SSS Wednesday Challenge Featuring Lawn Fawn

Below is the card I made for the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge this week.

The challenge is Anything Goes- but they are featuring Lawn Fawn products!  I used the 

Lawn Fawn Dream Stamp set and dies

I love the colors I used in this card- I cut stamped and cut the feathers out of a background that I had made previously.  I used SSS ink to ink the cloud stencil background and also used a clouds embossing folder for the middle strip. And of course all inked parts were covered with Wink of Stella for that great shine.

You can join this week's challenge here:

Distress Embossed Texture Paste Tutorial

Hello everyone! I am very excited to share with you my first ever video tutorial. I was playing in the studio with stencils and texture paste and decided to try using Distress Embossing Powder with the paste. The results were so cool- texture on texture! I have seen other artist's videos using embossing powder (like sparkle or glitter) with paste which inspired me to try this. This is my first video tutorial and I am still working out the details on camera position etc. Take a peek and leave a comment to let me know what you think of the video and the technique!

I hope you enjoy and try out the technique yourself! I will be posting some projects soon using the backgrounds I make in this video.

A big shout out to Ranger Ink and Tim Holtzfor their wonderful products and inspiration as well! 

Designer Drafts Challege: Paper Smooches Sparks

This week's challenge for Paper Smooches is a Designer Drafts challenge:

Below is the design and my interpretation of it:

This was my first designer drafts challenge in a while so I decided to further challenge myself by using a stamp set by Paper Smooches Circle of Honor that I haven't used yet. 

 I made the background of stripes using a stencil and alternating with colors of distress ink. Added a little glimmer by matting with blue glitter paper and onto a red glittered card front. A little Wink of Stella on the stamped stars and banners to match!

Check out all the entries for this week's challenge and join in here.

Day in the Studio Creating

Happy to be spending the day in my studio creating! I have two more projects to share - one using the new Tim Holtz die Fresh Brewed- my absolute favorite and one for the Paper Smooches SPARKS challenge. I will be doing 2 separate posts for these since their styles are so different!

 So for any of you that know me I love coffee- STARBUCKS to be more specific! Nothing beats a good latte! So when Tim came out with his coffee themed stamps and dies- I was more than excited!!  Today I decided to make a card using the dies- I was in the mood to get back to my grungy-vintage-inky style after the last few clean and simple cards I have created.  I really love both looks- but INKY is my favorite!
I went through my stash of pre-made backgrounds and found some great textures/patterns to use to cut out the coffee cups.

I found some DCWV woven paper that I used to cut out the lid and the cup sleeve- then I put the sleeve through the crimper to get that corrugate look! Of course all the pieces were inked with distress ink and I used Tim's new thinlit dies from the love collection for the sentiment. The colors just remind me so much of coffee stains and Starbucks! I saw a photo on the wall at my local Starbucks of a burlap bag of coffee beans which gave my the inspiration for the watercolor 

mono print background I used made with Tim's layering stencil Burlap.

 Since this week's Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge is No Rules- I thought I would enter this card- it's stuff I have been yearning to play and create with since it arrived!
You can join the challenge here on  the Simon Says Stamp Blog!

Simon Says Add a Little Texture Challenge

So excited that this week's Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday challenge is all about texture! I just love playing with texture paste.  I decided to use 2 different stencils from SSS- Tiny Spaced Hearts and Mosaic Heart- both SSS Exclusives!

I decided I wanted to have the Mosaic Heart as the focal image-colored with distress ink and embossed with clear embossing powder for a great shine.  In order to get the tiny hearts only around the focal image I used a technique I call Stencil Masking- it's like using a diffuser when dry embossing but with texture paste and stencils instead.   I first inked the mosaic heart and embossed- then I placed the tiny hearts stencil over it and masked off the area of the mosaic heart on the tiny hearts stencil using post it tape. After masking was complete I used texture paste over the open areas of the stencil.  I am definitely thinking about doing a tutorial for this since it is better explained with pics.  Please comment below if you would be interested in a tutorial for this technique! 

I wanted to keep the image clean and simple so I used the die-cut word Love from black cardstock and embossed several time with clear embossing powder to add more texture and shine.  I love how the texture of the clear embossing on the focal image is complimented by the texture of the paste.  The Tiny Hearts is a fantastic stencil by SSS and can be found here at simon says stamp and the mosaic is so versatile-you can get yours on their site as well.

Here's a close-up of the textured hearts:

You can join the challenge at Simon Says Stamp blog-Wednesday Challenge:

And remember to let me know if you are interested in a tutorial for this card using the Stencil Masking technique!

Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: A Little Piece of Paradise

Since my craft studio is my "little piece of paradise" especially this past month with all the snow- I decided to join in on the fun at this week's SSS challenge: A Little Piece of Paradise.

Paradise for me right now is dreaming of spring- the beautiful flowers budding and seeing color in nature again! So for this challenge I decided to try a new technique and use a background stamp that I  hadn't use to create some "springlike" cards bursting with color.  I am addicted to background stamps right now- and new techniques with them.  Made several colored backgrounds from the Heartfelt Creations Daisy Patch stamp - using white embossing powder as a resist.

I left one background whole while I cut the others into a grid pattern and line pattern, mixing the blue and green backgrounds and the yellow and orange backgrounds.  I used distress ink-love how they blend so well for this technique.   

Here are the cards individually:

Welcome to my little piece of Paradise!

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge: All Creatures Great and Small

Just a quick post to share another creation-I have been busy in the studio crafting fro several challenges this week and building my portfolio for DT calls.

