify the same idea, but this one would be appropriate for my immediate family!

I didn't create this card specifically for a challenge, but it occurred to me that this might fit in over at Happy Little Stampers October "Anything Goes with Dies" challenge.

Happy Little Stampers: HLS October Anything Goes with Dies Challenge

_________________________________________________________________________________

This post is getting pretty long, but I did want to offer up my final track of cards, those created for challenges. I'm sharing this morning's creation with Make the Cards Challenge #65 - "Halloween". 

Again, I'm using the papers from the Park Lane "Boo" 12x12 pad. The red-orange panel was a piece left over when I used the backside for something else. It worked best to make it into a slim-line format. I cut out the windows in the house at the bottom left so that the purple mat would show through the windows. The pair of goblins were fussy cut from a white ghost embossed cardstock from last year. I colored in their mouths and eyes with a black marker and glued them both to the face of the card. The sentiment is from Unity Stamp Company (#IB-121 "Spooky Chair") and I white heat embossed it onto a scrap of purple cardstock and die cut a label, threading black and white baker's twine through an eyelet.

The envelope is another of the coordinating papers in this collection and I made it using an older envelope template from Anna Griffin/All Night Media. I haven't participated with Make the Cards Challenge before this, but here we go:

Make the Cards Challenge #65

 

THANK YOU

This morning I'm sharing a thank you card I made yesterday for friends who hosted a wonderful dinner party last Sunday evening. I'm not entering this in any challenges but wanted to share it here because I was so pleased with how it turned out.

 

This was so much fun to make and stretched me to come up with creative ways to present my ideas. It started with a piece of old Graphic 45 "Kraft Reflections Collections - Two for Tea" printed cardstock that has been languishing in my stash for years. I fussy cut the knife, fork, and spoon from the printed side and cut a rectangle from the back unprinted side,  stamped the doily (Stampin' Up "Hello, Doily") with VersaMark, and heat embossed it with white embossing powder to provide a placemat. The next step was to make a plate with a couple of different circle dies. Once I had glued these together, I dragged the outside edge of the plate through the VersaMark ink pad and dusted it with gold embossing powder to rim the plate with gold. The last step before adding a napkin was to mat the rectangle with metallic gold sheet and glue it to a top folded A6 card base, after attaching the plate and silver to the placemat.    

The folded linen napkin is my favorite part of this card. I blind-embossed a scrap of linen textured stock with an edge embossing folder, gold embossed the sentiment, and folded the napkin before attaching it to the plate. 

The card and envelope are Strathmore watercolor stock, and I lined the envelope with metallic gold vellum.   

OCTOBER 31st

It seemed only appropriate to feature the letters "31" on this second half of the October challenge here at Two Old Bats! I selected the top right quadrant of the mood board as the inspiration for my card. 

Starting with a Tim Holtz cobweb stamped with Ranger "Hickory Smoke" Distress Ink, I overlaid a black square and white heat embossed the second web. I die-cut the cobweb image into a 3" square and die-cut the PTI numbers out of the black square. I mounted the numbers over the face of the cobweb so that it would look like the numbers were behind the web. The sentiment (Simple Stories #13821 "Boo Drew") was stamped in black, and a red-orange square mounted to the face of the card. 

The final steps were to attach the cobweb image with dimensional foam and pop on a black heat-embossed fussy cut Inkadinkadoo spider.    

There's still plenty of time to participate with this challenge! Check out what the other designers have created for your inspiration. We're looking forward to seeing all of your creations!

Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge: October Mid Month Reminder

SIT FOR A SPELL

I've been really cranking on the Halloween cards this whole month! I'm determined to get 25-30 cards before next week when I need to get the ones that are traveling cross-country in the mail. This morning I used the color challenge by Laurie at The Paper Players #PP612 - "Purple, Green and Orange + Any Neutral" as my inspiration.

The orange, green, and purple horizontal striped paper from Graphic 45 caught my eye a couple of weeks ago while shopping for adhesives, and I knew I had to have it for Halloween sentiments. It wasn't until I wanted to use this chair from Unity Stamp Company (#IB-121 "Spooky Chair") that I noticed that one of the lines of the paper was referencing sitting down - perfect connection! The background spider webs are stamped from an Impression Obsession #CC141 C-A-C "Spider Web" background that I've had for years. I adhered it to a 6" x 4-1/2" top-folded white card base after edging it with black ink. I cut a strip of the striped paper and attached a die-cut Tim Holtz spider with a purple eyelet through which I slipped a length of green and purple ribbon from my stash. I backed the strip with dimensional foam and glued that to the card face. The final step was to stamp, fussy cut, and adhere the chair to the strip. 

