Tag Your Addiction

I understand that the first step in overcoming an addiction is admitting you have one. Well, I have a few, one of which is ribbon. Unfortunately, I have admitted this addiction many times and yet I still find the need to save scraps of ribbons from gifts, packages, and any other item containing the beloved piece.

This is a picture of my "traveling" bag of ribbon. I have jars at home containing scraps (organized by color) and ribbons on spools line my work area as well as other jars containing smaller spools. But, I do use my ribbon stash so I'm hoping that justifies my need to acquire every pretty piece/style I come across.

Now that I've explained this addiction, let me show you how this factors into today's project. I'm in St. Louis for a scrapbook convention and so my ribbon "travel" bag came with me. And deep in the depths I found the perfect ribbons to finish the tags I created.

These tags take advantage of stamps from the December 2011 and April 2012 Kit of the Month stamps. And I used one of my favorite stamping techniques - watercolor. And before you start saying to yourself how hard watercoloring is let me tell you about my watercolors - they are pencils and a waterbrush. The pencils allow me to color around the edges to add shadows and highlights. I don't have to be perfect - more pencil in some places, outside the lines in others. I then use the waterbrush to pull the color from the edges to the middle of the image, thus creating the shadows and highlights. It truly makes me feel like an artist!

The best stamps to use for watercoloring are line drawings or open designs because they provide areas to color. That doesn't mean you can't use solid stamps (notice the Made with Love stamp), it just means you have less areas to color.

I love each of these tags, but the poppy (you bring me sunshine) tag truly speaks to me. I love poppies, well actually I love flowers. And flowers are the perfect design to watercolor. And while I love pinks and purples, the oranges of poppies make me happy and fills me with sunshine - which is why the sentiment I used seemed perfect.

The jar, well it offers multiple possibilities and the stamp set comes with three labels. But don't let that limit your creativity. I have visions of filling this stamped bottle with actual buttons on a project. Another addiction I have - collecting buttons.

Tomorrow wraps up this week of creating with Unity Stamp products. Come back tomorrow for the final project. And thank you so much for all the wonderful comments. And remember, feel free to point me in the direction of some of your creations. I love seeing what others create!

Supplies:

Jar, thank full, heart with flowers, and made with love stamps (December 2011 Kit of the Month; Unity Stamp Company)
Poppy and you bring me sunshine stamps (April 2012 Kit of the Month; Unity Stamp Company)
Watercolor pencils (Staedtler)
Waterbrush (Kuretake Co.)
Perfect Little Black Dress ink (Hybrid Ink; Clear & Simple Stamps)
Vintage Photo Distress Ink (Tim Holtz; Ranger Ink)
manila tags
ribbon pieces


Size: 2 1/4" x 4 3/4"

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Pearls and Lace

Welcome to day three of my card making extravaganza. Today's card incorporates the girliest of girly items - pearls and lace. I love doilies and have several from various trips I've been on so when I saw the Bella Doilies set I knew I must have it. And lovely doilies they are.

I wanted the doilies to take center stage so I embossed them with clear embossing powder on white cardstock and then rubbed ink on the stamped image. The effect is perfect for these dainty images. The pearls and ribbon add a little touch of elegance to the design, as do the subtle blue and tan colors.

I also enjoy mixing and matching stamp sets. The sentiment I used is from the Wonderful stamp set and while it works well with the scalloped bird stamp, I like that I can use it with other stamps equally as well.

Remember, I'm doing a drawing at the end of the week for stamps from Unity Stamp Company (they are kindly allowing the winner to pick two Itty Bitty stamp sets). So leave a comment on any or all posts this week until midnight Friday to qualify for the drawing. And check back tomorrow to see a set of tags incorporating Unity Stamps.

Supplies:

doilies stamps (Bella Doilies; Unity Stamp Company)
sentiment stamp (Wonderful; Unity Stamp Company)
Faded Jeans and Antique Linen Distress Inks (Tim Holtz; Ranger Ink)
clear ink (VersaMark; Tsukineko)
clear embossing powder
pearls (Say It In Pearls; Prima Marketing)
kraft and white cardstock
gold ribbon

Size: 5 1/2" x 4 1/4"

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A Little Birdie

Happy Tuesday and welcome to another card using Unity Stamp products.

