Foiled

Long time, no blog.  I have had a crazy year, which is why I haven’t been online much and I haven’t been crafting too much.  My husband and I decided to get divorced, so we spent the beginning  of the year getting our affairs in order. The divorce was amicable and I'm happier now.  Then I had a roof leak in the beginning of June in my tv/craft room.  The leak wasn’t that bad, but it ruined part of the popcorn ceiling.  So I had to redo the ceiling and that led to repainting the room.  So I was without a craft space for 2 months.  At the same time, I had 2 coolant leaks in my car.   Then I had another leak in the roof that caused the ceiling in the bathroom to collapse.  And now my dog has cancer and I’m driving 2 hours every week for his treatment. 

On the happier end of the spectrum, my Mom and I took an epic trip to Oregon and Seattle for my 40^th birthday.  We went  to Portland, checked out the waterfalls along the Columbia River Gorge, row boated on Clear Lake, went to Crater Lake and drove up the Oregon coast before finishing the trip out in Seattle.  Crater Lake is absolutely amazing.

 

Now to the crafting.  Artsy Inkers is getting ready to have another party – Inktoberfest.  And I’m hosting a challenge for it.  So if you aren’t a member of the board, now is a great time to join.

The challenge is based upon a Plaid product my Mom demonstrated back in the 1990s.  She was a craft demonstrator for Plaid and would demonstrate the products at different craft stores in the areas.  

I’ve been wanted to try it for a card for a while.  Here's the finished card.  

Now here are the step by step photos and instructions.

Step 1 – stamp an image on a piece of acetate.  You will be putting a frame around it eventually, so just make sure the piece is big enough to fit your frame.  I used Staz-On and the image is by Stampendous.

Step 2 – color in the image with a coloring medium that will be translucent.  I used my Copic markers.  Because Staz-On and Copic markers are both alcohol based, I colored the reverse side.  Otherwise, the markers would have removed the stamped image. 

Step 3 – this is the tedious step.  You need to use something that will be opaque to color around the stamped image.  I used a metallic acrylic paint.  You need to color everywhere except your stamped image.  Do the painting on the reverse side.  Make sure you don’t paint where you colored.  You want the stamped image to be translucent.  It will probably take several layers to get it opaque.  Just let it dry between layers.  It took me about 4 or 5 layers to get it fully colored. 

Layer 1 

Finished 

Step 4 – lightly crumple a piece of tin foil.  It should be smaller than the frame.  You are going to attach the tin foil behind the image.  It will show through in the areas that are translucent but not where they are opaque. 

Step 5 – make a frame and attach your image to the frame.

I die cut the scalloped oval and used a regular oval to make the frame.  I used next size down of scalloped ovals to trim down the image and the piece of foil.  I cut another of the larger scalloped ovals from a scrap piece to be the back of the sandwich I created.

Step 6 - Attach the image to the back of the frame.

Step 7 -  lay the foil down.  Don't use any glue at this point because you don't want it interfering with the effect.

Step 8 - Glue the scrap large scallop oval to the oval frame and tin foil.  I forgot to take a picture of this step.

Here is what the finished piece looks like.

Here are a couple of close-ups to better show the tin foil behind the image.

And here is one more of the finished card.  I embossed the base with a Sizzix (?) embossing folder.  The ribbon was from my stash. I used by bow-it-all to make the bow.  I made the little poinsettia using a new Spellbinders die.  I added liquid pearls for the center. 

Instead of making a floating image, you can just die cut a piece of cardstock that is the same size as your card.  That is what I did with the first card I made using this technique.  Here is that card.

The image is by Power Poppy and I colored it with Copics.

Thanks for stopping by and please come again.  

Snarky Birthday (Projects 49 and 50)

Woo Hoo!!!! I've finally met my goal of 50 projects posted, so I can lift my shopping moratorium.  I do have a bit of a confession.  Since I knew I was getting close to my goal and I had to order some reinker for my Copics (a purchase allowed under the moratorium) and Dick Blick was having a sale with free shipping, I picked up a set of Brushos last month.  But they have been sitting in a drawer untouched since they arrived.  Which has been making me a little twitchy. But now I can play with them.  I can't wait.

These two cards have been waiting a while to be posted, since I made them for my aunt's birthday in March and my sister's in April. They started with the sentiment stamps from Riley & Co.'s Funny Bones collection.  I picked them up because I thought they were really funny and perfect for my aunt and sister.

