Caribbean Flowers

I was going to update last night, but my keyboard became possessed. Seriously, it would only type backwards. One of the arrow keys was jammed, so as soon as I typed anything, it would jump back a space, thus, backwards text. It made it very hard to even log into blogger to moderate comments, nevermind an update, lol!

Anyway, it's all good now. Here's a card I made. I was feeling in mood for some Caribbean colour scheme. I actually used some Bazzill cardstock that is nearly the same tone as Cool Caribbean, but it's textured. I stamped it with the various flowers from beautiful blooms in Caribbean and White. I had this cut piece of velvet ribbon laying around, so that too got placed on the card. A couple notes about punches and these flowers: the dotted center fits nicely in the 1/2 punch. So if you screwed up and didn't get it centered (like me...) stamp another, punch it out, and attach with tape or a pop dot! The large 9-petalled flowers will just fit in the 1-3/8 circle punch. I cut mine out and mounted it on the circle instead. The birthday greeting on here is from the second batch of Studio G $1.50 clear stamps. The ink kept pilling, so I stamped it in versamark then in caribbean. That seemed to solve things. Ah, the differences between acrylic and photopolymer!

Q & E

It's funny, I was kind of thinking twice about ordering this set. I was like, hmmm, more flowers... Well, I don't really have that many flowers, hardly any in clear sets. I feel that my purchase was justified, I really like how quickly a sharp design can come about with just a little bit of stamping with these flowers. The first one started with 3 Colorbox inks- Peacock, Baby Blue, and Brown. I decided that I wanted to use the 2 sizes of the 8- petalled flowers, suddenly, I was done :D

The second card, started with me wanting to use a black die-cut ribbon slide. Well, suddenly I was using the flourish-y iris, both sizes, and look at that another card! This card is a bit smaller than usual. It is 5.5x3.5. I wanted something stationery-like, and this seemed like more of a note card size. I debated to myself about the addition of colour, obviously I decided to leave it. I figure, it was so easy, that I can do another one with colour!

Falling Leaves

First off, looks like there's enough interest in the 5/8" ribbon share for it to go through. So look for details in 7-10 days! If you're still interested and haven't emailed, etc, let me know, there is still an opening, and I can always make a waitlist in case someone can't make it!

Secondly, did everybody see this beauty by Trudee?? I loved it, and decided to make my own version. First I cut a 3" square, then daubed mustard and white chalk into the square. Next, I stamped the leaves, leaving the mask on. I coloured them in really rust reinker. I decided to do this on kraft paper because I thought the chalk reverse mask would show up better. I don't, thankfully, need a sympathy card, but I thought this design worked well for the theme, and then the next time I need one, I don't need to concentrate on making one.

Thirdly, my PaperTrey stamps arrived! Unfortunately, for the first time EVER in my ordering crafty stuff from the U.S., I got customs charges. I feel that if I am ordering a product that is made in the USA, that CANNOT be bought anywhere in Canada, I should not have to pay Canadian taxes on that product. Of course, I also think that with them recently raising the 48-hour limit spending amount, they should have also adjusted the postal allowances. Okay, rant over :D New stamps!

Sharing?

Hello! I was interested in doing a small (6-8 people), CANADIAN ONLY, 5/8" grosgrain ribbon share. Right now I am just waiting on my samples so I can colour match to the 8 Stampin' Up colours of wide grosgrain. I was also going to throw in a 9th colour, I was thinking something to match the new neutral, Basic Gray. I figured out all costs, and it would come to $33.00 per 90 yard share (9 colours x10 yards), that's with shipping in a small bubble Xpresspost mailer, regional OR national. If you are interested, please leave a comment or email me (side link), or pm me at "tashers" at www.splitcoaststampers.com.


I do NOT have this product in hand, like I said I am waiting on my sampler. However, is this something anybody would be interested in? I want all the colours of that lovely 5/8 ribbon, but I really don't need 100 yards of each. I would happily take 10 yards though, especially if it's only going to cost me 37 cents a yard versus 90 cents a yard.



