Stampin! with Jaydee

Hi Everyone.  

Happy Sunday.  And, because I just can't resist giving you all an ear worm.... Wild Thing... You make my heart sing... you make everything groovy.....

It's the fabulous Claire's turn to host our Paper Players challenge this week and she has a great theme for us:

As Lou travels so much, I have gotten into the habit of leaving a little card in his bag before he leaves.  Now, I don't do it every time, as I still like there to be a small element of surprise :-)  So, a challenge requesting me to create a love-themed/Valentine card is always a welcome excuse to make another card for my stash!

One of the classes at Altenew  is Easy Die-Cutting Techniques.  I looked around my stash of things to see what I could make using this technique that wasn't something floral.  I remembered I had this wonderful Sun image from a 2017 Hero Arts card kit and realized it would be perfect.  it combined two of the classes I've been doing - easy Ink Blending and the Easy Die-Cutting to create this card.  

On a side note - the Easy Ink Blending class is one of my favorite classes so far.  Amy creates some gorgeous cards and provides some really useful tips along the way.  I thought I knew how to ink blend, but learned several things from Amy - including which papers to use for easier blending.  The classes are the cost of a couple of cups of coffee and well worth it.

Now... on to my card:

I wanted to keep it clean and simple and, of course, it couldn't have frills, bows, glitter, anything shiny and nothing even remotely connected to Pink.  But, I also wanted to stay away from the normal blues and neutrals that I generally use for masculine cards.

I began with a piece of card stock and blended a couple of different colors of yellows and oranges on to it.  I then die-cut that piece with the wonderful sun die.    Here's a close-up of the sun:

Once I had die, cut the sun, I took a piece of Neenah Solar White 80# card stock  sized at 4.25 x 5.5 inches and placed the die on it in the position that I wanted it on the card.  I adhered the die-cute piece of card stock down onto a Neenah Solar White card base and then adhered the die-cut sun into the negative space.

After I had stamped the sentiment from an Old Papertrey Ink set, I used some black card stock to die-cut an elephant from the same Hero Arts kit and adhered it so that it would be silhouetted against the sun.

Here's my card:

Looking at how I took this photograph, the sentiment doesn't seem straight...but I went back and checked and it really is straight on the card :-)

I hope you will join the Paper Players for our challenge this week.  If you are looking for some inspiration, you have to look no further than the wonderful creations from our Design Team:

• Claire
• Joanne
• Laurie
• LeAnne
• Nance 
•  Sandy
•  Elizabeth
• Jan
• Annie

On a personal note:

As my regular readers know, I went through a creative slump at the end of 2017 and into early 2018.  This invitation to join the Altenew Educator Certification Program really was the injection that I needed.  Going through the classes has motivated me and given me the excuse to go and just create for the fun of it.  If you are interested in the Educator Program - you can find details here  Or, if you are interested in attending some of the classes, you can check them out here.

The weather was freezing cold last night and, uncharacteristically, the wind was coming from due North, bringing with it an intense Arctic chill.  Even though it was in the minus 30s, Lou and I slept with the window open.  For once though, it was only open by a couple of inches, but even those couple of inches were enough to keep the bedroom really cool.  Looking out today the sun is shining, the sky is a gorgeous pale blue and is absolutely cloudless.  For those in Minnesota, we know that means it's going to be cold.  I feel for those people going to the Super Bowl down in Minneapolis today!

Even though it's cold, I am hoping to get outside today to take some quick photographs of the snow for you.  Especially for those of you who like the snow, but don't get any!

I went looking through my photos from Fall and found this one.  I love the front garden in fall, especially with the new plantings.  It's been nearly 5 years since we did the planting after we moved into our new home, and we needed to replace some of the older plants.  We continued the all native theme and I love that the garden looks good, but that it also serves as a place to attract insects and provides cover for the birds and small fauna.  We left the grasses and seeds to provide cover and food in winter, too.

The Echinacea look gorgeous - but, more importantly, their seeds are a welcome food source for the birds in winter.  It's not unusual to see multiple species of birds pecking at them during winter.

I'll be back tomorrow with another card and, hopefully, some winter shots for you.  In the meantime, warm hugs and prayers for those of you who need a little lift tonight.

Hugs

Jaydee

Card recipe:

• Card stock:  Neenah Solar White #110 and #80
• Stamp:  Papertrey Ink
• Dies:  Hero Arts
• Inks:  Altenew