Tropical Toonie Tuesday

Doesn't thank sound good....Tropical.....sigh.....

Well I have two opposite cards for your today...one very much in the tropical theme and the other in a Christmas theme.

This is my color challenge card today. The colors were Chocolate Chip, Kiwi Kiss and Tangerine Tango. I wasn't even going to play, but realized that I needed to make a thank you card for someone who made us something wonderful....you'll see that in a minute.

Sample One: Tropical Thanks

One thing I really like about the Eastern Blooms set is that you can get a very Eastern feel to it, a lovely Asian design, but you can also create a sort of tropical feel to it too with the larger flowers.

Here I stamped the larger flowers on Whisper White in Kiwi Kiss and in Tangerine Tango, cut them out, created "leaves" from the Kiwi petals and also stamped one of the trio of flowers stamp in Chocolate Chip and cut out. I assembled all these together with glue dots and adhesive to give some dimension, folded some of the petals and then mounted on the Haiku paper with dimensionals. The sentiment is from Beautiful Borders and I overstamped the outline petal.

Just for your to know...today I grabbed from my scraps what I thought was SU Whisper White paper to stamp the flowers on. As I stamped it it looked "grainy" to me, even as I was cutting it I was thinking...hmm this just doesn't look right. You know when you get a new stamp and it needs conditioning and it doesn't stamp clean...it sort of had that look. I went to my larger sheets and grabbed a new piece of SU Whisper White....EUREKA! Gorgeous image. SU Whisper White....the paper of choice. Really, it has such a nice polished finish that is perfect for stamping.

See these pictures as comparison.....

Non SU White on the left...see the grainy look to it...yuck!

SU Whisper White below on the right....see the nice crisp image you get!?

And here is what I was making this card as a thank you for....a friend from church made me an Autumn Wreath this weekend and gave it to me. Isn't it gorgeous!????! I really had wanted a wreath and it is perfect on our door. It gives it such a festive look!

Sample Two: A Christmas Door

And in the theme of wreaths and doors.....here is a card I made several weeks ago for the Great Swaps Girls Winter Mini Swap. I thought it would be a "great" idea to design a watercolor swap...I do love watercoloring but man this took me SO long to finish because I was making I think 15 of them. I wanted deep rich colors so I used the deep chocolate and reds and greens for a very festive warm feel.

Background is stamped with Weathered, I watercolored with reinkers, and SW Markers. I added Dazzling Diamonds glitter to my tree after the entire project was completed to give it that shimmery snow feel, see below.

I also included a touch of our new Alpine Ribbon from the Winter Mini and did the sentiment with the scallop punch to give it a pretty ribbon feel too. I also used our old Zig Painty for the sliver on the door handle, hinges and light fixture. It has lots of dimension and warmth IRL.

Recipes: Sample One: Stamps Eastern Blooms, Beautiful Borders Paper: Chocolate Chip, Haiku DSP, Whisper White, Tangerine Tango, Kiwi Kiss Ink: Tangerine Tango, Kiwi Kiss, Chocolate Chip Accessories: Wide CC Grossgrain Ribbon, Oval Punch, Dimensionals, Scissors, Glue Dots, Piercer, Scalloped Edge Punch

Sample Two: Stamps: Weathered, Home for Christmas Paper: Chocolate Chip, Always Artichoke, Watercolor Paper, Old Olive, Ski Slope DS Ink: Always Artichoke, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip, Brown Stazon Accessories: SW Markers, SU Reinkers, Alpine Felt Ribbon, Piercer, Dimensionals, Felt Flowers, Silver Brads, Scalloped Edge Punch

Share:facebook - twitter - pinterest

Tropical Toonie Tuesday

My New Teams!

A couple of months ago Beate asked me if I would like to be on the Product Review team over at Splitcoast. I happily said an enthusiastic "Yes!". If you receive the "Weekly Inkling" newsletter over at SCS you'll see a link to this months' Product Review of the Scor-it Tool, or you can link to it here: Scor-it Review . As well, the girls on the team created some fabulous projects with the Scor-it and you can view them here: scoritpf . I just don't want you to miss out on some great ideas and creativity. My team members are all stellar girls: my sweet friend and fellow DD alumnus Jodi Collins, Silke Ledlow, Mary Brown, another DD alumnus Jami Sibley, and the wonderful Beate Johns.