I'm not looking into doing shares a lot. There are a few other items I am eyeing for potential shares (like the coffee pound bags a la PaperTrey Ink), I'm just trying to save a little money, and pass the savings onto a few others!

Friendship Bag

I was browsing a Martha Stewart Christmas book over lunch, and there were these adorable gift bags. The template was for a teensy bag (1/2x2). I modified the pattern.
Start with a piece of paper 5.5x11.75. Score across at 1.5 inches. Now, score at these intervals: .75, 1.5, 2.25, 6.25, 7, and 7.75. Cut off the first rectangle (the 1.5x.75 piece). If you decide to do handles, I found that marking a 2-inch line in the top center of the 4x4 panels gave a good guide. I used the elastic cord from the upcoming Holiday Mini. That stuff is amazing, it keeps it's shape! Assemble box-style! I attached magnets to the top to serve as a closure.

This set is a Lizzie Anne Designs set, Au Naturale, that I got from Jacksonbelle-Embellishments
I coloured the images with markers, reinkers, and an aquabrush. I outlined the butterfly and leaves with a 10% cool grey prismacolor marker. I will eventually make 3x3 note cards that match the main design to include in the bag.

I don't normally address specific people on here, but I want to make this message is seen by Shelby. I would email you, but the link to your profile isn't public, and I don't have a way to access your email address! Please try again!

Christmas Card Prototype #1

I usually have some idea of what I'm going to do for Christmas cards by now. I slipped this year! I decided to start working on a few prototypes (and this one really IS a prototype!). I like to do a fun and bright one as well as a more serious one. Plus, I usually have 2 versions of each card- one that will mail with only one stamp, and one that is only appropriate for hand delivery.



This card started last night actually. I really wanted to play with this awesome ornament set by gel-a-tins. I love the images, I just haven't done much with it yet. I wanted colours that were mildly reminiscent of the holidays, but cheery, so out came green galore, tempting turquoise, and real red. I did the main image part yesterday. I had added little bits of stickles on everything, so I just let it dry overnight- then nothing gets ruined! I finally came back to it tonight. This card was going to be 6x3.5, but then the main image was too overpowering. So I decided on 6x4.5 Well, that didn't work so well either. You know what happens to a 6 inch piece of paper when you crimp it? It loses a 1/4"! So the card became 4.5x5.75. Well, by that point it might has well have been a standard size! I wanted to use 5/8" red grosgrain in place of the crimped paper, but I do not have any.

The Caribbean Guava

You know, it's too bad Stampin' Up! didn't release these colours the same year. I think guava and caribbean together make a really fun colour combination. I threw in some gable green, because let's face it, that colour gets ignored, a lot. I considered using celery, but I thought, whynot gable? This card features a neat technique I saw in the latest Creating Keepsakes. Although I do not do much scrapbooking, I subscribe to this magazine for a few reasons, one of those reasons being Jennifer Maguire's Tools & Techniques column. She takes a particular product or technique and features it with least 8 cool ideas. Anyway, this month, embossed paper was the "tool". The cool idea- lightly stamp onto the raised parts of the embossed paper with a background stamp! I had to try this! I embossed my paper with various images from the Bodacious brass template. Then I inked up my Friend Definition and ever so gently stamped it. It really doesn't need a lot of pressure, you don't want to stamp beyond those raised images!

Tapestry

This card that I made yesterday for the sketch challenge reminds me of a tapestry or one of those detailed tile hot plates. I knew the medallion shapes from True Friend would work well for the central diamond part of this sketch, but I didn't really know what else to do. So I grabbed the coordinating designer paper and starting to work. I had it all set up, but it needed a little something. I dug through my stash of brads and these square rhinestones brads that I had bought in July surfaced. The green of the rhinestone was kind of a nice transition colour from the wasabi medallion to the khaki green of the river rock in the background paper. Funny thing about this card, by some miracle, the tiles all lined up. Why is this miraculous? Because I didn't cut out the rectangle that way. I cut it long, then I cut that piece into 4 smaller pieces and arranged them. Aren't flukes like that nice?

