A Blog Called Wanda - Photography, Paper Crafting, and Life from Northern California!

Card Maps! A fun challenge and a Daisy Bouquet just for you!

Hey! Nice to see you here! It's 4th of July week and it's a scorcher here. Whew. Trying to make it through my work week with a three day weekend on the horizon. Yippeee! I have been up to some crafty shenanigans and have a cool retro 4th of July card to share on Friday. But today, I have something very fun to share!

Some of us in the Taylored Expressions crew were given a neat opportunity to participate in the current Card Maps challenge over at their website! Woot Woot! We all got awesome sketches in advance to use with our favorite stamps and supplies from TE. I LOOOOVE the sketch I got and I'm really sure I will use it over and over again. I created a happy, sunny card perfect for this Summer week….

Here is the sketch! Awesome, right?

All of my supplies are from Taylored Expressions. This Daisy Bouquet Stamp Set is a favorite of mine, and now it has a perfectly matching die! So crisp! I layered my bouquet onto a kraft circle…

Just a few Copic markers for this card. I love the yellow!

Thank you so much for stopping by! I hope you will look at everyone else's CardMaps creation! Have a wonderful day!

July 1, 2014
Funky Bird!

Howdy friends! I'm checking in from my craft cave this afternoon to share a funky card I made that was inspired by a cool bag I purchased. I love this company – Papaya Art! Like, reallllly love this company. I have tons of their notepads, bags, and even my iPhone cover is from them. Their style is cool and hip and so pretty. Well, a while back I bought this bag at my friend Stephanie's store and it inspired me to make a card! Yes, I can find inspiration everywhere – that's the fun in life! Beauty is all around us, isn't it? The pattern for this bag is called 'Golden Bird' so I made a card with a golden bird!

I went way out of my comfort zone with this fun and vivid color palette. LOVE this bright raspberry pink popped against the softer aqua. Yes. Take a look at my funky bird card!

Had so much fun making this card. I never would have die cut leaves out of white paper???!! It is so crisp though. The bird and leaves are dies from Memory Box. The flowers are Tattered Florals from Tim Holtz. And, of course, lots of enamel dots….my current obsession.

Here's a side view. I stamped the text onto the yellow/golden bird with Corduroy Distress Ink and then gently inked the edges as well. I really am drawn to the contrast of the 'vintage' brown with all those bright colors.

To make my sunray background I used a Memory Box Stencil and some Versamark Ink – and a little dauber. This gives the background a faded and soft look which is really nice.

Very subtle – and a nice base for layering my other elements.

I used Mister Huey's mist in white all over the entire card and flowers for some added flair.

Here is the bag next to my card – what do you think? What inspires you?

Best wishes for a FABULOUS weekend my crafty pals! XO

June 28, 2014
Papertrey Ink June Blog Hop! Pie Charts and Butterflies….

Hi crafty friends! I'm here today to share a card I made for the June Papertrey Ink Blog Hop! Yahoooo! This is such a fun hop to be a part of! It's open to all customers and there are always so many beautiful entries and so much inspiration. Whenever I can, I like to join in this one! Maybe you will to? You have all day! CLICK HERE for details on the PTI blog!

Sometimes PTI does an image inspiration, sometimes a color recipe and sometimes a sketch recipe. Well, this month, they did all three! For my card, I elected to use one of the color recipes and one of the sketch recipes. Check it out!

Okay, so when I started to make that little pie chart it seemed like an easy idea! LOL. It took me a while, but I really like how it came out! My white layer is embossed with an older PTI impression plate that I love. The butterfly dies and the 'happy' word are new PTI supplies that I've never used before. I layered a vellum butterfly over a pretty aqua mist butterfly…

Here's a side view of my cute pie chart and the butterfly.

So here's how I did my pie chart…. I cut a white circle and then used my ruler to draw sections and then I numbered them in order. They I cut them apart and used the sections as templates for my colored papers. I would definitely do this again – maybe in a bigger size so it's easier to cut the sections. Worth the effort though, and something I never would have thought of if it wasn't for this cool sketch!

