Happy Halloween everyone.
I don't celebrate Halloween very intensly, no one does in the Netherlands, although it's getting more popular each year and I buy candy each year, kids don't seem to trick or treat, or the skip my house cos I'm scary haha...I might eat them, the kids I mean not the candy lol.
Anyway
I printed a digital stamp from Lili of the Valley, called Furry babies- bat- on Crafter's Companion Neenah paper and colored it with Spectrum Noir and Spectrum Illustrator markers.
Added Nuvo shimmer pen on the wings and stars and adhered the panel with tape runner.
I don't have any W+9 products, so sorry about that.
I used the Hero arts color layering deer and the Hero Arts classic Christmas borders for the sentiment.
To stay with in the monochrome theme I used Bristol smooth card as my panel as it's slightly creme-ish.
For the deer I used Memento dewdrops: toffee crunch. rich cocoa and espresso truffle, in that order.
Also I used Espresso Truffle on the sentiment.
Adhered the panel to a card base.
This fortnight the challenge over as AAA cards is: inkblending.
Our sponsor this time is Stamplorations, and the prize is a giftcertificate of $15 + 10% coupon offer for players.
For my card I used Memento dew drops to do my inkblending. I know not many people do this, so I wanted to show how wonderfully they blend and even out when drying. Smooth blend, the easy way. Still an arm workout, but easier ;-)
I started my card by stamping the sentiment from CAS-ual Fridays (lovely snowflake) with Versafine onyx black ink. Heat set it to be sure.
The I used Sticky notes to mask off an area on my card, big enough for the deer, but as small as possible so to leave ample white space. Also I love the trees are sticking out of the area.
On hindsight these sticky notes weren't the best idea, apparently they're not entirely water repellent and some of the ink seeped through , I covered one splotch with the tall tree, but I have to leave the others, or diecut more trees.
These dies I've had for ages and I'm not sure which brand they are anymore, sorry, any you have will do the job as well. I cut them from black cardstock.
For the inkblending I used Memento Nautical blue, Teal zeal and Summer sky. I usually just look in my book which colors I think will work together. I made Memento "recipes" too, like with the Distress inks.
As normal I used my mini inkblending tools and applies the darkest inks first. There's quite a leap in saturation from teal zeal to summer sky, but by going over it with a real light hand of teal zeal you kind of match it all up.
As with Distress inks, these react to water as well and so I splattered some on the area, leaving the masks in place. Then I splattered Dylusions white linen and Distress spray Brushed pewter for my snowflakes. To finish the snowfall I also splattered some Talens ecoline (100-white) this is much more opaque than the Dylusions spray, which turned a light blue as it reactivated the inks below. All these layers will give a lot of depth to the scene as the lighter splatter will look further away and the silver is just for shine as it's a Christmas card.
Removing the masks to reveal your little scene is kind of magical...until you see the splotches lol.
Attached the diecuts with liquid glue. I used the border to ground them and I pretend the white is a snowbank.
For more information or to play along the AAA cards challenge, see this
I made the Christmas one for a SimoN Says Stamp Monday Challenge a while back, but I also wanted to share how I did them in a video, just in time for Halloween.
But they're equally fabulous for any other occasion of course, like a wedding favor, school treats, party favors, baby shower, just adapt the paper to the occasion en voilá!
I don't have the Lawn Fawn die and frankly with my scoringboard I can do more, different sizes and projects.
I also don;t know the size of the Lawn Fawn bag, but I made mine to get 2 out of one sheet of 12"12 card.
You need a piece of paper that is 6"x12".
You can make it taller, but 6" is the width of my Big Shot if you want to diecut out the "handles", I used a small rectangle shaped die with rounded corners.
Score on the long side at: 2", 5", 7"and 10" then on the short side at 2"only.
Burnish your scorelines, then cut the bottom and notch them slightly.
I used a hole punch to make 4 holes and then fed some silver ribbon through it, and tied it together.
You can also just stample the ribbon to the bag and or hot glue the ribbon also.
My hole punch is a little big and the smaller one was too tiny to feed ribbon trhough, maybe bakerstwine would have been better, but hey, you live and learn.
I use hot glue to put my boxes and treatbags together, it's faster and more secure than tape or liquid glue, but you can
I had my craftstore order this hilarious set from Art Impressions (catastrophy), mainly because of this stamp..I'm a lamp...rofl
Luckily my cats never had to wear one of these, my vet doesn't like them and neither do cats/dogs ;-)
So for my card I stamped the image onto 140lbs watercolor paper from Schut with Simon Says Stamp intense black ink. Colored him in with Talens ecoline, a fluid watercolor.
