CBC - Quilts or Stitching

I have had a package of ExtravOrganza for at least a few years and as I thought about this challenge it started calling to me "Hey... look here... I've been waiting a long time for you to use me and the time is now!".. so of course I had to agree.  The collage image is printed on the ExtravOrganza... VERY cool!!! It worked great!!!  And since I printed the whole digital sheet, you'll be seeing more things with the other images I have.  Next I took a piece of muslin, rubbed on a little distress ink (I actually just used what was already on the foam applicators from previous uses, didn't reink), and stitched the ExtravOrganza on top.  Now I'm not a big sewer (translated I've done very little - HomeEc in high school and since then mostly just simple mending when needed)... but it too has been calling to me lately (I sewed on some atcs a few weeks ago).  My machine was giving me fits when I first started stitching the pieces together... I had to stop and pull threads a couple of times but I didn't want to waste the image so I persevered (and used some flowers to cover the really bad spot).  I like it and the very subtle colors showing through from the Distress Inks.  The background printed paper is Prima Fairy Floral.  The saying is stamped on the same paper in a quieter area, cut out, edges inked, and the heart colored in with a Tombow marker.  The butterfly is stamped onto grungepaper with Distress Ink pine needles, cut out, Distress Ink scattered straw sponged over it to add color to the open areas, and the lock attached to it with brads.  Faux stitching with a black pen around the edges of the background.

Details of the challenge can be found either on the Created Byhand Challenge Blog or on the Quietfire Creations Forum.

CCC #31 - Rusted Enamel

Rusted Enamel is a very cool technique!!!  It has been awesome working through Tim Holtz's book Compendium of Curiosities... I've learned soooooooooooo much... and to think there are just a few weeks (techniques) left to do.  As always, pop on over to Linda's blog Studio L3 to get all the details on the challenge.

My Distress ink colors used on the tag are worn lipstick, tea dye, and brushed corduroy.  The flourish is stamped with Archival olive.  The bottom cut with an On-the-edge die.  The flowers are cut from white felt, sprayed with Color Wash cranberry and then Perfect Pearls forever violet, dried, sprayed again with violet and dried.  Amazingly the shimmer of the Perfect Pearls Mist does not stand out on the felt like it does on paper and grunge.  I then ran a bead of Rock Candy Distress Stickles around the edge of each flower and let it air dry.  I then realized that I was going to stamp on the flowers and had forgot so I stamped a text image on them.  Cut the ticket from a piece of Tim's Vintage Shabby paper, stamped the Valentine's ticket with Archival jet black, added a little worn lipstick and then black soot ink around the edges, and went over the "14" with glaze pens.  

The Lord Bless You Card

A very springy, blingy card made for a very special friend!!!  The background paper is Prima Fairy Flora.  The scripture stamp is from Our Daily Bread Designs, specifically this set.  The flourish is grungepaper colored with Distress Inks and sprayed with Perfect Pearls Mist.  The rosette was cut with Tim Holtz's rosette die from Fairy Flora paper.  After it was made the edges were coated with glitter glass using Glossy Accents.

Queen of Hearts ATC

The Created Byhand Challenge (CreateByhand Blog or Quietfire Creations Forum) theme this week is Queen of Hearts.   This is timed to correspond with the 2nd Annual Queen of Hearts Challenge on the Quietfire Style Blog... there are prizes!!!!  My atc base is an actual queen of hearts playing card.  I adhered a piece of fairy flora cardstock over it tearing off the corners so you could still see the card and sanding the edges.  The edges are inked with Distress Ink brushed corduroy and the flourishes stamped with the same ink.  Added the collage image, the gold crown charm, red gems on the crown.  "Queen of" and "Everything" are stamped on vellum, torn out, wrapped on the card taping to the back.  I went over the red heart on the card with red Glaze pen.  Gold brads and black dots on the edge to finish things off.

Live the Life

The tag is grungeboard cut with Tim's tag die and then embossed with Woodgrain texture fade.  The tag started longer and I had put a border along the bottom but decided I really didn't like what I was doing and cut that part off... but not wanting to waste an otherwise nice beginning to a tag I chose to make a short tag. The coloring on the base tag is Tim's technique Weathered Wood with white and yellow paint dabber and a few colors of Distress Inks.  The bird and cage are cut form grunge.  The cage is embossed with the dot matrix texture fade, painted with silver paint dabber and then some black ink over that to tone it down.  The bird is colored with Distress Inks and stamped.  The bells were silver and colored with black alcohol ink.  The black dots around the edge and for the bird's eye were done with black Enamel Accents.

An Artful Adventure

I really enjoyed making these cards using Wendy Vecchi's Studio 490 stamps and Art Parts plus some other things.  The largest flower and stem are art parts.  The other flowers, leaf, and bird are grungepaper.  The printed paper in the background is from a Tim Holtz paper stack.  The bird is cut with Tim's die.  I sprayed a bit of color wash on the background and added stamping.  The bird is sprayed with color wash and then Perfect Pearls mist.  The flowers, stem, and leaf are colored first with Snow Cap pigment ink, dried, colored with Distress Inks, stamped, and finally sprayed with Perfect Pearls Mist.  There is some Beadazzles in the center of the flower glued on with Glossy Accents.

