Be still and know by Charmaine Canham

 How are you? Are you OK? How are you holding up? Let me tell you, I am not doing well.

The world is on fire, countries are at war,
we are fighting amongst ourselves.

 I had to make myself a card tonight to remind me that
 God is in control. He is almighty, and He's got this. 

Ok, let me tell you how I made these two cards:

The inspiration for this card is from all the noise we constantly hear from the big cities. I chose the Landscape Silhouette stamp set for both cards.

First, I made the background using my favorite combo of Distress Oxides: Black Soot, Chipped Saphire, and Dusty Concord.

Next, stamp Typewriter Text Background stamp with white pigment ink.

 Stamp the city silhouette with black ink, and then clear heat emboss it to prevent smudging. 

Add "stars" with white Copic Opaque paint splatters.

Stamp your sentiment from the Faith Wordfetti stamp set. I then
mounted it on silver Mirror card to play on the silver of the stars.

The next card is made in the same way and with the same stamp sets.

I tried to mimic the "fire" using these distress oxides.

This background is named Psalm 23 background.

Stamp this with a Gathered Twigs Distress Oxide.

I found a Versafine Clair that matched the brown of the Distress Oxide. This is
 also, a nice ink for detail stamping.

I added gold Tonic Mirror cardstock to the back.

I hope you found some comfort today.

Talk soon,

Charmaine

BUNNIES, BUNNIES, BUNNIES!

Today I have a super sweet post filled with the cutest cuddliest... bunnies! Who doesn't love bunnies amiright? Sweet N Sassy has some truly adorable bunnies in both clear stamps and digital stamps....

FIRST we have this so cute little guy from this month's Hoppy Spring set. I inked him up on a Neenah Desert Storm card stock base, masked him, them covered the background with the new Textures 11 flowers using Versa Mark for a tone-on-tone look. I unmasked and those flowers moved to the background so I could color my bunny with colored pencils and have a one layer card.

Next I have another clean and simple card, but this time, I didn't fill in the white space. (I did, however, die-cut and mount my panel for a little dimension :)) This card uses a new digi called Bunny Love. It comes with a sweet sentiment that I have used on many a project lately! I created my "card front" in a word doc with the bunny and sentiment placed just where I wanted them. I printed, colored him with Copic markers, and die-cut the layers - that is all there is to it!

My last project is a mixed media ATC (Artist Trading Card) that I created for a team swap. I used Distress Oxides on heavy watercolor paper to start my card. I added texture with Typewriter Text BG, Texture Tiles 5, and the new Grunge Dots Stencil. I created a word doc with a bunch of my images and sentiments from Valentine Bunny with Heart and Bunny Love respectively and had a fun day of coloring and fussy cutting. I added a little washi from my stash to "ground" my bunny and balance my ATC then glued my image and sentiment down... I signed the back and mailed off to my friends - SO MUCH FUN!

I hope you were inspired today - HOP to it and go great something this weekend!

By the way, there are still a few more days to get in on the SNSS moving sale!

Thanks for stopping by!
Lyn

All you need...is a cat...

Hi there, friends, and welcome to the weekend!  Today I'm sharing a card I created with one of our newly released stamp sets...Kitty Love!  I am such a fan of silhouette images and now we have a silhouette set with cats!  Yippee!

My card started with lots of layers...one dry embossed, one covered in wee little paw prints, and a bunch of others that are there simply to add color!

My main panel started out life as a piece of cream cardstock.  I used a blending tool and Distress Ink to cover a large portion of the cardstock in Scattered Straw ink.  I then put a large circle mask over the cardstock and added more Distress Ink colors...Rusty Hinge and Wild Honey.  I then used the Typewriter Text background stamp to add a little bit of stamping inside the sun.  (You could mask off the background so the text image won't get on the rest of the card, but using acrylic stamps means you can bend them to stamp only where you want the text.)  The cat was stamped on cardstock and cut out.  I also used Distress Embossing Powder in Black Soot to add some texture to the cat.  The Distress Powder just adds texture, without adding shine.

To finish the card, I used foam tape to attach the cat, stamped the sentiment, and added the heart.  (The string holding the heart was hand drawn)

Enjoy and  have a great weekend!

Sympathy...

Hello! It's Monika here today, bringing you couple of sympathy cards. 

Normally, I would use monotone colors and nothing too bright... but this time, I wanted to give bright colors a try and see how I liked the cards... 

The butterfly from Majestic Monarchs clear stamp set, was stamped with VersaMark and heat embossed with clear embossing powder on pink card stock. Then I sponged some dark pink ink on top. (On the second card, I used white embossing powder instead of clear.) The butterfly was then die cut with the coordinating Monarch die set.

To make the background for the first card, I heat embossed the Typewriter Text Background image with clear embossing powder. Then I rubbed green ink on my craft sheet, spritzed some water on it, and placed the card stock over it. (Dry it with a heat tool, or put it aside to dry...)

