HAI Christmas Cheer

 Hi there and welcome back! Today I have another card for the Holly and Ivy Challenge, which is always anything goes!

I decided to go with the Sweet Poppy set of the bauble stencil and die! Love this combo! So versatile!

First I inked the bauble stencil with Distress inks Worn Lipstick and Wilted Violet. These inks blend so nicely!

Next I stamped the little image and sentiment from the Stampin' Up Warm and Toasty set in VersaFine Claire Monarch ink.

The bauble was then die cut using the coordinating die.

I layered this to a piece of blue card which was then layered to a white card base.

A pink and blue ribbon were then added to finish off the card.

That's it for today. I hope you will join in the challenge?

Till next time,

Shona

Turner Syndrome Awareness

 Today I am sharing a card I made specifically for a Challenge that promotes Turner Syndrome Awareness. I first became aware of  Turner Syndrome two years ago when the stamping community, headed up by Lori Kobular, started the Turner Syndrome Awareness Blog Hop. 

Turner Syndrome is a genetic disorder where a female is born missing all or part of her second X chromosome leaving her with life-long medical issues and learning disabilities. This condition occurs one in 2,000 female births worldwide, but is more common among pregnancies that do not survive to full term. That is why Turner Syndrome Females are considered MIRACLES! I hope you will go to Lori's site to learn more!

Here is the mood board for the Challenge:

I started this card a couple of weeks ago and it changed directions several times before it was finished. I had this never before used Stampendous Hydrangea Garden stamp, stencil and die set that I recently came across during a clean-up in my stamping room. Since the Butterfly is also a symbol of TSF, I thought this set was the perfect choice!

I began with stamping the hydrangea bloom in my stamping platform with Versafine Clair Nocturne ink. The outline part of the stencil was placed around the bloom and I colored using inkers and some Distress Oxide inks.

This was returned to the stamping positioner and was reinked with Nocturne and then heat embossed with sparkle. The mask part of the stencil was then placed on top of the bloom in the stamping positioner and the leaves were positioned and stamped with the Nocturne ink.

I then placed the leaf mask over the first set of leaves and stamped a second set over to the left.

This was the result, once the masks were removed.

The leaves were then colored using inkers and different green inks, with the bloom and leaf stencils being put in place of areas not to be inked.

The butterfly was then stamped, colored with Copics and die cut.

I covered the butterfly with Versamark ink and then heat embossed with Clear Detail and then again with Super Thick Clear. This gave the butterfly a beautiful shiny coat!

Back to the hydrangea, Broken China was applied to the background and then misted with water.

I found this a little darker than I had wanted, so I'll deal with that later!!

I covered a piece of pink cardstock with double sided adhesive and cut out a frame with the Tonic Topnote Trellis Layering die.

Lavender Iris glitter was then applied to the sticky surface of the frame when I took of the protective backing.

To tone down main image I decided to cover it with vellum. I attached it with a little Pixie Spray to hold it in place temporarily. I attached the glittered frame to the piece using a flower and brad in each of the four corners.

I placed the finished panel back in the stamp positioner and positioned the butterfly stamp on top of the vellum.

Just the body of the butterfly was then inked:

The glazed butterfly was then placed on top of the body of the butterfly. Now she has legs and antennae again! The card front was layered to pale purple and then on to a white card base.

I searched high and low for a sentiment. As luck would have it another dear stamping friend, Donna Ellis, had recently gifted us a sentiment that we could use on our personal projects and I thought it would be perfect for my card. However I did have to change the size to fit where I wanted it to go. So after adjusting the dimensions on my computer, I printed it out on the same pink cardstock that I had used for the frame. I then die cut the sentiment using the inside die cut of the Tonic die set. 

The sentiment was attached with some mounting foam. Some pink baker's twine was knotted around the spine of the card to finish off my project.

I hope you have enjoyed stopping over today? I also hope that you take the time to go back and check out the Turner Syndrome Awareness Blog Hop. Not are there many fun prizes to be won, but you can also learn much more about these miracle girls!

