A Quick "Hi" and Embossing Technique

I had some inspiration the other day while browsing through Pinterest. Love that place, I could spend my entire day there. 

I found some tutorials on different ways to use your dry embossing.

This one tutorial caught my eye so I decided to make a postcard with the technique.

First thing you do is grab an embossing folder and a piece of patterned paper

Once your paper is embossed, you take a brayer and some embossing ink and ink up the raised portions

Using clear embossing powder you heat set the raised portions of your card stock

Once that was done, I used distress ink to go over my entire piece of paper

This is the outcome once your done with your inking, I kept going over and over it until most of my background was covered with black

Then I took a baby wipe and wiped off the ink from the embossed portions making those areas pop

I added some green paper for my backed piece some fibers, ribbon and a stamped image

My stamped image is from Stampotique called:

Carrot - by Jill Penney

and I colored her with copic markers

This is my finished postcard

Loving the texture and contrast in the background, this is a really nice technique. I think next time I might try using paint instead of the distress ink

Thanks again for stopping by, have a super day!!

Cheers!

I've Got Wings - Journal Page

Happy Wednesday Everyone, hopefully your work week has been smooth and your happily on your way to the weekend! 

Today is also my day to post over at the

Stampotique Designers Blog - and there are also some wonderful other designers who post on a daily basis and they all give such great inspiration

Today there is an awesome new challenge over at Stampotique Designer's Challenge Blog .. the wonderful and talented Arwen is asking us to use some "wings" in our projects this week. 

I'm super excited about this challenge because I love just about everything with wings. 

I wanted to create something in my smaller  3 1/2 x 5 art journal today so I am using a wonderful stamp by Daniel Torrent called

Daniel's Tree Topper

I love this stamp, it's so versatile and can be used in so many great creations. 

For my page, I made my own stencil with a bunch of circles and used archival inks to create my background. I then used a few more stencils to layer on my background here

I really like the uneven circles in the stencil, it seems like nothing I ever do is perfectly cemetery so I love that it's all goofy looking 

I then stamped Daniel's Tree Topper onto another sheet of paper and colored him with my copic markers

I cut him out and glued him onto my page

I drew the word "fly" myself and also colored that with copics and backed it with black card stock

I added some white gel pen doodling around the hearts

Thanks again for spending some time with me and if you haven't tried your hand at making your own stencil, you should really give it a go. It's something I will definitely be doing again

Cheers!!

Angel Boy - Journal Page

Sometimes just working in your art journal for no particular reason is the best thing ever!!

It's so funny because I set out to use certain stamps and images on this page and I ended up doing something completely different. This is why the Art Journal is so freeing, no rules and no inhibitions. I love it!

I used the following Stampotique stamps for this page:

Angel Boy - By Daniel Torrent

Cross Hatch Swirl - By Maryse Carrier

This page began with black and blue acrylic paints put on with an old credit card

I added some stenciling Finnabair's circle stencil and red acrylic paint

I stamped my cross hatch swirl in a heart pattern and cut it out and colored it with archival inks

I stamped my Angelboy and colored him with copic markers, I found this heart shape in his wing pattern so I colored that red too

I added the sentiment on a black strip of card stock and used my white gelli pen to doodle a bit

Sometimes it's fun to go and create with nothing special in mind. You should try it and see what you come up with.

Thanks for stopping by,

CHEERS!!

Friends Homes

Hello everyone, thanks for coming by the blog once again. I always appreciate your kind comments and your visits so thank you!!

I have a few things to share with you today

First - I have this friend, her name is Terri Richardson and her website is: Catching Moon Beams she is like a pen/art pal, her and I send each other art along with letters now and then. (definitely check out her website, she is a wonderful artist)

 She sent me this piece of work that she did and she wasn't pleased with how it turned out.  When I got it, I loved it, I didn't think it was bad at all, I saw potential. (we are always our own worst critics) 

I decided to make something for her with it and send it back to her. 

This is what it looked like when I got it.. 

I really like it, it looks like a stone background or something

I decided to use my Stampotique Stamp by France Papillon it's called Home Sweet Home

I stamped two houses onto some scratch paper and embossed with and then colored them with Copic markers

I also used some black card stock and the Tim Holtz - Sizzix decorative die strip called "Cobbestone" to make a path

I then wrote my sentiment and cut it out

Here is my finished project.....