And here's another buggy photo for you. This butterfly was just chilling out in the green onions. Isn't it pretty!

Sugar Coated

I saw this cute little manufactured tag card today. It was about 3x3, and had this wavy, glitter covered line along the right side. I was inspired. I really wanted to do a glitter covered wavy line, but first I had to plan it out. It made the most sense to cover BOTH sides entirely with my double-sided tape (I've got the type with removable backing). Then, I drew my wavy line, cut it out, removed tape from ONE side and coated in glitter. Voila! One extremely sparkly wave made! Putting the tape on first ensures full coverage, less likelihood of patching being needed, and ease of cutting (as long as the backings still on).

It looked cool, just the wavy line, but then I got to to thinking of how it reminded me of a really fancy cake or sugar coated candy, which led to the dots. I covered narrow scraps of paper with the tape (only one side this time, since I was less concerned with adhering it), then leaving the backing on, punched it out with several circle punches. Again, because the backing is still on, the punches glide right through! Then I coated in glitter and set up the card. Once again, it looked cool as it was, but I had kind of backed into a corner. I didn't leave a good amount of space for a greeting. So my only option was to make a small layer. I cut out a square from chocolate, then used scalloped scissors on it. Then I stamped the happy birthday greeting in the 3 main colours, stamped the gift, coloured it, cut it out, then popped it up with foam tape. Because I had already brought the chocolate colour into it at this point, and I had this pre-knotted ribbon just sitting on my desk, I decided to add that too :D

Gift Box

These cards may look slightly familiar! I needed to make a nice little gift for my mom's friend. After making the green birthday card last week, I decided that that design would well in other colours. I made 2 of each of these 4 designs with matching envelopes. My colour pairings: Blue Bayou and Soft Sky (I do not have these colours' ink pads, so I substituted not quite navy and sage shadow{stamped off once}); Purely Pomegranate and Regal Rose; Wild Wasabi and Certainly Celery; and Chocolate Chip and Close to Cocoa. At first I was going to add sentiments, but I decided against it. You really never know what someone is going to need a card for. This style and the variety of colours I included could work for anything from birthday to thinking of you.

I had to package this up nicely, so I put together a box. Here are the instructions: Base: 8.5x7.5, score at 1-3/8 from all edges, cut one side of every corner, never cutting along the same side twice.Lid: 5-15/16x 6-15/16, score at 1/2-inch, cut one side of every corner, never cutting along the same side twice. For a looser fitting lid: do 7-7/16x6-7/16 and score at 3/4-inch in. Assemble using super tacky tape for the corner tabs.Will easily fit 10 cards and 10 envelopes. It's such a quick box design. I've modified this basic template using 12x12 paper to fit gifts as big as clothes! I didn't feel like decorating the box much after assembling those 8 fairly detailed cards. Instead, I found some nice white satin ribbon from a grab bag from Dunwoody Booth, then I added a little happy birthday tag, tied on with silver elastic cord.

** edited to add a photo to help out **

Another "True" Birthday

This time the card is for my mom, so I used the flower from this set instead of the leaves. I really liked the Hugs layout earlier, so I wanted to do something similar. I started with the Apple Cider paper and wasabi ribbon. I was kind of stuck as to how to use my stamped image, since it wouldn't show up well on the rust dotty paper. So I cut it out. I popped up the petals, as well as the center. The sentiment is from Paper Trey. Since I had already adhered the flower, it was just easier to go with a clear sentiment. It can be difficult using the stampamajig if you have any dimensional layer in the way.

I was outside earlier today and happened to see a bumblebee enjoying our echinacea. I ran back inside to get my camera. Amazingly, it was still there when I came back! It was hard to get a good picture, it was a very busy bee, flying from flower to flower! And of course, the shot that turned out best was the one with the rattiest looking flower. All the other flowers are beautiful, they haven't started to wilt or been eaten. This one, was not so lucky... It's funny, I remember being so scared of bumblebees when I was little (I still am of wasps, hornets, etc), but I was just inches away from the bee. Bumblebees are pretty cute!

