Altered Cabinet

I bought this little cabinet on clearance quite a few years ago. It was missing some of the knobs and other parts, so it was pretty cheap.

I had a little bit more of this paper, and since I love it, I didn't want to cover it up too much, so the cabinet isn't too fussy. The base coat is some old Apple Barrel Blue Mist. This color was retired quite a few years ago, and I was hoarding what I had left, waiting for the right project. It matched the blue in the paper perfectly. The inside is an ivory color.

The gold is Inka Gold Metallic Rub. It isn't as brassy looking in real life as it is in this photo. If you haven't tried the Inka Gold rubs, try them, they are wonderful! They have a bees wax base, and can be used on most surfaces. If they start to dry out, just add a little water to them. When they are used on wood, they dry to a hard surface, which won't rub off, but you can also paint with them like watercolors, or rub them onto your paper with your fingers or daubers. They are really versatile!

I went around the outside of each paper panel with gold ink, and added gold outline stickers and jewelry findings as accents.

Stamped and Painted Tiles

Sorry I have been missing for so long, but it's been busy here lately.

I have been doing two more projects with my air dry clay and silicone molds, one was a card, and the other is an altered cigar box. I'm still putting layers of varnish on the box, so it's not ready to be photographed, and it's too dark today to photograph the card, so I'm showing some coasters I made last fall. I made them for the Christmas show that never happened, so they are in my shop waiting for next summer.

These were made using some unglazed ceramic tiles I bought quite a few years ago. The stamps are mostly old PSX stamps, as well as one or two old Stampendous ones, and a couple of other brands I've had for years. They were stamped with Stazon black, and painted with ordinary craft acrylics, then coated with a couple of layers of water based varnish, and sprayed with Krylon.

They were all painted with the same colors of paint, and match in real life, but some were photographed in full sun, some outside on cloudy days, and some, inside on rainy days, so the colors look a little different.

Anyway, if you can get hold of some unglazed tiles, it's really fun and easy to stamp and paint, and the tiles make great coasters for Christmas presents!

Things I made with air dry clay

This morning I showed some silicone molds I got, and a Martha Stewart Crafters Clay kit in this post.

These are the things I made. I definitely will be wanting more molds, and more white clay. It was fun and easy to work with, and I will be able to use the molds with my Fimo as well.

I didn't really like working with the colors. It takes a lot of practice to use two colors in a mold, and not have one color squish into the other, but I think I will practice more with using two colors in the cameo. I also don't like the pink and colored things I made as well as the white ones. I tried mica flakes, glitter and PearlEx in them, and I liked the Pearlex, but even though I used very small mica flakes, they were sort of big on the finished castings. The glitter wasn't bad.

Using colors would be okay if you don't care about seeing detail in your things, but I'd rather paint and shade mine after they are dry, so I can show how much detail they have.

I wish the detail showed up in this photo, but it is dark here before 4:00 now, so I had to use a flash and it washed everything out.

I do like the amount of detail in everything I made from all of the molds. I used parts of all of them, and they all worked well. I had to wait until they dried a bit to remove a few things from the molds, but the only one that I had to be really careful with was the kelp from the wilton mold. That one had a lot of really tiny branches on it, but I managed to get it out without too much trouble.

Using these molds and the clay was really fun, and I can't wait to see what they look like when I paint or shade them!

Air Dry Clay and Silicone Molds

My birthday is in a couple of weeks, and my mother wanted us to take her to AC Moore so she could get me some birthday presents.

While we were there, I decided to buy one of the Martha Stewart Craft Clay kits. The only one they had was the heirloom kit, but that's okay, because I really liked the molds that came with it.

I have been looking at these for a long time, but what made me decide to buy them was that I had bought a silicone mold from Mod Podge, and some of their glue stick type things a few weeks ago and didn't like them, but I needed something I could use in the mold.

I had also been looking at silicone molds since I bought the Mod Podge one, and had found so many beautiful ones made for baking on the internet. I did a Pinterest page of many of them here. They are gorgeous, so go look at them!

Anyway, after seeing those molds, I decided to get the MS kit, and some Wilton molds. My mother got me a couple more of the MS molds as well, but I can't have them until my birthday. :-)

I wish I had bought more of the white clay while I was there, because I have a feeling I am going to need it. Oh well, it's something to ask Santa for! I've seen people mixing it with PearlEx on the internet, and I really want to try that!

