Card Word Puzzle - Congratulations

One of my favorite stamp sets is Card Word Puzzle and I've been having fun trying out my copics on the gorgeous flowers in this set. I'm following along with Heart 2 Heart's current Wedding Challenge and Freshly Made Sketches #41.

Please keep in mind that I am a beginner in coloring with Copics so I'm sure I didn't exactly put my shadows where they should all be but I will continue to practice!

Here's a close up of the flower so you can see that I popped up the middle section with foam tape.

Supplies used (all CTMH except markers and embossing folder): (C1494) Card Word Puzzle stamp set, (retired) Silhouette Level 2 paper pack, Cranberry cardstock, (44751) Archival Black stamp pad, (Z1151) 3-D Foam Tape, Cuttlebug Victoria Embossing Folder, Copic markers

Don't forget...Stampaganza only lasts until Saturday! For every two My Acrylix^® stamp sets (sizes A, B, C, D, or E) you purchase at full retail price in June, you'll receive a third stamp set of your choice (of equal or lesser value) for free!Pin It

Scrapbooking Mysteries!

Once school ends, my workload takes a big nosedive thankfully and I have more time to do things that I like, such as creating art, catching up on movies and TV, and reading. I've already made more cards in the past week than I have in the month of May! I also decided to watch as many of  the Mary Tyler Moore episodes that are on Hulu as I can (I've seen the first season already). We have also made many trips to the library.

I often reread favorite books and authors since I always seem to catch new details that I didn't in my first read throughs, but I certainly love finding authors and books I haven't read before so I was pretty intrigued when I came across Laura Childs in the mystery section and saw that she has a series devoted to scrapbook mysteries. This may be old news to some of you but I am so happy to have found her mystery series and the fact that they have a scrapbooking theme is just icing on the cake!  So far I've read the first three in the series. They are fun books!

Now, if only I can generate the same enthusiasism for cleaning as I do for reading, I'll be in good shape!Pin It

A Little Birdie - Retro Sketches #17

It seems that I am gravitating to sketch challenges lately! I made some more time for creating (don't worry, I did do some laundry too finally!) and based my card on Retro Sketch #17.

I pulled out my CTMH June Stamp of the Month, which I love but hadn't used yet! This is what I came up with.

The outside doesn't really make sense by itself  so here's a pic of the inside.

Supplies used (All CTMH except where noted): (S1206) A Little Birdies stamp set, (Z2105) Black stamp pad, (X7154B) Cruisin' Level 2 paper pack, (Z1701) Baker's Twine Neutral Assortment, (Z578) Corner Rounder, Spellbinders Lattice Rectangles Nestabilities, Crayola and Loew-Cornell Colored Pencils

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Love Your Layout : June 2012

Here's the latest Studio J layout video from Close To My Heart.
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Best Fishes - Freshly Made Sketches #40

I used the following sketch from Freshly Made Sketches to make my card.

I changed my card a little bit and since my main image already had a sentiment, I used a wooden shell embellishment instead of the banner on the bottom left.

Supplies used (all CTMH except where noted): (X7151B) Footloose Level 2 paper pack, Cocoa cardstock, Pear Cardstock, (C1500) Under the Sea stamp set, (44571) Archival Black stamp pad, (Z2194) Sky stamp pad, (Z2195) Lagoon stamp pad, (Z2197) Pear stamp pad, (Z2167) Creme Brulee stamp pad, (Z2114) Cocoa stamp pad, (Z1693) Seaside Wooden Shapes, (1771) Waterbrush, (Z1702) Baker's Twine Paradise Assortment, (Z1336) Opaques Pearl Adhesive Gems, (Z679) Liquid Glass, (Z697) Round Sponge, Cuttlebug Tiny Bubbles Embossing Folder, Spellbinders Nestabilities, Fiskars Paper Crimper, Crayola green colored pencil

I used some techniques and supplies that I taught in my recent Kids' Scramp Camp. Every participant received the Under the Sea stamp set and that's what I used here (since that's what I had out!). I combined two of the stamps from that set onto one acrylic block and then left the little tiny fish on its own block to stamp into my main image.