Lovely Challenges

Here is a card I did today that combined two challenges- today's inspiration challenge, and Jen70's Super Saturday Challenge . This card measures 4.75 square. I used the gel-a-tins set: hugs & kisses. One thing I discovered while making this card was that my craft inks match Stampin' Up!'s designer paper, at least this series, WAY better than the dye inks. The Regal Rose dye ink actually clashed with the pink polka dot part! I wasn't pleased, but then I remembered that the craft and dye ink pairs sometimes differ a bit. For the little word tag, I stamped the word first, then punched it out, then added the brad. The ribbon was cut by squeezing it in half, then cutting at a diagonal.

Happy, Simple Joys

Here's a card I made last night. I brought out my polyshrink and made a lovely strawberry charm with it. I also used the small corner rounder several times here. I had started with just the main image and frame being rounded, but then it just seemed to fit to do it all.

A few simple birthday cards

I was in the mood to make some extremely simple cards. These cards are 3-1/2x6-3/8. That size is a ideal for including any sort of cheque or bills within them.

The first card features some PaperTreyInk stamps. With all the excitement surrounding their new releases, I was inspired to pull out that Green Thumb stamp set I had had to have. I actually have some more plans now that I took it back out. I found that this Scenic Route paper went fantastically with it. It reminded me of that buggy texture. I used the middle sized stems in this set to make little hop marks.

The second card features some gel-a-tin stamps. The happy birthday set is such a fun one to use. I went with one of my favorite colour combinations- chocolate, pumpkin, teal, and olive. I stamped the presents on 1-3/8 size squares, then framed those on 1-1/2 squares. The bows are chocolate coloured, I see now that I didn't add quite enough brightness when I was editing my photo, oops!

My exciting news this past week was that I am one of SCS's newest "dirty girls". Being on the Dirty Dozen team was always a dream of mine. You know, one of those dreams that your REALLY never expected to happen! I cannot wait for all the different themes to "attack" these next few months.

Lovely Thoughts

I saw today's colour challenge this morning, I was inspired, but I had all sorts of cleaning and computer stupidity happening, so it didn't get done until now. I quickly browsed through the other challenge uploads and spotted a few others who used this set, this stamp in particular, with these colours. It worked really well! I went with a garden scene once again. I really liked how the last one turned out, so I figured, let's try that again! I didn't want to stray from the challenge colours, so I painted the leaves brown, which I guess could be a tad depressing, but it works. I'm pretty sure my layout was inspired by a "Val-card". She has such an gift of creating awesome layouts. They aren't overly busy, just amazing.

On here, I stamped the Definition background on 3/4 of the cardbase, and linen on the other 1/4. The little x stitches are from All in a Row. I just recently unmounted that one, so expect a LOT more use. I didn't like the stark whiteness, so I softened it up with some good ol' paint splattering. The greeting is from the Punch Box set.

A few "True" Birthday Greetings

This first card I made yesterday. There were a bunch of scraps on my desk from a previous project, so I just started to fiddle around with them. I ended up with a card that is approx 3.5x6.5. I really love making this size card. They also would fit a money gift nicely, not like I have loads of money to be giving away, but if I did... I stamped the Friend Definition background twice for a subtle wordy background. The rest is pretty clear :D



This other card was for the Featured Stamper challenge. Today's stamper is Jen70. I really wanted to do the challenge today because Jen was the one that started this challenge. I based my card off of this one . It was so pretty that I didn't want to change much. I changed the main set and the colours, that was about it! This one is for my Dad. It's his birthday tomorrow! I know it's not a super masculine card, but it is fairly neutral.

Warmest Wishes

Here's a card I made this morning. I felt like doing some watercolouring. I stamped several flwoers from Oh, So Lovely, then went about colouring them in. After they were dry, I carefully outlined them with a grey marker. I used the 10% Cool Gray by Prismacolor. I decorated the card front using textured Soft Sky, as well as some of the Rose Red argyle from the Palette of Prints. It's a close match to Pomegranate. I finished it off with some twill. I was going to knot the twill, but it makes such a thick knot, and then I couldn't center the main image as I wanted to.