Today's card started with a misting of pink and purple glimmering mists (from Shimmerz). Once the paper dried I stamped the scalloped bird from the Wonderful {Itty Bitty} stamp set. This bird is to me elegant and whimsical at the same time - I love the scalloped border and the dotted background. To enhance the scallop border I cut out the design using my scalloped edge scissors.

The card front is Mellow from Crate Paper's Lillian collection (yes, I'm a Crate Paper product hoarder). Added a strip of purple with white swirl washi tape and a piece of ribbon from Crate Paper's Neighborhood trims. To make the scalloped stamped image stand out a bit, I rolled the edges of the scallops with my finger nail. The cluster is created with a stick-pin and rhinestone from Close To My Heart, two random buttons I had, and a scrap of grey and white ribbon. The purple button is on foam tape and I stuck the stick-in in the foam tape to protect the sharp point.

This card speaks to me in multiple ways - my favorite colors (purple and lime green), sparkly things, and ribbon. What have you created lately? Leave me a comment with a link to your project. Sharing is a great form of inspiration!

P.S. - At the end of the week, I get to give away Unity Stamps! How do you get these stamps? I'll be randomly drawing one name from those who leave a comment any time from now until Friday at midnight MT.

Supplies:

Scalloped bird stamp (Wonderful; Unity Stamp Company)
Bed of Roses and Purple Passion (Spritz; Shimmerz)
Mellow - green side (Lillian; Crate Paper)
White cardstock (Bazzill Basics Paper)
White scallop ribbon (Neighborhood Trims; Crate Paper)
Pearl stick-pin and rhinestone button (Close To My Heart)
Purple with white swirls Washi tape
Buttons

Size: 5 1/2"x 4 1/4"

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It's a Beautiful Day

Spring is in full bloom, the puppies are happy and adorable, and I spent time creating. I started acquiring a fine collection of Unity Stamps almost a year ago. Their designs are varied - cute, whimsical, vintage, trendy - I could go on. After having them for several months (which allows them to properly age) I pulled them out to use for projects this week.

The first is this card:

It combines a banner from the March 2012 Kit of the Month and a saying from the April 2012 Kit of the Month. The banner is so versatile - stamp it and color it, or stamp it on a variety of papers and layer together, or do as I did and stamp it twice and cut out a few pieces to pop up with foam squares.

The paper I used for the background (The Paper Loft's Easy Breezy collection) has an aged effect. To tone down the colors from the pens, I inked the edges with Vintage Photo Distress Ink. The finishing touch, a couple strands of baker's twine from Queen & Co.

It was fun making the card - playing with my Copic markers and these fun Unity Stamps. Come back tomorrow for another creation using Unity Stamps.

Supplies:

Banner stamp (March 2012 Kit of the Month; Unity Stamp Company)
It is a Beautiful Day stamp (April 2012 Kit of the Month; Unity Stamp Company)
Vintage Photo Distress Ink (Tim Holtz; Ranger Ink)
B12, B14, Y00, Y06 (Sketch markers; Copic)
Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy - blue side (Easy Breezy; The Paper Loft)
Summer Blue baker's twine (Twine Twist; Queen & Co.

Size: 4 1/4" x 5 1/2"

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Life is Wonderful card

It's amazing what having a few new products will do for your creativity! Yesterday I created this card for a friend and it was so much fun!! Plus it has lots of purple in it.

I used a piece of string I had in the tool drawer for the banner line and foam squares to raise the pennants from the card. The finished card is 4.25" x 5.5".

Here are the products I used to create the card.

Kioshi Collection Pack (BasicGrey)

Wonderful {Itty Bitty} (Unity Stamp Co.)

Life Documented Banner (Unity Stamp Co.)

Perfect Little Black Dress hybrid ink pad (Clear & Simple Stamps)

Tim Holtz Distress Ink - Vintage Photo

Tim Holtz Ink Blending Tool

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Surprise Card Swap

This weekend at CKC-Portland a couple of gals showed up thinking there was a card swap happening only to discover that there was not. I felt so bad for them. And so I posted a sign saying we would hold a card swap on Saturday at noon and if anyone wanted to participate, bring 20 cards. I also stated we may not have many swappers, but we'll swap with whoever shows up. And of course, I would participate.