This first card I made for my aunt for her birthday. She collects, among other things, Wizard the Oz stuff. So I figured this sentiment would be great for a card for her. The image is by Kraftin Kimmie and I picked it up to go with the sentiment. I colored her with Copic markers and I will admit to googling the stamp to find some ideas for coloring her.  I have such a hard time figuring out where to put the highlights and shadows, especially on clothes.  I know you are supposed to decide where the light is coming from but that method just doesn't work for me.  I have a easier time using an example.  There is a reason why I stamp instead of draw.  I kept the card fairly simple.

The second card was for my sister’s birthday. She is a runner. She has run several marathons and half-marathons. And I think she's crazy. So when I saw this sentiment stamp, I had to get it. Again, I picked up this Kraftin Kimmie stamp to go with the sentiment.  

I created the background for one of the alcohol ink challenges over at Artsy Inkers back in March/ April. I used mod podge to attach tin foil to a piece of comic book board. Then I embossed it with a Cuttlebug embossing folder. Then I inked it with Meadow, Juniper, and Clover. The alcohol inks did not adhere very well to the tin foil.

The die cut piece was cut from a piece of comic book board covered with a "dirty" paper towel. I've mentioned before that I save the paper towels I use to wipe distress inks off my craft sheet because they usually come out looking cool. In fact, I tend to use one paper towel for blues, greens and purples and another to reds, yellows and oranges to ensure I have pretty paper towels. I attached the paper towel with mod podge and while it was wet, I added some perfect pearls. 

I added the sequins because I accidentally tapped the image with the grey marker.

Sorry but I'm not sure what I did with the list of the Copic markers I used for coloring the images.

Thanks for stopping by and please come again.


 

A Couple More AIR 15 Cards (Projects 46 & 47)

Even though AIR 15 if over, I’ve got a couple of more projects from AIR15 to share with you. 

The first card involves a z-fold.  Here is a link to the FarNorth’s blog posting with instructions on how to do a z-fold.  Here's a pic where you can see the z of the fold.

I decided that I wanted to create a scene that went across all three layers and I went with a beach scene.    Instead of cutting along the diagonal, I drew a line on both sides of the paper so I could use that as a guide for stamping.  Then I fussy cut the top part off so that instead of having a straight line.

 

The front panel is the ocean. I stamped the waves with Versamark and heat embossed with clear embossing powder. Then I stamped the fish with Versafine.  I added the bubbles, stamped with Versamark and heat embossed with clear embossing powder.  I inked around the fish with Distress Ink in Salty Ocean. I colored the fish with Squeezed Lemonade, Mowed Lawn, Picked Raspberry, and Dried Marigold.  I went back and stamped in some waves with Salty Ocean and the seahorse with Picked Raspberry.  The waves and fish with bubbles are by Studio G.  The other fish, bubbles and seahorse are by Fiskar.  I fussy cut along the top waves.

 

I did the same scene on the back, except I forgot to stamp the fish before adding the Salty Ocean background.

 

 

Center panel is the beach. I stamped the shells across the top with a variety of ColorBox pigment ink and then embossed with clear embossing powder. Then I inked the beach with Squeezed Lemonade and Antique Linen and then flecked Vintage Photo. I meant to stamp the shells on the body of the beach before coloring the beach but I forgot so I did it after and embossed them. I added a little bit of the ocean at the bottom.

I did the same scene on the back of the center panel.

Back panel is the sky. I stamped the birds and palm tree using Colorbox pigment ink and embossed with clear embossing powder.  I also stamped and embossed the waves. Then I inked the sky with Tumbled Glass and Salty Ocean, the sand and ocean the same as the other layers. I added a beachy sentiment. All the stamps are by Inkadinkado.

 

Here's a picture of it completely open.

 

And here's what it looks like closed.

 

This next card combines 3 of the challenges in this card.  The first is the paint background, which I described in previous posts.  The second was the digital stamp challenge.  The host’s husband converted a piece of his art into a digital stamp for us to use for the challenge.  Isn’t she lovely?  And the final was the mistakes challenge, which is going to take some explaining.  One of the members of Artsy Inkers hosts a Bingo challenge during every party.  Before the party starts, she posts a list 25 words.  If you want to play along, you pick a 10 of the words and message her your list.  Then each day of the party, she posts 3 of the words from the list of 25.  The first person to have all 10 of their words posts and post BINGO, wins.  This time around, she picked a list of common mistakes made in stamping.  So for her challenge, you had to incorporate at least 2 of the mistakes on the list into your project, but not cover them up.  Personally, I think this challenge was a bit of a jinx because I ended up making several mistakes on this project, none of them intentional.   