Time for an overlay

I really like using acetate in all sorts of different ways on my cards. Yesterday I felt the need to make an overlay. This card features the new set True Friend. I was debating on getting it, it was that darn greeting that threw me. It's really cheesy, I just can't imagine actually saying that out loud. But I really liked the other images in the set and how nicely it coordinates with the Apple Cider paper. And wouldn't you know it, I used that darn greeting on the first card I made with this set!

Pomegranate Pretties

I got the Pretties Kit today and immediately had to put a hat pin together. First I dyed the petal with Pomegranate reinker. I also tried colouring the smaller one with a marker, which worked fine and was less messy. Now came the problem, I had put together this pretty hat pin. How does one make that work on a card. It's such a large item that you don't want to put anything else there to distract from it, you know? Finally I decided to use some organdy (seriously, what was Stampin' Up! thinking: they brought in a kit for making elegant accessories, yet retired one of the more elegant ribbons!) I stuck the pin through the knot of the ribbon, then placed the rest of the pearls and beads on, and finally the stopper. To finish it off, I stamped "happiness" from warm words. I figure I can use it for a shower or wedding card. The card base is textured Pomegranate, which works beautifully on it own.

Happy as a kitty with a ball of yarn.

With my new grey shading markers in hand, I started to search through my stamps, figuring out what would need shading. I brought this cat set back out. Again, I know it's not the most popular, but it certainly is fun to colour. I painted it with various twinkling h2o's, then I went to work with my grey marker, creating a shadow. I finished it off with a greeting from , you guessed it, So Many Sayings. I had this whole turquoise and orange decorated part ready to go on something bigger, something more colourful, but it just didn't work. It didn't even seem to work on a normal sized card. So I cut down my card to 5.5x7. Which was actually quite convenient because I had a TON of envelopes that fit this size nicely. Sometimes loads of layers and texture is nice, but sometimes it just doesn't go. This was one of those cases where it just didn't go, and I'm happy with how it turned out!

Colour challenge Tuesday!

I looked at today's colours: blue bayou, soft sky, and cameo coral, and thought, Meh. Well, that was before I tried it! This card all started out when I wanted to test out my new 10% gray tone prismacolors. I love the glow-outline effect around certain stamped images and wanted to try it for myself. I picked up the markers today at the University Bookstore. Anyway, so first up, finding an image that would work with a halo glow. Hmmm, I decided on the Year After Year. I looked at the images, and it dawned on me- hey, that elephant just might work with the colour challenge! So I started watercolouring it with soft sky, then adding shades of blue bayou. Lastly, I did my little halo effect. Now, this is my first attempt at it. I learned that the markers will reactive the versafine. In this case, that was okay, I liked the blended effect. Next up, deciding on a layout. It's a pretty basic one. At first I didn't have the button or stitching, but then I noticed I was lacking an obvious visual triangle. The button seemed to nicely complete this triangle, except then it seemed out of place. So, paper piercing, followed by stitching! And so, it all came together!

Other stamps on here: rattle from Holiday Blitz, saying from So Many Sayings, Linen background

Paper Tole

So here's my take on today's challenge. Most people were doing sculpted roses or other flowers, which is definitely one form of this technique. I went with the more classic approach. I started with a very detailed image and built it up in layers. I did the base layer, plus 2 more layers. With such a detailed main image, I wanted to keep the rest of the card pretty simple. I pulled out the watercolor joy wheel and used that. This card measures 5x11. The main image was coloured with SU! markers and some aquabrushing in parts.

Here's a closeup of the layers of the flowers. There are three laters here in total.

A quick ATC

This was for another challenge: to make an artistic trading card. I started with watercolouring the little fairy (from best friends by gel-a-tins) with twinkling h2os. Next came the background. I stamped the wings with a glue pad onto shimmery paper then coated in glitter. I stamped a greeting from So Many Sayings into two parts. That's all! My sister saw me using glitter and wanted to know what I was doing. I joked that I my pores hadn't ingested their weekly amount of glitter and were suffering withdrawal.

