Papertrey Ink November Blog Hop - Merry Christmas Sparkle

Good Morning! Today is the day of Papertrey Ink's monthly blog hop. For this month's challenge we had this gorgeous inspiration photo to play with.

 I could have gone in so many different directions and actually started out with a different card in mind but ended up with this design. The photo does not do it justice, I do love how this card turned out.

I first stamped the wreath shape from Rustic Wreath in a dark green - I tried with lighter inks first, but it looks better if you can see the shape of the wreath through the dots. I then evenly spaced the largest dot from Polka Dot basics in a dark teal around the wreath. Next I stamped the light green and light blue with the next smallest dot and using Versa Mark I randomly stamped a smaller dot and heat embossed in silver. Since my light blue ink was stamped last some of the embossing powder stuck to the blue dots but not the green, it is a nice effect. After embossing the sentiment in silver I stamped over the large teal dots with versa mark ink and then rubbed Perfect Pearls over them. Topped it off with a silver foil bow and mat and a scattering of tiny rhinestones.

Supplies:
Stamps - Rustic Wreath, Polka Dot Basics (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White (PTI), Silver Foil CS
Ink - Lagoon, Topiary, Pear, Sky (CMTH), Versa Mark, silver EP, Perfect Pearls
Dies - Lil Inkers Bow Die
Other - bitty rhinestones

MIM #228 - Pearlized Blending

Hello all. It has been a while since I have had the opportunity to play along with Papertrey Ink's Make It Monday challenge. This week Lizzie has a great tutorial on using Perfect Pearls over blended ink.

I have two cards to share today. For both I created a mask from vellum as Lizzie suggested and die cut a hole using a Spellbinders circle die. I forgot to heat emboss a design on the red bauble before I started blending my inks, so I just added a sparkly flourish afterwards. The little silver caps on the baubles were cut from a Tiny Tag die cut. The Perfect Pearls really make these ornaments shimmer. I think I well make more of them as they are single layer cards and are fun and quick to do.

Supplies:
Stamps - Meadow Greens, Rustic Wreath, Tremendous Treats Christmas, Keep It Simple: Season's Greetings (PTI)
Dies - Tiny Tags (PTI), Plain Circles Small (Spellbinders)
Paper - Stampers Select White (PTI), Silver Foil CS
Ink - Versa Mark, Clear EP, VersaFine Onyx Black, Copic Multiliner, Perfect Pearls - Perfect Pearl, Hollyhock, Tulip, Vineyard Berry, Sky, Dutch Blue, Moonstruck, Topiary, Ponderosa Pine (CTMH)
Other - rhinestones, silver flourish

Papertrey Ink October Blog Hop - Christmas Joy

Good Morning all! Today I am participating in Papertrey Ink's October Blog Hop. This month we are challenged to take inspiration from the photo below:

I was inspired of course by the colours red, green and kraft and also by the twine wrapped sprigs of greenery. I had in mind to create a swag of magnolia leaves including some painted silver, however I only had one leaf die that even remotely resembled a magnolia leaf and it was too large to do what I wanted to do. I am happy with the results of my first Christmas card for this season.

I die cut five leaves using the Leaf Silhouettes die, scored them down the middle and inked the edges and center spine with dark green. I glued them down to a narrow strip of brown cardstock and added the jingle bells and twine. I only had natural twine, so I added a few drops of red re-inker to some water in a mister and sprayed the twine. For the jingle bells I took silver bells, painted them with white acrylic paint and sprinkled with prisma glitter. For the background I sponged some white pigment ink onto the edges of the kraft paper and on the left and upper sections of the piece. I spattered some white pigment ink, heat embossed the sentiment and also stamped a few snowflakes.

Supplies:
Stamps - Filled With Joy (PTI), Snow Flurries (CTMH)
Dies - Leaf Silhouettes (PTI)
Paper - Classic Kraft CS, Pinefeather CS, Stampers Select White CS (PTI), DP (CTMH)
Ink - Versa Mark, White EP, White Pigment Ink, Ponderosa Pine, White Acrylic paint, Tulip re-inker
Other - Twine, jingle bells

Hot Glue Embossing Revisited

Good Morning all! I am thrilled to have a video tutorial on Hot Glue Embossing going live today at Split Coast Stampers. You can check it out here.

A couple of years ago I created this card for a challenge. I loved the way the hot glue created dimension and interest. You can check out that post here.

 

After being asked to be a guest tutorial author for SCS I played around some more with my hot glue gun and came up with a few more ways of creating designs with the glue.

