Make It Monday video tutorial: shading with Copics...

Recently, I purchased a few more Copic Markers to add to my stash and have been having fun with using them in different ways! Today is my day for a Make It Monday video over at Papertrey Ink, so I've made this card with shadowing under the die cut. I'd love if you would stop over to watch the video at Nichole's blog, give it a try, and let me know what you think of this technique!

I've used a Pure Poppy die cut, trimmed from the Framed Friends die by Papertrey Ink, then a light pink R20 Copic marker for the shading under the word. In the video, I will show you other samples of cards I've made recently with the same technique. Word dies work excellent for this, but you can shadow under other die cuts as well!

I've used Tulip Time and Wonderful Words: Friends stamps also.

Swing by Nichole's blog to watch the full Make It Monday video on how to recreate this card! Have a fabulous day, and don't forget to play along in the shadowing challenge for your chance to win a Papertrey Ink gift card!

So Glad We're Friends:

(All Supplies by Papertrey Ink Unless Otherwise noted.)

STAMPS: Wonderful Words: Friends, Tulip Time

INK: Melon Berry, Sweet Blush, Pure Poppy, Bright Buttercup, Spring Moss, Simply Chartreuse, Ripe Avocado

DIES: Framed Friends, Tulip Time

PAPER: Stamper Select White, Pure Poppy cardstock

OTHER: sequins by Pretty Pink Posh.

Watercolor pencils: a video tutorial...

Happy Wednesday! Will you get any crafting time in today? Perhaps some watercoloring? If so, hop over to Scrapbook Expo's Weekly Scrapper blog to watch a new video tutorial I filmed yesterday using the new Bold Blossoms Watercolor Sheets by Papertrey Ink and watercolor pencils. You can view the video HERE.

There is also a Bold Blossoms stamp set and some Bold Blossom coloring sheets available at Papertrey Ink, if you are more of a stamper or prefer to color with Copics and other coloring mediums. I hope you enjoy seeing the process with the watercolor pencils, and let me know if you have any questions! Have a great day!

Make It Monday video tutorial: Bringing the Inside Out...

Good morning. I hope you are all having a bright, sunny start to your day and are ready to break out your stamps and dies for the next Make It Monday challenge! I've got a new video up for you on "Bringing the Inside Out", which you can see HERE at Nichole's blog.

First, to decorate the outside of the card, I've used the new Make It Market Mini: Garden Guild stamp set.

Then to bring the inside of the card out to the front, a circle is die cut through the front of the card with the Limitless Layers 2.5" Circle die collection. The Scripted stamps and dies were used for the sentiment and a flower from Quilted: Summer added to the inside.
Using this technique of die cutting a peek-a-boo window and decorating the inside with a pop of color allows you to add some much needed color to an otherwise boring inside of the card! And you still get the enjoy the pop of color on the outside as well...two for one! I hope you'll play along in the challenge over at Nichole's blog for your chance to win a Papertrey Ink gift certificate. Thank you for swinging by today! Be sure to check out the video HERE.

You Brighten My Days card:

(All supplies by Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted.)

STAMPS: Make It Market Mini: Garden Guild, Quilted: Summer, Scripted

INK: Pure Poppy, Harvest Gold, Aqua Mist, Simply Chartreuse, Ripe Avocado

PAPER: Fresh Snow Fine Linen Cardstock, Harvest Gold Pattern Pack

DIES: Scripted, Quilted: Summer

OTHER: Gold metallic thread - Coats & Clark, sequins - Pretty Pink Posh.

new Make It Monday video tutorial...

Today it is my turn for a Make It Monday video tutorial at Papertrey Ink! One of the lessons I taught in my online Craftsy class is using patterned papers on cards: arranging them, how to choose certain papers, etc., so I thought it would be fun to give you a little sneak peek into that. In today's video, I'll show you my inspiration photo and how I will pull five colors from the photo to use in my paper designs, and then I'll show you how to make your own set of patterned papers that all coordinate with these colors and how to scale them appropriately. And finally, I'll show you a few ways to use those papers you just created and how to arrange them on a card!

