Running With Scissors…

Today I’m sharing a card made with Flourishes’ new Lilac set.  I used the small lilac image but the set also includes a larger lilac blossom, as well as magnolias and accessory images.  I simply can never have too many flower stamps.

I watercolored my lilacs on watercolor paper with Twinkling H2o’s, little mini-pots of shimmery color.  This is the first time I’ve made any serious attempt at shading with my H20’s and I was pleasantly surprised with the outcome.  In the past I’ve viewed them as a fun medium for straight coloring with a twinkly sparkle as a bonus.  And they are ideal for that.  But I’ve learned they aren’t as limited as I once imagined.

In my card’s photo the delicate shimmer is not evident but when seen in person it adds so much more interest.  I painted the lilac blooms first with a light lavender shade.  Then I simply dabbed on Wild Plum with the tip of my paintbrush.  The result is this two-toned, highlighted look — very easy.

The paper I used is BasicGrey Lily Kate and the sentiment is from Flourished Words.

Do these look delicious?  Oh, the colors!  This is a sampling of some of my little pots of paint.  The colors are irresistable!

With this small lilac photo I’ve attempted to capture some of the shimmer.  I managed to get the light to pick up parts of it but mostly what you see are the tiny metallic flakes that refract the light.  You’ve probably seen H2O’s before and, if not, I know you can imagine…  You can click on the lilac vignette for a larger view.

It’s time for me to sign off now and settle down for the evening.  I’ll be back to visit and share again as soon as possible.  Have a great rest of the week!

Spring is a time of renewal and new life and I guess that’s as good a time as any for Flourishes to release their new Rock a Bye Baby set.  I see such love and sweetness in these gentle vintage images.  I really do like this set.

There are four stamps in the set, all of which are shown here.  They’re perfect for coloring with soft chalks for the delicate shading and moon glow effect.  I kept to colors that felt vintage this time around but I’ll be looking forward to trying my hand at some different looks, as well.  The crescent moon on the tin was cut out and raised on dimensional foam tape.  I haven’t decided yet what might go in the tin.  Any ideas?  I think some baby soaps would be nice, or maybe an assortment of itty bitty socks or booties.

Here’s a little closer look at the card:

I used some starry, sparkly Disney vellum by EK Success to create a night sky for my background.  It’s adhered with double stick tape under the ribbon and behind the main image.  It’s further secured with the ribbon tied through a slot punch opening in the corner.  After I stamped the sentiment I trimmed around it and snipped the ends to make it resemble a stream of ribbon.  The ecru lace added an additional touch of vintage to the design.

Flourishes has released another set today, as well.  It features lilacs and magnolias and you may imagine it’s a set after my own heart.  I’ll be sharing a card from that set tomorrow.

Now, for a little excitement…have you heard Flourishes big news yet?  They’re no longer the three Flourishes ladies many of us have become familiar with:  Jan Marie Caruso, Nancy Kirk and Sharon Doolittle.  They’ve grown to four.  And who might that fourth Flourish be, you wonder?  Well…

Gosh, I think you should take a little trip right here to find out — I wouldn’t want to spoil her surprise!  I’m truly delighted at this news and I know all Four Flourishes are, as well!

You may also want to check Flourishes’ SCS forum Wednesday, the 14th, for another one of their fun contests with a very generous prize.  They’ll be announcing their big news there, too.  It’s BIG!  And I think it means big, wonderful, exciting things in store for all of us stampers, too!

Thank you so much for dropping in on me today.  Have a wonderful rest of the week!

• Stamps:  Rock a Bye Baby
• Paper:  Not Quite Navy, EK Success Disney vellum, More Mustard, So Saffron, Whisper White, SU! Spring Flowers DP (retired)
• Ink:  Chocolate Chip, Close to Cocoa, More Mustard
• Accessories:  Stampin’ Pastels for coloring, ribbon, lace, ticket corner punch, slot punch, Scotch brand foam mounting tape

Dragonflies always make me think of warm, still summer days near the water — the buzzing whir of insect wings, seed pods snapping open all around me, the occasional kerplunk of a bullfrog leaving its sunny lily pad float for the water’s cooling depths.  There’s a lake we like to visit every year…more a pond, really…actually, it’s a small flooded meadow — picture Walden’s Pond.  No motor boats, not even a boat ramp, but we like to slip a small car topper past the water’s edge and float quietly among the summer sounds all day.  I’m longing to be there this very moment, but I’m afraid summertime isn’t quite here yet.

