Quietfire Design's byhand newsletter 7th Anniversary Contest

The featured Quietfire product for these projects is Grungeboard.

This is one segment of a scavenger hunt for a $30 gift certificate from Quietfire Design, celebrating the 7th Anniversary of the byhand Newsletter compiled and designed by Suzanne Cannon of Quietfire Design.

To get all the information about this contest and 2 others, see the newsletter here.

Mini Book

This mini book has pages that are 3" x 3" and the covers are 3 1/4" x 3 1/4". I used some marbled paper I made at a class on the covers and bound it with a decorative spine binding. I did one spread in the book and sent it on. It will go to 4 other people to work in and then on to a very special lady that we wanted to do something for. I used paint for the background of my spread, stamped the quote on a transparency, attached it with clear glue and used stickers around the edge. Added collage image ribbon and flower trim using stickles glue in the center of the flowers. All stamps on my spread and the cover and the collage image are from Quietfire Design.

Purple Flower

This is another floral atc for the byhand swap. The large flower was made using a cateye ink pad. Little flowers - Stamps by Judith; Saying - Hero Arts. Stickles glitter glue for accent.

Ordinary Miracles

This atc if for a swap on the byhand yahoo group. The background was done with Ecoline watercolor inks and plastic wrap. The flower and words are from the foil seal on a container of sour cream, Daisy brand. Gold strip stickers along the bottom and right. Ecoline inks and gold stickers are available from Quietfire Design.

And the winner is..................

Well, no one actually hit the nail on the head with what I did with the stencils but I've decided to have the give away anyway and entered everyone that left a comment. I used a random number generator to pick the winner and it is lindart!!!! Woohoo!!!

So just what did I do you ask :-)) I layed down the stencil on white cardstock and using a sponge dauber applied microglaze through the stencil. Put the dauber on your finger, dab it in the microglaze, dab it on a piece of scratch paper to be sure you don't have any clumps when you start and begin sponging it through the stencil (add more microglaze to the dauber as needed). Start in one area and work your way across the stencil - Don't go back and sponge again once an area has begun to dry. Remove the stencil. Then either sponge or spray on your color, blot up the extra off of the microglazed areas and dry with the heat tool.

Heart - after the microglaze was applied I sprayed the piece with water, sprayed Adirondack color wash onto a cosmetic sponge and dabbed it over the heart allowing it pool wherever it wanted (I did not blot this one off, the color ran right off of the microglaze).

Tree - after the microglaze was applied I sprayed it with water and then with diluted color wash espresso also sponging some on.

Last atc - after the microglaze I sprayed on 2 colors of color wash, blotted the piece, dried it, flicked on some water, let it set a little bit and blotted again, redried it, layed on the stencil in another spot and sponged some ink through it, added the torn music paper sponged with ink, and also stamped a couple of flourishes.

(If you missed the post this is referring to, scroll down to the "Fun With Stencils - Give Away")

Journey atc

I got an order from Quietfire Design today and it included the newest sets of Cedar Canyon rubbing plates. This means I now own all of them and so I thought I really should start actually using them :-)) The background for this atc was done by wetting a piece of white cardstock very well, dabbing it off on a towel, pressing it onto one of the plates from the floral fantasy set using my fingers, brayering the cardstock with Kaleidacolor blue breeze, taking it off the rubbing plate and drying it. I then stamped a flourish image twice using the blue breeze ink, added the collage image, sponged some ink onto the book and lace parts of the image, stamped journey with black ink, and used a fine tip black pen to add writing to the book page. All supplies available from Quietfire Design.

Created Byhand Challenge

I'm getting in just under the gun with this one :-) The challenge posted last Tuesday on Created Byhand was spritz-spray-spatter. The background for this card was done using a Cedar Canyon rubbing plate I just got in the mail today. It's from the floral fantasy set. I put one dropperful of Distress reinker fired brick in a mini mister bottle and then finished filling it with water. Repeated with another bottle and spiced marmalade reinker. I used both of these to spritz the rubbing plate well and then layed a piece of white cardstock onto the rubbing plate and pressed well holding it there for a bit to soak up all the color. Dried it with a heat tool, trimmed it to 4" x 5 1/4" and softened the white areas a bit by sponging on some Distress ink dried marigold. Quote is stamped onto vellum, torn along the right and left, rubbed some dried marigold on the back of the stamped area, dried it, layed it onto the background folding the top and bottom to the back and taping them down. The ribbon is white silk colored with Distress ink fired brick. Added flowers, leaves, and a brad. Layered it all to a folded green card.

