This month for the White on White Instagram Hop,we are playing with the theme of Romance... I chose a beautiful Altenew embossing folder to play with... and then added a simple sentiment. I suppose I could have done more, but I love how it turned out!
I don't know how I missed this fabulous sketch challenge blog... but I did! An online friend of mine recently joined this design team and that's how I found the challenge. I loved the sketch this week and knew I wanted to play along. I don't always have time to play along with other challenges just because I'm so busy with all of the other commitments I've made for my creating. I'm happy I had a little time to play with this one!
I played with a few different ideas before landing on this card... I thought that the loopy embossing folder felt like the pattern a butterfly would make while in flight... and I added some looped gold thread for one of the elements of the sketch. Since I stamped on pattern paper (and it felt a little flimsy), I cut out an extra butterfly out of cardstock and layered them together to give the focal point a little more stability and to make it pop off of the page a little more.
Today I am joining many of my papercrafting friends in an Anti-Racism Instagram Hop. I saw the opportunity and with the state of the world right now, I jumped in with both feet to participate. But then it came time to create my card and I froze. I'm an white woman in Canada who has never experienced racism first hand. Sure, I've heard comments and seen stuff directed at others, but I've never had to live that life for myself.
I finally came up with a card idea and then I started to panic about what to say in my post about the hop. How can I know what to say? How can I know what to tell others. But then I realized, my silence wouldn't help anyone... but just showing up and letting others know that I stand for humanity might just make a small difference in the world.
I love my neighbours and the people in my world... no matter where they came here from, what languange they speak at home, what colour their skin might be. I accept others as I expect them to accept me. I am a safe spot if someone needs it. And I hope that by standing up and declaring these things that I can help make a difference. Racism is never OK...
So... on to my card. I am in love with the shape of this double heart that's part of an alphabet die set from Concord & 9th. I dug through my stash and found several shades of cream and brown and cut the heart(s) out of all of those shades. I glued the outside of the hearts directly on to my card, overlapping them slightly... and then used foam adhesive for the insides of the hearts, also overlapping them. I hope it conveys the idea of love and holding hands with our neighbours and friends...
This week on the My Favorite Instagram Hop, we are playing with our favourite Valentine's or Love Themed products.
Let me tell you, I am so sick of red, pink and hearts right now! I don't send Valentine's to people and now I have a huge stash thanks to all of the design team work I've done in the last few weeks. I am close to being done with the love themed cards.
I'm not against love... I'm just tired of making these cards LOL!
Anyway... I grabbed a background I foiled at Christmas and didn't use to create my card today.
Good morning, clean and simple friends! It's time for a new challenge at Addicted to CAS!
I wasn't not feeling too creative when I sat down to make this card... I was tired of making Valentine's themed cards and the code word "pink" just screamed at me to make another one. Instead, I found this extra piece from some cards in the last few weeks and thought "it's pink" so I played with it.
This month we are building up our stash of appreciation style cards for the Build Your Stash Instagram Hop. Some of my friends did some cards to thanks the nurses or teachers or fire fighters in their lives. I don't have a need for anything like that, so I went with a simple thank you card. I used the exact same things on these two cards... even the same layout. I love double sided pattern paper!
We have an "anything goes" clean and simple challenge at CAS on Friday that starts today. No theme, just a CAS card! What could be easier?!
Mine was so easy that I picked a bunch of extras from my bin of extras to create my card today... so I don't have much information on the items used. I hope you can enjoy the card without knowing all of the details.
This week, the participants in the This or That Instagram Hop had to choose between RAIN or SNOW. At this time of the year, I choose snow. I don't love snow, but here in Calgary, the cold weather often results in sunny skies. I'd take a day of snow and sunny skies for the rest of the week over a week of gloomy cloudy days because of rain. Besides, snow is bright and white and fun (unless you have to try to drive to work in it!). I complain about the snow, but honestly, I think it's pretty!
Challenge #306 at Time Out Challenges is a Pick 2 Challenge... choose any two of the inspiration words from the graphic below to create your card. Thanks to Lawn Fawn for hosting this challenge!
I went a little nuts and chose FOUR words instead of only two! I had some fun with some shades of pink and red sparkle paper as well as a gorgeous sparkly heart!
This week for the Card Clubhouse Instagram Hop, our theme is "Unexpected Valentine"...a challenge to use unexpected colours for a Valentine's card. I chose to go with black, white and gold as I find it elegant. I was really tempted to add just a little pop of red, but decided that was too traditional.
It's time for another Mini Slimline Instagram Hop... no themes for this hop... just sharing a mini slimline card each month. This is one of my favourite card sizes to play with. For my card today, I played with one of the left over pieces from the postage stamp die and stencil I used last week... I think it fit pretty well! I added a little embossing for an extra punch.
Card Info
There's a new challenge at CAS Colours & Sketches that starts today, and it's a colour challenge.
The colours felt beachy to me, but I just wasn't inspired to make something beachy... so instead I went more graphic to use the colors.
There's a wonderful new sketch at Atlantic Hearts this week...
I didn't make it completely clean and simple in the true sense of the style, but it's pretty close. My big white layer just screamed for some embossing on it!
This week on the My Favorite Instagram Hop, we are playing with my favourite woodland scene. I don't do much with scene stamping, but I wanted to play along. I sure hope that this works for the theme!
It's the beginning of February and time for a new sketch at Build Your Stash Holiday Card Makers. We hope to inspire you to make a Christmas card or two every month to help you feel less overwhelmed in November!
First, let's see the sketch!
Today is the first hop of the new One Layer Instagram Hop... we are making cards that only have the base layer on them. This month, our optional theme is ink blending.
I realized as I was typing up this post that I cheated and added a die cut sentiment to my card. Whoops!
I used some washi tape to mask off parts of the card front to create my blended stripes and then stamped this gorgeous floral over top of it. I could have stamped the sentiment right on the front, but the one I liked the size of would have been lost in the floral.
Today we are celebrating Kati's birthday with an Instagram Hop to help make it a little more special. Since she loves all things colourful, she chose a rainbow theme for her hop!
I started with this gorgeous pattern paper and went with a design I used on a Christmas card a few months ago. I went shopping at my favourite local stamp store last week to use the gift card I got for Christmas (and a little more than that too!) and I bought those gorgeous leaves and a great new sentiment stamp and die set.
For the month of January, we are playing with the theme of Love for the Rediscover Your Supplies Instagram Hop. As you may be aware, I am trying to get back to my clean and simple style more often and while this card isn't quite there, it's pretty close...
Already the end of the month... and time for me to share my second and final card using the January 2026 sketch at Build Your Stash Holiday Cardmakers.
Here's a reminder of the sketch...
I chose to do a second more clean and simple card with this sketch. I toyed with embossing the white panel, but I'm glad I didn't. I like it like this.
This is the last week of the "old or new" challenge month for the This or That Instagram Hop. My family gave me a gift card to The Paper and Ink Boutique for Christmas and I went shopping last week. I didn't think I wanted to hop on the postage collage bandwagon until I saw some people cutting collages apart to create something different... I came home from the store and immediately made this card.
Another rainbow themed card for you today, for the Rainbow Connection Instagram Hop. For today, I chose a pretty brushed rainbow printed paper to go behind a die cut window. I die actually cuts out the floral square, but I placed it back in to the hole it created on my front panel to create a window look.