Here is the color recipe I used:

And here is the sketch recipe!

I added some clear bling to the center of my butterfly. And stamped 'birthday' on a tiny banner… To go with my 'happy' die cut.

Thank you so much for hopping by today!

Have a blessed day!

June 25, 2014
It’s the weekend – let’s get caught up!

Helllooooooo! Happy Friday night! Yeah! A weekend awaits and I am blogging! I've missed ya this week. I have lots to share. I have a couple more watercolor technique cards I made last weekend and some other stuff too. How are you? Got any fun plans for the weekend? I hope you do! Me….I have no idea what I'll be doing, and to be honest, that's just okay with me! I know one thing that's 100% certain….Sleeping in tomorrow!!

Here is card #1 with another SUPER cool watercolor technique from the Onlinecardclasses class I signed up for. I'll warn you, this took about four hours! But, I think it's worth it because I really like how it turned out. Lots of color and a pretty pattern.

Here's a side shot of this card. I tried a bunch of different things on the front – banners, die cuts, stamped things and nothing looked good. So, I left it just the way it was. And, I sort of like it. I think this could be a nice 'any occasion' card for either a man or a woman. What do you think? What would you put on the front of this?

Here's a side shot of the coloring and the colors…

The first step is to take watercolor paper and white heat emboss your stamped pattern. This is a giant background stamp from Penny Black. I used Versamark Ink and White Embossing Powder.

The next step is to INDIVIDUALLY color each tiny section!!! I used Distress Markers in some pretty shades. You'll notice that all my colors fade in the same direction. This gives an overall appealing look. The color placement is totally random. I took my marker and gently colored a swatch in the section, then took my water brush and blended it.

I only colored about half the image, then I cut it out around the edges.

Here are my marker colors….

This next watercolor technique is an old favorite! This cute stamp set is from Mama Elephant. I simply stamped my images with Distress Ink pads and then went over the images with my water brush. This softens the edges and gives a blurred look.

I kept this card really clean and simple too…

One last watercolor/stencil technique – if you'll indulge me!!! This is F-U-N!! Take your favorite stencil and some mini Distress Inks…. Blot your ink pads directly onto the back of your stencil in a random fashion.

Next, take your mini mister and spritz the ink really good. Let the ink colors sort of run together…

Then, smush your stencil down on some watercolor paper….

Voila! I told you this was fun!!! How neat does this look??? I haven't made anything with it yet. It's just sitting on my craft table right now.

Give it a quick hit with the heat gun to stop the ink from rolling around and ruining the images.

In the interest of full disclosure…. Here's another one I made that I don't really like. I think all the darker colors are not as interesting as the brights…but there you have it!

AND…you thought this post was over??? Ha! Today was my day to host over at the Taylored Expressions Blog and here's the card I'm sharing over there. You know it's only two weeks until the 4th of July! CLICK HERE to see more photos and my notes and directions for this card.

Whew. Okay, now I'm done!

Have a great, awesome, wonderful, fantastic weekend. Love ya!

June 20, 2014
Stamp Joy!

Hi there! Just popping in with a SUPER FUN announcement! Something I've been keeping a secret for a little while…and I am so excited to share with you today! Taylored Expressions is going to have a big stamping event in October of this year….and I am going to be one of the instructors for the classes! I am beyond thrilled to be a part of this unique and fun event. It's going to be a great time! Maybe some of you can join us there? I sure hope so!

For all the details, please CLICK HERE to go to the STAMP JOY page!!

June 18, 2014
Sunflower Sunshine Card!

