There was a mini VSN this weekend. I wasn’t home for the live postings, but I did managed to make a few cards before the deadline.

First up is my Guitar Queen. The challenge was to use a Beatles’ song as inspiration. I went with “While my Guitar Gently Weeps”….though really the only thing that translated was guitar! I went with a rocking look and bright colors. The layout is an old mojo sketch. The star was created with chipboard, white paint, pink craft ink, clear EP, and green dye ink – easy peasy! I stored much of my stamping supplies when I moved and I must have been in a very “minimalist” state of mind when I decided what would store and what would ship because I left almost all of my punches at home…boy do I miss my circle punches!! I would have added little circle mats to the brads, but making them now requires hand-cutting and I didn’t have time within the challenge limits.

Next up is my BlackJack card. This was a fun challenge – the idea was to create a card using the point system given and come up with a 21-point creation. I did it! This was a card that has been in my head since I saw the Fan Club April Inspiration. Again, I didn’t bring my cloud template so I made one. I always seem to think big when I made a cloud template, oh well. My sponge had a darker blue in it and I didn’t get it all out when I applied Bashful to the cardbase. I would also have added blue sky to the focal image panel. Ugh, sometimes time constraints really bug me!

Finally, my last VSN card uses strips of paper. I spent a lot of time with making the background, so the rest of the card is plain. I love the “plaid” background and had fun creating it! I only have one country-feel set – but it is a classic. I love my “On the Farm” set and will never get rid of it!

Thanks VSN Hostesses for some awesome challenges!

Over at SCS, there will be another VSN mini on Saturday. But on Friday – there was a surprise challenge! The challenge was to embellish a card with at least 3 things (from a list).

So, my card isn’t highly embellished, but I made up for it by eating a couple cookies whilst I created the card The first requirement was to use a favorite stamp set. Well, for me, my favorite set is always the one I most recently got – that would be Wishing You by Dawn for PTI. Then my “bar” selections were ribbon, buttons, and the piercing template.

I made this card for my BIL. I don’t know many other techy people, so I definitely wanted to use this computer image. When I looked at the latest CAS challenge over at SCS (CAS08) and thought it would work perfectly.

The font for the binary lines isn’t very tech looking, but I thought it went with the whimsical lines of the computer. I was just glad that stamping all those was very easy!

So last weekend was Word Card Making Day. Splitcoast had a day of challenges. I tried, but managed only one card. I do like the card – I did the sketch challenge…though my interpretation might be a bit loose   I got the idea for the circle accent from a commercial on tv.  I already had them cut when I decided to try this challenge. The free-form cutting and bright colors made me think fun. I always need birthday cards, so doing a b-day card was a no-brainer! I *love* this new Designer paper from Stampin’Up! – it is a great color scheme and some fun patterns. I free-form cut the strips and outlined them with a black pen – to match the circles. And all these free-form shapes made me think of the Doodle Alphabet set.

A couple nights ago I started on the thank you cards I needed to send with the goodies I’m sending to my contest winners (for the DSS program on SCS). I finally finished them today. I used a PageMaps sketch (Mar 08), and some neglected paper and rubber. This is a simple card, but I like it.

carefreecreations.

The final challenges of VSN have been posted. These gals are quite talented in coming up with these challenges (and connecting them with books!).

Top left is my “African Batik” card. I wasn’t sure what the difference was between this technique and just regular brayering…especially since you embossed on top of the brayering and not a resist like I thought it would be. However, the white pencil really does add just a bit of dimension – though that is the part with which I had the hardest time! I brayed my ink onto glossy, forgetting that I was to immediately spritz with water, my ink dried…so when I did spritz I got the water spot effect (which I like!). Then I embossed the giraffe. Finally I went back over with a white watercolor pencil, but it didn’t want to stick to the card – so I got more of a whitewash effect.

Next is my “Lemon Meringue” card. This card was fun to make. And there isn’t a stamp on it! I love bright colors – this is something I’m just learning about myself. I don’t do bright clothes, but I can see adding a few more touches around the house. Anyway, I actually found some pattern paper in my paper stash that went with SU’s Yoyo Yellow. Then I dug into my flowers and found complements there too! I finished it off with Making Memories word washers and some sparkly yellow brads. this is one of my favorite cards from VSN!

