Teal Butterflies Embossed with a Stencil



 

Hi, and in case you didn't already know this, I spend a lot of time watching Youtube (could this be why I accomplish so little during the day? Nah, probably not!)

 

 

Caught this video from Ellen Hutson using a plastic stencil. I'd seen this done before, and had tried it, but never felt like I got a good embossing. Loved the Hero Arts stencil used in this video, but don't have it (_yet_!). Hunted through my stencils, and thought to try this MBox stencil. Mrs. A's  Butterfly Challenge #53 was for teal & texture, and this was started with that challenge in mind. Doing my usual ploy of missing the deadline, decided this would also work for the May CAS Mix Up Challenge.

 



 

 

 

 

MBox Butterfly Vine Stencil was taped over white card stock, run through the Big Shot as instructed in the video. However, I had to go to Tab 1, and add a lightweight shim (cut from a tv dinner box). My B/S is a newer one, and the sandwich used in the video was too 'tight' to go through on Tab 2. Worked good on Tab 1, with the shim, and got a very nice embossing.

 

Used Memento Teal and DI Concord Grape to sponge over the still taped stencil.

 

MBox butterfly (solid die cut from a snippet from a heavier weight paper that came from a set of sheets..it was part of the packing that helps keep the sheet package in a shaped form. It was white on one side, so hmmm...to the craft room instead of the recycle box. It cut very nicely, and there's 2 layers). The matching overlay die was used to cut the top butterfly, and this was sponged the ink remaining on the sponge from the Concord Grape. Added a couple rhinestones for a little glitz.

 

Sentiment is from a PBlack clear set, chosen primarily because it fit the space where I wanted to put it. Inked with the Memento Teal, heat embossed with Ranger Clear EP.

 

The stitched edges were made from a Lawn Fawn stitched rectangle. (Jennifer McGuire recent video showing how to do this. Cut the rectangle shape. Replace the rectangle die so that it is only going to cut on a 2nd edge..and then you have the skinnier rectangle with the stitching all around it. Would post the link, but can't find it just now!). If anyone is interested, I'll try to hunt it up. I learn a lot from Jennifer!!!

 

Hope this will fit the bill of fare for CAS Mix Up. So thanks for skipping by and come back when you can. Blessings & Hugs.

 

 

 

 

DeeDee's Digis - Rustic Leaves

Good afternoon, and Happy Monday. Back again with another card using DeeDee's Digis - the Rustic Leaves set. This one proved to be so very easy to use with a created background and a Memory Box border die.

Before sharing the card, let me first extend a warm welcome to a lovely new follower:

Caz S (Bunny) of Bunnys Bits n Bobs

 

Thanks so much for  becoming a follower here, and I hope you'll enjoy what you see! Also encourage my readers to pop over to say a big hello to Bunny, and check out her blog. Always so nice to meet a new friend.

 

Now on to the card:

printed the precolored leaves and used a S/B square die that fit the motifs to cut out. Used a dark blue Copic marker to go round the edges, as there was not room on the card front to add a skinny mat behind these squares.

- Memory Box Contempo Circle border (sorry, can't find this one to provide a link) - die cut from some Reflections Blue C/s. This die cuts off the edges, and there's a scalloped edge waste - which I decided to fit back over the 'holes' to create a defined border above the leaf squares after I saw that it looked better this way.

- background created using Tsukineko All Purpose Champayne Mist and some wadded cling wrap - daubed around on the card stock, leaving lots of clear spaces. Then put out some small dabs of Silk acrylic paint in a dark fall green and some orange. Spritzed all the paint with water to make puddles, then swiped some 140# w/b paper through the puddles, repeating until all the puddles were used (with just a few blobs, 4 backgrounds were created...as the ink is used, more water sprayed and of course the backgrounds get lighter). It's really quite a pretty look. This background was embossed with a leaf motif folder (Paper Studio A2 Leaves).

- Lawn Fawn Stitched Leaves - smaller leaves) were cut from a snippet of another created background which had been done earlier. Sentiment is from the Falling Leaves digi set and printed on the computer, die cut with a S/B label and sponged lightly with Shabby Shutters DI. Once I decided what I wanted to do with these pretty fall leaves, this card came together very easily.

