Is she done?

Well, honestly, I don't know. How sad is that??

I worked and worked on this for several days. As I said before I've been in the mood for white pencil on this background color. I thought she (Oak, Ash & Thorn from Third Coast Rubber Stamps) came out lovely, especially when I cut around pieces of the leaves and curled them up a little bit.

The first mat is multiple colors of Distress Inks (Vintage Photo & Frayed Burlap) applied with a blender tool. Then I stamped a wood grain background from Rubberstamp Ave with Walnut DI. Finally I added more leaves in white.The second mat was just a nice piece of brown card stock, but I outlined it with one of my new spica pens. Of course since I had the spica pen in hand.... Perhaps you can see a tiny bit of sparkle in her eyes? Yup! Had to add the spica there too!

I attached some of the gorgeous ribbon I bought by the yard at the (not so) LSS to the gold card base. After attaching the matted image I still feel that there is something missing.

Something perhaps on the bottom right? Dunno. I couldn't think of a single sentiment that belonged there. Well, at least none that I have! :) Maybe some dew drops? Ahhhhh!

So, maybe she's done. Maybe not!

Thanks for visiting!

What inspires you?

I was captivated by an amazing quilt/wall hanging the other day. We were at Pearl St Mall (Boulder's walking mall - an expensive place!) and DH had ducked into one of the shops. I was with ds at one of their playgrounds. I looked up at some commotion and saw that one of the art co-op shops was having a showing. There, against the back wall, way up high, was a gorgeous piece of work. Really intense greens against a dark charcoal (fading to a misty gray) background. I *had* to get closer!

Once I got in there, I found that it was bright leaves against a jagged, pieced background of graduated grays. Beautiful. It was, of course, hideously expensive (although if I was swimming in money it would've been *mine*!) and much too large to fit in my house. Believe me, I really tried to justify it! lol

I couldn't get it out of my head. I wanted to create something that would pay homage to that quilt. Leaves? I have plenty - and they were an easy choice - but they just didn't seem right. I didn't want to copy it, just be inspired by it. And then it hit me! Eyes. Eyes staring at you from the dark. Oooooo. Chilling! :)

First I stamped these gorgeous tiger eyes from Third Coast on white c/s with Onyx Black VersaFine ink. Colored them in with regular ol' prismas (two colors of green) while trying to keep in mind everything I've learned about coloring eyes from Marianne's blog. Not too shabby, huh? Then, a la Zindorf, I worked that brayer! London Fog Memento ink from the top, Black Soot Distress Ink from the bottom. Then I ran the edge of the DI pad along the panel to suggest grasses. Cleaned up the eyes (a little ink stayed on the pencil & made them look dull) and added white gel pen accents.

I chose a green/black shimmery base and stamped the bamboo from one of the ubiquitous clear Inkadinkado sets with Onyx Black VersaFine. Which didn't really stick very well to the c/s, but looked pretty good 'faded'.

I mounted the eyes panel on black vellum, then popped that up over the ribbon and charm. I like that pop of red, although I'm still questioning whether I should have used plain black. *sigh* Am I ever totally happy?? :)

Thanks for visiting! :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving! To me, finally, we're allowed to look forward to Christmas. Yes, I'm one of those people that get irritated when Christmas music starts playing two months early... mostly because those songs get stuck in my head! :)

Now I can feel good about posting Christmas cards, which is my intention today. I have to say that I didn't come up with this idea myself, I CASEd it from Beate (here). This is actually pretty unusual for me, I don't generally *like* to CASE, but this time I just fell in LOVE with the look she achieved. I made two versions, but I think I like them both the same amount - very unusual!

For this first one I used a tree from a set that I bought from Stamp Oasis (part of Rubbernecker now). I've always loved the SU! set Lovely As A Tree but I just can't justify buying it. I think this tree does a great job instead. And yes, those trees in the background also came in the same set from SO. I think the Peace and Joy sentiment also came from Stamp Oasis, but that would have been waaaay back in the day - long before Rubbernecker bought them.

There was a certain amount of 'technique' (if you want to call it that! ROFL) to getting this glitter on. First I squeezed glue (MS glitter glue) along the tops of the branches, thoroughly glittered, then smushed and dragged it downward so it would look more like snow on branches. Instead of piles of glitter! :)

For the second one I used a branch from Third Coast. Again, I think this does an excellent job of taking over for the SU! set. Both cards have Martha Stewart glitter in Carrara Marble on the branches but it's a lot thicker on this one. I wanted to add the piercing that Beate did on this one, I think it adds to the overall feeling. I forgot that I wanted to add background trees to this one too, hence the background snowflakes. They're very light IRL, I think they look just as nice as the trees in the first one.

Here's a closer look at the snowflake and glitter. You can really see all the dimension that the glitter has. I had to use the Martha Stewart glitter glue; it just seemed to hold the glitter better than the others that I tried. I used my Cuttlebug to cut out the snowflake from plastic packaging (one of the embossing folder covers) then coated it with Stickles. The stickles had a pinkish cast (?!?) so I dumped a bunch of the Carrara glitter on the wet stickles and 'smushed' it. That's right, I *smushed* this too! lol

As always, I appreciate your visit!

