I'm not really sure why this time of year has me itching for posting on my blog again, but it seems to be a thing for the past couple of years. I feel so sad to think that this blog has been so quiet for so long. For so many years this blog was like another baby to me, in which I poured my crafty soul out to the world. I had hit such an all time crafting high over a year and a half ago, but then suddenly it all started to become overbearing. Crafting became more like a second job, and with working full time outside of the house, running my two very active children to all of their activities, coaching competition cheer for the first time, I no longer had any me time... crafting for fun was not... well... fun. Then the pandemic hit, and I took a bit of a seat to crafting and sharing. I still crafted occasionally, but not anything like I had in the past. Nothing came naturally anymore, and so I was at a loss with my art. I focused more on my family, more on myself, more on moving and building a new house.
Speaking of new house, I now have a dedicated craft space! I am oh so lucky! I will share pictures soon, as it is still a work in progress and I still wish to purchase a few more things before I share the whole space. But I LOVE IT! It has big beautiful windows, and two smaller windows on the side. ( I thrive on windows and sun ) And I am slowly dipping my toes back into the crafty blog world again. Posts will not be as often as they once were, but I'm hoping to get back into the routine of sharing my art with all of you, and being inspired by your artwork as well! I've still visited many crafting sites, while taking my break and left my comments, but I'm excited to be inspired by other blogs again and join in challenges and more! I'm also hoping to get back into my original paper crafting love of scrapbook pages. I miss having those sweet memories to flip through, and for my children to look through and ask questions or share stories.
Alas, I've probably shared more information than you might have been expecting when you stumbled upon this page, but I hope you will take a moment to see the card I've created as a jumping point back into the papercrafting world.
I found my inspiration from the Altenew April 2021 Inspiration Challenge.
The colors were not colors I would typically think to put together, but I really wanted to try putting them together. To create my card I used a fun mix of Altenew products including:
Altenew Aztec Motif Stencil
Altenew Precious Moments
Altenew Striped Florals
I really like when crafters use tone on tone, especially with colored cardstock. Again, this is something I admire of others, but seldom try myself so I decided to give it a go. Since I was going to use colored cardstock for my background I chose to stamp my images onto colored cardstock as well. The great thing about stamping on colored cardstock, especially with floral images is that half the coloring is done for you! ha! I then used my Spectrum Noir Classique Alcohol Markers to add more depth to the stamped images. Please keep in mind it has been quite sometime since I've colored in stamped images, and so my shading is not quite as accurate as one would hope, but I was just proud of myself for following through with my original idea. Never missing a chance to add sparkle whenever possible I used my Spectrum Noir Sparkle Pen in Crystal Clear to color over my flowers, and oh how I love that pen! Once I heat embossed my sentiment onto black cardstock I began layering my elements up from the stenciled background, flowers and leaves, sentiment, and a final touch with a mix of flat back pearls and rhinestones.
I am also linking this card up to the Shopping Our Stash: Plant Life Challenge
Thank you so much for taking the time to visit my blog, and I do hope you'll come back! Next time I promise not to have such a long winded opening to my post lol.
Have a great rest of your day, and Happy Crafting!
Lisa