Fun With Stencils Give Away

Here's a picture of what will be in the package (could be more if I decide to add to it). There is some duo mulberry cardstock stuff, some book pages and misc stuff, a variety of backgrounds I've done from my stash, a bag of charms and doo dads.

If you missed how you could win this, look down to the next post. The technique I used with the stencil is the same on each project. The stencils I used were a tree, a flourish with hearts, and part of a leafy border. Also you can click on each picture to see a larger one.

Fun With Stencils / Give Away

I've been having some fun trying something different (for me anyway) with stencils lately!! I thought it might be fun to see if anyone could figure out just what I did and what I used (supply/supplies). So I've decided to give a prize to someone who could guess. What you need to do is leave me a comment telling me what you think I did/used, which one of these projects is your favorite, and your email address so I can let you know if you win. I'll draw one name from those who guess right and send them a package. I don't have the package all put together yet but will post a pic when I do. I'll make the drawing on Tuesday, March 11th. I got the stencils I used from Quietfire Design. The first and third projects are atcs. The 2nd one is a 5 1/2" x 6" card .

A Monthly Rubber Stamp Club

The Project of the Month on A Monthly Rubber Stamp Club for March is a paperbag book that I made. I had a great time with this book. Hope you all like it!!! More pictures and complete directions can be found at AMRSC.

A Birthday Card

My husband's birthday was March 1 and this is the card I made him. The scenic leaf stamp is from AJ's Country Stamps and I got it at a stamp convention dh and I went to this past fall. It was the first time he'd ever gone to one with me and we had a really good time. This stamp is from a set of 4 that we both liked and he especially thought they were cool stamps so I used one for his card. Image was stamped with black permanent ink and colored with chalk pastels and a Dove blender pen. Next layer is a black heavy textured handmade paper and I inked the ridges with Brilliance ink. Leaf brads in the corners. "Happy Birthday" is a sticker.

Journal with Grungeboard Covers

This is a journal I made reently using Grungeboard for the covers and binding it with the Bind-it-all. More pictures and step-by-step directions can be accessed via the February byhand Newsletter. There are also other projects to be seen and other wonderful art. Check it out!!

Vamp Stamp News

Both of these cards use the soot stamping technique and are published in the March 2008 issue of Vamp Stamp News. I remember trying this technique a few years ago and having lots of trouble but after reading the article in the Jan. '08 VSN about soot stamping, I decided to try it again and it went so much better. Love my Vamp Stamp News issues!! They always have great information and articles very helpful to stampers. (Nope, I'm not just saying this because she publishes my cards :-) The calligraphy stamps, checkerboard, and flourish images are all from Quietfire Design. Also got the star border stickers from there.

You Make My Day Award

I am so blessed!!! Two wonderful people have awarded me with "You Make My Day Awards". Gayle and Jodi are both inspirations to me!!

The rules for the “You Make My Day” award are to re-present it to 10 people whose blogs bring you happiness and inspiration and make you feel happy about blog land. Let them know through email or by posting a comment on their blog so they can pass it on. Beware you may get the award several times, and if you do, consider yourself really, really loved. So to pass it on and keep the love going ~ here are 10 of the 100's of blogs that keep me inspired and bring a smile to my face. Check them out when you have a few minutes... perhaps there are some new friends to be made!

