Stamps #353

Door County Rubber Stamps, Another one of my favorite company’s.  And I am so excited because this weekend I am going to a Fall Festival Three day Work Shop over there and it will be a TON of fun.  I am registered to take part in eight classes and we are going to have a Spooktacular party on Friday night.  All taking place at a fancy resort hotel.  I’m so excited.

Anyhow, back to the card.  I stamped this beautiful whale image in metallic blue and embossed it with shiny clear embossing powder.  I let the background paper carry the design with what looks like waves to me.  To give a little balance to the large circle on top I added the heavier looking black circle rain drops to the bottom.  (more of that goodwill stuff I purchased for ten cents or some such bargain pricing.)  I bought lots of them at that price. 

Trying a new Technique

So I’ve never tried this technique before and didn’t really enjoy it.  Maybe if I would have had a new pencil with a brand new eraser the dots would have stamped better.  I like the end result of the card with that wonderful organza ribbon from SU.  I think they do have THE BEST organza ribbons on the market.  (I have never been affiliated with them in any way besides a customer)  I just love some of their supplies.

I also tried the “faux” inlay technique.  I cut an oval into the layer I was going to use as my top piece and then cute all three of the oval pieces at the same time through the Big Shot.  Then piece them into the hole that was cut into that top layer.  I rather like the look but it seemed the ovals stretched a bit and I had a difficult time getting them to lay completely flat into the oval cut.  But I rather like the look of it.

This was a Prickley Pear Rubber Stamps Snow Flake die.

GKD Stamp 352

Simple Christmas card for the GKD Monday challenge last week.  Once again, I LOVE how crisp and clean her rubber images stamp.  Both these stamps were in a grab bag that I won from her.  When you win the Monday challenges at StampTV they give you a wonderful little mini kit with papers and lots of stamps and ribbons, all kinds of goodies.  So fun to play in the challenges there with that kind of winning potential. 

I used a brush of acrylic paint over the sentiment because it looked so WHITE and kind of boring and that just lit things right up.

Technorati Tags: GKD,Christmas

Hummers #348,349, 350,351

Using some techniques in the challenges posted for HYCCT.  The top one is stamped on tissue paper.  I used a spray adhesive on the card stock and carefully pressed the stamped and colored tissue paper over it and trimmed it.  I used a corner punch on two corners to give some movement to the card.

The flowers in the second set are part of the set of the first humming bird.  A friend gifted me with that wreath and I love the way it looks on this embossed resist semi glossy card stock.  I used markers direct to the stamp for the pretty hummingbird colors.

show me some love

Another HYCCT card.  No sentiments allowed but let the card say “I Love You”  I used the MFT sketch 199 to showcase this.  I added glossy accents to the top heart and popped up the double heart dies on dimensionals.  Turned the crown banner upside down and I loved the look of it. It went together faster than I thought.  I have been wanting to do an “inchies” card so this was the perfect sketch.

Just playing around

 

 

 

MFT color challenge for this month was a fun one.  I decided to use that same trick and pick out the colors from my scraps and then see what I could create from that.  I love how this one turned out.  All elements are MFT.  That dark piece is a HOT FUDGE card stock but it looks kind of black on here.  Aren’t their images so very cute?

Technorati Tags: MFT,COLOR CHALLENGE,MASCULINE

Smooshed @ SCS Stamps #346 & 347

  

The idea was to take two pieces glossy cardstock, drop reinkers The idea was to take two pieces glossy cardstock, drop reinkers on one side and smoosh them together to make a unique background.  I thought it looked rather like a jungle pattern and I’ve been wanting to play with these little die cuts from sizzix.  They make the sweetest animals when used with different designer papers.  I thought I would hang that fun monkey up in the corner for a bit of fun.  I stampled that Bamboo background from an old SU large back ground stamp.  I still use it a lot. 

The second card is similar for the background but I added a bit of spritzing with a toothbrush and some more of that lilac re-inker.  These re-inkers were from SU.  I only have a couple of these on hand.  I’m glad I never really went overboard purchasing them.

Simon Says color challenge Stamp 345 Prickley Pear

Simon Says Stamp has a Wednesday color Challenge   I did that trick again….picked out all the colors from my scraps and then decided what to stamp and which pieces would be used for what.  These images are from Prickley Pear Rubber Stamps, the die cut sentiment is from Cheery Lynn and the little tag is MFT die with a MFP sentiment stamp on it.  I used MFT for the zig zag strip too.   Really had fun with this one. 

