Always with Brilliant Blue

I spent most of today playing with embossing powders and using my current favorite SU! set, Always. I had a sampling of double sided papers from the Azure designer series sitting on my desk, which motivated me to work mostly with its coordinating colors, Brilliant Blue and Very Vanilla.



These first two pictures show very similar cards -- the only difference being that the top one has a layer of Bashful Blue to frame the images while the second one instead has a layer of Brushed Gold. The Rumi quote stamp showed up in my mailbox this week courtesy of my dear friends in North Carolina (Hi Fonda! Hi Katie!), so I figured I should start getting some use out of it while they're letting me borrow it. The embossing powder I used for these is called "Gold Fire Opal" and has specks of multicolored sparkles in a gold base. It's absolutely stunning when you see it in person.









This next card is the one I struggled the most with today. I'm not completely thrilled with how it turned out, but it's a lot better than what I was initially going to settle for. The embossing powder is an off-white pearl, except for the saying for which I used detail white powder. After embossing the pearl branch thingey onto white cardstock, I decided to add a little contrast by sponging some Brilliant Blue ink along the edges to make it stand out a bit.






I found some gold floss which coordinates beautifully with the Gold Fire Opal embossing powder, so I put it to good use on this next card. The print paper is from the Azure set by Stampin' Up! The whole thing seemed rather plain, so I added a little interest by VersaMarking a flower circle on the card base for a little interest.






This next card was actually my first one I made today. (I'm posting them in random order.) I used "Crystal Frost" embossing powder which has a grainy white base with tiny multicolored sparkles mixed in. The three blue jeweled brads really add to the design, I think.






Here's some more embossing with Gold Fire Opal. I snagged a stamp from the SU! Sweet Serendipity set for the saying on this one.






Can you tell I really like the stamp with the Rumi quote? Here it is again! The images are layered on Bashful Blue here, and the embossing powder is once again Gold Fire Opal.

Garden Windows

Here are some of the cards I made with the images I colored yesterday. Stamp set is "Garden Windows" by Hero Arts. Oh, and the "Thank You" and "Smile" are from Stampin' Up! sets.






A closer view...

Working with Gamsol

About six months ago (or maybe a year, who knows?) I got me some Gamsol (oderless mineral spirits) and had every intention of experimenting with colored pencil blending. Alas, life happened, and the Gamsol got lost in the shuffle for awhile. It resurfaced today, and it occurred to me to try it out with the Garden Windows Hero Arts set I got last week. I looked high and low for my SU! pure color pencils and couldn't find them, and my PrismaColor pencils are on a shelf too high for me to reach without help... so I pulled out my cheapie Crayola colored pencils to see if they'd work. They did!



I tend to not use colored pencils much because even when I color in a circular motion I can still see the pencil strokes, which I find discouraging. Gamsol solves that problem! I tried my best to get some pictures so you could see the difference with and without using Gamsol. The images on the left are the Gamsol'd set. The contrast is even more striking in real life.





Now to make some cards out of these...

Hero Arts Card Exchange for February

Shirley D. and Barb A., don't look if you want to be surprised!!



And now, to the rest of you...



My adopted mom kidnapped me on Friday, fed me brunch, and then forced me to go to Archiver's (my favorite store in the whole wide world!), where she bought this new set of Hero Arts stamps for me (LL070 Garden Windows), along with some bling. I feel so spoiled!






Since my Hero Arts Card Exchange cards are due to be put into the mail no later than February 20th, I had a perfect excuse to crack this set open and get to work. I chose to heat emboss with black ink and then paint the images using Twinkling H2Os.






Then I assembled the cards using Stampin' Up! cardstock (since it matched the watercolors so perfectly), and then added some of my new bling to the centers of the three flowers. Ta-da!

Faux Silk Technique Swap

One of the folks in the KraftingKarensStampCamps Yahoo Group requested for Wish Wednesday yesterday that more people join the Faux Silk Technique Swap which she is hostessing -- and in a moment of madness I told her to count me in!



Actually, I'm glad I did it. The technique is super easy and fun, and I really like the results. Basically, it goes like this: (1) stamp on tissue paper, (2) smoosh and wrinkle tissue paper, (3) unsmoosh the wad of tissue paper, (4) glue tissue paper onto neutral cardstock using a glue stick. Let dry and trim to size. Voila! You got something that looks kinda like silk.



I broke into my brand new Stampin' Up! set, "Always," which I'm sure you will be seeing a lot of since I love love love it. Colors are Purely Pomegranite, Blue Bayou, Soft Sky, Groovy Guava, and Wild Wasabi. The "always on my mind - forever in my heart" is stamped in black either directly on the card base or on a scrap of Blue Bayou, depending on how straight my first stamping attempt was (*grin*).



The "ALWAYS" flower is four layers: Two scallop punches, a 1-1/4" circle punch, and a 1-3/8" circle punch. The little holes in the Guava scallop were done with a teeny tiny hand punch. It's attached to the card with a Stampin' Dimensional. Fun, eh?



Here's a pic of the tissue paper before I smooshed it:





... and the set of 10 cards needed for the swap:





and finally, a closer view of a single card:

Another Round of Bali Breeze

I've been playing some more over the last few days with the SU! Bali Breeze double-sided papers, and here's what I came up with...



I pulled out my tag punches and the flower punch from the Three For You Punch Box kit for this first card. I really like the teal and red rose color combination.






The woman/butterfly stamp is from Ducks in a Row. I pulled out my heat gun and embossing powder for this card and some of the others. I'd forgotten how embossing makes a simple card look elegant. In case you can't read the quote, it says "To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of the arts. - Henry David Thoreau" I know it's a Stampin' Up! stamp because of the index label, but I wish I knew what set it came from. Anyone out there know??