This week's challenge on the Simon Says Stamp Blog is All Creatures Great and Small- featuring Paper Smooches Stamps. I decided to use the inked night sky background again for this card-and since I love owls- I chose the Hooties stamp set by Paper Smooches for my "creature".

I love how these super cute owls look with the night sky background (see previous post for details and link to Jennifer Maguire's tutorial).  I also used the moon from the Cosmos set as well.  All stamped images were colored with Copics and the branch was stamped with versamark on brown card stock and embossed to get the look of real wood.

Hope you have enjoyed ! You can join the fun on the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge blog-just click on the image below:

Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge: Anything Goes Card 2

After watching Jennifer McGuire's Inked Night Sky tutorial, I was inspired to use it as a background for a card for this weeks challenge.  You can see all the details and join the challenge here on the Paper Smooches Sparks blog.  For this card I used the Space Cadet stamp set which can be found along with so many other cute sets at Paper Smooches Stamps.

After making the background (watch Jennifer's video here), it seemed obvious to me to choose the Space Cadet set to work with- although I have a tons of other ideas too (more to come).

After stamping the little spaceman and the planets I colored them with distress markers and a little water to blend and covered with glossy accents as you can see here:

The sentiment was stamped on a labels die cut and a few Tim Holtz stars were colored and added for a little extra sparkle!

Just love how this background came out and it's the perfect setting for these Paper Smooches stamps- thanks again Jennifer for the inspiration.

Paper Smooches: Anything Goes Challenge Card 1

More snow here means more time in the studio- while I do not enjoy the winter weather, I definitely will not complain about all this time to create!  For this week's Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge I created two cards (so far). I will do a separate post for each.   Feeling the dark and drearys of this winter weather I decided to brighten things up a bit with my first card: Wishing You Brighter Days - using the stamp set Cosmos which can be found along with so many other great sets here on the Paper Smooches site.

  The background was done using Embossing Paste and the Tim Holtz Rays stencil and then colored with distress ink. The suns were stamped with distress ink and embossed with clear embossing powder- hearts were stamped in the middle of each and covered with glossy accents. The cloud was cut out using a die and the sentiment stamped inside.  Hopefully this card will brighten someone's day- it did mine!

Tim Holtz 12 Tags of 2015 February

Got into the studio today to complete my version of Tim's February tag.  You can see Tim's tag and tutorial here on his blog. For the background, I used various valentine seasonal papers and ephemera for my collage.

 I decided to change it up a it this time and I used Eclectic Elements fabric in lieu of the red felt heart. I cut 4 hearts from Tim's new Bigz die Hearts and made a flower out of them

I was able to cut the ring off one of Tim's idea-ology Type Charms and color it with alcohol ink for the center of the flower.  Really like the look of the flower using the fabric. 

Looking forward to another great tag project next month! 

Paper Smooches SPARKS Challenge: Picture Perfect

Here is the inspirational photo from this week's Paper Smooches challenge and alongside my project:

I was inspired right away by the colors- they reminded me of sherbet ice cream- raspberry and orange flavors.  So I decided to use the Paper Smooches stamp set Sugar Rush  and for colors I used Memento Dye ink- Rose Bud and Tangelo.  After stamping the ice cream cone- I cutie out and used texture paste (colored with the inks) to make the actual ice cream scoops.

Such great texture- looks good enough to eat! And of course I had to add sprinkles! 

The background was stamped in the same ink colors-alernating two sentiments from the stamp set. I then layered this panel onto a panel covered with gold embossing ink- to bring in the gold from the photo.  The final white background was dry embossed with a Sizzix embossing folder- I picked this one because it mimicked the pattern of the candle holder.

Picture perfect challenges are always fun and challenging!! You can play along too- details are 

here.

            

Valentine Creations!

Back in the studio today to create some Valentine cards.  Here what I came up with- lots of red and pink! I will be entering both these creations into the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge   for this week.

Love the look of the bottles- with distress rock candy crackle and distress stains. I used so many different techniques on this card. The grungeboard heart was  embossed with Distress Fired Brick Embossing powder, tinted the wings and the arrow idea-ology pieces with alcohol inks, and created the background by spritzing the Tim Holtz Hearts stencil with Picket Fence distress stain after creating a base of color (red and pink) by misting distress stain onto water color paper.



For the second card I used the Tim Holtz Valentine embossing folder to create a texture background of valentine words.  Using the blueprint stamp LOVE and watercoloring with distress markers I created the main focal image.  The XO was covered with Festive Berries distress glitter for a little sine and layered over some hearts ribbon.

Hope everyone has a fantastic Valentine's Day! More snow to come here so I definitely will be spending more time in the studio!

Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: Red & Pink

This week's challenge is to use Red & Pink in your project. You can check out the great samples from all their talented designers on Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog.

 While red and pink are not my favorite colors to work with- I have been using lots of both given that Valentine's Day is coming up soon.

For this card I used Tim Holtz's Petal Drop die to make a heart from corrugate.  I then hand stitched the two sides together for a vintage look using hemp twine. The letters are from grungeboard and I embossed them with Distress Embossing powder Fired Brick for such a great texture.  The background was stamped with Picket Fence Distress Paint and then colored over with Distress inks -leaving the XO as a resist. A few embellishments were added for interest -replacing the O with gears and clock hands. This was my first time using my Petal Drop die and I really love all the possible ways to use it!


I hope you decide to join in the challenge as well and show off all things red and pink!