Friday, June 29, 2012

Happy Friday

And it is a wonderful Friday because I have the day off and I have Neil Diamond songs filling my head after seeing him in London, ON last night. Ya, he's old...and he walked through a couple songs but never the less seeing him live has been on my bucket list since he starred in the Jazz Singer and I'm glad I saw him.

My plans today were to wash the bedroom windows, however with the heat index sitting at around 100 I don't think I want to open those windows today. No worries, I have a huge laundry list of things that need to get done around here so I'll save that chore for Monday which is also a holiday here in Canada so I have a nice long 4 day weekend.

Before I go get out the dyson and my enjo cleaning mitts I'll get to my real reason for being here, Bellarific Friday. I decided to do something a little different with this weeks sketch and used Stamping Bella's Grandma's Gramophone by Rheea. Pauline made a BEAUTIFUL card with it last week and she ommitted the little lady and her pup and I kinda wish I had done that as well because it would make the card more versatile. None the less, I like the way it turned out.


I started with a piece of hot press watercolor paper and stamped the image with black Archival ink. Then I used my ranger distress markers and blended the colour out with a wet brush. I sponged on some distress ink around the edges and stamped just a tiny bit of Eclectic mini musical notes because I thought it was fitting.

Next week our challenge is all about EMBOSSING....and the it leaves the door wide open for possibilities. Instead of the 'go to' embossing folders, maybe try heat embossing, or maybe a brass stencil and a stylus. Have I gotten your creative juices flowing yet? I know mine are.

Till next time, Linda.

Sunday, June 24, 2012

It's all about the girls...

This week our challenge was all about the girls...and there is nothing more girly than one of Stamping Bella's Uptown Girls.. This is Isabella, and she is a little over indulging on that ice scream I think.

I even have one of those cute inkadinkado kid quote stamps to put in there that says 'tomorrow we can eat broccoli, but today is for ice cream!'....how wicked cute it that!


If you are wondering why I am late with this...well I have age-activated attention deficit disorder. You know, you start something, get distracted, start something else and it seems to go on endlessly until you forgot what you started to do. It's crazy!

Anyhow...I'm gonna be short and sweet and leave it at that. Then get back to colouring, which is what I sat down here to do in the first place!
But before I go, one last distraction...and that is our Bellarific Friday for this week....a sketch gals!!!! Hope you like it.




Friday, June 15, 2012

up UP and AWAY!

Last night I decided to put my girl through the ropes...we BOTH need the exercise...and the ropes for us is a long walk. If you don't know who my girl is, that would be my beloved West Highland Terrier Bessie and her pic is on my side bar. Isn't she just like the cutest girl EVER!

This is one of our first long endurance walks since her second knee surgery back in February. We have done many short walks and lots of sprints (she LOVES to sprint and fetch...that is how she messed up her knees) but no marathons. But last night we were gonna start our marathon training and for us a marathon used to be an hour. With her short (15-20min) walks and sprint 'training' I thought I'd put her to the 1/2 hour test. She was all guns and roses for the first 20 mins and then slowed right down. When we got home after 30 mins she was pretty much 'spent' (as my kids would say). And I have to remember she IS getting older and turned 9 this spring but I'm determined to get her back in tip top shape because she is a happy healthy dog with a lot of years left in her (not to mention TWO new knees!). We are gonna take it slow and steady and hopefully by September we will be back to our hour long walks 2-3 times a week again. So up UP and AWAY we go!

I kinda think that Bessie and I are like Stamping Bella's Ramona and her Teddy taking off on an adventure to exciting new places. New neighborhoods to scout out while keeping tabs on the old familiar ones to see what has changed.


As always I started out on bella's BESTEST paper but I coloured this one primarily with prismacolor pencils and gamsol. However, I did start with a base of some very light shades of copics because I am partial to the rich base of colour I get with them.

After taking the picture I thought ...shoot! ....I forgot the glitter, so just try to imagine this one with glittered clouds okay...because that is where the glitter will go. The one thing that made this card come together so nicely was the fab sketches I had to choose from and that was all the sketch challenges that Stamping Bella has sponsored since the beginning of the year.

Next week our challenge is INK UP THE GIRLS....come on! How freaking easy is that...I can pretty much predict that an Uptown Girl will be in my future!

'till next time...later....Linda

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Lantern Flowers revisited

Last week I got a few new Memory Box dies that I was 'dying' to use! Corney...I know...but I couldn't help it!

Mom needed a card, I needed to use my new die so I pulled out Stamping Bella's Lantern Flowers for another go 'round. I didn't think I could top the first one, but I think I like this one even better with those pretty lacy flowers.



This is a large card, 5x7 to be exact. I started with bella's BESTEST paper and except for some highlights with a white pencil I used only the following copic markers:

Y11, E50, 51, 53, R30, 32, 35, 59
E07, G40, 43, 46, 94, 85, 99

My original intent was to glitter the flowers, but when I was gluing down the flower die I got some glue on the background of my image. When I wiped it off, it left a shiny mark which I tried to remove but took off some of the sponged ink I had applied around the edge. Well, I had to rethink the placement of the glitter and it did a great job of camouflaging my booboo!

In other news, I have a sore throat today, I'm hoping it is just dryness and Paula didn't send any of her germs through the phone lines when I was talking to her the other night. She doesn't like calling me at work anymore because after being relocated to the 'mall' I have a new phone number and a 7-digit extension. Paula doesn't like that! And if she does get up the energy to pound in those 7 digits I am rarely at my desk because lately I have spent more than half my day in meetings. What happened to those days when I sat at my desk for 8 hours with my face buried in a computer and not interacting with anybody outside of my pod! I kinda miss that sometimes.