The red, yellow, blue, brown, and white clay were in the kit, along with a couple of white plastic tools, some florist tape, and some florist wire in case you want to make one of the beautiful roses in the instructions.

The small round blue molds were also in the kit. The two large blue ones are from Wilton, and I kept the photos that were with them so I could use them for future reference. Those photos are at the top of the picture. Even though some of them are quite large, I thought that they would be fun on cigar boxes. The orange ones at the top, are the Mod Podge ones.

Anyway, I'm off to play, I'll let you know how I like them!

Embossed Wreath Card

It was really difficult to get a photo of this card. One shows the detail, and the other shows the shimmer.

I used the Spellbinders 3D M-Bossabilities Rustic Wreath Folder on dark green CS, then used one of those square foam shading things with Delicata Golden Glitz to shade it.

The sentiment was done with the same ink and a JustRite stamp. The gold behind it was done with gold mirror card and a Spelllbinders tag die. I fussy cut the green paper to fit inside it.

The card was matted with gold mirror card, and gold pearls were added as accents. It looks much prettier in person.

I'm sort of depressed this year. Usually we have a big Christmas Craft show, and I count on it to make money for Christmas, but this year they aren't having it, so any Christmas cards I make that I don't send myself will have to wait until next summer before I get a chance to sell them. I've tried both eBay and Etsy, but I always spend more money selling than I actually make. I sure wish we were in a bigger area where there are lots of shows.

More flowers I made

These are some more flowers I made. Most of them are from McGill punches, but the three little roses are from Spellbinders Bitty Blossoms.

The yellow on the roses is much paler than it looks in the photo, and the greens in the leaves aren't as bright either, but I took this photo at night.

I was pretty happy with the McGill flowers, especially since it was my first try, but I think I need more practice with the Bitty Blossoms. I'm not at all happy with them. I have wanted those dies for a long time because of the beautiful flowers Marisa Job has made with them, but mine don't look at all like hers. I will practice some more though, and I'm sure they will get better! I also wish I had shaded the outside of the yellow petals on the pansy with purple. I think it would have looked more real that way. The center of the pansy and the stamen on the Calla Lilly are the ultrafine orange crush Flower Soft.

I also played around with some premade roses I got on clearance at Michaels last year. All of these were white, but I used some Brilliance stamp pads, and different brands of glitter sprays to color them. Some of the flowers were colored with more than one shade of spray. The ones which still look white have pearl shades on them so they shimmer in real life. I've found that I like buying white flowers best, because then I can color them to match my projects.

WOYWW 233

This is the day of the week where we all go snooping around peeking at each other's desks. If you want to join us, hop on over to Julia's blog, to see what it's all about.

I've been MIA for a few months while I had my shop open for the summer, but I hope I will be able to get back in the swing of things now that summer is over.

This photo was taken on Tuesday evening, since I have to pick everything up each time I finish. I was finishing up two different projects at once, so I have a strange mixture on my workdesk.

First I finished up a card that I posted Tuesday night by adding rhinestones to it. The card is on my desk, and the two blue baskets are where I keep my Rhinestones and pearls during the winter. In the summer they are sorted by color on a turn-around display thing. It's much handier that way, but it takes up too much room to bring it home for the winter.

I was also finishing up some flowers I made from McGill punches and Spellbinders Bitty Blossoms. Those are sitting on top of a container of embossing powder while they dry. All my embossing powder is in flat plastic boxes. It's easy to use this way, because you just put your card into the box and shake, but it takes up a lot of room if you have a lot of colors.

The black rectangular thing on my cutting mat is my flower embossing mat. The cup contains my embossing styluses, pens, and other things. You can also see part of my Fiskars trimmer, ATG, heat gun, scissors, dimensional tape, Really Useful Boxes, a craft knife, and my antique box, which contains the small things I use at every session.

Underneath the cutting mat is my non stick craft mat. It's on a sample wallboard paneling thingy. I find it really easy to keep it on the wallboard thing under the cutting mat. That way I don't have to put it away every time, and when I want to switch back and forth between cutting and doing messy things, I just keep my cutting mat on one side of it, and I can use both at once. Before I started doing this, I forgot about putting my project back onto the cutting mat, and I cut through the craft mat. :-( I also used to forget, and use my heat gun on the cutting mat, which warps it. Now I usually remember to put my project on the craft mat first, before embossing.

Please ignore the mess on the side of the desk. Those are boxes of supplies and things, and they aren't very neat after digging through them trying to find things!

