Merry Monday Bells

I was thrilled to win the "chalkboard" challenge at Merry Monday last week!  It means they've invited me to be the Guest Designer for the upcoming challenge "Make a Card with Bells on It".

 Here's my card:

I had run off a bunch of pieces using a friend's musical score embossing folder and had this narrow strip of it sitting in my UFO box.  The space at the bottom made me think of a new stamp I recently bought - I thought it would work well with the curviness of the embossing folder.  Here's the stamp:

I knew I couldn't fit in the whole stamp, and all I really wanted was the sentiment, so I used my Versamarker to ink up the part I wanted and then heat embossed it in gold. It just fit!!  

I die cut three bells out of dark gold glitter cs and strung them on gold cord, keeping the curviness idea going.  The bells and the whole panel are popped up with foam tape.

Thank you, Merry Monday, for the honour!

Supplies:

Stamps - Great Impressions "Jingle All the Way"

Ink - Versamarker pen

Paper - white cs, gold glitter cs

Size - A2

Accessories - L'il Inker bell die, musical score embossing folder, gold cord, foam tape

Emboss Resist Sleigh Ride

Before I get on to today's card, I want to share some exciting news.  Two of my favourite stampers, Loll Thompson and Bonnie Klass, are starting a new challenge blog on March 1st.  They are calling it CAS Mix Up Card Challenge.  It's perfect for those of us who make mainly CAS cards but want to dabble in a bit of mixed media.  So head on over and sign up!

This week's SCS Technique Lovers' Challenge is "Revisiting Emboss Resist".  I love emboss resist so made this card:

I stamped the sleigh ride and the sentiment in white and heat embossed it. Using lots of different Distress inks, I sponged the ground and sky. For the snow, I sprinkled chunky white ep randomly over the sky and in a more controlled line along the "ground" the sleigh is on. I heated it from underneath. The bell that is part of the sentiment stamp did not look right so I restamped it on a scrap of watercolour paper, heat embossed it in gold, painted the bell in gold, fussy cut it, and layered it over the original white bell.  Here's a close-up: Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps: Great Impressions "Jingle All the Way", Tim Holtz sleigh

Paper: Penny Black luxury white cs, scrap of watercolour paper

Paper Size: A2

Ink: ColorBox white and gold; Distress Tumbled Glass, Faded Jeans, Stormy Sky, Chipped Sapphire, and Iced Spruce

Accessories: white embossing powder, gold watercolour paint, Frantage Chunky White embossing powder, fun foam sheet

Straight Up or Offset? Which Do You Prefer?

This week's Merry Monday challenge is to include berries on a Christmas card. 

I chose the lovely Festive Florals stamp as it reminded me of the image on the challenge.

I wanted to compare using my Zig brush markers on watercolour paper and cs. I used watercolour paper for this version.

I kept my panel centred and balanced the way I usually - totally my comfort zone.  I bordered the panel with a subtle dotted dp and mounted on a cream cardbase.

The second version uses cream cs for the image.

I like the results with the Zigs on both kinds of paper.  But I used the Zigs more as markers than as watercolour paints so it might not have been the best test.

When I cut out this panel with my stitched rectangle, I got the cs a bit crooked and slightly cut off one of the corners. So, given that I'm trying to be a little less rigid about mounting everything square and balanced, I angled it to compensate for the cut-off corner.

I'm curious - which do you prefer?

Supplies:

Stamps: Penny Black Festive Florals, Rubber Soul sentiment

Paper: cream cs, red cs, watercolour paper, red dotted dp

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Distress Archival Jet Black

Accessories: Zig brush markers, Lil Inker stitched rectangle, clear glitter, gold stickles, red ribbon

A Beautiful Colour Combination

This week's 52 Christmas Card Countdown is to make a card with blue, cream, and gold - love that colour combination!

 

I had a die cut gold Merry Christmas sitting in my extra pieces box so started with that. It works really well with the Rubbernecker winter trees stamp as the stamp has a flat bottom - perfect to edge with that sentiment die!