Tip - Try out different ways of working with the glue, using different embossing powders and different combinations of re-inkers on scrap paper.

For the card above I sprinkled gold glitter about 3/4 of the way through heat embossing, unfortunately you can't really see it in this photo (did not have proper lighting for this shot), but it does give a wonderful effect. The art panel on this card was made by the drizzling the glue. When you add the re-inkers the colours tend to stay within the confines of the pattern spaces.

Here are a few more sample panels that have yet to be made into cards.

 Supplies: Watercolour paper, hot glue, embossing powder, re-inkers

Papertrey Ink September Blog Hop - Chalkboard Technique

Good Morning! Today I have a card for Papertrey Ink's September Blog Hop which you can find here. The challenge is to use the chalkboard technique and the inspiration photo below.

I am not really happy with my results but I have run out of time to try again. So here it is:

Supplies:
Stamps - The Sweet Life, Movers & Shakers Sentiments, Inside & Out - Well Wishes, Stacked Sentiments, Wonderful Words: Birthday (PTI)
Paper - Fine Linen CS, Terracota Tile CS, True Black CS (PTI)
Ink - Fine Linen (PTI), Sorbet (CTMH), Versa Mark, White EP, White pencil, White Pigment ink
Other - twine, wood stars

Papertrey Ink SAF 2015 - Runway Challenge

Well, it's Monday and this is my final card for this year's Stamp-a-Faire celebration at Papertrey Ink. I didn't complete all of the challenges, but am happy with the six that I did get done. Below is the Runway inspiration photo selected by Ashley.

And here is my card

I do love how this turned out. I also used Maile Belles' sketch from the Patterns challenge.

Supplies:
Stamps - The Sweet Life, Meadow Greens (PTI)
Dies - The Sweet Life (PTI)
Paper - True Black CS, Stampers Select White CS, Sheer Basics Vellum (PTI)
Ink - Versamark, White EP, Clover Meadow, Sweet Leaf, Tulip, Baby Pink, Sorbet inks (CTMH)

Papertrey Ink SAF 2015 - Pins + Needles Challenge

This challenge is all about using stick pins, machine stitching or stamped stitches on your project. Melissa, Amy and Heather offer some great tips in their videos - check them out here.  I chose to use a decorative pin for my project and while I had my patterned papers out, decided to add some of those as well.

I also used Nichole's layout from the pattern challenge.

Supplies:
Stamps - Stylish Sentiments: Birthday (PTI)
Paper - DP - Teresa Collins, Stampers Select White CS (PTI)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black
Other - seam binding, stick pin, beads

Papertrey Ink SAF 2015 - Mix & Match Challenge

Betsy Veldman and Dawn McVey offer some great tips on matching patterned papers and colours in this segment of SAF 2015. I chose to work with patterned papers for this challenge. I realized I don't use a lot of patterned paper on my cards so this was a nice change for me.

I used four different papers on this card. I kept the design simple and let the papers do their thing.

Supplies:
Stamps - Thank  You Kindly (PTI)
Paper - Sycamore Street DP (SU), Stampers Select White CS (PTI)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black
Other - bakers twine

Papertrey Ink SAF 2015 - Thread Challenge

Well, it is now Sunday and I am still working on yesterday's Stamp-a-Faire challenges at Papertrey Ink. Check out these great video tutorials by Laura and Danielle on using thread and twine. I chose to make a thread nest and have to admit that I basically CASE'd Laura's card here. Love how it turned out, except I need to get me some of that great thread that Laura uses.

Supplies:
Stamps - Boutique Borders: Birthday (PTI)
Dies - Chevron Vertical Coverplate (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS, Soft Stone CS, True Black CS (PTI)
Ink - Versa Mark, White EP, Pacifica, Sweet Leaf, Juniper (CTMH)
Other - thread, black pearls (Kaiserkraft)

Papertrey Ink SAF 2015 - Pattern Challenge

The fun continues at PTI today. This is my second completed challenge, to utilize one of the designers' go to card patterns. I selected this great design by Dawn McVey.

Here is my card

Supplies:
Stamps - Doodle-i-doo, Stylish Sentiments: Birthday (PTI)
Dies - Doodle-i-doo (PTI), Labels Ten (Spellbinders)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS, Sheer Basics Vellum (PTI), Neena Solar White CS
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, Clear EP, various Copics
Other - rhinestones

Papertrey Ink STAMP-A-FAIRE 2015 - Paper Fashion Extravaganza

Good morning all! today is the day of PTI's all day stamping event. This year's theme is all about fashion. If you haven't taken part in the past it is definitely worth checking out. Great challenge, how-to-videos, fun and prizes all day long.

