Monday, November 30, 2015

Are Rules Made To Be Broken?

Now we are almost into the month of December, My Christmas cards are mailed. The Christmas decorations are almost out. Presents are bought and wrapped (I hope - I am writing this post in early November), and I have moved on to other things than Christmas cards.

When I was at the York Heirloom show and shopped at Pat Huntoon's Technique Junkie booth I bought some new stamps.  I am only now getting to make cards with these. This is one of those new stamps I bought.

Then I must also confess - sometimes as stampers we just hit a dry spell, when we cannot think of a new card layout or a new placement of element on the front of the card.  There are some things you can do about this when it hits.  You can give up until inspiration hits you.  That is not a good option in my opinion although it has happened tome this way in the past when I have been ill for a while.

Or you can look for new card front layouts and new ways of presenting the focal image.  There are lots of places on the internet to do this.  I subscribe to  a lot of blogs for this purpose. I follow those blogs whose author pays attention to detail and the way they create fits my own creative thinking.  Sometimes they do not show cards with stamps I like (or own for that matter) but I will like the layout. I will save those images.

You can look on Splitcoast Stampers for cards made with a specific stamp set or with a particular theme or subject matter in their search box.  I have searched both ways.  And in the last few years you can look on interest.  I rarely just "go" to Pinterest but use the email they send me to find new things.   And that was how I found this layout.  I thought it was perfect for this stamp set from Technique Junkie Stamps!

The Technique Junkie focal image stamp set is The Rules -  http://techniquejunkies.com/the-rules/.  I also used the Vintage Dictionary stamp http://techniquejunkies.com/vintage-dictionary-page/  for punching out the small squares.  Then I stamped - Love My Shoes http://techniquejunkies.com/love-my-shoes/  .  I only colored in the flowers because most of the shoe image would be tossed away.  I used a small flower punch and ;punched out an area within the stamped flower image.

All stamped images were colored in with Copic Markers.  I used a border punch and 2 layering square punches.   I stamped the lady first, then placed the layered squares, and then stamped the  two sentiments.  I swiped my Winkastella pen the dress and the hat, and the decorative part on the shoes.

Saturday, November 28, 2015

Christmas is coming...

Happy Saturday Junkies! Pam here today and I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving with their loved ones.  Have we all recovered from the turkey and stuffing overload?? I know I haven't yet!  And of course the days after Thanksgiving mark the start of the Christmas season.  I have a fun card project today featuring just that!



I created an artsy background using the Christmas Trees, Set of 6 stamp set, alternating stamping with Ranger Dye Inks Electric Lime and Green.


To add a bit of pizzaz I sprayed the entire panel with red, green and white ink sprays to give it an abstract artsy feel.


The sentiment is from the Simple Sentiments 1b which contains so many great sentiments for every occasion- a must have!!  I added some stars for a bit of dimension and interest to the trees.
A simple yet artsy Christmas card to send to friends and family!
Thanks for joining me today and remember only 27 more crafting days left till Christmas!!
Embrace imperfection!
Pam



Thursday, November 26, 2015

Let It Be

Happy Thanksgiving!  Jerri here from A Bushel And A Hug.  I hope you have a wonderful and blessed day. I will keep today's post short so you can get those turkeys in the oven!!

Today's card was made using the stamp set Bee Quotes.

To make this card I first ran a piece of white card stock through my Cuttle Bug with the embossing folder called Honeycomb.  Then I ran a dotted turquoise paper through the Cuttle Bug using the same embossing folder.  I used the outline on the patterned paper as a guide and cut out about nine of the honeycomb shapes.  I randomly placed those on my white paper and glued them down.  Next I used the bee from the stamp set and stamped it on a piece of vellum using Archival Ink. I fussy cut the bee out and then put it on the yellow patterned paper and pop dotted that piece onto the card front.  Using one of the many quotes from this stamp, I stamped Let It Be and cut it out with a label die and placed it on the card. I chose a dark Turquoise Blue card stock to matt the card.

Have a Wonderful Day with family and friends
Jerri

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Walk in The Park


Hello Junkies!  

The Crafty Nurse here with my last post for the month using the November release stamps.  My card features the "Brick Wall Background S646" and "Park Walk SD665."  I began by stamping the brick wall with Black Onyx Versafine Ink then heat embossed with clear powder.  I created the brick pattern using art anthology in Teracotta-Velvet, Pumpkin Spice-Sorbet, and Kenyan Copper-Sorbet. I then edged the entire stamp using  “Black Leather Jacket Sorbet," which created great texture.  For my focal point, I stamped "Park Walk SD665" which I sprayed with Art Anthology Colorations in Avocado and Timeless.


I hope everyone is enjoying some family time for the Thanksgiving Holiday this week and hope you'll find some time between eating and family to get inky.  

Gobble, Gobble!

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Flower Bouquet Tutorial

Good day fellow stampers and paper crafters.  Beth Norman here with a 30th birthday bouquet for my daughter.  If you look closely you will see a Serenity Butterfly amongst the flowers and Happy Birthday nestled in the front of the basket.  I thought you might like to see the process I went through so you can recreate a flower bouquet too.

Supplies:  Co-ordinations cardstock, regular cardstock, designer paper, paper flowers, basket, styrofoam to fit your basket, ribbon, liquid glue (I used Tombow), quick dry bondable glue (I used Speed-Sew), wooden stir sticks, green paint, paint brush, paper straw, flower dies, sanding block, embossing machine, embossing folders

Cut out your largest flowers using the Co-ordinations cardstock and designer paper.  Run your flowers through the embossing machine with the embossing folder then gently sand away the raised portion of the embossing to expose the lighter undercoat.
Cut the second layer with plain cardstock.  Make sure the pieces are smaller than the first layer.
Using a mixture of Co-ordinations and regular cardstock cute the smallest flowers. Run flowers through embossing machine.
Layer your flowers are desired.  In the center add store-bought little flowers, or buttons.
Paint stir sticks green for the stems.
Using good bondable glue to adhere your flowers to the stir sticks and Serenity Butterfly.
Glue styrofoam with good bondable glue.  Lay different products around the styrofoam to keep it in place while the styrofoam dries.
Add paper straw and ribbon and complete as desired.













Monday, November 23, 2015

Thank You Watercolor Card

This was a fun stamp to play around with my watercolors.  I inked the stamp with my Spectrum Aqua pens, and then stamped onto dampened watercolor paper.  I re-inked the stamp with Versamark and heat embossed with black powder.  I painted the background with Twinkling H2O's.

Stamps from Technique Junkies 

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Angel Choir

{jane bosi}  Happy Thursday, Junkies!!  With the holidays just about upon us, I'm starting to focus on Christmas cards.  While I like the traditional holy family images, it's always fun to step outside of the box with more non traditional images and colors.  It's a nice stretch of creativity!

Today, I have two cards to share that feature the beautiful Angel Choir image.  This is a great image to color!  Or, if you aren't feeling like a lot of coloring, spotlighting is a great technique that can highlight a few of the beautiful cherub like faces:
I also added the beautiful "Merry Christmas 2" sentiment--I just love the script of the font--so delicate!

That's all for me today.  Make your today awesome--Jane