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Organizing Instead of Stamping!

Christmas, Copic Markers, High Hopes, Holidays, Sewing/Stitching, Techniques 8 Responses »

Oct 232008

Good Thursday morning! For the past few weeks, I have been thinking about moving my studio around. The thing was I couldn’t think of a way to change it that was better than what I started with. While traveling last week, I had a brainstorm (oh you KNOW it hurt)! I finally took some time yesterday to read the Sunday ads and saw that Target had the ClosetMaid 9-cube organizers on sale. Perfect! I ran over to Target around 4:00 and bought two. I had this idea and thought it might work. After dinner I started putting the cubes together. Now when I bought one of these for Mallory’s room at school, it took my mother and I close to three hours to put the silly thing together. Last night, I put both of them together in just about an hour and a half! Not that I remembered how from Mallory’s, but it just made clear sense. Imagine that!

Needless to say, I gave up moving things around about 10:00 last night. So this morning the studio is still in chaos but I do have a clear idea of how I’m going to finish up today. I’ve had the studio set up so that I could entertain Stamp Club every other month. To me, there is something wrong with that picture – the studio needs to be set up for me! They are only here once every two months, I work in there every day – changes needed to be made to make it more convenient for me. I’ll figure out where to put them later.

Anyhoo, while I continue to work on the studio today, I do have a card to show you. I made it a few weeks ago thinking I would post it while on the road. After struggling with internet connections and just being simply exhausted, that just didn’t happen either. So here it is today.

The image was colored with Copic Markers, the edges were sponged for a rustic look, and all the background layers were sewn to the background panel. To add some dimension I used Tulip Puffy Paint on Santa’s beard and Stickles for his hat.

Stamps: Woodland Santa and Fairy Merry Christmas from High Hopes Rubber Stamps
Paper: Neenah Classic Crest Solar White; SU Always Artichoke; BasicGrey Figgy
Ink: Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black, Archival Jet Black and Vintage Photo Distress
Accessories: Copic Markers; Tulip White Puffy Paint; Ranger Liquid Pearls; Tsukineko Sponge Dauber; Sewing Machine; Venture Mounting Tape; Ribbon

I’m heading down to the studio – have a good one today!

Christmas Cods!

Challenges, Christmas, Copic Markers, High Hopes, Holidays, Sewing/Stitching, Techniques 10 Responses »

Oct 122008

Good morning! I hope you’ve had a nice weekend so far. I’m still in the studio playing catch up/get ahead, but I needed to take a break and do some fun stamping. Last evening I started working on some soldering projects, and as the evening wore on the more frustrated I became. If anyone has a secret to get those jump rings soldered on, please let me know! There are times it can be as easy as pouring Bailey’s in my coffee and then there are times like last night . . . when you want to forget the coffee and drink straight from the bottle!

Anyhoo, onto to some fun stuff. As I do every morning, I checked out the Challenge on Splitcoaststampers. Today is the Featured Stamper Challenge and this week the Featured Stamper is Anne Ryan. I chose this card of Anne’s, Design . . . IC145, to work from. I loved the layout and the sewing on the card. For my card, I eliminated some layers, changed the direction of the ribbon, and kept some of the sewing.

The image was colored with Copic Markers. To add some fun dimension to Santa’s beard I covered it all with Tulip White Puffy Paint. His hat was covered in Liquid Pearls.

Stamps: Fishing Santa and Christmas Cod Sentiment from High Hopes Rubber Stamps
Paper: Neenah Classic Crest Solar White; SU Riding Hood Red; BasicGrey Figgy
Ink: Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black, Archival Jet Black and Vintage Photo Distress
Accessories: Copic Markers; Sewing Machine; Tulip White Puffy Paint; Ranger Liquid Pearls; Venture Foam Mounting Tape; Ribbon

Well, I’m back to the soldering. I’m hoping to finish both projects today . . . we’ll see if it all goes better after walking away from it.

New Stamps!

Christmas, Copic Markers, High Hopes, Holidays, Sewing/Stitching, Spellbinders, Techniques 7 Responses »

Sep 292008

It’s me again! I don’t normally do more than one post in a day, but it was in the stars today I guess. I did tell you before that I was playing catch up from being lazy (well actually laying around with a heating pad on my back) all weekend.

High Hopes Rubber Stamps released some fabulous new images yesterday. Yes, I’m a day late (and maybe even a dollar short – I haven’t paid the bills yet) but the image was colored. I just needed to finish the card! To see all the new releases, all you need to do, is go to the High Hopes Home Page and type HOTP in the search box!

The image was colored with Copic Markers and the wings were highlighted with a Stardust pen. The bells, ribbon and belt buckle were highlighted with a Gold Spica Pen and to highlight the boots, I added Tulip Puffy Paint to the fur. I couldn’t resist pulling out my favorite holiday paper, BasicGrey Figgy. The background is made with scraps of Figgy that were sewn to a panel of Always Artichoke.

Stamps: Holly the Winter Fairy and Fairy Merry Christmas from High Hopes Rubber Stamps
Paper: Neenah Classic Crest Solar White; BasicGrey Figgy; SU Always Artichoke and Riding Hood Red
Ink: Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black and Archival Jet Black
Accessories: Copic and Spica Markers; Sakura Stardust Pen; Spellbinders Petite Oval Nestabilities; Tulip White Puffy Paint; Sewing Machine; Ribbon; Venture Foam Tape

So I guess this is all for me today. Now I need to finish up the household stuff!

