Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #596

 

Happy Wednesday!  

 I hope you're having a great start to your week! Trevor got back from Italy on Friday night so we went out for a little family adventure hike on Saturday but by Sunday he wasn't feeling too hot and by Monday he was sick.  I guess he brought us back something a little "fun" from Italy.  He's not allowed anywhere near the kitchen and has to stay away from the rest of us.  None of us want what he has!

We've got a brand new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches this week!  Our hostess is the incredibly talented Judy Rozema!  Judy's cards are always beautiful!  She's super creative and this week's sketch is no exception!  Make sure you head over to Judy's blog to check out her cards!  I love Judy's sketch this week and I love that we are to keep the bottom half of our card naked!  I pretty much knew right away I wanted to do a Christmas card with the Holiday Blooms dies!  

I used the Dazzling Diamonds Hot Foil plate to create the background for my top portion!  I tried it in pink first but then opted for silver!  I will still do something with the pink one though!  It's so pretty!  I went for a white and silver look this week since last week we went white and gold!  I might actually get some Christmas cards made this year!!!  

Supplies:

Cardstock: Hammermill White, Silver Foil
Other: Dazzling Diamonds Hot Foil Plate, Joyful Christmas Sentiments, Holiday Blooms, Silver Foil(all Spellbinders)

My kids agree to go for one hike a year and I have to be very strategic on where we go hiking.  This hike is a trail that goes around the Upper Kananaskis Lake.  It's a beautiful trail that has minimal elevation gain so they were "happy".  We had a great adventure out together!  

Thanks so much for stopping in today!  I hope you'll join in our challenge this week so please head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and submit your card!  Just remember to check out Judy's instructions this week!

Have an amazing week!
Jen

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #595

Hello!
Happy Wednesday!  I hope you're having a great start to your week!  I am back from a week in Ontario with my family!  It was such an amazing visit.  We had so much fun with my parents and I was able to see many of my aunts and uncles at a family wedding.  The groom wore a pink tux.  My youngest son (who's almost 15) thought the tux was perfect in pink!  The other's weren't so convinced but I thought pink was a fun choice - how different is pink from the powder blue of the 70's?

We've got a fantastic new sketch this week at Freshly Made Sketches!  Our favourite Texan, Amy O'Neill is hosting and she has come up with a great sketch for us to play with!  Amy makes amazing cards and is always sending the cutest ones to her kids so please head over to her blog to check them out!

I struggled with this sketch to start with.  I haven't felt very creative lately at all.  I don't know if it's because it's summer and I'm out of routine, just want to be outside or that I feel very tired by the end of the day and don't feel like crafting.  Summer always gets me out of whack.

My mom blessed me with the Spellbinders Holiday Blooms die set when I was at her house visiting.  I love all blooms and there are many parts of this die set that would work perfectly on a non-Christmas card so I grabbed it and my Be Bold Blooms and started crafting.  Of course I started with colours and gave up and opted for white and gold.  

Supplies: 

Cardstock: Basic White (SU), Gold (SU)

Other: Holiday Blooms Dies (Spellbinders), Be Bold Blooms (Spellbinders), Be Bold Sentiments (Spellbinders), Gold Foil (Spellbinders), Glimmer Hot Foil Machine (Spellbinders)

I thought I'd include some recent hike photos.  We did this one on Sunday!  Trevor let me have 24 hours to acclimate back to elevation and then we headed out on a smaller hike just in case I was sucking wind!  I wasn't!  It was actually really good!  We hiked at Little Arethusa and Arethusa Cirque.  The day before had been super smoky but we were blessed with clearer skies and the perfect temperature.  It was a little chilly to start but we were hot and sweaty by the end.  We also ended up with a windless and person-less summit!  Two of my favourite things!  We also had a marmot on the summit with us.  If you don't know what a marmot is they're like an alpine groundhog.  This particular creature was a little too curious and I was afraid it was going to bite me so we opted to let it have the summit and we headed back down!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I hope you'll join in our challenge this week!  Please head on over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog to get the details and see some of the design team inspiration!  We'd love to see what you come up with this week!

Have an amazing day!
Jen

 

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #593

Hello!
Happy Wednesday!  I hope you are having a fantastic start to your week!  My youngest and I are heading off on an adventure today!  We're flying to see my parents and attend my cousin's wedding in Ontario!  I've actually been able to see my parents a few times already this year which has been wonderful!  I'm super excited to visit them during the summer.  Though I might not be looking forward to the humidity!  

