Challenge #5 Inspiration with Stephanie

Hey everyone, Stephanie here! So glad you could join me today! I'm back to share some crafty inspiration for our current challenge! Here is the board we are working with:

As you can see, there is LOTS to be inspired by and so many fun elements that work perfectly with the month of March!

This is the photo inspiration element. Isn't it so pretty? I just love it!

I decided to use it as one of my elements! For this card I chose the far left column:
Geometric Shapes, Layers, and Photo Inspiration!


For my geometric element, I used the MFT Tiny Triangles stencil and the super fun Heidi Swapp metallic gold texture paste over a blend of distress inks. I cut out my scallop circle die with the largest circle from the Craftin Desert Divas Stitched In Circle Dies and adhered it to my card base as my first layer!



Next I adhered the awesome four leaf clovers, which were inspired by the photo inspiration, directly to the circle panel and popped up the lucky cat on top! These adorable stamps and "smile" sentiment are from Lawn Fawn's "My Lucky Charm" set. All of the images are colored using my awesome Spectrum Noir alcohol markers! As a finishing detail I added glossy accents to his gold medallion and small gold star sequins on the card base!

I hope you enjoyed my card and that you found it inspiring! Thank you so much for visiting today!

For a quick jump to the current challenge, you can click here! I hope you'll join in and I look forward to seeing your creative projects! :)

~Stephanie

Challenge Four Winners

Wow! Can we just say wow?! The entries for challenge four was so amazing! You all amaze us with your talent and the way the challenge board inspires you! Thank you again for playing along and making this challenge so much fun.

We will get straight to it and announce the winner (Champion) of the prize and our Masters!

Our Champion is...

#31 Giovana from Believe: A Place to Praise and Craft

Congratulations Giovana! Your card was a stunner! The card conveys such a strong message! We also love the way you water-colored your vibrant poppies with the gorgeous sun rays behind them! Thank you for joining us for this challenge and creating such a stunning inspiration for us all to enjoy! Please email us at tictactoechallenge@gmail.com with the subject line Challenge 4 Winner. Please include your full name, address and your choice of stamp set above.

And our Masters...

#27 Lea from Lea Lawson Creates

#29 Lucinde from Lucilight

#39 Wiebke from KomMa-designed

All of these were beautiful! Thank you all for taking the time to play along with our challenge and share your talent with us! Please grab your badge and display it on your blog for all to see! :)

There were so many fabulous entries that we want to do a special shout out! First one to #4 from DT member Lindsey for this fabulous card, #17 from Michelle for this adorable shaker card, and #33 from Dee for this pretty floral card. Thank you so much for linking and sharing your creations!

Come back tomorrow for an inspiration post from our DT member Stephanie!

Have a great day!

Challenge Five

Hello everyone! Welcome back to another Stamping Smiles Designs Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge! We cannot believe we are on our 5th challenge already! Wow!! I guess time really flies when we're having fun playing with our crafty supplies, huh? :)

Who is ready for St. Patrick's Day and are excited for Spring to arrive? We know we are as you can tell from the inspiration photo below! Yep, you heard that right! For this challenge, we included an inspiration photo in the challenge board as one of the element. Whichever rows inspires you from this photo inspiration and our fifth Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge Board is what we challenge you to create! Just a reminder, if you choose the row without the photo inspiration, you may certainly use the photo as part of your design as long as you include the other three elements. Also, please make sure you are including the challenge graphic badge in your blog post and not the blog badge if you're playing for the prize. Thanks!

Photo Source

You are playing for one of the following 3"x 4" stamp sets. The winner will get to choose the stamp set of their choice. If you already have all three in your stash, why not play to give one of these sets as a gift for one of your crafty friend? You can click on the links below to read more about each stamp set.

Memory Box Stamps Bunny Tea Time Stamp Set

Clearly Besotted With Love Stamp Set

Clearly Besotted Still A Hoot Stamp Set

Now let's see what the design team cooked up for inspiration.

Lindsey used the middle column down: beads, gold and rainbow.

Shannon went with the second row across: friendship, gold and layers.

Olesya chose the 1st row across: green, beads and geometric shapes.

Nora was inspired by the top row across: green, beads and geometric shapes.

Stephanie chose to work with the 2nd row across: friendship, gold and layers.

