Eclectic Ellapu December 2016 Pink Team Challenge

Me, ambitious? Never! ;) ...says the lady who made FORTY of these Christmas cards! I got the buckle idea from something I saw on Pinterest years ago, and had a fun (and eventually tedious) time making these paper belts & buckles. This also made great use of the button stash that I just had to buy as a kid, and am still working my way through.

Do you have a great Christmas make? Join in Eclectic Ellapu's December "Anything Christmas" challenge!

Can I CAS?

Clean and Simple (CAS) cards have not really been my strong suit. I find my eyes are most frequently drawn to complicated, heavily embellished or multiple layer projects. My inspiration boards on Pinterest definitely corroborate this! I started this batch of birthday cards during a crafting evening with friends, so I did not want to spend hours designing a card; I wanted to get crafting! So I tried my hand at CAS.

While I accomplished my CAS goal, these cards still took hours... although a lot of that was drying time after playing with making my green, yellow, and blue Brushos fireworks streaks!

Entered in:
613 Avenue Create Challenge #191 - Anything Goes
Aud Sentiment Challenge #168 - Anything Goes + Sentiment
Crafting From The Heart Challenge #135
Crafts Galore Encore Challenge - November Anything Goes
Crafty Cardmakers #176 - Explosion of Colour
Crafty Catz Challenge #346 - Anything Goes
Craftyhazelnut's Patterned Paper - November, Anything Patterned Paper
Create and Inspire Challenge #55 - Anything Goes
Creative Fingers Challenge #120 - Anything Goes
Get Creative Challenge #52 - Birthday
Glitter N Sparkle Challenge #214 - Anything Goes
Not Just Cards Challenge #38 - November/Anything Goes
Simon Says Monday Challenge - Shine Bright Like a Diamond
Simply Papercrafts #40 - Anything Goes
Word Art Wednesday #256-257 - Anything Goes

Eclectic Ellapu November 2016 Pink Team Challenge

In a near ode to Portlandia, November's Eclectic Ellapu Pink Team challenge is to "put a bow on it." Bows are not a frequent guest in my crafting, but one found a welcome place in my Thanksgiving door hanger. 'Tis the season for holiday crafting!

This project included a bit of stamp masking, some ink blending & sprays, gelato stenciling, background stamping, sentiment embossing, mounting on painted cardboard, and, of course, a raffia bow.

Eclectic Ellapu October 2016 Pink Team Challenge

My design team project for Eclectic Ellapu's October challenge pushed my crafting boundaries a bit. That's what challenges are for, right? This month's challenge theme is "shabby chic", so I tried my hand at shabby chic for the first time. I had some good technique inspiration to apply to my project by way of Pamellia over at My Little Craft Things, whose work has drawn my eye since the first time I saw one of her projects.

My two most used supplies on this card? Crackle paste and white acrylic craft paint. So much white acrylic paint! Only the pearls, tea-dyed lace, and rafia were left untouched by the white paint.

{crafted while listening to Annalisa Tornfelt's "Ride a Unicorn Sideways" and "The Number 8"}

Eclectic Ellapu September 2016 Pink Team Challenge

Over at Eclectic Ellapu, the Pink Team's September challenge is the theme "Gifts". If you want to join in, make something with a gift-giving image/sentiment, make gift packaging, or make a gift!

My Design Team project is a gift that also has a gift theme, because really, every day is a gift. Once the invincibility of youth gives way to recognition of our mortality, this sentiment gains depth. With the idea that each day is a gift in my mind, this month's project took shape: a daily gift of one of my daily gifts. Thus, my tea book was born: seven pages of tea, one each day as a gift and a small way to reach across the miles to share a cup of tea with my friend.

 

 

Supplies used:

• upcycled cake box
• Lemon Chiffon Apple Barrel acrylic paint
• Sea Green and Yellow Brushos
• Memory Box Texture Drip Rings stencil
• Golden Semi-Gloss Regular Gel
• Tea Dye Distress Ink
• Prima Marketing Bloom (Paige) stamp
• Versamark and Ranger super fine black embossing powder
• Twinkling H2O's from the Autumn Brilliance, Passion, and Holiday Sparkle sets
• stash paper
• Beacon 3-in-1 glue
• plastic page protectors and We R Memory Keepers Fuse tool
• green embroidery floss

{crafted while listening to Mystic's "Cuts for Luck and Scars for Freedom"}

"To Read a Book" Postcard

This handmade postcard was a project for Postcrossing and a great excuse to play with some newer supplies. A book lover who likes handmade cards = a perfect recipient of my first postcard attempt!

I had some kraft postcard 12x12 paper on hand, so I gessoed it and started playing with gelatos, Brushos, and Twinkling H2Os. Not until after I water-sprayed the Brusho powder did I remember that gelatos are water reactive, and I was really wishing I had some fixative spray on hand. Lesson learned! Fortunately, it was the kind of creative accident that does not detract from the end result. The focal stamp is from Papertrey Ink's "All Booked Up" stamp set.

Does anyone else here have a love of reading? What book is a particularly loved "old friend" of yours?


{crafted while listening to "The Number 8" by Annalisa Tornfeldt}

Eclectic Ellapu August 2016 Pink Team Challenge

Where did this summer go? I am about to leave home again for another 9+ months after a couple of blissful months at home. Onward and upward, right? I am looking forward to beautiful sights and time to craft this fall and winter, but leaving home is getting harder each time I do it. It was a mood of home-based sentimentalism that inspired this month's Eclectic Ellapu piece for the Pink Team's Floral challenge.

