Freshly Made Sketches #700!

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #700!

Freshly Made Sketches is celebrating a big milestone this week with the 700th challenge and 14 years of inspiration!!!! The sketch is a throwback to FMS14 and was designed by the challenge creator, Lesley Croghan. Although I stepped down from the Clean Team a few months ago, I am thrilled to be invited to play along with them this week!

The aqua and gray squares were die cut and adhered in their grid with washi tape to keep the edges clean as Tim Holtz Distress Snowfall Grit Paste was applied with a Taylored Expressions Breezy Stencil. While it dried to a translucent, frosty finish the Poppystamps Birthday Blowout sentiment was heated embossed in Liquid Platinum onto a oval piece of vellum.  

The the MFT Fab Foliage and Wild Greenery dies are attached along their spines to the gray tiles and then the sentiment oval slipped into place amongst the leaves.

For a little extra fun, Clean Team designers are posting the first card they created to play along with Freshly Made Sketches. For me, it was for FMS117 way back in December 2013!

My card is also being entered in Seize the Birthday #311 No Flowers challenge.

I hope you check out the amazing Clean Team designs at Freshly Made Sketches and play along with us this week!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #676

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #676!

Clean Team designer Kim Singdahlsen has given us a fun sketch this week! A weekend harvesting lemons completely inspired my design and had me pulling out the Memory Box Small Citrus Rounds, Zig Real Brush markers and watercolor paper. 

While the various layers of watercolor dried, an MFT Rectangle Frame, cardstock and canvas look patterned paper were cut and layered. A partial sentiment from MFT Full of Sunshine is stamped on the paper and the die cut layered below to finish off the panel.

I hope you check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #674

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #674!

The amazing Clean Team designer, Jen Mitchell, has given us a fabulous sketch this week! I knew I wanted to do something with speech bubbles and text and almost flipped the design before deciding I like the look of an angled curved line more and kept the vertical orientation.

The MFT Happy Birthday Background Text is heat embossed on a white panel, then die cut with a MFT Speech Bubble edges die. Lawn Fawn Chit Chat stamps and dies were used to create the trio of birthday greetings popped up over this panel. Before it is adhered to the green panel, a MFT From All of Us sentiment is heat embossed in the bottom corner.

I hope you check out the terrific Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches this week!

I'm also entering this card in Seize the Birthday Challenge #299 in the Anything Goes category.

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #672

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #672!

I am excited to be hosting the challenge at Freshly Made Sketches this week and came up with a sketch that allowed me to play with The Stamp Market Happy Birthday Garland die set. You can make a simple banner along the top of your design or keep going as I did. Use whatever letter, numbers, images or shapes you want in your creation!

Although I ended in a place completely different from my original plan, I am really happy with the final result. A simple patterned paper provides a great base for the Fiestaware inspired letters left dangling from the paper strings. I think this die set is going to be well used for quick and easy birthday cards!

Check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us this week at Freshly Made Sketches!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #669

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #669!

The queen of layering, Clean Team designer Narelle Farrugia, has a wide open sketch for us this week. My need to replenish the stack of birthday cards had me reaching for balloons when I saw the circles, but as always, you can use any image in your design. Inspired by Narelle's layers and a new The Stamp Market Wispy Waves stencil, a windy tone on tone background is created first by adding a touch of ink to white molding paste.

Both MFT Balloon Stax and Poppystamps Celebration Balloons dies are used to give me the sizes I wanted and cut in a number of colors before deciding to go with an orange and aqua mix. The MFT Bitty Birthday Wishes sentiment is heat embossed and a couple of waxed thread strings added to the larger balloons to finish the design.

Check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us this week at Freshly Made Sketches!

I'm linking this card to Seize the Birthday Challenge #297 - Use Something New.

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #667

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #667!

Happy New Year! Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches first challenge of 2025. Our super talented Clean Team designer, Cécile Ribon, is the creative genius behind this perfect start to the year. 

Although tempted to use a new snowflake die, I went with stars this week. Remember, you can use whatever image you want and make a card for any occasion. Even though this one could be used to celebrate the New Year, it is heading to a dear friend for her birthday.

A four inch square panel is embossed with stars and a large gold shimmer MFT stacked star added with glue dots to give a bit of lift and dimension. The Stamp Market Big Bold Numbers base dies are cut and embossed before the outline dies are cut from glitter paper and layered on top.

The simple heat embossed MFT Itty Bitty Birthday sentiment and a scatter of star confetti finish the design.

I hope you check out the fabulous Clean Team designs and play along with us for the first challenge of the New Year at Freshly Made Sketches!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #665

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #665!

I can't believe how perfect the amazing Kim Singdahlsen's sketch is for a birthday card. Okay, it is also perfect for anything MERRY, JOLLY or whatever other five letter word you need to spell out. I always have to interrupt the holiday card making season to make sure I have a few masculine cards on hand with a December birthday boy in the house.

Kim's vertical panels had me thinking HAPPY, so I pulled out the MFT Veritcal Stitched Strips and The Stamp Market Skinny Alphabet dies to play around. As often happens when I want to lean masculine, I end up using blues, greens or grays and a monochromatic palette.