I was determined to make a simple card today.  I really need to get better at that.  One stamped panel, a sentiment and some ribbon, perhaps?  I was a little surprised at how quickly this card went together.  I know there’s not a lot to it, but I’m beginning to understand the allure of the simple card.

My stamped panel features the KK Originals Dragonfly Double Take stamps from Rubbernecker Stamp Co.  It’s a set of two stamps — a solid and an outline.  I stamped the solid dragonfly image several times in Versamark on glossy white cardstock then rubbed over it with ColorBox Fluid Chalk inks in Lime Pastel and Ice Jade.  I used wadded bathroom tissue (yes, TP) as my blending tool — take up some ink from the pad, then rub it over the glossy panel.  The Versamark images will resist the ink, thus the name for this technique, Versamark Resist.  I stamped the outline on just one dragonfly image and covered the wings with Crystal Stickles.  The white cardstock base has a slight texture to it.  The sentiment is also from Rubbernecker.

It wasn’t until I’d finished the card that I realized the solid dragonfly images have no antennae — dang it!  Poor things, flying around bumping into each other!  Did you notice?  I haven’t been able to focus on much of anything else about the card since I zeroed in on that.  I hope it’s all right.  I was so excited about making a simple card…

This will be my last post as a guest designer for Rubbernecker Stamp Co.  I’ve enjoyed my time with them and you can bet I’m not done using their images.  They’ve been a great team to work with, too — warm hearted and caring of each other.  Thanks, girls, for bringing me into the fold and making me feel welcome!

Just a couple more things… you’ll find Rubbernecker Bucks up for grabs Tuesday at Linda’s Works of Heart (Linda Duke) and Walkin’ On The Bad Side (Sherry Cheever).  Don’t miss out!

Treasure Hunt Tuesday means there’s a free stamp to be had if you can find it (it’s pretty easy pickin’s, actually) at Rubbernecker Stamp Co.  Go here on Tuesday for your Treasure Hunt clue.  Good luck to you!  Have a wonderful day!

• Stamps:  Dragonfly Double Take - SKU: 4021-O, Glad We’re Text - SKU: 25-21
• Paper:  Glossy white, textured white, Tempting Turquoise
• Ink:  Colorbox Fluid Chalk inks in Lime Pastel, Ice Jade and Chestnut Roan, Versamark, Chocolate Chip
• Accessories:  Ribbon, Crystal Stickles

Hello!  There were a few questions about some of my stamp room features, both in comments on my blog post and in emails I received, so I hope I can do a satisfactory job of answering them here for all of you.  I did reply to the emails, but perhaps others might have been wondering about some of the same things so…

I was asked about this chest and what I keep in it.  I believe this is supposed to be a jewelry chest.  It was a gift from my husband several years ago.  He thought, correctly, that it would be an attractive storage chest for the embellishments I use on my cards.  The hinged top opens to a storage area a little deeper than the four shallow drawers.  It really is ideal.  At one time this was more than adequate for my needs.  Little did we know…

I was also asked about this handy unit:

I did a Google search on Stampin’ Up! storage units and found this site where you can see a selection of storage solutions.  I believe it’s the same site where I purchased my unit several years ago.  There is a wall unit that includes storage for the markers, as well.  I love having my inks at my fingertips.  Sorry about the glare of the light, by the way.  That’s my new Ott light, purchased specially for my newly reorganized room.

Finally, I made reference to the fact that I index these various wood mounted stamps in a binder and I was asked to explain how I do that.  Well…they’re rather loosely indexed –  my method is very low tech, but it’s easy and it works for me:

When I first started stamping I kept my few stamps jumbled in a Rubbermaid tub.  I could never find anything, even when it was right before my eyes.  I’d wind up dumping out the whole tub and using all my available time just searching for a particular stamp.  These drawers allowed me to sort them into types.  Rather than label the drawers, I turned the first row of stamps label-forward so I can easily see which type of stamps a particular drawer contains.

