Shabby Chic Wedding Card for AHSC #176

Hello and welcome back, crafty friends!  Here in the USA we just celebrated Labor Day, which is the unofficial end of summer which is fine with me as I have always been a big fan of autumn.  While some people get inspired when spring rolls around, whether it's to clean, redecorate, or get crafty in other ways, I feel my best in the fall.  Maybe that's why I felt brave enough to use this latest sketch by Michelle Stewart for Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge #176 to venture into unknown territory...  I made my first attempt at a shabby chic card!  It's not as fabulous as the more experienced shabby-chic'ers that always inspire me, but I'm pretty tickled with it for my first try so let's get started!

details:   Later this month we will attend the wedding of a Young woman whose family and ours have known each other forever, and the bride and groom have planned a very country, somewhat rustic themed wedding with their colors being brown (barnwood), white, and mint.  So when I decided to use this sketch to make their wedding card, the first thing I did was to get out this lovely chevron barn board-patterned paper by The Paper Studio, which I cut to 5 x 7".  I cut a 3 3/4" panel of white CS and used Sea Glass ink and the heart stamp from the retired Charming Cascades set to stamp the background pattern and then I used my edge distresser to give that piece a rough, worn looking edge.  I then used CTMH's retired Art Philosophy cartridge to cut the 3 1/2" frame from Sea Glass glitter paper plus a solid shape in the same size in white CS to back the frame.  On that piece, I created a light watercolor background by pressing the closed Sea Glass stamp pad together so that ink was deposited in the lid and then "picking up" the ink using the medium flat waterbrush.  Then I used Saddle ink to stamp the ampersand image from a retired set called Mr. & Mrs., and Sea Glass ink to stamp the words and adhered those three layers to the card.  I used heat embossing and white embossing powder to stamp the congrats sentiment from another retired set called The Happy Couple.  Then came the really fun part:  the embellishments.  I dug out all kinds of things to try but ended up using a variety of retired (and some previously unused) CTMH products:  I hand cut leaves from a wide burlap ribbon, I layered 3 paper blooms and sponged one with Saddle and another with Sea Glass to make the body of the flower with the middle toned Mocha Opaques faux pearl in the center.  My rustic flower felt like it was lacking something so back to the stash I went and after several ribbons failed to impress me, I remembered seeing a recent post that had a pretty little clutch of string behind a focal point image, so I opened up a package of white waxy flax and that did the trick.  I finished the card off by adding a trio of pearls in the bottom corner:  the largest was another of those mocha opaques, the smallest was one of the white ones, and the middle sized was another white one which I colored with my turquoise blue ShinHan alcohol marker.

So, that's how  I created my first shabby chic wedding card.  I hope you will take time to check out all the projects our design team and participants have come up with this week, and hopefully you will find time to create and share your own project based on this sketch from AHSC and share it with us.  As always, you have until 11:55 p.m. Eastern/10:55 p.m. Central on Sunday, 9/11/16 to link up.

Happy crafting!  ~~  Annette

Wedding Congrats with AHSC #174

Hello and welcome back, crafty friends!  One of the things I love most about paper crafting is being able to really customize cards or gifts for special people on their special occasions, so I took this occasion and this sketch from Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge to create a card for my lovely step-niece and her groom for their upcoming wedding.  They gave chosen yellow, navy, and gray for their wedding colors, which aren't exactly traditional colors, and I'm pretty sure I wasn't going to find many cards to choose from in a store with this color combo so I was extra happy to be able to create something unique for the happy couple!

details:  I started with a 6 x 4" card base cut from Sapphire CS.  I then ran a 5 3/4 x 3 3/4" piece of Canary CS through my Cuttlebug using the retired Heart embossing folder and did a little sanding to make the hearts stand out.  I used some scraps from the retired Charlotte kit for the stripes on the left and the base of the sentiment panel.  I used Sapphire and Canary inks and some Canary CS scraps with the retired "The Happy Couple" stamp set for the cake and bride & groom cake topper and another retired set called "4 My Friend" for the sentiment.   I wasn't sure exactly where this one was going when I started but I'm pleased with how it turned out, and now I have to get busy designing and cutting some vinyl to adhere to a glass block they want to use for a mixed sand sculpture in place of a unity candle.  I have 5 step-nieces and this is the second one to get married, and both have asked me to create something for the wedding day, and I'm so happy and honored to do this for them and hope I will get to help when the next 3 are ready to tie the knot!

