Stamp Paper Ink

A new sketch is up on the MFT blog and I thought it would be perfect for a Father's Day card! Let's be honest.  Masculine cards can be so hard to make sometimes.  Not all guys like the cute, cartoon stamps of people or adorable animals on their cards, as I have found out personally.  So how do you make a card a guy will like? For this card, it started with the paper.  I loved the colors and the arrangement of the triangles.  So maybe your guy would like a geometric card?  The MFT sketch challenge #441 is perfect for a geometric card design. I used the  Inside & Out Stitched Square STAX dienamics  to make a stitched frame out of dark blue and a stitched square out of light blue, trying to match to the patterned paper I chose.  Next I cut 'DAD' from the coordinating dienamincs for the All About Dad stamp set.  For the letters, I chose a dark teal to help the letters stand out from the blue.  Lastly, I added a banner sentiment strip in the same dark teal

Sketches are great inspiration or wonderful springboards when your crafty mojo is low.  So occasionally a sketch will give me multiple ideas.  I love that, when sketches can inspire different ideas.  Here's my second card using the MFT Sketch Challenge #440 . I love the versatility of the Stitched Flowers dienamics from MFT.  I've used them in a couple of other cards and always love how they look.  Plus, this card ended up with very little stamping using mostly die cuts and one stamped sentiment. This time I used the flowers for the circles and the stems as the lines to the circles by rotating the sketch 180 degrees to put the sentiment strip at the top.  Here's another look at the sketch. Recently I purchased the tiny check paper pack from MFT and I just love the look of gingham!  So I was eager to use the paper for this card.  I thought it would make a nice background without being too busy.  Another recent addition to my stash was the Stitched Rectangle S

So while I was prepping for the next 30 day coloring challenge, I had an idea for a Christmas card with one of the stamps I choose.  Well, I couldn't let the idea slip away so I got started.  Here's the finished card.  Keep reading to see how she came to life! This is an older stamp set, now retired, by MFT called Warmest Wishes.  I was lucky enough to find someone selling it on eBay for a reasonable price.  The girl looks like she is trying to catch snowflakes so my thought was to make it a 'nighttime' scene.  I had two options for a nighttime scene: use Copic markers to color her on white paper with a distress ink background or stamp directly on colored paper to use Prismacolor pencils to color her.  I decided to use colored paper so I could work on my no-line coloring.  Pencils just seem to lend themselves better to no-line coloring than Copics do.  Perhaps it's just me that finds it easier. I stamped the image on a pretty blue color of cardstock using ve

Hi Everyone!  Time for another sketch challenge from MFT.  Here's my card for the sketch: This is what the sketch looks like.  You can also view the challenge here . Originally I thought the sketch would make a cute Christmas card.  I could easily see the circles as ornaments hanging down.  But I saw someone else had a similar idea so I wanted to do something different.  So I rotated the design 90 degrees to the left and then flipped it so the sentiment strip would be a banner hanging down. I decided to use the MFT stamp set Meant to Bee .  I thought the lines to the circles could be the dotted lines of the bee's flight and the circles could be the bees.  I ended up only using two of the bees so I used the dotted heart as the middle circle. For the background, I decided to make it look like the honeycomb inside a beehive.  I grabbed my custom made honeycomb stencil and two distress oxide inks: squeezed lemonade and mustard seed.  To make it look like a h

Welcome back!  It's time for another weekly sketch challenge from MFT Stamps.  For those that don't know about MFT Stamps or their challenges, head on over to their blog .  This week brought some changes for MFT.  The challenges used to be hosted on a separate site, but they are now on the main blog.  To find the challenges, I recommend using the search feature.  There are three challenges: a weekly sketch challenge, a color challenge, and a birthday challenge.  The sketch challenge is posted every wednesday at noon EDT.  The color challenge is posted every second and fourth thursday of every month.  The birthday project challenge is posted once a month.  For this sketch challenge, you can find the details here . Now on to my card entry!  Here it is, all finished. This is the actual sketch for this challenge.  Looks a little different than my card.  All I did was rotate the sketch 180 degrees to put the rectangle element on the opposite side and put the banner at t

