Of all the ephemera in the world.....

....my favorite is Crate Paper/Maggie Holmes ephemera.

I dove into the stash again yesterday.  Every time I do this, I realize that I might never have to buy embellishments again because I have SO MUCH.

My jumping off point for this card was that blue and gold tag....usually that's the way these stash cards work.  I pick something I want to use, might be the focal point, might not be, but then everything falls in place from there.

The tag is a little small to carry the card on it's own, so I needed pieces to balance it, and I decided to utilize some polaroid frames, also from Crate Paper.

At this point, I pulled out the 6x6 pads.  I went with a neutral base piece and decided it would be fun to back the polaroid frames with some patterned papers.  These were actually just scraps that were loose in one of my Crate Paper 6x6 pads.  I also added a strip of black/cream chevron to the bottom to ground everything.



For balance and to soften the composition, I added a bit of pink doily and a portion of a PTI Leafy Branch die cut.

Finally, to finish off the focal tag, I stamped a sentiment from Ellen Hutson's Mondo Magnolia set and a bit of twine.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you're inspired to break out some of that old stuff!

Updates and Ramblings

Hey everyone, I've been ignoring my blog a little bit.  It's been super busy here.  I've been spending a lot of time in the last week designing.  I tend to design in fits and starts, so I'll do nothing for months and then whip up a bunch stuff.  We work pretty far in advance.  In fact, I'm almost done designing for the year....just have to come up with some holiday ideas, crazy, right?

I haven't managed to create in a week or so, so I've been feeling a bit twitchy.  One of my go-to methods of diving back into creating is pulling out the stash, which is exactly what happened here.  An old Studio Calico journaling card and a really old squirrel sticker, plus a sentiment from My Favorite Nut are the star here.  I used some woodgrain paper as a mat and for some extra texture.



The good news is I have lots of creating in my future.  The Neat & Tangled May release just showed up at my house!  We ended up skipping the April release because of some manufacturing delays, but we'll be back at it in a couple of weeks.  I think you're really going to like the release too.

OK, that's all for today, thanks for stopping by!

Hey everyone!  I'm popping in to announce the winner of the $30 credit from last week's Altenew blog hop.

That person is.....Carolyn Steele!

Congratulations Carolyn! Please contact Altenew at winner@altenew.com by 6/30/2017 with the subject line Altenew April Release Blog Hop Winner from Miriam Prantner's Blog to claim your prize.

Bunny Cards

I had a little time to create yesterday and pulled out this adorable new die set I got from Mama Elephant.  So cute!  These dies are meant to coordinate with one of ME's favor dies which I don't actually own, but I like them on their own.

I kept this pretty simple.  I backed them with a colored mat and then used the largest of the Neat & Tangled Scalloped dies as well.



The sentiment is from N&T's Cottontail Cuties set and I curved it to fit on the curved banner from the Scalloped dies.



My girls are not into pinks and purples these days, so I went with some less girly colors.  I almost skipped the bows, but they were too cute not to add, plus if any holiday brings out the girly in my not so girly girls, it's Easter and the pretty dresses that they can't resist.

Thanks for stopping by!

*Affiliate Links Below

Mama Elephant Creative Cuts, Favor Bag Accessory - Bunny

Neat & Tangled Dies, Scalloped

Neat & Tangled Clear Stamps, Cottontail Cuties

The Ton’s Spring 2017 Release Blog Hop

Happy Friday everyone! Today I'm hopping with The Ton as they celebrate their spring release. You should have arrived here from Chris Dayton's blog.

The Ton has 18 new stamps, 13 dies and 14 Couture Mixes for their new Spring 2017 Release which includes up to three free gifts with purchases. For more information on The Ton’s incentive gifts, head over to The Ton’s blog. All new release products are available now!

I have a soft spot for peonies, so when I saw the release I knew immediately which stamps I would be working with.

First up a very clean and simple card featuring Dearest Peony.  I really wanted this beautiful image to be the star, and I waded back into the world of no line coloring.  The image was stamped with WPlus9 Fairy Dust ink and then colored with Copics.  The gray leaves are solid in the stamp, and I wanted to keep that effect, so rather than my normal three color shading, I just used two shades of gray and kept it very subtle.  

I really didn't want to add much to the card once I was done coloring, I wanted the focus to remain on the flower, so I fiddled with placement of the panel and the sentiment strip going with something not so centered to give it a modern feel.

Next up, is Peony Crush, a gorgeous 6x6 background.  This was stamped in Versafine on watercolor paper and then heat embossed.  Then I broke out my Kuretake Gansai Tambi Starry Colors watercolors (that I bought 6 months ago and hadn't used yet) and chose a couple shades of gold to paint the peonies with.  The open leaves were painted a very light green and then covered with the lightest gold from the Starry Colors set, and the background was  painted a dark green.  

