Monday, April 30, 2012

May SOTM Blog Hop!


Welcome to our CTMH Stamp of the Month Blog Hop! We will be featuring May's SOTM, which is called "Friendship Bouquet", a lovely set of 8 Sunflower stamps!

If you have come here from PAMELA'S BLOG, you are on the right path! This month we have dozens of Close To My Heart Consultants sharing their creations using this month's original SOTM and other great CTMH products on their blogs. Hopping is simple to do - just click on the link at the end of the post on each blog to move to the next one! Here we go!

This month I created a quick color card for my team meeting. I colored the images using Sunflower, Sunset, Garden Green, and Chocolate inks. Then I spritzed the whole thing with a weak solution of Sunset reinker (about 10 drops) plus water in my Spray pen. The Chocolate CS in that background was inked direct to paper with a chocolate ink pad, and that adorable Dotty paper came from the amazing ($5!!) Dotty for You Paper special! I added a bit of Color Ready Seam Binding topped off with a Bling button that I painted with a combo of Liquid Glass and Garden Green Reinker for customized sparkle!

Here's a close up of the quick color technique. I created masks by stamping the sunflower image onto CS scraps and trimming out the image just along the lines. You don't have to be careful - you are not saving that sunflower!

You want to make a blank spot for the area you want to color - so you can line it up over a stamped image. I made two masks for the sunflower (one for the brown center and one for the petals, and one for the leaf image. Then you just grab a sponge dauber, lay the mask over your stamped image on your card, and daub in the color where you want ti to go, protecting the areas where you don't. You'll be amazed at how quickly and easily you can color in stamped images with this fun technique!

Once you've gone to the trouble to make the masks, tuck them into your stamp envelope to save for another day of coloring fun!

Now Hop on over to DEBRA'S BLOG to see what wonderful craftiness she's got up her sleeve! Be sure to visit all of the Consultants at their Blogs to get some great SOTM  and other fun ideas!

Remember, the SOTM is only available for one month, so contact your consultant (or click here) to see how you can get this stamp set for just $5!

Here are some other projects I have made using the May Stamp of the Month...
Oops! I don't have any yet! I've been so busy working on my Superhero Creative Club kit and a few NEW workshops that I haven't had much stamping time...check back here next week and I'll post some more with this adorable set. Or follow me via email so you won't miss a thing!


Avengers Assemble! Superhero Album is here!


In the Great Hall of Wendy's Stamp Pad, our Stamping Heros assemble to enjoy the world's greatest crafting materials created from the CTMH legends of the universe!

Superman! Stamping Rules! Giggling Girls! And YOU!

Their mission:
To fight for amazingly fun Girl Time...
To create that which is adorable...
and To serve all mankind. . .
or at least conquer Father's Day gift giving!

Great Hera! That workshop is just $25!

 Sessions available at 9 am or 1 p.m, or crop all day from 9 to 4 with no additional fee.

Swoop in  to save your spot on May 19th for a SUPER good time!!



Each kit includes pre-cut papers, bases, and embellishments including the new Superhero Rub-ons and Superhero Badge Buttons plus full color instructions to make everything pictured - just add adhesive! 

Please RSVP by May 9th to reserve your kit for the Superhero Album workshop. You can contact me via email, or reserve your spot via the Paypal Link below. You don't have to have a Paypal account to use this feature! To Go kits are not limited to quantity, but the May 19th Workshop (which includes a light lunch at no extra charge) is limited to 8 attendees total per session.

Bring a friend I haven't met for a free Bonus stamp set! Email me for details!


Workshop and TO GO Kits
 
 

Saturday, April 28, 2012

CAS-ual Friday quick Cricut Card

Happy spring weekend! The weather here is PDX is not quite warm and sunny, but the trees are blooming everywhere, and for the first time in FOREVER I am not dying of spring allergies! Hooray!

In tribute to my new found well being, I crated this adorable quick Cricut card using the new A Blossom stamp set (only $6.95!!). I cut the tree trunk and the flower pieces on White Daisy Cs using my beloved  Art Philosophy cartridge. Then I made a row of the dotty stamp in Sweet Leaf (inspired by the colors found in the Heart 2 Heart Photo Inspiration Challenge) and layered on the sentiment in Cocoa ink. I accented my flower tree with a shiny Green button and pierced a row of stitches all around the outside of my card.

Here's a close up of the stamping for the "tree". I inked the larger flower in Sunset ink, dragging the stamp across the pad to add texture to the stamped image. Then I inked the smaller flower in Smoothie ink, stamping it off onto scrap paper and rolling the tips of the flower back into the ink pad before stamping my final image.