I inked up the stamp with two shades of blue ink, stamped on cream cs, added glue and glitter to the trees, and finished off with some die cut gold Christmas stars.

Thanks for dropping by!

Supplies:

Stamps: Rubbernecker

Paper: cream and gold cs

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Distress Faded Jeans and Chipped Sapphire

Accessories: Impression Obsession sentiment die, Memory Box star dies, Quickie glue pen, glitter, foam tape

Cards for CASology and Merry Monday

I'm posting cards for two challenges that close today.  First up is CASology "Valentine".

 

Friends of mine and their black lab, Sally, are arriving to stay with me today, and since it's Valentine's Day and I thought it would be fun to give them a card.

When I was at Loll Thompson's house recently, we did some embossing folder stamping. I inked up a hearts embossing folder with various red inks, very lightly spritzed, and then stamped cs with it. Because it was a portrait-oriented ef, and I wanted this card to be landscape, I trimmed it down to just a small background piece.

The hearts were punched from a leftover piece of smooshing on watercolour paper.

It's also for the SCS CAS challenge "Won't You Call Me Sweetheart?".

Next up is Merry Monday's "Chalkboard" challenge.  Not my favourite technique to do, but I thought I'd give it a go.

 

I have a set of sentiment stamps by Whimsy called Christmas Chalkboards so this seemed the perfect opportunity to ink up one of them that I'd never used.

I stamped and heat embossed it in white on black cs, then smudged some white ink around it and added some snowflakes just using the ink.

I then die cut it, added it to a dp background, and embellished with a die cut branch and snowflakes. If I were to do it again, I'd leave off the branch as it makes it a bit too cluttered for my tastes!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Supplies for the Valentine:

Stamps: SU D is for Dog, SU sentiment

Paper: white cs, watercolour paper

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, various red Distress inks

Accessories: hearts embossing folder, heart punch, red marker, Sizzix label die, foam dots

Supplies for the Chalkboard:

Stamps: Whimsy Chalkboard sentiments, Judith and Rubber Stamp Tapestry snowflakes

Paper: black and white cs, Pixie Press dp

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Hero Arts Snow

Accessories: Sizzix die, white embossing powder, Cheery Lynn snowflakes die, Tim Holtz branch die

Naked Stamping

Last week's Splitcoastampers Technique Lovers' Challenge was called "Naked Stamping".  The idea was to create a background with whatever medium we liked and then use line stamps over top to let the background medium show through (rather than colouring the image).

I chose to use my Brushos.  My first few attempts were disasters - my colours came out too strong or too muddy. I'd been using mixed media and watercolour papers. Then I went back to the coated cs I used when I first got my Brushos and had much better luck.  I ended up creating three cards, the first of which I'm really pleased with:

My plan was to end up with distinct patches of scarlet, yellow, and orange to kind of fit the stamp but the colours ran together a bit more than intended. I was okay with the peachy colour they made in the centre. I watered the Scarlet Brusho down quite a bit to get it pale enough. When dry, I stamped the poppies.

I then went on and made two much more simple variations with different stamps.  In both these cases, I used a single colour of Brushos.

I experimented with different inks for the stamping.  The first card uses black archival ink, the second uses a black pigment ink with clear embossing powder, and the third uses a green archival ink for a tone-on-tone look.

Thanks for dropping by!

Supplies:

Poppy card:

Stamps: Penny Black poppies, A Muse sentiment
Paper: ivory cs, coated cs
Paper Size: 5.25" square
Ink: Ranger Archival Jet Black
Accessories: black pearls, Lil Inkers stitched circle die, and Brushos (Scarlet, Orange, Yellow)

Pansy card:

Stamps: Holly Berry House pansies, Paper Angel sentiment

Paper: white and black cs, coated cs

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Versafine Onyx Black

Accessories: violet Brushos, Sizzix die, clear embossing powder, Buttercup Liquid Pearls, foam tape

Holly card:

Stamps: Great Impressions

Paper: white and coated cs

Paper Size: A2

Ink: Ranger Archival Library Green

Accessories: L'il Inker stitched rectangle die, Sizzix embossing folder, green Brushos, red Stickles