This card is for the PTI Forum mid-week challenge (CMWC48), which was a sketch. The colors came from the OCCC blog. When I do a PTI challenge I like to use PTI stamps, but I challenged myself even more by doing a card I could send out this week for a male birthday coming up. Lots of restrictions!

I really only have one set that is sorta masculine – Pond Life. So I browsed the gallery until I found this card by Julie Cameron – I immediately knew the fish scene would be perfect! I like how this card turned out, though I didn’t follow the sketch strictly. I love using white as a mat to lighten up the darker colors.

I even did the inside (it has been a few cards since I did an inside, hee hee).

I haven’t stamped in what feels like forever, but is probably more realistically only a week. I’m determined to get back in the groove. I had a card I needed to make and I hoped that would spark some other ideas.

The first card is a thank you. I knew I wanted to do a pine tree for this recipient, and I needed the card to be a long card. The pine reminded me of the holidays, so I pulled out some old SU paper. I went with green and blue so it didn’t feel quite so holiday-ish. I went with white accents to balance the dark feeling from using a brown base.  Silly me, though, I knew the paper was Olive, and I thought I grabbed the Olive marker, but I got the Artichoke instead…so yes, my tree doesn’t “go” with the paper…but by the time it really bothered me, it was done! The square behind the tree is cheap chipboard (i.e., cereal box) covered with Cocoa paper and sponged with white ink.

When I was done I definitely wanted to keep stamping, so I checked out some challenges and decided to do both the Mojo Monday challenge from Julee, and the OCC stitching challenge. My daughter was invited to a birthday party this weekend, so I knew I wanted to do a girly birthday card.  When I looked at the Mojo sketch sideways, the optional triangle turned into a candle flame.  I recently appropriated an old pair of jeans into shorts for painting. I used the left over jean material and stitched a piece to Saffron cardstock. Then I stitched and sponged the edges of the Saffront layer. Since the cutting wasn’t too good on the jeans, I put everything on an angle.  I didn’t want to put accents at the bottom of the candle, like in the sketch, so instead I put eyelets throughout the candle. The flame is done with a teardrop punch which is then edged in red, sponged with orange, and stickled. I attached the flame with some wire. In retrospect, I should have used a brighter yellow or even pattern paper for the Saffron panel.