Box Template: As well, some of you have asked me for the template for my Advent Mantle Boxes I made on Tuesday's post. I don't have any fancy schmancy software for this, so I just drew it out for you. It really is an easy box. Sorry for the empty top and side lines, those are the edges of the paper, so imagine solid lines there! It's on a 8 1/2 x 11 sheet. Yesterday I mistakenly said the box was 2.75 x 2.75, it's actaully 2.5 inches x 2.5 inches x 2.5 inches. This way it all fits on that regular sheet of cardstock. Solid lines mean CUT, dashed lines mean score. Basically you are cutting out a cross shape and scoring it into sections to make your box.

The bottom of the "cross" there's a piece that says DISCARD, that's the tiny piece you're left with once you cut after the .75 inch section that folds in to attach your box together (use sticky strip). (Don't discard that .75 inch section! You'll need it! :) just discard the tiny piece after that...hope that makes sense - let me know if it doesn't!) If I can figure out how to attach it as a PDF I will later.

The 1/2 inch sections at the edges of the "left and right sides of the cross" are the folded in lid which does not get sticky strip on it, and the folded in section that makes the bottom of the box that does get attached with sticky strip.


I'm a Great Swaps Girl!

In January when the amazing JulieHRR asked me to be on the Dirty Dozen I was overjoyed. It was like the floodgates opened and two other great Swap teams also contacted me about joining their very amazing groups, that are a real honor to be a part of. I knew I couldn't juggle it all, so I had to say - thank you but no. The tough part is that you have to keep being chosen for the Dirty Dozen team a secret for a month before your reveal...so I couldn't even honestly explain why!

So after my DD term was over, I went back to one of those teams and said, remember way back when you asked me to join the swap group? Do you still have room? Well, these sweet girls had saved a spot for me. So, I'm a new Great Swaps Girl. Such fabulous women! Here's a link to the Great Swaps Girls blog too.

Here's a swap I did for the new Catalogue. It's always nerve wracking for me when I do a swap with a group...especially like this one, for the first time, I second guess myself all the time thinking....is this good enough???? So hopefully it was :)

I really think that Bella's Bloom is one of the under appreciated sets of the new catalogue. Not only is it inexpensive but very versatile and classy and it goes really well with Bella Rose paper. But here I paired it with my favourite Urban Garden in rich shades of Kiwi Kiss and Not Quite Navy and White for some crisp contrast.

I inked up the flower in Not Quite Navy SW Marker and Old Olive on the horizontal (the shade is a deeper tone of Kiwi Kiss so it works here). Then I added the sentiment and it just fits inside our new large oval punch. I added a little piercing on the sentiment and then started layering the paper and scallops and ribbon. On some swaps I used White Taffeta ribbon, but ran out about half way through so I used the Kiwi Kiss Satin ribbon just on the green side (because that Vanilla side really would not work here). And I really love the rich look it gives. I did a lot of sponging on each layer that you can never really see unless its in front of you, but it gives the paper edges rich color. I added the simple floral circle in a 1/2 inch circle punch with brads as accent.

Next week I'll show you my Christmas Mini swap once the girls are starting to receive them. And if you're in my stamping clubs you'll get to see all the Great Swaps Girls Swaps in person! What I love about something like this is getting a card in person from another designer that you really respect. Such a cool thing!

Recipe: Stamps: Bella's Bloom Ink: Not Quite Navy, Kiwi Kiss Paper: Not Quite Navy, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White, Urban Garden DSP Accessories: Large Oval Punch, Scallop Edge Punch, 1/2 inch Circle Punch, Earth Elements Brads, Piercer, Dimensionals, White Taffeta Ribbon, Kiwi Kiss Satin Ribbon, SW Markers, Sponge

Share:facebook - twitter - pinterest

My New Teams!