Snowman in Love

I know.. a snowman with flowers!!  But I really like it!!!  The scrollwork border makes me think of love swirling all around.  This card along with directions are now posted to the Quietfire Design Project Gallery  Here.  If you have time, leave me a comment and let me know what you think of the card.

Live Your Dream ATC

We've just begun a series of challenges on the EverythingWendyVecchi Yahoo Group.  These challenges are based on Wendy's "Make Art Studio 490 Style" books and each challenge will run from 1-2 weeks usually depending on the type of challenge.  The first one is easy and is taken from book 1, page 16.  The idea is not to duplicate Wendy's projects but to be inspired by them!!  This first challenge required us to use a butterfly and a scallop in our piece and the project in the book is an atc so most people are also making an atc.  Since this is taking place in the EWV group we must use at least one Studio 490 stamp in each project.  My atc uses all Wendy stamps.  My base is a Ranger manila atc blank.  I've used color wash sprays and distress inks.  The butterfly is stamped onto grungepaper twice, cut out, colored and layered.  My scallop is a stamp and I created a frame by stamping all 4 sides.  The black dots were made with Ranger's enamel accents.

More ATCs

These are some atcs I made last week to take to an in-person swap I attended this past Saturday in Des Moines.  I had a great time at the swap!!  and added some wonderful atcs to my collection!!!  

CCC #30 - Altered Metal with Paint...

... and because I got behind AGAIN..   this tag also includes CCC #29 - Weathered Wood Grunge and CCC #28 - Colorful Layered Fragments.  I went a little crazy with the color this time... I'm thinking it must be because of the blizzard... ya, that's it :-))  The tag is cut from Grungeboard using Tim's tag die.  I used the woodgrain texture fade on it... the paint for the weathered wood technique was mixed using some Paint Dabbers (I need to get more colors of these), some reinker, and some Golden fluid acrylics... and then the ink used was dusty concord.  All stamps are Tim's except for the letters to spell "Love", those are Studio G.  The spots were made with bubble wrap and sunshine yellow paint dabber - also dabbed it around the edges of the tag.  The ribbon was colored with color wash butterscotch and wild plum.  Ideology film strip ribbon, trinket pin, and philosophy tag.

All details about the Compendium of Curiosities challenge can be found on Linda's wonderful blog.

Follow your dreams....

All stamps (flourish, butterfly, quote) are from Quietfire Design.  The technique used on the main panel is Neutral Shadows from the current (Feb/Mar 2011) Technique Junkie Newsletter.  The colored ink I used for the technique is Adirondack currant.  Border punched (EK Success) a piece of paper from the Fairy Flora collection.  Sticky back pearls on the butterflies and along the border.

This card works for the Created Byhand Challenge (ning group or blog), I have a dream.

Journey ATC

Lots of fun stuff with this atc.  The very textured paper in the background is wallpaper sprayed with Ranger's color wash sprays and some Perfect Pearls Mist.  There are some scraps of lace and paper (you know when you rip a piece of paper from a spiral bound notebook and you have all those holes along one edge.. I cut that edge off and saved it to use), some stitching, a left over rusted grunge flourish, white German scrap colored with Distress Inks, paper flowers, sticky back gold pearls, 'find joy in every journey' is a rubber stamp from Inky Antics, and the girl collage image is from Collage Stuff.

ATC - Dapper Dan

This is another atc made from elements found in a Memories in the Making A.T.C. Collection paper pad.  This pack is called Men.  The background paper (I added stamping - diamonds, text, flourish), man image (cut out with deckle scissors and layered onto black cardstock), Dapper Dan piece, and clock (I added Glossy Accents over the glass area) all came from the pad.  The key is from 7 Gypsies and the mini paper clip and mini brad are Tim Holtz Ideology.

CBC - 1st Anniversary or Paper Piecing

As you can tell I chose to focus on the 1st Anniversary choice of this weeks Created Byhand Challenge.  Some day I might try paper piecing but this is not it.  The printed paper I used on this card is from Prima's Fairy Flora Collection... Suzanne has added the 12 x 12 sized sheets to her website here.  These papers are gorgeous and double sided!!!  I cut all parts for this card from one sheet  - No, I didn't use the whole sheet - the darker piece is one side and the lighter pieces are from the other side.  All stamps are from Quietfire Design - heart, flourish, together forever. I stamped together forever on a very light area of the paper and die cut with Spellbinders 3rd from the largest Labels Four die and edged the piece with gold Krylon.  Next I die cut a piece using the largest Labels Four die with the flip side of the paper showing and also edged it with the gold Krylon pen.  I cut the background piece from an area that had lighter to medium shades in it, sponged on Distress aged mahogany ink using the ink blending tool,  stamped the flourishes with aged mahogany, distressed the edges of the piece with the Tonic paper distresser, again sponged aged mahogany on the edges and attached it to the folded card.  Layered on the die cut pieces using foam mounting tape.  Stamped the heart on a light area of the printed paper using aged mahogany, cut it out and attached it to the card with foam mounting tape.  Added an Ideology spinner to the center of the clock with a brad and attached them to the card doubling the foam mounting tape for more dimension.

