Virtual Stamp Weekend at Splitcoast!

Wedding Song card

Every hour on the hour, there was  a new challenge posted.  Here they are in reverse order because I can't make Blogger behave.





Card 5 10:00 ... A card with a lady in red to celebrate heart health.  I have GOT to get to bed now, as I am hoping to do a 2 mile run tomorrow at ... ugh ... 8 AM!!!






Card 4  9:00   A card with 2 or more techniques:  marker tapping for the rain, gray shadowing around the frog, and blender pen warts!




Card 3   8:00 PM  --- Song bird ... I love this image and copic colored it.

Sketch Card

Card 2   7:00 PM--- based on your wedding song???  We didn't have a wedding song, only a small wedding after college, we were both pretty broke, a nice dinner after and that was it ... but I loved the song Cherish by the Association, I remember arguing that it was a pretty song even though it was mostly one note on the piano which made it very easy to play ...This will be my card for our 40th Wedding Anniversary in June.


 Challenge number one - 6:00 PM - was a sketch, in the shape of a heart and its 4 chambers. With the image of blood pumping in my mind, I switched to water pumping through an aquarium and made this get well cod. Yup ... it says cod. Although there are really 4 cod. Cods?  Goldfish!

Wednesday Sketch Day!

Here is today's sketch from Splitcoast ...

The joy of doing a card a day late is that I can also do the Ways to Use it Challenge which is to use GRAY as a background. A little different to color on, but very effective I think with the black and the pink.

This card was made for my yahoo copic group's challenge this month - I drew the image and you can grab it and use it too ... HERE ... and the text was from HERE.  Image was colored with copics, and I used a blender pen in the indentations in the cookie on top, can you see it?  Just touched it to the chocolate color and let it pool into a little circle.

You can play in the challenge too ... group members get to play twice, but anybody with a copic in their hand can play and have a chance to win some prizes. Of course if I tell too many people I won't win the cryogen paper or the coupon from Oozaks, but I really think it could be fun if more people played.

Teapot Tuesday

I had this card finished early ... Mike is traveling for work which means I give in to my crazy sleep schedule and don't feel guilty about it. The teapot was MOST unusual and the story to go with it requested elegance ... I was SO tempted to make an elegant lady and then put her in scruffy running shoes but ended up using the shoes I colored and cut out on my turtle instead.  My lady uses the dress technique from Sunday, I had the template sitting on my table so it was a no-brainer.

Not my usual style, huh !!!

Man man man man manly men ...

Free digi for you - png

If you watch "Two and a Half Men" on TV as much as we do, then the song from my title will get stuck in your head too and you will be going around the house going "Ooo ooo ooo" to the melody.  The challenge at the Copic Musketeers Blog is to create a manly card.

To me, a manly card is not a cute little 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inch card. Just the envelope alone says "girly."  So I made my card in a nice manly business size, the size a fellow can bring in from the mail and not feel embarrassed about.

The text is free here and I drew the ice cream sandwich, which I posted for your enjoyment - feel free to snitch it off the site, I am honored when somebody likes my drawing enough to use it.

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Click on "free digis" label below to find other goodies I am HAPPY  to share!

Orchids from Amy ... Phalaenopsis Maria Theresa

How do you capture such a gorgeous flower.  Actually drawing the GROUP of flowers turned out to be quite challenging for me!  Now that I have the drawing ( please grab it if you want it ) I want to somehow recreate the vibrant colors.

Maybe if I would tear the pages out of my sketch book, I wouldn't get that gray shadow in the corner of my image. Oh well, I really like to keep them all wirebound together.

Click on the words " free digi " below to find other goodies that I am happy to share.

Phalaenopsis Maria Theresa

Copic Frog

It is 9 o'clock at night and I just discovered a really cool site --- plus they are looking for a new Design Team Member.  I have been on my own since my term with Firecracker ended and I like the direction and kick in the pants I get from being on a design team.

Scribbling with my copics at this hour under a light on my desk is not the way to make art or influence people, but I came up with this frog and the colors I used.    Then I whipped him into a card so I could get it submitted before the deadline which just happens to be ... TODAY!   So from finding it to posting the card was less than an hour. Imagine if I could take my time and work in daylight!  I doubt that they will choose me since the stuff I saw there was quite artistic and skillful,  but it was fun trying.  Besides I love doing warts on frogs. ( poke the blender pen into the ink and watch it spread into a well-defined dot!)

Please click on the label "copics" below to see all my coloring and a few tutorials.

President's Day Here I come

Actually I have to admit I don't even OWN a dress, but sure would love to squeeze into this one for President's Day tomorrow.   Inspired by this card on Splitcoast.

This card flips open at the top and says " You look younger every day" as a birthday card.

What is WITH my scanner?

This card is really gorgeous, with all coordinating pinks and browns, but my scanner refuses to cooperate. So take my word for it, the peach is really not peachy at all.

Card Sketch Wed

I played with my copics and used a soft pink and warm gray around the image. I am hoping that my pink and beige coloring will distract you from the fact that it is indeed a Christmas image with holly and holly berries ...

I was really happy with the way the colors worked out. 

Teapot Tuesday

Ok, maybe not my favorite card ever but I DO like how the bow punch worked for making his feet!

Maybe the dragonfly nose was a little too much!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Card Front

Inside

What kind of a valentine do you make for a runner ?

I really toyed with Juliet's idea of black and lacy ... and this is what I came up with.

The inside of the card has a shoe that is raised, which accounts for the shadows in the scan.

Bunting Flags

I always love things with paint chips. It is so much fun to stand at Lowes and be overwhelmed with the colors --- then to choose a few treasures to take home. Unfortunately it is kind of like collecting seashells, once they get home I have NO clue what to do with them.