My panels are always slightly narrower because I cut them from a bigger sheet. So I mount the panel with foamtape and fill the gap on the cardbase with a similar colored washi tape.
For more information on the Cat lover's blog hop, see this
For today's card I'm revisiting a card I made a few weeks ago for the Less is More challenge, but different ;-)
I loved the intense blue sky against the white diecut panel.
I used Talens ecoline in a variety of blues (505.506.507.578) on Schut classic watercolorpaper 300grams/140lbs.
I wet down the paper first apply a range of colors in an ombre like effect.. Few layers heat setting in between.
If your paper curls up, just heating from the back as well, that will straighten it right back out.
Then I splatter Dylusions spray white linen and Distress spray stain brushed pewter and Talens white ecoline (100).
For the diecut this time I used a Craft Emotions die, but any you have will do, as well as the sentiment, I used a Crealies one,with Versafine onyx black ink.
I love the contrast and the white trees really looks like snow covered trees to me.
I used carpet double sided adhesive for the watercolor paper and foamtape for the cardpanel.
For my card I cut a black panel, And stamped the eye ball from Create a Smile (big time) multiple times with Versamark ink, and heat set them with Wow! embossing powder (opaque bright white), same with the sentiment.
I did contemplate to use one of the monsters, like a snail/slug thing, crawling, or is that slithering off the sentiment, but it didn't quite fit and I kinda like the eyeballs in the night.
For some color I added a few enamel dots.
For more information on the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge, see this.
For more information on the Less is More Challenge, see this
That's the challenge theme over at Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge, it's about to run out, so I better get a move on ;-)
I've used my dog stamps from Katzelkraft (les Chiens) and the Merry Christmas stamp from Simon Says Stamp. I stamped them both with Versafine onyx black ink and used Spectrum Noir aquablend pencils to color him in.
To add the fairy lights, I first drew them in pencil, then traced them with a black Sharpie.
I wanted the dog to have been mischievous and naughty, he has been playing with the decorations.
Mounted the panel onto a cardbase with taperunner.
For more information or to play along the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge, see this
I have a bin I put cards in, usually I'm not too happy with, or I didn't finish, or I don't know how to finish just yet. But once in a while I go through the bin, I trash stuff I still don't like, or gift it/donate it to people who do.
Others might just be unfinished, like ,my purple roses I ran out of color in my ice cube trays. I do take coloring things to my volunteering work as sometimes it';s really, really quiet and I pass time coloring, again those add to the pile.
I recently ordered a bunch of enamel dots from Ali Express and although small sheets, they are only 75 euro cents, like 90 dollar cents, compared to 4-5 dollar I think it's good value and I esp love the ones with glitter, of course ;-) And I did go back to order all the other colors and some with heartshapes
So i make piles with the ones that are colored, ones that need finishing and start pulling them together into cards.
I did stamp the sentiments last night, but I forgot to record that bit, making a decision on what kind of card it will be is usually the biggest hurdle for me.
Some cards have smudges and inky things so I try to erase them, if that doesn't work I add some of enamel dots and or rhinestones.
Where needed a bit of washitape and foamtape, but mostly simple layers with tape runner.
I hope this will inspire you to go through your unfinished or rejected work and do something with it :-D
I made recipes for Distress inks about a year ago, or a bit longer. Today I thought I should do the same for Memento inks. As I blend with them quite often it would be handy to have a view of the recipes I came up with, rather than reinventing the same recipes over and over.
So I looked at my color chart and picked colors I thought would go well together. Some didn't work as well, but most of them are OK, if not super.
I had four colos of ink left after I made all the strips I had thought of and, well, I had to include those four too, right?
To make the cards, I cut up a sheet of paper (in this case old logo paper from a company I was given), not my regular cardstock, and it doesn't blend as well, but well enough for this.
I mean these are just to give you/me an idea, I won't be using these on a card!
I cut 3cm strips, a little over 2 inch as our paper is 21cm, so it would give me 14 swatches out of one sheet.
Then I started the inkblending, most are with three, some have four colors, so some swatches have a white bit at the bottom, feel free to inkblend all of the strips if you want.
My hands are aching now, so I hope you can still read my rheumatic handwriting ;-)
If you prefer you could print the ink names and then attach the swatches, but I found it hard to position it.