I loved the very rich feel of the background when I was done, almost like a tapestry fabric, but it was a bit too heavy for a full card background, so I did some fussy cutting to trim it down.  I popped up the panel for some extra drama and then added a sentiment from Dearest Peony to finish it off, also popped up.  

That's all for me, but you definitely want to keep hopping because there are prizes! Five $25 gift certificates to The Ton's shop will be given away to random commenters from the hop participant blogs. To qualify, you must leave a comment on The Ton Blog Hop post. The comment period will close on Monday, April 10th at 11:59pm. Winners will be announced thereafter on The Ton’s blog.

The next stop on the hop is Janette Kausen, and I've included the full list below in case you get turned around.  Happy hopping and good lucky!

1. The Ton
2. Brenda Noelke
3. Svitlana Shayevich
4. Lisa Harrolle
5. Chris Dayton
6. Miriam Prantner
7. Janette Kausen
8. Justine Hovey
9. Laura Jane Head
10. Amy Kolling
11. Tae Eun Yoo
12. Amy Tsuruta
13. Eunji Jung
14. Isha Gupta
15. Jenny Yamasaki
16. Kay Miller
17. Vera Yates
18. Stephanie Klauck
19. Emily Midgett
20. Taheerah Atchia
21. Mayline Jung
22. Laura Sterckx
23. Laurel Beard

Altenew April Release Blog Hop - Prizes

Hey eveyone!  I'm so excited to be participating in today's hop showing off some of Altenew's new layering dies.  These are so cool, and I knew right off the bat that I wanted to work with the Cityscape set which consists for Cityscape Cover Die A (basic building outlines) and Cityscape Cover Die B (buildings with window details).

I've got three projects to share with you today, and this is a pretty lengthy hop, so I'm going to dive right in.

First up, I'm using the dies together, as intended, but with a twist.



Rather than die cut both of the plates, I dry embossed the B plate, the one with the window details.  Then I cut two of the A plate.  One from paper that was inked with Desert Night and Dusk ink to create a gradient, the second from white cardstock.  These were adhered offset from one another and then to the dry embossed panel to create an additional layer of interest and dimension.



The sentiment is from the Label Love stamp set.

This second card uses only the A plate, but rather than using it as a cover plate, I trimmed it down as more a standalone die.



First, though, I used some spray inks to paint a rainbow on some mixed media paper.  This was then die cut using the A plate to create the pieces that were inlaid into the buildings.



To finish the card off, I embossed a sentiment from Magnolias for Her onto a strip of black cardstock which also serves to anchor the cityscape.

For my last card, the focus was on the B plate.  I dry embossed it again, but this time, I lightly added black ink to the plate first.  The plate was then cut from black cardstock, and then I adhered the negative sky cut over top of the embossed piece to give it a very graphic, bold look.



For the sentiment I used the rest of that black cardstock cutting, and inlaid the windows with silver mirror board.  Then I cut letters from the piece using the Bold Alphabet dies.

To set the letters apart, I used a circle die in the corner of the panel to create a window, and for a pop of color, I added a mat with just a bit of red showing.  The letters were then popped up with foam tape.



That's all for me today, but there is so much more to see.  You should have come here from Therese Calvird's blog and the next stop is my good friend May Sukyong Park, but I have the whole list below for you as well if you get turned around.

Altenew
Laura Bassen
Eunyoung Lee
Jennifer McGuire
Erum Tasneem
Virginia Lu
Dana Hyejin Gong
Yoonsun Hur
Laura Jane
Debby Hughes
Flora Monika Farkas
Therese Calvird
Miriam Prantner
May Sukyong Park
Lydia Evans
Evelyn Yusuf
Anna Kossakovskaya
Lydia Fiedler
Sveta Fotinia
Isha Gupta
Svitlana Shayevich
Lilith Eeckels
Kelly Tribout Latevola
Nicole Picadura
Ashley Horton

There are also prizes to be had! To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a $50 gift certificate to THREE lucky winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew blog by Friday, April 14th at 11:59 pm EDT for a chance to win. The winners will be announced on the Altenew blog on Saturday, April 15th.  I also get to pick a winner from my blog to receive a $30 gift certificate. My winner will be announced on April 14th, so please be sure to check back.  Good luck and happy hopping!

Craftsy Class Giveaway Winner / Class Discount

Hey folks!

Just popping in to announce the winner of my Craftsy class:  Andrea1702!

Congrats Andrea!  Shoot me an email and I'll get your code to you.

For the rest of you, I have a 50% off code to share:  http://craftsy.me/2nNYN0e

Have a great start to your week!

One Day Sale!

Hey everyone!  Just popping in quickly to share that Danielle is running a sale over at Neat & Tangled today only, 20% off using code NOTAFOOL.

If you've been eyeing something, today's the day!  Affiliate Link:  http://bit.ly/2irxoQO