Puppy and Cupid Valentines

     I have to get this post written up very quickly before the feline fur babies awake and see me posting something featuring a puppy!  Here are two more of the Valentine cards I've done by recycling vintage Valentines from the box I found hidden under who know how many tons of supplies when the craft room was getting packed up and reorganized.

     I especially love these two and put in quite a bit of work on them.  Let's start with the puppy.

     Starting from the card base and working upward, the background dp came from Paper House, trimmed to fit the front of an A2 size card.  I had some lovely, glittered ribbon scraps in my stash which I think came from Crafty Ribbons.

     I dug out a set of doily dies from Spellbinders, and cut alternating layers of white and pink doilies (all cut from scraps), offsetting them as best I could.  Once all those were layered together with foam tape, I added the hand cut puppy to the top of the stack.  

     I added one of my signature bows to the bottom of the card front and called it finished.

     Challenges:

A Gem of a Challenge

Aud Sentiments

Cute Card Thurs

Cut It Up

Outlawz Twisted Thurs

Paperbabe

Penny's Paper-Crafty

Pixie's Snippets

Southern Girls

     Here's the second card with a sweet cupid image.

     I put silver glitter on his wings, and I used a rectangle die from QuicKutz top cut the image from the front of the old card, then inked the edges with ProMarkers to enhance the distressed look.  I 'dyed' a white doily with a dark brown ProMarker so that the image piece would pop.  I had two scraps of ribbon, one in hot pink and the other a golden brown.  I decided to put the doily between them and then wrap them around a piece of background dp (also Paper House.)

     The image went on top and I make a double bow but sewing two hand crafted bows together.  The final touch was a tiny, epoxy flower in the bottom corner of the image.  I hand wrote the sentiment in the opposite corner.

     Challenges:
Aloha Friday
Brown Sugar
Crafter's Castle
Crafty Calendar
Crafty Catz
Creative Fingers
Happy Craft
If You Give a Crafter...
Polkadoodles
Time Out

     Happy Crafting.  NanaConnie  

30 Days of Christmas at Beccy's Place

     Three posts today!  Amazing!  But there's a good reason.  I just had to get in on the Month of Holiday Cards at Beccy's Place and today is the first day.

     Each year, Beccy's Place does a full month of daily challenges to help us get our Christmas cards done.  I completely missed out on playing in it last year and have spent the last 11 months looking forward to playing this year.

     Instead of a different theme each day, this year Beccy has decided to use the alphabet and, since today is the first day, we need to use things starting with a "A."  Beccy is very liberal with her suggestions for possible "A"s so mine are:  Alcohol Markers and Altered "ribbon" (more about that below.)  However, we have to watch out because there are only 26 letters in the alphabet but a full 30 days of challenges so I know she's going to throw us a curve or two along the way.  :-D

     I colored this with ProMarkers and silver metallic paint pen, plus glittery gel ink on the faint stars behind the wise men.  The background paper is recycled from paper which wrapped a potted plant, ironed with a fairly cool iron to take out the wrinkles.

     The wide gold "ribbon" isn't ribbon at all.  It's altered gold lame fabric.  I had a strip left in my sewing box from some other project.  It was feathering and fraying on the edges so I did a double stitching line with heavy quilting thread along each edge, added "Fray-Chek" to each edge, then trimmed the fabric between the two lines of stitching, getting rid of the frayed sides.  Voila'!  Ribbon.  :-D  However, it's important to cut with very sharp scissors and to take your time cutting so that you don't accidently cut across your stitching line.

     Both the image and the forest green frame are cut with dies from Sizzix and I adhered the image piece on top of the ribbon, then found another gold ribbon (actually ribbon, this time!) and tied the bow with my bow maker.

     Challenges:
Beccy's Place
Craft-Dee BowZ
Crafting by Designs
Crafting from the Heart
Crafty Sentiments
Creates and Makes
Creative Moments
I {heart} ProMarkers
Kraftin' Kimmie
Lemon Shortbread

     OK, the end of the third post today.  I'm going to be so busy at lunch time linking up to all the challenges!  :-D  Happy Crafting.  NanaConnie

Polar Bear Christmas

     Today's card is another salute to recycling instead of tossing away.  I've been working on the Christmas images my friend mailed to me a month ago and that made me remember a box of old cards which I had saved because I thought some of them could be recycled into other cards.

