Greetings, my bloggy friends and an extra-special
big hello to my new Followers! Thanks for joining me on my crafty travels and for spreading the news of my Christmas in July Cash Candy! =) I will be 'round to visit you soon! I meant to do it this week, but the days have zoomed by much faster than expected... I started attending an aquarobics class last week and the trip every night is now eating up 2 or 2.5 hours of my evenings. I'm starting to fall into a routine, but it was a big adjustment at first.
I have been trying to get just a little bit of crafty time in each night and did a lot of coloring over the last week... Nothing more relaxing than getting into a coloring groove. =) One of the images I really enjoyed coloring up was for this fortnight's challenge at
Paper-Crafting Journey of Pearls and Swirls, sponsored by
Saturated Canary! One randomly chosen winner will receive two Saturated Canary digital images! Krista generously offered an image to each of the DT members and I was drawn to
Honey, who reminds me of my friend Nancy's granddaughter. There's just something about that girly tutu and heart t-shirt with those big boots together. And that bunny! Love! It was just the perfect image for a card for Nancy.
And a side view...
I'm very happy with how this one turned out... My coloring came out nearly exactly as I pictured it (especially considering I pictured it based on my own skills, not the fantastic examples that populate my Google Reader every day! LOL)... not perfect, but my coloring is getting better! I had problems with the dark grays/black bleeding around the boot and it took ages to keep adding blender to push the ink back where it belonged. But imperfections aside, I had such a good time coloring her up! =) I wanted to add a bit of shadowing around her, but I was afraid of ruining my image after all that work, so I left it plain and colored in just a bit of ground beneath her. I definitely need to do some practice images to see what shadow colors look good with which image colors. Sigh. More practice. Always the answer. LOL
I did add a bit of girly glitter with a little Stardust Stickles on the underlayers of the tutu and a metallic silver pen for her shoelaces and the pull at the back of her left boot.
For my card I started with an 8.5x11 pearlized black cardstock with the matte side folded in. I took a blank embossed and pearlized wedding invitation card - I've had a box of these for 8 or 9 years - which was a little too big. I cut a strip out of the middle and ended up cutting too much! I 'fixed' that by adding some light gray satin ribbon and creating an accent strip across the middle. I added a gray swirl digi paper from Pink Petticoat, trimmed to fit inside the invitation's inside border and a pink paper cut with the largest Romantic Rectangle die from Spellbinders was layered under my image with a bit of corner rounding and a lot of pink and white pearls to accent. I added a few more teeny tiny pearls on the bare strip of pearlized black cardstock... love those itsy bitsy pearls! No sentiment, as tends to happen with my 'just because' cards. I didn't photograph the inside, but I used the matching RSVP card on the inside with a few more teeny pearls. Kind of elegant. =)
Here's a closeup of the top corner. I took it at the last minute, so the lighting isn't as white as on the other photos, sorry!
I thought about adding a bow or a swirl die cut, but in person the pearlized and embossed swirl pattern on the wedding card really stands out and my coworker is not really into bows and flowers and froufrou, so I kept it simple. It gives it a sort of white-on-white effect with the pop of pink of that girly tutu and pink lacey edge from the die! =)
So if this doesn't get you in the mood for pearls and swirls, check out my teamies' creations over at
Paper-Crafting Journey and catch all the details for the challenge! And if you haven't entered my Christmas in July Cash candy going on
HERE, make sure you come back and check it out -- $40 gift certificate for my existing Followers, $25 for new or existing Followers, and $15 for anyone, regardless of whether they Follow or not! =)
In the meantime, I'm entering my card in the following challenges and link-ups:
Dream Valley -
#36 Anything but Square
Simon Says Stamp & Show -
No Rules!
Lexi's Creations -
#69 For a Friend
The Paper Shelter -
#73 Anything Goes
I will be back tomorrow with some CHRISTMAS CARDS! Woohoo! =) Til then, happy crafting!
Christy
I added a nice coating of Crystal Stickles with its green and yellowy-pink glitter for her underskirt and the rosette in her hair and bit of Stardust Stickles on the second rosette that I printed and cut out for the top corner of the card. The heart border is an older Martha Stewart punch. I used a bit of pink grosgrain ribbon to cover the seam and added three of the punched out hearts with a dot of the pearl pen to the bottom corner. 