I finished the background by adding blue and pink strips to the left side, adhering part of the grass die-cut (Tall Grass die), rounding the corners, stamping the greeting on vellum (Sympathy Innies clear stamp set), then attaching the vellum strip to the card... and lastly attaching pink thread with a Sticky Dot. The butterfly was then adhered with dimensional tape.

The background for the second card was partially covered with embossing paste, before splashing pink glimmer mist over it...

Thank you for stopping by,

Monika

Thank you for everything

Hello friends!! Hope you are having a fantastic day. Today, I have a Clean and Simple card for you, it took me only 13 minutes!! Pretty good, right? I used Thankful Blossoms Set and Thankful Blossom Dies, and Typewriter Text Background set.

Here are the details:

• Cut a card base from Pink Cardstock. A2 size.
• Cut a piece of Watercolor paper 3.5" x 4.75", mist it with Taxi and Estate Green colors. Set aside to dry.
• Stamp blossom in red ink and leaves in green ink. Die-cut pieces with coordinated dies.
• After watercolor paper is dried, stamp Typewriter Text background in Vintage Photo Distress ink.
• Stamp sentiment in Jet Black Archival Ink,
• Adhere the blossom and leaves to panel with foam adhesive. Die-cut a large scallop border and adhere it behind panel.
• Add red sequins.
• Add panel to card base with foam adhesive.

Hope you like it!

Have a wonderful day.

God has your back - shaker card...

Hello! It's Monika here today, bringing you a butterfly shaker card. I am (still) in love with shaker cards, and they are really easy to make.

I used New Beginnings clear stamp set and the coordinating New Beginnings Butterfly die set as my focal point, along with the shaker element.

The background (water-color paper) was stamped with Typewriter Text clear stamp using VersaMark ink, then it was heat embossed with white embossing powder. Next, using gold metallic acrylic paint (Ranger) and water, I painted over the heat embossed background, and I splashed the same ink on top with a small brush.

Next I die-cut a 2-1/4" circle with a Spellbinder die. Then I positioned the background sheet onto my white base card along with the die-cut circle, lifted the background piece off (leaving the circle), and using the die-cut circle as my guide, I adhered dimensional tape around the circle.

Before filling the circle with sequins and micro beads, take the protective sheet off of the dimensional tape strips. Otherwise the beads might end up all over the place while you are working on taking the top sheet off...

Add some more dimensional tape onto the back side of the water-colored background panel and adhere it to the base card.

The front was decorated with a border that I die-cut with Doily Border Dies, a die-cut leaf branch, pink thread, and rhinestones. The greeting is from God is Bigger clear stamp set.

My color inspiration came from Curtain Call Inspiration Challenge. 

Thanks for stopping by today. 

Hopefully I have inspired you to make something creative today...

Monika

Thankful Blooms...

Hello! It's Monika here today, bringing you a card using one of the new stamp sets, the very elegant Thankful Blooms clear stamp set and the coordinating Thankful Blooms Die set.

The flower and leaves were stamped on Vellum and heat embossed with white embossing powder... giving a very elegant and delicate look. The background is stamped with Typewriter Text Background stamp. 

Thank you for stopping by,

Monika

Christmas Silhouettes...

Hello! It's Monika here today, bringing you a Christmas card... but before I get to my card, I would like to remind you that Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps is doing 12 Days of Christmas. 12 days of sweet deals, and today it's 15% off bundles! 

Now to my card... I am so in love with Christmas Silhouettes clear stamp set and the coordinating die set. (If you don't have this set, today you could get a sweet deal on the stamp and die bundle!)
I love using the pretty images, (especially the mistletoe), but today, I decided to use the elegant deer image.

I also used the Large Snowflake Die set and die-cut a medium large snowflake out of vellum. It was the perfect backdrop to the deer. The background was stamped with the brand new Typewriter Text Background stamp and splatters from Grunge Elements clear stamp set.

The unusual color combination came from The Color Throwdown #272.

Thanks for stopping by,
Monika

Just My Type

Happy December 1st to you!  I can't believe how fast this year is flying by.  What about you?  I trust you had a lovely Thanksgiving surrounded by those you love.  We had a great time at my mom's stuffing our faces with delicious food and laughing until we cried.  I cherish those times and the memories we make.

On to Sweet 'n Sassy...  :)

We don't typically do a release in December but this year I decided to change things up a bit so we'll be releasing 4 fabulous new stamp sets and 1 coordinating die set at the end of this week!  I have been having a BLAST playing with these new stamps and I am excited to share a sneak peek with you today. 

Wait till you see the rest of the release!!!  Eeeeeeeppp!!  It's so wonderful!

Until next time, have a blessed day in the Lord!
Korin