We've got a fantastic new sketch this week at Freshly Made Sketches!  Our hostess this week is our favourite New Zealander, Karren Johnson!  Karren's such a creative stamper and is the queen of hot foiling!  She's one of the reasons I'm broke!!!  

I needed a card for my Father-in-law's birthday - which was yesterday.  Karren's sketch was perfect!  I used the amazing Adventure Awaits paper pad from Honey Bee Stamps with the coordinating Pinstripes and Polka Dots: Outdoors.  I threw on some evergreens and called it a day!  I struggled with the sentiment and I'm still not sold on it but it's what worked!

Supplies:
Cardstock: Shaded Spruce, Certainly Celery, Basic White (SU)

Patterned Paper: Adventure Awaits, Pinstripes & Polkadots: Outdoors (Honey Bee Stamps)

Other: Evergreens Dies (Taylored Expressions), Sentiments for Everyday (Spellbinders), Silver Foil (Spellbinders), Glimmer Hot Foil Machine (Spellbinders), Tasteful Labels Dies (SU)

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  Please be sure to head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and join in our challenge.  The girls on the Design Team have created some gorgeous cards that will definitely inspire you!  

I thought I'd share a few photos of one of our more recent adventures!  We did two hikes this weekend.  I'll share the second one next week!  We hiked at Cory Pass.  It's a beautiful area that passes between Mount Cory and Mount Edith!  I wasn't sure what to expect but it far exceeded my expectations.  It was such a beautiful area!  I loved it and we had the whole area to ourselves!  

I hope you have the most amazing week!

Jen

 

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #592

Hello!
Happy Wednesday!  I hope you're having a great start to your week.  It's been a good week here.  My youngest had his last day of school yesterday which I was so thankful for!  He is now done at the middle school and will go to high school next year with my oldest.  My days of driving him to school are over!!!  Praise the Lord!!!  I'm so thankful to finally be starting our summer vacation.  My oldest has been done for over a week but he's working maintenance at the golf course so we don't see him much!

We've got a great new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches this week courtesy of our favourite French designer, Cecile Ribon!  Cecile's cards always blow me away so you need to head over to her blog to check them out!  Cecile's sketch really stretched my brain.  I struggled with it for a while but I had just used these trees and the dies were still sitting on my desk and I thought they would work perfectly.  I tried one design but didn't like it so opted for an all white Christmas card!

I apologize greatly that the photo quality of my card is poor.  The lighting was terrible when I took it.  We have some rare cloudy skies and it was impeding my ability to take a good photo!  I really love these white sequins from Taylored Expressions.  I had been using them sparingly but I used quite a few in my shaker!

Supplies:
Cardstock: Basic White (SU)

Other: Nested Circles (Pink Fresh), Circle Dies (Spellbinders), Silver Hot Foil (Spellbinders), Joyful Christmas Sentiments (Spellbinders), Evergreens (Taylored Expressions), Sequins (Taylored Expressions and SU)

I thought I'd include some pics of our hike on Friday!  We tackled the Heart Mountain Scramble!  It was a spectacular ridge walk.  No bears on this adventure!  We did see a cute marmot!  You'll see his picture below!  

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I hope you'll head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and join in our challenge this week!  The design team has some amazing cards there to inspire you!  We can't see what you create!

Have an amazing day!
Jen

 

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #591

Hello!  

Happy Wednesday!  I hope you're having a wonderful week so far!  We finally got some rain yesterday.  It rained most of the day which wasn't so great for my oldest who had to work outside in the cold and wet but so amazing for our dry ground that is desperate for water!  I think "rainy season" is coming to an end which is sad considering we hardly got any rain.   Life in an alpine desert I guess!  

We've got a brand new sketch this week at Freshly Made Sketches!  I am fortunate to be this week's hostess!  I really do enjoy hosting the challenge!  It's so fun to get to see each and every card and read all of your posts!  I love seeing everyone's creativity!  

I tried to get creative on my sketch!  I wanted to pick something that was outside my normal comfort zone!  I am generally drawn to easy, plain sketches so I tried to change it up a little!

I need another wedding card for my cousin's upcoming wedding.  I grabbed my Lovely Layers Peony and got cutting.  I went with white again since I really do love mostly white cards!  I figured a peony was a good wedding flower and it wasn't the Be Bold Blooms!!!