I'm linking this sweet, simple card to the CAS-ual Fridays April Showers Bring May Flowers Challenge.

Thanks for stopping by!


Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Monday Motivations Team Cards


My team did our first swap at our monthly meeting last night, and here's the result - gobs of adorable cards! I made the grey birds in a stack card, and the other cards were made by our meeting attendees: Karin Smith, Cathy Lambert, Linnea Schmidlin, Elaine Gall, Theodora Stacey, Amanda Crandall-Moore, Stephanie Blake, and Kelly Cuttitta!

Thanks for the fun meeting and the inspiration, ladies!




Saturday, April 21, 2012

Amazing Pam Klassen

I saw the CUTEST card the other morning by the super talented Pam Klassen made with my beloved Dotty for You papers... so I had to run upstairs and make it! I still can't believe that all this paper is just $5!!

I was out of the green stitched ribbon (gasp...must order more stat!!) so I went with the also awesome  Dark Chocolate striped ribbon. I hit my stash of clear buttons and gave up just one of my hoard of tiny chocolate paper flowers...

I am a die hard fussy cutter - love my Cricut but I can't help it. A B&T (Background & Texture) paper like this is on my table, I'm practically itching to trim out the images! So it was fun to make a card actually using the butterfly paper as a whole piece. Thanks for the inspiration, Pam!


Ooh - and my Moxie Fab Life is Tweet card got chosen as the RetroSketch Rockstar of the week - sa-weet! They have an adorable new sketch up that I'm working on right now - come on over and play too! Now if I can figure out how to add my awesome new RockStar blinkie.... you know I can't resist a bit 'o bling...

Thanks for stopping by - you are amazing!

Friday, April 20, 2012

CAS-ual Fridays: Opposites Attract

OK - I am not a CAS-ual stamper. CAS means Clean and Simple - a style I love and admire and have a very hard time pulling off. I figure stamping is like any other skill - I just need to practice and, though I may never lose my tendency towards lumpy-bumpy-add-one-more-layer projects, it's good to stretch, right?

And yes, I know there's not a lot of white space here...but there's only one thing going on the in background - the green Dotty for You paper, so that's pretty simplified for me! There's actually not a bit of stamping on this card - it's all pieces from the Dotty for You paper set. It's relatively flat (for a card made by me) and only took a few minutes to put together. Why am I concerned? Well, I made it for the CAS-ual Fridays Opposites Attract challenge. If you are a lumpy bumpy gal like me, get over there ASAP and see why I'm trying to expand my horizons - they make some simply ADORABLE flat and simple cards! I used Pale green (Sweet Leaf) and Pink (Smoothie) colors as my opposite ends of the spectrum.

I am particularly amused by my flower embellishment: I built it out of the butterfly images from the Dotty for You papers right down to the little green leaves! I was fussy cutting butterflies fro another project and got distracted...and cut way too many. I couldn't toss them out so I found a new use for them. (Caren C. I was thinking of you when I did this. Stinkin' butterflies...)

Maybe it's not the most CAS-ual card...but it's simplified from my usual seventy layers and I'm loving it!



One quick shout out - happy birthday to my baby boy, Gabe, who's turning 6 today. May you always make a heart with your hands when I take your photo in a field of tulips...and not kill me for sharing this adorable photo when you get a bit bigger....

Happy Friday, Stampin' Friends!



Thursday, April 19, 2012

Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge

Call me Dotty, but I think my favorite print in the Dotty for You paper packet might, maybe, possibly be the pretty heart clouds (at least for today)! I haven't used it as a print - I fussy cut every one of those clouds, even the extra bits hanging off the sides of the paper. How sweet are they?

When I got the new sketch challenge from Taylored Expressions, I knew just what I wanted to do with it. I've been following that adorable blog forever, but not particiapting very often. The cards there are amazing - so go have a peek, and bring along a cupcake!

I added a smidgen of the Crusin' paper packet, trimming out the individual scrabble tiles to create my sentiment for this card. Lots of 3-D foam tape was applied... I used three of our little glitter buttons and topped them with Sparkles.

I trimmed out the individual clouds, then lined them with a Sakura silver gel pen (silver lining, lol). Then I applied Silver Glitter glitz to the silver lining with my finger - like applying eye shadow but ever so much more fun! Finally I added Silver Glitter Glitz raindrops under my clouds. I used the dots in my Dotty for You paper to decide where to place my raindrops. I'm gonna save this one to mail back to the boys while I'm in Dallas for Convention this summer!

Thanks for stomping by my puddle, Stampin' Friends!


Monday, April 16, 2012

Dotty for You Blog Hop!

