Lilies for April

April 15th 2024 - not only tax time, but also time for a new Beautiful Blossoms Challenge - where anything goes as long as a floral is the focal image. Here is our gorgeous inspiration board:

When I saw the lilies I knew I wanted to use the new Clear Stamp and Die of the Month Feb. 2024 from Spellbinders called Lily Arch. It is a really pretty set and I love when a die cuts out all the "in-between" bits of the image. 

The teal set was stamped with Altenew's Obsidian Black Pigment Ink onto Ranger's Tim Holtz Watercolor Card Stock. I used Altenew's Crystal Clear Embossing Powder over it while it was still wet and heat set. The image below was stamped on the same paper with Versamark Ink and set with Ranger Ink's Princess Gold Embossing Powder.

Both floral images were water colored with Mungyo's Professional 48 Pan Watercolors and Silver Black Velvet #8 and #6 watercolor brushes. 

Both cards have an ink blended background over a stencil I found in my stash. Unfortunately it has no name etched in it. I do love a good circle stencil for a subtle background! I ink blended Ranger Ink's Distress Ink Tumbled Glass on the teal card and The Stamp Market Cactus on the gold/green card.

I almost always use a die with some sort of design texture around the edge...for 2 reasons: 1) I get a nice straight edges and 2) it brings interest and movement to the card. For these cards I used Penny Black's Creative Dies #51-706 semi-circle stackers. 

Thank you for stopping by and visiting my blog today. Come join us...we'd love to see your florals!

I will also be submitting to: NBUS

for this is the first time I've used the Lily Arch set.

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

RAM for Paper Funday

Welcome to April 2024 Paper Funday Challenge where Anything Goes! Rachelle Ann Miller was one of our generous sponsors this month and I decided to use her digital image called Animal Balloons for some baby cards for my daughter's shop!

I want to show how to mask a digital stamp to be able to create a background over the images. First, I created the card by printing the digital stamp with a Brother Laser Printer onto Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Watercolor Card Stock. Then I was ready to mask the background.

Start with an older brush that will fit your image. As a tole painter, I have a stash called "Seen Better Days" and I picked one from that set. Run the brush over a bar of soap, coating it, otherwise the brush you use will be ruined. I use Pebeo Drawing Gum and find it to work perfectly! Dip your soap-coated brush into the Pebeo (I like the blue color so you can see where you've applied it) and just paint all the images that need to stay white. 

Get into all the little spots so that the background remains white. You can see how the images were completely covered. Let dry, but not for days and days. I gave it about a half hour.

Now to create the background, I used Distress Oxide Tumbled Glass with my sponges and A Colorful Life Designs Stencil called Cloud Edger. 

I buy a set sponges from Amazon and cut into pie shapes. I make a "handle" with a punch I have from Stampin' UP and staple it to the top of the pie shaped sponge. I prefer to use these instead of blending brushes, round sponges, etc. Much cheaper and in my opinion work even better once saturated. If they get worn out, I just replace with a new piece of sponge.

Now to remove you can use a residue art eraser (as seen in the picture above) or just rub the blue Pebeo with your finger and pull it gently off the paper. You can see the hole in the balloon in the picture above where I started to remove the Pebeo Drawing Gum.  

Once the mask is removed completely and the background was completed you're ready to color. 

I watercolored the cute cute image with Mungyo Professional Half Pan Water Colors Set of 48. 

The sides were edged with an eyelet border from Spellbinder Winter Borders Die Set.  I love border sets and this one in particular has 8 different dies.

For the 2nd card it was created basically the same, but I use Distress Oxide Salty Ocean for a little darker background color.

The sentiments came from a retired RAM (Rachelle Ann Miller) MFT set called Number Fun 1. Here are the 2 cards together:

Thanks so much for sticking to the end. Hopefully this tutorial helped for those wanting to delve into digital stamps.

Come join us at The Paper Funday Challenges. We love to see your work!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Penny Black Guest Designer - 2

It's mid month and time for a reminder to join in at Penny Black's Saturday Challenge where the theme is "Anything Goes" and "Optional -Easter". I used a stamp and a separate Creative Die today for these love themed anniversary cards.

The mini stamp set is called FOR YOU #30-801. I stamped it with Altenew's Obsidian Black Pigment Ink unto Ranger Ink's Distress Tim Holtz Watercolor Cardstock and sprinkled it with Altenew's Crisp Clear Embossing Powder while the ink was still wet and heat set it.

I watercolored the image with Mungyo Professional Half Pan Watercolor Set (48) for it has some lovely browns, perfect for our little mice. One card has a pink rose and one card has a red rose. 

I used the sentiments from the stamp set, too. The little tag on the rose was blank, so I cut apart the word "Love" from the "Lots of Love" stamp and it fit perfectly into the tag. I can just puzzle the 2 parts of the stamp together next time I want to use the full sentiment.

