December 28 Stampfest at Lynette's

Lynette and I had our last Stampfest of the year at her house on December 28.

We had a great time visiting and enjoying food and treats...

yummy chili for our dinner

and snacks...

cheese and crackers, tortilla chips and salsa, 

fresh fruit, cookies,

and we had a great time making cards!

Used a map for the background

Stamps: Lost and Found CSS25887, Boundless Flight CSS30188

French Market CSS30232,

Stamp Francisco 1982-94

Stamp: Inkadinkado #98045

Vintage photo distress ink 

Sponged distress inks peeled paint, mustard seed and peacock feathers on faces

Stamps: Acey Deucy Spring K2-836, 1034-lady

Club Scrap

Distress inks: walnut stain, aged mahogany

Twill, staples

Sizzix Texture Fades embossing folder called Leafy by Tim Holtz

Stamp set: Stampin' Up! Best Blossoms

Distress inks: pickled raspberry, wilted violet, mermaid lagoon, squeezed lemonade, twisted citron

I think Lynette used the Cuttlebug Stars embossing folder.

Stars made with a punch for this card.

Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year!

Thank you for visiting!

Christmas Memory Book

Decorated the cover of a mixed media notebook 

to create a Christmas memory book for my daughter

who is having the Christmas dinner celebration this year.

The idea is to have family write a little something in it each year. 

Stamps: Michael Strong, Stampin' Up!

Inks:  Distress pine needles, walnut stain, Versafine embossing ink

Zing "gold glitter finish" embossing powder

Cuttlebug snowflake embossing folder

Jane Davenport INKredible pen

Canson Mix Media 5.5 x 8.5 inch, 138 lb. blank journal

Thank you for visiting!

Wildflowers and Mixed Media Thinlits

I thought I'd share some cards I made in the past month or so

using my new Sizzix dies:

Mixed Media (background)

and Wildflowers #2.

I had fun using old book pages for these two cards.

As I sponged this background I tried to create a peaceful scene.  I don't like to make gloomy sympathy cards. The cut openings reminded me of an opening into a beautiful world.  The tree reminded me of the everlasting tree of life. 

Used an alcohol ink background on glossy paper from my stash for this one.

Thanks for visiting!

Sponged Background Autumn Cards

Here are more distress ink sponged backgrounds.

I know these are similar to my Halloween cards,

but I was on a roll and having fun with this.

Stamped tree with walnut stain distress ink.

Used Michael Strong's Pumpkin Harvest set

fussy cutting the pumpkin and adhering with dimensional foam.

Stamped cherish and friends (unknown stamp manufacturer) 

with Stampin' Up! close to cocoa ink on white cardstock,

trimmed then sponged with fossilized amber ink.

Sponged distress ink on scraps of paper and punched tiny leaves

adhering them with liquid adhesive.

Used a script stamp (unknown manufacturer) with pumice stone distress ink 

and stamped randomly over the background.

Colored the vine part of Michael Strong's Pumpkin Harvest stamp

with mowed lawn distress marker.

Stamped and fussy cut one of the leaves and adhered with dimensional foam.

Pumpkins stamped in distress carved pumpkin ink.

Distress inks: 

mermaid lagoon, stormy sky, fossilized amber, fired brick, carved pumpkin, twisted citron, pumice stone

Thanks so much for visiting!

Halloween Cards 2017

Happy Halloween!

I made my own distress ink sponged backgrounds for cards this year.

Also fussy cut my own bats and ghosts drawn from home made templates.

Used Michael Strong's oval alphabet set to spell "BOO".

Added white eyes to my larger bats with a Jane Davenport White Paint Over Pen
Used a Gelly Roll White 08 gel pen for my small bats eyes.

Used Jane Davenport Mermaid Markers (water brush markers filled with dye based ink) and an aqua brush on scraps of "watercolor like" paper for these backgrounds.  Trees drawn by hand with brown mermaid marker. Used black PITT marker for ghost face.

Added a background script stamp here.

...and a background screen stamp here.

For a friend's Halloween Birthday

Quick cards made with printed papers with handwritten 

"Happy Halloween"

Distress Inks used: mermaid lagoon, stormy sky, black soot, pumice stone, carved pumpkin, fired brick, twisted citron, walnut ink, fossilized amber, scattered straw, seedless preserves.

Versafine Black Onyx ink

Stamps:

Michael Strong, Hero Arts, Posh Impressions and unknown 

Miscl:

Jane Davenport Mermaid Markers
Jane Davenport White Paint Over Pen

Gelly Roll White 08 gel pen

Faber Castell Black Pitt Pen

August 14 Stampfest at Lynette's

Lynette and I had a wonderful time visiting, stamping, drawing and painting yesterday.  We experimented with my new distress oxide ink pads: broken china, faded jeans, fossilized amber and worn lipstick. We were inspired by Jennifer McGuire's blog post and video demonstrating distress oxide ink on kraft and other dark papers. It was fun to see the "oxide" effect, a whitening of the stamped image after it is sprayed with water. We added accent marks with a white gelly roll pen after the stamping was dry. We also used a green ink pad. I think it was a Tsukineko Opalite Interference. 

Update Aug. 17, 2017: Versa Magic Tea Leaves, a chalk ink pad.

Most of the images are just card fronts, 4 x 5.25 inches in size.

Card front created by Lynette

Card front created by Lynette

Card front created by Lynette

Card front created by Lynette

Card created by Laura

Card created by Laura

Card front created by Laura

Card front created by Laura

Stamps:

Hero Arts CG303 Luscious Bold flowers
 Stampin' Up! Tropical Blossoms
Punch Box Designer labels Stamp Set and matching punch
Rubber Stampede

Lynette and I both drew a lady face and then added watercolors to it.
Here are the unfinished pieces.