Don't forget to check out the fall & winter digis that you can find over at DeeDee's Digis, as well as some pretty Christmas sets.

Thanks for joining me today, and I hope your week is off to a good start. This will be another busy one for us, but at least the weekend gave us a little breather. Hope the weather is nice where you are. Come again when you have time! Big hugs.

Brusho background, Spellbinder Oval & Memory Box Too

Hello again and welcome. Today's card has lots of fun stuff on it, and has been done - pretty much - for a while. Just getting around to photo & posting, and that was delayed due to Life!

Here goes:

- Brusho background using just the Black pot. Didn't it yield magnificent color? Tried to do the technique Eileen Godwin did with the Ranger Spritz tool, but haven't mastered that well yet. Plan to keep trying to get the look however. Even though I didn't get the results desired, thought it still looked nice, so stamped a PBlack Flower Sparks transparent set using a Blackberry Colorbox Fluid chalk ink. Had never used this ink pad; looked black in the container, but was a dark purple. Did a 2nd generation stamping after the 1st two blooms, but the MB die cut (?small Chloe stem?) sort of obscures it.

-Die cut the motif using largest of the Oval Regalia S/B set.. Considering adding a few pearls around the lacy part, but need to look at it a bit yet.

- Lavendar/purple card base from Bazzil texture cardstock, and IRL the color looks darker than in this photo. S/B corner dies cut from white snippet. Copic BV markers changed these from white corners. Liked it better with purple tones, then drew a skinny line using a WoS purple pen. That may not have been my best idea, because one of the corners has a pretty shaky line (bottom left). Again, we'll say this is my Amish touch! Decided to go with it as is, and hope the recipient will like it anyway. The sentiment will go inside when the card is ready to mail.

Hope you like this one. Thanks for visiting, it's getting time to sit in the porch swing & enjoy something to drink. Ya'll come back when you can...and Big hugs.

Brusho Memory Box Peony - Thinking of You

Good evening and thanks for popping in for a little visit. First, a big welcome to Shelly S .of My Creative Rumblings. Thanks so much for choosing to spend a little time here with me, and do please pay a visit to Shelly to enjoy some of her fabulous work.

I expect you may be getting a little tired of the Brusho backgrounds, but I am having such fun playing with this stuff. Made quite a few pieces as it's not worth the bother to just make one background, and then waste all the excess color. Our SIL lost his Dad last week, and we needed a card. Looked through the dies - decided to use a Memory Box Peony die and here's the resulting card:

Sorry for the glare on the photo. Started with a card base of World Win white paper. This is a good weight for a card base, and has a fine texture...a bit finer than the Bazzill cardstock I use frequently.
Cut the MB peony die out of the card base where the flower was to be. Saved the outline and all the little bits. Then cut the same die out of a pink Brusho piece, that had a final pearlized spritz before drying; which is why the colors look less intense than what you've been seeing here. You'll see the other die cuts used at later date. Used the blue outline from a blue & green brusho piece.

Inlaid  outline & all the little bits in the appropriate places. Used Sookwang tape (double side tape) behind the opening.Must say, this has been the easiest effort yet doing this technique.

- Sizzix border folder to emboss.

- Elizabeth Craft sentiment on a snippet of Dylusions background. Used 2 layers to build this up, and probably won't do that again, using water color paper. Oops, see that I forgot the little pearl that needs to dot the i. Will add that prior to mailing. Thought about using some copics to darken the green in the sentiment, decided to leave well enough alone. I have a problem with that!!!

Thanks again for visiting this evening. Hope you had a lovely Wednesday, and are getting ready for a wonderful end of the week. Hugs.

DeeDee's Digis - Daniel's Tree

Good evening, and I'm back with just one more DeeDee's Digis card to end out the month of July.
This is the last week to participate in the July Digi of the Month challenge. The August set is ready and waiting to send to anyone who participates by the deadline (Sunday, 2 August), so don't miss out!
Edit:   My error: that should have read Sunday, 3 August. Thanks Pippa for catching this boo-boo!