Now before you look at this I want to warn you, when I was putting this together I made a boo boo and had no idea I had even done it until my friend Terri pointed it out to me... Can you catch the boo boo I made?

How funny is it when something like this happens with your crafts? I am such a goober sometimes haha!! I told Terri that my house was the one upside down because that's how my head is usually, haha!!! DUH!! I just had a good laugh about it

She liked it anyway and I'm so glad too, it will be a funny story for years to come....

Secondly - I also wanted to share with you an ATC that I received. The Stampotique Facebook group did an ATC exchange and I got a wonderful ATC from the fabulous Jenni Jones in Australia. I just love it!! Jenni did a fantastic job!

If you ever want to check out the Stampotique Facebook group here is a link:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/47241351547/

Thanks so much for stopping by, I hope I gave you a good laugh with my project!! haha!! 

Cheers!!

Specially For You - SDC131 - Stars

Hello all, thanks for stopping by, I hope you are all having  wonderful week. Hopefully it's only a 4 day work week for some of you.

I have a card for you today that is posted over at The Stampotique Designer's Blog 

I hope you will stop by and check it out and partake in the challenge this week

We are giving you one more week to do the "Stars" challenge

So make sure to stop by the Designer's Challenge Blog and link up your creation

Here is a sneak peek of my creation this week, I used the Stampotique Stamp - Topknot - by Daniel Torrent for this card

Hop on over to the Designer's Blog to check out some more details

Cheers!!!

Be The Star - SDC131

Happy Wednesday everyone, today is once again my day to post over at Stampotqiue Designer's Blog, I hope you will stop by and check it out.

The Designer's Challenge this week is hosted by the wonderful Sam an she is challenging us to use some "Stars" 

For this creation I used Stampotique Stamp:

Zara Gift by Maria Sabina Raita

I love this challenge, stars are my favorite next to butterflies and hearts haha!! I wanted to make a birthday card for a friend of mine who is having a birthday this month.

I had this great Tim Holtz Ranger watercolor paper laying around the craft room and I really wanted to get it out and play

I also used some Tim Holtz Distress paint in two colors to create my background for this card.

I love the way you can spritz the paper and paint and just run your card stock through the paint and it all blends

While that was drying I stamped my image and colored Zara with copic markers

I then used Archival ink and a stencil to create my stars and dots that are in my background

I took a white gel pen and doodled here and there on the stars and circles

I added some colored wash tape and wrote my sentiment and cut it out and put everything together

I'm not very good coloring with copic markers just yet but I'm taking some classes this year so hopefully I'll get better haha!! For now, here is my image

This turned out to be a fun and festive card for my friend, hope she likes it 

Thanks again for stopping by, have a wonderful Wednesday everyone!! XOXO

New Year Brings New Twelve Tags of 2014

Hello all, I'm so excited to begin a new year with Tim Holtz and the Twelve Tags of 2014. You can find Tim's wonderful tag for January and tutorial on his blog here:

Tim Holtz

My finished tray from last year was so wonderful and I just love how the year ended up and how my tray looks. You can see it in a blog post here:

2013 Finished Tray

So this year I wanted to do something similar, that I could display but also something different, if that makes any sense.

 I decided to do something that I love and that is making postcards. I'm going to make one for myself and one to send to a friend every month. I have this 7 Gypsies recipe card tray that is the perfect size to store postcards and I'm most likely going to store my postcards there. 

I followed most of Tim's tutorial but added a few elements of my own to the postcards. I used Tim's XL die "Word Play" to create the word "Time" and then I just colored the word black with distress paint and also used some copper metallic distress paint to give it a grungy metallic look

I used Tim's Tiny Tabs and Tags die to create my tab on the side of each postcard and I simply wrote in the words and used the mini stapler to staple the tab onto my postcard

One of my favorite things is clock works and steampunk so I always love Tim's January tag because it usually has some sort of Time element and this one did not disappoint, I love how both of my postcards came out!!! Each one is a little different but they both look great. 

Thanks again for stopping by and have a super, fantastic day!!! 

