easy

Better Late than Never

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Inspiration can show up at any time – on a walk in a park, talking with a friend, searching for ideas online. Sometimes we act on ideas from the inspiration immediately. Other times the ideas get set aside for one reason or another.

When I was coming up with an idea for a Mother’s Day card a few weeks ago, I remembered an inspiration challenge I had seen on SplitCoastStampers.com and the design idea I had for it. I went to look up the challenge and found it had been posted 9 years ago.Mothers' Day Card

This idea had been rolling around in my head for 9 years and I hadn’t acted on it yet!

I felt like such a slacker.

Then I remembered the saying of “better late than never” and decided to get over it and move forward with finally using the design.

The inspiration challenge image was one of the simple line drawings from Pablo Picasso. He is one of my favorite artists and I love these drawings. I immediately thought of the Heartfelt Thanks set by Stampin’ Up! because it had the line art of a flower. I wanted to use the line stamp in black ink with the partner stamp of the whole flower in clear heat embossed powder over it. But I never thought of a layout I liked for it, never found the time to sit and play with it, excuses, excuses, excuses.

Then a few weeks ago, I was back on SplitCoastStampers.com and saw a card posted by Penny627 that she made for a Try a New Technique challenge. I really liked the layout and it felt perfect for the line art idea. Continue reading →

White Christmas Card

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I was in the mood to make a monochromatic card for Christmas this year, and white seemed like a fun color to try.

White Christmas Card

A few months ago, I had found an interesting embossing template that was a Christmas tree and decided to use that. Originally, I wanted to have some mulberry paper behind the torn piece of paper with the tree on it. I tried to organize my craft supplies this year, which means I cannot find my mulberry paper right now. And no local craft stores seem to have it. So I grabbed my glue pens and some glitter and went with sparkle instead of fiber.

I must say that I am happy with the results. The photo isn’t the best, but I wanted to try to show off the embossed tree on the torn panel of paper in the middle. The swirls are Dazzling Diamonds Stampin’ Up! glitter.

My favorite thing about the cards this year is that my son helped with them. He embossed all of the trees for me and did great job. I love making our Christmas cards every year, and having him help made it that much more special this year. Continue reading →

Zentangle

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Not long ago, I was looking for something simple to do that wouldn’t require a lot of time or effort. I was thrilled to discover Zentangle. All that was needed was something to write with and write on. Easy peasy.

Zentangle borders I drew from the Zentangle Untangled Workbook

In addition to being a creative outlet, Zentangle also has the benefit of stress reduction. I find it meditative and a great way to quiet my mind. Trust me when I say that quieting my mind is not an easy task at times. 🙂

After trying it on my own, I decided to pick up a workbook to learn a bit more. I chose The Zentangle Untangled Workbook by Kass Hall, and I highly recommend it to anyone wanting to learn more about Zentangle.

I love that this book is a workbook with tiles in it for practice. The picture to the right shows one of the pages I did in the section for borders. It was great to be able to draw right there with the instructions. And it starts by having you draw straight lines and circles before moving on to more intricate designs, which are still surprisingly easy to draw. Continue reading →

First Attempt at Painting

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A picture of the ground - the inspiration for my paintingPainting is something I had always wanted to try. So a while ago I grabbed some paint, brushes, and paper and decided to just do it.

Knowing that my skills for drawing something that looks real are an opportunity for improvement, I decided to paint something more abstract. I had taken a picture of the ground while on a walk because the tree roots and rocks looked interesting, and that seemed like good inspiration for an abstract painting.

Another thing I know about myself is that I tend to work better under a little pressure. Otherwise, I will try to perfect every little detail and never finish. So I got the supplies ready and gave myself 2 hours, which seemed reasonable for a painting on a half sheet of paper. Continue reading →

Take a Picture

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Photography is a great creative outlet.

You don’t need an expensive new digital camera or a vintage film camera to enjoy it. Most people have smartphones with really good cameras built in, so you already have the tools to try this.

A butterfly on a pink flower

I usually have my phone with me and will take a picture of anything that looks interesting, pretty, unusual, shiny, etc. I was glad I had my phone with me when I was on a walk in a park and took this picture of a butterfly on a flower. I used a free photo app to crop it, so it didn’t matter that the rest of the original picture didn’t look so great.

I even took a picture of the ground once because the tree roots, rocks, and twigs just looked interesting. This photo has since served as the inspiration for my first stab at a painting, which I’ll tell you more about in a later post.

If you like to take selfies or post pictures to social media? You’re already doing something creative! 🙂 Enjoy the process and have fun with it.