PaperFections

Pear Tile Coaster

Happy Sunday to you! Today is my last Limelight guest designer post for the month over at the Flourishes blog. I hope you'll join me there, to see how I made this 4" x 4" tumbled marble tile drink coaster with my Copic markers and beautiful Flourishes Pears stamp set! Read more →

Paint Chip Bookmark

Today over at the Flourishes blog I'll show you how I made this fun Valentine bookmark using their beautiful Winter Bouquet stamp set on an Inchie Arts white Twinchie Square, colored with Copic markers, and a paint chip sample. I hope you'll join me! Read more →

February Calendar Copic Tutorial

Hello and happy Sunday! I hope you'll join me today over at the Flourishes blog for my Limelight guest post. I have a Copic coloring tutorial, with some airbrushing tips, for my February calendar! Read more →

Flourishes Limelight Designer!

Good morning, everyone ... I'm excited to be the Limelight Designer for Flourishes this month! I've always loved their gorgeous stamp designs, so I was very honored to be asked to design with them! I hope you'll check back in each Sunday this month, for some pretty Flourishes inspiration! I'm starting off the month with one of my very favorite Flourishes floral images, the Lenten Rose set, colored with my Copic markers, of course! You can find out all the details on how I created this card (or artwork piece?!!) over at the Flourishes blog today! Happy Sunday! Read more →

Flourished Lilac

Here's another sample from Flourishes' new Lilac set that was released last week. I chose to use SplitcoastStampers.com's weekly Color Challenge #167 (soft green, soft pale blue & navy) and Sketch Challenge #177, so almost all the choices were already made for this card except choosing the papers I wanted to use! I was delighted to find Memory Box's Inspire paper pack has most of these colors! I added Stampin' Up's Night of Navy as a 5.5" card base and matting around the image I stamped onto a more solid sheet of this paper pack's colors. I used Ranger's Adirondack Espresso dye ink to stamp the image and then quickly clear heat embossed it while the ink was still wet. This gave me a good outline to add the Dark Blue Stickles for the lilac flowers. Here's a closeup, so you can hopefully see all the sparkle this lilac has -- there's actually a lot of purple in it: I used these Copic markers to color the leaves & branch: G24, G28, E25, E27; and T3 for shadows. The sentiment is from Flourishes' Siberian Iris set. The edges of the focal image and mat were distressed using Tonic's Edge distresser.... Read more →

Divine Design: May Flourished Magnolia

May magnolias -- I love them! And they currently ARE starting to bloom in Texas . . . I'll try to get a photo and post a little later today. Since they are just about my favorite flowering tree, imagine my pleasure when I first saw this beautiful set from Flourishes! The set is actually called "Lilac" but also includes this branch, leaf and two different magnolia blooms, so you can build your magnolias as you see fit. I ran out of time to post my Divine Design last week, so here it is! <=You can click on that link to learn more about this challenge and here to view the gallery of other participants' projects. (To see my other months of Divine Designs this year, you can either click on the "Divine Design" text in the footer of this post or under the Categories list on my right sidebar.) After "building" my magnolia blooms by stamping them with Tsukineko's Memento Rich Cocoa ink (and Adirondack Lettuce dye ink for the leaves) onto Poison Ivory shimmer cardstock (it's looking a bit washed out in the photo above, but the background is actually a lovely ivory), I colored them with these... Read more →

Flourished Baby Boy

Here's another sweet baby card from Flourishes' beautiful new vintage baby set, Rock A Bye -- this time geared more towards a boy -- did I say how much I love this set?!! I used SplitcoastStampers.com Sketch Challenge #176 for the layout. The image was stamped with Tsukineko's Memento Rich Cocoa ink onto Cryogen White shimmer cardstock and then airbrushed with Copic's Airbrush System and Y02-Canary Yellow while still in the Spellbinders Nestabilities Classic Scalloped die. The die acts as a stencil, leaving the white border around the scalloped edges of the circle. The focal image was colored with these Copic markers: Clear Stardust Gelly Roll pen was used on the moon's night cap and baby's clothes -- I liked the silvery sparkle, it looks like the twinkling moonlight! The hand-cut sentiment was stamped and airbrushed the same way as the moon image; both are popped up on dimensional foam tape. Light blue velvet ribbon (Michael's) looks like it's suspending the sentiment. Patterned paper is from BasicGrey's Oh Baby Boy collection -- it was faux stitched using a paper piercer and Ranger's new white opaque pen. Notecard base is Memory Box Iris. Supplies: Notecard, Copic markers & Airbrush System, Spellbinders... Read more →

