Box card sampling

I'm back for a quick blog today about my first experience working with SVGCuts and boxed cards.

I made this little beauty from a file I downloaded from SVGCuts today. 

http://svgcuts.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=3&products_id=395

A fellow crafter had these amazing little cards on display at my recent retreat and although I don't normally fall for these types of cards I was amazed at how cute they are!!! I definitely fell for boxed cards lol.

I downloaded the file for this card from the SVGCuts site and chose to use Bo Bunny's Rejoice paper line that had been gifted to me by my friend Deb from All Ways Scrapbooking. Great little home based business! Visit her online shop here: http://www.allwaysscrapbooking.com. Of course I had to add a little touch of Tim Holtz to my project. I used the Remnant rubs called Gilded Holiday for the "peace love joy" on the front flap and his Alterations embossing folder with the poinsettias on it for my gold background piece. Both of these were from an amazing store called Memories and More. Love those gals. You can fine their site here: http://www.memorycrafts.ca

I was floundering a bit trying to figure out how to load and cut this file on my Cricut Explore but after going to the help section on SVGCuts I soon found a video showing me exactly what I needed to do on my specific machine.  So helpful!!! Great video SVGCuts. 

Another great thing about this SVGCuts file is that there is a video tutorial on how to assemble these little beauties on the site. In depth and step by step instruction! So helpful!

After assembling the card I added a little Liquid Pearls in Garnet and Brass to finish.

Thanks for popping by!

In the Christmas spirit

Last weekend I joined 23 other ladies in a crafty fun weekend at a beautiful little lake called Gardom Lake just outside of Enderby, BC.  If you've ever been to this neck of the woods you know how beautiful and lush the forest are here.  To me it's a magical little place with paths meandering through the forest and log cabins that make you feel like you are miles and miles away from anywhere.  The retreat was a 3 night card making fest for me and my focus was all around Tim's mini blueprint Christmas stamps and his holiday wreath.

I created numerous embossed and watercolor cards that reflected the beauty around me.  I kept things simple but elegant using Rangers Queen's gold embossing powder and Tim Distress Markers in: Fired Brick, Tattered Rose on the poinsettia's and holly berries. 

I used Pine Needles and Forest Moss on the pine branch and on the holly leaves.  
 

For the center of the poinsettia and for some of the stamp descriptions I used Spiced marmalade and Fossilized amber.

 My background paper is by Authentique from their Tidings collection.  I love love love this paper!  I walk around telling people to feel it, which may sound strange, but if you know Authentique you know that the quality of their paper is nothing short of amazing.

My instructions are quite simple.  I cut out the watercolor paper and the patterned paper using my Avery-elle double pierced rectangle dies.  I used the largest rectangle for my patterned paper and then the next size down to cut out my watercolor paper.

I stamped the images on my watercolor paper with Versamark and then added Rangers embossing powder.  I heat set it and then put it aside.  I did this step numerous times so I could get my cards all done at once.

Then i took my distress markers and added just a little bit of color to my stamped images.  Once I added the color I took my watercolor pen and added movement to the color.  Basically I blended the two colors together.  It doesn't take a lot of color on your stamped images to get a really great effect so use your markers sparingly when adding color to your stamped image.  I will try preparing a video (first time eeks) to show you how I add color to my stamped images.

I stamped each card using Tim's Mini Handwritten Holidays stamps.

I drew on the stamp with a mix of my Forest Moss and Pine Needles markers and then stamped directly onto the card before it dried.  No worries if it dries up on you too quickly because you can just give it a very light mist of water and it will reactivate the ink so you can stamp it.

Finally I mounted the background piece onto a kraft blank card and then layered the watercolored image on top.

Although these were quite simple to create I love the end effect of less is more.

Have a wonderful day!

Birds and the Bees repost

Hi all,

I'm back today with a project I created about 9 months ago. I was involved in an ATC challenge themed "Birds and Bees" and I was lucky to borrow my good friend Barb's Bird Crazy stamps by my favourite guy Mr. Tim Holtz.  Here is my original project from Pinterest.

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/A7fBcAAQQI0CZIQMkeYAAAA/

I had the bird part covered but was perplexed as to how to incorporate the bee part into my ATC. Finally I had this crazy, and aren't these birds all about crazy, idea to stripe my bird like a bee. Voila, birds and bee all rolled into one! Now to come up with a quote for the card. Lucky me that Barb was around and came up with the quote "to bee or not to be". How fitting! Thanks Barb!!

My handsome bird/bee has drawn a bit of attention on Pinterest so I thought I would recreate him, with a couple of tweaks, for my blog and here it is. 

First I embossed a piece of watercolour paper with my new Tim Holtz/Sizzix embossing folder "Sparkle". Then I coloured in the center of each sparkle with my Mermaid Lagoon distress marker. I gave the paper a few spritz of water with my mini mister to help the distress ink spread. Then I put that aside to dry. 

I stamped Mr. Bird twice onto my watercolor paper. One is for the main bird and the second is for his wing, beak and eyes. I cut those out and set aside. 

My first colouring was the bird base with the stripes on it. With a light coloured pencil I drew my stripes onto the bird as a guide. 

Then I coloured in my yellow and black stripes. Next I coloured in the wings, beak and tuft of hair. Even though these will be covered by my second layers I still like to colour them in as that layer will be popped up.  

Final step was to color in the second layers. 

After colouring I assembled my bird. I added pop dots to the second layers of the bird and placed them onto the first layer. I did take a gelly roll white pen and added a bit of highlighting to that second layer to add some depth. 