Welcome to our CTMH Dotty For You Blog Hop!  We will be featuring CTMH's National Scrapbooking Month Special, which is this adorable Dotty For You Paper Packet with 24 sheets of fantastically trendy prints for just $5!!  If you have come here from TRACI'S BLOG, you are on the right path! 

This month we have almost 40 Close To My Heart Consultants sharing their creations using this groovy Dotty For You paper and other great CTMH products on their blogs. The blog hop is a great big circle, so you can start here and work your way all around.  If you get lost along the way, you’ll find the complete list of participating consultants hereThis is simple to do - just click on the link at the end of the post on each blog to move to the next one! Here we go!

When I saw that cloud print in the packet I knew just what I wanted to do with it. I saw an adorable Sunshine and Happiness Layout on the Bella Blvd. Blog by Katherine McElveen. I loved the idea of it, but it was a one pager, with one photo...and she lives somewhere sunny and that's not quite how things roll up here in Oregon. So when we got a couple of mostly dry, sort of sunny days this month (after having kicked off the month with snowman building on our back deck), I knew it was time to bust out of the house and hit the road with my trio of rapscallions for some Oregon adventure! 
I knew I couldn't have my version be quite as sunny, since, as you can see in the photos, our sunny days right now incorporate quite a bit of grey sky still. So I handcut a cloud template in a similar shape to the clouds from the Dotty papers and used that to sponge in Grey Wool clouds over the top of the (now expanded by me) two page layout. And topped that with some pearlescent glimmer mist...

I hand cut the circles, clouds, and labels/tags from the various Dotty papers,popping some up with 3-D foam tape and detailing some with a fine tipped silver gel pen. Really, the images on the label page all look stamped and distressed already - so cool!

I stitched on my sun rays by hand using grey thread, and added an older retired Badge button I'd been hoarding until I found just the right project - Hello, Mr. Sun! I ringed my circle sun with bitty brads too.

On Page 2 I continued the Sky/Ground theme from Page 1, floating more hand cut clouds across the top and circle bits and labels across the bottom. I cut 1/4" strips for the journaling across the top. I used to do 1/2" strips for this kind of journaling, but I like how much cleaner the 1/4" strips look...plus you can write a lot more in the same space...and you might have noticed that I tend to write a lot, lol. 

Finally, I added some bling! I gave each cloud a "silver lining" by patting on Silver Glitter Glitz with my finger just along the bottom of each cloud. I tucked Bitty and Colored Sparkles onto the clusters along the bottom and on each butterfly body. And I added a Pin Clip to the bottom of Page 1 to hold the year since we usually go every year...but usually in the drizzly rain! Perhaps you can see the shine of the "silver lining" down in the close up?   

Now "Hop" on over to CAROL'S BLOG to see her beautiful Dotty art work! Be sure to visit all the Consultants at their Blogs to get some great crafting ideas and other fun ideas! Remember, this Dotty For You paper packet is only available through National Scrapbooking Month WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!  Contact your CTMH Consultant (or click here) to see how you go Dotty over these fabulous papers before they sell out!

One more tip - To create these fab photo collages that fill up the bottom of my Layouts I just popped into Picasa (a free program you can download from the web) and chose the folder that held all my pics from our little foray to the Tulip Festival.Then I chose Create>Picture Collage and dumped half onto each side, fitting 31 photos onto a two page LO! My favorite part (besides stuffing a billion photos onto my page in one fell swoop!) was the "Shuffle Pictures" Button - so much fun!


Here are some more projects I have made using this 100% Awesome Dotty For You paper packet (and I've got lots more a-comin' this week!):


Card Patterns Sketch #161

Can you stand a bit more Dotty for You today? This time I used the new sketch from one of my favorite sketch blogs, Card Patterns. It is a cute square card, a bit out of the box for me, a girl who tends to lean hard on the standard size card! I needed to squeeze in one more post as I specifically used a fun Stick Pin for a flag on this card for the Tuesday Throwdown stick pin challenge...and I'm getting tired of finishing cards for challenges and then not posting them until just a smidgen too late! Might be time to actually start using that Blog planner i found on Pinterest...

I cut three layers of a simple daisy shape from my Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge and gently rolled each petal between my fingers before layering all three together with 3-D Foam tape.

The yellow scallop is cut from the same swirly Dotty for You paper. Each pattern in the pack is a brightly colored print on one side and a coordinating monochromatic polka dot on the back - sweet!

