Card Class in the Studio

It's true...I taught a card class last night.  I wanted to feature some new products in the studio and designed a class making cards.

These are 2 of my sample cards using the new Send It Clear cards by Clear Scrap.  I used Tim's umbrella man Sizzix Die and a sheet of acrylic, then inked with Ranger's alcohol inks.    Only the top half is attached to the front of the acrylic card so that it opens as a gate-fold card. 

The card on the right has only one flap attached for demo purposes, and again I used a flower die to cut the multi-layered flower from that same sheet of acrylic, using alcohol inks as my colorant.  Don't you just love how Ranger's inks matched the scrapbook paper?  Me too.

This one looks similar, and yet the alcohol ink technique is different.   This person attached both flaps on her card, choosing to turn the 2 pieces of scrapbook paper to showcase both sides.  Clever girl.  I think these might've been made by Joyce, but that's just a guess.

I know this one looks very similar to the above card, but it was made by someone else, who also turned her papers in the very same way, but if you click on the photo you'll see the petals of her flower are standing up, not curled down.

One of those photos shows Joyce's card and the other is Mary's.  I'm pretty sure about that.

This one is definitely Sharon's because I recognize the cuffs of her sweatshirt.  She chose to have her outer papers match.  Don't you love the intense colors on her flower?

This one is Lynda's and her flower has a monochromatic look.  I like that.  These acrylic flowers can be manipulated so easily with your fingers.  No heating required.  Her petals are raised far more than mine...just personal preference.

We also made cards using Japanese Washi Tapes, Fabric Tape and Lace Tape.   I didn't photograph mine, but the 4 cards below were all made by Michele.

Wish you could've joined us.

And the STARS came out to play

This year our club has decided to try something new.  For 14 or 15 years we've had a project each month where someone plans it, brings supplies, and then leads us through the steps to complete it.  But now we're starting at home and completing something during the club.  This month we were to bring luggage tags with backgrounds only, which we traded so that each of us had 8 different tags to take home.  I pulled out over 100 oriental images and we all chose what we wanted to stamp on each of our tags.  This first photo shows my tags.

These belong to Sharon and I know this because the one in the top right corner was stamped on both sides.  The one you see here is the back, inked with Ranger's stains, and she liked that better than the front.

Here's the front.  She used Pearl Ex which gives it a shimmer, but felt it had a bit too much to really showcase the stamped images.

I believe these are Deb's only because I see her extras are all decorated.  We each made 10 so that meant we had 2 to fool around with on our own.

Based on that theory, this should be Michele's display.

And these are Mary's.  Her blue-gray tags have streaks of color where she literally did her direct-to-paper from the pads, and while she wasn't thrilled with the inked tags, we were all enthusiastic about the end result when images were added.

I think these are Laurie's only because the top left tag has another matching tag underneath it.

This should be Lynda's only because she was beside me and I gave her 2 of mine.  See the tags on either end of the top row?  My backgrounds and she wasn't pleased with her first attempt.
And I guess Lyn slipped out before I got a good shot of hers.  Sorry about that.  Unless of course one of you emails to say I got the names wrong.

Bottom line, we had fun.  And we got some exercise because we were constantly running back and forth to the stamps on a different table.  That along with almond blueberry cake...happy campers!

Four Years of Blogging...off and on...

Can you believe it...I began this blog 4 years ago.  And yes, I know, I've been updating it poorly, but life continues to get in the way.

Big things coming, beginning with stamp club tonight.  Can't wait to show you what we're making as our project so come back tomorrow and take a gander.

Tiny tot turned 2 and I have studio portraits everywhere...except here of course.  Go ahead, tsk tsk, I hear you.

Thank you for stopping by and no kidding, tomorrow it will really be worth your time.

STARS Project: Envelope Books

As promised, I'm back with photos of our stamp club's monthly project for March.  This is the front cover of Lori's book.  And below is the back cover.

Every month I'm amazed at how everyone has access to the very same supplies, but they're all drawn to different bits of paper or clip art, or different stamp images.  The big surprise this time was how many brought supplies of their own, like colored envelopes and scrapbook papers.

Lori brought green envelopes:

And Laurie brought pink:

Mary's were brown:

And Lyn's were white:

Deb brought a rich green and found some great scraps of paper I had leftover from days gone by...



Have I mentioned we have a lot of Linda's and Lynda's in stamp club?  Lyn is actually Lynda too but was a goos sport and abbreviated years ago.  Her husband always knows when it's me calling because I ask for Lyn.  Everyone should have a little inside joke.

But I tell you this because I don't want you to be confused when I say these envelopes are created by Lynda:

And now, before I put these last 2 sets up, my apologies ahead of time to Michele.  In one photo you've got such a great smile I didn't want to NOT post it, but the picture is blurry.  In the next one the picture is crisp but the smile is gone because we were laughing and moving and coaching.  (I can hear Laurie telling her not to move in the middle of the shot)

See what I mean about that smile?  How could I possibly crop this photo down and lose that?

And again, with the covers...such different ideas.  At the top of this post you saw Lori's.  Now look at Mary's with that pop thanks to scrapbook paper and some of my measuring tape clip art:

Sharon and I didn't participate.  Instead we played catch up, comparing all the free games we've downloaded on our ipads, in between running around admiring the ongoing creations. 

Another photo op lost:  Lynda stamped an image that looks like the spectacle contraption found in an optometrist's office and I pointed out that I had a stamp of an eye that would fit perfectly inside the lenses.  But she wanted a left eye and a right eye.  So I whipped out a piece of transparency and had her stamp the eye twice before punching them out.  When she adhered them, one had the stamped image face up and the other was flipped over so that it was reversed.  Best of all, the shiny transparency looked like there were really lenses in the frames.  Now how cool is that?!

I've said it before and I'll continue to say it.  If you're not a member of a local stamp club, start one!  Look at all the fun you're missing.  Lo those many years ago I kept seeing the same faces show up for my classes and suggested they start joining me at my house once a month to play free of charge.  And here we are, with some of those very same girls still coming and still having fun. 

Are you close by?  Interested?  Email me.  And if you're not, we're not going anywhere so come back to visit...often.