Swan Song

And by that, I mean this may well be the last bouquet of the season.  

That's Maggie up front with some red Knockout roses, a couple of Climbing Pinkies and a Mrs. B.R. Cant in the back, plus some Mexican...heather or sage, I can't remember.  I never get tired of spring colors, even in the fall, but the temps fell to 37 last night and that'll make just about any summer-blooming posy pout.  

Today's card is more than likely my Halloween card swan song as well, but I had to do just one more for a couple of challenges (linked below).  It's..."different," certainly not my fave, but interesting to do. 

I should have quit after the fourth attempt at coloring the witch's hat failed, but I'm not a quitter and found a different route to satisfaction instead.  I was trying to color with Copics with two strikes against me - I don't really know how, and I have very few of them on strict orders from Santa to not buy any for myself until after Christmas.  (Fine Santa, if you insist.)  So I decided to stamp the image on lavender CS that I pre-stamped with a swirly image, then I painted it with a layer of ivory Creative Inspirations paints, then a layer of charcoal and colored in the tiny stripes with green and black.  The tiny flower was made with a tiny punch, two layers, painted with Fuchsia CI paints, sprinkled with Grape glitter (Art Institute), then attached with a tiny sequin in the center.  I was on a tiny roll by then.  I popped the hat up on dimensionals on a die cut circle that was painted with several layers of Copper CI paints, then sponged with two shades of green to mimic a patina-ed effect, though I see in the pic that I need to work on the randomness of the sponging a little more.  *sigh*  Sometimes you have to know when to call it quits.  Layered that on a purple circle.  BTW, the copper circle was for one of the challenges.

Oh by the way, you can't even tell that the CS was lavender or that I stamped a pattern on it.  Of course.

The background is pretty self-explanatory, with four different patterns of Halloween-themed papers on Very Vanilla CS that I inked up with Pumpkin Pie and Memento Tuxedo Black, using the DTP method.  Kind of looks like the Rocky Mountains in retrospect.

The pumpkin stripe was also direct-inked with black and adhered with a stripe of purple ribbon around it.  A scallop greeting and a couple of tiny rhinestones, and this puppy was finished.  Good thing because I was about to drop-kick it down the stairs.  Oh well, they can't all be faves, rght?

Thanks for joining me and have a lovely evening.  Happy Crafting!!

Challenges entered:

FOSTV Challenge #43 - Halloween or Harvest
Tuesday Throwdown #121 - Halloween
Color Throwdown #215 - Black, orange, purple, green
SCS F4A140 - Creepy-Crawly (bonus with a spider)
SCS IC360 - Agate Christina (copper buttons)
Fussy and Fancy Challenge #74 - Anything Goes
RRR Challenge #58 - Halloween w/ribbon
Pile It On #43 - Holiday, Any Holiday

and last but not least,

There She Goes TSG#178 - Sketch