To index the stamps in those drawers I started a catalog — a 3-ring binder divided into categories:  flowers, Christmas, baby — that sort of thing.  A page in the catalog will have several related images stamped on it – all flowers or all Christmas, etc.  I can leaf through the catalog to see what I have and make a choice as to what I want to use.  I then go to the drawers and find the stamp.  A particular flower may be in one of three drawers but the drawers are smallish and shallow so not much digging is necessary.

This is my catalog.  Granted, it’s one of the prettier pages in my catalog…I no longer color the images — that was from the old days when I seemed to have more time on my hands.  Back then I was just learning — practicing my coloring and figuring out how to use an image on a card.

I still have every one of the stamps on this page but when I give away a stamp, I simply cross it out on the page.  I mentioned that my system is very low tech…

That’s it for now.  I think it’s time to go stamp something…maybe something from this page…  Have a fabulous day!

I’d like to wish all the moms out there a very happy Mother’s Day.  In fact, whether you’re a mom or not, I hope you’re having a darn fine day!

I made this card for a friend at work who requested a card for her mother-in-law.  When I asked if she had any preferences as to the look of it she said, “do you have any clowns?”  ???!!!

I replied, “for Mother’s Day?”  ???!!!  We both laughed.  “Uh, no I don’t have any clowns but I have this iris I’ve been working on.”  I showed her the partially colored flower.  Thankfully she thought it was pretty and asked if I could use some purple in the design.  Trying to suppress the image of purple clowns, I told her I had a nice amethyst that would look good with the pink…and we settled on that.

This is my Siberian Iris from Flourishes.  You may not be able to see all the dimension in the photo, but the iris is stamped, colored and cut out four times.  I cut out the whole image first, then each layer of petals was cut out and adhered one on top of the other with sections of foam mounting tape.  The petals were lightly sculpted in the process by bending them around my finger.  The coloring was done with soft chalks and sprayed with three coats of a glossy sealer.  The glossy coating added some substance which allowed the sculpting to better hold its shape.

The background is made with Flourishes’ two Damask stamps:

• Damask in Craft White ink on amethyst cardstock for the upper background
• Damask Reverse in amethyst ink on white cardstock for the lower background.

The vase was created with my key tag punch (one end sliced off) from a left over piece of the Damask background.  I sponged the edges and bottom of the vase with amethyst ink to give it the illusion of a slightly rounded shape.  The white hearts on the sage border are from Harlequin and Accessories.

I’ll be back tomorrow to answer some questions about my stamp room.  I hope you have a wonderful Sunday!  Moms — bless your hearts!

• Stamps:  Siberian Iris, Damask, Damask Reverse, Harlequin and Accessories
• Paper:  Almost Amethyst, Whisper White, Sage Shadow
• Ink:  Palette Noir, Almost Amethyst, Craft White
• Accessories:  Ribbon (from Flourishes), silver cord, pink heart eyelet, key tag punch, Scotch brand foam mounting tape, Stampin’ Pastels (soft chalks), spray gloss sealer

It’s not a dream room, perhaps, but it’s my happy space and I’d like to invite you in for a visit.  I’ve finally come to the point where the room actually feels spacious and uncluttered.  There’s more work to be done — customized cabinets, shelving, etc. – but I’d like to enjoy it as is for the time being.  My room is a smallish bedroom with a south-facing window.  In our neck of the woods ground floor bedrooms usually have high windows so, no, I don’t have a good view of the garden while I stamp.  On a pretty day I’m always outside, anyway, so no matter.

I recently turned the whole house upside down to reorganize everything around my new desk.  It’s a computer desk from Staples — it makes an excellent stamping center.  The cost of a real wood desk like this would be formidable, but this is a composite with a fake (but very nice) laminated finish which wipes clean easily with a damp rag.  I love my new desk.  I feel so nestled into my stamping area there.  All my coloring tools, papers, embellishments and most frequently used gadgets are within easy reach.  You can click on any of the photos if you’d like an enlarged view.

We’ll just turn in a circle around the room.  This is the other arm of the desk under the window.  The iris carts, also from Staples, are a perfect fit under the desk.  Formerly, there was a large dresser under this window.  The drawers were too deep to be efficient — too much rummaging through piles of supplies.  The shallow iris cart drawers keep things much more accessible.  The bottom drawer holds hanging files reserved for my new PaperTrey cardstocks.  The Sterilite drawer units alongside the desk hold stamps from various companies.  They’re organized by type and indexed in a binder so it’s easy to find what I’m looking for.

