Experiencing Technical Difficulties...

I just can't catch a break lately. My laptop had a run-in with a glass of California Chardonnay, which needless to say has left it in no condition to compute. I'll be back as soon as I get the silly thing out of rehab, lol!

An Inchie and an ATC

Miss me? I was on vacation and there was supposed to be internet access, but that was not the case so I was forced to take a vacation from everything. Not a bad deal, actually. Don’t get me wrong. I do this blog because I enjoy it, but it was so nice to just spend a week with no definite plans or schedule. But, now I’m back and reality beckons.

I have a couple of things to share with you today. The first is an ATC that I did with my new Caran D’Ache Pablo colored pencils using a reference photo from the monthly colored pencil challenge on Wet Canvas. Nice pencils! The leads are soft and creamy, but hold a point without crumbling, and the colors lay down nice and smooth. I think these will be my go to pencils for working on papers with a smooth finish. The paper I used for this ATC is Strathmore Bristol Vellum.

My other project is a card using some more of the cool inchie stuff I got from smARTworks. I used shimmering watercolors to paint the inchie, and I think the rest if fairly self-explanatory. As always, though, please ask if you ever have questions about how I did something. I answer all questions so don’t be shy!

smARtworks is having a big 40% off sale on rubber right now so if you've been thinking about shopping, now's the time!

Starving Artistamps Classic Decor Blog Hop

Come on in! You've found the Starving Artistamps DoodleFactory Classic Decor Blog Hop. We're celebrating the release of some brand new, very fun DoodleFactory images...Classic Decor and a set of sentiments to go along with them! I've used some of the images on my cards, but there are more, and there's blog candy hidden somewhere, so make sure you visit all the blogs in our hop. I'm the second stop, so if you didn't come here from the Starving Artistamps Company Blog, you should head over there first.

Juliana Swanson at Stampin with Inky Fingers is next in our hop. Juliana is an amazingly brilliant designer AND she's turning the big 40 today, so you'll definitely want to stop in over there to see her cards and give her a shout out for her birthday! There's a list of all the blogs in the hop at the end of my post...just in case you lose your way.

I've got some pretty awesome cards for you (if I do say so myself), but before I get to them I want to tell you about the awesome special that Tracey is offering on the new set. For 3 days only (July 8th-10th), buy both the complete collection of stamps and the coordinating sentiments and get enough cling cushion to mount them FREE.

OK...now for my cards! This one is paper pieced with Basic Grey Offbeat papers and kraft cardstock. The black accents are done with a glaze pen so that it looks like laquer, and colored accents are done with Copic markers. I thought this one would be a nice way to present an Ikea or Crate and Barrel gift card.

Next is another room scene using Basic Grey Marrakech paper with Copic marker coloring. Don't you just love that cuckoo clock?
And, here's another room scene that doesn't use any printed paper at all. All of the images are colored with Copic markers, and I made my "wallpaper" with the Fern Leaf Tooled Leather background stamp.


Now for the grand finale! What in the world is Yapples up to now?!? You just never know where he's going to turn up! This one is colored with Inktense pencils on watercolor paper. I embossed the chandelier, wet the paper with a mister, then used a waterbrush to pick up color from the pencil tips to create the tie dyed background. The rest is basic watercoloring, and you can't see in the photo, but I added Stickles to the chandelier to make it sparkle.


Blog Hop List
Starving Artistamps Company Blog
Me
Juliana Swanson
Donna Baker
Kathy Daume'
Lori Tecler
Lydia Fiedler
Andrea Cloutier
Natasha Trupp
Irene Silva
Dawn Mercedes
Jenn McMillan
Nina Aaslund
Laura Davis
Kazan Clark
Tracey Berkey

Baby Quilt

When I saw the Faux Iris Folding technique in the latest Technique Junkies newsletter, all I could think of was a quilt. At the time, I has just gotten the new Doodle Factory Oh Baby! stamps from Starving Artistamps. All of the elements seemed to be meant for each other...you know, like chocolate and peanut butter, so I just had to make this card.

For the quilt, I grabbed a bunch of coordinating scraps to make my piecework. To add to to the quilty feel, I drew stitching in the border with a white gel pen. My images are colored with Copic markers.

Enjoy the weekend!

smARTworks Tea Party 21 - Pass the Salt!

This was a fun challenge! Donelda asked us to use the salt technique somewhere on our cards. Believe it or not, I had never tried the technique before. Well, it turns out that it's wicked fun! Just create a wet wash with your choice of watercolor media (I used watercolor crayons), drop grains of salt into the wet paint and let it dry. Magic! I was having so much fun that I made 10 backgrounds before I knew it!

Here are the cards I made with two of them. The first one incorporates my latest addiction--Inchies. I stamped the butterflies (Inchie Blocks - Set 4) with Chestnut Roan chalk ink onto a piece of leftover piece from a watercolor wash I had hanging around and colored them with Prismacolor pencils. I cut out my squares and mounted them onto white Inchie Squares and covered the edges with more brown ink. For the background piece, I did a wash with shades of brown and yellow. The paint had dried a tad too much before I added the salt, but I still liked the effect, so here it is. The sentiment I used is from the Indigo Bunting set.

The second card I made was completely inspired by the background, which reminded me of a star galaxy. For this background, I blobbed three different colors onto a really wet piece of watercolor paper and added the salt while everything was still quite wet. Keeping with the swirly star galaxy theme, I chose a flower from the Star Flowers set and colored it with Copic markers. The center of the flower is a round paperclip attached with a large round glue dot. After I attached the clip, I sprinkled on micro beads to cover the exposed adhesive. It's much prettier IRL!

Susan, Dina, Donelda, and Giovana are joining the party this week, too, so be sure check out what they did. This was a fun challenge, and unfortunately, it's the last one for a bit. The Design Team has decided to take the summer off, but don't worry...we'll be back! In the meantime, we'll be participating in other challenges, and of course, we'll be posting on our blogs.