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Serendipity SSCB#37 – Thankful!

Posted on November 5, 2014 12:00 AM by Julie 6 Comments

Best of 2014!

Welcome to the November Challenge for Serendipity Stamps! This month the challenge is appropriately…Things you are Thankful or Grateful! You can get all the details over on the Serendipity Challenge Blog. The DT has the added challenge telling a story about why we chose the images/dies we used.. And as always, we have a have a gift certificate up for grabs to a random player. The sale this week is 20% off both the Thanksgiving and the Autumn Categories … good through Nov 11th.

The story behind my card is bittersweet and hard to tell without tearing up. This wasn’t the original card I set out to make, but this image was really calling my name. And though the little bird on the birdhouse looks suspiciously like a chickadee, I colored him to look like an American goldfinch because…well let me back up. Two years ago this Friday, we lost our long time companion…a red mask conure (parrot) named Odie who had been part of our family for almost 27 years. He loved to watch the birds at the feeder and the goldfinch (birds see in color, unlike dogs or cats who see only black & white) was his favorite. We’ve had dogs and were always sad when they passed but this little bird was something special. He was an import from South America (back when they could still do that) and we rescued him when he was about a year old. He had been dumped on a friend on mine who didn’t know what do with him. My husband and I had been reading about parrots and really wanted to adopt one, so we took him. The reason we named him Odie was because we also had a cocker spaniel at the time and Odie could see him through his window and the first thing he did was imitate the dog barking. He later had a pretty good vocabulary and contrary to public opinion, birds are super intelligent (even more than dogs or cats). They have reasoning ability and other than man, they are one of the only species able to construct and use tools to help themselves. It’s really something to have a “pet” who can not only talk to you, but also lives with you longer than most children! So that’s my reason for using these images as I’m ever so thankful for the almost 27 years we had with such a special little bird!

After stamping the birdhouse and coloring it with Copics, I die cut using a little bit of my out of the box technique on the left side. I left the die in place and sponged on a little antique linen ink. I added a few more die cut layers using paper from one of my fave paper collections. I also added some stamped, colored & fussy cut maple leaves and two die cut acorns on top along with the greeting. The finished card is 4.25 x 5.50 and these are the Copics I used.

Here’s a little look at the inside & if you’d like to see a picture of Odie, look down toward the bottom of my sidebar. That’s Odie on his favorite coffee cup. 🙂

Thanks so much for stopping by! Please be sure to visit and comment on all the DT blogs so you’ll be entered to win!

Special Guest Designer: Lisa Minckler

Supplies:

Stamps: Serendipity Stamps –Bird House Autumn 1179H, Miss You 624B, Maple Leaf Cling set 806QCL, Happy Thanksgiving 1127D

Paper:X-Press It white, dp (Basic Grey – Indian Summer)

Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Distress Ink antique linen

Accessories: Spellbinders A2 matting basics B, labels 28, decorative labels 28, Copic markers, Serendipity Oak Leaf Scroll die 035ED, Oak Leaf outline & Acorn dies 034ED

Fall Flowers

Posted on October 7, 2014 12:17 PM by Julie 3 Comments

My fall card today features a pretty little Autumn bouquet of flowers & wheat for the Color Challenge (CC499). I tried a technique on the flowers called “stamp etching “. I didn’t add too many little “etching” lines on the flowers today, but I like the depth they give. After coloring them, I added some gold stickles to centers of the sunflowers and orange stickles to the other 2 little flowers. A few leaf outlines were stamped w/ the rust ink, then overstamped w/ the solid leaf versions using a combo of inks & spritzing. After cutting them out, I wrinkled them so they’d look more realistic.

The argyle background was stamped w/ the peeled paint ink & the diamonds were stamped w/ the scattered straw ink, stamped one off so it wouldn’t be so dark.The finished card is 5.50 x 4.25 and these are the Copics I used.

Thanks so much for stopping by! If you haven’t, please head on over and check out the DRS Thursday Challenge…this week, Twine (use twine or embroidery floss on your card). DRS images are not required so be sure to link up your creation.

Stamps: DRS Designs- Med. Silhouette Leaf, Open Leaf, Fall Leaf w/ Acorn, Autumn Flower Spray, Scarecrows & Cornrows greeting, Argyle Background, Argyle Diamond

Paper: white, olive textured (DCWV mat stack)

Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Distress Inks in scattered straw, peeled paint, rusty hinge, ripe persimmon

Accessories: Copic markers, stickles, narrow olive ribbon, Spellbinders A2 matting basics A & B, acorn confetti, Micron pen

This entry was posted in DRS Designs Fall/Halloween/Thanksgiving Glitter Spellbinders Nestabilities Splitcoast Challenges and tagged autumn DRS Designs DRS Thursday Challenge fall Glitter Spellbinders Splitcoast

ODBD October Release!

Posted on October 1, 2014 7:58 AM by Julie 28 Comments

Welcome to the Our Daily Bread designs October Release! We have some beautiful images and dies for you this month…perfect for fall, Thanksgiving & Christmas.

Prize Information:

Three randomly selected winners will each receive a $15 gift certificate to the ODBD Store, to be used toward the purchase of ODBD Stamps found in the “stamps column” of the website just for commenting on the Design Team cards! You have until October 2, 2014 at 9:00 p.m. EDT to leave your comments on the ODBD Blog or the Participating Designers Blogs for a chance to win! The Winners will be posted on the ODBD Blog on October 3rd, so be sure to check back there to see if you won!

For my first card, I used the beautiful Poinsettia Ornament along with the Matting Circles dies, Peaceful Poinsettia dies, Circle Ornament dies, Doily dies, Vintage Flourish Pattern dies and the greeting from the Christmas Pattern Ornaments set. I gold embossed three poinsettia ornaments, carefully colored them with Copics, die cut one full ornament and fussy cut the poinsettias of the two others. A pink layer was die cut as well as a shimmer pink doily to back it. The ornament topper and some of the poinsettias were die cut out of gold and a couple more poinsettias out of pink.

The greeting was also gold embossed, die cut and added under the ornament. The large pink layer was die cut out of pink using the Vintage Flourish Pattern die. Only the border shows, but I like the way the stitch pattern looks around the edges. The finished card is 4.25 x 5.50 and these are the Copics I used.

Supplies:

Stamps: Our Daily Bread designs – Poinsettia Ornament, Christmas Pattern Ornaments (sentiment)

Paper: white, pink, gold corrugated

Ink: Encore ultimate metallic gold

Accessories: ODBD Circle Ornament dies, Matting Circle dies, Vintage Flourish Pattern dies, Doily dies, Peaceful Poinsettia dies, gold embossing powder, Copic markers, Spellbinders Nested Pennant dies

On my second card, I used the beautiful Autumn Tree set along with the Elegant Ovals dies and Rustic Beauty Paper. After stamping the tree on cream and coloring it, I die cut it and the greeting which was stamped on a separate piece of cream. A larger elegant oval die was used to cut the backing layer behind the greeting out of the rustic paper. I used a kraft knife to cut around the top of apple basket part of the image to insert the greeting layer. The edges were sponged & I also used a Copic to color the embossed edges.

The finished card is 4.25 x 5.50 and these are the Copics I used.