Party Time with Mo Manning

Hey! Back with my first Copics card in ages. Like, seriously, ages... 16 months, maybe?

When one of my coworkers saw the Doctors Day cards and especially the PowerPoint I had projecting on the wall (see my last post), she asked if I could make her daughter a birthday card using the same colors. Her daughter's on the school band and plays the saxophone, so she wanted anything with music. I had the perfect image in mind...

The image is So Jazzed by Mo Manning. I still had bits of cardstock and the watercolored paper I'd made for the Doctors Day cards, so I pulled this together. She only gave me a night's notice, and I ran out of time, so I had to assemble everything quickly at home and finish coloring the image at work during my lunch. I have never glued together a card before finishing the image, and I think I held my breath the larger part of lunch. I still went a bit out of the lines, but I was rather pleased by the end. Especially since it's been so long since I colored. I did well capturing the red shade of her daughter's hair too!  The photo is, unfortunately, another on the fly by cellphone; the richness of the colors in the real-life card is really pretty. I added some Stardust Stickles to the heart on her coat and swirls on her skirt and a teeny dot on the heart attached to the dog's collar. Some Golden Rod Stickles made the sax super sparkly.

As the image is the focus and I didn't want to detract from the watercolored background, I stayed really CAS with this one. I didn't have a piece of the purple cardstock big enough to back my image, so I used two pieces that didn't quite come together so I hid the seams with the little gem up top and a purple heart coated in glossy accents on the bottom. The sentiment is a Paper Smooches sentiment from the Birthday Sampler embossed in white and I used a Happy Birthday from the same set inside along with a strip of the watercolor (no pic, sorry).

I'm entering this sweet girly in a couple of challenges:

Crafting When We Can - #66 for a Child
Charisma Cardz Challenge - #7 Clean & Simple
Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week #118
.
So that's it for now... hope to see you all again soon! Until then, best wishes and happy crafting!
Christy

Getting Inky for Doctors Day

So.... getting back into crafting has taken me a bit longer than expected... timing's been a bit off and I caught a respiratory virus that kicked my butt (or should I say lungs?) for the better part of 4 weeks. Exhaustion and creativity don't share the same space very well. LOL  And to be honest, I was having a hard time getting started. So many stamps, so many supplies, so many ideas... so much blog surfing... where to start? I admit I was overwhelmed with choice! I began just playing around with watercolor paper and Distress Stains, so when my first must-make card opportunity came along, I was ready.

We had our Doctors Day brunch a little earlier than the official Day this year and I was tasked with creating cards for my department's doctoral staff. I wanted something clean and simple, but interesting. I tried out some of the (oh so many) papers in my stash, but I wasn't feeling it... so I decided to make my own. I wanted a color mix that was pretty gender neutral. I used a mix of Tumbled Glass, Shaded Lilac, Dusty Concord and Peacock Feathers with a little Black Soot and Brushed Pewter for accent. I had this deep purple Wausau cardstock that went with it beautifully. (Please forgive the awful photos... I forgot to take photos at home so I had to use my cellphone at work. Appalling lighting, although the microscope made for an interesting card backdrop LOL)

I played with lots of different shape options for the sentiment before deciding on basic circles. I know it looks white in the photo, but the card base is a light cream. I added some interest with my Judikins Galaxy Spiral stamp, using Distress Stain in Tumbled Glass to keep it light and watercolor-y rather than going straight from the ink pad. I rounded the top corner and added a single gem on the bottom and called it done. Then I repeated the process 36 more times!

All the work was worth it though - my coworkers were pleased and the docs loved them. I even took a photo of the last whole sheet of watercolored paper with one of the circle sentiments and created a PowerPoint slide that was displayed on our conference room wall during the brunch using the overhead projector. It's a cheap way of getting a really big decoration as a focal point. =)

Even better, I got a few card requests out of the deal AND my mojo has started flowing again. Feels good to be getting inky!  A big thanks to those of you who've sent me messages or left encouraging comments. The best thing about the crafty community is that sense of community. Kinda feels like coming home after a very long trip. =)

I do have one more card to blog, so hopefully I'll see you shortly!  Happy Crafting!
Christy