What a FUN week and a great topic. I draw inspiration from an amazing array of things in my day to day life. Sometimes ideas come to me at inopportune moments when it’s impossible to jot down notes (like when I’m mowing the lawn). Occasionally I suffer from those dreaded creative blocks. When this happens, I step away from my stamp desk and try to mentally remove myself from designing. Then, when I least expect it, something will get the juices going again. It can be as simple as a TV commercial, advertisement, fabric pattern, garden magazine, scrapbook product, printed paper and even simple embellishments.

Today I’m showing you some of my most recent visual stimuli….cards made by YOU. I chose six of you (had to narrow it down) whose art inspired me for various reasons. I put these into categories such as Style, Sketch Design, Color, Details, Composition and Technique, then I “lifted” them. How fun this was!!!

Let’s get started.

I love Julie’s style and I’m drawn to it. It seems that everything she does shows outstanding craftsmanship. Julie reminded me to pull out my edge distress tool that I don’t use much.

And My take on Julies project is below. I folded up paper flowers to create the buds.

I chose Scrapperjjb’s (Jenn) card for her composition. I liked the large and small ribbon at the top of her tag. Looking closely at her project it reminded me of some old ribbon stash I had that I could use to lift her idea.

Since Father’s Day is Sunday, I decided to turn the tag into a card that I’ll give my husband.

Teresa’s card shows simple elegance. The layout is clean with uncluttered lines. She colored her flowers with a bit of ink (nice touch) she also used eyelets in the centers of her flowers…something I’d forgotten about.

I followed her layout, changed the colors up a bit, stamped my flowers and used extra large eyelets from We R Memory Keepers. Oh, and I punched the holes on the side of the Kraft paper with my Bind it All…love that machine.

Sarah did a beautiful white on white. I usually think of it for weddings but was intrigued with the way she added a splash of color. I also like the way she stamped an additional portion and mounted it on top over pattern paper. Very crisp and clean. Everything flows nicely.

And here’s my example. This technique is easy if you have a stamp positioner, thank you Sarah for reminding me to pull that out and finally use it. I used Sarah’s layout as well, just put in a scallop border and buttons.

I love this simple card. I tend to look at small details and what caught my eye was Jillians small circles that she incorporated. I also like that she used a spiral clip and brad plus one of my favorite color combinations. So sweet!

I did a quick watercolor with markers and added corrugated cardboard for the flower pot. I used Jillians detail circles to the right which I think balances out the card.

And Finally Tami. Her color combinations are always so nice, very complete. I love the tangerine and pool combo in this card it reminds me of sherbet. Very refreshing! I can only imagine what her room colors are in her house, pretty I bet.

I generally use a lot of brown in my pieces so this was a pleasant change of pace. I stamped the bird on white paper and stamped again on pattern paper to use for the wings. Also, the very faint background is a sneak peek of another large background stamp.

Thank you ladies for allowing me to “lift” your cards. Recreating your work has invited me to get out of my rut. This was great fun.

Remember, when lifting peoples artwork, try to mention the originator when ever possible.

Thanks for joining our week of inspiration. Remember you still have until Sunday by 11:59 PST to get your weekly challenge card (click for details), uploaded to the Hero Arts Flickr Group — don’t forget to tag them with the word “inspire”.

If you have any questions about todays cards, please ask :o)

Enjoy!

This entry was posted on Friday, June 13th, 2008 at 4:04 am and is filed under Fun Fridays. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.