Silver and Pearl Merry Christmas Card

I frequently save pretty tags to recycle later on cards. I usually throw them into a drawer where I keep unfinished things I wasn't happy with.

For this card, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to make, so I looked into my unfinished parts drawer, and found this tag. It was a polished silver with embossed shiny silver details. I matted it with Core'dinations white Pearl CS and silver mirror card.

Next, I embossed another piece of the pearl CS, trimmed it close to the embossing, and mounted it onto more pearl. This was matted with more silver and more pearl, and mounted onto a pearl card.

The matted Christmas motif was mounted onto the embossed part dimensionally, then silver rhinestones were added. It was fairly quick to make, and I was quite happy with the results!

Pink Roses and Creatables Card

This is another card I made a few months ago with dies from Marianne Creatables.

The design was cut from Core'dinations white pearl CS, and shaded with Brilliance Pink, then mounted onto some pink Core'dinations Gemstones CS. It was matted with gold mirror card, mounted onto a white card, and accented with roses, a bow, and pink and white rhinestones.

Lace and Gold Card

I made this card about a month ago when I got my new Spellbinders. It was done using Elegant Labels Four and Opulent Ovals. The paper is white CS and a pale gold Core'dinations Pearl CS, and all shading was done using Viva Decor Inka Gold Metallic Rub. Most of the layers were mounted with dimensional tape, and Liquid Pearl accents were added.

I photographed it twice, once to show the shimmer, and once to show the depth.

I love these elegant new Spellbinders dies. They make it so easy to create an intricate card with just a few die cuts!

Thanksgiving Blessings Card

Last September I made a card from an old JustRite stamp set I had. When one of my best customers saw it, she commissioned me to make two more cards with the other two stamps in the set. This is the second one.

The CS is a generic ivory, and metallic copper and green CS. The DP is some very old Anna Griffin CS.

The sentiment and frames were stamped with VersaMark, and embossed with gold EP, then cut with the matching JustRite dies by Spellbinders. I don't remember what color I used for the shading. All layers were outlined in gold, and some were mounted dimensionally. Green pearls were added as accents.

Elegant Angel Card

I finally got internet back again. It's been about two weeks since I could actually get a whole page to load, but now it is working again. It's still slow, but it's better than nothing!

Last year I bought this angel stamp on clearance at Michaels when we were in New York. I thought she was so cute, and would be fun to color, but since I bought the stamp right after Christmas, and I was tired of Christmas cards, I had to wait almost a whole year to make a card with her.

She was colored with a combination of Copics, Brilliance inks, and Viva Decor Inka Gold Metallic Rub, after stamping her with VersaMark and embossing her in gold.

The fame surrounding her was done with Spellbinders Elegant Labels Four, from gold mirror card. This was mounted on a piece of Core'dinations Pearl CS, which I embossed with the same die, and cut a little larger than the frame. I ran a gold ink pad around the edge of this, and mounted it onto a slightly larger card made from the same CS.

The panel she is on was cut from Labels Four, and Liquid Pearls were added as accents.

Internet problems again

Sorry I can't get around to visit. Saturday afternoon we started having internet problems again. We have been having them off and on for a few weeks, but now it's more off than on. It took over an hour to load this page to post on, and it doesn't even have many graphics on it. I absolutely hate Fairpoint. I pay for DSL every month, and can't even load a blog page, never mind watch you tube. Most people who are in areas which have cable have switched to Time Warner, but we don't have cable on our road.

Anyway, while I'm mostly without internet, I've been making flowers. I had a bunch of McGill punches, and have been playing with those. I also finally got Spellbinders Bitty Blossoms, but haven't been happy with the results. I can't wait until internet is back so I will finally be able to see tome tutorials to see what I am doing wrong. So many people have made some beautiful flowers with the Bitty Blossoms. Hopefully there are some on the internet that don't use you tube.

Luckily, I had downloaded all the McGill .pdfs a few months ago, so I can play with those. So far, I've done a pink and white lily, a purple clamatis, and a calla lily. They're in the largest size, but I think I'm going to try some in smaller sizes so they fit on cards better. I also have four of the Sizzix flower dies, and had downloaded the .pdfs for those a while back, so I can't wait to try them!

