Weekend Challenges

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My stamping time has been mostly limited to weekends lately.  My job is keeping me extra busy and tired during the week and I just don’t seem to have the energy to be creative when I get home on work nights. I hope things will calm down over the next couple of months so I can get back to normal and play in the week day Splitcoaststampers challenges. For now the weekend challenges provide lots of inspiration and relaxation for me.

The Saturday Inspiration Challenge gave us Creative Wall Coverings  to use to find tons of inspiring examples to choose from. I loved this Truckin’ with Santa collection and was instantly reminded of my Loads of Love truck and the Santa in Holiday Tag Team.

Here’s my interpretation of the inspiration set.

I stamped the truck on a piece of watercolor paper to act as the base for my project.  I stamped the truck again on a scrap piece of watercolor paper along with Santa and the trees. I wanted to pop up all the images in the scene for added interest and dimension.

I hand sketched in the little wood portion to recreate the Woody truck from the inspiration piece. All the images were watercolored using Distress reinkers and cut out. I sponged in the light blue sky area around the truck and I painted white craft ink around the ground area of the truck and embossed with white embossing powder. **Hint always heat set all the ink around your watercolor paper before applying ink for embossing so the powder only sticks where you want it. I added the trees to the scene first and popped up the tops with rounded glue dots. I stuck Santa into the window of the truck and attached the tree to the back of the truck and then attached the whole thing over the original stamped image and only the tires from the main layer show.  I love how this adds interest and how the snow looks piled up on the sides of the tires. I popped the red Nestabilities  frame up over the scene and attached it on the plain white base for contrast with just the addition of the green grosgrain and the little tag for embellishment.

Darlene Pavlick was our inspiration artist for the Sunday Featured Stamper challenge. I was inspired by this vintage card of Darlene’s.  I have enjoyed playing with all my new Crafty Secrets sets over the last few weeks.  I love the vintage images.  The girl I chose to use is from Garden Girls and is from the same set that Darlene used on her project.

I stamped the girl image on scrap watercolor paper, painted and cut out. I stamped the tree image on a base of watercolor paper and created a simple scene to be behind the girl image.  I painted the tree, and sponged in the grass and sky area. I used a simple mini tip applicator to pull up some grassy sprigs and to add texture to the grass area. I cut a Nestabilities frame to pop up over the scene and to attach the girl image to.  I didn’t want to detract from this gorgeous girl so I chose not to add any embellishments and added the simple Cuttlebug tree embossed background for contrast.  I wanted the girl and her blue dress to really pop on this neutral project.

Project 1    Stamps:  Loads of Love, Holiday Tag Team    Paper:  Real Red, White, Watercolor     Ink:  Fired Brick, Peeled Paint, Brushed Corduroy, White Craft, Bashful Blue    Accessories:  Grosgrain, White Embossing Powder, Glue Dots, Brushes, Sponges, Sparkly Fluff (Santa’s Hat and Beard)

Project 2:  Stamps:  Craft Secrets Garden Girls   Paper:  Vanilla, Chocolate Chip, Watercolor   Ink:  Faded Jeans, Brushed Corduroy, Vintage Photo, Peeled Paint,  Lemonade, Going Gray    Accessories:  Sponges, Brushes, Nestabilities, Cuttlebug, Mounting Tape, Glue Dots