T is for Thinking of Spring

Hello friends,

I got the results from my blood work after doing a month of no alcohol, desserts, bread, chips, processed meats, soda, etc. and adding in way more veggies and fruit. Turns out eating healthier really does work. All my numbers improved including my blood pressure. I guess I will continue with this journey. 

It feels like Spring here so we are trying to take advantage of it. Speaking of Spring, over at the Art Nudge Challenge it looks like Spring as well.  Here is my creation based on #artnudge225A. 

And here is the inspiration photo that inspired it:

I was inspired by some of the colors and the flowers.  I sketched out the vase, table and flowers, and I used Daniel Smith Watercolors, a Black Micron Pen, Tim Holtz Distress Oxide (mustard seed) and some watered-down white gouache to color it up. The sentiment is an old favorite from Stamping Up! This is going to a friend who needs a big hug.

The Art Nudge Challenge is open to all artists and is not just for card makers. You can art journal, sculpt, make ATCs, do acrylic, watercolor, or mixed media, sew, knit, etc. There are wonderful prizes too. Just make sure to link up your creation to the Art Nudge website before the end of February. There will also be 3 inspiration photos to inspire you - this is just the first one of the month. 

It is Wednesday and I am late again posting to the T-day linky-party over at Elizabeth's Blog:  Altered Book Lover. Better late than never right?  Happy T-day! To participate in the party, you need to have something related to a drink in your post. 

I broke my favorite morning mug a few weeks ago and my new favorite is this Dunoon China Spitfire mug. I bought it a few years ago after seeing a post by one of the T-day participants showing a display of Dunoon in a shop in Germany. I actually bought it for hubby, but he never uses it.  This morning it is full of coffee (I didn't give up coffee - lol). 

Here are some of my favorite cards from the last week. The first one was done for the Featured Stamper Challenge on splitcoaststampers.com.  I cased THIS pretty card done by auntof8. I made the main branches and bird housed out of scrap papers, watercolored the background with Daniel Smith watercolors and white gouache, drew in some berry branches, stamped in some bits of journaling and a sentiment, and covered everything in Snowtex. 

This card was made for last week's color challenge at Splitcoaststampers.com. I was fortunate enough to be asked to be a guest designer for January and February. I included the challenge colors in the ice cubes and the drink. I sketched this one on some regular paper, water colored it, and added Stickles to the ice cubes. The sentiment was typed up, printed, and cut into pieces.

I hosted the Friday F4A challenge last Friday at splitcoaststampers.com. Our inspiration was the letter 'H'. I included a hydrangea and the word 'Hello'. The flowers were loosely painted and then outlined with a micron pen. I embossed the centers with a Versamark pen and some white embossing powder. The sentiment is heat embossed, and I finished it up with Tim Holtz distress ink on the edge of the painting.

Hope you all have a lovely week and thank you for visiting. 

Hugz,

Nancy