Beautiful Blues

I made this card for a friend who has had quite a few sadnesses lately, which she has been handling so admirably that I aspire to do as well when I need to. Things like this can be especially hard this time of year I think. I just wanted to let her know I was thinking of her.

My inspiration for the colors and the dark cardstock is from a post that Yana Smakula did for some Christmas cards. You can find her post here. I am so addicted to this color combination, that I also made Christmas cards, a Sympathy card, and a bunch of Birthday cards using the same colors. I have used several different flower and sentiment stamps for these cards. I think the colors turn out to be dramatic and beautiful on the dark background.

Using the Hello Lovely stamp set from Concorn & 9th, I stamped the floral image on the left side of a dark blue piece of cardstock with Versamark ink. I embossed it with JudiKins Gold Detail embossing powder and started coloring the image. 

I used Prismacolor pencils PC1091 Green Ochre, PC1005 Limepeel, and PC919 Spring Green for the leaves. For the flowers I used PC105 Cobalt Turquoise, PC905 Aquamarine, PC992 Light Aqua, PC1009 Dahlia Purple, PC995 Mulberry, and PC934 Lavender. I especially love the combination of the blue colors, and in the Christmas cards I only used the greens and blues and not the purples.

I colored so many cards with these blue colors that I used up almost an entire pencil of Cobalt Turquoise, and I hand sharpen my pencils, so I'm not grinding them through an electric sharpener.

I had to use this pencil extender that I bought one year from Terry Medaris (no I'm sorry, I don't think the extenders are available any longer...at least if they are I don't know where you can find them) because my pencil is literally 2.25" long at this point. I looked for where I might find this color locally, but could not find it, so I sent to Dick Blick for more. (Dick Blick will sell individual colors of Prismacolor pencils very reasonably).

I stamped the sentiment from Simon Says Stamp Thoughtful Messages with Versamark ink and embossed it in matching gold.

I die cut the panel with a stitched rectangle die from My Favorite Things (MFT-463 Blueprints 13), which has a die that perfectly cuts a size 5.25" x 4" rectangle, with a nice stitched edge. I mounted the panel onto a piece of Curious Metallics Super Gold cardstock, and then onto a horizontally folded white card. At the end, I added some gems from Little Things from Lucy's Cards (clear and blue).

For some of the birthday cards I used white embossing powder, and the Sympathy card was done on black cardstock with silver embossing. When you emboss with white, there is a slight problem when you are coloring. It's difficult not to color over the embossed lines, and they they turn color and don't stay crisp white.

It can be difficult and time consuming to avoid all of the white embossing lines, and even if you manage to, some of the colors will get on the white. The pencils are intensely colored. Yana Smakula thought of an ingenious solution to this problem, but you need a stamp platform to do it successfully.

Using a stamp platform, stamp the flowers onto your panel in a color that you can see on your cardstock, and be sure to leave the stamp in your positioner. On your panel, color in all of the flowers and leaves. When you are finished coloring, put the panel back into the positioner, making sure to use anti static powder over the colored image, and stamp over your coloring with Versamark ink. Then emboss in white. The embossed image will come out crisp and clean. I don't dislike getting some color on the white, but if you want to see Yana's post and her video with that technique, click here.

To show you how this looks with silver embossing on black cardstock, below is the Sympathy card panel I made before it was mounted onto a base card. The sentiment is from Magenta 07.928.I With Sympathy.

The Christmas cards I did were embossed in gold and I used a different stamp set. I will post one soon to show you. For my Christmas cards, I'm planning to do about 10 each of at least 7 different designs (that is the plan right now anyway). I have 2 different ones nearly done so far. I will post one of each design for you as I go along.

It takes a while to color these cards, but I find it relaxing. I stamped a bunch of the Christmas ones and quite often at the end of the day I put on a podcast and just color. I love it!

Thanks for checking in with me!