Using Stencils

This sun ray stencil from MFT intrigued me from the first time I saw it.  I wanted to give this card a bit of a distressed look with the Kraft paper and Stencil Paste from Dream Weavers.  I smeared it on and then roughed it up a bit with my palette knife. 

I used the MFT curved die to cut right around that sentiment.  That sentiment is on a wooden block so there was no way to stamp it but like this.  I was glad I had the die to use this way.  I covered up the glue on the vellum with my strategically placed tabs.   All in all I liked the effect.  But it took me a long time to make this card.  I just couldn’t get it to come together the way I wanted. 

I like what someone said, just wait and look at it a couple of days later and then you usually like it better.

Technorati Tags: Stencils,Embossing Paste,MFT

Stamp 344 Z is for Zebra

I think I have only used this stamp once.  There was a time when African animals were all the rage and I think I picked this up at a rummage.  I have an elephant stamp too.   Hardly EVER gets used and yet I love the way this turned out.  I used a Cheery Lynn background die white on black to really make this couple stand out.  They are stamped on a MFT Blueprints 16 die cut.   Anyhoo—it was simple to make and I like the effect.  The sentiment panel could be any color.  Sentiment is from Door County Rubber Stamps.  Another HYCCT card.   I did the piercing along the edge with a little Cuttle Bug tool.

Sometimes challenges make you do strange things. Stamps 342-343

I won this stamp set from Mark’s Finest Papers in a drawing and never really thought I would use it but it’s surprising how many times I have pulled it out.  This is for the HYCCT challenge and I like to make cards that the moms going through treatment can give to their kids or grand kids.  The challenge was to BIND your card instead of folding it.  Hold it together with “something”  I chose staples.  I gave the alien a googly eye for added fun.   Stamps 342, 343

The sentiment is done in puffy embossing powder.

MFT, BOYS, SPACE, HYCCT14

Stamp # 340 & 341 SU

Digging into a really old set of SU that I purchased at a rummage sale.  Never have used this one before.  oh, but it stamped so sweetly in the orange and pink.  The little center its it’s own stamp.  And what do you think, I found this ribbon in the $1.00 bin at Target and it was the perfect add on for this card.  I took that top orange piece and cut it with my MFT curved die and then used just the top portion of a Christmas embossing folder to give it a bit of interest.  The back ground is water color paper and stencil.  It was a mop up of some stenciling I had done on my craft mat and I can’t bear to waste good distress inks.

Prickley Pear Rubber Stamps has this ever so sweet scalloped circle die.  I use it a lot.

CAS, CAS TEAM, SU, PPRS

No stamps

My wonderful young friend Paula hostessed a NO STAMP challenge for HYCCT over on SplitCoast Stampers.  I love my Top Dog Dies and this just popped into my head.  I was so pleased to find this wonderful Designer Paper in one of my little 6x6 packs.

Stamp 336 Stampin Up

I must confess, when I was working with this set from SU, I never thought I would use this stamp.  I have used the other images on different occasions but for some reason this one just sat there crying, “pick me, pick me”.  Yet every time I reached over it.  I was thinking INSIDE the box.  Open the box, and voila`  The PERFECT border stamp for this small tag and the gusty winds of autumn.  Now we are both happy and that entire set has been used and the stamp gets it’s little green mark, that’s how I tell if I used them during this journey.   Tell me, don’t you think it’s perfect?  (faux stitching, I know it looks real)   OH, and talk about fun!  I used my MFT sequins dies to cut out some clear sequins from some packaging material.  Had to run it through twice and put a bit a a shim with it along with my metal plate but it works.  Don’t’ they add just the right touch?   Thanks for stopping by.
 

ABU

Already Been Used but this was the first thing that came to mind for my friend Joyce’s challenge over on Split Coast.  The theme was  “somethings missing”

I really do like this fairy image and I get to use sparkle which makes it even more fun.

Technorati Tags: MFT,Fairy,Paper Piercing

Stamp 335 Stampendous

This stampendous image is so adorable.  She has been in my collection for years and years.  One of the first stamps I purchased.  I always enjoy using her and it’s fun to make her all warm and fuzzy with Fun Flock.  Remember that stuff?  so fun to re-visit old tools.  These snow flake brads have been hanging around for a long while too.  I colored these with copic markers to help them blend in a bit better than the stark white they are.