Today's inspiration challenge over at Splitcoast is from Santa Barbara Chic.  She included this row of Bunting Flags which I decided to copy .... I love them strewn across the inside of this card!

My baby was on Nova tonight!

I am SO proud!  The computer's name is Watson and my baby helped him learn to think -- and to answer jeopardy questions. So far I don't know who won the games that will be on Mon, Tues and Wed of next week, but I do know that Watson had a great showing in the previews and was featured on Nova last night.

http://video.pbs.org/video/1750548999

Here is a cute photo of him ... http://www-03.ibm.com/innovation/us/watson/research-team/strategy.html


The bluejay on my card is because that was the name of the project several years ago when David first started working on it.

Happy Birthday Susan!

I made this card for a dear friend on her birthday --- the patterned paper flowers are embossed in one of the extra large cuttlebug folders. The text is heat embossed then sponged and buffed.  I am really liking how it turned out.

My scanner here is bonkers. The card looks pretty much like the tan one on the left, but my first scan came out blue like the one on the right. I have no idea why!

Zen heart roses

Roses seem awfully appropriate for Valentine's day and I found this great zen pattern of roses made with hearts.  Now to make a card with it!  I am toying with Juliet's idea of black and lacy for Valentines Day with my shoe drawing ... hmmm.... gotta do some serious thinking here.  I plan to use my shoe digi ... it is here and yours if you like.   Sorry about the poor scan, my scanner here is on its last legs.

This is actually a New Balance Shoe, not a Nike like I thought. ( Thanks Juliet! She sure knows her shoes!)

Card is already made in my head ... when I get it made in the real world, I will post it.

I did the drawing, but Juliet came up with a ton of phrases to use with it ...

"Excuse me while I slip into something comfortable"
"Let's go tie one on"       
"You're my solemate"       
"We've been together a long time"       
"I thought you'd get a kick outta this"

"I hope you aren't feeling run down."

"I shoe miss you"
"I'm baring my sole to you"
"Here is something lacy for Valentine's Day"
"Just do it!"

"Catch me if you can!"

"What can I do to jog your interest?"

Digi Palm

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Somebody told me to publish both a jpg and a png so here they are ... (they both look the same to me! Something about transparency ...)

Hope you are thinking of warm - and a palm tree just says warm breezes to me. 

These images are yours to take if you wish. I got a new sketch book and have been playing.

Breathe ...and Balance

My yoga instructor says you can't have balance if you don't breathe. I don't stop to think about breathing much, but I do hold my breathe when I concentrate.  I am trying to learn to relax and just breathe, nothing else.  I really like how my silhouette came out - I drew her with a gel pen and then colored with a copic .3 fine point. I kind of like the little scratchies of white through the leotard. Looks kind of like a woodcut to me.

Not sure what I will do with this drawing, but it was very relaxing to do.

Brown and Pink Color Challenge

This card needed to be all copics, in brown and pink. I colored the image with RV 23 and E 35 then used a blender pen to remove color for the spots on his back.

The splash dot of the flower print is by tapping both markers on white cardstock repeatedly.

The wood grain is mostly E35 with a few stripes of RV 23 and some very fine stripes of E 37.  Nails on the plank were made with E47.   Edges were rubbed with a stamping spot in dark brown after cuttlebugging the embossing patterns.

The sketch is roughly based on a sketch by scrapmommy at this website ...    I love her work and think I will learn a lot from seeing her stuff.

And I tried the faux pressed flower technique again - I am really liking the way it looks to emboss a card with the flowers already attached and have them become part of the background.

Image was a freebie from twisty noodle.

Teapot Tuesday

What a cute little set is this! Unfortunately I think my cherry stamps are in Michigan --- along with a whole lot of snow so I am quite thankful to be in Florida, even without my cherry stamps.

Hope this "strawberry" will be ok for the challenge at splitcoast.

I did learn one thing --- cardstock in Florida really tears with a wide bumpy edge, almost comes into layers like pie crust. Of course it also kind of bends in the paper cutter. HUMID much !!!

Inspiration Challenge - Take me away in a Hot Air Balloon

Splitcoast features a different inspiration challenge every Saturday. Today's included this darling toy chest and it reminded me of summer when the hot air balloons go flying over our house in Midland  ...  and I wake up to the whoosh of their fans.

I took the pictures from our driveway and had them stored away on my computer.

Drawings are jpegs and yours for the taking if you wish.

The Year of the Rabbit ... and the Copy Cat

My friend challenged me to use her geisha drawing to make a card for Chinese New Year's.  I found an origami kimono on UTUbe and made the pink kimono. My copics saved me since some of my folds left the white back of the paper showing so I colored them in. ( I also left a stack of kimonos with BIGGER white folds showing on my table. I really should learn to clean up after myself!)

I think the drawing is incredible --- and really puts me in the mood for Chinese food for dinner.  I wanted the rabbit to be just peeking from behind her kimono.  Unfortunately my round punches are at the bottom of a plastic tub till the carpet gets installed ( and today we found out it is delayed a week ... ugh ) so I had to cut out her hair by hand. I think it ended up looking just a bit more like mouse ears than a geisha hairdo.

The word " blessings" is a punch my sister sent from HongKong, with translation and specific directions as to which end was up.

Twisty Noodle!

Just found this site which has lots of free coloring pages. The best part of all is that you can customize them to make them personal. So you can expect some copic colored cards coming soon. FINALLY found something I can use for all my nephews who love football!

http://twistynoodle.com/coloring/

Brrrrr Birds

I had fun coloring these bugaboo birds with my copics. I need to make some cards for my friends who are shivering up north!

The image on the card was cut, then clear embossed 3 times.  

Hambo Application

I applied to be a designer for Hambo stamps --- and these are the two cards I created for the application.

Didn't get chosen, but it was still fun.