Below you will find a complete list of all the products that I used in my project today:

Donna Ellis’s sentiment

Stampendous Fran’s Hydrangea Garden Stamp and Stencil Set

Stampendous Fran’s Hydrangea Garden Die Cut Set

Versafine Clair Nocturne ink

Sparkle embossing powder

Distress Oxide Inks:

Worn Lipstick, Wilted Violet, Peeled Paint, Fossilized Amber, Broken China

Versafine Clair inks: Cheerful, Verdant, Shady Lane

Blending Brushes

Vellum

Copics markers: RV02, Y13, YG256, YG13, W-3

Versamark ink

Clear Embossing powder

Super Thick Clear embossing powder

Tonic Topnote Trellis Layering Die Set

Double sided adhesive sheet

Lavender Iris glitter

Flowers

Brads

Pink Baker’s twine

Foam mounting tape

Along with the Turner Syndrome Awareness Challenge I would also like to take part in the following challenges:

Allsorts Challenge Blog Week 613: Feminine

Crazy 4 Challenges - C4C573: Flowers

Cute Card Thursday Challenge 675: Feminine

Crafty Creations Challenges February #418: Anything Goes

Creations in Pink Challenge #31: Anything Goes: Mainly Pink

Creative Sketchy Girls Challenge #57: Girls Only

Take care, until next time!

Shona

A "FLOCK" OF DISTRESSED BIRDS

Hi there, 

Glad you stopped by today, I've got a fun technique which I have played with before, Coloring on Flocking.  This time however, I used Distress Inks and Distress Markers to "color" my Snow White Flocking.  Even the sentiment is stamped on flocking!

I used the other bird set (Wilson) from the October Reveal. Here are the ingredients I used to make my card:

Distress Inks: Dusty Concord, Spiced Marmalade, Aged Mahogany

Distress Ink Markers: Pine Needles, Dusty Concord, Aged Mahogany, Spiced Marmalade, Black Soot

So let's start with the background, shall we?  I cut a piece of 4" x 5 1/4" Super Adhesive sheet and attached it to a piece of white cardstock. I removed the protective backing and covered the entire piece with Snow White Flocking, burnishing it in well with my finger tool.  I opened the Cuttlebug Leafy Branch embossing folder and applied Memento Summer Sky ink to the raised background of the folder. Taking the "fall" colored Distress Markers I then colored in the depressed areas. I "huffed" to remoisten everything as it took a few minutes to color in all the leaves.

The white flocked piece was placed in the folder so that the flocking was face down to the inked side. It was run through the embossing machine to provide this gorgeous result:

So then on to the birds! Since the Distress markers are dye based, I used Black Staz-On as my choice of ink. NB: If you prefer to use alcohol markers then you should stamp with Memento ink. I'm using the dye-based markers as I wanted to use the matching ink pads.

I took a piece of 2 1/2" Tear-ific Tape and attached it to white cardstock. I removed the protective backing and then applied the Snow White Flocking. The stamp was inked  up with the black StazOn and stamped directly on top of the flocking:

Then get coloring!

What I found with the Distress inks, that matched the Markers, is that I could daub the color directly to certain areas. This gives a more even look than using the markers. It's also a much quicker way to color bigger sections. When you use the daubers, just mask out the certain areas that you don't want colored. You can see the difference in the coloring with markers versus the daubers by looking at the tall bird. His belly was daubed, but I used the marker (Aged Mahogany) for his back. The marker produces a darker and more textured look. 

For the birds below. I daubed both of them (except for the masked eyes, beaks, belly and the legs).

Then they were all fussy cut!

On to the sentiment. I thought I'd see if it worked - and guess what? It did!

I placed a scrap of Super Adhesive Sheet on a piece of orange cardstock and removed the protective backing. I then applied Snow White Flocking and burnished it in well with my finger. I then inked up the sentiment stamp with Dusty Concord and stamped directly on top of the flocking. I loved the result. It was very clean and vivid. I hand cut it in to a fish tail banner.

To put the card together, I layered the background on to a piece of purple cardstock and then to an orange card base. It was then just a case of placing the birds and the sentiment with some Dimensional Foam, though I did use 1/8" Tear-ific tape at the feet of the birds so that the heads kind of popped up to give the card a little more dimension. Now looking at the photo it looks like the little guy on the right has bunny ears! 

Hope I've inspired you to get more colors from your flocking! It can be whatever color you want, or at least whatever color of markers and ink pads you own!

Have fun!

Shona

HELLO MY FRIEND!

Hello there!

