Before I share today’s project, I want to thank the design team at Create with Connie and Mary for selecting my “Best Part of Waking Up” coffee cup card as a Top 3 Pick last week. I love to be inspired by online challenges, and it’s always nice to get a “kudos” in return. If you missed that card, you can see it here.
Today’s project blends Create with Connie and Mary’s color challenge with Mojo Monday’s sketch challenge. Online challenges are great – with my sketch and colors selected, all I had to do is pick a stamp set to work with. OK, maybe there’s still a little more left to do – but I do have less decisions to make. 🙂 Here’s my card:
Here’s the challenge banner for this week’s Create with Connie and Mary:
And here’s this week’s sketch from Mojo Monday:
Tips, Tricks and Reminders
- Blended Bloom. By now, you’ve seen this Blended Bloom flower all over the place, right? Blended Bloom is one of the stamp sets that was included in Stampin’ Up!’s pre-order for demonstrators. While it’s perfect for Stampin’ Up!’s Blendabilties (not yet available to customers – but soon), I decided to heat emboss it with White Stampin’ Emboss Powder. To add a little extra texture to the flower, I painted the folded petals with my Stampin’ Chalk Marker.
- Centering You. Sometimes you just have to play around with shapes and colors. The “YOU” in this sentiment from Flower Patch is the important part of the saying. I highlighted it by placing the “YOU” over the center of the flower and adding some punched circles behind it – it’s like “YOU” have a halo behind you. The big plus – the circles repeat the borders around the panel below and hide the stamens of the flower (which I don’t think look very pretty – seems they would be filled with pollen which is a lot like glitter).
- Subtle Stripes. The sketch calls for two diagonal stripes along the lower panel on the front of the card. I cropped super-thin strips of Whisper White, Wild Wasabi and Perfect Plum to determine which would look best over the Coastal Cabana. All three options seemed to draw too much attention away from the flower. I decided to keep the stripes but made them Coastal Cabana to add a hint of dimension without taking away from the rest of the card.
Stamp Sets: Blended Bloom, Flower Patch Papers: Perfect Plum, Wild Wasabi, Coastal Cabana, Whisper White Inks: Coastal Cabana Accessories: White Stampin’ Emboss Powder, Stampin’ Chalk Marker, 1-1/4″ Circle punch, 1-3/8″ Circle punch, Hexagon punch (to create banner ends), Pearl Basic Jewels, Stampin’ Dimensionals
The Flower Patch Bundle in included in my Must-Haves List of items from the new 2014-2015 Annual Catalog. You can see the full list here.
Thanks for stopping by!
Brian
Weekly Deal. It’s Tuesday – your most favorite moment of each week. The Weekly Deals have been announced – check them out here.
FANTASTIC combination of challenges! I must agree, they take a lot of the “guess work” out of cardmaking! At first glance, I thought you embossed those little stripes – you had me fooled! Great card! Thanks for joining us in the color challenge this week at Create with Connie and Mary!
Congrats on your top three pick. That was a great card and it deserved to be in the tip three! The diagonal stripes on this card were the perfect choice! Very clever centering “You” over the center of the flower!
Love this card. Absolutely adorable.
Great stamp choice for the challenge!
Love, Love, Love those Coastal Cabana stripes. Missed them when I looked at the card. I had to go back and look again. They are so subtle. Hope I remember to use them on some card. The rest of the card is very nice, too, that was just my favorite part. 🙂
What a beautiful card. I love the Colour combination. I have saved every email post you sent just so I can remember the Colour combinations. Great job.
Stay cool in Hot Atlanta.
Sharon Storm
Virginia Beach
Love the card!! Thanks for sharing.
P.S. Brian, I have to thank you. Your post a couple of weeks ago convinced me to purchase the retiring alphabet dies. I used them for the first time on a scrapbooking project (on my blog today) and I just am so pleased that I listened to you and bought the dies! Thanks so much! : )
Clever using the Chalk Marker for highlights. After examining a bit closer, I did figure out that you used cardstock for the stripes. I agree Coastal Cabana was the perfect choice. Wonderful card Brian.
Beautiful!! I love the way you did those strips! What a perfect option! They are subtle yet add texture! And what a fantastic idea of using the chalk marker! Love that look! Thanks for playing the challenge at Create with Connie and Mary!
This card is strikingly beautiful. Excellent job Brian
Nice going on today’s card. The color combinations seemed unusual to me, but you really made them work. Your careful attention to detail and design help to make your cards winners. Congrats on your Top Three selection! You deserve it.
First of all, I love the color palette for this challenge. I forget about Perfect Plum {Blush}. The strips of Coastal Cabana are another reason why you impress us every day. You always have something “I” wouldn’t think of right out of the box. And your daily dose of humor (comparing pollen to glitter) ROFL! Thank you, Brian!
I have to agree with Susie that I forget about Perfect Plum ….and it really looks good with Coastal Cabana . Maria and I are swapping the MoJo Monday cards and I was trying my best to come up with those strips …thank you for the idea . I was going to go for embossed lines ,but I like the same color CS . Great card and glad you are a winner ! Course we all know that anyway !!
Fantastic card! I haven’t pulled out my embossing powder in a long time! Guess what I will be clearing out of the cobwebs this weekend! Love the color combo especially the Perfect Plum as the purples are my favorite!
What a simply delightful card! I love how you embossed in white on the colored cardstock instead of coloring in the flower. Also the added same color strips of cardstock really make it look embossed. Thanks for playing along this week in the Create with Connie and Mary Thursday Challenge!
Ah, I wondered how you only embossed certain areas! But you used strips of the same cardstock…clever! I also like how the flower is the background, not the focal image! Great job! Thanks for playing along with the color challenge this week on Create with Connie and Mary!
One word Brian….GORGEOUS! I love the crisp clean look. So wonderful with these colors. And the flower in Wisteria and white embossing is just amazing! Thanks so much for joining us for the color challenge this week at Create with Connie and Mary!