Category: Challenges

Art Inspiration, Cards, Challenges, Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps

Sweet ‘n Sassy Stamps Stamp-a-thon – Deer Scene

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

I hope you are having a great weekend!

I’ve been doing more sorting & organizing & just a bit of creating this week in the studio. Today I spent some time playing with the challenges during the Sweet ‘n Sassy Stamps Stamp-a-thon event.

The 1st challenge was to Create a Scene and here is what I came up with.

This would make a great guy card. I used Sweet ‘n Sassy Scene Silhouette sets Trees & Woodland and the sentiment is from SNSS Beautiful Birds. The gold splatter is Gansai Tambi watercolor. You will notice my blends aren’t quite as smooth. That’s because the bottom 2 greens are Distress Oxides and the top 2 colors are Distress Inks. I will mix them if that’s what I happen to own in the colors I plan to use.

Have a Blessed Sunday!

Art Inspiration, Challenges, Simon Says Stamp

Simon Says Stamp 5 Ways in 5 Days Day 3 Distress Oxides Play

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

I actually didn’t get a card done today for the 5 Ways in 5 Days but I did try 2 of the techniques in Kristina Werner’s video and hopefully I can play with the rest soon.

After being out in the 100+ heat index for appointments & errands, this play time was perfect & so much fun. I can spend hours making backgrounds sometimes. I got these done in about an hour. I worked in another look from the Card Makers Summit too.

I can’t wait to play with the other couple of techniques Kristina shared in her video. I’ve played with the Gel press before but it’s been awhile & playing with the Ranger Distress Resist should be fun too.

I hope you have a great Thursday. I’ll be getting my 3rd knee injection, the knee already feels much better with some extra fluid.

Art Inspiration, Cards, Challenges, Simon Says Stamp, Taylored Expressions

Simon Says Stamp 5 Ways in 5 Days- Day 2 Sparkle

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

Busy day & I’m tired. I got more sorting done in the studio, the new carpet was put in & the bedroom is almost back together and I got one of the 2 cards I started done for Simon Says Stamp 5 Ways in 5 Days.

Today Yana Smakula shared different ways to add sparkle to a card and I managed to get 3 different sparkles from my supplies on this card.

It’s very glittery so it’s hard to photograph. I didn’t have the medium Yana used but I did have Taylored Expressions new Glitter Grab that I hadn’t tried yet. I applied it through Taylored’s Winter’s Beauty Stencil then I grabbed some glitter I’ve had forever and tried for a striped effect. The outside edges are a light lavender glitter but just looks like a different white in the picture. The center is a mixture of white & silver glitter. Not perfect but very cool. I added a glitter rhinestone in the center & die cut peace out of glitter paper.

I will try & get my second card I started done soon but it may be after this week. I’d like to try & get something done for tomorrows 5 Ways and it’s an errand day so time will be short.

Have a Great Wednesday!

Cards, Challenges, Penny Black, Simon Says Stamp, Taylored Expressions

Simon Says Stamp 5 Ways in 5 Days – Day 1 Ink Blending

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

I hope your week is off to a great start!

No art sorting done today because we were clearing the master bedroom for new carpet tomorrow. But I did get a little more sorting done there.

I popped in on Simon Says Stamp new Summer Crafty Series 5 Ways in 5 Days today & decided to play along as the week allows. I didn’t have the Simon Says Stamp products that Laura Bassen used in today’s video so I challenged myself to use what I have.

I love clean & simple graphics. I used Taylored Expressions Masking Stencils Rectangle & just shifted it a bit to get the layers for the first card along with Pink Fresh Studio’s Happy Birthday. For the 2nd card, I created circle layers with my Hero Arts Infinity Dies Nesting Circle set & Yupo paper. Yupo makes great reusable stencils with your diecuts. The celebrate is from Penny Black.

So much fun but it’s off to bed, the carpet guys will be here bright & early in the morning.

Have a Terrific Tuesday!

Bash That Stash, Budget & Stash Stretchers, Cards, Challenges

Bash That Stash Polka Dots

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

It’s Monday and that means my heavy cleaning day so not as much time for art, which is why I am working on trying to manage my days a bit better.

Over on the Caffeine Fueled Chaos and Card Making Group they started the year with a “Bash That Stash” challenge. The premise is to use what you already have on hand. Some of us have bigger stashes than others, LOL! I certainly do.

Today’s challenge was Polka Dots and since I wanted to still do some quick creating, I dug into my infamous Bits & Pieces box.

I often test my embossing folders on plain old white cardstock so have a stack of them on hand. This one happened to have a swiss dot background, instant polka dots. I didn’t even have to dig in the patterned scraps for polka dot paper, the red was within reach. A quick sentiment, a little Stickles & instant card flat enough to mail easily. Which is important with rising postage costs.

I will probably only participate in the challenges now & then but I am definitely working on using more of my stash this year all around.

Have a Fantastic Week!

Cards, Challenges

Snowy Town

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

There are days I can be the queen of fast, simple, & elegant.

I am going to be working hard the next couple of weeks to get a better schedule in place. It was nice to have a breather from the faster pace of life but I’ve been moseying along a little too long I think. Plus with my guys working at home, I need a new routine that works for me without disturbing their work days.