 

Here is the list of my mistakes:

Mistake 1 - technique gone wrong - I intended to print the digi stamp and cut it on a lace scallop rectangle with my silhouette. Well the cut file was for a frame and I forgot to remove the inner cut lines and ended up with a frame and the image on a plain rectangle.

 Mistake 2 - torn paper - the silhouette ripped one of the scallops, so I ripped a bunch more so that it looks like the scallops frayed in the wind blowing the girls hair.

 Mistake 3 & 4 - blurred images and partially stamped image - the stamping of the background did not go so well.

 

 Mistake 5 - warped card stock - the paint warped the card stock.

 

You can see the mistakes better in this closer cropped picture.

 

I colored the image with Copics (I forgot to write down which ones, but I think it was YG03, YG06 and YG09 and then BG45, lips are RV10 and the eye is B02????) and went with making her a fairy. And I added some die cut flower to her hair with liquid pearl centers.

The background stamp is by Impression Obsession and I did the paint technique with metallic blue and purple paints.

I've got one more AIR 15 card to share but it deserves it's own blog post.  So I will post that one later this week.

 

Thanks for stopping by and please come again. 



Swinging Tire Swing (Project 15)

I interrupting my Winterfest recap to post an Easter Card.  Mainly because I used my March received kit and I want to be able to link up to the detailed directions here when I post the card over at Artsy Inkers.  Don't worry, I share the rest of the new techniques I picked up during Winterfest in the next couple of post.  And before I start with today's project, I want to put in another plug for Artsy Inkers, Jan/ Far North (here's her blog Far North Designs) is hosting a 3 week Alcohol Inks technique challenge at Artsy Inkers.  We just started week 2 and I've learned a ton. 

Now on to the card.  When I got the kit from my swap partner and saw the tree image with the tire swing, I knew I wanted to make the swing move.

 

What I ended up doing is a variation on a spinner card.  But instead of creating a channel across the card, you just make a slightly larger hole.  Don't worry.  I'll explain.

 

First, you will need a round pop dot and 2 pennies to do this. 

 

Step 1

I colored the background with Distress Inks.  I used Salty Ocean and Tumbled Glass for the sky and Mowed Lawn for the grass.

 

In this picture, you can see where I traced the pop dot on the paper.  I had also traced the tree so I would know where my hole was going to go.  You can see in the picture that I started cutting out the circle by cutting a line down the middle.  I wish I had a circle die that was the right size, but the smallest circle die I have cuts a whole bigger than the penny, which won't work.

Step 2

Make sure the hole is a bit bigger than the pop dot, but not bigger than a penny.

See, the pop dot fits in the hole. 

Step 3

Attach a penny to either side of the pop dot. 

You can kinda see the penny through the whole in this one.

And here is a side view once both pennies are attached.  I actually had to pull on of the pennies off and make the hole a little bigger because it wasn't rocking well enough.


Step 4

Attached the piece you want to swing to the penny.

Step 5

Use pop dots or foam squares to attach the image that is going to hide you rocking mechanism.  I actually cut pieces from the pop dot sheet.  You know the pieces left behind when you remove the pop dot from the sheet.  Oh, and before I added the tree, I stenciled some clouds.  I made the stencil using a Purple Onion Design stamp (it is actually a speech bubble) and dabbed on Hero Art's Unicorn white.

Actually, I may have done the stenciling after attaching the tree.  I also added the squirrel to the tire.

And I decided that the tire was too high up.  So I pulled it off the penny and added an extension to the "rope."  The added bit of paper is a bit messy but I suspect that I'm the only one who will notice.

I also die cut grass, which I colored with Distress Ink in Mowed Lawn and Pine Needles.  I wet the paper well and added some salt for even more texture. The die is by My Favorite Things.  I kinda wish I had put the layer closest to the tree on before the tree and done it flush to the page.  Oh well. I also added the second squirrel and the Easter basket.  The basket is a Studio G stamp.  I colored it with Spica glitter pens and Copic markers and added Distress Ink in the sky colors so I wouldn't have to fussy cut the inside area of the basket.  You can see in the last photo that the tire swing is in a different position than in the first picture.  If you shake the card, the tire swing moves back and forth.