Magenta Stamp

07.928.I With Sympathy

Other Products Used:

Concord & 9th 10135 Hello Lovely Stamp Set

Simon Says Stamp 101740 Thoughtful Messages

Die-namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die set

Versamark ink

JudiKins Detail Gold Embossing powder

JudiKins Detail Silver Embossing powder

Prismacolor pencils:

PC1091 Green Ochre

PC1005 Limepeel

PC919 Spring Green

PC105 Cobalt Turquoise

PC905 Aquamarine

PC992 Light Aqua

PC1009 Dahlia Purple

PC995 Mulberry

PC934 Lavender

The Paper Cut Deep Blue 80# cardstock

Curious Metallic Super Gold 111# cover cardstock

Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock

Jewels from Little Things from Lucy's Cards:

Ice Cube Mix

Deep Pool Mix

Thanks to Everyone

This is the last Thank You card in this series. I really want to thank everyone who was there for us at Art 'n Soul in the last month we were in business. Thanks to our customers and all of our vendors, especially the ones who helped us and went out of their way to make things easier. Thanks to Magenta, Rubbermoon and Stampscapes especially for facilitating our last orders. Thanks to our great rep Steve Meyer at Notions for making sure we got everything, and thanks to all of our very loyal customers. We will miss you greatly! Please like us on Facebook and occasionally when we find something interesting to share we will post there.

As for me, I will continue with my blog posts, and work through my big box of stamps and dies that I have not yet used. I hope you like what I have created and thanks for looking!

I really love this leaf collage die from Poppy. It has plenty of space in the center, so that you could stamp a variety of sentiments. I first cut the die out of a piece of Curious Metallics White Gold cardstock. I centered one of the Memory Box Stitched Square Layers dies over the leaf cutout, and ran it through my Big Shot. It makes such a perfect size square with a pretty stitched edge.

I stamped the You Are awesome stamp (from Simon Says Stamp Thoughtful Messages) in the center of the wreath in Versafine Onyx Black ink and embossed it with clear embossing powder. Since I was using a coated paper, the ink really needed to be embossed because it would take way too long to dry, if ever. If you use regular cardstock, you may not have to emboss it if you don't want to.

Next I cut the leaf collage die out of Yupo paper that was covered with alcohol ink in Fall colors. I intended to keep all of the pieces still in the die, but they fell out. I kept all of them right where they fell, and carried my cutting plate to my work table.

I covered the back of the white panel with scor tape, so that the openings were covered with adhesive. When you turn your piece over, all of the openings are sticky. The leaves I had cut out of the Yupo paper were still on my cutting plate in approximately the right order, and I just placed them in the openings of the white panel one by one. This part went very quickly and easily.

Again using the Memory Box Stitched Square Layers, (the next size up) I die cut a panel out of So Silk Glamour Green cardstock to frame the white panel. I mounted the panels onto a base card of Neenah Cream 110# cardstock cut and scored to 4.25" x 5.5"

Using the "Script Thanks" die from Simon Says Stamp, I cut out the "Thanks" sentiment from Glamour Green cardstock and adhered it below the squares. Under that, using Versafine Onyx Black ink, I stamped the message "for everything" that is from the Memory Box Spring Lilacs set.

This card came together very quickly and could be used for lots of occasions. It could be used for Christmas using green leaves and adding red dots for berries; or for Spring using just different greens for the leaves.

Products Used:

Poppy 1952 Wreath Collage

Memory Box 30038 Stitched Square Layers

Memory Box CL5199 Spring Lilacs Stamp Set

Simon Says Stamp SSS101740 Thoughtful Messages Stamp Set

Simon Says Stamp SSSD111718 Script Thanks die

Ranger Alcohol Ink

Tim Holtz Yupo paper

Versafine Onyx Black ink

JudiKins Detail Clear embossing powder

Curious Metallics White Gold cardstock

So Silk Glamour Green cardstock

Neenah Cream 110# cardstock

Thank You Memory Box

Dave and Monica Brethauer from Memory Box/Poppy helped us out a lot during the last days at Art 'n Soul. I won't go in to all of the nice things they did, but they really went the extra mile in making sure that every single customer who ordered with us at the end received their dies or stamps that they wanted. I'll just say that multiple mailings were required, and they were so kind to us. We appreciated it immensely.

I made this card from the pieces left over from the card on my previous post, and I really love how it turned out - even better than the last one. You can see that one here. The outlines of the leaves here came from the Yupo paper that I die cut for the last card. The gold leaves came from the gold outline for the last card. The "thank you" streamer is cut from the same Metallics Super Gold cardstock. The gold leaves were inlaid into the Yupo outlines and due to the magic of die-cutting, they fit perfectly.

The leaf borders and thank you sentiment were mounted onto 110# Neenah Cream cardstock. In this photo, it looks like there is a green border around the card, but there is not. The final size of the card is 5.5" x 4.25". This makes the perfect Fall thank you card.

Materials used:

Poppy 1858 Brilliant Leaf Border die

Poppy 1796 Thank You Streamer die

Ranger Yupo paper

Alcohol inks: Sunset Orange, Terra Cotta, Sunshine Yellow,

Raspberry, Flamingo, Botanical, Gold Mixative

Curious Metallics Super Gold cardstock

Curious Metallics White Gold cardstock

Thank You Postal Carriers!

