Inspiration Everywhere...

Someone recently asked me where I get my inspiration for making cards.  There's inspiration everywhere!  A few good places to look are paper crafting magazines, which are great for demonstrating new products and techniques, another is blog-surfing - also a sure-fire way to find something new to try on your own projects.  Today, we're talking textiles.  In a recent blog, I demonstrated a card modeled after one of my grandmother's needlepoint creations.  This blog is about taking what you see everyday, and letting that fuel your creativity.

My 5 year old son took this photo of me in my favorite T-shirt.  It's a gray background with red, yellow and orange filigree chairs, and it says blah blah blah "coffee" blah blah etc... (I love coffee).  It's a very simple everyday item...

So now, here's the T-shirt in the form of a card - Basic Gray card stock, with Summer Starfruit lattice die cut, and a Riding Hood Red blossom.  The "Thank You" sentiment comes from the Perfectly Penned stamp set, #122890w/112892c stamped in Riding Hood Red classic ink.  Basic Gray is a fantastic launch pad for zany color.

This is a sweater from my church's coat closet... There's no telling who's sweater it is, but as I was hanging up my coat before church one morning, this sweater was there and I had to take a photo of it, it was just too brilliant.

I cut some concentric squares with my paper trimmer, 1-1/2", 1-1/4", 1" and punched a 3/4" circle of Whisper White card stock for the center.  The colors here are:  Elegant Eggplant, Perfect Plum, Wisteria Wonder (purples); Rich Razzleberry, Melon Mambo, Pretty in Pink (pinks).  Sponge the edges in the darkest color, pierce the center of the stack, give each layer a good scrunch, and hold it all together with at brad.  Stampin' Dimensionals are the best way to adhere the flowers to the card front, they give the brad a little cushion as well as popping the flower up off the surface.

The background is a 4" x 5-1/4" piece of vellum card stock, run through the Big Shot with the Houndstooth embossing Folder.  The Label background is Basic Gray card stock cut with a Label Framelets die, and run through the Big Shot with the Square Lattice embossing folder.  The leaves are Summer Starfruit, Lucky Limeaid and Old Olive card stock.  Like the flowers, I sponged the edges in the darkest layer color (Old Olive) and gave each a scrunch.  The leaf shape comes from an old stencil of a rounded triangle, and a little free-hand extrapolation.  Stamp set is Loving Thoughts #125843w/125845c

While neither of these examples are exactly like the originals, the inspiration comes from the forms and colors of the fabrics.  Take a fresh look at your decor, closet , or coat rack, and see what inspires you...

Enjoy!