No biggie except I didn't have any cards to swap and no supplies to make cards (although I happened to have brought my tools with me, just no paper and other stuff). Luckily, there was a Vendor Faire full of supplies I could purchase. So off to shop I went.

We had green card bases for the Friday night crop - grabbed 20 of those.

Stopped at Technique Tuesday and found two stamp sets that I HAD to have. One was Thank You sentiments in Ali Edwards' handwriting:

The other was a stamp I saw earlier this year and fell in instantly in love with (the tree/swing image is one stamp and the words are two other stamps):

Next came the ribbon. I found this crinkly brown ribbon that was perfect. Not sure who makes it but I found several references on the Internet for making something similar (wrinkled rayon seam binding).

Then I was meandering down the aisles and spotted Flower Soft (their web site wasn't working when I wrote this so here's a link to their blog). I have wanted to play with this for quite awhile and this stamp seemed perfect for it. So I picked up two little jars of peach. In case you are wondering what Flower Soft is, it is little pieces of something that resembles flocking but seems more like little pieces of fabric. Not sure what it is, but it is used to add dimension to projects and is beautiful for flowers, trees, bushes, and more.

More wandering and Boxer Scrapbooks suggested some paper, which was perfect with the brown ink I had planned and the peach Flower Soft.

Then adhesive. I had brought a little with me, but not enough to make 20 cards. A friend suggested trying the Embellishment Glue Stick from Pioneer Photo Albums. I was quite skeptical as I have used glue sticks in the past and they typically don't stick after a few hours. But Roger with Pioneer said I would really like it, so I gave it a try. It was AMAZING!!!! I used it to adhere the ribbon to the paper and it is still stuck (even after being smashed into my suitcase). I have a couple of their regular glue sticks to try too so we'll see how that goes as well.

Supplies in hand I was off to create. I think that creating late at night and under pressure were a pretty good combination. I didn't agonize over the design too much and opted to not include a sentiment. Here's the final card:

It's a simple card, but I like it! It was fun to create and fun to swap with the ladies in Portland.

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Good Things Wednesday

Yep, it's Wednesday and it was a good day, partly because I was did a segment for Good Things Utah. And I have to confess, while I usually enjoy doing the projects I make for the segments, this one was especially fun. Maybe because it was so easy, but also because I made a sample of the page we use in the featured class (15 Minute Pages) and it includes photos of my adorable hounds (look closely at the clip and you'll see it in the background).

So here's the link to the segment: Circle Your Scraps Card.

Here are two additional photos of the card. I don't have a photo of the layout, but if I get one I'll definitely share.

Hi card made using circles

Side view - the circles under Hi had foam tape under them

The thing I loved about this card is that it uses scraps and is so quick to put together. The layout is also very fast - cut a few squares, add some stickers, photos, journaling, and voila - a completed layout. You'll love this class too. This is just one of four pages that you complete, so if you are going to a CK Scrapbook Convention and looking for ways to make quick layouts, check out this class.

Happy creating!

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Just Because Card

Busy week - normal things at work and then Good Things Utah contacted me Tuesday morning to see if I could come on Wednesday morning to do a segment (one of their people had to cancel at the last minute because of illness). So I scrambled and pulled a technique from one of the new classes we're teaching at CKC called Material Girl. The segment is Just Because Rolled Flower card.

The flower technique in the GTU segment uses adhesive backed fabric paper (this particular product is from the Dear Lizzy American Crafts line). You could use paper or fabric, but the advantage I found with this product was the thickness/stiffness aspect. Fabric would be a little floppy and paper may not be as pliable (although you could soften paper up enough to make it more pliable, just be careful not to tear it). Plus, this fabric paper can be inked, rolled, scuffed, and more.

What I learned - make the circle bigger than you think you need :) Because you are cutting a spiral and then wrapping it around itself, it gets quite a bit smaller. And, I would practice with paper scraps before diving into this with the actual fabric paper since it is more expensive than scraps.

It was a fun card to make and interesting product to play with. Enjoy!

P.S. I've included the file with the spiral pattern too.

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