Recipe for 1st card: natural and bronze c/s, Distress ink Vintage Photo, Chalk ink Warm Green, London Fog Memento, Adirondack Snow Cap, VersaColor Sky Gray, white Gelly Roll pen, MS glitter and glue, Stamp Oasis trees and sentiment

Recipe for 2nd card: natural and evergreen c/s, Ancient Page Pine, Adirondack Snow Cap, Versa Color Sky Gray, white Gelly Roll pen, MS glitter and glue, Cuttlebug & snowflake die, Stickles, Glossy Accents, piercing template & paper piercing tool, branch from Third Coast, 'Silent Night' is a partial imprint from a Hero Arts stamp that says Silent Night, Holy Night

Mom's birthday card

Hi there! Today I thought I'd post the birthday card I made for my mom. Don't worry, she got it already (even though it was late - very late). I think I inherited my aversion to the post office from her! lol

I thought I'd start by showing you the first version. While I love the image panel, the card came out *ugh*. As much as I *wish* I didn't make any mistakes, I'd really rather keep it real. I mean, I make ugly things (doesn't everyone?) but I do TRY to go back & fix it. You just got invited along to see how.... :)


I just love this stamp from Third Coast (well, they are one of my very favorite companies) she looks so purposeful and mysterious. This card just didn't look purposeful - OR mysterious! lol I think I was trying not to use too much black, thankfully I've passed that phase. I can tell you that I worked really, really hard making the base card the right color, choosing the accent stamp & coloring it and making the placement *just so*. Yuck.

Sorry to burn your eyeballs out like that... how 'bout this instead? Oh, much better! Once I got past my aversion to black (really, how could I be averse to black?!) things started to fall into place. By changing the orientation of the image piece and using basic tone on tone stamping I brought life back to the important parts!

You may be wondering about that panel. It's not actually a difficult technique, I just sponged Lumieres on a piece of watercolor paper until I liked the way it came together.

The woman was chosen long after the background was done. I think she was waiting for the perfect background. Eh, it's what I do. Stamp by the seat of my pants, that is!

Thanks for dropping by!

Recipe: Woman from Third Coast, corner from Bo Bunny, Halo Blue Green & Gold Lumiere paint, watercolor paper, Charcoal chalk ink, Brilliance Graphite Black, gold gel pen, black & gold c/s, pop dots

Something mellow

Hello again!

Today I have something a little more mellow - no black! A little amazing, no?

I *love* this stamp from Third Coast, but then I love all the stamps I get from Val. If you've never gone to see her offerings - do!
Once again I was lured by the Distress Inks, they are very easy to blend using Tim's blender. The only problem I have is remembering not to put the edge down first - I'm working on it. Some days are better than others, this time I didn't get any hard edges (woohoo!).

Thanks for visiting!


Recipe: Bamboo Post stamp from Third Coast, background paper from DCWV, ribbon from my stash, Distress Inks & blender, white embossing powder, 'Journey' is from another stamp by Rubber Stampede (partially inked)

Serendipity was the name of the game!

I have something pretty for your eyes today. Something more my 'style' - heh, like I have one!? Anyway, dh has ordered new software for my laptop and I'm expecting it in the next couple of days. I don't really know how long I'll be 'down', but maybe this will be worth checking out in the meantime? :)

This was not even close to what I had in mind when I started, but I guess I could say that about most things I make. *lol* I used a bunch of Distress Inks on Claybord (just like Stampbord) but didn't like the way it looked. NOT because of the board - that stuff takes ink like a dream! I just didn't like the way the colors were coming together. Sooo, I went over almost all of it with Mica Magic inks (love those!) and a makeup sponge until I liked it. IRL the bottom looks like a crashing wave, pure seredipity. Over that I used a background stamp that says things like Diva, Independent, Strong and Woman (among other things). I wish I knew where that stamp came from... I bought it many moons ago at one of my first stamp shows. You know, before I knew how addicted I would get to UM's (that had no info on them). I stamped the woman's face last using Archival Black ink from Ranger. I just love the look of her eyes.

Here's a close up of the grungeboard in the corner. This was my first foray into grungeboard and I wasn't sure what to do with it. This corner seemed to need something flourishy, so I broke into my package and started altering! I tapped it with green ink, then poured Opals embossing powder on it. The ink soaked in so quickly that I got a spotty look to the Opals when I heated it, but it looked intentional - so I kept it!

I edged the entire piece with black velvet ribbon and added feathers from the fly fishing section of the local sporting goods store. Hah! I can find crafty stuff *anywhere*.
Thanks for dropping by!



Recipe: Claybord panel, Mica Magic reinkers, Brilliance gold ink, grungeboard flourish, Opals EP in Eucalypt, Third Coast Rubberstamp, unknown background stamp, feathers, black velvet, red liner tape, green dye ink