Stampin'Blends

Stampin'Blends

Okay, Stampin'Up! has brought back the alcohol ink blend markers. You might remember they had these few years back (blendabilities), but they had some problems with the tips drying (they were not airtight). So now they have fixed the problem (??).

I know, I'm a Stampin'Up! independent demonstrator, but I haven't been able to jump this wagon yet. I guess I'm waiting for the verdict, weather they are problem free or ....

I like how they have reduced the nr of pens to 2, instead of the previous 3. I found that the 3 pens were almost too close in tone, so this is much better. 

I also find that since Stampin'Up! introduced the watercolour pencils and now the BRUSHO Crystal ink... there are other colouring options available, so I really don't need another one.... maybe I'll order few next time just to see if I like them....

But click on the link above to see the new colour options!

FINALLY some crafting!!

LOVE that new Painted With Love paper!!! and check out those PRETTY butterflies!!!

Okay, I know it's been awhile since my last blog post. I returned back to Canada on January 7th, but have been recovering from a VERY bad cold ever since. I actually got sick a week before Xmas, and I STILL have a cough!!! And I've seen a dr, got some meds, but still... it just lingers on.

But I must be getting better, since I've been crafting for the past few days!!!
Well... actually I've been busy finishing off a night stand (once it's at its fully finished, I'll post it here).

So this blog post is about crafting.

Yesterday I made a Wi-Fi sign for our guest bedroom. From this picture I blurred out our network name and password, but on the print they are printed with a very easily readable 'PT SERIF'-font. This way there are no questions about what letters, capital or lower case, and numbers there are in the password. You know how some fonts you cannot tell if it's a lower case L (l) or number one (1). But I found on 'PT SERIF'-font it's very clear. I used My Memories Suite 6 -program to make the sign (this is similar to the old Stampin'Up My Digital Studio program (same program developer), but since Stampin'Up got rid of the MDS, I upgraded to My Memories Suite, which gets updates regularly.
(You can still use the old MDS files in this program... too bad you cannot get the new Stampin'Up! images for it).

I also decorated the plain white frame with Washi Tape. The tape is from the latest Holiday Catalogue (no longer available). And the font visible in this picture is 'Jane Austen'.

I've also been playing with the new BRUSHO Crystals (available in the new Occasions catalogue, p.26). The BRUSHO Crystals are Watercolour ink crystals!!
So you can either sprinkle them on the paper and add water (either by spritzing or with a brush, depending on what effect you want), or you can add water on your card stock and THEN add the crystals. The cool thing is that you never know what kind of result you get. Okay, sometimes it can be annoying, as you want to create a certain kind of a background, and the end result is totally different.

On the picture you can see the pink and orange versions. They are created with a brush (smoothing the colour after adding water and the crystals). The others are done either by adding crystals and spritzing the paper, or by adding water with a brush and then sprinkling the crystals on it.

The biggest problem for me with these is that I have to WAIT!!! So I tried different kind of techniques, then let them dry until the next day (you don't need to wait THAT long, but I didn't have the time/energy that evening to finish them). So the hard part was to go back to the created pieces and trying to figure out what to make out of them. You can also add new colours after you let the original piece dry. I have a card coming up on that also.

So here are few cards waiting to be properly photographed in my lightbox. You can see the pink and the orange one used here (oops, one of the cards had decided to open too much... I guess you just have to wait few days to see it).

Merry Patterns, special Hostess set

I just love this stamp set - unfortunately it was only available for hostess orders for the month of October. Just too soon for holiday crafts. I got mine, but didn't get to use it until December!!

I love the easy two step stamping with photopolymer stamps. And even if you are not 100% matching, it still looks pretty good!

So I made this one card with 3 different colour combos, using the special metallic snow flakes available from the Holiday Catalogue. The pack has 2 different colours of metallic snow flakes - gold and silver. The back of the snow flake is white, so I guess you could use them white also.



The first two colour combos where on Whisper White card stock, using Night of Navy card stock as a layer, Silver snowflake and on one the deer and the pattern sentiment has been stamped with Night of Navy, and on the other using in-colour 'Powder Pink'.





My favourite colour combo was the first one, which actually surprised me. I don't particularly like Very Vanilla, it's just a bit too yellow. I also don't care for the new in-colour 'tranquil tide'. But in this card, combined with the gold, it just looks 'trafidional'. The pattern stamp in the sentiment 'season' and the deer head has been stamped with Sahara Sand. The wood pattern paper (where the deer is stamped) is from Wood Textures Designer Series Paper Stack.

Then a very simple design. Just using single layer of Thick Whisper White Card Stock!. The stamp is from Merry Patterns special Hostess set. I stamped the outline deer with Archival Black Ink and then coloured the pattern version with Real Red marker (just the sweater part). Stamped the red sweater on the deer and then hand coloured using Sahara Sand Marker the head and the legs. I tried first colouring the stamp with two colours, but the image ended up smudged.

The border is hand drawn with Basic Black marker. The idea for this card came from Pinterest. I saw a german demonstrator doing this and thought it look very Scandinavian!

Using leftovers in card making!

This card came up from bits and bobs that I had left from the earlier scenery cards. I cut some folds on the card to create a 3D effect and glued the houses on the folded stubs. I did colour the houses before attaching them on the card base.

Here is an overhead close up view of the houses.

There are three pieces attached in front of the 3 tabs. One piece is actually tucked going under the middle tab and one piece is attached on the left tab.

Here is a side view of the tabs and the image placements. The colouring is done with ink and aqua painter and some are done with watercolour pencils and blender pens.

let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Here are four different takes on the same card. All using the snow flake embossing folder (from the Holiday Catalogue). The last card has the snow flake embossed 'reversed', which looks really cool too.

The other differences are just the colours and the sizes of the snow flakes set on top of the card. The last card has only one golden snow flake, the rest of them are white (cut from Shimmery White card stock). The snow flake dies are from Seasonal Layers Thinlits set. 

Santa's sleigh

I saw this idea on Pinterest and wanted to give it a try. I first heat embossed the 'snow swirls' (or are they stars....) with versa mark and clear embossing powder - YES, it is clear but because it is on white card stock and inked after, it shows white!

Once I had heat embossed the images, I started adding ink with sponge daubers. I used the darker blues at the 'tips' or centres of the swirls and lighter tones to the edges. I even used some Tempting Turquoise on this! Then I stamped the images from Hearts Come Home stamp set with Early Espresso and added some 'snow' on the house and trees with White craft ink and a paint brush.

Colourful Scenery

 I saw this idea on Pinterest, and wanted to try couple of versions of it. I loved the idea of fully coloured houses, but the execution of the third version is not the best, mainly because I used Shimmery White card stock for the cut out houses, on a Whisper White card base. Plus I think I would prefer colouring the houses with Watercolour Pencils and then add water to make it look painted, rather than using ink and aqua painters.

These two cards are similar. The second one is layered a little bit tighter, just because I cut the pieces a bit shorter. So if you want it not so tight, make sure you have enough white space below the houses to tuck behind the lower layer!

And here is a close up of the fully coloured houses!