One last random thought...I'm sitting at my kitchen table looking out at my deck with all the flower filled pots. Only one pot has a geranium in it and I'm thinking next year it is going to be a geranium filled deck and all my pots will overflow with them. I'll have to make a note of that because I'm sure next year I will have completely forgotten how much I love those geraniums.  

That's it...lantern flowers and random thoughts.

Friday, June 8, 2012

Guy Cards

That was our challenge this week and I know it can be a challenge for most of us, me included! When it comes to guy cards I usually trend towards nature...leaves, trees, etc...but this time I thought I would stretch my stamps and look to use something that might not otherwise be considered a 'guy' image. Bring on Paula's porch swing by Stamping Bella.


I stamped it on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured it with copic markers pairing it up with Bo Bunny's Weekend Market Collection paper. Kind of a perfect match for a weekend lazing on a porch swing!

Now there was a method to my madness here because my brother turns 50 this summer and he is an electrical engineer by trade but a woodworker by night and made a beautiful swing that hangs from the porch of his century home so I thought this will make a perfect card for his birthday. I am also lucky enough to own one of his swings but sadly I don't have the deep porch to hang it from so for a while it hung on my back deck but now I'm looking for a stand so I can perch it in a shady part of my yard. I might have to commission him to make me one because I know exactly where I want it.

Next week is a sketch roundup, pic your fav from the sketches below and get crafty!










 Happy Stamping everyone!

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Happy Birthday to ME!

YUP...today is my birthday and I am not at all afraid to say that I am a whopping 53 years old....you know what that means...one year closer to retirement. My g'friend dreaded turning 49 this year and I say...hey it's all good! Another birthday is just a good excuse to get myself something I don't really need. This year I think it is going to be that Singer 160th anniversary sewing machine that Paula talked about here. She sent me a pic and over the weekend I slipped in front of my hubby and said in my sweetest voice....don't you think I need one of these for my birthday? When you throw in the 'B' word how can he possibly say no...not that he ever would...but it just makes the 'game' more fun.

Speaking of the weekend, we were back on 'tour' with Dave Matthews and on the way home we realized we drove around the entire shore line of Lake Erie! We started in Chatham and drove east to Toronto. Dave played to the crowd there for sure belting out all of the fan favourites. Then we headed east crossing into the US in Buffalo, NY en route to Cayahoga Falls, Ohio. A very different crowd there, much older and the set list was very eclectic and so different than the night before. Blossom Music Center is a beautiful venue tucked away in a heavily wooded area. It really is a peaceful place and if I were ever temped to park my butt on the grass somewhere, that would certainly be the place I would do it. From there we headed back to Chatham by way of Detroit! An entire loop of Lake Erie!

In honour of my birthday, it is only fitting that I colour up a birthday card! This is Stamping Bella's Ramona loves cake. Me and cake, not so much...if I'm gonna indulge I'd much rather eat an entire bag of potato chips or some really good keilbasa...yes, I am more salty than sweet.


At the risk of repeating myself, she was stamped on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured with copic markers, topped up with some prismacolor pencils. To make that cake extra yummy, I added some 'icing' with liquid applique. Don't forget about our masculine challenge this week and be sure to keep checking out the sneak peeks over at bloggabella.

As I always do, I'll leave you with a couple pics from the weekend....

Dave rocks Toronto

inside Blossom Music Center - LOVE it...reminds me of an old wooden rollercoaster

Blossom, view from the lawn.

And that's it! For the non-Dave fans...I'll be giving you a break because we don't have another 'date' until he plays DTE in July.

Saturday, June 2, 2012

Bench Buddies

Have you been enjoying the little sneak peeks that are going on over at Bloggabella? Well how 'bout you see something done up in colour! This is Belinda and Bernadette, the Bench Buddies!


I am not kidding when I say that one on the left reminds me SO much of my friend Colleen. If you have been around for a while, you might know her as my Vegas partner in crime. And when you're sitting next to her it won't be long before one arm is wrapped around your neck and the other is holding out her camera to snap a picture. Just to prove my point...and you can see she is much better at posing for these shots than I am!


Back to the card, as always I stamped it on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured these gals up with copic markers...a LOT of markers... Then I used pencil for the tufts of grass and shading around the image. You can't really see in the picture, but Colleen loves bling so I added some black spica pen to her belt. Finally some ultra fine flower soft added a bit of texture and colour to the grass.

We all know how Emily likes to surprise us so I'm not exactly sure WHEN these will be available, but you can be sure that once she starts revealing those sneak peeks it won't be long.

Friday, June 1, 2012

Twirly Birds

Happy Bellarific Friday, and just plain old HAPPY FRIDAY works too! I can't believe how busy my days are after a week vacation.

But never too busy to relax and immerse myself into some colouring. These are Stamping Bella's Twirly Birds by Vicki Boutin. Sentiment comes from Jane Davenport's Birdie Jane.


I may have mentioned that I scored the entire set of distress markers when I was at Kitchener's scrapfest and that is what I decided to use on these little birds. Start small I say! For you local shoppers did you know you can get them at Pickle...and you online shoppers can pick them up at Stamping Bella. Do I like them....OH YA! I used a smooth water colour paper and just a bit of ink directly on the image and then blended it out with a watercolor brush. Easy peasy! Then I finished them up with bit of pencil for highlights and shadows and sponged the blank areas with versamagic chalk ink. For a first try, I was pretty pleased with the result and can't wait to experiment more with these markers.

Next week our challenge is all about the men in our lives. So you got it, make something masculine!!!! I've got an idea in my head already and it won't be the typical image you might think for a 'guy' card...but I'll have a perfectly good reason why I chose it! I'm so looking forward to getting it done I just may work on it tonight!

That's it folks...not much else to blab about today.

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