It was a cheap, plain, wood frame....

... and now it looks like this!!!  I am over-the-top thrilled with how this frame turned out!!!  A little gesso, a stencil, some paste, some paint and... wah-lah!!!  Use wonderful stamps from Quietfire design and some gorgeous paper for the inside.... add an Ideology ornate plate along with a QF word to finish it off.  

This is my newest project on the Quietfire Design website.... get all the how-tos  Here.  

Artful ATCs

A wonderful lady in our local ATC swap group sent envelopes stuffed full of papers and fun stuff to any of us that wanted one... our only requirement was to make one atc using at least one thing from the envelope and the word artful of which she included sheets of the word in many different fonts.  I couldn't stop with just one and so far have made 6 artful atcs.  All paper used in these atcs (except the collage images, bird, and extra words to go with artful) are from the envelope... I've used some of the papers as they came and others I've added stamping, inking, painting and also have torn pieces and layered things... even the corrugated cardboard came from the envelope, I sprayed it with color wash and perfect pearls mists.  All the collage images I used are from the Collage Stuff sheet Crazy for Kids.  Other things I've added are flowers, pearls, charms, Victorian scrap (bird and butterfly), German scrap, gems, etc.  

CCC #27

I'm slightly late getting this in but I'm still happy to have it done!!  Linda's blog has all the information on this challenge...  CCC #27 Distress Misting Masks.  I used Tim's flourish mask, all Tim stamps and some Ideology.  The ribbon/lace is just some that I had... it was white before being sprayed and distress inked.

Postcard Swap

Lori is hosting a 4x6 postcard swap on the EverythingWendyVecchi Yahoo Group and this is my postcard.  The rules... use at least one Wendy Vecchi Studio 490 stamp (I used all Studio 490 images) and we couldn't do any layering of paper or use embellishments.  It is quite a challenge to not be able to layer up!!!!  But it was a LOT of fun!!!  I started with Ranger manila cardstock... stamped the text image with Archival ink olive, stamped the flower with Archival ink jet black, added color to the flower using a paint brush and Distress Inks barn red, fired brick, bundled sage, shabby shutters, wild honey (rub DI on the craft sheet, spritz some water next to the ink - not in the ink- and use your paintbrush to pick up color adding just a bit of water to the brush as necessary), added wild honey around edges using a blending tool. stamped the dots with jet black, stamped the scalloped border with jet black, added a rub of snow white Paint Dabber next to the flower using my finger to smooth it, let it dry, stamped Dare to be Unique over paint dabber with jet black, stamped Imagine and Celebrate today with jet black, added some Distress Ink tumbled glass over the dotted area but not over the wild honey ink on the edges, went over the end of the "stamens" with black Glaze pen.  On the reverse side I used the zig zag border image to make a line in the center just like a real postcard has a line to separate where you write from where you address the postcard.

Challenges - CCC and SSSS

I have been behind on the Compendium of Curiosities Challenge and to catch up have included challenges #24, #25, and #26 all on this tag.  Our "hostess with the mostest", Linda, of the wonderful blog Studio L3 has all the deets on her blog.

CCC #24 - Distress Rock Candy Stickles, page 47
CCC #25 - Scribble Stain Distress, page 34
CCC #26 - Rusted Grunge, page 45

The Distress Ink colors I used in the background are bundled sage, weathered wood, and tea dye.

I'm also including this tag for the Simon Says Stamp and Show challenge which is to use a new stamp or any stamp you have never used before.  The Tim Holtz stamp "it's all perspective" is one I haven't used before.  I stamped it onto manila card, cut it apart, and inked the edges with weathered wood and then black.

ATCs - Seeing Red

These atcs are for a swap on the EverythingWendyVecchi yahoo group.  The theme is "Seeing Red".  All the stamps I used are Wendy Vecchi's Studio 490 images.  The base is Ranger's manila atc blanks.  I smooshed barn red Distress ink onto the craft sheet, added a few squiggles of barn red reinker (not actually squeezing any onto the craft sheet but just squiggling what was on the end of the dropper), spritzed it all with Perfect Pearls Mist in the color perfect pearl, pressed my atc into it moving it around just a little, dried it, lightly tapped it into left over droplets and dried it again.  The text is stamped with Archival ink crimson.  The flourishy leaves were stamped with Archival olive.  The words stamped with Archival jet black.  The face is stamped onto grungepaper with jet black, cut out and inked with Distress ink.  An extra crown was stamped onto grungepaper, cut out, colored with Distress ink and layered over complete image with a scrap of grungeboard in-between for spacing.  Red 1/8" double faced satin ribbon, a couple of silver charms, and black dots made with a Glaze pen finish things off.  At the bottom of this post I have another picture, taken at an angle to show more of the Perfect Pearls shimmer you see as you tilt the atc.