Simon Flickr Challenge & Concord & 9th Challenge

I've been making so many Christmas cards that it's left me longing to watercolor so when I saw that the Simon Says Stamp Flickr Challenge was for coloring, in any method, so I used the new Concord & 9th Stamp Set  called  Hello, Lovely which means I am also entering this into the Concord & 9th Challenge. This is a big, beautiful floral arrangement that you can color in your choice of mediums.  All the arranging is done for you. The first card I made with this stamp I used Spring colors but for the second one, I wanted to do something in more Christmas-y colors.

I started with a panel of Canson Bristol Watercolor Paper.  After treating it with my powder tool, I stamped it in Versamark and heat set it using Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder--still my favorite gold!

I used a combination of Distress Markers (Festive Berries) and Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers in Persian Blue, Olive, & Deep Green with a water brush. The entire panel was spritzed with shimmer mist once the watercolor had dried. 

I stamped the sentiment from the Sugar Pea Designs Kindness Matters Stamp Set onto the same watercolor paper and used the same embossing powder.  

Next I die cut the sentiment and the watercolored panel using dies from the Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle Die Set then assembled my card onto a top folding card base made from Bazzill Whirlypop Cardstock using my ATG gun.  This was a super simple card for these challenges.  It took a little bit of time to watercolor, but I really enjoy doing that.  

So that's it for a quick post this morning.  I'm hoping to take the rest of the day off!  Thank you so much for stopping by today!  

Always Playing With Paper #81

We have such a great inspiration image today over at The Challenge #81 and it's so colorful that I wanted to play along. I find the Red blooms in the turquoise jars to be beautiful and the touches of gold in the photo add instant elegance and is one of the reasons I like to use gold in my projects.

I started by stamping the Poppy image from Botanical Blocks III Stamp Set in Versamark onto Canson Bristol Watercolor Paper and heat setting it using Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder.  I watercolored the poppy using Pure Poppy Reinker for the bloom, Deep Green Zig Marker for the foliage, and Light Blue Zig Marker for the sky.  I also used a Black Zig Marker for the center of the poppy.  I had watercolored a few other things yesterday morning so I set each aside as I completed them, returning back to them after they were dry. That was actually a very efficient way to work rather than doing all parts of each card one at a time. Once my image was completely dry, I gave the watercolor paper an all over spritz of Shimmer Spray and then went back over the petals on the bloom with my Wink of Stella Clear Shimmer Pen.

Next I trimmed out the piece of watercolor paper and matted it in gold foiled cardstock then attached that to a top folding card base that had been cut using the Noted: A2 Scalloped Card Base using Simon Says Stamp Audrey Blue Cardstock.

I added a sentiment from the Caring Hearts Stamp Set using Versamark directly on the card base and heat set it using Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder.

This is such a striking color combination and not one I would have thought to try on my own. That is part of what makes challenges so great! Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you are getting to enjoy some of this same gorgeous fall weather we're having here in Oklahoma.

Inspired By So Many Things

They have some great photographic inspiration this week over at Inspired By All The Little Things #27 and Sugar Pea Designs Mix It Up Challenge #18. I always enjoy photo inspiration challenges because they can be interpreted in so many different ways. In my case I was inspired by the repeating patterns of the umbrellas as well as the colors in the first photo and again the repeating pattern of the pumpkins in the second photo.

Sugar Pea Designs had a special release for the start of the Caring Hearts Card Drive which runs from October 1st through November 25th. The Caring Hearts Collection consists of three stamp sets and three die collections. You can see and read about them here. Sugar Pea is also donating 20% of the proceeds from the sale of these items from September 30th to November 30th to the Alzheimer's Association.

You can find the whole Caring Hearts Collection in the Sugar Pea Designs Store and they will soon be arriving at Simon Says Stamp as well.  The items are currently on reserve at both locations. I was super happy to get mine already as they sold out in a matter of hours.

The purpose of the card drive is to collect holiday cards for the elderly that live in nursing homes. Last year, they received over 22,000 cards and distributed them to over 100 nursing homes throughout the US, Canada and Australia.  It's a fantastic cause involving lots of your favorite cardmakers and designers like Jennifer McGuire, Laura Bassen, Debby Hughes and many others.

I started my card for these two challenges by stamping the envelopes from the Sugar Pea Designs Caring Hearts Stamp Set in Versamark and repeating a few times to create a vertical band of the images to watercolor for a border on my card. I heat embossed using Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder.  Once I had it watercolored with my Zig Markers and some Wink of Stella Shimmer Pen, I cut it first with the largest Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle Die and then cut lengthwise with one of the Simon Says Stamp Wavy Scalloped Stitches Die.  I also cut the patterned paper with the largest Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle.  The patterned paper is from Lawn Fawn's Perfectly Plaid Collection.  I also stamped and colored a couple of the single envelopes to fussy cut and use on my sentiment banner.  The banner is from Papertrey Inks Paper Clippings: Birthday Details Die.  I love it and keep it on my table all the time.  There are many great sentiments in the Caring Hearts Stamp Set but I keep this small set from Create a Smile called "Happy Mail" on my desk and I wanted to use that on my banner.  Everything is adhered to a top folding card base made from Simon Says Stamp Surf Blue Cardstock using my ATG gun. 

This was another quick and easy card to make.  It took me a lot longer to write and link up this post than it did to make the card.  We have a gorgeous, sunny Autumn day on tap here in Oklahoma so happy Saturday, everyone!