Thank You STV Challenge Hostesses!

Hello! Tonight several GinaK Designs designers are joining together to host a special thank you blog hop to our recently retired StampTV Challenge Hostess Team. The four designers we're honoring tonight have provided weekly challenges for the STV members for the entire months of December, January, and February and we are so thankful for their inspiration and hard work!*

• Shannon Bracken: Monday's Color Challenge


• Carolina Buchting: Tuesday's Anything but a Card Challenge


• Jennie Harper: Thursday's Sketch Challenge


• Selma Stevenson: Friday's Blast from the Past Challenge

Each participating designer was asked to choose one challenge shared during the past 3 months and make a card to share on their blogs tonight as well as to send that card to the hostess.

My card is for Selma Stevenson, the week I chose was wood graining. (Well, I had to use some flowers since they are Selma's favorite!) ;) Although I didn't look at any when I made this card, those distressed frames that look they were made from reclaimed wood and belong in some beautiful country farmhouse were what I was going for here...
I started with a rectangle of Kraft CS, then swiped it several times vertically with Tuscan Tan, olive and Cream White pads. Doesn't matter how many times I do this technique, I'm always amazed after adding the ink how realistic the finished product is, and how simple to create! Next I stamped on the Pressed Flowers sunflower and leaves in tan, then went over them with the outlines from A Year of Flowers in olive to make them pop a little more. On Pure Luxury White I stamped the Pressed Flowers in Versamark and then used daubers to add pastel chalks over it. (I'd been meaning to make a Pressed Flower card with this poppin pastel technique, plus I thought it would give a nice faded look to go with my country frame.) I used aqua ink to make the soft background around it. Then I cut a rectangle out of the middle going around the sunflower in the corner like it's carved out, and then snipped the other three corners at at a diagonal to give the frame mitered edges. I put them all back together and popped them up onto a Confetti base, haven't used confetti in awhile but thought the natural fibers in it would be really beautiful with this weathered wood frame. The card still needed a little something, so I punched out some fancy corners from Chocolate Kiss to play off the Coffee Bean stamped greeting from "Say it with Flowers", I rubbed a little more Cream White over them to give them a little patina, and then added an adhesive nail head to each, now they look like some old wrought iron hinges or embellishments.

Visit these links to see all the projects we've prepared for our alumni hostess team:

• Jessica Fick


• Theresa Momber


• Cathy Tidwell


• Lee Murphy


• Melanie Muenchinger


• Nina Brackett


• Carolyn King

And, the new StampTV Challenge Hostess team is also joining in on the hop tonight!

• Tina Gilliland: Monday's Color Hostess


• Karen Knegten: Tuesday's Anything but a Card Hostess


• Vicki Dutcher: Thursday's Sketch Hostess


• Sharri Seffens: Friday's Blast from the Past Hostess

If any of you have not participated in the STV challenges before, they are such a great way to hone your skills as a crafter, add new techniques to your repertoire, and get busy doing the same thing as so many other ladies at once, so fun to see how different all the cards are at the end of the week! A warm welcome to all the new hostesses taking over our StampTV challenges for the next three months! :) Congrats!!

*To see all the challenges the Retired Hostess team has shared during their term, visit the StampTV Idea Center , jessica added pdfs so you cnaa print all these out for your reference! :)