I used the Archival Black stamp pad to stamp my fishes and let them dry a bit before going in and using my waterbrush with ink from my stamp pads to paint. I used the Archival Black instead of the regular black just so the images wouldn't bleed while I was painting them.

Since I didn't want to use brads on my cards, I used Liquid Glass on some punched cardstock circles again (upper right corner). See my post from 6/22/12 to see details on how I do this. Although I wanted this card to be appropriate for giving to either a male or a female, I couldn't resist adding a little pearl to the shell. My son assured me that he wouldn't mind getting a card with a pearl on it. I had another small wooden shell shape which looked more like what a pearl would come in...a clam shell, so I decided to make another card with the same design. I used Pacifica ink instead of Lagoon for the "sea" and I used Cocoa cardstock circles instead of the Bamboo circles that I used in the first card on the upper right.

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Clean and Simple Sketch #196

After the last day of Scramp Camp, I found myself looking at a ton of scraps on my dining table. It was the Clean and Simple Stamping blog to the recue! Sketch #196 is a wonderful scrap user upper. I can see my self using this sketch often.

I decided to combine squares from three different papers which each had circle patterns on them and which had similar colors. I'm really loving circle patterns lately! I cut the Colonial White banner using my CTMH Cricut Art Philosophy cartridge, inked up the edges of the banner, and then stamped a sentiment from the Card Chatter - Birthday stamp set.

The best part of this process was that I had enough time and paper to make some multiples. Maybe I'll finally have some cards on hand when I need them!

Supplies used (all CTMH except for green scraps): (D1475) Card Chatter - Birthday stamp set, (Z2114) Cocoa stamp pad, (Z1686) Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge, Colonial White cardstock, Buttercup cardstock, (retired) Caboodle paper scraps, (retired) Good Times

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Bee Happy Thank You

This is one of those projects I started awhile ago and never got around to photographing. I used the Mojo Monday Sketch #245, but I never posted it on their challenge blog since I didn't photograph it until today!

Part of the reason that it took me some time to photograph it was that I wanted to make enough to send one to each of my preschool students as a thank you. I also was busy preparing for Art Camp which ended today. I used a bee stamp from the Bee Happy stamp set since we were the "Yellow Bumblebees," during our end of the year field day.

I played around with some of my new copic markers which I got using a gift certificate for Oozak.com (a gift from my lovely preschool class) to color in the sweet bee stamp. I'm still learning but here's a closer look at the colored image.

I didn't want to have to worry about whether or not I would need extra postage for these cards but I still wanted some dimension so I used one of my favorite techniques. After using a regular hole punch to get the red circles on the bottom left and the light yellow center for the flower, I applied some Liquid Glass.

After the Liquid Glass dried, my little punched holes somewhat resembled brads and give my cards dimension, not to mention some shine, without too much bulk.

Supplies used (all CTMH except for copics and nestabilities dies): (January special from 2009) Key to My Heart papers, (X7141B) Elemental Level 2 paper pack, (Z679) Liquid Glass, (B1374) Bee Happy stamp set, (44751) Archival black ink, (Z578) Corner Rounder, (Z1710) Just Blooms Paradise Paper Flowers, (Z1686) Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge to cut banners, Copic markers, nestabilities 

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Kids' Summer Scramp Camp 2012

The first week of my little camp has gotten underway! I try to offer a balance of free choice and "follow along" projects so that I can teach techniques but also give the kids some freedom to explore. After all, it's not fun if you're totally restricted in your creativity, right? Our first project was decorating a card box. I precut the Roxie papers using the Art Philosophy cartridge on the Cricut and with a paper trimmer to fit the card boxes, but the girls could decide which side of the paper to use and how to place their elements on their card boxes. They also chose how and if they wanted to add their pearl stickers and what color button to use. So while it was somewhat guided, there still was some free choice.  What I love to see is how different the projects turn out even with all the same or similar elements. I didn't get pictures of all the boxes but here are a few.

Tomorrow we will work on making some jewelry with scrapbooking papers. I hope they turn out well!

Now that school has ended for both me and my kids, I'm hoping I can post a bit more often. I have some projects just waiting to get photographed. I think it's also helpful to me that I switched back to the older Blogger interface. The new one is not intuitive for me! Although I do know that I will have to switch back to it soon, I figured I will use the old one while I can.

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