Flourished Baby Girl

It's another new release day for Flourishes . . . and here's that cutest baby set ever I mentioned the other day, Rock A Bye: This set is available for purchase beginning today. I adore this vintage style line art -- it begged for this scratched olive and floral vintagey paper from BasicGrey (Sugared collection). I really liked Papertrey Ink's Spring Moss satin ribbon to tie this card all together. I used CPS #64 for the layout. The image was stamped with Tsukineko's new Memento dye ink in Rich Cocoa onto Cryogen White shimmer cardstock, cut out, then colored with these Copic markers: As others have raved about this new ink, I found it worked fabulously with Copics -- no smearing whatsoever! The moon image was popped up on a floral circle cut with Spellbinders Nestabilities Petite Scalloped Circles and was mounted to a Sugar Plum Memory Box notecard. Island Blossom Dew Drops help balance out the sentiment that was also stamped in the Memento Rich Cocoa ink. I'll be back a bit later to add a link to a news release with a fabulous announcement from Flourishes! ETA: Here's a link to the news release! Be sure to check... Read more →

Flourishes Wedding

Today's card is a quick, simple wedding card. I made it for my cousin's son's wedding a few weeks ago, sent it off, and totally forgot to post it! It's made with Flourishes' Wedding Essentials set. I heat embossed the rings with Versamark and gold embossing powder onto shimmer white cardstock and cut them out with Spellbinders Nestabilities Classic Scalloped Squares. Then I did my inlaid trick by cutting out the same scalloped square from gold metallic cardstock and laying the white square into the gold piece. The Mr. & Mrs. was also heat embossed in gold onto the gold cardstock. This whole layer is popped up on foam dimensional tape. Black brads finish it off. The black mat is flush against the white shimmer card base (A2-sized). Speaking of Flourishes . . . are you ready for another new stamp release from them? I just started playing with some new sets that will be released next Wednesday, May 14 and I know you will love them! Some more gorgeous flowers are coming your way, along with THE cutest/elegant baby set I've ever seen! I'll be back in a bit with a cool new tool/trick I learned about this past... Read more →

Flourished Topiary

Look Mom, no designer paper -- can you believe it?! I worked with a color challenge today, using guava, blush & dark gray, so it's a little difficult to find just the right paper that will match a combo like that! Here's the link to the SplitcoastStampers color challenge, if you'd like to try it out. All stamps are from Flourishes and were new releases just last week. Ribbon and all cardstock from Stampin' Up! The dark gray flourish on the guava (left) panel is from the Wedding Essentials set and the dark gray flourish background on the right panel (stamped on blush cardstock with dark gray ink) is Reverse Damask. The cute topiary and sentiment are from the Siberian Iris set I used last week. I stamped it in SU's Basic Gray dye ink on blush cardstock and then watercolored the image with guava and celery reinkers. Olive Copic Spica glitter pen was used to accent the topiary. I dry embossed the edges of this focal image with my Fiskers trimmer scoring blade and then matted it with a distressed piece of SU Basic Gray cardstock. It's popped up on dimensional foam tape. If you'd like to play along... Read more →

Flourished Sabby Iris

Today's softer, shabbier iris card is a little more "me", I think! Flourishes' beautiful Siberian Iris is stamped with Ranger Adirondack Pitch Black dye ink on Neenah Classic Cream cardstock and colored with my beloved Copic markers: I tried a little different shading around the iris, to try and "shab" it up a bit. This was done with the three Earth colors in the top right of the photo above: The edges of the image were distressed with Tonic's Edge Distresser and then machine stitched to Stampin' Up's Cocoa mat. The background is Flourishes' Reverse Damask stamped with ColorBox Chestnut Roan fluid chalk ink on SU's Pretty in Pink cardstock. The "Just Because" sentiment is included in the set, which makes it very versatile and not just for Mother's Day. It is stamped in the same Chestnut Roan ink on cream cardstock, cut with Spellbinders Petite Scalloped Oval Nestabilities. Pink brads and ribbon are Stampin' Up! Note: I've added a Word document of the Copic Color Chart to this post. Hopefully that might help some of you who couldn't download the Excel file. Check back in tomorrow for Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge! Read more →

Flourished Iris

Wow, this card turned out very bright! But I was inspired by the colors in this new Sultry paper by BasicGrey. It also turned out large -- 6" square by the time I got everything on it I wanted! But this card will be for my Mom for Mother's Day, so that's okay. I'm honored to be working with Flourishes during April & May and looking forward to using their gorgeous stamps I've had my eye on for quite some time. This new Siberian Iris set is available starting today. I used my Spellbinders Out-of-the-Box technique (detailed here) to cut down the iris image a little, leaving a flower petal sticking out of the box on the right side. The floral image was stamped in Ranger's Adirondack Pitch Black dye ink, stamped on shimmer white cardstock and cut and matted with Spellbinders Nestabilities Classic & Scalloped Rectangles. Then I colored it with these Copic markers, to match the paper: None of the Siberian Iris I Googled were these colors, but I had fun coloring it to match my paper! The beautiful bright pink satin ribbon is by May Arts and really does match the pinks in the paper, but it's... Read more →