Going All White? Go with Texture

After seeing a couple of paper weaving projects in various magazines at Barnes & Noble, I wondered, "To weave, or not to weave? That is the question."

To weave, it is! 

After tearing strips and weaving the background from Neenah Solar White 80lb paper, I ran a large scrap of the same paper through the Cuttlebug using the StampinUp Subtle Textile embossing folder. Then, I punched the snowflakes from that textured paper. The sentiment strip is vellum with white heat embossing. 

There's so much going on here with texture, and it all works for me! What do you think?

And is anyone else in the U.S. longing for winter? Snow would be really nice about now....

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan

Learning as We Go

You know, teaching right now is a lot like creating cards: I learn as I go. For today's card, the inspiration came from THIS PIN by Alexa. I decided to use the Martha Stewart hydrangea layered punches, watercolor crayons, and gold Smooch. While the results are okay, my method does need tweaking. 

I punched, painted the petals with three different shades of purple watercolor crayon, and then highlighted the petals with the gold Smooch (diluted and applied with a watercolor brush. Then, once everything was dry, I assembled the flowers and leaves (from a Tim Holtz die, colored with two shades of green watercolor crayon). 

If I could do it over again, I'd apply the Smooch AFTER assembling the flowers, so the gold highlights would be a bit more intentional looking. They're a bit of a mess this way. But at a distance, it's quite colorful and pretty!

Many thanks to Alexa for her awesome inspiration piece!

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan

 

Scraps Doing Their Best

Recently, I've developed a small mess on my desk, a mess made up of discarded bits from past cards. The little pile of die cuts and sentiments called to me...and was reduced by two with this card.

The branch die cut and sentiment strip were combined with a background of friendly words (from an old set from Simon Says) and bling colored with Copics. 

This makes me so happy! And that's all I have to say about that. 

Today, I took an online class covering the basics of synchronous and asynchronous online college instruction. I needed the basics. Synchronous classes meet via Zoom or other online platform at the set schedule as if they were face-to-face but just online. Asynchronous classes don't meet at a set time, so all activities have to be delivered online, usually on a weekly schedule. 

Assuming I have classes to teach this fall, they might be synchronous or asynchronous or possibly even face-to-face at a college-credit-plus, high-school setting...or some combination of these. As of now, I have two synchronous remote classes on the schedule (each with only two students enrolled so heaven only knows if they will run), but I've been frantic trying to figure out how to force certain activities into a synchronous model. The class today put my mind at ease and gave me some strategies for working in this weird new world none of us asked for. 

I signed up for another class on Thursday covering Virtual Classroom, which is sort of like Zoom but part of the digital learning platform at my college. All these new tools...so many questions! 

I'm so proud to be part of an academic community that cares so much about students and their learning experience. We are trying to do our best in trying circumstances. 

Here's to EVERYONE everywhere who's just doing the best they can right now. You're the BEST! And today's card is for you.

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan

More Autumn Inspiration

The layout for today's card was inspired by this gorgeous card by Karin. It's also found on Pinterest. I obviously went with more autumnal colors, though.

A few facts about this card. 

First, the script stamp is from Very Versailles (StampinUp) and it's really the whole reason I bought that set. 

Second, my original plan for the card was all oranges, but apparently I put the leaf stamp away without cleaning it, so when I inked it up with the dried marigold (Distress ink), dabbed a bit of rusty hinge (also Distress ink), and spritzed with water, what appears to be old olive (StampinUp) transferred as well. 

The results look awesome! Much better than my monochromatic version would have been. That happens so rarely, I thought I should celebrate! 

Third, my original plan was to follow Karin's layout and put a sentiment on the bottom. I die cut a thanks word, painted it to match the leaves, and discovered there simply wasn't enough space for it on the card. So no sentiment. 

Fourth, to make the soft, textured paper, I used Hero Arts handmade paper, ran it through the Subtle Textile embossing folder (StampinUp) several times. One natural edge comes with the paper, but to get the other, I painted plain water along the line I wanted to tear, let it seep into the paper, and then tore it. This will fray the paper nicely. 

Fifth, I really, really love this card and am so very, very grateful to Karin for inspiring it!

Hope you all are doing well. A line from a prayer by St. Francis comes to mind in these tumultuous times: ...where there is hatred, let me sow love." Let's all sow a little love, shall we?

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan

Forever Fern for Autumn

The incredibly hot and humid weather we're having in Ohio right now is making everyone in my house long for autumn, so I went with more autumnal colors for this, the third card I've made with the Forever Fern bundle from StampinUp. 

Such wonderful stamps to use, and so pretty! Card size is 6.25" x 3.5". 

I hope everyone had a safe and fun Independence Day. 

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan

Happy Independence Day!

I wish you all in Canada a very safe, healthy, and happy Canada Day, and you all in the United States a very safe, healthy, and happy Independence Day!

If you want to mark Independence Day by remembering (and perhaps learning about!) our founding fathers, I highly recommend the book Signing Their Lives Away by Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese. It's a great read, very lively and entertaining. It also shows how our founders were a motley group of people who didn't agree on everything but worked together to get stuff done that set our country on a path of freedom, liberty, and justice for all. We're still on that path, pushing for full inclusion in the life of our nation for all citizens. It's easy to get caught up in ideologies that divide, but we need to stay on that path together...all of us...regardless of political party, creed, or color.

Today's card uses a small and very old Hero Arts set, as well as part of a background stamp of the Pledge of Allegiance from Stampabilities.

The card is 6.25" x 3.5".

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,
Susan

Vellum Inspiration

THIS PIN from Yvonne inspired today's card, which uses a vellum overlay, botanical images, and a white die-cut word. Thanks for the inspiration, Yvonne!

My card showcases the new StampinUp set Forever Fern. These images don't layer nicely (trust me, I tried...it looked a mess!), so I used masks cut with the coordinating dies to bunch the images together. If you look carefully at the close-up below, you'll see slight gaps where the die cuts were too large for a proper mask, but you also probably wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't pointed them out. Without the vellum overlay, these gaps would bother me enough to fussy cut a better mask, but in this case, I'm fine with the gap. 

Today, I felt the need to flee my house for a bit, so I went to Marco's Paper and bought a few Copics and Distress inks. Yes, I wore a mask, as was everyone else in the store. Yes, I used hand sanitizer in my car before I went in and on my way out of the store. Yes, I washed my hands with hot water and soap for the length of the Lord's Prayer when I got home. 

I hope you're staying safe and protecting others, too. And stamping. Because making pretty stuff is also pretty therapeutic. 

Mercy, grace, peace, love, and kindness,

Susan