I am entering this in Simons Challenge O stands for….O stands for OLD in my creation.  Old supplies, Old techniques, Old sketch

Technorati Tags: Stampendous,Winter

Stamp 334 Door County Rubber Stamps

Oscar at Door County Rubber Stamps (see side bar) makes THE cutest stamps ever.  I was so honored to be on her Design Team for a while.  The last weekend of the month I will be going to a three day event at her place in Door County.  It will be so fun with lots and lots of stampers.  (We get to shop with a discount coupon and all kinds of free goodies coming our way too. ) 

The HYCCT challenge on SCS was to use chicks on our card.  I used a Coredinations scrap for the embossed chicken wire look on the one panel.  I love how that stuff sands off.  The big daisy was a clearance item from Michaels.

To achieve a clean masked look, leave your die in place and then lightly sponge in the background.  It gives a nice clean edge.

Technorati Tags: DCRS,Spring

A sketch challenge

MFT196 sketch challenge caught my eye this week.  I wanted to used these papers and image to offer support for our friend who has recently been diagnosed with very aggressive cancer in the brain, bones and lungs.  These colors all represent those cancers.  MFT gray cardstock GKD image and DP.  My fave Viva Pearl Pen in silver gets used again.

GKD Stamp 333

Another stamp and items from the Simple Things Kit.  I love that kit, oh wait, did I say that before.  I am amazed at how far one piece of 6x6 paper goes.  It’s so luxurious you only need touches of it on each card to really get a WOW look. 

This time I white embossed the leaf on the red Cardstock and then tinged it with ranger distress ink , tea dye to take a way a bit of the white.  The leaves on the DP look embossed and I thought it was a good tie in.

Stamp 332 Penny Black

Another rummage purchase.  I love the soft look of this image.  It worked so well for the water color challenge over at Simon Says  I wanted to depict our beautiful blue Wisconsin skies and that wind that just blows all the leaves around.   It’s the perfect image for this time of year. I used distress inks for everything.  A light color wash on the watercolor paper in blue and then I colored direct to the stamp and spritzed.  I stamped off once on scrap paper to lower the intensity a bit.  This seemed like it needed a frame so I dug out one of the old old old FIskars corner punches.

Stamp 330 & 331 more GKD

This stamp set was one of those I was wavering about when it came out a couple of years ago.  But….good karma took over and I won it in a drawing.  It’s nice to know that I have used enough that if I would have purchased it I would have gotten my money’s worth out of it.   The little house is a different set, also won in a grab bag from them.  I don’t know which set it is from, it’s actually the DOOR of a larger home image. It just fit right in that heart.

I wanted to try a shape card and I never remember to do it.  something besides a circle shape.  this Spellbinders die worked perfectly for this image.

Stamps 329 & 330 Gina K Designs

Looks like I’ve been caught with my fingers in the Gina K Designs basket of stamps.  I do love her stamps and guess the only reason I wasn’t using them so much is because they were red rubber and those are hard to get back to after using the clear stamps so much.  BUT….she now has clear stamps and wow they stamp every bit as nice as the rubber ones stamp.  This is a rather new set that she put out, last year, maybe, it has vertical sentiments with it which was my reason for purchasing it.  But BONUS, she also added flowers, stems, and dragon flies in with it.  I painted these with glue paint (I just squeezed my glue pen out on my Kraft sheet) took a small wide brush and painted on the glue and then topped it Razzle Berry Glitter from Stampin Up.  I sure do love their Glitter.
I am entering this into the Simon Challenge I've Fallen in Love with......that would be my Viva Pearl Pens.  I use them A LOT.  Any size pearl you want, just squeeze it out of the tube, any color you want, they come in so many colors.  I have about ten of them i think.  Shiny black is used on here.

