Happy

 

I`m sorry, but I´ve made my card for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Bubbles" with colours that my scanner doesn`t like at all - in general, all oranges and reds aren´t shown right, and then there are additional neon effects on this one ... if you go to my Instagram channel bockel24, you´ll see the colours much better taken with my smartphone camera, but even the camera can´t show the neons. That´s why cards have to be sent to real friends in real life - only the recipient can see the real card, and isn´t that a nice fact?

I've used stamps from Stempelbar and AALL&Create here plus watercolours and neon scribble sticks.

ATCs for trade at the Stempelmekka

I've made two ATCs tonight that I really like. I had made two collaged backgrounds some time ago that have been waiting on my desk to be used - and they`ve made perfect backgrounds for these two ATCs using stamps from Dina Wakley at RangerInk and Alison Bomber at PaperArtsy. Wanna trade? Meet me at the Stempelmekka in Dortmund on September 6th, and you´ll find them in my album ...

Keep the Balance

 
Some people today believe that their work-life-balance is the most important thing in their life, others struggle with keeping up their emotional balance in times of war, and then when you get older you know that there are days that make it hard to keep your head up and move a foot forward - so keeping your balance is really important for all of us.

I´m hosting the Sunday Postcard Art challenge this week with the theme and tried to visualize it with stamps from Tim Holtz and Paper Artsy.

P.S.: Looks like I´m unable to comment on WordPress even with a different email addy, my comments just didn´t show up.

Stamping is Colourful

 
I´ve made a relatively clean card for this year´s stamping project at Heindesign themed "Stamping is colourful". Just a few stamps from Concord&9th, Visible Image and Ciao Bella, and a bit of watercolour, that´s all. It was sent naked without envelope, and I´m glad that it arrived in good condition ...

Ladder to the Moon

 
"Ladder" is this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge, and I´ve kept my card simple using only stamps from CiaoBella.

I don´t know if you´ve noticed that I haven´t been able to post any links to any Wordpress blogs for weeks now, so please don´t be confused that my links can only be posted by friends now and that I´m not able to comment to your blogs if you are on Wordpress - sorry for that!

(Somehow Wordpress believes that I have an account there and asks me for my password - that I don´t have because I don´t have an account there. If someone knows how to fix this, just let me know.)

Chase Your Dreams

 
This week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge is "Archer", and this is the only archer image I have. It´s a rubber stamp designed by Nick Bantock, and I thought it might match the quote from Visible Image. 

Cats and Dogs

 
Heindesign´s annual stamping project is themed "Cats and Dogs" this year. I´ve used stamps from Ranger/Dina Wakley, The Sassy Club, Stempelbar, AALL&Create and Concord&9th for my card.

Cancellation Marks

 If you know me, you also know that I love to play with postage stamps and that Postage People are my favorite theme. So how could I resist this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge theme Cancellation Marks?

My card was made with real postage stamps received from trades and found at a flea market plus cancellation mark stamps from Elizabeth Craft Designs, Marianne Design, and Darkroom Door.

Hares for Earth Day

 
Hares for Earth Day is this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge, and here´s my card for it. I´ve recently watched a film about hares in art history, and some of them looked like the hare I´ve used for my card together with a quote from Aristotle.

(Stamps used here are from Stampers Anonymous, Stempelmine, Stempelwinkel, and Stampscapes.)

Freddy Fox

 
As my Sunday postcard had been already finished, I had time to make another card last night. I thought that the lovely fox stamp from IndigoBlu fits well on a distress oxide background from my stash. I coloured it with watercolours and used the words that come with the fox.

Bicycle

As you may know, I´m from Germany, and the city where I live could be called the capital of bicycles. People say that Muenster has more bikes than inhabitants. Unfortunately it´s also the capital of bike theft - it´s not easy to find someone who has never lost a bike this way. (Two of my own bikes have been stolen, but I got the second one back after 13 months because the police found it - so never give up!)

For many years, I´ve used my bike to get to school (in Bremen, another biking capital), university, and work but payed for this with many bike accidents and damaged knees. So today I like to go to work by bus and use the time reading a book ...

But as I don´t have a driver´s license, I use my bike for all other trips like shopping, visiting friends etc., so I use it several times a week. In Muenster, it´s the fastest way to go from A to B.

I´ve picked "Bicycle" as this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge and can´t wait to see your cards and read about your personal relation to bikes. 

(My card was made using a background paper and bike stamp from Ciao Bella and text stamps from Klartext.)

Bloom & Grow

 
Bloom & Grow is this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge theme. For my card I´ve used stamps from Jane Davenport/Spellbinders, Sam Poole/Creative Expressions and Visible Image. 

I´m soooo longing for spring, growing plants, and the smell of flowers!

Espresso

 
This week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge is "Espresso". 
My card was made using stamps from ArtJourney, AALL&Create, Altenew, Alexandra Renke, and Stamperia.

Spring

 
Spring is this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge. For me, that means sunshine, birds singing again, sprouting green, nests - and hope. New energy comes up after months of feeling tired all the time. It´s my favourite time of the year now (whereas I loved autumn in my 20s and 30s). 

What´s your favourite season and why?

Childhood Heroes - Friends

 
This week´s Sunday Postcard Art Challenge is Childhood Heroes. What a lovely theme, and I´ve had some different options for this one ... but I´ve ended with the Peanuts. My card features Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Lucy, Woodstock and - my favourite - Peppermint Patty. I think that what I´ve always liked about this gang is that they´re very different but are friend nevertheless. That´s what we´ve been searching for in our childhood and all our lives.

Just Me

 
This week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge theme is "Add Wings & A Crown". It beamed me quite a few years back when adding wings and crowns was en vogue. As the times they are a-changing (sorry, Bob), I thought that my card should be more modern and yes, more personal.

No angel, no princess, just me. 

There´s one thing in my life that I´m still struggling with, and it´s prejudices and projections other people have about you. This is something you can´t fight against. Other people don´t see YOU but they only see what they want to see, and they´re dealing with you disregarding who you really are. This happens every day, and sometimes it doesn´t matter, but sometimes it ruins your whole life and makes you feel very lonely. I think it´s the hardest thing I´ve found out in my whole life. You have no chance to tell people who you really are if they don´t want to see you. It´s true what Goethe said:  A person hears only what they understand.

Grunge

 
When I read this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge is Grunge, two things came to my mind: Grunge music from the ninetees (which I still love) and grunge stamping techniques (that I also love as a messy stamper). So I decided to combine them, and here´s the result, a tribute card to Kurt Cobain from Nirvana. Smells like Teen Spirit is still on my playlist, and if you look closely, you´ll spy the words "große Wut in sich aufsteigen ... schmeißen möchten" and "etwas abgespannt" on the book page scraps which mean a big rage coming up and wanting to throw something anywhere and feeling exhausted. It´s like found poetry as these have been on my desk waiting for this theme, they seemed so appropriate. 

The stamps I´ve used are from Stempelbar and Visible Image.

Being Green

This post is about exclusion, so beware if you don´t like political statements - but isn´t it all about politics? 

No matter if you´re green or black or whatever colour, or whatever religion, or whatever belief, you should be a part of our society.  Please feel welcome, whatever our politicians may say to get more votes ...

And yes, this card was made for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed Frogs, but any art is political too, isn´t it?

Happiness

 
When it comes to happiness, I'm definitely not an expert as I´ve always been more on the dark side of life. But I don't give up and hope for better days, so I've even made two cards for this week's Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Happiness" - maybe I'll find it one day.