This is another fun and versatile sketch to play with, and we'd love to see your take on it.  You can find the link up HERE and you have until 10 pm Central on Sunday, 8/28, to enter.  Even if you can't play, I hope you will take the time to head on over to the AHSC challenge blog where I guarantee you will find some inspiration!  Happy crafting, Annette

Happy Times for AHSC #158

I am so excited to share this project with you today!  Not only has Michelle Stewart outdone herself with this fabulous and versatile sketch to challenge us with for Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge #158, but I got to use CTMH's new kit "Happy Times" in honor of May being National Scrapbooking Month.  And finally the icing on the cake was that this paper helped me put together this card I've had in mind for a dear and lovely couple's upcoming wedding, which is barn themed with mint as the primary color.  This card was especially important to me as the young couple have been together since they were in high school plus the bride's mother was a childhood friend of mine, a high school friend of my husband's, and she was one of the witnesses when my husband and I eloped and got married by a Justice of the Peace.

details:  As stated, I used  mostly the Happy Times kit.  I planned to use the piece that looks like whitewashed wood but there wasn't enough contrast when I actually paired it with the mint striped and white-with-mint outlined flowers.  Luckily I have just a bit of a paper stash (ha ha) and after comparing several pieces, the one I liked best was this gray-based barn board looking paper from the long discontinued Dakota kit.  I used gold embossing powder and Versamark to heat emboss all the sentiments on the cover from the Mr. and Mrs. stamp set.  I used a bit of my favorite white and gold ribbon and the (retired) Gold Puffies for the heart.

For the inside, I again used gold heat embossing for this sentiment from The Happy Couple stamp set set on the same mint striped panel from the four squares on the front.  I backed that with a bit from the gold and white striped paper in the Happy Times kit and fussy cut the dovetails.  I am super happy with the way this one turned out but it is so hard to get a good photo of shiny embossing or metallics, I just don't feel like my photo does the card justice.  Don't forget to pick up a pack of this Happy Times paper during the month of May, it is so lovely and versatile it's sure to be a big hit.  I also invite you to play along with us at AHSC where there is never a shortage of inspiration!

Thanks for stopping by and happy crafting,  Annette

my "spin" on Freshly Made Sketches #73

For whatever odd reason, the first thing I thought of when I saw this sketch from Freshly Made Sketches this week was the Ferris wheel cut on CTMH's Artiste Cricut cartridge, and that made me think if my husband because he's such a boy at heart, LOL.  Anyway, it took a bit of thinking before I could piece it all together in the way I wanted to make a Valentine as unique as our lives together but I think I pulled it off and that boyish smile on his face was worth the extra time I took with this one.
Details:  As I mentioned, I use the Artiste cartridge for the Ferris wheel with Whisper for the circular part of the frame and then I cut the other pieces (which are grouped together as one image) in white and sponged the center support piece with Whisper ink.

I used the Dotty 4 You paper pack for the sky/cloud background as well as the gondola pieces, which I simply glued the pieces I had cut out of white CS on the back of the patterned paper and cut out each piece so the dotted paper showed on the front.  The heart image is in Smoothie using The Happy Couple (D1539).  The patterned paper at the bottom is from the Later Sk8r paper kit (X7167B) and I used Outdoor Denim CS behind the white banner.  Because I had a lot to say in a little space, I cut my CS to a size that would fit in the computer and typed my sentiment and then cut it to size.

For the inside, I used the Smoothie colored paper from the Dotty 4 You kit and cut a heart frame using the Art Philosophy cartridge and centered it over the sentiment, which was also done on the computer.  All in all, this is not your typical or traditional Valentine card but, well, that just wouldn't be our style.  Happy crafting, Annette