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!

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!

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)

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.

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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!

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…

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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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

Fancy Party Dress Celebrate

Do you ever play sketch challenges? I’m a huge fan; there is so much you can do with them compared to other challenges! And I always get a chance to use any new products I have!

These stamps and dies from Hero Arts were part of the April kit. I just love all of the mix and match clothes and accessories. I’d only played with a few of the stamps before and hadn’t actually made a card with them yet. The black cardstock frame was sprayed with a clear glitter mist. The white focal panel was inset into the frame. I die cut the left edge of the card so it would match my die cut border. This scrollwork border comes as part of a set with a plain border die and some other different borders. So it was easy to get the card edge to match. The card base is pink so I allowed a portion of it to show along the left edge. Last I added some details: flowers, sequins and gems along with some Wink of Stella on the top and skirt.

Come on over and play with us this week at Crazy 4 Challenges!

Enjoy, Rebecca

Crazy 4 Challenges Cards

I’m afraid I dropped the ball last week when it came to posting my card for Crazy 4 Challenges! I went to a Copic class Friday and Saturday. I had an amazing time; a huge Thank You and lots of Hugs to Cindy Lawrence! But I hadn’t slept well before and during so I was exhausted which made me forget to post! Sorry about that! So today I have both cards to show you!

First up, this week’s challenge which was to use green! I used Mint Julep with a vellum overlay for the leaves and aqua mist for the card base. The sentiment is a mix between Vintage Jadeite and Hawaiian Shores.

I tried adding some flowers but it just didn’t look right. Sometimes you need to know where to quit! The Nuvo drops are the loveliest pale aqua called Duck Egg Blue. So subtle but perfect for this soft card.

For last week’s challenge I made this card with No Line Colouring on it. I guess I had Copic on the brain before my course! Even better I was able to get an expert opinion from Cindy! Very helpful as I don’t do a lot of no line colouring. (A bit more shading on the left side of the coat and hat. The challenge was to make a Thank You card because it was Nurse’s Day, this month’s hostess is a nurse (so am I by the way), but I decided instead to make a nurse-themed card! I have way too many thank you cards in my stash already. It’s a good thing I make quite a few cards with no sentiment; so much more versatile that way.

This week is perfect for you to join our challenge right? The world is starting to get pretty green around here, finally, so make something green! Haul out those leaves, trees and froggies!

Enjoy, Rebecca