I actually had to trim the grass under the swing because it was too high.  The tree, squirrels and acorns were from my received kit, are Fawn Lawn stamps and were colored with Copics.  And they were fussy cut.  Those squirrels and acorns were a pain.

The kit also included another of the trees and some bunnies, so I think I will be making another swinging tire swing card with bunnies.

I am going to enter this over at the Mixed Media Challenge.



Thanks for stopping by and please come again.

 

 

 

 



Fall Inspired by Hero Arts (Projects 31, 32, 33 and 34)

Only 16 more projects before I can lift the shopping moratorium.

I mentioned a couple of posts ago that I love going to the Hero Arts’ website for inspiration.  Well today's post is several cards I made that were inspired by Hero Arts cards.

 

Card 1

 

Let’s start with the inspiration piece Hero Arts Halloween Greetings which provided the inspiration for the layout and how I did the background.

For this piece, I started by stamping the acorn and leaves on a snippet of X-Press paper with Memento Rich Cocoa.  Then I colored them with Copics and fussy cut them out with my Fiskars fingertip craft knife. The image is by Inkadinkado. 

 

I don’t know about you, but white edges drive me batty when I fussy cut things out.  So I’ve got a tip for dealing with that.  After I cut the piece out, I place it on a piece of scrap paper and run a marker in the same/ similar color as the ink I stamped with along the piece.  Basically I trace the piece on the scrap paper.  That way the edges get colored.  Just be careful, I can’t tell you the number of times I slipped and add a line to the image.  Here are some before and after pictures.

Before

After

 

 

 

For the base, I took a piece of patterned paper and stamped with the background sentiment stamp by the Stampin Place with Versafine in Vintage Sepia and embossed with clear embossing powder.  I added the lace to the back of the piece and attached that to the kraft cardstock.

 

I used a Spellbinders die to cut out the piece for the sentiment.  The sentiment is by Impression Obsession and stamped with Versamagic in pumpkin spice. 

 

Copics:

Acorns -  E21, E23, E25, E27

Leaves - R05 & R08, Y15& Y17, YR04& YR18 

 

 

 

Card 2

 

With this one, I was inspired by the technique used on this really cool card.  Hero Arts Inchie Art

For this card, I took a three by three piece of cream cardstock and stamped it with the Inkadinkado flourish stamp with Versamark and heat embossed with clear powder.  Then I inked the piece with Distress Inks in Spiced Maramalde, Fired Brick and Wild Honey.  And wiped the ink off the embossed portions.  Then I cut the square into inchies (one inch square).  I took five of the inchies and added stamped images and the sentiment.  I added the squares to a kraft base.  Then I added the orange ribbon from August’s ribbon club assortment from Really Reasonable Ribbons.  I made the bow using my bow-it-all and added it with a glue dot.

 

The stamps used are:

butterflies – Stampendous

Acorn  - Fiskar

Big leaf – Fiskars

Small Leaf  – Stampendous

Fall –  Stampendous

 

Card 3

This card is my version of an absolutely beautiful card made by Jennifer McGuire. Jennifer McGuire Get Well.  You will notice that my piece is strikingly similar.  I used different stamps and different techniques but I just loved Jennifer’s piece, and as they say, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  Because it is so similar to Jennifer’s piece, I wasn’t going to post it but, I really like how the butterfly came out.  So I decided to share it.

To create this card, I started with two pieces of watercolor paper.  For the card base, I brayered on Distress Ink in fired brick.  Because the paper has some texture and I used the brayer to apply the ink, it created a cool effect.  I think I misted the brayer with a little water to get better coverage.  For the smaller piece, I used Spiced Marmalade and did the same thing.  I stamped both pieces with Inkadinkado flourish stamps with Memento Rich Cocoa ink.  After stamping, I used my corner rounder on the smaller piece. 

 

I inked a scrap of watercolor paper with DI in Fired Brick for the sentiment, stamped it with DI in Vintage Photo and dovetailed the ends.  I inked the edges with Vintage Photo as well.  When I attached it to the smaller piece, I put a foam square in the center and then used adhesive on the ends to glue them down. 

 

For the butterfly, I stamped the butterfly with Versafine in Onyx Black and embossed with clear embossing powder.  Then I painted the butterfly with twinkle H2Os. 

Once assembled, I added liquid pearls in Cantaloupe and Rogue.  To get them to flatten, I applied a couple of dots at a time and then thwapped (yes, I just made up that word) the card against my craft desk.  Basically, I tapped, with some force, the back of the card against my desk until I liked the look of the dots.  I figured out that given the heat in Florida, the liquid pearls start to set up fairly quickly.  So I had to apply the dots in batches or the thwapping wouldn’t work. 