Yogi

Chris

Suzanne

Lenna

Deborah

Kristy

Keron

Nancy

Lori

Judy

Toilet Paper Casting

Happy Saturday!!! There has been a lot of talk on the Byhand Artists yahoo group about paper casting toilet paper and also with, I think it's called, cotton linter... or something like that. I also recently received an atc in a swap on that group that had a paper casting on it. My good friend, Michelle, was over and saw the atc and wanted to give it a try. I've heard of doing it before and it's been on my "to do some day list" for a few years so we sat down and played. We had lots of fun and I have more casting to make cards from. However, this morning while taking a shower (some of my best thinking happens there :-) I started wondering if I could do this with brass stencils. This flourish heart is a Dreamweaver Stencil and I got it from Quietfire Design. I took foam mounting tape, detacked it a bit and put it on the back of the stencil. I put a piece in each corner close to the design and also cut 2 tiny pieces to put in the center of the design to be sure the center stayed supported. I then attached the stencil to a piece of hard plastic and started laying on the toilet paper, pouncing with water and a stencil brush getting the tp down into the design and also I went out over the edge of the stencil. I used about 10 layers of tp on this. Dried it some with the heat tool keeping it at a distance and then let it finish air drying as I had some other things to get done also. As you can see, when I took it off the stencil it had worked very well!! I was so impressed!!! I tore all the edges just outside the stencil edge line. I kept this card simple. The base is Bazzill cardstock stamped with a medium sized flourish (Quietfire Design) in Adirondack butterscotch. The next layer is embossed paper from Quietfire Design and I edged it with a gold Krylon paint pen. I also added a peel offs sticker border along the bottom.

You Make My Heart Soar

This is an oversized card (9" x 7 1/2") that I've made for my husband for Valentine's Day. The folded card is a very light cream color. For the background, I stamped the large flourish (Quietfire Design) with Ranger resist ink and then sponged over it with Adirondack inks red pepper and cranberry. I've used the largest heart and largest set of wings in a pack of grungeboard(elements pack, dot pattern). The heart I painted with Golden fluid acrylic naphthol red medium, let it dry, and then dry brushed on iridescent gold deep. The wings were painted with iridescent bronze. "LOVE" is also grungeboard (alphabet set, swirl pattern) and is colored with a Krylon gold paint pen. "You Make My Heart Soar" was done with a Dymo labeler.

Purple Gothic Arch

The challenge at Gothic Arch is purple and I had been thinking maybe I would fit in getting something done for it. Well, I had bought some new towels.. purple even.. and after washing and drying them I was cleaning the lint screen on the drier and the lint was a light purple. On my way to throwing it away the challenge popped into my mind and I thought hmmm maybe I can use this :-)) So I put it on the counter until I had time. I had already scrunched up the lint or it would have been cool to glue on a fluffy layer... instead I mixed the lint with fluid matte medium and also added in a little bit of gold glitter. I cut the arch shape from watercolor paper, rubbed Stazon cactus green ink over it, dried it, and then smeared on my mixture and left it to dry. Good thing I did this at night because it's a lot easier being patient when you are sleeping, lol. It darkened the lint a lot but came out very cool. Lots of texture!! I printed and cut out the collage image (Quietfire Design) and attached it with gel medium. On a scrap of white cardstock I tapped the cactus green inkpad and then also sponged some ink on. On top of that I stamped "Serenity" (Quietfire Design) with Stazon royal purple, tore it out, and attached it with Glossy Accents. The flowers were punched from 3 different colors of purple cardstock and attached with Glossy Accents. Gold glitter glue added to the center of each flower. Along the top right I added 5 eighth inch gold eyelets, took white silk ribbon, colored it with Brilliance pearlescent purple ink, heat set it, and weaved it through the eyelets ending with a bow.

Another for Created Byhand

Since I still had part of an image left from cutting out the extra doves for the last card, I just had to make something else. This is an atc and it's probably inspired by the foot of snow we got last night. The background is from a tissue box. I stamped part of a flourish (Quietfire Design) along the right with Stazon pumpkin. Cut out the girl and glued her on. Punched several flowers and glued them on. Added glitter glue to the center of each flower, some yellow and some gold. Wrote the words with a black pen.

Created Byhand Challenge

This weeks challenge is to use a Free Collage Image provided by Quietfire Design... info here. I printed out the image twice... cut one out entirely and then cut just the 2 doves from the second one. Using foam tape I added the 2 doves over the doves on the whole image and then edged the image using a gold Krylon paint pen. This is layered to a folded Bazzill cardstock card. Calligraphy stamp (Quietfire Design) is stamped with Versamark ink and embossed with white. White silk ribbon (Quietfire Design) was colored using Distress ink antique linen and added to the card along with a gold clipiola.

