Thinking of you.

TRIPLE CHALLENGE

naomiconnolly2 Comments

What is a triple challenge I hear you think?

Challenge 1. Well for me today’s blog is the first one.  I have been invited by Miss Vicky to be part of the creative blog hop where following links you can see, learn, admire and recreate so much about the craft you love. Links and answers to questions all participants are asked are at the bottom of this blog. Thanks Vicky for taking me by surprise and showing faith in my creations.

Challenge 2. I am part of a small group of people at Caloundra Community Center called Crafty Creations and Vicky has organised a monthly card challenge. 1--January-2015You can see them here on Vicky’s face book page Stamps,Paper and Stuff.  Any one is welcome to join in. This is our first one. This is my creative contribution and not a minute too soon – dead line at end of week. See procrastination abounds.

Challenge 3. I have also chosen this card for a clients request for a Birthday Card for her friend who is 89. I hope the tactile feel will help with her enjoyment of the card. Now you know, think no more. Save the grey matter for creating, not wondering!

THE CARD.Butterfly challenge main card

I used Whisper White and Melon Mambo card stock with the new Painted Blooms DSP.

The small butterflies were from Papillion Potpourri the large from the Thinlits Butterflies and the sentiment Butterfly Basics. You can purchase the bundle for both of these at reduced price off them when purchased individually, on my Stampin! Up! web.

Butterfly card top section    The little green frame was cut from the DSP paper and glued to the Whisper White which had been stamped prior to attaching.

I glued the tulip covered DSP on the bottom third before embossing, then I cut out the circle.

Large ButterflyWhen I attached the Whisper White butterfly I just moved it down a fraction so that the Melon Mambo one peeped through.  Attaching a couple of Rhinestones completed the front of the card. It was then attached to Melon Mambo card stock and personalised inside.  Hope you enjoy it.

Now for  some serious stuff.
These questions are what you will read on each of the blogs. So interesting finding out what motivates others.
1.  What are you working on?
Being the newbie it has been this blog, and ALL that is involved from watermarks, uploads, links, media extras and I’m still not there. Being a new distributor I find there are lots of challenges and some steep learning curves but with each step I feel more empowered to make this really work. There is soooo much help in the Stampin’Up! Community there really is no excuse not to succeed. Well maybe ill health, but touch wood I’m great.

2.  How does your work differ from others in your genre?
As yet, thank goodness, it’s not work, and I hope it never becomes that. I’m retired you know!! Each person brings their entire life to the creative process as do I, so in that respect as no one else has had my life, I do differ from others, if only in small ways. I love the quote

“Be Yourself, everyone else is taken.”

3.  Why do you create what you do?
Mostly for the sheer pleasure the tactile aspect of cards creates in me. All things paper are in my blood (see about me) so my starting point is here. There is a sense of satisfaction, with a rye smile, when I have made a card that I have not cased from Pinterest or elsewhere. Just sensing what works and what doesn’t as I create is very satisfying. Then when I’m not 100% happy with the effort and recreate the same with changes. Viola my spirit sores! I love the fact that one formula I not longer have to deal with and that’s all the colour matching. It’s has been done with Stampin Up! and that makes the process so much more relaxed.

4.  How does your creative process work?
I have always been a collator of images and words. Having been a student that loved projects at school.(I still have some of those books.) Some times an idea will be fermenting away in that grey matter for weeks before I actually start to create ie., the above card 3 weeks of mulling over. By then I will have a petty good idea of the stamps, colours and layout I want to use. Of course it still can go wrong. The idea doesn’t measure up to the ideal. This little fellow was my first attempt at the above card. One I didn't want Both nice cards but I like first one better.

I have moved on from creating a lot of different hobbies that I am capable of, due mainly  to space restrictions and “been there done that” syndrome.

Creative Blog Hop happens every week and being a newbie I don’t know others yet but please pop over and visit these pages.

I feel very relaxed with Leonies blog, lots to see here and an Aussie too. http://www.stamp-a-latte.com/creative-blog-hop/

Also try Sue Erikson blog she has a delightful card at the moment using the Petals stamp brush set. http://www.soggystamper.com/2015/01/creative-blog-hop

Thanks for taking the time to read all this. Now you know a little more about me. Happy Stamping. Naomi

Combination Card.

naomiconnolly

Like so many others I still have an assortment of products other than Stampin’Up and this card is one I made using some of them together with my SU gear.. I really like the way the card is made then framed with the contrasting card stock. I hDuck front and logoave used the duck from the  Moon Lake Clear Stamp Set out of the Occasions Catalogue and stamped it on Very Vanilla card stock. I embossed the Cattails with The Big Shot and the birds on the wire.  These were from Darice Natures Borders.

I cut out the Spellbinders Cattails, colored with a cotton bud dabbed on Crumb Cake, Smoky Slate and Early Espresso with a touch of Pear Pizza and Mossy Meadow on the leaves then cut in half – only needed a few and adhered with sticky dots over the embossed image. The embossed Cattails were colored with chalk as was the duck from Moonlake  from the Ocassions Catalogue.

I Used the Thinking of you from the Wetlands Stamp set and some cattails (well they will do) from the Wetlands Stamps on Very Vanilla and cut it out with the Chalk Talk Framelit on the Big Shot.     I also cut out the backing from Mossy Meadow at the same time and used the lower section.  Then I tied it together with dyed string in Mossy Meadow  and hung them with a sticky dot from the wire.Inside duckswith logo

Looking inside the embossing gives a nice de-embossed image to the inside front of the card. A final stamp with the Cattails again then I mounted it onto some Mossy Meadow card stock to frame it.

Tomorrow is a double day with a card that is part of a challenge and some words about me    for  a blog hop.

See u then.