Embossed Pink Friendship Card

This card uses the Spellbinders 3D M-Bossabilities Folder Framed Labels Eighteen. I thought pink would be a very pretty color for it, and also put a smile on the face of my blog friend Jill. The embossing folder reminds me of wallpaper and wainscotting in a house. Originally I tried to use white CS and use the letterpress technique to make the bottom pink with white on the raised edges, then I was going to go over the white embossing on top, and make it white with pink embossing, but my letterpress techniques don't always work out very well. That went into a scrap drawer until I could see if I could salvage it.

For the second try, I embossed pink CS and used white ink to go over the raised portions. Next, I cut and embossed two sizes of Labels Eighteen, shaded them with white, and used a white Gellyroll pen to outline inside the die. The sentiment is from JustRite, and was stamped and embossed with white ink and EP.

The labels were mounted dimensionally, and the card was accented with pearls and a bow.

Frantage Christmas House Card

This is an old Stampendous stamp I've had for years. It was stamped with VersaMark, and embossed with Frantage Aged Hunter. Next, I ran the VersaMark pad around the outside and added more of the aged hunter for a border, and painted inside the oval with Twinkling H20s pearl gold. The holly berries were colored with a gold Gellyroll pen.

Gold pearls were added to two of the corners, but they still looked sort of blank, so I decided to add a bow. Most of the ribbon I had didn't look right, so I tried some old green and gold rayon stuff I've had for years. It was originally made for knitting with. The colors were perfect for the embossing powder, but it was quite thin, so I braided it and made a bow. I really wanted to add tiny jingle bells to it, but I couldn't find any small enough, so I decided on these little stars I had in my stash.

After that, the bottom corner needed something, so I added a few stars there too, then I matted and mounted it. All the paper is Core'dinations Pearl and gold mirror card.

Pearlized Iris Card JRC#108

I haven't had a chance to enter a challenge in months. I still don't have a lot of time, but I miss doing challenges, and decided to make one for JustRite Friday Challenge #108 - Sketch.

This week's challenge was a sketch. I think JustRite's Botanical Medallions & Banners Clear Stamps must be my favorite, because I seem to use it over and over.

For this card, I used lots of layers of Core'dinations pearl CS in white and pale gold. I love the heavy weight of this CS, and the shimmer is beautiful. It was stamped with VersaMark, and embossed with gold EP, then cut and embossed with JustRite's Nested Oval Medallion Labels Dies for the frame, and a Spellbinders oval die for the flower layer.

The frame and the flowers were painted with some watercolors I made from Pearl EX micro pearl. The top photo shows the shimmer of the paints and paper, and the bottom photo shows the detail.

Delicata Golden Glitz was used to shade inside the oval to add more contrast to the flower layer, and both layers, plus the pale gold layer underneath were edged with the same ink, then I used a gold Gellyroll pen to trace inside the oval die.

Next I cut four medallions from Spellbinders Fleur De Lis Pendants, which were shaded while still in the die with more Golden Glitz. These were layered over the background paper, and the medallions were mounted dimensionally on top of that.

Tiny fabric flowers were added to each corner, and liquid Pearls and a bow were added as accents.

Reflection Technique and Acetate Card

Even though I sold this card less than five minutes after I made it, I don't really like it. I thought I'd put it on here anyway, to show how I did the reflection.

I had seen a lot of posts about stamping onto plastic and pressing the plastic on the card to make the reflection, but I thought there was less room to mess it up if I just stamped it onto vellum and mounted the vellum so the image was reversed.

First, I shaded a piece of white CS and a piece of vellum using VersaMagic Aegean Blue. next, I stamped my trees onto the CS and the vellum, and cut the vellum just below the stamping.

To attach the vellum, I put some Usartquest Perfect Paper Adhesive over the black base of the trees on the stamped side, then turned it over and put it under the CS image so the backside of the stamping showed through the vellum, and the trees were reversed to match the ones on top. I liked the effect of how the vellum image was a bit lighter than the image on the CS.

Then I wasn't sure how I wanted to finish the card. I was planning on it being a rectangular card, but when I held this Spellbinders Grand Label over it, it was the perfect shape to outline the shape of the stamping, so I cut and embossed it. The mat was shaded with the same Aegean Blue, only darker, and I used a blue Gellyroll pen to outline the shapes.

Rather than make the whole card in this shape, I wanted it to stand up, so I decided to mount it onto acetate. I thought the acetate would be sort of like water, and would work well with the reflection. Then I cut, embossed, shaded and outlined a matching piece for the inside of the card and added some pearls.