Using my Dymo machine I spelled out my quote in two different fonts. I find it adds a bit more visual interest if you mix up your fonts a bit. I cut those out into individual words. 

I placed them onto my background sparkle embossed paper once it had dried. I used a Faber Castell Pitt pen to make the words stand out on the white background. The words were a little too light without the added black. 

Lastly I added Mr. Bird and there we are. 

I hope this inspires you to think outside the "bird" and to try something a little different. 

Fall'ing for minis

Fall is definitely within our reach! Cooler nights, leaves changing colour and more time to spend in my craft corner! Woo hoo!! I love summer but fall is just so beautiful and it gives me even more of an excuse to spend time in my craft corner! 

Today's project was inspired by the amazing Hero Arts. 

I recently purchased the Lia Build a Wreath Hero Arts stamp set from one of my favorite stores, Memories and More. It's so adorable! So many tiny little stamps that have so much possibility.

  

I started out by cutting a piece of heavyweight watercolor paper using my Avery-Elle Double pierced rectangular dies. These are my new favorites!

I very lightly traced a circle into my paper to use as a template for my wreath. I inked and stamped one stamp at a time onto my circle. In total I used 7 stamps from the set. I stamped each stamp 5 times in random angles around the circle.  For colour I used my Tim Holtz Distress markers to ink the stamps. I inked and then stamped quite quickly so that the ink didn't dry on the stamp. Here are the colours I used. Plus I also used Fossilized Amber for a little pop of brightness (not shown)

Once the wreath was complete I added the bird to the bottom of the wreath. I stamped it three times using a different color each time. As a final touch I used my Hero Arts mini wood stamp - Hello and added Liquid Pearls in Garnet to emphasize the berries.

I hope you've enjoyed my short and sweet tutorial. Happy Friday.

Michelle

 

Aloha Fall

Fall is slowly creeping into our midst but in my creative world summer has arrived. 

My project today is inspired by the newly released My Favorite Things Polynesian Paradise stamps and die set. While I normally tend to lean towards the distress style of crafting I couldn't help but fall in love with this cute little set.  Little doesn't seem like the right word for all the amazing amount of goodness in these sets. This set is packed with fun little sayings and characters. How about the little turtle!! So fun

Here is what the stamp and die set look like.

How great is it that you get all those pieces and what amazing options.

Here is a overview of the products I used to make my card and the steps.

First I used my Avery-Elle "elle-ments" Double pierced rectangles die set to cut out my watercolor paper for the background. I can't express just how much I love these dies. That little bit of added stitching around the sides is the best! 

Next I added a cloudy background to my watercolor paper using the Memory Box - Mini clouds stencil and Rangers Texture Paste in Transparent matte. I wanted a very light texture in the background for dimension. 

I coloured in the background ever so slightly using Tim Holtz distress markers. I swiped three rows of colour over the paper and then generously misted it with water using my mini mister. The colours I used were Blueprint Sketch, Stormy Sky and Iced Spruce. I put that aside to dry. 

Next up I coloured in my aloha girl and flowers also using the Tim Holtz Distress Markers. Here is a pic of the colours I used on the girl and the cloudy background. I cut her and the flowers out of watercolor paper as well. 

Cloudy sky and flowers.

Hula Girl

I cut out the Aloha saying using my Avery-Elle dies and then stamped it with Mowed Lawn and Seedless Preserves Distress Markers. 

Once the watercolor background had dried I took my Walnut Stain Distress Marker and added the sandy base that is under her feet. I just scribbled some colour on and then took my watercolor brush to spread it out. 

I assembled all the pieces together using a combination of pop dots and Sookwang tape. I popped up the Hula girl, flowers and Aloha. 

The card base and purple background are from Craft Smith paperpack and card packs.

Hope you are enjoying your Labour Day!

Michelle

Watercolor Crazy

Back in the spring I started experimenting with watercolor backgrounds using the Tim Holtz distress markers and boy am I having fun with it. My first card was a Father's Day card which turned out so great! 

I followed it up with another card.

Since then I have grown my distress marker collection immensely! My poor debit card! 

I purchased the Poppy Stamp Boddington Tree Cluster die recently and thought it would be fun to use the cutout on my existing watercolor technique. The results were great. Instead of stamping with black ink this is another great option. 

At this point I have realized that watercolor makes me happy! I have so much fun seeing how the colours blend and matching different cours together. 

Hope you enjoy my projects!

Planner madness

Recently I've noticed a lot of activity and popularity around Planners/Filofax. After seeing many photos of these wonderful little organizational tools I had the planner bug bite me as well. I purchased my first planner from aliexpress.com. To say I was happy with what I received is an understatement. This lovely A6 arrived at my door in no time at all and it's the perfect color. Having seen Heidi Swapp's fabulous planner collection I couldn't help but get some in anticipation of my planner arrival. Kind of sounds like I'm expecting the arrival of a baby ;-) haha. So this is my collection on arrival day. I also purchased some journal cards at my local Memories and More scrapbook store.

 

I've seen some pretty amazing dashboards in my web travels so I thought I would attempt some of my own. Here is what I came up with. I do love those little paper doilies. 

I have found that those great 12x12 sheets of paper have some amazing quote journal cards on them so I incorporated them into my designs. I bought laminate sheets from the dollar store and self laminated these for durability. After having struggled with those sheets I've decided a laminating machine is in my near future!! Lastly I added eyelets to the last two. It just makes them a bit sturdier and adds a little shiny bling to them. 

Thanks for stopping by!