My scanner has made high contrast scans, that's not how my inkblending looks!, but again, it's just for reference, I would urge you to make your own, if you're interested.
Remember Memento reacts with water, much like the Distress inks. the smooth out wonderfully, better than Distress inks to be honest. If you're new to stamping and need good stamping inks and blending ink and can't buy both, get these first ;-)
I haven't tried them as watercolors yet, not sure if they'd work for that, we'll see.
Today I'm using a digi stamp from Digistamp Boutique. It's an UK based company and I paid through Paypal.
I'm using one of the images from cute penguin set and one of the sentiments.
I sized it in Photoshop with three others to fill one sheet of Crafter's Companion Neenah paper and printed it with my inkjet printer. One of my cartridges is a pigment ink, there's two black ones, not sure which is used when, but it seems to work with my Spectrum Noir markers.
I cut the image to size, then decided to make it into a Polaroid style and then I decided to chop off the sentiment and place it underneath the image instead....
Colored the penguins with Spectrum Noir lol.
markers, added lashes to the penguin on the right, so it's now a couple. I used blue and green on the scarf for the boy penguin, but you could use girlie colors on the scarf and add lashes to the left penguin too, so versatile
Mounted the panels with foamtape and used my triangle ruler to make sure it's all lined up straight.
This week's theme over at Less is More is: one layer and stars.
For my card I made my own shimmer paste with Ranger transparent glossy embossing paste and Ranger Perfect Pearls and Shine powder from Kippers.
I cut a sheet of black card in half and folded it to make my card. Then I applied the paste through the Simon Says Stamp Falling stars stencil and let it dry. I used three shades of blue on this, but on my test run I used purples and pinks...But I made a panel out of it, so not one layer anymore....
Heat embossed the sentiment from Simon Says Stamp (3x4 Christmas) with Papermania superfine silver.
For more information or to play along with the Less is More Challenge, see this
This fortnight the AAA cards Challenge is: inspired by a film. Our sponsor this time is: Winnie & Walter and you could win a $25 gift certificate. I was inspired by the film Under the Tuscan sky, it's from way back in 2003, but it's on TV a lot and I watch it every time, as I love the villa she buys and the story of course. In this movie Francis gets divorced and whilst on holiday, she decides to by a Tuscan villa and stay in Italy. She meets a guy and at one point in the movie she goes down to see him. She asks the policeman on a blue scooter for a lift. She is wearing a white dress as in his dream. That was a bit hard on this stamp from
Newton's Nook (Newton scoots by), so I decided to color the cat as Francis' hair and give the cat a white scarf, kept the blue scooter. I did all the coloring on Crafter's Companion Neenah paper with Spectrum Noir markers. I did the highlights with a white gelpen. I stamped the image with Simon Says Stamp intense black ink and had the Brother scan & cut do it's magic.
The landscape is a dieset from Marianne design (lr0482 Tuscan landscape) and the road is from Sugar pea design (either home or school scape). I did a lot of diecutting and then inlaying them into each other.
As one of the requirements of our challenge blog is to keep the layers to a minimum, now it looks like three but it's only one ;-). I shaded the middle one a little with Distress inks Shabby shutters and a finger dauber. I did pull three colors of green, but I didn't like the lightest really and with the shading there's a bit more vidual depth.
The sentiment is also from the Newton's Nook set and I stamped it with Versafine onyx black ink in my Stampers friend from Be Creative.
Mounted the landscape with foamtape, but tape runner would also have worked and also mounted Newton with foamtape.
I hope you can see the movie in my card ;-)
For more information on the AAA cards challenge, or to play along, see this
Is the theme of the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge, showcasing Memory box.
It's almost a year ago my mother passed away and my first Christmas kinda sucked. I kept myself busy but I can relate to how it is a not so nice time for some people.
So I made kind of a Christmas card, but with a thinking of you sentiment from Stampendous (encouraging words).
For the circle I sued Memory Box tree branch circle and cut it from a panel, slightly smaller than the cardbase.
Traced the opening on the cardbase, so I knew where to inkblend. I used Memento ink ( nautical blue, teal zeal and summer sky) and I spritzed it with water for a snowy effect
in the background. The sentiment is also stamped with Memento nautical blue as I felt black might be too stark. I did consider making the edges black around the panel, but yeah I decided against it.
