CASEd image

How are you all today? We're past "hump day" and down to the count for the weekend. Yahoo!

I was determined to color this image with Copics but had a real fight doing it for some reason. I started out with blue and purple hydrangeas, but they were hideous. Probably because I don't have enough purple markers. (Do I hear another reason I need some more?) I should have switched to pencils, but I was determined. I ended up CASEing from Debbie Olson's tutorial on coloring this same image. Her blog is absolutely fanabulous, by the way! If you haven't checked it out, you should.

I changed up the layout, but used her same colors for coloring. The DP is from a jumbo pack of K & Co paper and the border punch on the bottom is from Martha Stewart.

Have a wonderful Thursday! I hope you all get in some time for stamping and fun!
Kathleen

Vase of Flowers

Alesa Baker images have to be among my all time favorites. They're so delicate and wonderful for watercolor. I used Copics on this vase of flowers. Unfortunately, I had a battle trying to get this one to photograph properly. The color is off (the yellow halo around the flowers too bright and the white background too grey). I finally gave up, but I need to figure out what I'm doing wrong. Any ideas? I might try switching from my good SLR digital to my pocket digital and see what happens. The border punch is a Martha Stewart punch. Believe it or not, the ribbon is Christmas ribbon that I got for a song in January. Go to love that!

Happy stamping!
Kathleen

Life's a Bowl of Cherries

Woohoo! It's Friday, and I'm off to the CK scrapbook convention in Valley Forge for the morning! Can't wait to see what goodies I can find, although I'm going to try to stick to my shopping list. (Haha. We'll see how that goes!)

I've been playing with Copics again, so I decided to color up this image from Karen Lockhart. Her stamps are fun because there's enough detail to have fun coloring but the images are small enough that there are lots of layout options. I'm sorry...I didn't keep track of which colors I used. I need to get better at remembering to do that. The checked paper is from a Making Memories pack that I picked up at Tuesday Morning. (If you have a Tuesday Morning store near you, check out their crafts aisle. I can often get packs of quality DP for only a couple bucks!) The sentiment is layered on red cardstock cut with the smallest Spellbinders Label Four die. It's hard to tell in the pic, but the zig zag edge has embossed faux stitching along it. Honestly, the stitching is a little hard to see in real life too. I'm a little disappointed with it. Next time, I'll try spraying my cardstock with Paper Glide first
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Here's a close up of the cherries. After coloring them with red, I touched each berry with the colorless blender. It "pushed" the color just enough to give shading to each cherry. It really did make a difference!

Have a wonderful Friday!
Kathleen

One Last American Art Stamp

Okay, here's one last Karen Stolper image from American Art Stamps. Can you tell I was coloring these over the weekend? I promise to move on to something different with my next post. This one was done the same as the last two, except I used the scalloped rectangle die today. I originally planned more embellishments on this one but decided to leave it clean and simple. The DP is busy enough. What do you think?

Have a great Thursday!
Kathleen

Sale at Ellen Hutson's Store

Ellen Hutson has a great sale going on right now. If you haven't visited her store (link here) before, she always has a wonderful assortment of new things. Lots of Memory Box, Lockhart, Copics, Basic Grey, and many more goodies. I'm not affiliated with her store, just a VERY happy customer. I've ordered from her many times and her service is always stellar and shipping is more than reasonable.

The sale runs through July 31. Just enter BEPREPARED as the coupon code.

Kathleen

Another American Art Stamp

Here's another American Art Stamp. I just love these funky, skinny ladies. I colored this one with colored pencils and Gamsol. This one's cut out with Spellbinders Curved Rectangle dies. (I can hardly contain my excitement waiting for the new Spellbinder dies that are being released at CHA this week! Love the Nestabilities!) I sponged this one with chalk ink while the paper was still in the die. Then I decided it needed something else, so I drew a line around the inside of the die, using a thin green gel pen. The paper on this one is from a huge box of K & Co paper from Joann's that only cost about $10 with a coupon. Great deal! There's around 200 pieces of paper in the box and there are very few that I didn't like or that had too large of patterns for cards. The flowers are from Prima.

Have a wonderful Tuesday!
Kathleen

Love Karen Stolper's Images

I'm trying to break out of my rut of making A2 (4 1/4" x 5 1/2") sized cards. Today's is 5" square. I love these American Art Stamp images. I fell in love with them a few years ago when I got the chance to go to the Carson convention. The image is stamped in Versafine black and colored with pencils and Gamsol (odorless mineral spirits). After cutting the image out with a Spellbinders Blossom die, I sponged on Chalk ink before removing the die. The main piece is attached with foam tape on two layers cut with Spellbinders Classic Scallops dies. I don't remember who makes the paper, but I think it was from Joann's.

Hope you're having a great weekend! Kathleen

Away too long

Well, I had good intentions when I started my blog, but then got distracted by remodeling my bathroom. How can redoing one tiny room create such a disaster of an entire house? It's finally finished, so now I have time for blogging again. I'll have some new cards posted over the next couple of weeks. I did get plenty of time to color while monitoring the contractor on the bathroom progress.

There's some great blog candy here that you should check out. Melissa is giving away goodies, including a Slice!

Happy stamping!
Kathleen

Fluffles

I decided to play today with a couple of Stampendous' Fluffles images. I love the silly Fluffles cats. I colored these with plain old waterbased markers. After playing with Copics the last couple of months, I wanted to see how much I could do with the waterbased markers. Not as much shading, but still fun, especially for this type of image. I decided to do very quick layouts. Both Fluffles and the scalloped circile behind them were cut with Nestabilities. On the second one, I ran the bottom part of the base cardstock through a Cuttlebug embossing folder. Hope everyone's having a great week so far!

Happy Mother's Day!!