Supplies used for this project:

• Gessoed game card
• Mister Huey's Color Mists - Mint Julep, Manila, and Overdue
• red plastic projector slide frame
• Smash post-it flag
• mini glass beads
• Distress Stain - Aged Mahogany
• Lindy's Stamp Gang Moon Shadow Mist - Buccaneer Bronze
• Thickers silver glitter alphabet chipboard stickers
• Stickles - Xmas Red
• red adhesive crystals
• Petaloo "Color Me Crazy" flowers

{crafted while listening to The Echoing Green}

Eclectic Ellapu July 2016 Pink Team Challenge

It has been a slow crafting month but busy life month for me. Eclectic Ellapu's July "Anything Goes" Pink Team challenge gave me the motivation needed to carve out some time to craft! Killing two birds with one stone, I used my crafting time to create a present for a friend. These wooden initials have been hanging out in my stash for a year or two, intended for this project, so I am very happy to have finally put them to use.

Stained wood with Distress Stain and Dylusions spray.
Test layout of miscellaneous stash findings.

Papers picked, cut, torn, layered, and glued.
More Distress Stain, through stencils.

Modeling paste dyed with 3 inks, then stenciled.
Glued down stash embellishments.

Added metallic mist and mica flakes to complete.

{crafted while listening to Twenty One Pilots, Fitz & the Tantrums, and Phantagram}

Gypsum Mixed-Media Finished Work

Here is the finished mixed media piece inspired by the poem "Sunday Run".
Read the poem in its entirety at Gypsum Words: https://gypsumwords.wordpress.com/2013/09/01/a-sunday-run/
There are numerous other poems on that site that I love, but this is the one that worked its way onto my cardboard canvas.

Eclectic Ellapu June 2016 Pink Team Challenge

The theme for Eclectic Ellapu's Pink Team challenge for June is Midsummer!

This was a fun one for me, as I originally learned about the Midsummer holiday via green walnuts. Seriously. It is odd, but true. Turns out that St. John's Day, aka Midsummer Day, aka June 24, marks the first day that many (European) markets have green walnuts available. Why would people want to buy unripened walnuts? To make pickled walnuts, vin de noix, and nocino, of course!

May you have a heady Midsummer Day!

The painting depicted on this card is "Salome with the Head of John the Baptist" by Guido Reni, circa 1630-1635.

Gratitude Journaling Via Mini Card Deck

Gratitude journaling; merely concentrating on things we are grateful for is supposed to reduce stress and increase the positivity in our lives. To apply this concept in a personal way, I decided to focus on things that I am grateful for in my husband. I made a small series from a macaroni & cheese box, cut into a deck of 1.5" x 3" cards. This project was inspired by an article by Irene Rafael in the Jan/Feb 2016 issue of Cloth, Paper, Scissors, by Gretchen Miller's incredible projects, and by an article about using gratitude journaling to manage stress.

Quickie Project: Trash Into Ornament

After Valentine's Day, I ended up with a plastic heart shell leftover from some SpongeBob SquarePants candy. It sat on my desk for nearly 3 months before I decided that it needed to be made useful or thrown away. That week, I needed a minimal supply, grab'n'go project, so here's what that almost-trash turned into:

 

 

Gypsum Mixed-Media Work-In-Progress

Years ago, as a friend started blogging poetry that tended to settle deep into my soul, I asked if he would mind if any of it ended up in my crafting. He did not mind, and every once in a while his words still inspire me. Unfortunately, those "once in a whiles" that inspiration hits rarely correspond with when I have time to sit and craft. This year, though, I have slowly been working on a piece that will incorporate several lines of his poetry.

The background of this piece is a panel from an used USPS Priority Mail box, "stamped" in dark grey acrylic paint using wadded up packing paper, then layered with some green acrylic paint, then gel medium mixed with white and pearl acrylic paint. This background piece sat near my desk for months, until this evening, when many instances of mental contemplation met with crafting time and some final decisions. The major downside of having used the gel medium on the background is that I now cannot use the spray inks I had planned on using to ink over most all of this background. They wipe right off! Clear gesso would be the solution to this dilemma, but I only have white gesso on hand at the moment.
This post is just the layers I added tonight. I will post again when I add the final layers, embellishments, and poetry to this project. *crossing my fingers that it turns out well!*

{crafted while listening to Pedro the Lion's "It's Hard to Find a Friend"}

Eclectic Ellapu May 2016 Challenge - Anything Goes!

For my first post as a new member of the Eclectic Ellapu Pink Design Team, I am showing my gratitude for being chosen for the design team by posting this thank you card. This month's challenge is Anything Goes; please share your papercrafting projects!

Earlier this year, a set of Spellbinders Opulent Ovals and a Death Cab For Cutie album from my Amazon wishlist showed up in the mail randomly. Turned out that my mother-in-law had just sent me a little post-Christmas surprise. As a thank you, the first thing I made with my new Opulent Ovals dies was this card.

The card base was cut from a Spellbinders Timeless Rectangle die, three layers are from the Opulent Ovals set, and one is from the Labels Twenty-Four set.

{crafted while listening to Denison Witmer's "Philadelphia Songs" and "Are You A Dreamer?" albums}