Pan Pastels - Oh My

Hello everyone, thanks for stopping by on this weekend. 

Last month I won some pan pastels from a drawing on the wonderful Marjie Kemper's blog and I was so excited. I haven't been able to really sit down and use them until the other day. I was thrilled to pieces to have won them because I have wanted to try pan pastels for a very long time. They are a little pricey so I put it off. 

I decided that I wanted to work in my Dyan Reaveley art journal and do a two page spread. Since I have never used them before I decided that I better go online and research them a bit prior to using them.

The first thing I did was cover some of my journal pages with Tim Holtz tissue paper and tissue tape. 

Then I wanted something to give my page some dimension so I used Liquitex modeling paste and a stencil.

I started with some make-up sponges and covered my page with a few of the pan pastels colors. These go on so smooth and the color is amazing

I then added some red color to the modeling paste stencil area and also added some stenciling here and there by using versamark ink and dabbing on more of the same colors

Lastly I added some black stenciling and some Dina Wakley and Donna Downey journaling words and some tissue tape

I also added a bit of white paint and went around the entire edge with red pan pastel

I'm not sure if this page is quite done yet but this is where I stopped for now. I really love the way it looks but I almost feel like it needs something more. Maybe something will come to me eventually, sometimes these pages just need to "sit" for awhile and I revisit them later

Just Because......

Hey there everyone, I hope that your staying warm in this very frigid weather. It's been warming up here in Colorado the passed few days, I'm glad we got to defrost even if it's only for a few days. I actually got to wash my car today. YAY!

I have been doing a lot of design team projects, class projects and gifts the passed few weeks and I really wanted to get into my room and just "play". Not for any particular reason but "JUST BECAUSE"

Sometimes its so nice to do some crafting just for yourself with no deadlines in mind. 

I have this art journal that I work in every once in awhile and I've done lots of background pages and so I found a page that I thought would be fun to work with.

It's not the prettiest page, it's kind of weird looking but I figured, hey, why not!?

I wanted to use some of my Stampotique stamps so I went with... 

I wish I'd worn panties - Carol's Collection

Cockatoo Screech - Kylie DiOrio

Are My pants too tight? - Daniel Torrent

These stamps are so much fun to color and stamp and figure out where you want them on your page. I had a great time doing this, it was so nice and relaxing.

Here is my finished page:

Next time your feeling a bit bogged down by deadlines, stop and  think... "Do I have panties on today?" HAHA!!!

Thanks again for stopping by!! Have a great day!!

Shoot for the Moon

Happy hump day everyone.. thanks for coming by.

Today is my day to share at the  Stampotique Designer's Blog

I hope you will stop by and check out my creation for this week.

The new Design Team Challenge this week is all about "Something New", did you get something new for Christmas? If so, we want you to use it in your creation and link it up 

HERE

For this creation I used Stampotique Stamps:

Shoot For the Moon - Amy Wilson Wellenstein

Stella - Jo Capper-Sandon

Tenticurl - Jo Capper-Sandon

I wanted to use another of  my ATB's or Artists Trading Blocks and use one for this little box.

This is a new die by Eileen Hull and Sizzix and it's fantastic!! I really love it and they are available HERE if you want to check out the die.
Also, make sure to stop by The Artists On the Block Blog, you can see many fun creations with these

First thing I did was take two colors of my Tim Holtz distress paints and colored my entire block, inside and out. I then took a star stencil and used Archival ink to stencil stars onto my block here and there. I also used my white gel pen to create more starts by just dotting white dots all over the block pieces

I didn't take a photo of this part but I free hand drew a "cloud" in the center of one of the sides of my block. I then took my Xacto knife and cut it out so I could see inside 

I stamped my Stampotique images and colored them with Copic markers, I adhered the "Stella" to the tenticurl stamp with glue

I used some scratch card stock to adhere my gal inside the block in the correct spot. You can see in this photo how I did that so that she would sit perfectly without bending backwards

I then put my block together and added a flower and sentiment to the top portion. I also added a few stick pens with gems

I added a vintage button for the center of the flower

I love the way you can see inside and there are stars all around

A Side View

Thanks for coming by on this Wednesday, take care everyone and have a great day!!!