This cute digi can be found right here. The set has a pre-colored image (fast card making, let me tell you & I don't work fast), line art for choosing your own colors and some very nice sentiments too. Remember that all these digi images can be resized to fit whatever size you may need for a particular card motif.

Here's what I did with Daniel's Tree:

 

(1) Inserted the digi image into a Word Document, resized this little goofball duck, along with the sentiments.
(2)Die cut the image with a S/B Label 1. Created a faux mat by cutting the outside edge of the die, using paper from a Colorbok Water Color theme pack (my $5 Walmart find - 12x12 sheets in a paper pad). I've seen Daniel's Tree used by some  of the other DT members and thought he was just the cutest guy, with a rather foolish look about him. Is he lost or what? (I've seen this look on DH's face on some of our trips...usually after we've driven miles out of our way, so maybe that's why this image appealed to me so much!). With those outstretched wings, I imagine that Daniel is saying "Ok, now where do I go with this tree?".
(3)Did a bit of shading with copics, added some spica on the scarf colors, his purple headband and his little boots.  Some Sakura Silver Star on the snow, and some Stickles snow falling. Also used a smaller Label 1 to remove the center portion of the mat.

(4) papers are from 6x6 BoBunny Mistletoe Collection (top panel) and American Crafts Peppermint Express (bottom panel).

(5)S/B In Spades border die from a DCWV 6x6 glitter pack.

(6) Memory Box stocking die - cut 2 shapes from 2 colors-same glitter pack. Clear rhinestones for a bit of bling; used part of one of the sentiments, which was shaded with just a tiny bit of DI Dusty Concord.

Easy Peasy, and the hardest part was selecting papers to make Daniel happy as he finds his way home. Hope you'll enjoy the card, and perhaps join in the fun at DeeDee's July Challenge of the month.

Remember August 2 is the deadline to participate. If you haven't discovered the  Digi of the Month challenges yet, you are missing out! Each month a featured set is offered that is available in the shop for just $1.25 (or FREE with your purchase of $10 or more). Make a project using this featured set and link it up to the challenge post, and you'll get the next month's featured set for FREE! This is a great way to build your digi collection at little to no cost, plus it gives you something fun to look forward to each month. What have you got to lose?

Thanks for popping in this evening, and come again when you have time! Many hugs.

More Butterflies

Hiya, Happy Sunday. First, thank you to all who sent comments about the Blogger issue. I've tried to follow some of those suggestions (right now I'm online with Firefox as my browser, still can't sign in to a blog where I'm already a follower, but not seeing myself. I give up! I've already wasted too much time on this frustrating issue).

There's a lovely challenge going on here and since there were a couple of spraying & embossing paste projects in the works, here's another butterfly card. Didn't turn out as envisioned, and hope that the faux piercing done by the die cut won't disqualify this one from the theme of A Stitch in Time. If you squint very hard, the piercing on the die _does_ look stitched! This one also has a few snippety bits too.

- base background (snippet) was smudged as a drying piece as when spraying top focal part; adding some WRMemory Keepers acrylic paint, heavily diluted with water & placed in a spray bottle. Very glimmery. Debossed with a Darice Argyll folder, . This background piece was just an extra white card stock on the table, used to blot the top w/color c/s while wet. Got some nice color, decided to experiment with the embossing folder..

- focal top piece was 140# weight w/color paper - sprayed with Dylusions (think it was Lime Green) diluted with White Linen. Let it dry, then sprayed again with the WRM diluted green - nice shimmer.  THoltz Splat stencil and some Mixed Media ?chalk? (in a pot, got at Michaels on sale...feels more like a chalky substance than ink, but is also 'wetter' than the usual chalky feel). I sponged this blue media using the TH stencil.  TCW flower stencil was used for the Viva Decor Glitter Paste embossing at top left. Let that dry. Used a Memory Box butterfly stencil with the same paste, let that dry. (For anyone just experimenting with these pastes, be sure to have some soapy water handy to clean off stencils & tool quickly. It dries fast, will be hard to remove if not removed at once when you've finished. Also, be sure to close the paste jar quickly.) MFT Die-namics pierced rectangle stax to die cut a portion of the w/c paper project.