The pale green letters are adhered straight in the center of the stitched panels before they are adhered slightly wonky on a wood embossed kraft panel. The MFT Bitty Birthday Wishes sentiment is heat embossed on a scrap of green vellum to finish the design.

I am linking this card to Seize the Birthday #296 where the Topping is Masculine.

I hope you check out the fabulous Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches this week!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #657

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #657!

Fall leaves and colors were calling to me this week and I took advantage of the amazing Clean Team designer, Karren Johnson's sketch to play with embossed texture and pretty patterned paper.

I was originally planning to replace the tag with just one of the Lawn Fawn Stitched Leaves before deciding to give it a bit more presence with an MFT Blueprint Tag. A little twine added more texture and interest to the design.

I hope you check out the terrific Clean Team designs at Freshly Made Sketches and play along with us this week!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #654

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #654!

How fun is this great sketch from Clean Team Designer Jen Mitchell! I was going back and forth between party hats and trees for the triangle shapes. As you can see, trees won this week.

I cut and layered the Tim Holtz Sizzix Forest Shadows dies, trimming them to replicate the triangle shape and fit on an Ellen Hutson Abstract Mountain cover plate. The front trees were cut from a left over embossed panel giving a little extra texture.

The sentiment is pieced together from a couple of Kerri Bradford stamp sets: GreaterYellowstone and Uncharted Territory.

I hope you check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us this week at Freshly Made Sketches!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #651

Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #651!

Our super talented Clean Team leader, Jen Timko, is behind the fun asymmetrical sketch this week! I went through so many ideas and thought I'd settled on feathers and a sympathy card, when I came across the Papertrey Ink Leaf Silhouette dies (yup, I tag and use them as feathers as well as leaves) and switched to a masculine leaning birthday card.

The large die is cut several times to give me options for color blocking the finished leaf. An older PTI Birthday Bash sentiment is stamped on a piece of patterned paper, die cut and inked to blend better with the other colors. The design didn't feel finished until a few stitched leaves leftover from another project were layered under the large focal point leaf.

I hope you check out the fabulous Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches!

I'm linking this card to Seize the Birthday #290 challenge in the Anything Goes category.

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #619

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #619!

I love this fabulous sketch designed by our super talented Judy Rozema! I knew almost immediately that I wanted to create something with a postage stamp look for the square element, but went through numerous ideas and color palettes before settling on this red, white and blue design.

A happy find was the airmail stripe image in an older Simon Says Stamp Sending Happy Thoughts stamp set to use for the vertical element. It is stamped in red first and then the strip was shifted to stamp the blue.

The postage stamp is created using images from Kerri Bradford Southern California stamp set and cut with a Spellbinders die. The SSS Sending die cut layered over the stamp provides the first half of the sentiment and an MFT Bitty Birthday Wishes finishes it off.

I hope you check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches this week!

I am also linking this card to Seize the Birthday Challenge #275 in the Anything Goes category.

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #612

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #612!

The super talented Clean Team designer Linda Callahan has provided a fabulous, classic sketch for us this week! It was just perfect for pausing the Christmas card production and adding a much needed masculine birthday card to my stash.

The Memory Box Graceful Stag Collage die is cut from a piece of holiday tartan paper that was trimmed to size first. It is adhered to a Sizzix 3D Leaf Pattern embossed panel and a second, darker green panel is embossed and staggered behind it.

The Poppystamps Birthday Blowout sentiment is stamped on a MFT Mod Rectangle die cut that is adhered to a second, slightly offset dark green die cut to finish this super simple design.

I hope you check out the terrific Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches this week!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #599

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #599!

I had so many ideas for the offset vertical panel in the fabulous Jen Mitchell's sketch this week that it was hard to focus on just one. Most of my designs had the panel being a die or stamped image, with the sentiment off to the right, so I'm not sure how I ended up with my sentiment on the panel.

Once settling on the Poppystamps Art Deco Birthday Greetings sentiment, dies and embossing folders were pulled that would work for a masculine design. The Stampin' Up Woodgrain and Sizzix 3D Leaf Pattern folders were supported by a few trees trimmed from a Memory Box Pine Tree Landscape die cut.

Check out the amazing Clean Team designs and play along with us at Freshly Made Sketches this week!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie

Freshly Made Sketches #597

 Welcome to Freshly Made Sketches #597!

I'm hosting the challenge this week and decided to create a landscape sketch that would allow me to use this MFT Life's a Beach sentiment. My vertical stripes are palm trees, but of course you can do whatever you want to frame the panel in your design!

I am absolutely in love with this MFT Watercolor Wash Rectangle stencil and blended kraft ink along the bottom inch or so and light blue for the sky. Wplus9 Dockside seagulls were heat embossed before the sentiment strip and Simply Graphic palm trees were layered and adhered. A few Studio Calico sequins were added to mimic coconuts.

I hope you check out the fabulous Clean Team designs and play along with us this week at Freshly Made Sketches. I'm so excited to see the gallery fill with your amazing creations!

Thanks for stopping by,

Jacquie