Blog Archives
Spring Card Camp 2 Day 14
Today’s tutorial was presented by Debby Hughes. I would love to be able to watercolour just like her. Perfect realism with wonderful muted colours that I am so drawn toward. To my surprise though, the video was about “winging it” with no or minimal supplies to produce a child-like project.
This style is soooo far outside my comfort zone, that I was literally cringing as I made this card. I had immediately thought of this Spellbinder’s Large die of the Month kit that I had, well, because I had received it as part of my Value Club kit and thought that I would never use it. It did serve to make me feel less guilty about owning it though,when I actually used it. Debby was wondering what type of palette the students would use. She used her more usual muted palette even though she was making a rainbow, but wondered if others would choose a more traditional palette. I decided to use bright Colorburst watercolour, as I felt this was going to be a totally uncontrolled project and Colorburst is pretty much uncontrollable too, so it would fit.
At first, I thought this card would go to the big round file as soon as I posted it, but it is growing on me. I think two of my granddaughters would like and appreciate the rainbows and bright colours. In fact, maybe we will have a cardmaking session when this scourge is over, and make some rainbow cards together!
Spring Card Camp 2 Day 10
Late, late, late today, but it is not because I made a 5 hour card. No, no, no………….I am late for a wonderful reason. One of my grandsons is 3 years old today and I was out for a “drive-by”, proper social distancing, no hug birthday party. Luckily the weather co-operated and we could sit on the deck and watch Theo play with his new toys from a safe distance.
Anyway, the tutorial today was about substituting images for certain letters in a sentiment emphasized card. At the time that I was watching the tutorial, I was in the midst of creating a donut card using an image from Picket Fence and the Wreath Builder stencil from Gina K. The donut on the stamp set was the perfect substitute for an “o” so it was a “no-brainer” to pick this image for my card when I got back from the birthday party.
It came together very quickly and it really is quite cute.
Spring Card Camp Day 14
Today was one of those days where what looked simple and quick, just wasn’t.
The tutorial was presented by the queen of rainbows and blending Laura Bassen. She did not disappoint, as her cards were stunning. As Shakespeare would say, “the fault lies within yourself”, meaning me. First of all, using the word MOM posed a challenge as the alphabet die only has one “M”. I had the devil of a time lining the letters up when they had to go through the cutter in separate passes. Then just when I wanted a smooth white card front, it seemed that every scratch on my plate embossed itself on my card front. When I finally got one card to the stage where I was going to glue the card front to the base, I inadvertently pressed the card front to my media mat. It did not want to come off without a struggle, which resulted in some bends and folds in the card front. This card had to be set aside until my attitude improved. In the meantime, I completed the other two cards. I liked how they turned out. The alphabet die set I used comes with both the shadow and the letters with the holes which makes it very versatile. As usual, the glimmery satin rose gold cardstock looks very elegant in real life, but loses something in the photography. When I look at the card here in the picture, it seems it needs more, but when I look at the card itself sitting on my desk, it is perfect with no additional embellishment.
When I turned my attention back to that pesky first card, I decided to cover the bend and folds as best I could as I didn’t want to start over. The bends and folds were big enough that no little cluster of gems or enamel dots were going to fix it. What to do? My Gemini Foil Press was sitting on my desk from another project so I decided to use that to make some simple but elegant flowers. I think the resulting card remain CAS with a touch of elegance from the foiling.
Whew, that was hard work today.
Rediscovering Foiling
I had brought my foiling supplies down to El Mirage, AZ when I dropped off my car in November, so I haven’t been able to do any foiling projects for quite a while.
I love the look of foiling, although the process can be nerve-wracking. This time, however, the process, for the most part, went smoothly. I found a relatively new foil plate and a nearly new frame foil plate in my stash that I wanted to use. I also just got a gorgeous new foiling sentiment die set, designed by Yana Smakula that I wanted to put into action. This sentiment set is unique in that the sentiment words are basically a single line stroke. This makes the sentiment so dainty and elegant.
I was pretty happy with the results ( I must have been as I have a whole little bag of sentiments in every foil colour). Anyway, Take a look.
Joy Die – 2 Ways
I usually like creating my own arrangements for the fronts of my card, but when I saw this die set from Spellbinders I thought it was too lovely to not purchase it.
I got the inspiration to use the die as a foil plate as well as a die from the internet, but I can no longer remember exactly where. Anyway, this was another set of cards that looks exactly like I envisioned it in my head. The rose gold colour worked well for both versions. I used the Gemini Foil press to do the foiling.
These two cards were made to be samples for Scrapendipity at the Great Canadian Scrapbook Carnival which is on next weekend at Spruce Meadows. Crossing my fingers for lovely fall weather at this amazing facility. Who knew that a Scrapbooking Carnival would work so well with an iconic equestrian location like Spruce Meadows.
Simon Says Stamp – Monday Challenge
The Monday challenge on Simon Says Stamp this week is foiling. They are featuring Gina K Designs and I have lots of her great products. Sadly, I did not bring any of her foil products to Phoenix. I did, however, acquire quite a few “hot foil” products while down here so I am going to enter the challenge using those.
I think that foiling is particularly suited to sympathy cards. On sad occasions, it is not “about the card”, it is about the person we are missing and foiled cards always manage to look elegant without taking over.
The dandelion in this card is from Picket Fence and the sentiment is from Spellbinders.
I had a boo boo on this card as I hovered the Heidi Swapp gold spray over the card one second too long after dripping on some dandelion fluff. This resulted in a spot of faint gold where I did not want it, but the card was too nice to throw away.
Coffee Lovers Bloghop Spring/Summer 2018 Day 4
Today’s card for the blog uses a Spellbinder’s die that I have used before in a post. I was thinking about how the farmers in South America get their coffee beans to market and that made me think of this die. I decided to use the Andes mountains as a backdrop courtesy of a Lawn Fawn die. Of course, because I am ridiculous, I decided to have the llama carrying ready to drink hot and cold coffees, rather than beans. Turned out rather well, I think.
Llama Llove
It is kind of funny how images of certain animals suddenly become popular. They pop up on everything from clothes to home decor and , of course, cards. Recently it has been llamas that have been in the trendy spotlight.
I saw this llama die from Spellbinders, and it was too cute to pass up. I don’t usually like die sets without stamps, but this guy had all the details to look great on his own. Paired with the Paprika paper collection from Photoplay, it was perfect.
When checking out the correct colours for llamas, I found this interesting warning sign. Photo is by Lutty Moreina.
Creativation Cards
It seems like Creativation is already a distant memory, but I wanted to do a post showing some of things I made in the classes I took at the show. There are some that are missing as they were unfit to be shown.
I have sorted them in my head into “must haves”, “Wish list cute” “cute but not for me” and “unfit (you won’t see these as the garbage man has already erased them from my life)”. You can decide which is which.
Here they are:
Lawn Fawn
Waffle Flower
Sizzix
Art Impressions
Wendy Vecchi
Spellbinders
Online Card Class- Day 2- Vellum Techniques
Here is a “poor cousin” version of Dawn’s beautiful card from our Day 2 lessons.
I rarely use the colour purple and I even more rarely use dark purple from my copic markers as it usually turns out too dark. Not so when you are colouring behind vellum as in this technique. Only dark colours show up well enough.
DebSelby
Maverick Muses 