It's not my favorite card, but it did use some new techniques I had never tried before. I hope it inspires you to try your own reflection, or to use some acetate on a card.

Church and Trees Card

I really like this tree stamp from Inkadinkado, and wanted to use it as a backdrop to this church and sentiment from Our Daily Bread Designs. First, I stamped the trees onto some medium/dark blue CS lightly using white ink. Next the Church and sentiment were stamped and embossed with white ink and white EP, which made it stand out from the background.

I wanted the card to be all blue and white, but I didn't want the church to be solid white, so I scribbled it in with a white Gellyroll pen, which hid the trees you could see through the church, and also gave it some texture.

The image was matted with some silver mirror card and more blue CS, then mounted onto a white card, and a star "jewel" was added.

Majestic Blue and White Card

I'm calling this one majestic because it is made with Spellbinders Majestic Labels Twenty Five and Gold Majesty Circles. It uses a shimmery blue CS from my stash, white CS, and the matting layer is actually gold mirror card, but this photo was taken outside on a dreary dark day, and the gold didn't reflect.

One of the things I miss about this die is there are some places I wish it was cut out rather than debossed so the background paper would show up. I decided to use Copics to shade some of the areas, but they are so fine that my coloring is a bit messy in some places. The card was also shaded through the dies with VersaMagic Aegean Blue, and I added Liquid Pearls as accents.

This week, I have been moving everything out of my shop to my house for the winter. I didn't realize how many wonderful things I have for card making until I had to move them all. It was a lot of work, but I feel thankful to have so much! My husband is saying once again that this is like living in a submarine. The house is really small, and with all my storage things, it leaves little room for getting around. I miss all the counters and space I had at the shop, as well as seeing so many people, but it will be fun having internet when I work on my cards again. (We don't have internet at the shop).

3D Christmas Pop Up Scene

This card was kind of an experiment. I decided I wanted to do a 3D scene with Marianne Creatables on hills of snow. The top photo shows the card open.

This picture shows the card closed. I wanted the inside to show when the card was closed, so I made the bottom half smaller. It isn't as pretty as I wanted it to be, but it's kind of neat anyway.

It was kind of difficult figuring how to do it so it would pop up right. Each layer is one quarter of an inch in front of the one behind it, and was done with strips of CS scored and folded into little open boxes between each layer.

All the paper is Core'dinations Pearl, in white and gold. The die cuts were colored with a Viva Decor Inka Gold Metallic Rub, and the Sentiments were embossed with gold EP and shaded with the gold ink. The sentiment panels were cut with Spellbinders. The inside sentiments are from JustRite, and the one on the front is from Our Daily Bread Designs.

Lighthouse Shadowbox

I've had this shadowbox for over a year, but it took me this long before I decided what I wanted to put into it. I think the company that made it is 7 Gypsies. I got it back when Becca Feeken had her kit club. It was part of the kit for one of the months, but I knew I wanted to do something nautical with it.

Since I sold the shadowbox right after I made it a few months ago, I am writing the steps as I remember them. I know I used some distress ink on the outside, but I can't remember the color. It looks like it might have been a dark brown. I couldn't really get it to shade the wood, but it did shade inside the edges of the little cubicles.

The backs of the cubicles are lined with some white CS which I shaded with VersaMark Aegean Blue. The bottom ones were shaded lightly, and the top one was shaded darker so it would make borders on either side of the stamped image. The stamp is Isle Au Haut Light in Maine, (or Robinson's Point), and is from a stamp I bought for my mother years ago from a company no longer in business. It was colored and shaded using various inks and Ranger nibs, Fantastix, and sponge daubers.

Real Seining twine from a weir was used in each cubicle, and I glued various shells I found on the beach in front of the shop into each one. The glue dried clear, but it was still wet and white when I took this photo.

Years ago, I also bought a little kit which made tiny brass lobster traps, lobsters and bouys. They were a real pain to make, but I had them made up, and the lobsters and bouys all painted. I had mounted them onto mahogany bases, and since Stonington is the real lobster capital of the world, I decided to put one of them into the center top cubicle.

Shell Beauty Embossed Card

I made this card with my new Spellbinders 3D M-bossibility folder Shell Beauty. The shading isn't as messy in person as it looks in the photos.

For this one, I didn't want to cover up too much of the gorgeous embossing on this folder, so I kept the embellishments to a minimum.