Closeup of the butterfly

- Memory Box Darla butterfly cut from the same blue color cardstock used for matting (snippet).
Sponged with DI Tumbled Glass & Stormy Sky, then embossed with a dots EF. Black overlay is the matching MB Vivienne die from a snippet of lightweight black glitter paper.

- pearls for the butterfly body and some green rhinestones to dress him up to go flying over The Pond to visit the Butterfly Challenge and see Parsnip at the Snippet Playground for week 117. C'mon & go along.

Hope all the details didn't put you to sleep. Had fun messin' about with this one. Thanks for visiting & Sunday Hugs!

Memory Box Window Scene

Good afternoon & welcome. Let's welcome some new friends:

Ginny of Maxam Made

Joni of Papell with Love

 

and let me add a link for Bobbie L. of Crafts by Bobbie. When I welcomed Bobbie as a follower earlier, I didn't have a link for her blog.

So please take some time and visit these blogs & leave a little love for them, plus enjoy some great inspiration. Thanks to you all, ladies, for visiting my blog and joining as followers.

Yesterday (Saturday) was meant to be a clean the floor kind of day (not that it needed it or anything silly like that!). DH suggested that we take a ride since the day was pretty, and have lunch at Scrapbook Creations, one of the few remaining LSS in our area. I protested - quite feebly as you might guess - that I really meant to clean the floors - but you know, it really was a No-brainer as to which won. Off we go, and upon arrival, happily discovered that some of my old stamp group buddies were having a weekend crop. So it was fun to catch up on what they were doing, had been doing, etc. Then we had lunch and shopped. A fun afternoon; then came home to take a long nap. Shopping can be tiring you know! Had pizza, salad & chicken wings for dinner...so a lazy day as far as anything productive. My kinda day. :-)

So here's the card meant to be shared yesterday.

- Memory Box window die, MB lamp die, MB Hanging Flower pot die

- MBox shelf  die that is sized to fit this window die; raised with dimensional foam.

- Elizabeth Craft sentiment thanks. 4 layers of c/s snippets, colored with copics.

The window view was salvaged from a card sent advertising a retirement seminar by an investment group. DH thought the scene was pretty & said "Why can't you use this for a card?". This got put behind the window frame & has been on the desk since before Christmas. Just had to think of what to do to finish it. Tried the THoltz brick EF as a background - looked at that for a while. Then decided to use a SU Vintage Wallpaper EF; inked the folder with one of the lighter Memento Blues prior to embossing, liked that look better. Now what to add for some interest? Finally decided on the lamp & flower pot hanger.

Lamp was diecut 4 times, (white snippets); glued layers together for some dimension. Colored the base with copics after gluing on a blue pattern dp. Covered the shade with a snippet of DP, added some tiny lace trim.

- Hanger chains cut from kraft snippet that had been inked for another use, but the design was blurry- so couldn't use it for its intended purpose. Covered the 'chains' with gold Wink of Stella. Pot has a 'wire frame', but this was covered when some of the snippet dotty dp was glued to a kraft snippet. This was the base to the wire pot frame. There's 3 layers on this pot.

- added some green fronds (snippet too!) using Impression Obsession DIE112-D - a set of 4 tiny, tiny leaves. Trimmed the fronds from the stem, dipped the tips into a spot of glue, stuck into the pot. Since there was 3 layers of the dotty pot, the tip slid into the space very nicely. Once it felt adhered well, bent the leaves just a bit with tweezers to make the arrangement more realistic.

Since there's a great many snippets in use on this card, I'm off to see if Parsnip will let me into the Snippet Playground. I have been remiss on visiting my playmates there as much as I should like, so I hope I can spend the afternoon making up for not being around as much! I am sure that you have lots of snippets that could be made into a card. That's all you need to gain entrance into the Crafty Snippets Playground, and meet some super lovely card makers. Check out this challenge.