When creating a set of stamped patterned papers or using pre-made papers on a card, you'll need to make sure you create at least one that is a large scale pattern, at least one medium scale pattern, and at least one small scale pattern. You can create/use more than that on your card, of course, but as long as you have one of each on your card, it will be very pleasing to the eye as far as the scale goes!

Here, the die cut flowers from Cutting Garden create the large scale on the card, the dots and stitches are medium scale (made with Polkadot Basics III and Chicken Scratch), and the plaid is more of a small scale (stamped with the line stamp in Note Niblets).

One more thing to think about is to create a stamped patterned paper that has ALL of the colors in it from your inspiration piece. Then when creating other papers to coordinate with this main paper, you'll pull colors from that main paper to use for the supporting papers.

There are really an unlimited number of ways you can use patterns on a card! You can place them horizontally, vertically, or horizontal AND vertical like I did on the "Thanks for all you do" card. Or you can use punches and dies to cut shapes out of them. If you'd like to play along, pop over to Nichole's blog to enter a card to win a $25 Papertrey Ink gift certificate! I can't wait to see what beautiful patterns you'll make!

Supplies:

(All supplies by Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted.)

STAMPS: Chicken Scratch, Background Basics: Super Gingham, Cutting Garden, 
Note Niblets, Polkadot Basics III, Mat Stack 2, Mat Stack 4

INK: Sweet Blush, Hibiscus Burst, Raspberry Fizz, Summer Sunrise, 
Orange Zest, New Leaf, True Black; Soft Granite by Hero Arts

PAPER: White cardstock

DIES: Cutting Garden

OTHER: sequins by Pretty Pink Posh, twine by The Twinery.

Make It Monday...

I'm up at Papertrey Ink today (Nichole's blog) with a new video for our weekly Make It Monday tutorial! I decided to try something a little bit different and talk about a particular style that my friend Wida Miller has coined, "Modern Whimsy". She tells me this is what my style is called! So I've been thinking about this a lot and what defines the style I'm most drawn to. I made a video to share a few tips on achieving this look. I hope you enjoy the video! And thank you to Wida for helping me figure out what my style is. I didn't know it had a name! :) It really helped to hear her view of what my style is, and how others view it...

You can watch the video HERE. To me, the Modern Whimsy style is a little carefree, not perfectly straight, light and airy, yet colorful with a lot of detail. Layered with hints of items peeking out from the back. Vellum and light backgrounds are always great additions to this style!

I did make a Pinterest board with more examples of what I feel this style looks like if you want to take a peek at more samples: Modern Whimsy on Pinterest. I get a lot of inspiration from scrapbooking pages. You can do anything on a card that you can do on a layout. Please let me know if you have any questions, I'd be glad to answer them. Have fun with this challenge! One winner will be chosen on Nichole's blog for a $25 gift certificate to use however you'd like at Papertrey Ink. Give it a try!

Peace card:

(All supplies by Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted.)

STAMPS: Holiday Button Bits, Layered Postmarks: Holiday

INK: True Black, Versamark

PAPER: Pure Poppy Pattern Pack, Sweet Blush Pattern Pack, Aqua Mist cardstock, vellum

DIES: Damask Snowflake, Half & Half, Fancy Flakes, One Liners

OTHER: twine, stars by Studio Calico, white embossing powder, washi tape.

Today is Day 3 of the Papertrey Ink countdown, and I get to show you a peek at two new stamp sets coming out this month! On these cards, I've used the new HEART-2-HEART #2 stamps and the new THINK BIG FAVORITES #14 stamps, available for purchase on March 15th.

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On this card, I've used the balloon die on the center balloon and popped it up with dimensional adhesive.  I used Smokey Shadow ink for the balloon strings and just stamped off one time, so the center balloon's string would be a little lighter. "Happy Birthday" is from the Think Big Favorites #14 set.

