Hannah Is An Angel Now

A friend that I graduated with lost his 22-year old daughter, Hannah, to a senseless murder while she was at Indiana University.  It was the week of the Little 500 and she was celebrating with friends.  They were all graduating in two weeks.  She left her friends around midnight and no one heard from her again.  They found her body the next day.  I will never understand the evil that exists in our world.

The one thing I do know is that God has us in his hands.  It has never been more evident than in watching my former classmate, her father, through Facebook.  The grace and spirit of this man, father, husband and friend is indescribable.  I never met Hannah but she must have been an incredible young woman.  There was no funeral, but rather a celebration of her life.  Her younger sister said she spoke to Hannah about death in one of their many talks together, and Hannah didn't want a funeral.  She wanted people driving up in limousines and laughing and talking about her life.  That is what they did.

I have witnessed her father not give into grief but embrace the wonderful 22 years he had with her.  He has shared many pictures of them together.  They are snapshots of memories he has of his wonderful life with her.  What a testimony of his faith.  I am humbled.  There are no worries or struggles that can match what he has gone through.  I have no reason to do anything but praise, just as he has done.  I only hope to live my life in the way he has exhibited through these difficult times.  God has a beautiful child with him right now and one day another beautiful soul will rejoice when he joins her.

I could not attend Hannah's celebration.  So I made a card as a tribute to her.  Hannah had long black hair. She was a member of Gamma Phi Beta, a sorority whose colors were purple and green.  My goals was to create a representation of a small portion of Hannah in the card.

I purchased a digital image called Clouds of Glory from AmazingPicturesbyMTP from Etsy for the background and used Photoshop Elements to layer an image from The East Wind, also Etsy, called Angel.

The following Copic colors were used on her.

Hair - C9, C7, C5, C3, C1

Skin - E000, E00, E21, E11, E13, E04, R20

Eyes - B37, B34

Wings - C1, BG000, BG0000 Wink of Stella Clear Glitter

Dress - BV08, BV13, BV02, BV00, BV0000, YG25, YG23, YG05

The floral leaves are dies from Shabby Flourish from La-La Land Crafts' April 2015 project kit.  I used seam binding and colored it with distress inks from Tim Holtz.  The flowers, paper and ribbon are from my stock.  The Fly High Hannah text was created in Word.

May God keep us all safe!

Thanks for looking,
Jo

A Little Love for My Little Love

Well, ok...she's not so little.  This is a Valentine card I made for my daughter, Katelyn.  She's 22, so not so little anymore.  But she will always be my baby!

The image is I {heart} You Marci by LaLa-Land Crafts from Irina's December 2014 Project Kit.  She was fun to color up.  I tried to apply my class knowledge to her pleats but the colors I wanted were so light that I couldn't get the contrast in there.  I like how the buttons in her hat turned out though!

Copic Colors:

Skin - E000, E01, E00, E11, E04

Hair - E30, E31, E55, E57

Dress & Hat - R000, R11, R22, R24, R27

Shirt, Shoes & Buttons - N0, N2, N4, N6

Love to Love You Stamp - Close To My Heart "Mad About You" set

Dies:

LaLa-Land Open Hearts Banner die and String of Hearts Die

Heartfelt Creations Ornate Gateway Die

Spellbinders Grand Nestabilities Scallop Die

Spellbinders Heart Circles

Love Chip Board - Studio Calico

Other Embellishments Unknown

I'm a pretty organized person, but my desk always looks like this after I'm done making a card.  Whew!  I haven't figured out a way to keep it neater!  You guys have ideas?

xoxo,

Jo

Glittery Christmas Elf Marci (workshop)

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!

Hopefully 2013 is a great year!  Everyone knows how hard it is to keep a

 New Years resolution.  That is if you choose to even make one! 

Mine was to try and buy less crafts and use up the stash I have because

my craft room is busting at the seams!! But I'm pretty sure I'll break 

 that resolution! I just need a bigger craft room!!

Here is project #2 from the workshop I took in early December with

Irina Blount of LaLaLand Crafts.  I was really excited about this one

because it was a new approach to coloring for me: coloring ON glitter!

It was a little challenging at first but it actually is easier than I thought.

My pics do not give the glittery effect justice because I'm not using

a great camera.  But in real life it is super sparkly!!

               

Left and right side views to try and show the many layers.

   

            

The glitter was Glitter Ritz and it was burnished onto double stick paper.

The image is then stamped on top of the glitter and colored.

Who woulda thunk it?? :)

Here I'm trying to show the paper pleating of the printed green paper.

I love how it gives a lot of dimension.  I also love the candy cane yarn.

And last the inside of the card!  Irina always stamps the inside of her cards

with the same image that is on the front and I think it just adds so much!!

So as far as supplies go, of course the image is LaLaLand Crafts.

She is called Christmas Elf Marci.   All the dies used are also LLL Crafts.
They are Christmas tree, holly flourish, large flourish, rolled roses and lotus.
The little ivory dots are pearl paint.

Thanks for looking!

                    XX,

                    Angie

I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!!  I hope everyone is getting to spend some

quality time with their friends and family on this fabulous

Christmas day.   For some reason I have really been wishing for

a white Christmas this year.   Too bad I'm in sunny San Jose, CA so

that's never gonna happen.   But this card definitely has a wintery

wonderland feel!   This cute little image is from LaLaLand Crafts

and is called "Christmas Lantern Marci".   I made this card in a workshop

taught by the owner of LaLaLand Crafts, Irina Blount.

We had 5 projects to make in this 8 hour workshop!!  Needless to say,

there was definitely homework!  Not one project was finished.

But we had soooooooo much fun!  And I would rather have more

projects presented and finish them later anyway!!

So here is my take on this super fab card designed by Irina.

It is just like the one she made on her blog.