The warm up challenge for the day is a bridal challenge - create a wedding card using only white supplies. Here is my creation:

Supplies:
Stamps - Botanical Silhouettes (PTI)
Dies - Heart Border, Bloom Builders 3, Doodle-i-doo (PTI)
Paper: Stampers Select White CS, Sheer Basics Vellum (PTI)
Ink - Versa Mark, Silver EP
Other - Rhinestones

Papertrey Ink August Blog Hop - Weaving

Hello all. It has been a while. Today is Papertrey Ink's monthly blog hop. Here is the inspiration photo:

Rather than the colours, what spoke to me in this photo was 'texture'. I wanted to include wool in some way in my project and ended up finding this fabulous tutorial on weaving wall hangings, so decided to try to create a miniature wall hanging for my card.

I do love how this turned out. This was actually my test piece, I ran out of time to create another. It was a lot of fun and I plan to do more of it, but probably on a larger scale. The warp strings (vertical) are supposed to be worked into the back of the piece, but on this scale I found hiding the ends a little challenging so I just trimmed them and then glued the piece to heavy cardstock. You can see that the weaving is starting to loosen a bit, so hiding the fibres is probably a better option.

Here is a shot of the frame and work in progress:

Thanks for looking, hope you are enjoying the blog hop.

Supplies: Rustic White CS (PTI), Stylish Sentiments: Birthday (PTI), Stitched Rectangle die (Lil Inkers), various yarns and fibres

Papertrey Ink May Blog Hop - Watercolor Blocks

Good Morning All! It has been a while since I have posted. Today is Papertrey Ink's monthly blog hop. The challenge - to create a project inspired by the photo below.

Here is what I came up with.

I used one of the stamps from PTI's Ombre Builders stamp set - love this set. I tried to replicate the variation in colour on the wood blocks, I ended up with more of a marble look, but I am happy with the results. I inked up the stamp with a light version of each colour first and then added a darker shade here and there by either direct to stamp pad or with a sponge dauber.

I made a second card with more random placement of squares.

Supplies:
Stamps - Ombre Builders, Boutique Borders Birthday, Thank You Kindly (PTI)
Dies - Small Sketched Stars, Building Blocks (PTI), Stitched Rectangles (Lil Inkers)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS, True Black CS, Raspberry Fizz CS (PTI), Silver Foil CS (DCWV)
Ink - various dye inks (CTMH), Versa Mark, Silver EP, Black EP
Other - Rhinestones

MIM Stamping and Mixing Patterns

Danielle Flanders has a great video at Papertrey Ink this week, giving tips on creating your own patterned paper with stamps and mixing those patterns together in a project. This was a fun challenge that highlighted for me that I rarely use a lot of patterned designer paper in my projects anymore.

Here are the three paper designs I created to make a baby congrats card for a dear friend's first grandchild.

  

Supplies:
Stamps - Background Basics: Super Stripes, Polka Dot Basics, Stylish Sentiments: Birthday, Hands of Time (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS (PTI), Pear, Sky, Buttercup CS (CTMH)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Pear, Sky, Buttercup (CTMH)
Other - mini rhinestones, corner rounder

PTI March Blog Hop

Good Morning all. I didn't think I would get the chance to participate in this month's blog hop at Papertrey Ink, but I did manage to find some time this morning to put together a card.

The colours and patterns spoke to me in the inspiration photo above.

 

I used this week's sketch at CAS(E) this Sketch! for my card design. 

Supplies:

Stamps - Wet Paint (PTI)

Dies - Wet Paint, Birthday Style (PTI)

Paper - Stampers Select White CS, Sheer Basics Vellum (PTI), Baja Breeze CS (SU), DP - Teresa Collins

Ink - Versafine Onyx Black

Other - Silver twine

Doodling With Stamps

The Make It Monday challenge at Papertrey Ink this week is to doodle on your stamping. You can watch Ashley's great video here.  I have come to the conclusion that I am the wrong personality type for this technique - colour outside of the lines and imperfect lines, yikes! After a few false starts I finally came up with a card I felt I could post.

I stamped the images from Pretty Petals in distress inks (I have limited colours) onto water colour paper and then added some more colour using a water brush. I then doodled with a Copic Liner. I am not happy with the sketchy lines that I added around the outside, but I was not starting over again so this is it.

I tried this technique with Polka Dot basics and was actually fairly pleased with with how it was turning out, but ended up going with the flowers instead. Maybe some day I'll go back to the polka dots.