Happy Birthday Balloon card:

Stamps: Heart-2-Heart #2, Think Big Favorites #14

Ink: Smokey Shadow, Hawaiian Shores, True Black, Pure Poppy, Vintage Cream,  Melon Berry

Paper: Aqua Mist patterned paper by PTI, white cardstock, Damask Designs patterned paper by PTI

Dies: Heart-2-Heart #2 die

Other: Basic Grey brads.

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On the second card, I used the balloon die in the center of the yellow felt flower!

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Let me show you how I made the flower!

Step 1: Die cut a "Frilly Flower" from yellow felt. Die cut the balloon from Hawaiian Shores felt and grab a brad.

Step 2: Stitch around edge of flower.

Step 3: Pull the 2 ends of the strings tight.

Step 4: Tie in center. Snip off the point of the balloon to make it round.

Step 5: Punch a hole in center and add brad.

The result is a different type of flower made with the Frilly Flower die! I used the balloon string stamps as stems for my flowers.

Get Well Soon card:

Stamps: Heart-2-Heart #2, Think Big Favorites #14

Ink: True Black

Paper: Aqua Mist patterned paper, Fall Prints and Patterns (dot), Harvest Gold cardstock

Dies: Heart-2-Heart #2 die, Edgers #5 die

Other: Basic Grey brads, PTI button and felt.

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Here is a bit more of a shabby look. I've used the balloon strings as flower stems here again and the little heart as flowers. The balloon die works well as a vase too! "Get well soon" is from the Think Big Favorites #14 set. I used Vintage Cream over the background paper to make the words a bit lighter, so the hearts would stand out more.

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Get Well Heart Bouquet card:

Stamps: Heart-2-Heart #2, Think Big Favorites #14

Ink: Dark Chocolate, Pure Poppy, New Leaf, Vintage Cream

Paper: Fine Linen cardstock, Dearest Jane patterned paper

Dies: Heart-2-Heart #2 die

Other: Spring Moss felt, Spring Moss ribbon, My Mind's Eye patterned papers, pearl.

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And last is a more colorful card. I used some of the new Dark Chocolate patterned papers with Aqua Mist patterned papers, and stamped some fun, colorful cardstock balloons after die cutting them out.

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I taped twine onto the back of the balloons and then tied the strings together at the end with another small piece of twine.

Colorful Birthday card:

Stamps: Heart-2-Heart #2

Ink: True Black, Raspberry Fizz, Hawaiian Shores, Harvest Gold

Paper: Dark Chocolate patterned paper pack and all cardstock by PTI

Dies: Heart-2-Heart #2 die, Mega Mat Stack 5 die

Other: Twinery twine.

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These were super fun to work with! Now stop over to Nichole's blog and Melissa's blog also today to see more sneak peeks!

getting in the spirit...

No pun intended! Ok, maybe a slight pun was intended! :)

Are you gearing up for Halloween? If so, you should definitely see the Phantom Banner Kit by Pink Paislee. It comes with these cute little letter cards that spell out "happy haunting", and there are many things you can do with them. I just made a banner out of the first word, so I could hang it over this frame, but if you made a banner out of the entire thing, it would definitely be over 2 feet long!

I've use Pink Paislee's Phantom line of papers, Banner Kit, brads and some Daily Junque tissue paper and twine. The grosgrain ribbon is from the craft supply store.

To create the large banner shapes, I used a new die by Papertrey Ink called Wine Bottle Tag.

On the bottom, I've added some Soiree Flags by Pink Paislee. Now all I need are some cute Halloween photos to complete the project.

If you'd like to read more about how to create the banner, please pop over to the Pink Paislee blog.

And I have to show you the little banner my 6 year old made for Halloween! (totally her idea...lol)

Crafty little girl...

That's what we love to do around here!

Do you have Phantom products in your stash? Pink Paislee is holding an October contest - pull out those products and create a home decor project for your chance to win a $50 Amazon gift card.