Black and White Card

This week is WinterStamp on the two peas forum. There are several challenges posted with prizes to be won. One challenge is sponsored by Quietfire Design and you need to use black and white and a QF calligraphy stamp. For this card I started with watercolor paper and added water and Ecoline liquid watercolor black creating darker and lighter areas. While it was still wet I layed on some strips of bubble wrap and also some scrunched up plastic wrap, let it dry completely and then removed them. Next down both sides I stamped one of the QF flourish stamps using Brilliance moonlight white. At the bottom I used part of one of the larger flourishes and stamped it with white paint. The calligraphy stamp is stamped in black on white cardstock, torn out, and part of a small flourish stamped in two corners with black and attached it to the background. The background is attached to a folded card of white Bazzill cardstock. I then took a grungeboard flourish, painted it white, let it dry, pressed a black inkpad to it, and attached it to the card.

Friendship Card

I've been having lots of fun incorporating grungeboard into my projects this weekend!! This card is 4 1/4" x 5 1/2". The folded card is green Bazzill cardstock. The background starts with white cardstock. The flourish is stamped with Versamark ink and embossed in clear. I then sprayed the piece with diluted Ranger color wash butterscotch and stream and blotted immediately with a paper towel to keep the colors light. Next I placed the piece between 2 pieces of copy paper and ironed it to remove the embossing powder. The grungeboard flourish and the flower brads were painted with Lumiere halo blue gold. The saying was stamped on vellum, cut out, layered onto a larger piece of vellum and those edges torn. all supplies and stamps can be gotten from Quietfire Design.

My First Skinny

A skinny is 3" x 5" or some say any size just so it's more tall than wide. All supplies and stamps used on this one are from Quietfire Design. All inks are Distress Inks. I started with white cardstock and stamped the harlequin background with antique linen. I then turned the stamp 90 degress and stamped again with worn lipstick. The hands are stamped with walnut stain. I sponged over the whole piece using shabby shutter getting it a little darker on the edges. The hand stamped in the lower right is trimmed out just around the fingers using a craft knife. The saying is stamped on a scrap of white cardstock with walnut stain, torn out, edges rubbed with worn lipstick and attached under the fingers of the hand. The heart was punched from harlequin grungeboard, sponged with worn lipstick and then rubbed with fired brick dtp.

Grungeboard ATC

It was difficult getting a picture of this atc. I tried scanning and had too many shadows because of dimension so this pic was taken with the digital camera but I've got a lot of bouncing light. The base is cut from a piece of harlequin patterned grungeboard (basics pack), painted with Lumiere burgundy, edged with a gold Krylon paint pen, and speckled with gold Krylon. The heart and key are dots grungeboard (elements pack). I painted the heart with Lumiere pearl magenta, let it dry, and added red heart stickers on top of the dots. The key is colored with gold Krylon. Tied gold cording around the key and then around the heart. The paper at the bottom (brighter in real life) is from a dark chocolate Hershey's kiss.

Created Byhand - Black and White

This weeks challenge on Created Byhand is to use only black and white. This atc uses black cardstock. I stamped the large flourish with Brilliance moonlight white. Then using a score-it board I scored 1/4" from each edge creatinga a ridge and rubbed the Brilliance pad dtp over some of the ridges. The key is stamped with Brilliance on black cardstock, torn out, edges rubbed well with Brilliance and then the key highlighted with a white Souffle pen. White dots along the edges were also done with the white Souffle pen. Words were hand written, cut out and added. All supplies are available from Quietfire Design.

This ATC is for a Valentine's mingle

I really enjoyed making this atc. The background is embossed paper from Quietfire Design and I dry brushed on Lumiere burnt orange. White lace was added along the left, rubbed with Distress ink antique linen, and red sequins added. In the center of the sequins I added a drop of liquid pearls and when that was dry colored it with a souffle pen. The girl is a collage image from Quietfire design. It was printed on white cardstock. I also cut out an extra flower and layered it on with foam mounting tape. The words were printed with a dymo labeler on clear tape, attached to cardstock sponged with Adirondack rust ink, and cut out. Metallic heart stickers added.