Heart 2 Heart Meets the Rose Blossom Garden for Beach Week


I have missed y'all soooo much.  After my family's Annual Migration to the Beach, I am ready to get inky again!  Yes, everyone in my family except me lives within spitting distance of both bay and ocean beaches, yet once a year we all go invade someone else's hometown, specifically Avon, North Carolina which is on the Outer Banks just north of Cape Hatteras.  I really had to smile when I saw that the theme of the first Heart 2 Heart challenge for August is "Bon Voyage or Good Journey,"  given that I am playing catch up on account of my trip to the beach.  This goes really well with the theme of Summer for the first (and second) challenge over in the Rose Garden.  Wait a minute!  Isn't the Rose Blossom Garden Challenge a Close to My Heart Cricut cartridge themed challenge?  Yes, but there have been changes.  Now the challenge will have a theme with a bonus challenge to use a particular key on a Close to My Heart Cricut cartridge.  You also have all month to complete both challenges which is why I am not scrambling to post this by midnight last night.  This theme change is really good for me right now because the bonus challenge is to use the "T" key on, you guessed it, Close to My Heart's new Artbooking cartridge which I will not be getting until after I host monthly group in late September.

Anyway, my family has been renting houses (the same one for years at a time until we outgrow it) from Outer Beaches Realty for 24 summers.  For the past few years, my aging father has not really been up to making the arrangements but is not ready to put the lease in my name.  The folks at Outer Beaches, Mary in particular, have been very understanding and willing to deal with me even though the lease is still in Daddy's name.  I definitely owe them a thank you card.

I figured it was appropriate to use photo of my daughter and sister taken at the beach.  I used the cut out filter on Photoshop to give it a stylized effect and printed it on card stock..  To make the bottom border, I used the Artiste cartridge to cut four .75 inch flourishes (page 43, shift accent 1) out of Lagoon cardstock and then trimmed off the bottom curl. 

After attaching the "waves" to the "sand" paper from Footloose, I cut along the edge.  Why do I set my self up for this?  You would think I like fussy cutting!  The sun was cut using both accent 1 keys on page 35.  Then I got to get my fingers inky with some sponging both on the front and inside.

I have always loved this sentiment from the retired Summer Breeze set and paired it with an image from the also retired Perfect Day set which I resist embossed.  Can you believe I used no embellishments?  Neither can I!  Everything I tried seemed extraneous.  Maybe I just wanted to keep the focus on my beautiful daughter...  Thank you for stopping by!  Now please head on over to Heart to Heart and the Rose Blossom Garden to see what the others have created.  Until next time, Hansi

Materials used, all Close to My Heart Unless otherwise noted:
Paper:  Footloose (retired), Claire (retired), Lagoon and White Daisy cardstock
Ink:  Lagoon, Crystal Blue, Cocoa
Stamps:  Summer Breeze (retired), Perfect Day Retired)
Embellishments:  Clear Detail embossing powder