Have a lovely, relaxing afternoon. I'm going to try hard to not succumb to a nap, and go visitin' some inspirational blogs instead. Thanks for your visit. Hugs. Oh yes, Downton Abby finale tonight, folks!

A Stenciling Experiment

Good evening and Upstate South Carolina got the predicted 'weather' today. Nothing really drastic, just some pretty swirling snowflakes. I think the temps were in the mid 30's F. We're being advised that overnight & tomorrow will be much worse, with a sleety ice mixture and more snow. Usually we see quite a bit of traffic go by our home - as we live on the corner of 2 streets in a rather largish subdivision. There's been much less traffic today, but still some. In past winters, we've been able to stand at our front windows and watch our neighbors navigate the icy corner, heading for the steep hill that is the exit from the neighborhood. Very shortly, we see the same car come sliding slowly back past our view. We are both always thankful that we aren't the folks who are having to brave the roads to get to a job. (Well, I'm always more thankful than DH, who is sure He could manage the roads much better! NOT! He learned to drive in South Florida, just as I did!).

Let me say warm welcome to Ignacio Molina of Nicecrane Designs who has joined as my latest follower.

I'm sure that many of you visit here, know these beautiful Nicecrane images. I've seen them used so skillfully by many blogs that I follow, and just purchased some of the designs. (Check Redanne and Stamping with Klass to name 2 very enjoyable places where I had seen these designs used. There are quite a few others too, but these particular blogs were fresh in my memory). I finally got my brain & my fingers coordinated at the same time and ordered a couple of the bird images. You do know, I like birds, right? See my lovely new blog header?? Well, it was designed by Ignacio of NiceCrane and I am just over the moon with how pretty it is. THANK YOU, Ignacio!

Decided to change some of the other colors to complement the new header. What do do you think? And please do yourself a favor, and visit Nicecrane to see the beautiful images...which are extremely reasonably priced. Stay tuned...I hope I can soon do justice to the pretty bird sets I ordered.

I'm sharing my stencil experiment I mentioned in an earlier post. It's really more of an example of: Don't do what I did!

- card stock was coated with gesso and dried overnight. Used some modeling paste over a Memory Box vines stencil. Think I used a stencil that was more intricate than I should have for this attempt and also probably got the paste on too thick. Let this dry overnight, and made sure to clean the stencil immediately when I lifted it from the paste. Still had a little shifting mishap as I lifted the stencil, which yielded a raised surface after drying. (if that makes sense..it was a rough raised place that should not have been there!)  Used a sand block to sand the dried surface, and that helped.

- painted some acrylic paints in golden & turquoise greens that were mixed with a cream color - over the entire surface;  using a small brush, painted in the depressed areas of the vine motif, with the turquoise green. I was liking the effort a bit better after this dried.

- smudged some Viva Décor Inca Silver paste with my finger over 2 corners - where you see the glimmer. Used some Viva Stempel paint in a turquoise color and smudged that around in some areas. The silver gleams nicely - no that is not a camera flash, but the silver that you see!

- MB Serene Bird die in navy blue Bazzill, popped up over a Die-namics Leaf Filled Flourish.
The leaf was cut from a snippet of dp, further shaded with copics. Lighter green leaf  was in the snippets pile, probably is a MB diecut from white c/s, shaded with copics. Used some of the 3D Crystal Effects on the leaves, let that dry overnight. Attempted to add the MB leaf around the bird with Glossy Accents. Where it touched the navy bird, the GA left 2 small smears. Thought it would dry clear. Didn't! Tried covering the edge with some glitter, intending to shade the glitter using dark blue copics. Alas, the copics pulled up the glitter. (I've seen that done on some other blogs, so not sure what I did wrong.).  This bird looks like he's been at our bird feeder and got some ice crystals on his feathers! I don't like it that he looks like he's got sugar spilled all over him, so this will go in the samples stash.

I had been a bit dissatisfied with the stencil results at first. As I kept working on the piece, I was liking it a bit better. As I was putting the dies atop the piece, I was getting happier. When I got the Glossy Accents smears on the bird, I was not pleased. I've always heard this stuff dries clear...well, it didn't on this navy Bazzill.