When Art 'n Soul was about to close, I wanted to make a few Thank You cards for some people who had helped us out; not only helped during the closing, but all along the way. One of those people was our Postal Carrier. She always had a smile and a kind word for us. When she was not working, our mail was often delayed past closing time. She was genuinely sorry when she heard we were to close.

There was absolutely no stamping on this card. I took a piece of Yupo paper and covered it with alcohol inks in Fall colors.

I die-cut the Yupo paper with the Poppy 1858 Brilliant Leaf Border die. This die cuts out a border of leaves, but also cuts out an outline. I cut it out at the top and bottom of the Yupo, but also cut it out of Curious Metallics Super Gold cardstock twice to create the gold outline that I used. I pieced the Yupo leaves into the outline borders, and pieced the Yupo background between the top and bottom border.

At first I cut the "thank you" sentiment out of the gold cardstock also, but it was completely lost in the busy alcohol ink background. I cut it out again out of Curious Metallics White Gold cardstock and stuck it down in the center of the card, right over the gold sentiment. That gave it some dimension and you can also see it much better.

I mounted the panel onto a base card of 100# Neenah solar white cardstock, sized at 5.5" x 4.25", and I applied some Nuvo Seashell Ivory drops.

I saved the leaf outlines that I cut from the Yupo paper, and also the gold leaves that were cut out when I made the gold leaf outlines above. I will share the card that I made with those in a post very soon.

Materials used:

Poppy 1858 Brilliant Leaf Border die

Poppy 1796 Thank You Streamer die

Ranger Yupo paper

Alcohol inks: Sunset Orange, Terra Cotta, Sunshine Yellow,

Raspberry, Flamingo, Botanical, Gold Mixative

Curious Metallics Super Gold cardstock

Curious Metallics White Gold cardstock

Nuvo Ivory Seashell drops

Happy Birthday Fred!

Sorry that I have been absent from the blog for so long. Many of you who know me know that Art 'n Soul, the shop where I have worked the last 6.5 years, recently closed and I have been super busy with helping to facilitate that for a while. I have promised my customers that I will continue to post to my blog, and I will try to post more often.

Other than the shop closing, I've had a wonderful year, including a trip to Holland and Iceland. I had a lot of lovely company this summer also. All through that time I shopped (many of my guests were artists and stampers, and I had to take them around, didn't I?) and acquired lots of stamps, dies, stencils, inks, paper, etc. I decided to put all of my new stamps and dies in a box (and then I had to get a larger box). I'm going to try to use everything in the box before I put those things in their places in my bins. That might mean that next summer you may see things I acquired this past summer. Sorry about that, but I'm determined to use everything!

To kick it off, I used a new die from Poppy for a birthday card for a dear friend from Holland. I'm sure he would not mind my posting it here.

I wanted to keep it simple because of mailing it to Holland, and no sequins or glitter because..guy card.

I die cut a panel of white linen textured cardstock using the largest of the Lawn Fawn Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables LF768.

I then used the Poppy die 1949 Oak Leaf Oval Collage, that is new this Fall. I really like collage type dies. I placed the die right in the center of my panel and cut it out.

Behind the Oak Leaf panel, I mounted a piece of Yupo paper that I had covered with alcohol inks in Turquoise, Pool, Mermaid, Amethyst and Raspberry.

For the sentiment, I stamped the Dutch Happy Birthday sentiment from the Magenta Multilingual Happy birthday stamp 07.907.L. I actually have several of this stamp, and I cut apart one of my cling ones. It has Happy Birthday sentiments in English, French, Icelandic, Spanish, Dutch, Japanese and Russian. If I don't have room for all of them on a card, I like to be able to use just the one I want. I stamped it with Versafine Deep Lagoon (when oh when will the new Versafine Clair colors be out in this country)?

I mounted the panel onto So Silk Glamour Green cardstock and then onto a 110# Neenah Solar White base card. I hope you like it!

Magenta Stamps Used:

07.907.L Multilingual Happy Birthday

Other Products Used:

Poppy 1949 Oak Leaf Oval

Lawn Fawn LF768 Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables

Tim Holtz Yupo paper

Ranger Alcohol ink: Turquoise, Pool, Mermaid,

Amethyst, Raspberry

Versafine Deep Lagoon

So Silk Glamour Green cardstock

110# Neenah Solar White cardstock