So, I'm sharing this with the group at The Paper Players:

The Paper Players: PP612 - A Color Challenge from Laurie

Added October 15, 2022:

FRIGHTFULLY DELIGHTFUL

That's the current challenge at Shopping Our Stash - #SOS481. This card comes from fairly deep in my stash - the background gray printed paper is actually wedding paper that I bought at least 20 years ago, and the mauve matting is left over from my personal Halloween cards in 2009.

I started this card with a black top-folded card base and a scrap of gray and white printed light-weight paper. The sentiment came out of the debris of my brain, and I created it with my computer and printed it is a dark mauve tone. The cloud behind my cute Tim Holtz witch and her navigator was stamped in gray and white inks using Hero Arts #CM317 "Color Layering Sea & Sky". I cut the sentiment and background into strips and glued them to a mauve mat, mounted all to the card base, and punched a hole in the sentiment strip. Witchie was stamped in black, colored with Copic markers, fussy cut, and mounted to the face of the card with dimensional foam. The final addition was purple twine.

Shopping Our Stash Weekly Challenge Blog: SOS481 - Frightfully Delightful  

 

 

CHANGING SEASONS

The weather has been lovely all week here in Southern Oregon and leaves are starting to change as the evenings get cooler. Several of the card challenges are using the emerging fall season to inspire us in our projects. I'm sharing my changing leaf with Addicted to CAS #230 - "Autumn", Paper Players #PP611 "Changing Seasons - Autumn", and Tic Tac Toe #181 (I used the left vertical column - Leaves/Metallic/Embossing). 

This Impression Obsession sentiment and image come from a favorite stamp set (#WP684 "Leaf Set", designed by Dina Kowal) that I've had in my stash for more than 3 years and have used repeatedly. I had some odds and ends of ivory textured paper that I stamped the image on - once in orange/brown and a second time in greens. I overprinted the sentiment with VersaMark ink and heat-embossed it with gold embossing powder. I die-cut a small stitched rectangle from the orange image and overlaid it on the green leaf image with dimensional foam, after die-cutting a larger rectangle from the green layer. I stitched a strand of metallic gold thread through the stem of the green leaf and matted the larger rectangle with some metallic gold cardstock and attached this to a side-folded card base that I found in my ivory scraps drawer. The coordinating envelope is lined with metallic gold vellum. I think it might also be appropriate to share this card with Shopping Our Stash #480 - "Leaf Me Alone". 

Here's a closer look to show the metallic gold on this card:

Addicted to CAS: Challenge #230 - Autumn

The Paper Players: PP611 - A Theme Challenge from Joanne

Added October 8, 2022:

TTTC181 - Featured Designer Jeanne - Tic Tac Toe Challenge

Shopping Our Stash Weekly Challenge Blog: SOS480 - Leaf Me Alone

WHEN THE WORKING DAY IS DONE...

...ghouls just want to have fun! Wow, this card was SO fun to make - I just got caught up in the exuberance of a zombie party! I was looking for an idea in which I could combine an old sentiment stamp that I had never used, new zombie stamps, and the colors orange and purple. The colors are the challenge at Color Hues #50 - "Orange & Purple".

This card was started with a white cardstock panel that I stamped the sentiment onto in orange and russet, after which I stenciled the background with the same colors muddied up and blended. Then I over-stamped the zombies (Whimsy Stamps #CWSD388 "Zombie Party") in purple and added stars and confetti in purple and red-orange. Some yellow-orange splatters also went over that and then I punched a hole in one of the stars and poked purple and orange twine into the hole.

 

Before mounting the card face and mat to a side-folded white card, I blended some more orange on the bottom corner and side and added more purple confetti. I wanted the twine to look like it was bursting out of the hole in the star, so I wound the individual strands around a paint brush.

Color Hues: Color Hues #50-Orange and Purple (colorhuesthecolorchallenge.blogspot.com)

I'm also sharing this card at Inkspirational Technique Challenge - "Use Stencils":

Inkspirational: Inkspirational Challenge #275 - Technique - Use Stencils (inkspirationalchallenges.blogspot.com)

And the new stencil blog: Stencil Fun October Challenge - "Halloween Colors"

Crazy is our fame - STENCILS are our game!: October Stencil Fun