Under the Sea!

Challenges, Copic Markers, High Hopes 4 Responses »

Aug 172008

Hey ỳall! Well it’s taken all morning long, in between loads of laundry, etc., to get one card finished. I take Mallory back to school tomorrow, and I must admit that there are a few things I won’t miss when she’s gone – her extra laundry and the trail of junk she leaves behind as she moves through the house. I’m sure it’s going to take me just about a week to get things back the way they were before she came home for the summer. Ah, something to look forward to!

When I checked in at Splitcoast this morning, one of the first things I looked at was the Featured Stamper Challenge. I don’t often do this challenge, but today I just couldn’t help myself. Today’s Featured Stamper is Jessica Rone a/k/a knightrone on SCS. I’ve been watching Jessie for some time now and absolutely adore her work.

For those of you not familiar with this challenge, the idea is to look at the Featured Stampers SCS gallery, and CASE one of their cards changing two or more things on the card. I chose this card from Jessie’s gallery. As you can see, it ended up looking nothing like Jessie’s card. I guess you could say I used it as inspiration more than CASEing.

Anyhoo, here’s my card:

I stamped the images on white paper, colored them with Copic Markers, and then masked them with Eclipse Tape and airbrushed the water. To add a little fun and dimension to the images, I added some Stickles on the Sea Floor image. After working on the background panel for a while (they all ended up in the trash), I ended up spritzing a piece of Lavender Lace Cardstock with Broken China Gold and Pearl Shimmer Mists. The ribbon is some new stuff I found yesterday on my Hobby Lobby trip. It frays a little when cut, and I had my lighter in hand trying to singe the ends. Well I slipped! So there was nothing else to do, but finish melting the rest of the ribbon. I like it so it stayed! It wasn’t until I was taking the photo that I noticed the last brad is crooked – let’s all ignore it and pretend it’s not there!

Stamps: Sea Floor Background, Simon and Dive Right In from High Hopes Rubber Stamps
Paper: Neenah Classic Crest Solar White; SU Old Olive, Not Quite Navy and Lavender Lace
Ink: Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black, Archival Jet Black and Broken China Distress; SU Old Olive
Accessories: Copic Markers and Airbrush System; Ranger Stickles, Gold and Pearl Perfect Pearls, Mini Misters; Eclipse Masking Tape; Tsukineko Sponge Dauber; Brads; Ribbon; Lighter

I hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend! I’m off to finish up the laundry and see if I can get some more stamping done.

On Guard . . . . Oberto!

Copic Markers, High Hopes, Techniques 4 Responses »

Aug 072008

Good morning! I finally got my stamp room put back together last night and everything put away. You wouldn’t believe all the stuff that was delivered here while I was at CHA and then in Texas. I kept piling it on a coffee table in the basement, and finally had to do something with it. Of course it didn’t help any that I was so sick after CHA. . . . And if you are wondering, I’m feeling much better this week. It must have been that second flight.

By the way, I learned something last week. When landing in Dallas, my right ear was killing me. The pain shot down my neck, I couldn’t hear a thing and felt like I was in a tunnel. Bev and Kristi picked me up at the airport, and our first stop was Target. I went to the pharmacy and asked them what I could do. As it was, if I held my head slightly to the left I could actually hear, but other than that I was in misery. The pharmacist told me to either take a decongestant or ibuprofen to reduce the swelling. I started taking a decongestant and within 30 minutes I could hear and the pain subsided. Just a bit of trivial information I wanted to pass along in case you didn’t know and if this ever happens to you.

I had the honor of being asked to work on the August Project of the Month for High Hopes Rubber Stamps. I’ve been waiting for the POM to be published on the web site before I showed it to you here, and I finally noticed it yesterday. Of course, it could have been there well before, but I was so busy getting chores done around here I forgot to look. (Here comes the noodle brigade now) Now that I’ve had to stop and take the pups for a walk, let’s get on with the card.

Lots of masking here. Stamped ships wheel, masked and then stamped Oberto. Polly was stamped on the wheel and then the mask was removed. The ships deck and the base for the wheel were sketched in pencil and then drawn with a Copic Multi-Liner. The images were then colored with Copic Markers and the edges were sponged with Vintage Photo Distress Ink. For the background, I stamped the Treasure Map randomly on the paper, then inked the white paper with Old Paper and Tea Dye Distress Inks. I misted the paper with water, then crumpled it up in a ball and opened it up. While the paper was still damp, the edges were distressed with scissors, sponged with Tea Dye and then highlighted with Vintage Photo.

Stamps: On Guard Oberto, Ships Wheel, Polly, Treasure Map, and Sentiment “Ahoy!” from High Hopes Rubber Stamps
Paper: Neenah Classic Crest Solar White, SU Basic Black and Cool Caribbean
Ink: Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black, Archival Jet Black, and Tim Holtz Old Paper, Vintage Photo and Tea Dye Distress
Accessories: Copic Markers and Multi-Liner; Eclipse Masking Tape; Tonic Tim Holtz Scissors for Distressing; Tsukineko Sponge Dauber; Hemp Twine; Oval Punches; Antique Copper Hardware