I began by using an ink blending tool to shade the embossing and give it more dimension. The ink is Delicata Golden Glitz. Next, I ran the ink pad around the edges of the panel to add a hint of a darker border. The card it is mounted on is an ordinary white CS card, but I also shaded the border of that with the same ink because it looked better mounted onto a shaded card than a plain white one. The shading is much smoother in person. I think the shimmery ink didn't work very well with the camera.

Both sentiments are from different stamp sets by JustRite, and were cut and embossed with Spellbinders dies, and shaded to match the card, then mounted dimensionally. I really wanted the card to say "Best Wishes", but the only sentiment I have that fits this die and would work with this card is "Happy Birthday". I think I need to look for some simple sentiments that are this size, because I use the die a lot.

I also wanted to use this ribbon, but it is too stiff to look good as a small bow. The ends don't like to lie gracefully, so I cut them shorter, and added the ends underneath the bow. I kind of like the effect, they make it look a little more interesting this way. Then I added a few pearls to finish it up.

Frantage and PSX Christmas Tree

To give everyone a break from cards made with my new Spellbinders. I am showing a card I made a couple of weeks ago using an old PSX stamp I have.

This one was done on Core'dinations Pearl CS and Gold Mirror card. All of the Frantage products were in the Gold Encrusted Jewel Kit. For the tree, I used VersaMark and detail gold EP. Next, I went around the outside with my versamark pad and added the antique gold and gold glass glitter. I also sprinkled a few bits of the antique gold around the card to add texture and detail.

For the encrusted jewel technique, I decided to use UTEE rather than the regular Frantage products, because I tend to get rather heavy handed with them. The UTEE gave a lighter look than the gold EPs. I sprinkled the UTEE between the tree and the border, then sprinkled in some gold mica flakes and glass glitter, and melted everything together.

After that, the tree looked unfinished, so I painted it with gold pearl Twinkling H20s. I did the ornaments with a gold Gellyroll pen, and they are a bit darker than the tree. It shows up more in person than it does in the photograph.

Normally I don't like messy looking cards, but the Frantage products are so much fun to play with that I use them anyway. This card really glitters and sparkles in person!

Cardinal and Chickadee Card

Today I tried my Spellbinders Bracket Borders One die set for the first time. I wish they were a little longer like the other border sets I have from Spellbinders, because it means they can't be used easily on a 5x7 card, but they worked nicely on this 5.5 x 5.5 card.

I used an old PSX stamp for this card, and stamped it with VersaMark, and embossed it with gold EP. After cutting and embossing all the layers, and putting the card together, I decided it needed some shading. All the gold shading was done with Delicata Golden Glitz, then I did some outlining of the die cuts with a gold Gellyroll pen and added a few pearls. The gold shading gave some shimmer to this card, even though you can't see it in the photo.

Radiant Rectangles Card

This is another card made with some of my new Dies. I really like the blue Wedgewood Jasperware, so I decided to make this card blue and white, reminiscent of my favorite dishes.

All of the blue is VersaMagic Aegean Blue, which was added by placing the dies back on the die cuts and using sponge daubers and fantastix to shade with.

I didn't layer this card dimensionally because I liked the effect of having some parts of the card in relief, and some parts embedded into the background.

The only embellishments needed on this card were some Liquid Pearls.

Adorning Squares Card

I have been taking parts from all the die cuts I made with my new dies. I decided to do them using nothing but die cuts, shading and pearls.

This is the one I made with the Adorning Squares set. It needed something in the corners, so I used some of my Noor! dies for those, since they fit the best of any corners I have. It was really dark today, so I took two photos. One, straight on, and another at a sharp angle to show some dimension.

The die cuts were all layered onto a square which I embossed with the outside die. I added shading to everything on the background except the embossing using Brilliance Rocket Red Gold, and matted it with gold mirror card, then mounted it onto the card.

All the layers were shaded with the same ink, then Liquid Pearls were added.

I almost didn't buy this set, because I wasn't sure whether I liked it or not, but it really is beautiful when you cut and emboss with it!

Frantage and Shells Card

I can't decide whether I like this one or not. It was one of the first cards I made with the Frantage products from Stampendous.

Last July when I was getting an oil change in my truck, I got a chance to run into JoAnns. They had stamps on sale for 40% off, so I got this one, another shell one, and the trees I used on my Moose Christmas card. This shell one was beautiful, and I decided to pair it up with a sentiment from Our Daily Bread Designs.