Supplies:
Stamps - Pretty Petals, Mini Blooms (PTI)
Paper - watercolour paper, Stampers Select White (PTI), Sorbet CS (CTMH)
Ink - Tattered Rose, Antique Linen, Peeled Paint Distress Inks (Ranger),Versafine Onyx Black, Copic Liner 0.1
Other - Water pen

Coverplate Stencil Anniversary Wishes

Good Morning! It is freezing here today, so a good day to stay inside and craft. I have a card for the   Papertrey Ink Make It Monday challenge. This week we are asked to use a coverplate die to create a stencil and then to use that stencil and embossing paste on your card - you can see Laurie's video here.

I really didn't have a plan when I started this card. I made a couple attempts with dyed paste that I wasn't happy with then I decided to try adding glitter to my embossing paste (I actually used modelling paste - don't know if there is much difference between the two). I added fine gold glitter first and quickly realized I wouldn't get much sparkle with it, so I added some coarse gold glitter as well and am quite happy with the result. I needed a 50th Anniversary card, so this turned out perfectly. It's hard to see in the picture, but the glitter does sparkle in real life.

Supplies:
Stamps - Wet Paint (PTI)
Coverplate - Vertical Chevron (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS (PTI), Gold Foil CS (DCWV), Vellum
Ink - VersaMark, Balck EP, modeling paste
Other - fine and coarse gold glitter, gold thread

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Blue Skies

The fabulous reveal at Papertrey Ink today is a new series of stamps, dies and coverplates called Blue Skies. The challenge today is to created an blue ombre project.

I heat embossed the sentiment with clear EP on white CS. I then sponged 4 different blues onto the panel going from light to dark. I then added a little bokeh effect with a stencil that I created using circle dies and a punch, a small circle stamp and white pigment ink. Matted with a piece of silver CS and a rhinestone over the ' i '.

Supplies:
Stamps - Polka Dot Basics, Stylish Sentiments: Birthday (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS (PTI), Silver foil CS (DCWV)
Ink - Versa Mark, Clear EP, White Daisy, Sky, StarSpangled Blue, Pacifica, Outdoor Denim

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Heavy Metal

The fun is still going on at Papertrey Ink's 8th Anniversary celebration. If you haven't checked it out already you should. Some great new products and lots of contests and prizes. Today's challenge is to use only metallics and neutrals on your project. I guess I went a little heavy on the metallics today.

I created my own large dot impression plate using a circle die, chipboard coasters and some cardboard for backing (see pic below). Some die cutting in silver and copper foil and a heat embossed sentiment and your done.

 As you can see I drew a grid to help in placing my circles onto my backer. Unfortunately I miscalculated where to draw my lines and I ended up using only the horizontal lines for placement and just eyed up the vertical spacing.

Supplies:
Stamps - Stylish Sentiments: Birthday (PTI)
Dies - Spiral Notebook (PTI), bow (Lil Inkers), Classic Circles (Spellbinders)
Paper - Stampers Select White (PTI), silver and copper foil CS (DCWV)
Ink - VersaMark, Black EP

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Ink It Up

The release at Papertrey Ink today is all about Spring. Today's challenge is to "spring" into action, take charge of your stamp collection and ink up a set that has yet to see ink. I ordered this 'Botanical Blocks' stamp set in August of last year and haven't had the chance to use it yet, so here we go.

I thought Betsy Veldman's Faux Stained Glass challenge from last October would work well with this stamp set. You can watch the video here.

Supplies:
Stamps - Botanical Blocks (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS (PTI), transparency film (3M)
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, Staz On Jet Black, Copics
Other - Stitched Rectangles (Lil Inkers), A2 Matting Basics B (Spellbinders), rhinestones

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Build a Bouquet

Alright, so I am already 2 challenges behind. This card is for Sunday's challenge to create a bouquet of flowers using multiple stamp sets. This turned out to be a lot of fun. Here is my bouquet, five stamp sets and a lot of masking later -

There is a strip of silver foil cardstock to the left of my floral panel, it isn't really showing up on the photo.

Supplies:
Stamps - Botanical Silhouettes, The Sweet Life, Meadow Greens, Leave It Be, Mini Blooms, Rosie Posie, Rosie Posie Step 2 (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS, Royal Velvet CS (PTI), silver foil CS
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black, various dye inks (CTMH)
Other - mini rhinestones, 3D foam

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Be Inspired By Maile Belles

Today saw the introduction of some new products created by Maile Belles. Maile took some time off last year and is back in full force designing for Papertrey Ink. The challenge today is to create a project inspired by Maile's work - I love her style. My card is pretty much a CASE of one of these cards and uses two stamp sets created by Maile herself.