Hi there friends! Whatcha up to this weekend? Did you get crafty? I hope your weekend was marvelous! I'm in the craft room this afternoon with my sidekick Mr. Buddy and I just finished a card I started yesterday. I have to tell you that I had THE BEST day yesterday!! I have been working lots of extra hours at work and feeling sorta burned out…. Yesterday I spent all day gettin' my craft on with a wonderful bunch of ladies. My friend Sharon hosts a scrapbooking day once a month – in her work conference room! Everyone gets two giant tables, and we had snacks and pizza and music and tons of natural light. My friend Caroline is Sharon's sister and she met me there and we just talked and relaxed all day. It truly did my soul good. I felt refreshed and calm afterwards. Just truly what the doctor ordered.

I worked on some more watercolor cards yesterday (I'll share those soon) and then I did some Copic coloring. Coloring relaxes me – does it do that for you too? I brought all 300 of my Copic Markers to the site so I could color whatever I wanted. Well, this adorable stamp set just came in my mailbox this week and I decided to color it. The set is from My Favorite Things and is called Sunflower Sweetheart! She is so cute!!

The stamp set has matching dies! NO, I did NOT cut all these pieces out by hand! LOL. Those birdies are soooooo cute!!!

You can see a tiny peek into the inside of my card…. I put another sunflower in there! The layers on the front of my card were made with the GENIUS die set from Mama Elephant – called Femme Frames! OMG where has that been all my life?? Seriously. You can see I popped up certain pieces with foam tape…

I started by coloring her dress, using four shades or true blue. I made pleats by adding darker blue lines going up the length of the dress with a darker shade. You really should try this – it's easy!! But the look is dramatic. Love.

Next I colored her face and cheeks using the shades int he photo…. I added some tiny dots with my white gel pen to her cheeks.

Next I colored her straw hat using several shades of brown and yellow. I made faint hash marks using a brown marker… Also, I wanted the top of her dress to be white… So I added very faint light grey lines to show shadows and to make the eye think "oh that's white." It's a little trick.

Sorry this photo is wonky… You can see here I've colored her hair and the flower…

Here are all my pieces ready for assembly. I cut a gingham rolling hill using a scene builder die from Taylored Expressions. Perfect. You can also see the Femme Frames layers here. The white layers onto the green, and then onto an A2 card. By keeping the color families the same on all my pieces it gives a very cohesive look to the finishes card. The birds are the same color as her dress, and the brown in her hair matches the fence. I have found that if you get too many color families going on it doesn't look as nice.

Sending YOU Sunshine!! XOXO

Now as if yesterday couldn't have been any better…. On the way home from the scrapbook day I stopped at the Outlet Mall nearby and found a KATE SPADE OUTLET!!! OMG. I thought I died and that this is what heaven looks like. Since it was their grand opening weekend everything was 40% off and then 20% more off! Wha WHAT???? Excuse me???? Um, so I had to buy these three things. Just had to. I got a new aqua wallet, that gorgeous bag and also a fun clutch! Me likey.

OFFWEGO!!!

Hope to see you very soon my friends!

Have a great week!! XOXO

June 15, 2014
Some watercolor fun!

Hi everyone! Hope you're having a wonderful week! I'm finally getting around to watching all the videos and looking at the printouts from the 'Watercolor for Cardmakers' class I signed up for last month! Yay! I really have to find the time, ya know? I finally had some stamping time, so I got out the laptop and watched two of the videos (this is a great series by the way – totally recommend it) and made the two cards I'm sharing today.

One of my cards is going to be my entry to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge this week – Stencils! I made my own stencil – you'll see later!

My other card is going into the COOL Fusion Card Challenge for this week and I used the color scheme for that challenge because it's so delicious!

Before I became a Copic Marker addict, my weapon of choice was watercolor pencils. I tend to gravitate to lighter color shades and before Copics, the only way I could achieve the look I wanted was to use WC pencils. I have a beautiful kit of Faber-Castell WC pencils that I got when a big art store closed down many years ago. That bad boy hasn't really seen daylight in a while and it was nice to play with the pencils again!! I also did some distress ink watercoloring, which you guys know is a fav technique too.

