Recurring themes: Cityscapes

This is a post I started writing in 2015 and have been meaning to finish ever since... 

I find I have inadvertent themes in my stamp and die collection:  background stamps with script/French/indecipherable writing, Gibson Girls, mail art and faux postage, snarky quotes, sassy women, moose, oceans and water, and on, and on.  Another recurring theme: cities and skylines. Maybe it was growing up in New York City, but I find drawn images of buildings, towns, cities, city maps, row houses, etc. alluring. When I finally added cutting dies to my collection, I had to have all of the cityscape dies. 

This 4th of July, I played with a few new purchases:  a cityscape die from Ellen Hutson and a fireworks layering set from My Favorite Things.  I dragged out my ancient embossing powders and chose a few of the best metallics.   If/when I do it again, I'd use a transparency to plan out the fireworks a little better - may putting one burst below the skyline, adding a few more, and thinking about placement and balance - always a challenge for me.

I have this someday project of cutting all of my cityscape dies, and stamping all of the city stamps and looking at them side-by-side.  I wonder how many of the dies in particular would look identical?

Stamps:  Fireworks by My Favorite Things
Die:  Big City by Ellen Hutson
Inks:  Versamark and Tim Holtz Distress Oxides

This could be vodka...

My grand plans for the July 4th holiday involved making at least five cards.  At least!  Which means I made 1.5...

I saw a card using this stamp set on Coffee-Loving Cardmakers, and thought about it for a long time before ordering the set from Cat's Pajamas recently.  The set features two of my recurring card themes and stamp purchases:  coffee/tea related stamps and saucy/sassy/snarky/wry/irreverent (which is the best descriptor???) sentiments.

I also wanted to practice with my watercolor markers, so I just stamped and embossed a bunch of images, and used my favorite for this card.  And look at me actually using some rhinestones I got for free with a stamp purchase a year ago.  I like a clean and simple card, but this one needed something.

Thinking about the card again this morning, if I were to do it over, which I might, I would leave the mug plain, or stamp or pattern piece a design on it, and then stamp the image with the sentiment in the same location on the inside of the card, leaving the sentiment as a surprise for the recipient.

Stamps:

Image:  This Could be Vodka by Cat's Pajamas
Background:  Love of Coffee by Picket Fence Studios

The perfect thank you card...

Saturday was my birthday!  My sister, who knows me so well, sent me a tomato spoon.  And, of course, I wanted to make her the appropriate thank you card...

I tried to spruce up the card with a subtle tone-on-tone background image (tomato red, of course) using Impression Obsession's Dotted Floral Cover-a-Card stamp, but the true find was that I had a stamp of a tomato spoon!  Well, sort of.  As I was browsing through my stamp catalog, continuing my trip down memory lane, I saw an Impression Obsession Tea Tools stamp:

I masked the other stamp elements, added a thank you greeting, and called it done.  Don't tell anyone that it's really a bon bon spoon...

Seeing what happens...

I find it so easy to be stymied when I don't have a specific project in mind, or an intended recipient for a card.  Last night I reminded myself that the only way to get past that is by doing the work - just put stamp to paper, and something will happen.

This card started from me just stamping out a couple of stamps from a new-to-me set on some scrap paper, just to see what they looked like.  It's simple, which is completely my style, but I might try this one again and see if some pale coffee rings works as a background, or detracts from my focal image.  The inside reads:  Coffee is my love language.

All images and inside sentiment:  Coffee Talk by Joy Clair.

Another Rainy Day...

We've been having this spate of gloomy, rainy, intensely humid days in my part of the world.  I feel lucky to live and work in places with climate control.

In a rare burst of inspiration and creativity after a stamping convention a number of years ago, I made this card, which captures the current state of things.

It's a simple thing - two stamps, no embellishments, and these days cold be easily mass produced, and have better ink coverage using the MISTI.  Background:  Rain Cover-a-Card from Impression Obsession; Foreground:  Umbrella People by Technique Junkies.

Those bygone days...

I wasn't feeling especially creative last night (turns out I was hungry - who knew?), so I worked on my unmounted stamp catalogue.  I have a bunch of stamps that I've either unmounted from their original wood blocks and then remounted with cling foam, or that are cling-mounted duplicates of stamps I already had.  As I was looking through my mounted stamp catalogue for company and stamp name references, paging through that binder, was a wonderful trip down memory lane.  Yes, I'm now securely in the unmounted camp, for ease of use, storage, and the game-changer stamp positioning tools that all but remove the possibility of inking mishaps, but I don't want to lose track of and stop using those older images I love and collected over many years.

Above is a favorite card that I never quite had the courage to send.  Marvy dye inks on glossy paper, mounted on black felt, gold paper, and then the perfect shade of purple card stock.  Image:  Acey Deucy/Lynne Perrella.

Wait, what is a blog again??

Oh, I remember, a web log, a journal, a record of what I'm doing, in this case, in the craft room.  I've tried a couple of different ways to record a snapshot of what I'm doing, but the paper versions - inchies and ATCs involved making a thing, and then an extra bit for the journal.  Now I'm trying an old scheme:  online, one photo, 1-2 sentences, supplies.  What are the key things you want to know about a craft project?

Impetus:  This week's Splitcoast Stampers clean and simple challenge prompt is balloons.  I've been wanting to play with this Concord & 9th set for ages.  Also exploring the idea that the image on the front of the card, the sentiment, and the intended recipient can have a little incongruity and it's not the end of the world.

Supplies:
Image:  Happy Balloons by Concord & 9th
Sentiment:  Tealightful Day by Pinkfresh Studio
Background:  Mini Cloud Edges stencil by My Favorite things
Inks:  Altenew, Versafine, Impression Obsession