DS4J Anything Goes Challenge + Girly Girl Twist

Hi there!

Today starts a new month long challenge at DigiStamps4Joy! The theme is always Anything Goes, but there's also an added optional twist each month.  This month's twist is "girly girl"!  

I walked into this card with a different idea, but the frame I wanted to use didn't work out so well. so I decided to leave it out.  I love how delicate and feminine it turned out :)

One of my favorite things about digital images is how you can resize them however you see fit and they're very inexpensive. This image is only $2.50 in the DS4J store and I can print it whenever I want!

Supplies:

Strong Lady 8 by DigiStamps4Joy
Copic Markers (E 000, 00, 02, 53, 55; R 12, 14, 17, 20; YG 05, 09)
White Gel Pen
Oval Die
Pearls and flower from stash
Ranger Liquid Platinum Embossing Powder

Thanks for stopping by! Please stop  by the DS4J blog and see what the rest of my teammates whipped up this week.

Oriental Trading Flower Stamp Set Review

Hi there! I hope you're all having a fantastic week :)

Today I wanted to share my experience using the extremely affordable Flower Stamp set (item #65/80755) that was provided to me from Oriental Trading.  If you haven't checked out their site, you need to! They have THOUSANDS of great products, many of which are related to crafting. My experience is with this stamp set only, but I'm sure that other stamps that they offer would have equal performance and bang for your buck :)

My package from Oriental Trading arrived quickly and everything was packed so carefully inside with a good amount of padding.  Nothing was damaged and my order was complete. This is a clear stamp set measuring 4" x 4" and contains 12 stamps.  I love that you can mix and match to build your own flowers and scenes; I just knew that this set was going to be FUN!

(butterfly card was made with pigment inks)

When I first tried using these clear stamps, I noticed that they didn't stick to my acrylic block very well, but that was a very easy fix with Tombo Mono Multi Glue.  I squirted some glue on the back, rubbed it in and waited for it to dry before trying again. The second time it stuck better:) If you notice after a while your clear stamps lose their stick, just try this quick fix and it'll make quite a difference.

I found that different dyes worked better that others. I had the best luck with pigment inks and for the watercolor effect, Distress Inks worked great.  You don't have to press down on the stamp very hard to get a great image; in fact, pressing down too hard made my images blurry.  

In the card below, I stamped using Distress Inks and misted with a tiny bit of water to make the ink run just a bit and make a cool effect.  Make sure to use watercolor paper when doing this technique ;)  You can find the blog post to this card here.

Here is a card that is similar to the card above.  I used pigment ink for the stem and leaves; on the flowers (from left to right) dye ink, pigment ink and dye ink.  If you compare it to the card above, you can see the different looks you get with different inks. Different, but still pretty :)

Another feature I really loved about this set is that that some of the stamps are solid while others have blank spaces. I colored these two flowers with Copic markers and decided to leave the leaf without color for no other reason than to keep the focus on the flowers themselves. I love how swirly one end of the stem is :)

Positives about this product:

*Price, price price!  These babies are incredibly affordable!
*Versatility--mix and match as you see fit!
*Let's just face it....they're adorable
*Includes both solid stamps and stamps that have blank space to use a variety of inks and markers/pencils to color.

Not as positive:  

*Overall the only problem I had with the stamps was that the backs of them didn't have much stick, but I was able to use glue to help solve that problem a bit.

*If you push too hard the image is blurry.

There you have it! I hope you've learned something new with this post. What are you waiting for?! Head on over to Oriental Trading to see what they have :)

Thanks for sharing part of your day with  me!

Dancing Ballerina -- DS4J New Release

Hello friends!

Today DigiStamps4Joy is releasing some new images (spoiler: they're adorable!). I made this card using their new Ballerina image.

Wow! She's just beautiful! As soon as I saw her, I knew what I was going to do.  I colored her with Copic markers and added a few dots using Liquid Pearls. The sentiment happened to go perfectly with the image, but it is not a DS4J image.  

Head on over to the blog to see what the rest of my teammates came up with and make sure to stop by the shop to purchase one (or five) images when you're there! There are hundreds to choose from and they're all very reasonably priced, so you're sure to find something you love :)

Supplies:
Ballerina image by DS4J
Copics: T01, R 81, 83, 85; E 000, 00, 02, 25, 27, 47
A*muse Studio Dance Stamp Set
Perfect Pearls in Silver Pearl

Thanks for stopping by today :)

Submissions:
Anything Goes for Kids
ABC Challenge--P is for Pretty in Pink
Alphabet Challenge Blog--N is for No Design Papers

Best Fishes + Prismacolor + NON August Challenge

Hi there!

August's theme of "Fun in the Sun" is going on at Naughty or Nice Challenges!  The team is excited to see what you come up with for this one and there are loads of possibilities, so whether you take the naughty or the nice route, we want to see your take on the challenge.

I love this stamp set even though I've only used it once.  It just reminds me of simpler times before technology has taken up so much of our lives.  This scene is just so beautiful and peaceful to me. It's a way of life that all kids should experience at some point :)

This is a pretty simple one.  I didn't get a great picture before it was sent off to my mom's coworker who was retiring, but you can see everything that was on it.  I stamped the image and colored it in with Prismacolors.  I didn't feel the need to add anything else to this one. I wanted it to be simple and without a lot of embellishments, just like the image :)

Supplies:

Flower Soft Moments in Time Best Fishes
Prismacolor Colored Pencils
Neenah Solar White Cardstock
Blending Stump
Baby oil
Memento Tuxedo Black Ink

Head on over the the Naughty or Nice blog to see what my teammates came up with and to join us in the fun! Thanks for stopping by today!