I cut the starburst image from the sheet of labels that comes in the Dotty paper packet, and the heart was handcut from Ocean CS and sanded pretty heavily. The Star was cut from the Dotty Paper labels, as was the SMILES sentiment I wrapped as a flag around one of our Pretty Pins stick pins. (I actually keep one of our adorable flower pins tucked in a rubber band around my Liquid Glass bottle - you know, to poke it when it won't go. Who can tell me where to get a Pretty Pin poker for a stubborn 4 year old?)

A bit of Lagoon Mini Medley stitched ribbon and I was loving my 3-D flower card! OK - I swear no more posts until after the blog hop tomorrow!


Dotty for my Team!

I had such a fun time hanging with my team yesterday! We made this adorable banner card - how much do you love all the little banners that are one, well, everything right now? I've been patiently cutting them with my scissors, or cutting them on my Cricut since there are two types/sizes of this shape on Art Philosophy, but sometimes you don't want to mess with that for just one little banner, even if they are absolutely PERFECT when cut on Cricut... and that appeals to this fussy stamper.

So I was thrilled to find a new use for my Square punch that fulfills my longing for lovely (but fast and lazy) banners! Just flip your punch over so you can see what you are punching (I used a Creative Memories 1 1/2" punch - don't gasp, I own non-CTMH stuff too!). I don't think the size really matters though. Just flip it over, insert your strip of paper from the corner of the punch and line it up so that it's evenly in the center of the corner with the two bottom corners of your strip touching the sides of the Square - you should be able to see a nice even triangle of your paper...now punch it! Woo - instant banner, baby!

Of course, I did whip out my Cricut for the adorable swoopy sentiment shape. I cut it at 1 1/2" on White Daisy CS and as a Layer at 1 1/2" on my Dotty for You paper. Then I took the center of the Layer cut and trimmed it in half with my scissors (no fussy here - you won't see any of that cut edge). I stamped the sentiment (from the Cricut bundle exclusive stamp sets) in Grey Wool ink  and popped the layer frame up with 3-D Foam tape. Then I adhered the two halves of the LAYER center on top and the bottom of my 3-D sentiment, giving it even more dimension! I love having the 3-D Foam on a roll so I can control the exact size of the tape I'm using - so handy!

The butterflies are just hand cut from the Dotty for You paper and layered together with a Sparkle body. And you can sort of see the pierced line that I made with my Piercing Ruler across the bottom of my Kraft Cardstock base as a finishing touch.

Thanks for a super fun time, Team Stamping Rules...and long distance gals (you know who you are) you can expect to see one of these in your mailbox this week. We missed you!  See ya in a few for Monday Motivations....check the last post to see what I'm cooking up for my swap card!

And to you, dear Stampin' Friends, thanks for stopping by. Check back in the AM for the Dotty for You Blog Hop - sure to make you go Dotty for this fabulous $5 paper pack!

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Got my Moxie Fab weekend Mojo on...

Oh my! Did I get my stamping Mojo back this weekend! If you have been following me on Facebook, you know I gave up coffee this week. And do I ever LOVE coffee...so this was a pretty tough week. So this weekend I holed up in my Stamp Pad with a nice cuppa Earl Grey to bust into my new Dotty for You Paper packet. Who needs coffee when you've got paper this adorable? 9 projects later I came up for air and a fun meeting with my team today. I'll share two cards today, plus the rest this week including a 2 page layout that I'm bursting to post...but I gotta wait for the Dotty For You Blog Hop! Be there...or be square!  First up is my take on this week's Mojo Monday sketch. I know, I know - I got it posted too late to add it to the linky, but I still like my little sparkly star card, so here it is.

I used one of the corrugated shapes that I sponged with Grey Wool ink and filled in the ridges with Silver Glitter Glitz. All the patterned papers, the large circle, and the 100% awesome sentiment are from the Dotty Paper Packet. That's right - I did a bunch of fussy cutting with these papers,as one side is typically a brighter multi-colored print and the other is a monochromatic polka dot...just what I love best!

I sprinkled on a scattering of colored and bitty sparkles to further highlight my bling-y star focal point. A stretch of Grey Wool baker's twine finished off my mojo card. I just LOVE me a bit 'o stripey baker's twine!


Besides getting my Mojo on this weekend, I also visited the Moxie Fab World, where this week's Tuesday Trigger is Three Little Birds. Aren't they just so sweet? I loved the grey with the blue and green, and I knew there was a stripey print in the Dotty for You packet that was just about these colors.

I've also been following a new blog for me called Retro Sketches, so I decided to jump into this adorable Trigger using their newest adorable sketch. I love how they do their sketches on this coffee stained graph paper thing - it so looks like it belongs on my stamp table...ok, maybe not the coffee rings anymore, but I can dream, right?