Have a look!

This is such a fun technique! I made a cute and colorful birthday card with my watercolor pencils and a stencil I made myself with a PTI balloon die! I chose a pretty hot pink, bright yellow, and medium aqua blue. Just my take on the whole Red, Yellow, Blue thing….

The card itself is really clean and simple. Just mounted my watercolor paper panel onto matching cardstock and then a white card. The 'birthday' die is from Papertrey Ink. The stamp set is also from Papertrey Ink. The stamped parts and the die cut are from a soft cool grey instead of black.

First thing I did was die cut a balloon from a piece of kraft cardstock to make my stencil. Then I placed it down on my watercolor paper and traced around the edge with my pencils. You can see I shifted the balloon die slightly for each one.

Then I shaded on the same side of each balloon with my pencils. Then, comes the fun part! Water!

It's like magic, every time! I forgot how much I love doing this….

Now this second card is a whole lotta happy!! For this card I inked with my distress inks right onto a stamping block, then repeated with different colors. At the end, I added these cute 'happy' die cuts from the Memory Box Happy Cloud Die!

Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth! Because I'm happy…. (Sorry I couldn't help myself right there with a little song)

Again…clean and simple…let the color speak for itself!

Yep, just smash your ink pad right onto a clear block and then spritz it with your water bottle…then put it down on the paper and smear it! FUN. Then after it dries, do your next color…. I used Worn Lipstick, Lemonade and Marmalade to match the colors in the Fusion Challenge! So fresh for Summer!

And some more photos – just because I like taking pictures of stuff! LOL.

June 12, 2014
Market Street Collection – I’m in love!

Howdy crafty friends! I am renewed with creative energy after spending the entire day in the crafty cave! The perfect way to end a really nice weekend. It's 105 degrees out today, so you bet your bippy I am NOT going outside! Got the AC on, and a nice big glass of water, and some new craft supplies! I finally took watched some of the videos for the Watercolor for Cardmakers class, and I made two watercolor cards that I'll share later. The main thing I played with today was the new Market Street Collection from My Mind's Eye. That is one of my all time favorite companies, and this new stuff is AH-MA-ZING! Yowza. LOVE. I'm glad I bought it! It's not my 'usual' color palette but I just was drawn to it and had a blast.

Here is a shot of the two cards I made. NO stamping on these! Just die cuts, embellishments and paper…oh….and enamel dots. NEVER forget the enamel dots. :-)

The peonies that hubs bought me on Wednesday are SO GORGEOUS!!! They are so full and fluffy! I thought it would be fun to use them as an accent for my photos today.

Here is the first card I made – with the Ashbury Heights Collection. I adore the flair buttons in the brushed gold color…especially with pink! MMMMMMM. I cut out some butterflies with an old Martha Stewart punch (doesn't everyone have this punch?) and cut a black oval out too. I just really had fun combining patterned papers. It's so vintage feeling…

I think this would make a perfect 'encouragement' card and I'll save it in my stash for the right occasion. The artwork on this paper blows me away. Do you see that the enamel dots in the center of the butterflies ARE GOLD!!!!!

The second card was made with the Nob Hill Collection! The big butterfly is the new one from Papertrey Ink. It's a great size! For this card, I distressed all my paper edges to make it shabby chic. Added just a touch of washi tape and layered patterns. Something cool about black with all that color.

SHINE!!!!

I gently curved the banners and the butterfly wings with my fingers to give the card some more depth and 'movement.'

Best messages: Shine and Be Happy!

Have a great week my sweet bloggy friends! What is going on in your craft room right now? I hope you are enjoying the Summer time and having fun. Talk to you soon! XOXO

June 8, 2014
Bright Birthday Card!