Just a quick blog to keep things ticking over.  My eldest leaves for Scotland again tomorrow for his second semester.  Have to say, since he's been home, my schedule has been a little off kilter!  But while he's been sleeping-in, and after I've gotten the younger two off to school, I've been trying to catch up on projects, both inside the house and in my stamping room.

Today, I managed to use up this little Cloud Nine Frog, from Set 482.  He's been sitting on my desk for at least two weeks - he even had a Lator Gator Velvet Glitter Crown at one point! Anyway, after I decrowned him, I still thought he was adorable and then I gave him a little friend - from the same set, (see if you can find him hidden amongst the lily!)  The other set, 47, that I used, for the fence and the bucket, happens to be on sale right now.

Here is the finished project:

Here are the full directions to make the card.

Have you entered your project for the January Monthly Creative Challenge here yet?  New rules - you don't "have" to use SNS images! Things have changed a little. Take a look!  What are you waiting for?

See you soon!

Shona

GHOST AND GOBLINS FALL FROLIC

Welcome to the Sparkle N Sprinkle Fall Frolic!  Today we have a fun array of projects from the Design Team to get you inspired for some Halloween fun and also some ideas for fall.  To be eligible for all the prizes that are up for grabs (a set of your choice and a couple of bonus prizes) you need to leave a comment at each of the posts.  If you got here by the way of the talented Brenda Smalle, then you are in the right place - if not, then you should go back to the Sparkle N Sprinkle blog page to start from the beginning.  Good luck!

For my two projects today, I used the Water Stamping technique. This technique is a really fun and easy way to make backgrounds for your cards.  I hope you'll be inspired to give it a go!

For this first card, I used purple and orange distress inks, and using the water stamping technique, with the little web stamp from the "Fill the Jar" set, I made the background cardstock for my card. The little witch was my first try at making a card with a digi stamp.  Sparkle N Sprinkle now carries a whole line of digital images by Michelle Perkett.  For those of you (I should say us - as this was my first try!) who prefer the "old-fashioned" method, many of the images are or will be produced in rubber also.  So do take a look - I have to say there are many lovely images in her line.  You can find complete instructions for the first card here.

For my next card, I used the same "Fly Away Witch" digi stamp and used the Water Stamping technique to make the wallpaper background:

You'll find complete instructions for the second card, here.

Hope you've enjoyed your visit. Make sure you leave a comment here, before heading off to see what trick or treat, my teammate Julie, has in store for you.

NEW SKETCH CHALLENGE AT SPARKLE N SPRINKLE

I'm writing this, before I head off to Scotland this afternoon!  I hope it publishes while I'm gone! There's a new sketch challenge over at Sparkle N Sprinkle, and if you participated in last month's challenge you'll need to check to see if you were the lucky winner!  So pop over here, to see the scoop on last month's winner and to get a look at some of the designers' ideas, to get your creative juices going!

Here is the new sketch for April:

I decided to make a gift card holder out of the sketch.  Here's my take:

I made my own background paper by stamping the sentiment with some of the new Tuscan embossing powders and then distressing with orange and brown distress inks.  After embossing Leo with Teddy Brown embossing powder and distressing the piece, I then bleached him!  Full directions can be found here for my card.

So come on and give it a try this month - you have an entire month to enter!

Distress Note!

For Gillian's Birthday Thank You Notes, I wanted to make them music-related.  I had some recycled music sheets lying around that had been used for center pieces at the school's last choir dinner.  I crumpled them up a bit more and distressed them with Distress Inks (I only used two colors on the card - Forest Moss and Vintage Photo).  I distressed every element on the card (except for the brads!).  The base layer, the green strip, the torn music sheet, the treble clef piece and the saying label - oh yes, AND the ribbon (that's my favorite piece of the card!)

Both the Treble Clef and the saying were from Sparkle N Sprinkle's Rock 'N Roll Stamp Set 428.  I applied a little Copper Embossing Powder around the edge of the treble clef piece, just to give a little "bling" to the vintage look.

OK, that's all my have-to-make cards taken care of!  Now I'm ready to have some stamping fun!!

Remember to stop by again on the 19th of this month, when Sparkle N Sprinkle will be having its next Blog Hop:  Deco Divas and Love is in the Air.  You won't want to miss the Design Team's creations - not to mention a chance to win prizes!

See you then.