Finally, I had a chance to stamp this week, although it was something of a rush job. Here's a picture of the card I made for my mother. The picture's not very good, as I forgot to take one before sealing the envelope. I ended up taking this while holding the card in my hand so it wouldn't blow away. We were outside at my brother's house. It was a beautiful day here, but very windy.

The background papers are K & Company, cut with Nestabilities. The only stamping was the Memory Box birdhouse and the sentiment (Hero Arts) with blue daisy background. Both were stamped with pigment ink and embossed with blue EP. It's hard to tell on my pic, but the birdhouse label was mounted with foam tape to raise it, and the sentiment was mounted with two layers so it is raised a little more. I had trouble deciding which color flower to use, so I ended up stacking a couple with a brad to hold them together.

I did this card over the weekend too. I already had the pieces cut out from playing with the Nesabilities Label dies when I first got them. The birds are a Maryse Carrier stamp put out by Stampotique Originals (I still miss visiting the store they used to have in Phoenix, but I would only get there a couple times a year while in Phoenix on business.) I very quickly colored the birds and flowers with colored pencils and then softened the coloring with Gamsol. I though the quick scribbly look with the color fit the style of the stamp. The border on the card is from Judikins.

Quiet Weekend

It was a quiet weekend. After an incredibly, unusually stressful week at work, I was in the mood to first get physical and then just "veg." After spending all day Saturday on yardwork (spring finally seems to be here in Delaware!), with every muscle in my body aching, the stress from the week was gone. That left Sunday for quiet crafting time. I dug out this old stamp from Magenta, which I have to have had for about ten years but haven't used in ages. It's stamped in Adirondak Caramel ink then highlighted with colored pencils. I cut out the insides with an Exacto knife and layered a small square behind so the rust color would show through. The tag on the bottom is just a rectangle with a corner punch done on each corner. (I didn't have the energy to dig out the die cutting machine.) I didn't add a sentiment. I'll keep this card in my stash for an emergency card and will add the appropriate sentiment then. I hope everyone else had a wonderful weekend with beautiful spring weather!

Colorbox Style Stones

There was some talk this week on Gingerwood (link on left sidebar) about Colorbox''s Style Stones. They're discontinuing them, so if you can find them, buy them now! After being reminded of them, I dug out some I had around and played. This was a super fast card. The style stone is colored with wo different colors of inks. I put the darker green on with a small stencil brush, getting down in the crevices. Then swiped a lighter green inkpad across the top. I colored the edge with a Krylon Copper pen (love those pens!). The background is a large stamp from Judikins, that stamped with clear embossing powder and then lightly brushed Perfect Pearls across. It took my longer to dig out the supplies than it acually took to make the card. Hope everyone's having a great weekend and are having time for fun!

Variations on a Theme

I wanted to use some of the pretty papers I've been hoarding and the teacup stamp from Stampington that I've had forever and never used. I couldn't decide which paper to use, so I made three versions. The image is stamped in Versafine black and colored with Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol. Quick and easy!

Happy Easter!

Here's my Easter card, made with a stamp by Magenta. The image was stamped in Colorbox Dune and then colored with pencils.

Magnolia Tilda

The Magnolia images are fun to color. I have young nieces who especially love getting cards with Magnolia images. This one is colored with Copics, which I just started using about three months ago. Love them! I put glass pebbles (aka skittles) over her eyes on the glasses using Ranger's Clear Accents as an adhesive. Unfortunately, her eyes don't show up very well on the close up shot below. They look much better in person and on the shot of the entire card.

Cats!

I started out with a pile of these kittens colored. I usually have a stack of images, stamped in black, sitting in the TV room so I can color whenever I'm hanging out with my boyfriend. Sometimes the colored images pile up before I get a chance to spend time in my stamp room actually assembling the cards. I joke that rubber stamping is an excuse for adults to color. I tend to color with pencils and Gamsol or with Copics. These were done with pencils. I had them colored in two different color combinations (pink/tan and blue/grey). I finally got to the stamp room, so I made two different cards.

For this one, the card was cut slighly smaller than an A2, so that I could attach the square at the top, and the card still fits in an A2 envelope.


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Outlines Turtle

I had a stash of this turtle from Outlines colored and finally had time to make it into cards. I decided to do one suitable for boys and one for girls. On the first one, I stamped a sentiment, but I decided to leave some like the second one. The tags are cut using my Wizard and Spellbinders die. The tag is there and ready to stamp, but I left off a sentiment. Some day when I need a card in a hurry, I can just add an appropriate sentiment onto the tag. The turtles are colored with Prismacolor pencils and blended with Gamsol. The embossed line of circles on the bottom of the card is a Cuttlebug folder.,




This one's a little different. Colored exactly the same, but a different card layout. The background is embossed with a Cuttlebug Embossing Folder (done in my Wizard), with a few of the circles colored in the middle with Ranger's Stickles. The patterned stripe on the left side is a piece of ribbon.

Daisies

I'm in the mood for spring to arrive. We're definitely having the spring rains, but other than that, it's still cold. I'm ready for skies that aren't grey and ground that isn't soggy. Not that I'm anxious for the summer heat and humidity to arrive! So, I decided to do some daisies today. They're colored (quickly) with plain old water-based markers. Then I cut out three of the daisies and mounted them on top with the tole technique.



Here's a close up of the raised daisies.

Quick and Easy "Guy" Card

Here's another "guy" card I made. I struggle with cards for men, partly because I don't have a lot of stamps that would appeal to a man. I could do grungy collage, but even that would be too "artsy" and not "manly" enough for guys like my father. Anyway, for this one, I colored the rubber directly with a combination of green, brown, and blue water-based markers and then stamped the image. I cut the oval layers using the Coluzzle. To make the miniature fishing net, I used a piece of cheesecloth.