Paper Smooches Blog Hop

Hello,
I wanted to pop in and let you know that Paper Smooches (one of my favorite stamp companies) is having a blog hop and there are prizes!!

Go to http://papersmooches.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-dt-blog-hop.html and join the hop.  Leaving comments on the blogs will give you a chance to win.

Thanks for stopping by. 

Its Cold Again....

So this cold weather gives me a lot of time to craft because I don't really want to go outside so I create! I just got this stamp set from Papertrey Ink, I love the candles.  I can think of so many ways to use this in the coming months.

and since everything was out I decided to make this.

I think that I saw Kristina Werner  coloring vellum pieces and I like the look so I had to try it.  The sentiment is from Technique Tuesday Monster Ink.  I just colored the vellum strips with markers, then I folded the strips over the twine and glued with glue pen. The glue dried clear so you can't see the adhesive.   I stamped the background with different border stamps in colors to compliment the vellum strips.  The letters are Kelly Purkey stickers and a little wooden heart colored with a red Wink of Stella pen. 

Thanks for coming by. 

Stenciled Online Card Class-Fourth Lesson Part II

Hello again,

I wanted to also share another card that I used distressed inks on the stencil .

I added some lilac bakers twine and the sentiment is mounted on foam dots with a few enamel dots on it.  I made those dots with a Viva Decor paper pen.  Jennifer McGuire has a video on how to make them.  I love how the colors pop on the card.

Happy crafting... 

Stenciled Online Card Class-Fourth Lesson

Hi,
Today's lesson was phenomenal, BUT it used a lot of mediums I didn't have. Jennifer McGuire layered stencils to create a beautiful look, so I decided to do that because I had stencils I could layer.

I stenciled the flowers and leaves and then layered a dotted stencil over the flowers and a striped stencil on the leaves to bring in another color and give dimension. I fussy cut them out and adhered with foam squares.  I added the 'hello' embossed on vellum, and adhered it to some designer paper.  The pearls and gems on the 'hello' are hiding the foam dots.  After I added the 'hello' I didn't like the flowers that I had on originally,  so I peeled them off and stenciled some more and added them, these flowers work better. 

This was the last lesson and I am going to miss them. :(  They announced another class in March so I can't wait for that one.

Have a great day!

Stenciled Online Card Class-Third Lesson

Hello,
Today's  lesson was about stenciling with embossing paste. One of the main reasons I took this class was to learn that skill, I have never used this medium before.  I have to say for the most part it is pretty easy but a tiny bit messy.

I embossed with a Heidi Swapp stencil that has hearts and stars and I think that might be confetti or it could be just dots.   I mixed some Stampin Up Calypso Coral with the white embossing Paste (Wendy Vecchi) and got the pretty coral color for the hearts, the rest I just left white.  I put some Silver Wink of Stella on the stars.  I embossed the vellum with white embossing powder and the greetings are from Winnie & Walter.  I love that big happy stamp. :)  I adhered with some foam dots to white card stock. 

I WILL be working on some more projects with embossing paste for sure. (I think I need more practice)  For my first effort I was pretty satisfied. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great rest of the day!

Stenciled Online Card Class -Second Lesson

Hi!
How many of you are in the middle of a snowstorm right now?  Outside it is snowing, it is freezing, and the wind is howling!   I don't plan on going outside anytime soon because I really don't want to experience it at all!  So it was a perfect day to craft a card and I am enjoying the stenciling classes so much!

The card below is an interpretation of Kristina Werner's card in the lesson today.  I thought it was great that there was another  way to use colored pencils!  Kristina used Derwent Inktense pencils and I used a combination of the Derwent Inktense, Derwent Watercolor and some Faber Castell that I have.  It gives the hearts a great look.

I actually made the big heart in the center of the card from a SSS heart diecut and then used the negative diecut as a stencil.  I don't think I would be able to use it with any wet medium but it worked for the pencils. The sentiment is from a new Winnie & Walter stamp The Big, The Bold and The Happy.  It is a very versatile stamp with a lot of little greetings you can put together. 

I used a Hero Arts striped background stamp in Colorbox Frost White for the kraft card base. I have a Heidi Swapp stencil that has stars, dots and hearts on it, so I just used the heart portion of the stencil and colored in the little hearts in different colors.  I mounted the card panel on foam squares, but first I tied some twine and a little wooden heart on the bow.  The heart has Wink of Stella but it is hard to see in the photograph.  I put a little washi tape on the bottom because it looked a little bare, and then I called it done! Hope you like!

Thanks for stopping by!