Stamp 327 and 328

Is anything better than ice cream for a dessert treat?  It’s my weakness for sure.  It was my plan to have this card be reminiscent of an old fashioned ice cream store like my Hubs and I visited when we were in AZ a few years back.  Very old fashioned and they even had phosphates yet.  I don’t know what those are but Hubs was sure excited about it.   I got this stamp at a rummage sale and the topping that went with it.  I love my MFT sequin dies that allows me to create sequins in any color.  A little push in the center with a stylus and they look pretty much like the real thing.  A friend of mine gave me that sentiment die cut.  It was lounging in her stash and she said she never used it.  I think it’s a Provo Craft for the cuttlebug.  It works well with several sentiments to choose from.  It’s getting’ loved on by me so I think it likes it’s new home.    The doily is one from Top Dog Dies that I am in love with.   I’m sad now cuz McD’s here only has the chocolate dipped cones in the summer time and so no more until next year.  Our McD’s is only one block away so it’s probably a good thing they do that. 

Stamp 326 from my stash

This adorable bear came from a rummage sale.  He’s the perfect guy card for a fisherman.  I call him Grampa Bear.  I water colored him with pencils this time and then made it look like a photo with those punched corners.  The nail brads are from my Viva Pearl Pen in copper.  I love those Pearl Pens. Such cool accents they make and one pen will give you lots and lots and lots of pearls.     This is for another HYCCT challenge going to MD Anderson center when they are all done.  I am keeping them in a separate box.  It’s fun to watch the box fill up as I add the envies and acrylic envies to each finished card.

323-324-325 Gina K Designs

From the Kit the Simple Things.  I am so glad I got this.  It has two stamp sets in it.  Lots of stamps on both sheets and nice sizes too. Beautiful papers.  It’s easy to make a card quickly with this kit.  The ribbon looks a bit purple on here but actually it matches that red leaf perfectly.   I stamped the wall stamp twice cuz it was a bit short to fit the width.  of the paper.  Then the pumpkin I just inked up with two different Petal Shape Memento inks.  I love those little shaped inks for inking direct to the stamp.  Everything but the ink came from the kit.  I fussy cut that leaf out after stamping it with a watermark pad.

Journal page 2

With October being breast cancer awareness month and all the stamping activities that are surrounding this month, I wanted to make a page depicting feelings about this unfortunate disease.   Many of my friends have gone through many different kinds of cancer.  I wish there was less money being made off from cancer treatments and more affordable ways for people to get care. This art is being entered into Simon says Monday challenge. The finishing step was stamping on acrylic.
Here’s my page and here’s the explanation behind it.  These are all Gina K Designs images.

For Laurie's ABC (anything but a card)  challenge on StampTV  i chose to make my 2nd ever journal page. I scouted out a variety of GKD stamps from my collection and turned them into a collage of hope. Many of my friends have gone through breast cancer and its treatments. I think the first thing they understandably feel is Fear. I took the Grow Old w/me sentiments stamp to depict that. I wanted to incorporate all the seasons as usually treatment takes longer than a year. Since C is world wide I used the globe. I used the bird for hope besides the Hope in the center of the world. I used the Celebrate dress stamp b/c there is a celebration each time they go back for review and are cancer free. I used the Home because cancer affect the home life so much. The couch and On the road sentiment seem to be what i hear most often. "I can't seem to get off the couch until it's time for my next treatment" I wanted mostly monochromatic but a touch of color. I faux stitched the side to signify the unraveling that accompanies this hated disease. I stamped the Thank you friend sentiment in green as how many times a cancer patient says Thank you to her friends for keeping her going. And lastly I added the Hope ribbon in GKD pink gingham with an acrylic image of Melanie's Hand stamp with the word Prayers in the middle that i cut out from the frame. Thanks for the idea, Laurie.  I had thought of making a page about cancer but didn't know how I was going to do it in a positive way. I hope you can see all the detail. Thanks for looking and taking the time to read. hugs.

image free stamping

HYCCT challenge to use pink and purple and two of some kind of element on your card.  Using StampTV Gina K Designs Inside Out sentiments with paper from the Spring Time Silhouette kit from long ago. Yep, I still have a couple of pieces of DP and some ribbon and brads left over from that kit.  They are packed with goodies.

322 Mark’s Finest Papers

Don’t you just love covered bridges?  When we went to the Greenfield Village in Detroit this year we enjoyed walking through an old covered bridge.  They used to charge tolls to go through.  They put the covers over them to protect the base boards from rotting.  I think you got charge charged 2 cents for each sheep you were herding across.

This card goes into Simon Says Challenge to use something with transportation.