Dream sentiment is from mirror paper snippet using an Elizabeth Craft die. I enjoyed this experiment enough to try it again. I will use my Aileen's Easy Flow glue to adhere in future. I know this stuff dries clear...

Hope you enjoyed my ramblin's this evening. Also hope that should you be in the path of this storm front, that your power is staying on, snow is not endangering your roof, or any dreadful stuff like that. We're staying cozy, and I even cooked today - also baked a carrot cake for snacking tonight. Remember...I don't cook!

Thanks for your visit, and many Cyber Hugs. Come again when you can.



Memory Box Twiggy Tree Valentine

Good Morning lovely visitor, hope you have a nice cup of something warm & let's have a little chat. A bit too cold to swing on the front porch, but we can pull up a chair by the fireplace and enjoy some coffee or latte, or whatever fits your fancy.

I saw this lovely card at Selma's Stamping Corner when I was trying to remember how to use the Memory Box Heart Canopy for the tree on the card today. Just went back trying to find the specific card so I could be sure to thank Selma for my inspiration, and My Goodness Gracious, I got lost just wandering around looking at her wonderful art. I've got to have some time to really enjoy her blog, but first I have some commenting to do, 4 on-line classes to catch up, and get this card scheduled to post! Thanks Selma for some marvelous inspiration & can't wait to return for a long lovely browse.

- Memory Box Twiggy Tree (98143) die cut from silver mirror paper (a piece that I've been trimming from for a bit, so I'm calling this one a snippet too. I used all of the bits on the snowflakes from the Rudolph Peace card. So the tiny bits have gone into the trash, and I'll have to hunt up another piece of silver.

- MB Heart Canopy (98283) using a white K&Company 12x12 Specialty Paper. (it's white with light silver floral motifs, and this pack is a NBUS - also VOS)

- lightweight red glitter paper(snippet) taped on the back. Tried to zoom to show how these red hearts glitter, but it blurred.

- Layers adhered to black glitter paper (center removed with a square die to save layers).

- EK Success punch on the corners (another boo-boo. I tried to use a pretty MS corner punch which worked great on 3 corners; messed up on the 4th, and basically chewed the corner. I should know better than to try this since the punch was cutting through the white & red glitter papers). Used snippets of the red glitter to cut cover up corners, added a pearl to decorate.

- red velvet paper c/stock (from inside of a box but it diecut well) used to cover the white square card base.  Again removed the part under the motifs & used it on the Rudolph Owls card. Used a tiny snippet of this c/s to punch the hearts - and surprisingly, this punched quite well. This was an old Paper Studio punch and I was amazed that it punched out as the velvet covering on the card backing is a bit thick. Bet the MS punch wouldn't have done so!

Think this will be for Sweetie as he hasn't seen it yet. Other than my chewed up corner, I liked this card. Hope you will too.

I managed to use up some more snippets on this card, so it will be submitted to Pixie's Crafty Snippets Playground, Week 109. Since this is a scheduled post, I will edit when the post is live, to finish the linking process. Thanks for your visit & have a lovely day. Hugs.

Valentine with Memory Box Serafina Heart

G'morning lovely visitor, and thanks for surfing in on a Sunday morning. Here's another Valentine  Sorry to have another Valentine motif, but I still have a couple of special ones that need to be made, then get inserts done on the others I've already shared. Check my list of recipients and make sure I've got all of them covered with a card.

- Memory Box Cupid Heart (98281) cut with red velvet paper

- Serafina Heart (98278) cut with a snippet of silver pattern hologram paper

- C/B Hugs & Kisses EF - folder was inked with Memento Love Letter prior to running through the Big Shot.

- Impression Obsession Die017-V set (there's 2 die patterns) on red & white snippety strips

- Paper Studio Peel-off silver stickers for bottom trimming.

- cardbase is white, and tiny pearls added on the Serafina heart and on the border red trim.

Don't think I'll put a sentiment on the outside of this. I think the recipient will know what it's for.

Ya'll enjoy your Sunday, hope you are keeping warm in your part of the world. Thanks for visiting, and Hugs.