Stenciled Online Card Class -First Class

Hello!

Today was the first class for the Stenciled Online Card Class.  I have always like stenciling and you can do it in so many mediums.  The lessons today were great, I learned many new techniques and reinforced some techniques that I knew already.

OK for the card below, I tried it a couple of different ways but was never happy with the end result.  I really wanted to emboss it with clear embossing powder but no matter which way I did it, I wasn't happy. (I guess if I wasn't determined to  use this stencil I could have made it work ) :)  So I ended up embossing with white embossing powder (Zing).  I am not sure where I got the bird stencil, so I can't  give you a brand name. The background is the Falling Snow stencil from SSS.  I added some sequins and mounted on white card stock and the card base is the same navy blue as the first panel. 

This is one of the techniques I learned today and I think I will use a version of this again on another card.    I can't wait for the rest of the classes.  I learn so much and can't wait for each course that is offered. I hope to post another card tomorrow after the second lesson. 

Have a great day!

January Birthdays

Hi,
I seem to have a lot of birthdays in January.  I wanted to show you the cards that I made for some of the birthdays this month.

The stamp set is Paper Smooches.  I clear embossed the Happy Birthday on some card stock and then made some tags and added a piece of blue bakers twine to tie it in with the card stock.  I added some little wooden stars.

I have had these KandCompany die cut stickers for some time and did not know what to do with them.  I saw something similar to this but I changed it up.  I clear embossed the background with the Hero Arts Rain large stamp and the birthday is spelled out in Kelly Purkey stickers.  I just stamped a balloon on some scrap card stock, mounted it on some foam and then tied the end with bakers twine.  I also added some enamel dots to balance out the card. 

This is SSS Whimsical Flowers die cut set.  I have used this so many times and keep coming back to it.  I also used the A2 die cut.  The background is embossed but I lost the folder and can't remember the name of it :).  All of the papers are Graphic 45.  I added some little pearls to the center of the flowers and a button with some twine.  Some of the flowers were adhered to the embossed card stock and some were popped up on foam squares.  

Believe it or not I have more birthdays to celebrate so I guess I better get working on more cards. 

Thanks for stopping by. 

Cold Weather Blues

I don't know about you guys but I am a little winter weary already and it has not even been winter for a month!  We had a really cold snap here with below 0 weather and during the worst night, we lost our electricity.  Thank goodness it was only for 3 hours or so and we do have a fireplace so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.  So hopefully no more nights like that! 

I did make the card below from an old tutorial I saw.   It is supposed to look like a piece of tile. I tried it the first time like the tutorial but it was really a mess and I didn't like the way it turned out. I changed it up a bit.  The original tutorial had the stamped pieces of card stock cut into equal pieces and then Versamarked and clear embossed.    I did it a little differently from the tutorial.  I Versamarked the whole  stamped image, clear embossed  and then cut and distressed the edges of the cut pieces with some Tim Holtz distress ink.   I then adhered it on another piece of card stock and then mounted that on some foam squares.  I like it but I think I will try again to perfect it a bit.  It needs tweaking.

The stamp set was Paper Smooches Crystal Clear, the frame is Sizzix Scallop Framelet.  I added a twine bow and some enamel accents. The card base is  Neenah Solar White card stock.

The clear embossing does make it seem more like a tile piece but you really can't see it in this photo.

Hope you like but I will be trying this again so hope to have that version up soon.

Happy Crafting!

Chalkboard Sentiment

Hi,
I wanted to post the chalkboard art that I did for my daughters for Christmas.

I DID frame this but forgot to take of a picture of it!  This is the first time doing something like this.  I painted the wood with chalkboard paint and then rubbed white chalk all over it and then wiped it away with a paper towel.  At first I did this in colored chalk but when I spray lacquered it, it faded the chalk and it didn't look as good as I wanted it to.  So I bought some Sharpie paint pens and used those.  I like it but I think the chalk looked better.  I will have to research how to preserve the chalk. I had read that you should lacquer but I really didn't like the end result.  I was in a time crunch so I went with this. 

The second one for my other daughter was this:

This is a tutorial I followed and again this was first done with chalk but the spray lacquer faded it too much so I redid it in the Sharpie paint markers.  This is a clip board bought from Office Max.  I masked off the clip and then painted it with chalkboard paint, chalked up the board as explained above and then did the art.  I did chalk up the whole board but forgot to take a picture of that and it does look better with the whole board chalked in.

For a first effort I was not unhappy with the results but I am going to keep trying and hope to get much better. 

That is all for today, thanks for stopping by.