Supplies:
Stamps - Mini Blooms, Think Big Favourite #24 (PTI)
Paper - Soft Stone CS, Stampers Select White CS (PTI)
Ink - Pacifica, Sunflower, Cotton Candy, Sky, Pear
Other - 3D foam, rhinestones

Papertrey Ink 8th Anniversary - Sketch and Colour Challenge

Well, the celebrations have begun at Papertrey Ink. They are celebrating their 8th Anniversary with contests, prizes and new products. The first challenge is a sketch and colour recipe challenge - you can check it out here.

A dear friend of mine is having surgery next week so I created this card for her. The colour recipe I chose included Summer Sunrise, Berry Sorbet, Spring Moss, Ripe Avocado and Aqua Mist. The inks I used were as close as I could get to these. The colour I used in place of Berry Sorbet does have a pink tinge to it but you can't see it in the photo.

 

 Supplies:

Stamps - Inside & Out: Well Wishes, Rosie Posie, Rosie Posie Part 2, Filled With Joy (PTI)

Dies - Tag Sale #3, Building Blocks (PTI)

Paper - Stampers Select White, Aqua Mist (PTI)

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Sunflower, Olive, Juniper, Smoothie (CTMH)

Other - beads, white baker's twine, various ribbons and fibers

MIM #200 - Layered Cover Plate Die Cuts

Good Morning! Hope you all managed to shovel out from under the snow yesterday. The Make It Monday challenge at Papertrey Ink this week (their 200th challenge!) is to create a project by layering die cuts created by their coverplates.

I don't have a lot of cover plates, so choosing was easy - I went with the vertical chevron cover plate. A few months ago I was playing around with Ranger Distress inks on water colour paper, but couldn't achieve the effect I was envisioning. So I set the piece aside for later use. When I saw Dawn's video yesterday I thought this paper might work well with this technique. My top layer was cut from the watercolour paper and I also cut one from black CS and one from grey CS. Love the effect - I think this makes a great masculine card.

Supplies:
Stamps - Boutique Borders: Birthday (PTI)
Dies - Vertical Chevron Cover Plate (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White CS (PTI), Black CS (SU), Grey CS (Bazzill), watercolour paper
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, various Distress Inks (Ranger)

Confetti Garland Valentine

Happy Sunday all! I have another Valentine's Day card to share today. Betsy Veldman created a Make It Monday video on how to add a confetti garland to your project - you can see it here. The challenge at Less is More this week is 'Little Ones' - which can be babies, children or small elements on your card. I chose to go with small elements - the small hearts in my garland. My card design was inspired by this week's sketch at CAS(E) the Sketch!

I had a difficult time photographing this card, we have a winter storm coming later today and there is no sun. I created the subtle striped background by masking with post-it notes, applying Versa Mark and clear embossing powder. The center heart and small hearts in my garland were leftover from last week's card making using Scotch brand clear glue and alcohol ink. The picture doesn't do them justice but these hearts are really colourful and shiny.

Supplies:
Stamps - Who's Your Valentine (CTMH)
Dies - Spiral Notebook, Heart Prints (PTI)
Paper - Stampers Select White (PTI)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Versa Mark, Clear EP, Scotch clear glue, Alcohol Ink (Ranger)
Other - silver cord, silver sequins, silver beads, black brads

Papertrey Ink January Blog Hop Take 2 - Hearts and a Retro Sketch

Here is my second card for the blog hop at Papertrey Ink today. For this card I used the sketch at Retro Sketches this week.

For this card I created another heart accent using a die cut heart, liquid glass (I think this product is similar to Crystal Effects) and alcohol ink. I created a Bokeh effect panel for the center of my card - for this I randomly sponged pink and grey ink onto my CS and then with the tiny heart stamp from Boutique Borders: Love, I randomly stamped first, second and third generation hearts using a white pigment ink. I then die cut my panel with a square die and die cut two small hearts out of the bottom right corner. The tags were die cut from CS and vellum and topped off with some ribbons and fibers tied together. I really like how this turned out.

Supplies:
Stamps - Boutique Borders: Love (PTI)
Dies - Heart Prints, Tag Sale #5, (PTI), Classic Square (Spellbinders)
Paper - Stampers Select White (PTI), Vellum (CTMH), coaster
Ink - Versafine Black Onyx, Clear EP, Ranger Alcohol Ink, Liquid Glass (CTMH), Watermelon ink, Grey Wool ink, White Daisy Pigment ink (CTMH)
Other - ribbons and fibers