I diecut the retro deer from Simon Says Stamp out of brown card and stuck a red enamel dot on his nose as a little wink to the recipient. Maybe get a smile out of them.
I mounted the panel with foamtape and then tucked the deer under the trees, using tape runner.
For more information or to play along to the Simkon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge, see this
The Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge is : not a card.
So I made a treatbag.
I made mine Christmassy, but then I also filmed it for my YouTube channel next week with Halloween stamps, ofcourse if you use other kinds of paper it could be for teachers, parties, birthdays, weddings etc.
I don't have the Lawn Fawn die and frankly with my scoreboard I can do more, different sizes and projects.
I made it to fit 2 out one sheet of 12x12 and you need a piece of paper that is 6"x12".
You can make it taller, but 6" is the width of my Big Shot if you want to diecut out the "handles", I used a small rectangle shaped die with rounded corners.
Score on the long side at: 2", 5", 7"and 10" then on the short side at 2"only.
Burnish your scorelines, then cut the bottom and notch them slightly.
I used a hole punch to make 4 holes and then fed some silver ribbon through it, and tied it together.
You can also just stample the ribbon to the bag and or hot glue the ribbon also.
My hole punch is a little big and the smaller one was too tiny to feed ribbon trhough, maybe bakerstwine would have been better, but hey, you live and learn.
I use hot glue to put my boxes and treatbags together, it's faster and more secure than tape or liquid glue, but you can
use anything you like ;-)
If you want to see how I made it, the video is going live on October 26th 0:00 Amsterdam time.
For more information or to play along with the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge, see this
For today's card I used a digistamp from Gerda Steiner designs. Little Christmas reindeer. It's a pack of digital stamps. I also printed out the Christmas tree, which is a free digistamp.
On the other sheets there are digis from DigiStamp boutique, and I made little scenes with the tree borders, the GSD mummy cat and the little gnomes, those are all separate images.
But I'm using the little Christmas reindeer. Printed it with my inkjet printer onto the Crafter's Companion Neenah paper and colored it with my Spectrum Noir markers.
Bit of shimmer on the ornaments and nose with the Nuvo shimmer pen (clear gloss) and a white gelpen to emphasis the shine even more.
I added the sentiment whilst is was in Photoshop. Matted the panel to centre it all up again and adhered it to the cardbase with taperunner.
I made this card for the My Favorite Things (MFT) WCMD (world card making day) challenge #4 and the SimoN Says Stamp wcmd challenge.
I also made it for a friend, she's going through a tough spot right now, so I pulled out the friends furrever and the polar bear pals, they both have images where critters are hugging, but I decided on the polar bear pals as they're sitting down and I wanted them to sit on to of the MFT Hugs die.
I made the card into a shaker card, but diecutting the Hugs from a 140lbs cardpanel, mounted acetate and foamtape and filled the shaker bit with micro diamonds, these are actually pointy, not flat and intended for nail art.
I swiped Distress inks tumbled glass on the cardbase behind the opening for a wintry northpole iceberg feel.
I stamped the images on Crafter's Companion Neenah paper and colored them with Spectrum Noir markers, then had the Scan n cut cut them out.
On the inside I stamped the sentiment from the same set with Versafine onyx black ink and adhered the second polar bear with tape runner, much like the one on the front.
For more information on the MFT challenge, or to play along, see this
For more information on the Simon Says Stamp WMCD challenge, see this
the second challenge over at My Favorite Things (MFT) wcmd (World card making day) is to use dies only.
I don't have many of the MFT dies, so this took a lot of thinking.
I came up with this fall card using the Safari tree from MFT and I diecut the tree three times, but ended up using just one on the card.
I also die cut the canopy from a piece of watercolored paper with Distress inks on it in fall type colors, although the red went a bit pink, but hey... I used the MFT snowdrift dies for the hills I cut out of a stripey watercolored look 12x12 sheet, that's from Craft Sensations, I hope that's OK. I thought the stripes could look like fields with produce and the sky is also a piece of paper I cut from a greys blue.
I then cut the MFT Happy wonderful Christmas dies several times out of brown card to make Happy Fall instead I adhered it with liquid glue, was thinking about stacking them, but that would have taken many many passes and well give me a lot of waste, and I didn't want brown letters.
The hill in the front is mounted with foamtape for dimension, the sky and back hill with taperunner and the tree has flat and raised leaf bits.
I wanted to add red enamel dots as if they were appels, but I didn't have any :-(
For more information or to play along with the MFT challenge, see this
