And Now for Something Completely Different...

One of my biggest challenges in crafting is to loosen up and have fun. Ninety-nine percent of everything I make is tightly controlled, carefully planned, and precise. But as Betsy's acrylic block proves, loosening up and not fretting over a smudge here or there has its distinct advantages.

When I bought the Grunge Me set from Papertrey, I immediately sat down and made half a dozen cards that are what you expect from me: neat and tidy with lots of white space and fun color combinations. I'll share those later, of course. But then, I made this:

It made me smile. It's loose, happy, and fun. But something about it didn't feel right. The colors are some of my favorites...SU pumpkin pie, Memento canteloupe, and rich cocoa...but the warm scheme seemed a bit off considering the sentiment. The "paint" looks like earth, terra cotta, dust.

So I reached for SU marina mist and baja breeze and Memento black and tried again.

Oh. My. Gosh.

The cool, water colors on the crisp white are perfect. Just perfect.

Now, if you look closely, you'll see some order in the chaos. For instance, I stamped the big spatter three times in full-up marina mist in a triangle arrangement. The small spatter is also stamped three times full strength in baja breeze. Then I filled in all the holes with off-stamped, lighter images.

See, this AR/OC tiger won't change her stripes.

But she might spatter some ink around every now and then.