     I found a card with this image of the mama polar bear and her two cubs.  It was already colored but I wanted a snowier look so I took a white gel pen and added all the snowflakes to the bears and more snow to the trees, then used white chalk and a Q-tip to add another layer of white over the entire thing.  The white chalk softened the image and even gave it more depth.  Unfortunately, it didn't photograph as well as I had hoped, regardless of how many different shots and angles I tried.

     I inked the edges of the image and then played with different background colors, first trying blue and gray.  But when I laid the image onto bright, Christmas-red, CS, I knew that was the perfect choice.  :-D

     I found the glittered, gold mesh, ribbon in my stash and added a strip of it the red background piece before layering on the image.  I tied one of my "bow tie" bows from red satin ribbon and added it.  The sentiment is heat embossed, as are the tiny, gold snowflakes.  A rather CAS design but one which is definitely 'finished.'

     Challenges:
Christmas Cards
Cookie Challenge
C.R.A.F.T.
Craft-Dee Bowz
Glitter n Sparkle
Jo's Scrap Shack
Morgan's Art World
Penny's Paper-Crafty
Polkadoodles
Word Art Weds.

     Did you all have a wonderful weekend?  I did.  I'm facing a really busy week this week, doing all the last minute things necessary to get my younger granddaughter off to the national Cheer Championships in Florida.  We're hoping the wildfire situation won't have too great an impact or that the fires will have been put out by the time she and her team have to be there.  I've been saying prayers for all my friends who live in Florida that all is well for them despite the fires.  Happy Stamping.  NanaConnie

Bouquet Basket Recycle

     Last week I shared with you a card I made by recycling parts of older cards which had gotten bent or damaged somehow and were ready for the trash can.  Before tossing them, I took what I thought could be recycled and set those bits aside for future use.  This is another of those projects.

I looked at the sketch at The Outlawz

and based my card design on it (layered shapes) but left out the

middle horizontal element.

     The bouquet basket is the part I rescued and recycled.  It had originally been stamped and heat embossed with silver EP, then colored with ProMarkers and gel pens.  I cut it off the old card, leaving enough deep green CS around it to look like a mat.

     For the background, I took some watercolor paper, dampened it, and applied green watercolor paint to it.  I let the paper absorb some of the watery color, then did a quick dry with a heat gun.  I added a spritz of shimmery gold ink and, after that dried, I ironed the paper to get it flat again.

     I used one of my die sets (Spellbinders) to cut it into three pieces, then layered those together, adhering the largest one directly onto the card front and putting the two inside pieces on dimensional dots.  I deliberately turned the smallest inside piece upside down because I liked breaking up the pattern of the watercolor and sprayed ink.  The bouquet basket also went on dimensional dots so there's plenty of depth and texture on the card.

     I really like the background pieces and plan to play around with more combinations of watercolors and sprayed inks.  I haven't done a sentiment yet because I'm undecided whether it's a Mother's Day card or a birthday card.

     Challenges:
Crafting by Designs
Crafty Addicts
Crafty Creations
I {heart} ProMarkers
Paper Sweeties
Penny's Paper-Crafty
Word Art Weds.

     Be sure to visit again tomorrow to see my DT card for the newest QKR Stampede challenge.  I think you'll find that my project tomorrow is a bit different from what I normally do with QKR.  :-D  Happy Stamping.  NanaConnie

Feminine Birthday

     Today I'm sharing another card I've made, recycling one of the vintage and outdated cards given to me by a friend who found a small box of them at a yard sale.  This one turned into a delightful feminine birthday card.

My inspiration came mostly from the photo in

the challenge at Always Playing with Paper.

     I fussy cut the inside corner of the card and used it as the focus image, adding some punched, colored with ProMarker, then beaded, flowers along the edge.  I ran the front of  the card base through my "Linen" embossing folder.  I used the folder without using the rubber embossing pad in the 'sandwich'.  That's one of my favorites ways to use it because the embossing is always so subtle.

     The double butterfly was made using die cut butterflies, dimensional dots, and a gemstone.  Finally, I used white ink to stamp the sentiment and called it finished.

     Challenges:
Artistic Stampers
City Crafter
Come and Get It
Crafting from the Heart
Crafts Galore Encore
Craft Your Passion
Digistamps 4 Joy
Incy Wincy (top row)
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends
Love to Scrap
Not Just Cards 
Outlawz Greetings
Paper Creator's Crafts
Petal Lu

     Today would be a great day to stay in and craft but I have things to do out there in the great big world so the crafting will have to wait until tomorrow afternoon.  Hope your week is going well.  Happy Stamping.  NanaConnie