Tonight’s card is another red, white & blue Holiday in July Extravaganza Card for the Troops. I have a couple of town or house border dies but I picked up the Little House Border by Paper Rose recently & decided it would make a great quick card.

I think the most work on this card was splattering the blue background with white paint. I die cut the border die, layered it on the card, stamped the sentiment & completed in about 15 minutes. Clean, simple & elegant.

I have always loved clean & simple design. I am just not an over the top person. I can do lots of layers, 3-D & fussy but simple & elegant is my signature style.

Do you have a signature style you prefer?

Thanks for popping in!

Cards, Challenges

Jolly Snowman

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

It’s time for another holiday card in red, white & blue for our Holiday in July Extravaganza for the Troops.

July is a good time to look at your 4th of July paper kits to see if there are any papers that will work for the winter holiday season. Plaids, polka dots, stripes, stars & hearts are all universal patterns that can work well any time of the year for any occasion. One such kit provided the patterned paper I needed to today’s card.

One of our group members sent some Troop holiday cards with this fun snowman die from Creative Expressions. I knew he existed, I just wasn’t quite sold on picking him up for my collection. As you can see after seeing the cards in person made with him, I now have my own die.

Isn’t the plaid paper from the Photoplay Land of the Free collection just perfect behind him? It definitely gives that cozy winter feeling to our red, white & blue theme. The sentiment is from My Favorite Things Christmas sELFies stamp set.

Have you tried a patriotic holiday card yet?

Thanks for popping by!

Cards, Challenges, Faith Based Art, Kindness matters, Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps

Bookmark Challenge

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

Almost didn’t make today’s post as I wrestled with a migraine for about 36 hours, then I just feel drained. But even moving slow I decided to tackle the challenge from the Creative Worship Bible Journaling group.

We were challenged to create bookmarks to share with others. I think we are going to start seeing a lot of kindness initiatives in the coming months. It’s been a challenging year to say the least & sharing encouragement, love & kindness will make a big difference to our neighbors & our fellow brothers & sisters in Christ.

I made 2 cards & bookmark sets to go out as Happy Mail this week & a bookmark for me. I used the new True Beauty Stamp set from Sweet n’ Sassy Stamps along with the sentiment on the reverse of the bookmark from the Faith set. The embossing folder for the cards is Memory Box Chrysanthemum Field.

Complete set of 2 cards & 3 bookmarks
Bookmark gift inside of card
Front & Back of bookmark
The bookmark will easily fit in any book

I am actually working on a small stack of happy mail to send out this week along with our July shipment of Troop cards.

I challenge you to join in the kindness movement & do something nice for someone this week. Maybe a phone call, a card, a small surprise, just a little bit of something to let someone know you care.

A smile is a great start.

Cards, Challenges

Red, White & Blue Ornaments

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

I have another great example for our July Holiday Extravaganza for the Troops.

This card was a bit fussy, meaning a few extra steps but I love how it came together. If I were making several of these for the Troops I would probably do either a batch of 6 or 12.

I always suggest when doing sets of cards for the Troops to keep the duplicates to a minimum because we are sending to one unit. Working in sets of 6, 12, 18, 24 work best to keep the variety fresh. I have received in the past a box of cards where the sweet person who sent used the same rather large stamped image on about 100 cards. They all started blending together even with different sentiments attached. It really helps a lot to have a mixed selection in the boxes we send to the troops. We want them to feel like a card “store” just arrived in a box with lots of different styles to choose from.

It was really fun digging through my patterned papers to see what fit our patriotic holiday theme. You can never go wrong with classic stripes, polka dots, plaids etc. I set aside a variety to work with for July.

This card features Memory Box Classic Ornament & Spellbinders Classic Triple Scallops dies. The greeting is from My Favorite Things Snow Globe Sentiments.

Have a Fabulous Week Ahead!

Thanks for popping by!

Cards, Challenges, Penny Black

The Holiday in July Extravaganza

Ruth Cooper

Hi Angels!

As most of you know, I have been working with Cards for the Troops for many years. It is one of my favorite encouragement projects especially since we are a retired Air Force family. My husband has always called it a multiple blessing. We get to make cards to send to the troops, the troops know we care about them & their families, their families are blessed when they receive that precious happy mail from their service member.

We have a special challenge going on this month on the Let’s Make Cards group on Facebook. That challenge is to make patriotic themed holiday cards for our annual holiday shipment. Of course everyone is welcome to make any style of holiday cards they would like but we thought it would be fun to throw some red/white/blue into the mix.

I thought it would also be a great way for me to share some ideas & get a few cards made myself for the shipment. While searching for ideas for the theme I saw an image with red/white/blue holiday trees. I knew exactly what I wanted to use to make this card.

Penny Black’s Tall Trees are just a fun pine tree shape and a great size. While looking at my dies, I thought it also would be fun to use PB Curved Stitch for the snowy hill and the holiday sentiment is from PB Holiday Hello & I didn’t search for where greetings came from. My dies desperately need reorganized.

We are pretty limited by restrictions on what can be used on our cards so I plan to showcase easy designs with a lot of interest to them. It doesn’t have to be flashy to be a great card.

I hope you are enjoying a great holiday weekend!

Stay tuned for more fun.