It's been a while since I had time to work on a card or a challenge.  Thankfully, a few days ago I had some extra time to play in my craft room and was inspired by the current My Favorite Things sketch challenge #430 .  I ended up with the cute birthday card pictured here.   Here's the sketch for the challenge.  I decided to turn the design 90 degrees but kept the card layout in portrait.   I replaced the hearts with fish from the Gillfriends stamp set.  I didn't want all of the fish going in the same direction but I did want them to be roughly the same size.  I choose the angelfish, the blowfish, and the one I call a fighting fish.   Using Distress Oxide inks in Tumbled Glass, Broken China, Faded Jeans, and Chipped Sapphire, I blended the colors on white paper from light to dark to create an ocean depth.  To add movement, I placed a Wave stencil from Memory Box on the paper and blended Broken China over the Tumbled Glass, Faded Jeans over Broken China,

When I first saw the latest sketch for MFT's sketch challenge, I knew what stamp set I wanted to use and how I wanted the card to look.  It isn't often that an idea translates easily to reality, so I was pleased with how my card turned out.  Here's my finished card for the challenge. This is the original sketch, the one that everyone works from to create a card for the challenge. The MFT sketch challenge runs weekly and a new sketch (as well as the winner of the previous sketch challenge) is posted on Wednesdays.  Head on over there to see what others have created and join in on the fun! MFT Sketch Challenge #379 With the slope and the banner, I had the idea to use the Somebunny I Love stamp set which I recently purchased but had yet to use.  I wanted to create a night sky with clouds at the bottom of the card, so I flipped the sketch so the slope would be at the bottom.  This is just some of the versatility of sketch challenges.  Rotate them, flip them

Time for another MFT stamps sketch challenge!   As always, the challenge requires at least one MFT stamps product.  Since I recently purchased the Raving Raccoons stamp set from a Facebook de-stash group, I thought it would be the perfect time to use it.   Here's my finished card, which I managed to get done with just 12 hours to spare. Now on to the card sketch.  I knew I wanted to use the raccoons.  I also spotted  a piece of white polka dot on black paper  on my craft desk  that I thought would look great with the raccoon.  So I placed those to one side along with a pre-cut card base.  Lately I have been on a trend of using  light aqua, dark aqua and red together.  It's a great combo for winter cards too.  I had scraps on those colors waiting to be put away so I thought I'd use those as well for this card. MFT stamps card sketch #376 So using the elements in the design, I decided to 'bend' things a bit.  I used the broader curve in the stitched b

Ok, so this is my first time participating in My Favorite Things sketch challenge.  I first discovered this company earlier this year and I'm so glad I did!  They post weekly sketch challenges and it's easy to participate, you just need to use at least one MFT product.  That's great for me because I'm still starting to buy stamps and dies from them so my inventory is small. Here's the current sketch challenge. Here's my take on the sketch.  I'm currently working on Christmas cards that I will mail this year to friends and family.  Not everything is MFT.  The plaid paper is by The Paper Studio.  The main stamped image of Santa in his rain deer pulled sleigh and the sentiment are by Papertrey ink.  The stitched border, stitched banner tag, and present are by MFT.  (All products will be listed at the end.) As you can see in this photo, the front of the card actually ends at the red border.  This allows the piece of plaid paper I put inside t

Ok, so this is my first attempt at the Papertrey Ink Make It Monday Challenge.  Posted on Monday, June 22nd, the challenge was to dress up part of the inside of the card and bring it to the front through a die cut.   Here's my card... Inspired by a friend who is moving soon. A view of the card standing up... Harder to see the inside design this way. Thanks for taking a look! Supplies used: PTI tinsel & tags dies (house, small banner, three tree landscape, tree & house landscape, cloudy sky), PTI tinsel & tags stamps (house roof), PTI house additions stamps (home, house front, house door), PTI Boards & Beams stamps (home sweet home, congratulations on your new home), CTMH eclectic edges stamp, CTMH olive ink, CTMH cranberry ink, Colorbox black ink.

Every year for the past two years, I have made my own Christmas cards.  This year is no different except I'm posting the cards I make as I make them and starting early. The past two years I have started with purchasing the Christmas card kit from Close to My Heart in addition to making my own designs.  This year they are all my own.  Close to My Heart did make a card kit for this year but I just wasn't that happy with the look of it.  So this year I'm making all my own designs with some inspiration from Pinterest and Papertry Ink. This week I came up with two designs using Papertrey Ink's stamp set: Tremendous Treats: Christmas stamp set, matching Papertrey Ink dies, and various Mat stack dies. First is the Gingerbread man card. "Sweetest Holiday" card I had the perfect christmas paper to use as the background with the Gingerbread man stamp.  All of my cards are 4 by 5 1/2 inches unless I note otherwise. I cut the patterned paper down to 3 7/8 by 5