I'll probably be doing some more crafty stuff later on today. I was going to take a stab at today's technique challenge: Paper Tole.

Dry Embossed Seashell

This card was done for another challenge: dry emboss a vellum image. The seashells from Beautiful Beach work wonderfully for this technique. Stamp your image, turn it over onto a foam surface and start embossing whatever you want to puff out. I saw this layout at i heart 2 stamp and was determined to try it. I got the idea to fancy up my vellum piece from Emily's card here. You may notice that my entire caramel background is stamped with the Linen stamp. It took me two tries to get this right. That piece of cardstock measures 5.25x5.25, so it's bigger than a background stamp. The first time I had foolishly stamped the image completely onto the paper, which left about an inch left to stamp. How the heck would I ever line up the second part??? Lightbulb! I knew I would be putting a horizontal panel overtop. So...do the background stamping so that the "ugly' part will be covered! I know this may seem totally straight-forward, but sometimes those are the hardest things to think of.

You make me happy!

This is for today's Limited Supply Challenge: use sentiments to create a background image. On this card, I used the happy definition from Define Your Life to split my Olive background into two parts (background image and plain). The flowers are from the gel-a-tins set Bloom, the stems are from Sewing Kit. The other sentiment is from one of my current favorites, So Many Sayings. I used Kraft paper as my neutral. I had seen a sample of that the other day, which inspired me to use it again. It gives a totally different feeling to a card versus when white is used.

A card, that I actually made today!

After posting Diane's card (the cool caribbean one a few posts down), I just kept looking at the layout and thinking, I need to do that! So I did. I changed up everything, except the layout and theme. I used my favorite trio of the in colors (wasabi, guava, and pomegranate) and I used some gel-a-tins (Funky Flower Garden). The "be happy" is from the So Many Sayings, but it seems very Hero Arts-esque to me. This card is ridiculously heavy considering it doesn't have that many layers. It's the style where the whole card (the guava part) is mounted on the pomegranate single pieced backing.

Did you know that it's almost my 1-year stamping blog anniversary? I can't believe it's been that long!

I've also been messing around with my template. When I switched over a while back, a bunch of custom HTML and other links disappeared. So I was just adding those all back in. I also finally got my picture to be a non-distorted size on my page (yay!)

Boo!

If you regularly check out my SCS gallery, then you've already seen this, but I wanted to share it here too. This is a tag card, made for another challenge. I had SO much fun making it! I think tag cards are my favorite beyond regular format item to make! I love piecing everything together, figuring out what should go on each panel. I only used one stamp set on here: Batty for You!. The fabulous paper is from the new creepy crawly paper back. The chipboard letters are the Simon Lower font, which I've had for a while. To make this card, start with a 9x5.5 panel, score at 3" and at 6". Fold in a cut your angled tops. Decorate as you see fit!

Simple 1-layer Collages

These were done for another challenge. The challenge was for 1-layer cards. I started by cutting a rectangle out of the middle of a large piece of cardstock. Then I sponged on my lighter inks (celery on the one, apricot on the other). Next I did started the collaging. I stamped the Kindness definition stamp, followed by some leaves (again, using the lighter colours). Then, I stamped more leaves in the darker colours (wasabi and pumpkin). I finished off with a greeting from So Many Sayings and some organdy ribbon.

Some overdue RAKs

This first one I got quite a long time ago from Diane (My Little Stampin' Spot), but I had misplaced it and forgot to post it. It's a really beautiful card! This layout is awesome, and it's one of my favorite colour combos-caribbean, celery, and chocolate.

This second one is from Colleen (Distinctive Touches). I received it earlier this week. I just love the colours she chose for the polished stone technique. This is a technique that I really enjoy, but rarely do anymore. It's nice because it can work alone as a cardfront, as Colleen did here. It's really quite stunning!