I just added some cute little pearls to her coat and the plastic

roses on top of the flowers and the bow of her hat are from

Recollections. (Michaels brand)

      

                                                                            

All the dies I used are from LaLaLand also.  I used 5 different dies and a

doily on the front and inside.  The dies are as follows: Christmas tree, Heart fence,

Large Flourish, Lotus, Filigree.

That's it for this card!!  The 4 other projects 
will be posted at a later time!!

                     Hugs today everyone!

                     Angie

Non-traditional Christmas

So is everyone out there scrambling to get Christmas cards done??

I always tell myself I'm gonna start making them in July so I don't feel so rushed in

December, but what happens to me EVERY year?  I feel rushed!!  But it's

okay, somehow it'll all come together in the end.  Even if I have to buy

a few store bought ones! LOL!

  Well I absolutely love non traditional Christmas colors so

today I have "Winter Marci" from La-La Land Crafts in a gorgeous

purple hue.  I love purple and blues together so I thought I would try

this combo out on a winter card.

The papers and the seam binding ribbon are from my stash.  I really like

the multicolored chevron paper.  It has a Missoni look to it and feels like it

should be on a sweater.  Hehe.The crochet lace is Melissa Frances and I just love it!! 

I ended up buying it in all the pastel colors she had.  The cute

 little purple clip holding the sentiment and the snowflake brad are

from Michaels.  The charm was purchased off Etsy.

Other products I used:

Spellbinders Floral Ovals

MS: pine punch

Flowers: WOC and Prima
 sentiment: LOTV

This is another one of those images that I colored over a year
ago when I was first learning to use my copics but is
just now being used on a project.  I know the purples were colored
with V91, V93, V95, and V99.  The rest of colors I didn't write down.

Challenges I would like to enter:

yumifumihandmadecrafts.blogspot.com: ribbon or lace

karensdoodlesnetherlandschallenge.blogspot.com: non traditional Christmas colors

craftsandmechallenges.blogspot.com: ribbon or trim

delightfulsketches.blogspot.com: festively floral

craftdoormagazine.com: anything goes
scrapbitzcopics.ning.com/group/cmccopicchallengegroup: non traditional Christmas colors
uniquecrafterschallenge.blogspot.com: Christmas
crafts4eternity.blogspot.com: Christmas chaos
fabnfunkychallenges.blogspot.com: #3 or 3 of something
abcchallenges.blogspot.com: anything goes

Cupcake Superhero

Here is a super quick, super fun card for a young girls birthday.  I used "Cupcake Marci" from La-La Land and I think she is hysterical.  I love everything about cupcakes and if I could be a 

cupcake superhero, I totally would!!  And if I could wear purple and pink everyday and not

look like a child, I would do that too!!  LOL!

The ribbon is actually seam binding from my own stash that I colored with an ombre effect using my copics.  I really like this technique so my ribbon matches my project perfectly!

The gems/rhinestones and charm are also from my stash.

I used the Cheery Lynn "anastasia lace" die to make my lace.

The "filigree" corners are from La-La Land.  They are covered in glitter.

Marci's mask, cape, and belt are also glitterized with my Spica pens.
The corner dots are Candi minis  from Craftwork Cards.

Very simple inside. (was kinda in a hurry)  The stamp set on the front is from JustRite Stampers and the inside sentiment is Stampin' Up.  And of course below are the copics I used.

 Challenges for this card:

emeraldfaeries.blogspot.com: use a charm

inkyimpressionschallenges.blogspot.com: birthday

raisethebarchallenge.blogspot.com: birthday

allsortschallenge.blogspot.com: young at heart

brownsugarchallenge.blogspot.com: BINGO: bling-glitter-ribbon

pinkgemchallengeblog.blogspot.com: ribbon & lace

scrapbitzcopics.ning.com/group/cmccopicchallengegroup: all about kids

craftuscrazy.blogspot.com: favorite color: pink/purple combo

simplycreatetoo.blogspot.com: use your stash (seam binding I colored for ribbon)

craftyannschallengeblog.blogspot.com: tic tac toe: gems-glitter-lace

pattiescreationschallenge.blogspot.com: birthday

La-La Land Crafts Halloween Cards Class

So of course it's been a crazy long time since I've been able to post anything 

on the blog because of previous commitments I had to complete.   

But finally I was able to do something fun just for me!!  Over the past 

weekend I had the honor of taking a class from the very talented Irina Blount.  

For those of you who don't know her, she is the owner of La-La Land Crafts.  

You know, the super cute Marci and Luka rubber/digi stamps??

Well that woman can create some amazing projects!! We made a total of 3 
Halloween cards with her newest Halloween images.   We completed the 
assembly of the cards in the class but I wasn't able to finish all the coloring 
of 3 images so I had some homework!  LOL!!  I still have one more to color but 
I thought I'd share the ones I have done. 

The first is Flying Witch Marci and she was so fun to color.

I'm not very good at coloring folds in clothing but Irina taught me

a few little tricks!  Thanks Irina!

This is the scary tree die from LLL crafts.  Love it!

Inside of card is cute too!  Oops!!  I forgot to take a picture of it BEFORE I
wrote in it!!  Did it on both cards silly me!!

This next image is Lil' Devil Marci.  Loved coloring her too.

Hope you can see some of the glitter coloring I added to 

both these images!  I love adding a little bling

to all my images! 

These will not be entered in

any challenges due to the fact they are not my ideas.

Yes, I colored the images and put the cards together, but

these were Irina's projects that I replicated in her class.

I had so much fun that I'm going to take one of her eight hour

workshops in December in which we will be making 5

projects!!  How will we get them all done, I don't know!!

If you want to check out more of her amazing work, check

out her blog at http://everythingpapercrafts.blogspot.com.

You won't be disappointed!