Happy Birthday to Simon Says Stamps with Colour Me Colors and Nacho Average Sketch

Simon Says Stamps is celebrating their 5th year of blogging challenges and the theme this week is "Happy Birthday"!  They will randomly select one participant to receive a $100 voucher to their store to celebrate this milestone--who wouldn't want to win?  With my fingers crossed to be a lucky winner here is my card:

Close to My Heart products used:
    Sunset CS
    Colonial White CS
    Sunset Ink
    Black CS
    Chevron Embossing folder
    Charming Chevrons stamps
    Heartfelt Birthday Wish
    One Way Border stamp inside card
    Almond Glitz Glitter Gel (retired)
    My Legacy Writer to outline .08 (retired)
    3D Foam Tape

Other products:
    SU word window punch

Inspiration for this card was provided by Nacho Average Challenges #83 (sketch)

and Colour Me...#14 (color scheme)

And since this is a birthday card I am also entering it into "Seize the Birthday" with  Buttons and Bling option (notice the sparkly dots on the black pieces).

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful week filled with fun and creativity!

:) Marie

St. Patrick's Day Card for Numerous Challenges

As I was reading my blog list this morning I found a new card challenge with a sketch I wanted to try.  It is called The Challenge #2 and is on Lesley Croghan's blog "Always Playing with Paper".  She even includes cutting dimensions to help you get started.   Here is the sketch that inspired me today:

Since I needed to make some St. Patrick's Day cards, I changed the heart shape to shamrock shapes. 

The shamrocks were cut with the "Celebrate with Flourish" Cricut cartridge from Kentucky Green CS (retired Close To My Heart).  The patterned paper is also retired from CTMH.  I used  the Darice St. Pat's Day Background embossing folder and a sanding block for the bottom card layer.  The gold metallic CS is also retired CTMH.  (I really used a lot of old stash to make this card!)  The gold accents were made with a regular paper punch form the gold metallic CS.  I skipped the sentiment because I thought that it was obviously a St. Patrick's Day card!

I am also entering this card into the following challenges:

    Exploring Cricut--Luck of the Irish

    Cut it Up--Green for St. Patrick's Day or Spring #40

    Pinspirational Challenges--#98 St. Patrick's Day

    Simply Create Too--#56 Shop in Your Stash

    Cuttin And Stampin Challenges--St. Patrick's Day/Lucky

    Diecuttin' Divas--#156 Luck of the Irish

    Time 4 Scrap--#35 St. Patrick's Day

    Artistic Inspirations--#82 St. Patrick's Day, Green or Anything Goes

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful week filled with fun and creativity!

:) Marie

Hexagon Shaped Card for Heart 2 Heart Challenge

Heart 2 Heart really challenges me to think outside the box with their numerous "theme" challenges.  This week both H2H Design Teams will be posting "Shaped Cards"--other than rectangular or square.

My card started with a 4.25" Colonial White hexagon cut from the new Artbooking cartridge.  I then used my Close To My Heart ruler to trace the shape adding .25 to all sides.  I scored on the top flat side and traced again to form a folded card base from Autumn Terracotta CS.  The Cranberry CS mat was cut at 4.5 from Artbooking.  The flowers are from the Autumn Happy set--first stamped in Cranberry ink and then stamped in Autumn Terracotta ink to fill in the "white" spaces.  The greeting is from Heartfelt Birthday Wish which was masked to allow the Washi Wonder stamp (Exclusive Hostess Reward--see page 6 of the catalog here) to fit under the birthday greeting.  Almond Glitz Glitter Gel was applied to the inside of the birthday letters.

The Color My Heart Color Dare challenge this week is to pick Cranberry and one other color so this card meets that challenge also.

We would love to have you play along with us at Heart 2 Heart with this Shaped Card challenge.  You have until the end of October to link your card up with us here.  We can't wait to see what you create!  Please check out what the rest of the awesome Design Team has for you and leave them so well deserved comments if you can.

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful week filled with fun and creativity!
:) Marie

Color Dare #24--Neutrals and Design Team Announcement

Have you been to Color My Heart Color Dare this week?  If so, you'll see that there is a brand new Design Team and I'm on it!  I'm very excited to  join the very talented ladies that are on this team!  Visit my sidebar and check out their amazing blogs. I've had the opportunity to be a Guest Designer for this challenge which I thoroughly enjoyed and now I will be submitting something made with the fabulous Close To My Heart products every week!

This week's challenge is to create a project (card, layout or other papercrafted item)  using only neutral colors from the Close To My Heart Basic color palette.  They are:

White Daisy
Colonial White and

At first I thought that this would be difficult as I usually prefer bright colors but then I remembered that I had the perfect CTMH paper in my stash.  Silhouette was one of my favorite Close To My Heart papers which retired several years ago but it works great for this color challenge!  It features Black, Bamboo, Colonial White and White Daisy.  The paper I chose has a lovely floral pattern to it.  On  my first card I also added Chocolate, Colonial White and Desert Sand cardstocks and used Almond Glitz Glitter Gel and Stardust Glitz Glitter Gel to embellish the patterned paper.  The sentiment is from Card Chatter--Sympathy (a very versatile set) and it was inked in Versamark ink, Chocolate ink and then clear embossed to give it some texture.

After I applied the CTMH Glitter Gels I wondered if maybe I went overboard with it so I made two more cards trying out different neutral colors.  In this next card I used Black and White for the greeting and Colonial White as the card base.

This last card features  Black embossed sentiment on a Bamboo strip of cardstock with a black card base.

I like all of these cards with a slight preference for the glittered first one.  Do you have a preference?  I would be interested in reading it and would love for you to leave me a comment if you have the time.

This neutrals color challenge at Color My Heart Color Dare ends at 9PM Central Time on Thursday.  We would love to have you join us there! 

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful week filled with fun and creativity!

:) Marie