Here we are on the opposite wall.  It’s a pretty short trip.  This desk is my embossing area which doubles as a second work space when I have company.  The desk will be replaced with something prettier one of these days.  I like having a peninsula of sorts in this area so I’ll maintain the general layout.  My embossing powders and glitters are kept in an old spice rack.  I’d like to paint it white and maybe do a little stamping on it.  Either that, or find something more efficient.  The spice rack seemed like a good idea until my collection started to outgrow its home.

Here, you see evidence of a room in need of a paint job.  Yes, that’s on the to-do list.  I did wash all the walls but this spot just wouldn’t clean up.  Honestly, what can I expect from a ten year old paint job?  There are Stampin’ Up! sets on the shelves and miscellaneous stamps in the drawers.  The Stampin’ Up! sets are shelved in the order of backgrounds first, then sentiment sets.  Orange cardstock marks the divisions.  After that comes sets A - M on these shelves.  The rest are across the room.  Someday I hope to have better shelving (or fewer stamps?).  I labeled the end of each box with the name of the set and marked the retired sets with a hot pink highlighter.

The black file cabinet is full of my Stampin’ Up cardstocks.  I’m happy to finally have all my cardstocks and designer papers protected from the fading effects of light.

The designer papers are stored in the cabinet pictured below.  They’re stacked in 12″ x 12″ trays which I purchased from the Paper Wishes catalog.  More Sterilite drawer units make better use of the large open area of the cabinet.  The top drawer of the other cabinet is full of ribbons (in addition to the ribbons on top of the cabinet).  You can see more about my ribbon storage in Ribbon Central.

We’re back around to the desk again.  This cupboard is where the computer tower would sit and, once again, I’ve maximized the space for my purposes with the Sterilite units.

One last picture — I hung a curtain rod the full length of the window for my punches.  These are the large and medium-sized punches.  The small punches are kept in one of the iris cart drawers.  I love my punches and use every one of them, some more than others, of course.  Can you imagine how much space these occupied on a shelf?  This is much better!

There are not a lot of decorative touches in this room but it’s a pleasant space for me.  I’m surrounded by the things I love, tidily arranged.  It gets a little messy sometimes when I’m working on a project — the more rushed I am, the messier it becomes, but it picks up quickly with a niche for everything.  I’m working to make it more pleasant and efficient all the time, but I hope not more crowded.  In the process of all this rearranging we hauled three truckloads of the years’ accumulation to Goodwill (not all of it was from my stamp room).  I also packed up a large box of stamps and other supplies for my coworkers — spreading the love to budding stamp artists.

Gosh, I think I feel like stamping now…  Thanks for stopping by for a spell.  I sure enjoyed having you over.  Let’s get together again real soon, okay?

This is probably my favorite image from Rubbernecker Stamp Co. – no surprise, probably, since I love flowers so much.  But this, in particular, has such a free flowing, light and cheerful personality.  I was tempted to do it in pinks and grays, but I just finished a pink card this weekend so…Guava it is!

Actually, it was this Cuttlebugged piece from my scrap drawer that helped me decide the colors.  I know the ink is Guava but the cardstock might be Marigold Morning.  At any rate, I thought they looked good together and I love the way the hearts in the paper carry the theme.

The image is watercolored with inks.  The sentiment is from Rubbernecker, too, and it’s one I picked up as a companion for this vase — two favorites on one card.  I hope you like it, too!  Here’s a list of the essentials:

• Stamps:  Hearty Vase - SKU:  20 SO CM, Petite Can’t Express - SKU:  2000-03
• Paper:  Wild Wasabi, Marigold Morning, Apple Cider designer paper from SU!, 140 lb. cold pressed watercolor
• Inks:  Jet Black Stazon, Groovy Guava, Really Rust, Going Gray, Wild Wasabi, Chocolate Chip
• Accessories:  Ribbon, brad, Floral Fantasy Cuttlebug embossing folder, Scotch brand foam mounting tape

Tuesday, once again, brings the opportunity to win Rubbernecker Bucks — this time from Broni or Kittie.  But that’s not all — it’s Treasure Hunt time at Rubbernecker Stamp Co.  If you’re in the mood for some adventure, go here to find a clue to a free stamp!  Enjoy!