Lynette used a piece of  Canson 140 lb watercolor paper.

I worked on the watercolor paper inside my Jane Davenport Butterfly Book. It's also known as a travelers notebook. I have not had the nerve to paint it this till now. 
We ran out of time. Hope to do more work on these lady paintings.

Materials:
Jane Davenport watercolors, neutrals and brights
Aqua brushes

For  our dinner, Doc grilled Coho salmon that his friend caught in Lake Michigan. Yum!

Lynette made fresh green beans and a yummy seafood pasta salad!

My husband, Don and I had always have a wonderful time with Lynette and Doc. 

Thanks for visiting!

August 11 Watercolor Fest with Grace

Grace and I had our second Watercolor Fest yesterday.

She treated me to lunch at Portillo's. Later we had a blast playing with watercolors.

She created this gift tag for a watercolor gift set she's giving to a friend.

Grace gave me this 18 pan set of Superior brand watercolors.

We had fun trying them out.

Grace made this lovely landscape with the Superior watercolors. I love the fence in it!

Grace also painted this scene. Aren't the colors dreamy!

I think Grace added some accent lines with a Sakura black marker in both paintings.

I made this lady sketching it first with pencil, then used watercolors. 

When dry, added accent lines with a Faber-Castell PITT black fine marker pen.

Was inspired to make these flowers after seeing this PIN

which goes to this  YouTube

After painting, I splattered paint with the paintbrust

and added accent lines with the Pitt marker.

Also added white accents with the Jane Davenport white paint pen.

I'm not good at adding the accent lines. 

Added white with the Jane Davenport white paint pen here also.

Grace and I were inspired by images found online via google searches and Pinterest.

Thanks for visiting!

Michael Strong Black & White Blog Hop

Hello friends and welcome to the Michael Strong Black & White Blog Hop.
I hope you came hear after visiting Jill's beautiful artwork on her blog, Jill P's Place.

Today's card features Michael Strong's sweet Penguin Pals stamp set.
I think these 2 penguins are perfect for a Black & White themed card.
You can see Mike's penguin set and all of his wonderful stamps in his online catalog HERE. 

Be sure to visit Michael Strong's blog and leave a comment for a chance to win some Blog Candy!

Back to my torn paper pocket card...
I stamped Mike's penguins on white cardstock using Versafine black onyx ink,
 heat embossed with clear embossing powder and fussy cut.
I cut 2 pieces of white cardstock 5-1/4 inches wide. 
Then I cut them long enough to fit in the dry embossing folder 
that came with Tim Holtz's Bird Talk 2 stamp set,
dry embossed them and tore them into 3 pieces as shown.
With a tiny amount of white glue, I attached the torn pieces on the sides and bottom,
to keep them together. 
Then I placed this on the card base and punched 6 small holes 
and added black mini brads to secure the pockets to the card as shown. 

The penguin on the left is slipped into the pocket and can be removed.
The penguin on the right is attached with dimensional foam adhesive.
I wrote my own sentiment with a Jane Davenport "Inkredible" cartridge fountain pen
that has wonderful dark black ink and writes like a charm.
Added a few clear plastic sequins with white glue for some bling.

I have 2 other torn paper cards posted here and here 
which show variations of this torn paper card idea. 
My friend, Lynette, introduced me to this technique.
She saw Beth Cote demo it on the Carol Duvall Show some years ago! 

Now for more fun and creative ideas,
please hop on over to Shelly's Creative Rumblings blog.
Enjoy her beautiful artwork and be sure to leave some blog love/comments!

If you landed here in the middle of the blog hop and don't want to miss any of the fun,
you can visit Hetty's Craft Chaos blog to see the entire list of the participants. 

Remember, be sure to leave a comment on Michael Strong's blog
for the chance of winning some blog candy!

Thanks so much for visiting!

July 22 Stamp and Watercolor FEST with Lynette

Lynette and I had a great time stamping, drawing and watercolor painting on Saturday.

Lynette brought drawing pencils and Yasutomo pearlescent watercolors-21 pans, that she found at a garage sale tucked inside a zippered case with elastic loops to keep everything in place. I made a sample background using them-bottom left in photo above.
For our faces, first we sketched with a drawing pencil, then we used Jane Davenport's watercolors Petite Palette Brights and Neutrals. After it was dry, we used Jane Davenport's Inkredible pen for accent.

By Lynette

By Lynette

By Laura

I was inspired to attempt to draw and paint this steam engine after seeing Mary Hambrick's wonderful steam engine on the Jane Davenport Mixed Media Facebook group. 

My dad is a train lover and so I had to give this a go! I have a set of train stamps that I used for most of Dad's cards that I make. For his next card, I may have to try and make one like this.

I'm glad Lynette was interested in trying to make a Corner Flip Card. My friend, Lola, at the Enjoy Michael Strong Yahoo Group shared one of these along with the video tutorial by Dawn Griffith. Lynette and I referred to Lola's blog, Raevon59's Blog that instructions and the video which is also on Dawn's Stamping Thoughts blog. We had to view the video a few times. Once we made the cuts in the correct place, it was easy and fairly quick. We did not add the 2nd layer of color cardstock that was 2-3/4 x 2-3/4".

Inside of Lynette's Corner Flip card

Inside of Laura's Corner Flip card

Stamps used:
Michael Strong, Stampin' Up, Hero arts, Stamps by Judith, PrintWorks

Inks used:
Distress abandoned coral, twisted citron, squeezed lemonade, worn lipstick
Versafine black onyx

Lynette and I always have so much when we get together! Looking forward to next time!

Thank you for taking the time to visit!