321 Mark’s Finest Papers

When I made that journal page the other day, I had a lot of excess water color laying on my craft mat.  I hate to waste COLOR so I sprayed up a couple of water color paper pieces and made back grounds and then because I was still playing with that leaf stamp I pressed it onto these soft colors and I’m in love.  

320 Prickely Pear again

 

Isn’t this a great design?  I so blatantly CASED it from a picture from a simple single kit that I got free at a SU party.  I didn’t do it EXACTLY but pretty close.  I love the simplicity of this  with it’s multi colored strops and the bonus was getting to use a bunch of scrap pieces.  That little spokie die cut was

a part of the kit and I just stamped my Prickely Pear Pumpkin in the center and colored it in with SU markers.  I will have to remember this layout. Another HYCCT card.

319-320 more Prickley Pear fun

Check it OUT!!  that skull just makes me chuckle.  and those black cat pairs, too cute. I used some Gina K Designs paper from the kit.  I have the perfect friend to send this too.  She will get a kick out of it.  Ya gotta be careful about things like this, you know?  She is six months older than me and we always send funny cards to one another.  MFT dies.  Aren’t those sequin dies fabulous?  I get a lot of use out of them.

Entering this into the MFT Sketch Challenge for this week

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317 7 318 SU

This fabulous sketch came from My Favorite things BluePrints dies.  When you buy their blueprints they give you access to a PDF file that shows several different ways to use the fun dies.  I loved this sketch and all the pieces are from BP #6.  The images are from two different Stampin Up sets.  And there you have it.  HYCCT challenge.

316 Penny Black

Who doesn’t love these sweet critters from Penny Black?  Another SCS challenge, this time the Sketch challenge.  I really do love sketches for stretching out ideas.  This also goes to HYCCT.  I know that looks like really fine stitching, but you know me, no sewing allowed!!

315 old SU image

I was so pleased how this turned out.  Another HYCCT card.  Using clear embossing paste after stamping with Versamark, I then sponged over the image with a couple of different distress inks for an emboss resist technique.  I added that funky back ground piece in which I didn’t cut all the way to the ends with the paper punch.  The red background has a faint spray of red mist over a stencil.  BARELY discernable in the photo but way 2 kewl in real life.   Thanks for looking.  Mucho appreciando or something like that.

312-313-314 Gina K Designs

I’ve been making a bunch of cards that haven’t made it to my blog this week.  I am playing catch up this Saturday evening. 

What a fun image to use the paper Tole technique with.  This is the first card for the HYCCT (Hope You Can Cling To) Challenge on SCS.  Lots of dimension going on here. Using my new Stamp TV kit called Simple Things.

Sometimes life isn’t always fun

I sent this to a cyber- friend who’s son and wife were murdered.  It gives me chills.  They have a four month old baby left behind.  What can a person say in such a situation? 

I have used this stamp before in my countdown so it doesn’t get a number.

Stamp 310-311

The Prickley Pear Stamps are so much fun.  I played a long in a color challenge on SCS for this one.  Check out the expression on that cat!! II t makes me laugh.  I cut the orange panel and stuck it under the purple  piece in which I had used a punch to cut out those leaves.  I left the ends of the raffia kind of frazzled for more of a halloween effect.  Very fun card to make.  That die is from Prickely Pear too.  --take note Princess Judy. 

FIRST JOURNAL PAGE

My first art journal page.  I’m so excited.  I got my journal while in Colorado this past summer at the bookstore Allan Zink took Nancy and me to.  I didn’t intend to purchase one but while we were looking around I saw this and it was water color safe so it had a new home from that day forward.  Summer has been so very active I didn’t have time to play in with it.  But my online stamping friend JoAnn Crayton encouraged me by posting pics of her first journal.  It looked so fun I had to get started.

My first page is going to be entered into Simon’s Monday Challenge Finishing touch.  After all my other steps, it just needed a little something in that corner and I inked up my MFP foxy autumn stamp sprayed it with a bit of water and pressed and just like that I qualify to enter this challenge.   Well the other leaves would have qualified me too but I think Mr. Fox stamp was the finishing touch.

I actually taped this leaf to the page.  It was such a gorgeous red when I found it and put it beside Gilbert’s plate that night at supper and he enjoyed it too.  It needed a permanent home. 

I marker colored distress inks on my mat and pressed the leaf into it to get the color to make the shadow leaf beside it.   Love when what’s inside of me comes out in art.

Thanks for looking and being a part of my new journey.