I’m posting this little paragraph just to check my email subscription service.  I subscribe to my own blog so I can keep an eye on things and I didn’t get my last email.  I suspected that would happen.  You see, for some unfathomable reason if I post in the middle of the day, or anytime other than late at night, the email won’t be delivered.  It happens every time.  It will generally be carried along with the next post (if I do it at night).  So…just checking.  Blog stuff…can’t live with it, can’t live without it.  Have a great day!

Sometimes stamping is so darn much fun!  I had the best time making this card.  I’m celebrating some birthdays this month and with Spring in the air I thought I’d make this one a garden party.

The cake and its pedestal are still one of my favorites.  They’re from Flourishes’ Cake Decorating 101 set.  I stamped the cake outline and the cake slice within it in Pretty in Pink.  That’s all you have to do to make it look like there’s a slice gone from the cake.  To make the scalloped frosting edge I used a product that’s new to me — Eclipse Masking Tape — for masking the sliced area.  I now know I won’t let myself run out of this stuff.  How easy it made the masking!  The paper is very thin, with a repositionable adhesive backing.  Just stamp on the Eclipse paper, cut out the image, remove the backing and position where desired.  I saved my mask because it seems to have enough tack left to be reusable.

The cake plate is embossed Rose Red craft ink.  All the coloring was done with Stampin’ Pastels (soft chalks).  I went over all the colored areas of the cake plate and pedestal with a clear Sakura glaze pen for a glassy appearance.  There’s no masking required to match up the pedestal and plate.  I did, however, cut the cake out and adhere it to the plate because I wanted more of a dimensional look to it.   You may be able to just barely see some Stickles sparkle along the frosting scallop.

My card became a garden party when I decided to use this piece of BasicGrey Sultry paper in the background.  It’s one of those pieces you can’t bear to cover so I created somewhat of a scene with it, instead.  See the little table the cake sits on?  That’s another piece of Sultry.  I stamped and embossed the other large cake plate from the set on it.  To give it a ceramic finish I pressed it into my Versamark pad and embossed, repeating once for more of a glaze.

Here, you can see a little more detail, including the pattern in the table top.  You still can’t see the ceramic gloss, darn it, but the sparkle shows up nicely.

The flower embellishment is a Wal-Mart treasure.  The sentiment is from Flourishes’ Sweet Treats.  I added plenty of heat-curled ribbon so the party would be easy to find.

Well, this party needs to head into the kitchen to get dinner on the table now.  I hope you’ve been having a nice day and will do the same tomorrow.  See you soon!

• Stamps:  Cake Decorating 101, Sweet Treats
• Paper:  Chocolate Chip, Pixie Pink, Whisper White, BasicGrey Sultry 6 x 6 pad designer paper
• Ink:  Pretty in pink, Versamark, Chocolate Chip, Rose Red craft
• Accessories:  Ribbon, Stampin’ Pastels, spray matte sealer, embossing powder, Scotch brand foam mounting tape

Thank goodness for a nice piece of designer paper when you need a card in a hurry.  I thoroughly enjoy stamping but the only thing stamped on this card is the pretty sentiment from Flourishes’ Many Sentiments.  Still, I had the satisfaction of putting it together myself, and that counts for something.

My paper is BasicGrey Periphery, the 6 x 6 pad which is perfect for card making because the patterns and images are scaled down to a more workable size.  You can see a nice selection of 6 x 6 pads here, including some of the newest BasicGrey collections.  I chose this paper today because I finally got my hands on some of the May Arts sheer ribbon from Flourishes and the colors are a perfect match.  Oh, my!  If only the photo could show how this ribbon feels — silky, supple and sublime!  I just noticed they have it in chocolate, too.  Be still, my heart!

My very simple card also uses Stampin’ Up!’s hardware and some self-adhesive paper roses from Wal-Mart.  Crystal Stickles added life and light to the roses — amazing what a little sparkle can do.

I’m glad you could stop by for a minute today while you’re out visiting.  I hope you have a good rest of the week.  Take care!

• Stamps:  Many Sentiments (Flourishes)
• Paper:  Basic Gray, Brocade Blue, Whisper White, BasicGrey Periphery designer paper
• Ink:  Basic Gray
• Accessories:  Ribbon, silver cord, paper roses, Crystal Stickles, hardware