Hellloooooo friends! What's up with you this first week of June!? Um, yeah, I said JUNE! Another year flying by at the speed of sound! Whizzzzz….there it goes! Sheesh. Today is a special day in my life, a day that we have been celebrating for 21 years! Today is the anniversary of the day my hubs and I had our first date….June 4, 1993! Yikes. It's kinda corny, but we always make a special day out of this day. Tonight I left work on time (which felt weird) and we went out for a nice dinner. I got a beautiful bouquet of peonies delivered to the office earlier. Just a fab day! We met on a blind date! A mutual friend set us up and we went out for lunch. My one and only blind date I've ever been on. That was the day God sent me what I needed….someone to protect me and love me and take care of me. What a blessing.

I have a bright summer birthday card to share today with you today. For summer I love the color combination of blue and orange. POW! These are opposite colors on the color wheel so they go together perfectly. This combo reminds me of popsicles, and the ocean and beach balls…. Here's my card:

I told you it was bright! Maybe I should have warned you to grab your sunglasses! I used products from a lot of different companies on this one. I'll try to remember. The stripes background is from Papertrey Ink. So is the 'birthday' word. The flower dies and the 'happy' word are from Simon Says Stamp. The rest is just pretty Bazzill papers and some gingham and gems…

This combination is soooooo crisp against the white and black. Love it!

Here's a shot of my layers….

I think it ended up being 97 degrees here today…. WELCOME SUMMER TIME! I hope you had a smashing day everyone! XO

June 4, 2014
Lazy Sunday Crafting….

Hi there! I was lucky enough to have some quality time in the craft room on this lazy Sunday afternoon. I didn't have a plan, nothing in mind that I wanted to make… Got out some watercolor paper…and a new die….and then some ink pads… And before you know it, I had every single Tim Holtz papercrafting item on my desk! LOL. I whipped up quite a frenzy in here! I love those kind of days! I love it when things just happen and I lose myself in the creative process. It rejuvenates me!

I'm entering this card into Linda's Compendium of Curiosities Challenge #3! (CLICK HERE) She is making challenges each week based on Tim Holtz's book – very cool.

So here's what I came up with:

All my supplies are from Tim Holtz (except the yellow polka dot paper, which is from Websters Pages). I used only Distress Inks for my stamping and coloring. The center panel is a 4×5 sheet of watercolor paper and my finished card is a 5 1/2 inch square!

Oops! I forgot the butterfly – that is a Martha Stewart punch! I punched it out of watercolor paper also, and then used Distress Inks and Distress Glitters on it. Ya know, made it kinda shabby chic.

One of my favorite shabby chic tricks is to curl the edges of my paper up. Makes it look worn and cool. My center panel is mounted on foam tape.

I tried out a new technique today and I really like it! First I took these three colors of Distress Inks and sponged around the edges of my paper with a sponge dauber. Was really messy with it. Then I spritzed water over the entire paper and let it kind of run together. Then I dried it with my heat tool and this is what it looks like!

It is sort of hard to photograph!

Next I used the Corduroy Ink pad to stamp this neat saying on my paper. After that I used some water and more distress inks and flicked spots all over the page!

Here is the die that I used to make my yellow rose! Yep, it's a pinecone! LOL.

I cut the pinecone rose out of watercolor paper using my Vagabond and then put the yellow inks directly onto the die cut piece. After I got all the yellow ink on there, I spread it around with a wet paint brush. Later I went back and added some Marmalade Distress Ink around the edges.

After the color was dry, I rolled the rose starting from the outer piece until it formed the flower. Then I glued it together using Glossy Accents. Once that was dry, I added a mixture of Clear Rock Candy and Mustard Seed Distress Glitters…. (Yeah, this card took all day!)

Here is a close up of the finished rose!

Here's a close up of the cool saying! Doesn't it look neat in the brown with the spots? It looks old and romantic to me. I couldn't resist adding a little gem heart with some twine.

Thank you very much for letting me share my process with you today! This card was really fun to make and I like how it came out! I think I'll throw it into the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge too – for this week it's "Anything Goes!" Best wishes to you for a great week ahead! XOXO

June 1, 2014