I couldn't decide which side of the paper I wanted to use for the next card, so I just chopped it in half and split the difference. I also tried a technique I had read about in a Yahoo! group: Rather than actually get up from my desk and get my rose red craft pad (heaven forbid!), I just inked the stamp with Versamark and then inked it again in the rose red dye ink pad. It embossed gorgeously!!






I used my blender pen to color in the flowers on this next embossed image.






I wasn't so sure about this next card because of the colors, but it's grown on me this morning. Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive, and Rose Red is an unlikely color combination, but it seems to work. As a happy accident, I grabbed my Dragonfly Black Colorbox pad to emboss rather than my Lava Black -- and it turns out the greenish black looks great with the Old Olive.






I pulled out punches and pretties to make this next card. I colored the white flowers with markers, and a green jewel brad holds them together.






Don't tell anyone, but these next two cards are made from scraps. I like the first one best.






Of this batch of cards, this one is the one I'm least sure about. But, I can honestly say I've made uglier cards, so I've decided it's not so bad.

Bali Breeze Color Stretch

Today I decided to continue working with Stampin' Up!'s Bali Breeze double-sided designer paper. The colors that coordinate with this paper are Taken with Teal, Pumpkin Pie, Rose Red, and Old Olive. When I saw the papers in the preview brochure, I just HAD to have them, (you know how that goes!), but once they landed on my desk, I spent days staring at the colors and wondering what I was thinking. These colors have me out of my comfort zone, but I forged ahead... and I think I came up with some decent cards. You be the judge.



This first card is the the boldest of today's creations -- don't you just love the paper? I think this is my first time layering the corner punches, and the brads match perfectly with the Pumpkin in the print. The "Smile" is from the Word By Word background stamp. Such a simple card, but fun!






The following card is Old Olive with River Rock accents. It looks a bit washed out in the photo, but in real life it looks pretty classy. Gold Stickles adds a bit of pizazz.






I was hesitant about putting Old Olive and Taken with Teal together in the same card, but with the encouragement of a friend I moved forward on these two; and I'm very pleased with the results. Stamps are from "Embrace Life," and I also used blender pens, white grosgrain ribbon, and green jewel brads that coordinate well with the Old Olive in the center of the flowers.








This last card is Old Olive and Very Vanilla, with gold flower brads to give it a bit of bling. The "Give Thanks" stamp is from The Angel Company. I used my trusty Corners punch and the retired Wrought Iron corner punch. The little envelope came in a package of goodies sent to me by the list mom for the KraftingKarensStampCamp Yahoo! group who was cleaning up her work area and offered to send her "junk" to someone. I jumped at the offer, as one person's junk is another person's treasure! I'm looking forward to incorporating the other goodies into future cards.









I'm heading out today to see the doctor and run some errands, but I can't wait to get back home and continue working with the Bali Breeze papers!

January's Not-So-Great Card of the Month

This pathetic little card took me nine hours of struggling with lots of breaks, and I'm still not happy with it; so I'm dubbing it January's Not-So-Great Card of the Month. Colors are simply Taken with Teal and Whisper White, with the patterned paper being out of the Bali Breeze double-sided paper series. Stamps are from Stampin' Up!'s Simply Said set. It's too vertical for my tastes (yes, it's a design flaw), but at least the ordeal is over. Sigh. Has anyone seen my Muse?



January 28th Addendum: Okay, you guys are right, I'm being waaay too hard on myself. I've been looking at this card for a few days now, and it's growing on me. After making the cards in the above post, I think the color Teal is starting to make its way into my heart... well, sort of. There's hope, anyway. At any rate, thanks to everyone for the encouragement!

Hero Arts Card Exchange

I made these cute little fellahs for my first month in the Hero Arts Card Exchange Yahoo! group. Needless to say, the main stamps used (Smile, Stitching) are Hero Arts stamps; but I snuck in SU! paper (Ginger Blossom) and a stamp from the Garden Silhouettes set.

More Ginger Blossoms Cards

I've been working on another gift set of cards using the Ginger Blossoms double sided papers from Stampin' Up!



The words on this first card were trimmed from the Word By Word background stamp. The stitched look was created with a Hero Arts stamp. Cardstock is Cameo Coral and ink is Ruby Red. I kept the card simple because I think the paper design makes a big impact all by itself.






This simple card was made with the Garden Silhouettes set. I added a little coordinating double-stitched ribbon and used the ticket corner punch to jazz things up a little. When I combined the colors Wild Wasabi and River Rock back in November, I felt I had created an ugly card -- but now I love these colors together!






I let the paper speak for itself on this card, too. Cardstock colors are Ruby Red, River Rock, and Cameo Coral. The camera doesn't pick up the gold flecks I made with my Zig Painty, but they look cool with the gold eyelets.






I used clear embossing powder on white craft ink for the "stitches" on this card, and further enhanced the stitched look by using my paper piercing tool. If I had to do it over again, I'd use white EP instead to make it look more authentic. The single flower is from Embrace Life, and the Native American Saying is from The Angel Company.






This next Cameo Coral card features paper piercing on the corner punch accents, and some Stickles around the flower centers for pizzazz.






Here's an other embarrassingly easy card made with Embrace Life. Cardstock is Blue Bayou, and I used a blender pen to give the flowers a little depth. See the pretty Stickles?






The centerpiece for this River Rock card is stamped in Ruby Red using the Garden Silhouettes set. Punched corner accents are Cameo Coral and Groovy Guava.






I used the Word By Word background stamp again on this next card, simply cutting out the word "happiness." Card base is Wild Wasabi, stitching is again the Hero Arts stamp, and centerpiece flower is colored with blender pen and Stickles.