Watercolor Star Background--NON July Challenge

Hi there!  I've really missed sharing my cards with you, but I had to take a bit of a break to take care of some very important things at home. Thanks for being patient :)

July's theme at Naughty or Nice Challenges is "Stars" and you have until the 25th to submit your creations. Full disclosure: this card is not a new creation for me, but it is for you. I made it a while ago but since I took a break, I haven't made anything new. I wanted to share something to get back into the swing of things. Regardless, I hope you like it :)  I thought this would be a perfect masculine birthday card, which is awesome because I have a really tough time coming up with masculine cards.

I love how cool the background turned out! 

I used a star background stencil and smooshed Peacock Feathers and Mowed Lawn Distress Inks onto it, then liberally sprayed with water.  I carefully and quickly turned the stencil upside down and immediately placed it on my watercolor paper.  At this point, I didn't move it around, but I did leave it there for probably 30 seconds putting pressure on different parts of it to make sure the paper absorbed the ink.  I lifted up the stencil quickly and carefully then let the watercolor paper dry on it's own.  You can use a heat tool to expedite the drying, but I didn't want the ink to move all over the place.  After it was completely dry, I stamped the sentiment and the rock star horns in Versamark before dry embossing and adhered it to an A2 card base.

Supplies:

Distress Inks in Mowed Lawn and Peacock Feathers

Water

Spray bottle

Anti-static tool

Black embossing powder

Versamark Ink

My Favorite Things Graduated Stars Stencil

Mama Elephant Good Times

Neenah Solar White

Strathmore Watercolor Paper

That about does it for me today! Stop on by the Naughty or Nice blog to join us in the challenge or to just see what entries they've received and what the other DT members came up with. Thanks for spending part of your day with me!

Latinas Arts & Crafts--Christmas in June

Hello everyone!  Today I have a very special card to share with you. As a member of DigiStamps4Joy's Design Team, I was invited to be a special guest designer at Latinas Arts and Crafts!  They have lots of fun challenges on their blog and the FUN theme for this particular one is Christmas in June! I love Christmas cards and was so happy to share this one with all of you.  I used the lovely DS4J image called Christmas Candle to create my card.

Very Christmass-y I must say!  I colored my image with Copic markers and used partial die cutting to cut it out.  I layered several of the dies that came in the set using regular and dimensional adhesives, then added a big red bow, perfect for the holiday season :)

Supplies:

Copic markers

Wink of Stella

Bow it All v. 2.0

Dimensional & Regular Adhesive

Spellbinders Nestabilities Majestic Elements Die Majestic Label 25

Green Card Stock

Neenah Solar White Card Stock

Ribbon from stash

Christmas Candle image from DigiStamps4Joy

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I hope you like the card and encourage you to stop by Latinas Arts & Crafts to see what their talented Design Team came up with and to join in the fun :)

Peachy Keen Stamps + NON June Challenge

Hello friends :)  We are having a sketch challenge at Naughty or Nice Challenges this month!  The great thing about sketch challenges is that you can copy the design exactly as you see it, or you can make a few changes as long as your creation resembles the original sketch. For example, it's OK to use a different shape (you'll notice this in mine below) or you could add some embellishments. The most important thing is that you should be able to compare the two and see their similarities.  

Check out the sketch on the left and my take on it.  The "guts" of the sketch are still in my card, even though I made a couple of changes:  I used a curved edge instead of point and the space between my curved edge and the bottom of the card is larger than the one on the sketch.  I went with a curved edge because I liked the idea to let it mimic the roundness of the cherries :)

I used Copics on the stems and paper pieced the cherries from card stock that I had in my stash.  The green frame was created by using the same Copic marker as the stems, and to show a bit of a reflection, I used a white gel pen on the little cherries :)  The little sentiment tag faded into the background a bit, so I lined the edges with Distress Ink so it stood out a bit.

That's about it for me today!  Remember that the challenge goes through June 25, so you have almost four weeks to crank something out and join us in the fun!   Also remember that your creations can be naughty or nice, so use your imaginations ;)

Supplies:

Neenah Solar White Card Stock

SSS Curved Edge Die

Patterned paper from stash

Copics YG23, 25

 Spellbinders Nestabilities A2 Matting Basics A

Cuttlebug Swiss Dots Embossing Folder

Thread from stash

Peachy Keen Stamps Faceless Fruit, Fruit Sentiments One, Basic Paper Doll Face Assortment

Distress Ink in Barn Door

Memento Tuxedo Black Ink

Submissions:

Use Your Stuff #186--Stripes and Dots

Just Us Girls #295--Wild Card (Paper Piecing)

Send a Smile 4 Kids--Anything Goes

Simply Create Too #86--Keep it Simple

Wags n Whiskers #155--Seeing Spots

Aud Sentiments Challenge Blog #132--Cute plus a Sentiment

Creative Knockouts--BINGO (stamp/embossing/die cut)

Cute Card Thursday #375--Too Cute

DRS Designs--Easy as 1-2-3 (one embossing folder, two cherries, three dies)