I wanted to use the Frantage Shabby White around it, so I stamped everything onto some pearl blue paper using VersaMark and Cobalt Blue EP. After running my VersaMark pad around it, I embossed it with the shabby white. The card is matted with darker blue CS and Gold Mirror card, and pearls were added to the top and bottom.

I think the card would have been prettier done on some distressed type light brown paper from a K&Co pad I have and stamped in a dark brown. The shabby white kind of overpowers it, but I was trying to do a seafoam type frame around it. I also think that next time I will try stamping the sentiment onto a die cut and just using the shell-stamped paper as a background. Oh well, it's not too ugly, and someone bought it almost as soon as I put it into my shop!

I finished cutting all my new dies today at the shop, and used the parts I cut to make some cards. I got one finished, and another one is almost done. The cards I've been working on are completely made with the new dies layered and shaded. It was so much fun! Unfortunately I forgot to bring my phone with me to take pictures with, so I'll have to take them tomorrow.

It's getting pretty cold up here now, so I suppose we will have to close up soon. I will miss the shop and seeing so many people, but most of my friends from away are gone now, so we aren't seeing many people at all now. On a brighter note, it means I will have some time to visit you all again. :-)

This is an infrared photo I took years ago of the building where my shop is. As you can see, it is on pilings over the ocean. It was once a clam factory, where they canned clams. It's beautiful there, but it gets pretty cold and drafty in there this time of year!

New Spellbinders

It's been a really long time since I have bought anything really interesting. Most of the money I made this summer has gone to pay bills, but a few weeks ago I decided to treat myself to a bunch of the newer Spellbinders I have been drooling over, and they arrived today.

I got these three 3D M-bossabilities, plus the regular M-bossalility folder above. I love the new 3D ones, they really have a lot of depth to them, and are beautiful when embossed. I embossed them all on plain white cardstock just to see what they looked like, and I was impressed. I can't wait to see what they look like when I add color to them.

These are the dies I got. I feel very lucky to have gotten so many of the really beautiful ones.

I also got the junior magnetic spacer thing it says you need for the Imperial Gold ones. I've got to find out what I was doing wrong with that though. I followed the directions exactly, and double checked to make sure I was doing it right. It was almost impossible to turn the crank on my Grand Calibur using the cutting sandwich it said to use on the package. I ended up backing my dies out, because I was afraid I was going to break the grand Calibur. The magnetic spacer things are really mangled now. Anyway, I found out that the Imperial Gold ones come out perfectly well without the magnet. I taped them the same way as you tape any other die to keep them from moving when you cut them together, and ran them through once, then ran them through again sideways if they needed it, just like with any other intricate die. The magnet would have been great for holding everything in place, but after trying two different gold dies with it, my Grand Calibur sounds kind of funny now. I hope I didn't break anything. The instructions said to use the A and C plates with the magnet, which is what I did. I was just trying different combinations of the dies to see what they look like, and only used cheap, lightweight CS, so it wasn't like I was trying to cut the good stuff.

I spent all afternoon trying different combinations of the dies to see the different ways to use them, and I still haven't cut them all yet. It was really fun, and they are so beautiful. All these new dies are so lacy and intricate, and I am really excited to play with them some more!

I also like the fact that so may of the newer Spellbinders products are larger. My cards are almost always 5x7 or larger, and if they are square, they are usually either 6 or 7 inches. In my shop, people barely look at anything smaller. They really like the larger ones, and the larger sizes of the dies and embossing folders makes it much easier to make the cards bigger.

Autumn Leaves Card

A few weeks ago, I was going through some of my older stamp sets and decided to make a few fall and Thanksgiving cards with this older JustRite set.

The layers were stamped onto ivory CS with brown and embossed with clear EP, then I cut them with the matching Justrite dies by Spellbinders, colored them using Gellyroll pens and mounted them dimensionally.

For matting, I used a dark brown with a slight metallic finish, and copper. The DP is from Graphic 45's Botanica Bella collection. This was the only time I have ever seen Graphic 45 products in a store, and it was the only design they had. It was in a Hobby Lobby in Webster, NY. I have been sorry every time I have been there since, that they didn't have any more Graphic 45 products, because I love them, and never get around to mailing away for them.

For embellishments, I added a few gold pearls and some fall flowers which were in a silk flower bouquet I bought at a dollar store.

Asian Inspired Quad Twisted Easel Card

I used this Asian stamp set from Fiskars to make an Asian Inspired quad twisted easel card. This is a side view showing the peace and love stamps from the set.

