Hello there, and happy Saturday to you!  It’s time for another theme challenge at 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown:  Christmas windows.  The perspective can be either looking into the window or looking out from the window.  So long as the window is the main focus of the card, it’s good.

I’ve owned this cute rubber stamp of a boy and his dog looking out a window for… um… let’s just say a pretty long time.  Even though I think it’s adorable, I’ve always been rather intimidated by it because I worry that my coloring skills won’t do it justice.  Well, this challenge provided me with the opportunity to push myself past that fear.  I guess I did OK.  One of the reasons the stamp has bothered me is that there is no background to the window – so that way, the user can choose to put it on whatever type of building he or she pleases.  I decided the easiest thing to do would be to add it to cardstock embossed with the brick embossing folder.  I highlighted the bricks with a few swipes of my white ink pad.  I was trying to follow the current Freshly Made Sketches challenge for the layout, so I tried making the one rectangular element into a snowdrift up against the side of the building, under the window.  I put a few scrap cardstock shims behind the window to give it some dimension, but in hindsight I’m not entirely sure that was the best idea.  Then there was the horizontal twine-like element of the sketch.  The realist in me couldn’t figure out a logical reason for that in my scene.  So I opted to just add a simple little bow to the snowflake, which takes the place of the button-like sketch element. The sentiment is made up from two different stamps. Since it seems to me like the boy is looking out of the window, perhaps missing somebody who is far away, it made me think of kids whose parents are stationed overseas with the military. Even though it’s too late to send this card to Operation Write Home to be used this holiday season, it’ll keep for next year.

52CCT 11-15-2014

Go check out the other design team members’ windows – this is one time where it’s okay to be a “peeping Tom”, LOL!  🙂  Then create your own card featuring a Christmas window and share it with us at the 52{C}CT site.  We’d love to have you join in the fun and creativity!  Thanks for stopping by today.

Edited on November 19, 2014:  I’m so honored to have been named one of the “Perfect Princesses” at Freshly Made Sketches!  Thank you to Linda for choosing my card!

Supplies:
Stamps: Billy and Sparky at Window (eat cake graphics); Trendy Trees (Stampin’ Up); Christmas Tags (Sweet ‘n Sassy Stamps)
Cardstock: Soft Sky, Soft Suede (SU); Pure Luxury White (Gina K. Designs)
Ink: Craft White (SU); Tuxedo Black (Memento)
Other: Brick embossing folder (Tim Holtz); Premier colored pencils (Prismacolor); odorless mineral spirits (Hampton Arts); snowflake punch (EK Success); Cherry twine (Really Reasonable Ribbon)

This summer I’ve been enjoying finding new blogs and sites and participating in their challenges.  I recently found yet another, In Style Stamps

I love sketch challenges because for me, figuring out a layout is often the most difficult part of creating a card.  So I decided to take part in the ISS sketch challenge.  This one had an extra twist – to turn the sketch into an easel card.  So I thought about it and finally came up with an idea.  I turned the sketch on its side because I felt my idea worked better that way. 

This card ended up being a mix of old and new stuff.  I’d never made an easel card before, but I found a really helpful tutorial online and figured it out.  I also hadn’t used this shape of Nestabilities dies yet and decided it was time to put them to use.  The patterned paper is from one of my oldest Basic Grey 6″ x 6″ pads; I’ve had it for a couple of years.  The cardstock for the card base is even older. And it seems like forever since I’ve used any of my stamps from eat cake graphics.  I used something else new to color the image – Copic markers that I received as an early birthday present from my husband.  I still have a lot of practicing to do with the Copics, but aside from my ink smudging a little bit, I’m pretty satisfied with my coloring job here.  I left the bottom panel blank so I can write a message to whoever receives the card.

I’ll admit that as I was working on the separate pieces of this card, I wasn’t liking it very much.  It felt like too much of a hodgepodge of things that didn’t seem to work together.  But now that the card is assembled and complete, I like it.  It’s still not one of my favorites, but I’m happy with it.  Sorry for the kind of dark photo.  It’s been trying to rain here all afternoon so I didn’t have a lot of good light for it.

iss-aug10-sketch.jpg

Supplies:
Stamps: Abagail’s too late for cake, Am I too late for cake, short present (eat cake graphics)
Cardstock: Mauve Mist, Kiwi Kiss (Stampin’ Up); Basics White (Papertrey Ink); papers from Gypsy 6″ x 6″ pad (Basic Grey)
Ink: Onyx Black (VersaFine)
Other: markers (Copic); Dahlia die (Nestabilities)

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