Tracie chose 2nd row across: friendship, gold and layers.

Thank you for joining us in our fifth challenge. Please read the "Challenge Rules" tab at the top of the blog to be eligible for the prize. You have until Tuesday, March 15 at 11:55pm CST to submit your entries. We can not wait to see what you create! HAVE FUN and don't forget to check back on Thursday for our challenge winners! Until then, happy crafting! :)

An InLinkz Link-up

Challenge #4 Inspiration with Nora

Hi everyone!! I hope you are having fun playing along with Stamping Smiles Design Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge #4. I have been looking at all your wonderful creations and am in awe of all the creativity. It is so interesting to see the different interpretations everyone has using this card.

Nora here to bring you a little inspiration using Challenge #4.

I chose the middle row from top to bottom with the elements-sequins, Distress Inks and stencil to create my card.

I used a technique on this card that I had never tried. It was using shimmer spray and Distress Ink with a stencil. I snapped some photos to give you a little photo tutorial of the process.

I inked a piece of white card stock with Peacock Feathers  Distress Ink. I did not use any fancy tools but literally rubbed the ink pad across the paper. 

Next I covered the inked card stock with the Echo Park"Branches" stencil and misted it with a clear shimmer spray. (You can also use water if you did not want the shimmer.) I sprayed just enough to cover the stencil but not enough to saturate the paper. I used a paper towel to blot any excess moisture there might have been on the stencil.

I slowly took the stencil off and used a heat gun to dry the panel. It might buckle a bit but once you adhere it to a card, it will be fine. You can also see that I did not mist the card evenly. I could have gone back to fix this but I liked the way it came out so I chose to leave it this way. 

I cut the panel down a bit and adhered it over a top folding white card base. I then added a strip of white and black polka dot paper at the bottom of the inked panel.

I used PaperTrey Ink's "Vintage Linens" stamp set to stamp the flowers in black dye ink. I then die cut them with the "Vintage Linens" matching die set. I adhered the leaves and flowers to the front of the card, using foam adhesive on the left flower to give it a bit of dimension.

I adhered three clear sequins randomly over the card and used clear Wink of Stella over the black leaves and the flower stamens. 

I chose to leave the card blank, figuring I could add a sentiment later, depending on what I want to use the card for.

There is still some time to play with the Challenge #4 card. I cannot wait to see what you create!!

Thank you for stopping by. Have a wonderful day!!

Nora

Challenge Guest Designer : Yukari Yoshioka

Happy Thursday Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge Fans! Today I am so excited to introduce our guest designer for challenge 4, Yukari Yoshioka of Handmade By Yuki! I am telling you this girl is crazy talented and she is going to make you fall in love with her project today! I absolutely adore her style of cardmaking! Like me, she loves creating with cute and whimsical images that make people smile. Below you'll find a little information about her in her own words followed by her super cute project.

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Hello! My name is Yukari; however, I go by my nickname, Yuki. While originally from Los Angeles, CA, last summer we moved to beautiful Seattle, WA. When I'm not busy paper crafting, I enjoy cycling, snowboarding and training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. While I enjoy trying new techniques and styles, my favorite by far would be making cutesy cards using critters!

For today's card, I went with Sequins, Distress Inks and Stencil to create a fun birthday card featuring the cute kitties from the MFT "Cat-itude" set. I colored the kitties with Copic Markers and then fussy cut them out, leaving a white border. I then cut a square panel from white cardstock and used the MFT "All Lined" stencil to apply Twisted Citron distress ink. I die cut two strips of dark gray cardstock using a stitched border die and glued them to either side of the focal panel. I used a light gray cardstock and created a stamped background by stamping the fish stamps in a light gray ink for a tone-on-tone look. I white heat embossed the sentiment onto a strip of black cardstock and popped that onto the focal panel with foam tape. To finish the card, I added some Shimmer Pico Embellisher to the collars and matching Pretty Pink Posh sequins.

I tried to keep the colors gender neutral and really love how this card turned out. I had so much fun playing along with this challenge and hope you were inspired too! I'd like to thank Ka for having me this month!

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So? Did you fall in love with this cute kitty birthday card? I hope you did! Thank you so much to Yuki for providing us some more inspiration using our current challenge board! And please stop over to Yuki's blog and give her a shout out for her oh, so cute card!!