June 30, 2017

Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop

summer 17 coffee

Welcome to my entry for this season’s Coffee Lover’s Blog Hop. As usual, I went for a shabby theme this time.

sum 17 coffee lovers (2)I started by choosing a paper pack, the Bloom collection by Maggie Holmes from Crate Paper. She is one of my favourite designers EVER! The gorgeous paper I used for the background has been calling my name for along time but it is VERY busy! So I spread some gesso over the middle 3/4 of the paper. Some of the pattern shows through but not all. Over that I added some light embossing paste through a Prima stencil. They make the best shabby embellishments EVER! I added glitter and embossing powder to the paste. That’s the gold roses you see in the background.

sum 17 coffee lovers closeup

Next I layered a bunch of embellishments and my focal tea cup and saucer (Altenew). Most of the paper pieces are Maggie Holmes embellies, the trims are from my stash, the washi is from Recollections. I hand calligraphed the sentiment with Dr Ph Martins iridescent ink. Last I added a bit of shimmer with a Wink of Stella pen and some gems from Lucy’s Little Things.

Enjoy, Rebecca

June 17, 2017

Critter Stack!

This week our challenge at Crazy 4 Challenges is a sketch! My favourite! This one is tall and skinny (but you can alter it if you wish) so I pulled out my favourite stamp for this shape of card.

c4c critter stack

Super cute critters right? I have no idea what the real name of the stamp is as it was purchased over 10 years ago! You could Google the company Eat Cake Graphics though if you are interested. I used my new Simon Says Stamp barely beige ink so I could do some no line colouring. The cow didn’t work out that great because 2 of my markers needed their nibs cleaned. It causes weird shiny spots and prevents the ink from blending well. I really loved how the chicken and sheep turned out though. I was looking hard for a sentiment to use; when I saw this one it made me laugh out loud. These critters are sure fighting (and maybe losing) a hard battle to stay stacked up!

I hope you will join us for this sketch. Look forward to seeing you there over at the blog!

Enjoy, Rebecca

June 07, 2017

Beachy Cake Box

Hi! I have a beautiful cake box video up on SplitcoastStampers today! You can see it by visiting this link. Cake Box SCS.

Here is a sneak peak! Go check it out!

scs cake box finished

Thanks for visiting and have an awesome crafty day!

Rebecca

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat Retirement Card

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat! Can you repeat that please? That’s the theme of the week at Crazy 4 Challenges! You can repeat any shape, die cut, embellie, image or sentiment as long as you repeat something at least 3 times!

sailboat retirement

Hubby is constantly needing retirement cards, mostly for men, at work. So this was the perfect opportunity to repeat some images! The banner at the bottom was repeatedly stamped with Happy Retirement (PTI) on some old Basic Grey paper. It’s a great way to use a smaller sentiment as the repetition allows the sentiment to stand out and adds emphasis. The focal image is stamped on watercolour paper and watercoloured with my hodge podge of professional paints. (many different brands)

c4c sailboat retirement2

I love how both the sky and water fade out towards the bottom! For the foam of the ocean near the boat, I layered my watercolouring. Each layer made the water darker, I started out with a pale wash, but I made sure to vary the top edge. Click on the photo to see it larger. It then gives the illusion of the texture of the water as the boat moves through it. A touch of gel pen helped to add more white to the white caps. If you look carefully at the sails, you will see I added the shadows of the rigging. It seemed like a nice touch to add. It isn’t perfect as I would have liked; I faded out the shadows of sails (on the other sails) when they should be crisp lines but oh well.

Don’t miss a thing! Stay tuned for more colouring, vintage, shabby chic cards and fun tips. Subscribe to get my posts in your in box!

I also used repetition on the background, stamping the captain’s wheel, a companion image to the sailboat, over and over in a ‘random’ pattern. It’s not truly random, start at one corner and stamp in triangles, not straight lines, but it looks random-ish when you are done. This is an awesome and fun challenge. Pop on over to the C4C blog for more inspiration on this theme! Hope you can join us this week!

Coming soon! Crafty Book Reviews and a fun unboxing video! It’s a secret but it’s super trendy and super cute!

Also I will soon be able to reveal 6 yes SIX months worth of cards made for the SplitcoastStampers Dirty Dozen Design Team. I’ve barely been blogging the last 6 months and I’m so thankful for your patience and perseverance. I can’t believe it’s almost over and it was a blast! There are a lot of cards I’m really proud of over there!

Enjoy, Rebecca

Flip Flops and Sunshine!

(ETA: Sorry this is late. Don’t you hate it when a scheduled post doesn’t post???) (ETA 2: See tip at the bottom for some exciting Copic info!!)

This week for Crazy 4 Challenges, we were asked to make a card with a summer destination theme! Yeah, I could make summer cards all year round (and sometimes I do!!!) BEACH BABY!Yeah!

c4c swimsuit flamingo

I recently got some new dies from Echo Park including this lovely retro swimsuit and flamingo! Aren’t they so fun! I also won a $20 gift certificate to Avery Elle and after much difficult decision making (have you seen their website?? It’s da bomb dot com!!) and throwing a few extra bucks into the mix, I came away with some amazing products including the sweet Bunting stamps and dies!

The background paper is from Summer Dreams also by Echo Park. This paper is so pretty I decided to make an oversized card (4.5x5.75” I think) so maximize it’s gorgeousness. Around the edges I used a tracing wheel and a gel pen to create some faux stitching. If you’ve never seen one, it looks like this…

tracing wheel

Photo Credit

You can get them at any sewing store but they do come smooth too, for finer, thinner fabrics, so be careful which one you buy. I’ve also got one with less defined teeth and they won’t pierce paper so check the ones you see and get the wickedest looking teeth you can get! Use a foam mat under the paper and when you are done, you can sew by hand if you wish or just trace the line with a gel pen! If you prefer zigzags, just run a second line of holes next to the first and connect them with a ziggy line!

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c4c swimsuit flamingo2

Isn’t that banner so cute!? The die set comes with a super fine ‘string’ for hanging all of the cute bunting bits. I glued my twine to it to get a really nice arc in it. The circle die cut is Triple Tear from Spellbinders which I sponged with some matching inks. Well, actually I inked first and cut second! The flamingo, glasses and swimsuit are all sponged lightly along their edges to help them stand out more. For the wing, I used the negative die cut as a stencil! It was the perfect shape!

The legs and beak were coloured with Copics. This busy mama ain’t got no time for cutting in multiple colours when I can help it! Ditto for the glasses, that’s turquoise paper under the dark brown lenses (I know, it looks black). I even did that with the word panels. I’d planned to piece in some coloured cardstock but when the die didn’t cut all the way through, I just decided to carefully ink the letters with a Copic marker. Worked out really well and it was faster too! No piecing those tiny letters and especially the even tinier centers of some letters! At the end, I added a bit of white gel pen on the flamingo and sunglasses. Swimsuits aren’t very shiny so I left the gel pen off. A couple of matching sequins and I was all set for the beach!

TIP: Did you guys know that Copic just came out with a fine tip nib for the Sketch marker? I KNOW RIGHT??? I bought 5 packs (of 3) that very same day! Get them at Imagination International. The email I got said supply was limited so hurry on over!

I hope you can play along with the challenge this week at Crazy 4 Challenges. When a lot of people play it just makes all our hard work seem worthwhile! Come on over and join!

Enjoy, Rebecca