Stampin! with Jaydee

Hi Everyone.  Happy Friday.

It's the fabulous Carolyn's turn to host our Addicted to CAS challenge this week and she has a really interesting code word for us.

 

It took me a while to decide what I was going to do with this challenge.  My initial thought had been to go with a night sky and stars... but decided against it.  I then thought about going with an owl against a night sky... .but dismissed that, too.   It was then that I realized that Midnight is also a color... as in Midnight Blue.. and that got me to thinking about those wonderful evening skies that have gradations of blue until - finally - everything is dark.  

 

So, I decided to go with a gradation of blues and took my Tim Holtz butterfly stamp (or.. in this case moth stamp :-) ) .    I began with a piece of Recollections 110# white card stock that I taped to my craft sheet.   I then took my Tim Holtz Ranger ink pads and did the ink pad to paper technique.  I wanted a really good saturation of color and the blender tool wasn't doing it for me.  Using the pads directly on the paper gave me intense color and mixed together beautifully.

 

I then took my moth(butterfly) stamp and spritzed it with Perfect Pearls mixed with water.  Shook it up and sprayed the stamp.  I then put the stamp onto the inked card stock for that shimmery/mothy shine.

 

Here's my Midnight Moths:

This card really is so much prettier in hand than it is in the photograph.  In the hand the colors are really intense and rich - they look a little faded out in the photograph.  The moths shimmer beautifully against the dark background.

On a personal note:

OK.  That's it!  I've had enough!  I'm moving.  )Well, if it wasn't our 4th anniversary.... not a wedding anniversary - but it is 4 years- to the day - since we moved into our new home.  I cannot believe it has been 4 years. )  Now.... where was I?  Oh, yes!  Moving.   Why would I want to move?   Well... tomorrow morning we have A FREEZE WARNING.  Yes.  It is the middle of May.  And. yes. it was 90 degrees last weekend.  and. YES!  It is going to be 31 degrees tomorrow.   Come on.... Spring... We had the landscapers in this week planting trees and shrubs and little flowers.  They only finished this afternoon!  And now we have a freeze warning!

Well, I guess it's a good thing we planted native plants and shrubs. :-)  Hopefully they should be able to withstand the shock of the cold tomorrow.  We have to surround the planted areas with deer proof fencing.  the fencing is going to be up for about 2 years whilst the shrubs and trees are given the opportunity to take root and grow enough that they will survive the browsing from the deer.  I was really worried about the black plastic fencing they were putting up - but it is much better than expected and we are still able to see the planting and watch it grow.  Once they get established the birds and butterflies are going to love the flowers and the berries.

So, I guess there are those of you who would like to see who has been visiting our feeders?   How about this shot, then?

Aren't they a handsome pair?  They are very skittish so I had to take this shot through the deck door.. but I don't think it detracts from how gorgeous these two are.   I love that we are able to keep them around for the summer in our new home. :-)

It might have been our 4th anniversary in our new home - and it seems appropriate that we had the electricians here the whole day (4 of them!) putting in puck lights, changing out lights on the staircase, putting in stair lights down to the basement, changing out our chandelier and putting lights up in the bar area.  Not only did we have the electricians, we also had the screen guy building a screen door for the door onto our deck.  We also had the landscapers here and the guttering guy!   So it was a crazy day - but absolutely worth while.   I'll share some photos with you next week of our new lighting - oh! and the amazing screen door.

I'll be back tomorrow with my Paper Players card.  In the meantime, warm hugs and prayers for those of you who need a little lift tonight. 

Hugs

Jaydee