Sea Breeze ....

...  Morning!  We're enjoying gorgeous summer weather here in Northville.  It's a bit milder than normal, but that suits me very well.  My card today celebrates balmy summer evenings at the beach - be it lakeside (as here in Michigan) or at the seaside.

Stamps: Inkadinkado - Coastal, Down by the Seaside; Stampin' Up! - Work of Art
Inks: SU - Pacific Point, Tempting Turquoise, Smoky Slate; Versafine - Onyx Black; Memento - Tuxedo Black
Accessories: White Lustre Card; SU Card - Smoky Slate; Wink of Stella - Clear; Copic Markers

Our theme at The Male Room - TMR#16-15 is Vacation or On the Beach - last week I made a card showing vacation preparations, so as a reminder I thought that I'd show a beach card this week.  I'm also submitting this card to Inkspirational - INK#88 (photo inspiration) and to Colour Throwdown - CTD#355.

I cut a panel of soft grey card slightly smaller then the card and adhered it directly the base.  On the white panel I stamped this lovely lighthouse scene - reminds me of the lighthouses around Michigan.  I masked off the clouds, lighthouse, beach and moon and stamped a gradient of blues to create the sky and lake (sea).  After removing the mask, I coloured the lighthouse, clouds, and beach with Copic markers.  As I decided to make this an evening scene, I added sparkle to the moon with my clear Wink of Stella brush.  On the inside I cut a mat layer of grey card and added some shells to the white panel.

I took a close-up photo of the moon to show the sparkle:

We've had some fabulous submissions for The Male Room challenge and there's still plenty of time to join in, deadline is Tuesday 18th August midnight BST (7.00pm EDT).

Last Friday Jonathan, Mum and I took a short road trip to northern Michigan.  We stopped first in Mackinaw City and headed out to see the bridge connected the upper peninsula with the main body of Michigan.  It was getting dark when we arrived, so we went back out in the morning to have another look - it's a fab bridge.  Then we drove to several towns - Petosky, Charlesvoix, Glen Arbor, Leland, Frankfort, and Ludington.  It was a lovely day, but we weren't able to spend much time in any one place - so we'll have to visit again.

Jonathan, Mum and me in front of the Mackinac Bridge.  

Looking across the lake towards Mackinac Island - you can see the ferry taking over the first visitors of the day.

Petoskey Marina - it was so quiet and peaceful.

Early(ish) Sunday morning at Ludington Marina.  This is a view of the lighthouse through one of the many sculptures in the area.

The Spirit of Ludington.  We had a lovely time walking around the marina and watching people take their boats out to the lake.

We then headed off to Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp to pick up Kathryn and to watch the choir concert.  Kathryn spent 12 days at the camp singing and studying Shakespeare.  She was very pleased to see us as she had missed us all very much, but she loved it and can't wait to do it again!!  The choir concert was fabulous.  It was a really good weekend.