 

 

Card 4

For this card, I finally gave die cut inlay a try.  I was inspired by this card: :Hero Arts Thank You Flower Branch.

I started by cutting the tag shape with my silhouette from watercolor paper and from plain cardstock.  I actually made a few of these because I donated several to Operation Write Home.   So for the first one, I cut the branch from the watercolor paper tag first and then the leaves.  But that meant when I cut the leaf that’s dangling off the branch, I didn’t get the full leaf.  So I had to re-cut it from a snippet of watercolor paper.  For the rest of the tags I made, I used the branch die to figure out the placement of the leaf, but cut the leaves first.  Hopefully that makes sense.   Then I ran the branch and leaves through my Big Kick again to emboss them.

 

I inked the background with Distress Ink in Mustard Seed.  Then I stamped the background sentiment by the Stampin Place with Tea Dye Distress Ink (I think).  I colored the branch with Tea Dye and Vintage Photo Distress Ink.   The leaves were colored with Spiced Marmalade, Squeezed Lemon, Fired Brick and Barn Door.

I then attached the watercolor paper tag to the plain cardstock.   Then I placed the branch and leaves back into the tag.   To finish it off, I added some ribbon from my stash, pattern paper to the card base and the tag on top.

I'm going to enter these over at Pixie's Snippets Playground - Week 152
 

Thanks for stopping by and please come again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Squirrels! and a Thank You. (Projects 7, 8, and 9)

I’ll start with the thank you.  Ms. Di over at Pixie’s Snippets Playground featured my Autumn Greetings card.  Thank you so much, Ms. Di.  I felt so special.  Now on to the cards:

 

So I have a fair number of squirrel stamps because my mother is affectionately known as the crazy squirrel lady.  She does wildlife rehab and has rehabilitated and released many squirrels over the years.  She currently has a permanent resident of a three legged squirrel named Tripod Nubbins.  So I’ve accumulated many squirrel stamps.

 

Card 1

 

I stamped the squirrel with Hero Arts Shadow ink in Just Right and layered it on textured cardstock squares, putting the brown square at an angle.  The top is actually orange but it looks more yellow in the picture. The purple textured cardstock is punched with a Fiskar border punch and I stamped the sentiment with the HA Just Right Shadow ink.  It still needed something, so I took the pieces punched out of the purple and attached three to the top corner. (Do they count as snippets?) I’ve got tons of little ziplock baggies full of the punched bits from when I use border punches.  I’m such a pack rat; I can't throw the bits out. I figure I'll use them eventually.  So at least I used a few on this one. The rest went in a baggie.

The squirrel is an Inkadinkado stamp and the sentiment is by TPC Studio.

 

Card 2

 

This little guy is a digital stamp by A Day for Daisies.  I used my silhouette to print him and then cut the shape out.  I colored him with chalk and sprayed with a sealer.  The pattern paper I found in a paper storage container I bought when I first started card making, about seven years ago, and that I uncovered when I was organizing my papers a couple of months ago.  So I’ve probably had this paper that long.  I originally planned on adding some paper flowers to this piece, but I just wasn’t feeling it.  I decided to leave this one fairly simple.

 

Card 3

 

For this one, I stamped the image on X-press It paper with Memento Tuxedo Black.  I stamped the big acorn on a snippet of X-Press It paper with Memento Rich Cocoa and the acorn hat on a snippet with Memento Tuxedo Black.  I colored the images with Copics (the list of colors are at the bottom of this post) and a silver metallic color pencil.  I fussy cut the acorns with my Fiskar fingertip craft knife.  I love that thing for fussy cutting.  It takes a little getting used to but once you do, the control is amazing.  I popped the large acorn with foam squares but I just glued the hat on flat.  I wanted a little dimension but I was afraid popping it up would hide the squirrel's eyes.  The stamps are by Inky Antics.  The pattern paper and textured cardstock are from my stash.

Here's a close-up of the squirrel's acorn cap.

 

Copics:

Acorns – E21

                E23

                E25

                E27

Squirrel – E11

                E17

                E19

Basket – YR20

                YR21

                YR23

                YR24

                YR27

 

I'm entering Card 1 and 3 over at Pixie’s Snippets Playground

 

Thanks for stopping by and please come again.