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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 →

When Designs Change for the Better

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When making a Mother’s Day card in May, I had the design all planned out. I was very unhappy with the initial result, but it led to a design that I liked even better.

The design was going to be super simple using an acrylic stamping block and re-inkers for the background with a silhouette image stamped in black over it. I used white watercolor paper and stamped the inked background on it. It looked so lovely that I did not think about the texture of the paper.

Upsy Daisy Card

Stamped image by Stampin’ Up!

When I stamped the image over it, the texture became obvious and I just didn’t like the result. Naturally, I had waited until almost the last minute to make the cards, so I was in a mild panic trying to quickly figure out how to tweak the design. I decided to use some velum to stamp the image on and attach it over the background, because the colors would still show through pretty well.

The problem was that I had recently “cleaned up” my crafting area and couldn’t remember where I had placed the velum. Eeek! My husband saved the day by suggesting that I use tracing paper instead – and I actually knew where I had stashed the tracing paper. Shwew.

I stamped the image on the tracing paper, tore the edges, and attached it to the background paper with brads. The result is pictured here and I was so pleased with how it turned out. Continue reading →