Stampin! with Jaydee

 

 

I didn't have a "sparkly" sentiment, so I had to add a much shimmer and shine as I could.  I embossed the Ticker Tape backgroud stamp with silver embossing powder, added a gold sentiment from the Opposites Attract set and then finished it off with some rhinestones - well a few of them :-)  As I no longer have glitter in my stash, this was about as sparkly as I could make it:-)  Here's my card:

As this is the first challenge of 2022 - it is also time to welcome our talented guest designers for 2022.  Please welcome

Cindy Beach, Jennie Maier and Christy Stanford!

 

You can check out their sparkly creations, as well as the others from our design team on their blogs:

 

• Ann
• Claire
• Joanne
• Laurie
• LeAnne
• Anne Marie
• Cindy
• Jennie
• Christy

On a personal note:

As it is so cold here today - down to -35ish - yes that would be MINUS 35.. I thought I would share a couple of photos from Antarctica - where it was MUCH warmer when we visited last month :-)

This little fur seal was as sleepy as can be when we came across him on Deception Island.  Deception Island is an old whaling station and retains some of the buildings that were last in use in thee 1930s.  It still retains some of the old buildings that were left after the last time the volcano was active in the late 60s.  Deception isn't actually an island, it's the caldera of an active volcano.  I must admit, I can't ever remember sailing into a caldera before!  Anyway, this guy was sleeping peacefully when we got there.

However, after 100 people decided to visit him, he was a little less sleepy, and keeping a beady out on everyone!

He really was beautiful and it was great to see seals actually sleeping on the Island where they were once processed for their beautiful fur.  Keeping him company on the Island was an Arctic Tern

I've only ever seen terns in tropical areas, so it was great to see their cold weather counterparts!  It was a very foggy, cloudy day when we visited Deception Island and I was struck by how melancholy a place it seemed.  Because of the destruction from the volcano eruption in the late 60s, there are many damaged buildings.  With the lack of light, I found it fascinating to photograph what was left of some of the structures.  The photos almost look like surrealist paintings and reminded me of a great South African artist called Keith Alexander.  He painted some of the most amazing surreal paintings of houses being taken over by the desert in Africa - and I think he would have appreciated these scenes in Antarctica.

I just love the light in this photograph.  The rich rust colors of the old whale oil barrels is so surprising among the greys of the sky, the reflected snow and the black of the volcanic ash.  I felt the same way about the pyroclastic rocks - the red/orange almost looked as though they had been left behind from brick buildings, but there were none of those on the island, so I realized that this was red volcanic rock, with just a little touch of green from sea flora.

These two crosses standing alone on the caldera struck me as the loneliest place in the world to be buried.  Most of the crosses and graves were swept out to sea by the last eruption in the late 60s. 

I'll leave you with one last photograph showing some of the damage to the buildings and structures.  You can see that I was still fascinated by the rusty red color.  After being in Antarctica for a couple of days, you realize there is are no warm colors.  It's all shades of black/grey/white and blue.  So the rust felt really intense in the landscape.

I'm hoping to get into my craft room today to play along with some challenges.  If I do, then I will have some cards to share with you later in the week.  In the meantime, warm hugs and prayers for those of you who need a little lift today.

Hugs

Jaydee

Card recipe:

• Stamps:  Ticker Tape, Opposites Attract - The Greetery