Supplies:

Cardstock: Basic Black, Basic White, Wild Wasabi (SU)

Ink: Garden Green (SU)

Other: Lovely Layers Peony (Honey Bee Stamps), Dainty Diamonds Embossing Folder (SU), Sequins (Honey Bee Stamps), Mini Everyday Sentiments (Spellbinders), Black Foil (Spellbinders), Glimmer Hot Foil Machine (Spellbinders)

Thank you so much for stopping by today!  I hope you'll head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and join in our challenge!  I would love to see what you create with my sketch!

Thought I'd share some photos of our recent hike!  The first one is of the mama and baby grizzly we startled when we came up on the ridge.  They were much closer when we first saw them and we cautiously backed up and made noise which scared them off - thankfully!  I didn't take a picture until they were a very good distance away!  This hike was absolutely spectacular!  Amazing views despite being a little on the smoky side.

Have an amazing day!

Jen!

 

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #590

Hello!
Happy Wednesday!  I hope you are having a wonderful week so far!  We are still in the middle of a crazy drought.  We need rain so desperately.  We are supposed to get some rain today and we are praying that it comes.  We didn't go hiking last weekend because there was rain and thunder storms in the forecast (and the last place you want to be in a storm is on top of a naked mountain!) but we didn't get a drop of rain.  The ponds of drying up, some of the towns are going on water rations, everything is starting to die.  It's so sad.  We definitely need rain for our wildfires too!  So praying we do get rain this week!  

We've got a lovely new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches courtesy of the amazing Kim Singdahlsen!  Kim's cards are always so lovely so please head over to her blog to check them out!  I guarantee you'll come away with a wish list of new things you need!!!

Kim's sketch threw me a bit.  I originally thought I could do a Father's Day card but I don't have a lot of masculine products so I got frustrated very quickly.  My Echo Park Bee Happy paper was sitting on my desk so of course I grabbed that again!   I knew I couldn't use the Be Bold Blooms so I grabbed my Honey Bee Stamps Lovely Layers Wildflowers instead!  I added a gold hot foil sentiment and some gold sequins and I was done.  I wish it had come together as fast as that sounded, but it didn't.  Shocking!

Supplies:

Cardstock: Basic White, So Saffron, Wild Wasabi, Basic Black (all SU)

Patterned Paper: Bee Happy (Echo Park)

Ink: Daffodil Delight, Wild Wasabi (all SU)

Other: Lovely Layers Wildflowers (Honey Bee Stamps), Be Bold Glimmer Sentiments (Spellbinders), Gold Foil, Glimmer Hot Foil Machine, Gold Sequins

Thank you so much for stopping by today!  I hope you'll head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and join in our challenge!  There are some amazing cards there to set your creativity on fire!  

I don't have any hiking photos for you this week since we didn't get out!  Hopefully I'll have some for next week!

Have an amazing day!

Jen

 

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #589

Hello!
Happy Wednesday!  I hope you're having a great week so far!  Canada is being hit with some pretty crazy wildfires right now.  Ontario and the Eastern part of the country seem to be hit pretty hard right now.  The whole country could use some rain.  Hopefully we'll soon get some!

We've got a fantastic new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches this week!  Our hostess is the amazing Linda Callahan!  Linda's cards are always fantastic!  Head over to her blog and check out those beauties!  

So this sketch might have stumped me.  A lot.  I have a couple of "reject" cards on my desk that I tried but was not happy with at all!  I finally decided to go for an "all white" card.  I hadn't done one in a while and it was about time.  I still love the look of an all white card!  I hope you're totally shocked that I didn't pull out the Be Bold Blooms!  I grabbed the Lovely Layers: Wildflowers from Honey Bee Stamps instead!  

Supplies:
Cardstock: Basic White, Silver Foil

Other: Lovely Layers: Wildflowers Honey Cuts (Honey Bee Stamps), Sentiments for Everyday (Spellbinders), Silver Foil, Circle Dies (Spellbinders), Dainty Diamonds Embossing Folder (SU), Basic Rhinestones (SU)

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I hope you'll head over to the Freshly Made Sketches blog and join in our challenge!  The more the merrier!

I thought I'd share a few photos from last weekend's hike.  There were no falls this time and no grizzly bears - which was a little disappointing!!!

We hiked Black Rock Mountain.  The drive to get there was insane.  It was physically the closest to our home but took the longest because we were driving on these sketchy dirt roads with giant pot holes and then we had to drive down an old river bed!  Super cool but super dusty and slow!

Have an amazing day!

Jen