This side shows a lantern and the happiness stamp.

This is the card from above.

This is how the card looks closed.

I used black CS, gold mirror card, some more of the red art paper, and some origami paper from my stash. The stamping was done with VersaMark, and was embossed with gold EP. The red squares were cut with a Spellbinders die, and a gold outline was made with a gold Gellyroll pen. The origami paper was also cut with the same die and outlined in gold. The whole card was mounted onto a white square card which opens to write inside.

Moose in the Trees Christmas Card

I love red and white Christmas cards, so here is another one I did a month or so ago.

I've had this moose punch from Punch a Bunch for over a year and never used it. I was going through my punches a while back and saw it, and decided it might be fun to use it on a Christmas card with the trees stamp I had.

I like larger cards, so I decided to pair it up with some very old JustRite frames and sentiments stamps on a 5x7 card. I wish I had gotten a chance to get more of the frames and sentiments sets before they were discontinued, because I love them. There was a beautiful set with baroque frames that I particularly liked, but by the time I ordered them, the only ones left were Christmas and Thanksgiving, so I got those. The frames work so well with so many sentiments, and JustRite had a custom die, which made it easy to layer them. Anyway, I'm so glad I got the two sets that I managed to get!

The red CS is more of the art paper, and is really a nice quality, and the white is my favorite Core'dinations Pearl, so it's heavy and frosty looking. Everything was stamped and embossed with white ink and white EP, and some of the lines around the frames were done with a white Gellyroll pen. The moose and the frames and sentiment were mounted dimensionally, and I added some pearls to the corners.

When I embossed the white, I didn't brush off any of the loose bits of EP, so it looks like a few flakes of snow are just starting to fall.

My Stampendous Frantage stuff actually came today. I couldn't believe the two day delivery really happened! I can't wait to use it, but yesterday I started working on a set of stamped and painted coasters. I'm doing 12 of them, and they are coming out nice. I'd rather be playng with my Frantage stuff, but I need the coasters in my shop more than I need more cards!

Encrusted Jewel Technique Christmas Tree Card

This is another card I did last summer using the encrusted jewel technique.

I got the Inkadinkado stamps with a magazine I bought last year, and knew I wanted to make a red and white card. I also knew I wanted to play some more with encrusted jewels, so I decided to stamp the tree and sentiment using white EP, and surround it with the encrusted jewels to make it look like you are viewing the tree through a frosty window.

I ran out of most of my Stampendous Shabby White, so this card uses what was left of it with some regular white EP and some Stampendous chunky glass glitter melted into it. A Versamark stamp pad was run around the outside of the panel and I did the embossing after sprinkling the glitter on the outside edges of the white, so it would be a little narrower than the white part. It was really fun!

Next, I added some gold Stickles "balls" to the tree.

The embossed panel was matted with more of the red and some gold mirror card, then mounted onto a white card.

The red CS is actually from a sheet of art paper. I am always really frustrated with the shades of red in the card stock in the stores. It seems like they are either orangey, purpley, or faded looking, so now, whenever I see art papers, I always look for nice reds. They usually come in large sheets, which I then cut to a manageable size using a carpenter's square and knife. They come in beautiful shades of red, much richer than ordinary card stock, and they are nice and heavy.

I have had such fun playing with the Stampendous Frantage products that I sent for some more. I can't wait to get them! Since I haven't bought anything new since last winter, I also sent for some new Spellbinders. The Stampendous products were ordered from their website, and were sent out very quickly. I ordered them on Monday, and they should be here tomorrow. (Of course they are sending them by the Post Office, so the two day priority mail will most likely be closer to a week, even though they are only coming from New Hampshire, but that isn't the fault of Stampendous, it's the fault of the strange way our mail comes now).

The Spellbinders were ordered from Cut At Home, on 30 September. Unfortunately, the very next day, they went on sale for 40% off. Since I ordered $260 worth of dies, and they haven't even shipped them yet, I wish I had waited. I specified UPS delivery, but I called to find out where my order was, and found out that they are going to be shipped through the post office, and no discount, even though they waited a week and a half to process my order. For those who have followed me for a while, you know how bad our mail delivery is, so this really bummed me out. I wish I had ordered them from Joan's Garden, then I would have had fast shipping, and talked to a person who really cares about her customers.

Anyway, it will be really fun to play with some new things!