Bottom left is my “Fall Thoughts” card. The challenge was to dust off an old set. The SU Simple Sketches set was one of my first purchases. I also think it is time to sell it – I haven’t used this set in over a year! Autumn is my second favorite season, so I enjoy making fall cards. I used my new oval nesties – those are so easy to use, well worth the price (which really isn’t bad when compared to individual punches).

The final card is my “Frank n Bats” Halloween card. This was a tough challenge for me – mostly because I wanted to do the challenge AND the bonus AND pick House Colors that other hostesses hadn’t…it was just too many restrictions. So I just did the main challenge. I really like how this turned out!

Scrappy vs Stampy – Those terms refer to the types of products used on a card. If it is mostly pattern paper and embellishments, it is scrappy. A good example of that is my Lemon Meringue card – no stamps at all!. A stampy card is one where even the texture of the card is created using stamps. A good example of that is my Fall Thoughts card. The bottom portion of the card is a background stamp – some simple masking allowed me to stamp the leaves and weave print on the same card base. I admire folks who can do primarily stampy cards and make them look good. Scrappy cards generally grab my eyes first. For my own style I lean toward scrappy cards, but I love working with ink and rubber (well, polymer mostly ).

I just posted my VSN challenge over at SCS. I can’t take credit for the challenge idea, but it was fun writing up the post and creating the samples. I’ve never done “inchies” before – mostly because I felt the real estate of a card was too big for just 1 inch. I took the easy route for my first venture and did a group of inchies (which I’ve dubbed “groupies” – corny, but cute). This was easy to do, but I didn’t feel like I really tried the challenge since there was more than one of them on the card. So, keeping with the same stamp set, I tried again. This was actually easier than I thought it would be! I don’t know if “inchies” will become a staple in my design box, but at least I’m not afraid of them any more!

FYI, the pattern paper used on the spider card is a spider web (retired SU paper) that I outlined with a Stardust pen. I also punched the bottom of the card to resemble the web edges.

The first night of VSN is over – though there is still time to play (you have until Sunday, August 24 10pm CT to upload your images to SCS). Here is a group shot of the cards I made for Friday’s challenges:

I always try to make cards that I know I can use when I’m done with the fun of the challenge. There are two challenges that got me to do something new – scratch-n-sniff and flocking. I had always wanted to try scratch-n-sniff but just never took the time. When I first read this challenge I wanted to do something different…eventually the idea of baby powder came to mind. While I had a few hurdles with that one, I do like how it turned out. The other challenge, flocking, had me digging into my stash for long-ago purchased items that I just never took the time to try. This was SO EASY – a little inking in my glue pad and a little shake of flock and voila. I will definitely be doing that one again soon!

Notes about the other cards:

The Gnome Bookmark card is 8 1/2 x 5 1/2, fold in half. From the front, trim 1 1/2″; from the back, perforate at 1 1/2″.

The Sketch Book has about 6 pages from my sketch book in it. I used Japanese Stab Binding (SCS TLC142) and twine to do the binding along the spine. The flower is stamped directly on the Kraft paper then colored with pencils.

Thanks to all the hostesses for such great challenges!

Wow – these past couple of hours have been quite, um, interesting. Tonight is the beginning of the VSN challenge weekend over at SCS. Being the procrastinator that I am, I am frantically trying to finish the last couple of challenges. One of which I chose to use baby powder. Not having used it on my children, I was apparently unaware of how the bottle works. So, instead of simply peeling the sticker from the holey lid, I pried the lid off…and well…I’m sure science was involved in this:

And if that wasn’t bad enough, SCS is down. VSN was supposed to start at 7pm ET…that was about the same time SCS went down. It is now 8:15 pm I know the powers-that-be are trying as hard as they can to get it working, but I feel for the coordinators of VSN. (((hugs))) to Vicki and PS.

On Friday and Saturday, SCS will be hosting a book-themed VSN. The wonderful coordinators – Vicki and Peggysue – have a great line up of challenges – so make sure you stop by and check it out. My little challenge will be Saturday at 8pm ET.

Tonight is another mini VSN over at SplitCoastStampers! The fun begins at 6pm CT – so make sure you stop by and check out the great challenges the hostesses have pulled off the shelf for you!