So here's my take on the Retro Sketch #7 and Moxie Fab's Tuesday Trigger. I inked everything with Black ink, and all the papers are still from that Dotty For You paper packet. I stamped my birds using (sneak peek) the June Stamp of the Month - aren't they just the sweetest? I paper pieced the biggest bird using Dotty papers and Sunset CS, but did a combo of inking and markering on the smaller birds to get their beaks and legs detailed.

Each birdie got an adorable little sparkle eye. I popped up the sentiment with 3-D foam tape - I just love a cute pun! I'm linking this card up to The Hybrid Chick: Card Caravan Challenge: Spring because this is spring in Oregon to me. Grey skies, birds singing, (mostly green) color starting to come back in...gotta love Springtime in the PacNW!




I'm linking this to the Get Your Craft On Party over at Today's Creative Blog - check it out for lots of amazing crafty ideas!  I hope you'll check back here tomorrow for the Dotty for You Blog Hop with gobs of Dotty Fun! I'll be posting the rest of my weekend projects this week too.

Have a HOPPY day - So TWEET of you to stop by!

Monday, April 9, 2012

Spring is here!

It was such a gorgeous day today here in Portland, the kind of day that makes you forget about the 100 days of gray and soak up the sunshine with a smile! I was crafting in my Stamp Pad this afternoon, but I'm not quite ready to share what I'm working on yet...

But I did realize that I had this fun spring-y April SOTM card that I've been hoarding and not sharing! I used the border stamps lined up back to back to make flower images... because even the least girlie set around can be used to make a (sort of) floral card!

I used Sweet Leaf, Creme Brule, Pansy Purple, and Dutch Blue inks. I flipped that long bar sentiment image around to stamp the dots along the top of the center embellishment panel. And I stamped the line background image on the bottom of the card with second generation Sweet Leaf...can you see that?

Maybe not...but it's there. Then after stamping over everything with the big grid background image (my fav from this set I think) I sponged and inked over everything with more Sweet Leaf directly from my pad. I'm linking this to the H2H Easter/Spring Challenge - check them out for more fun and sunshine!

Ready for another beautiful sunny day now, please...and thank you!

Saturday, April 7, 2012

I'm SUPER...Thanks for asking!

Here's the last of my Stamping Royalty submissions...There's a lot of detail here and a cool coloring trick!

The stamps are mostly the April SOTM, combined with the new Superpower stamp set and an old fav, Thank You.

I did some faux stitching (an awesome technique described at the end of this blog post) on the center panel.

The 3-D center embellishment was stamped with the superhero image. Then I made a little mask out of a post-it to cover up my hero and over stamped him with the grid image in Pacific ink, then sponged it with Sky ink. I filled in around the hero with Bitty sparkles on the grid junctions. I stamped the top layer with the stripe image and sponged it with Cranberry ink.

I colored in my hero using my plain ol' water brush dipped in a bit of 91% alcohol. I know blending pens are cheaper, but water brushes are more versatile to me, plus I've been using mine for like 6 or 7 years - how I haven't lost it before now is a wonder, but they truck on forever!  I squeezed my pad to make a little puddle of ink in the lid. Then I used my alcohol dipped water brush to pick up a bit of color and started shading. The alcohol mixes with the dye ink and gives you a lot more flexibility in the shading and blending! Perhaps not Copic level coloring...but way cheaper!






I'm getting ready to close the order for the Stella Album workshop for April. If you've been waiting to order your kit, this weekend is the time!  Here's the link to the RSVP info - the workshop is precut, so we have to order early so I can all the work done for you!

Thanks for flying by - have a fab weekend!

Friday, April 6, 2012

Christmas in April...why not? We had snow...

Here's my fourth submission card for the Christmas/Holiday category. This one is actually a trifold photo card!

The tree is from one of my favorite stamps ever, Grown with Love, which I thought was still available, but it seems to be MIA from my website...so now I'm thinking retired. Could it be?  The little hearts are stamped in Cranberry ink, then I stitched the little ornament "hangers" with colonial white floss.

The Cricut banner is separated by Bitty Sparkles, and stamped with "A Typeface".  I loaded the branches of the tree and outlined the card front with Stardust Glitter Glitz gel.

Here's the inside of the card, which has enough room to fit lots of photos of the little guys and still handwrite a message to loved ones. Man was this a heavy card - lots of layers! I wouldn't mass produce something like this, but perhaps as a special thing just for the grandparents...

I figured that a holiday card was appropriate as we're supposed to get some snow again. In April. To prepare us for the 70 degree Easter weekend they've predicted. Gotta love living in the Pacific NW - may you always carry 3 light layers just in case!


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