I wanted the mice to be on something....something to ground them and I happen to have Penny Black's Creative Dies WOOD FLOORS #51-441 which I thought was just perfect! There are 2 dies in this set - the floor which embossed the lines and the separate baseboard. I cut 2 sets for each card and layered them up for nice thick floor dimension. It really gives the card some structure.

The floor boards were ink blended with Distress Inks: Tea Dye, Vintage Photo and Walnut Stain.

I always have such fun creating with Penny Black products. They are really versatile and can be used for so many occasions...I can see the mice running on top of the IMMENSE LOVE Creative Die...umm, I'll have to try that next! Thank you to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge for inviting me to Guest Design this month. It was so fun!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

More Purple for March

Welcome friends to The Beautiful Blossoms Challenge for March 15, 2024!  Look at the lovely inspiration photo below:

We are collaborating with Double Trouble Challenge and here are the perimeters:

I used a retired MFT Stamp called Flowers In Bloom for my floral card this month:

Watercolored with my Mungyo Professional 48 Half Pan Set on Ranger Distress Tim Holtz Watercolor Card Stock. I use a text embossing folder and ran the card panel through for some word texture in the back. Any embossing folder would do. And lastly I used my favorite ribbon from Stampin' Up which I am sure is long retired. The Happy Birthday sentiment is from Honey Bee Inside Snarky Sentiments and coordinating Honey Cut.

Overall a simple card, but I believe it has a big impact. Come play along with The Beautiful Blossoms Challenge and The Double Trouble Challenge - a 2fer! Thanks for joining me today, I truly appreciate it.

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Altenew for Paper Funday

Hello my friends and welcome to March 2024 Paper Funday Challenge where anything goes! I choose Altenew as one of our sponsors this month. I had so much fun with a set I have had in my stash and has not received enough use...Golden Garden Stamp Set and Coordinating Die.

I made several cards, as usual, for once I have everything out I like to try different ideas. I used Ranger Ink's Tim Holtz Distress White Heavystock Paper for all the cards. It is a 130lb. smooth surface and takes mixed media well. In this case I watercolored on it and it worked perfectly! I used Altenew's Watercolor 36 Pan Set to drop in a little bit of sketchy color.

I also used sentiments from Altenew's Inky Bouquet stamp set. I like the unusual font in this set.

The card below uses Altenew's Dotted Tile Debossing Cover Die in the background with an Erin Lee Creatives Rattan Arch 4 Die. One simple flower die cut from the Golden Garden set and a sentiment from Inky Bouquet finishes the card perfectly for my taste.

A side image:

Another colorful version:

Love this set!

For the background of this next card I used MFT Stamps Colorful Confetti Background Red Rubber Background Stamp with Versamark Embossing Ink and heat set with Ranger's Princess Gold Embossing Powder. I like the subtle textured background.

The hexagon shape is a die from Spellbinders called Essential Hexi-Gems Dies. I cut the floral image from the Golden Garden Set with the Coordinating Die and also cut it from black cardstock. This way I created a shadow for the focal image. The cute little sentiment is from Honey Bee Stamps Inside Snarky Birthday set and the Honey Cut Coordinating Die Set. I am such a fan of sentiments with coordinating dies.

Thank you for sticking to the end. Come play along with us at The Paper Funday Challenge this month and check out our fabulous sponsors.
*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Penny Black Guest Designer

Hello my friends and welcome to my Guest Designer post for Penny Black Saturday Challenges! Penny Black is one of my absolute favorite stamp companies and I love the opportunity to go through my Penny Black stash and create...in this case I made multiple cards.  The theme for this challenge which begins Saturday, March 2, 2024 is Anything Goes with Optional Easter.

I needed some anniversary cards and thought the Spring Tulips and the love theme would be perfect! 

I used 3 main Penny Black Die Cuts products for my cards today: The TULIPS #51-430, were cut out of Ranger Ink Distress Tim Holtz Water Color Card Stock, the YOU #51-760 and IMMENSE LOVE #51-760 were cut from Bristol Smooth Card Stock. All were cut three times each and layer together with Bearly Arts Glue for nice dimension.

Penny Black's Creative Dies set called CROSS STITCH BORDERS was used for the background for this card. I ran the largest die 3 times through the front of the card to create texture and movement. 

The card below uses Penny Black's Creative Die DAINTY DASHES STACKERS for the edges which I personally love.

Here's a close up of the water coloring on all the tulips using Mungyo's Professional Half Pan Watercolors. Most of the sentiments come from Waffle Flower's Happy Anniversary stamp set.  

Here are all 3 shown together: The large die cut words were ink blended with Ranger Ink's Distress Inks: blues were Tumbled Glass, Salty Ocean and Mermaid Lagoon. The Purples were Shaded Lilac, Dusty Concord and Villianous Potion. 

Penny Black's products are all high quality and well designed. They are so much fun to take a day or two and just mix and match and create! Thank you for joining me today and I'm looking forward to seeing your work at the challenge! 

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.