Branching Out

Here's a quickie I put together with three different dies. The leaf die originally had three leaves, so I trimmed one leaf off to give the little birdie a place to stand. I paper-pieced the bird like I did before, to give her some added interest. I say "her" because the brown and red reminds me of a female cardinal. I LOVE seeing these in my yard, and we usually have a pair of cardinals nesting in one of our trees each year. The label die is from a Becky Higgins set and is a great size for many of my scripture and sentiment stamps, though it also proved to work well for this bird and a saying. The sentiment is from the "Be Kind" set by Verve.

Can you see the texture on the leaves? There was a paper insert in a box of soap I'd bought, and rather than throw it away, I knew I'd find a use for it one day -- and that's how it became a branch with leaves. I like re-purposing things like this, but it's a slippery slope between saving things you'll use, and saving things and having them pile up, up, up! The trick is to actually USE it once you've saved it. :)

Have a happy and safe Friday the 13th!

Sailboat Peace

I played along with the Splitcoast "Clean and Simple" challenge #489, which was to make a "tropical" CAS card. If I went on a tropical vacation, I'd hope it would be like this "Beachfront Boat" stamp scene by Stampendous. Whether on that boat or on that beach, it looks so quiet and peaceful, I could think of no better sentiment! And because I will be using this in my card ministry, I paired the idea of peace with the inside scripture "Be still and know that I am God. - Psalm 46:10"

I'm also submitting this to the Dragonfly Journeys "Summer Lovin'" challenge. I'm sure everyone has some kind of summer stamps or dies, so link it up so we can see what YOU made! :)

Supplies:

Stamps - "Beachfront Boat" by Stampendous; "Holiday Word Borders" set by Hero Arts
Paper - "Aquarelle" (6 x 6 pad) by Love Nicole
Ink - Versafine onyx black; Ranger Distress Oxide inks for watercoloring 

Watercolor Sympathy

Today's card features an old stand-by stamp set, "Close as a Memory" by Stampin' Up. This set is so old, it's wood-mounted! I've become so spoiled by clear stamps, I'm not used to the guessing game of stamping and hoping I've lined it up straight. But besides that, this set is a great go-to for sympathy cards, because it's kind of fool-proof with the flowers and the great sentiments.

I started with Tim Holtz's "speckled" stencil and rubbed distress oxide ink to get the random spots in the background. I also used the oxide ink to sponge around the edges. Next, I inked up the flower stamp using Tim Holtz distress markers, and spritzed the inked stamp with water before stamping it. The sentiment was stamped onto the "Classy Label" die by Verve, and popped up with dimensionals.

Here is the inside sentiment:

I love the wording of both of these sayings!

About my cardstock: Like many, my first introduction to stamping was through Stampin' Up!, back in 2001. At the time, I bought a lot of packs of their cardstock families, and inherited more when my sister retired as a demonstrator years later. Since then, SU has gone through so many "in colors" and have retired and replaced colors, but I still have my original stash. This blue cardstock is from SU, but I don't know the color, and even if I did, chances are good that it's either retired now or called something different. So please forgive me in the future for not giving the name of the color of cardstock, because frankly, other than a few of my favorite classic colors (old olive, eggplant envy, chocolate chip), the names really didn't register with me.

Have a great week!

Collage Duo

REMINDER: Now thru July 8, enjoy 40% off ALL Hambo stamps! See our SALE page for details. 

I had this "collage" page in my Pebbles paper pad that I wasn't sure how to use. It's kind of busy to use as a background, as I normally do my designer papers. But then instead of seeing the page as a whole, I started seeing the smaller squares and rectangles and ways I could divide the paper, and I came up with two designs:

Not only did dividing up the squares make them more manageable, but I still have enough squares left over that I could make a third card -- just not today!

The first card uses two rectangular sections that I cut out:

I framed these two sections with another coordinating paper from the same pad. For some added interest, I used a couple of dies to cut out a red heart, which I popped up on the bottom, and a yellow flower, with a little jewel center.

For my second card, I centered a larger portion of the collage on my white card stock base:

I framed it out with a coordinating turquoise solid paper, and then added a Hero Arts sentiment to the bottom. Very CAS (clean and simple)!

This keeps happening to me, where a design that I originally skipped over because I didn't know how to use it, ends up making cute cards that I want to duplicate! Maybe some day the lesson will sink in, and I won't immediately dismiss something that is challenging.

Have a great weekend!

Supplies:

Stamps - sentiments on both cards by Hero Arts "Everyday Sayings"
Paper - "Garden Party" by Pebbles
Ink - Memento "Lady Bug" red (top); Memento "Teal Zeal" (bottom)
Dies - heart & banner (top) by Becky Higgins

Stenciled Leaf

REMINDER: Now thru July 8, enjoy 40% off ALL Hambo stamps! See our SALE page for details. 

Now on to today's card:

I'm very happy with how this stencil (Carabelle Studio) worked! I didn't have to adhere it in any way; I just held it down with the tip of one finger, and sponged the Tim Holtz distress oxide inks around it. It stayed in place without slipping, and I got this really crisp image.

I layered this on a print from Love Nicole's "Aquarelle" pad for a cool monochrome look. The finishing touch was the Hero Arts sentiment, which was embossed in white.

Happy 4th of July!

Making Some Noise

REMINDER: Now thru July 8, enjoy 40% off ALL Hambo stamps! See our SALE page for details. 

Now on to today's card:

While on a stamp retreat years ago with some of my Hambo Stamps designers, I was privileged to receive a tutorial from card-maker extraordinaire Melissa Edwards. She is a master of coloring, but the technique she showed us was using markers on an acrylic block and spritzing to do easy water-colored backgrounds. I've since made dozens of cards (you can see some here and here) using her technique, because not only is it very easy to do, but the results are STUNNING. But we didn't merely lay down the watercolor -- she taught us to add "noise" to the color, which kicks it up a notch.

My card above demonstrates such "noise." Although this time I used a swatch of designer paper instead of using markers to make the water-colored strip, I still started with basic variations on a color:

Above is the paper I chose from Love Nicole's "Aquarelle" pad. I cut it down so that I just had purplish strip on the left. I could have left the strip as it was, glued my die cut on top and finished the card, but it would have looked a little more dull than it does with the added "noise." I started with a script background stamp, and stamped it in an ink that coordinated with the paper's design, but wasn't too dark. You want the noise to be there, but not stand out too much on its own. Next, I chose another coordinating color to stamp some leaves randomly over the script. The paper already had some white spots included in the design, so I was satisfied to stop there. You can see a close-up of the noise below:

With the paper now jazzed up, I was ready to glue it to my white card base, and add the "Prim Poppy" die cut. Finally, I finished the card with a scripture stamp from Verve. The noise adds just enough extra drama to help the die cut stand out a little more, and leads to a more interesting card.

Do you like to add noise? If you've never tried it, give it a shot, and feel free to link up your result in the comments below.

Happy stamping!

Supplies:

Stamps - scripture from "Scripture Medley 4" by Verve; script background by Recollections; leaves from "Fanciful Filaments" set by Hero Arts
Paper - "Aquarelle" (6 x 6 pad) by Love Nicole
Ink - Memento "Lilac Posies" for sentiment and leaves; "Sweet Plum" for script background
Dies - "Prim Poppy" by Memory Box 

Hambo Summer Sale!

Now thru July 8, enjoy 40% off ALL Hambo stamps! See our SALE page for details. Spread the word!