VLVS December Challenge: A Little Mail Art Fun

I'm sneaking in at the last minute of the VLVS December monthly challenge.  I was just addressing an envie for a Christmas thank you card and it occurred to me that a plain white envelope is WAY too boring (thank you VLVS for the Mail Art Monday posts).  :)

Isn't this more fun??

Love this quirky little dude!  My sister, who is the recipient, will get a chuckle out of it, too, I think.

Here is the inspiration pic from VLVS:

Happy Trails...

WordUp Weekend: Christmas Tag

The creative muse is a strange and wonderful thing.  The tag I made today for Stampotique's WordUp Weekend (where we ask people to share their makes using text stamps from Stampotique) totally and completely morphed from one idea to another.

The sentiment is 3 Greetings.  I also used several other Stampotique stamps in the background: Mash-Up, Kate's Doodles Cube, Texture Cube #1, Stringed Lights and finally, 3 In a Round.  Holy smokes, I was on a roll digging through my stamp stash.  :)

Here's the funny thing.  This is not what I envisioned AT ALL.  I was thinking of using Fleas Navidog (because I love it and it cracks me up) with sweet, little Phoebe Doo.  I was going to add a hat to Phoebe Doo so I guess that stayed the same at least.  I even completely switched gears at one point and thought of using Eric with the tag on an art journal page.  Look!  He's even colored and cut out - all ready to go.

Hmmm...strange thing, my muse.  Anyway, come join us and stamp your heart away using some of the fab Stampotique text stamps.  Share your creations on our FB page!

Ho ho ho and Merry Christmas!

Word Up Weekend: Keep Your Holidays Happy!

Today my share is a friendly reminder to stay happy this holiday season.  :)  I used 3 Greetings, my go-to Bla Bla Bla, and Noelle.

I don't know what it is lately, but I just can't help but add blingy bits to my cards.  Here's a different view where you can see the pretty star sequins scattered about the background.  Hard to see, but also in attendance are bits of green stickles on her skirt. 

Happy Holidays!

Half an Hour of Art

Marjie Kemper, an incredible mixed media artist, started a Facebook group recently that's dedicated to artists, crafters and anyone else who's interested, to try to carve out a half an hour of time each month to create.  The criteria is that whatever you delve into, it shouldn't take more than 30 minutes.  The idea is not necessarily to have a completed project but instead to get those creative juices flowing.

I saw a blog post on Marjie's blog where she whipped up an ATC.  Now, y'all know I love me some ATCs and I had a hankering this morning to do something creative.  Here it is:

I have a stash of ATC backgrounds all ready to go.  I don't know where this one came from but it looks like a shaving cream background.  It was easy to slap on a little stamping and watercolor to have a finished product in 30 minutes or less.

If you're interested in learning more about #halfanhourofart check it out on Facebook.

Cheers!

12 Tags of 2016 - Last one! Day 11

Woo hoo!  I did it!  Completed all 12 tags.

This last one is for Day 11 where the theme is 'Country Christmas'.  I was inspired by both designers' tags today.

I tried to keep my tag on the simpler side and liked Anna's tree shape for her tag.  My die cut doesn't have a solid base though so I backed it with a woodgrain-embossed tag.  I also borrowed Anna's star but made mine look rusty.

Similar to Kittie's gingham, I think of swiss dot patterns as kind of country-ish so used that pattern on the snow on my trees.

Finito!  All 12 tags done and here they are:

(Ugh...I know better than to take pics at night!)  One of the tags is missing as I already used it on a gift.  :)

That's a wrap! 

SDC 263: Christmas

Ho! Ho! Ho!  'Tis the season for Christmas-y delights and that's exactly what we're celebrating over at the Stampotique Designers Challenge blog.  For this challenge, I brought out Kate's beautiful angel and put her on a card.

Squeeze some time for a little stamping out of your busy schedule and join the challenge.  We love to see your work!

Merry Christmas!

12 Tags of 2016: Day 12

Helloooo again!  It's the last day of the 12 Tags challenge over at The CLASSroom.  Today's challenge is a color challenge and the colors are beautiful!  Here's my tag which is pretty much completely borrowed from guest designer, Angie Backman.

Here is Angie's tag:

I still have Day 11 to do and then I'll have a complete set - woo hoo!

Stampotique's WordUp Weekend

Since I've been on a tag-making roll I made a gift tag for Word Up Weekend using my new (woot! woot!) Fleas Navidog stamp.

Ever since I added the Dog Cube to my collection I knew Fleas Navidog would have to follow.  :)  I also used Spiral on the background.

Stampotique has SO many great sentiment stamps. Check them out HERE!  While you're at it, take a peek at their alphabet sets too.  

Fleas Navidog!

12 Tags of 2016 - Day 10

Woo hoo!  I'm caught up (for now...)!  Today over the 12 Tags of Christmas With a Feminine Twist it's another color challenge.  This time it's woodsy, nature colors.  I pulled out my Lawn Fawn stamps again to make this tag which is most definitely inspired by Heather Meeson.

I love having a stash of gift tags ready to go!

12 Tags of 2016 - Day 5 (Frozen)

Being a preschool teacher, you can only imagine what comes immediately to my mind when I see "Frozen" as the theme for Day 5 of the 12 Tags of Christmas With a Feminine Twist. Somehow, I managed to resist all references to Olaf, Elsa and Anna for my tag though.  :)  Instead I took my lead from Brandi's tag.

You may be scratching your head.  Let me explain...I wanted to make my tag on vellum as she did, but as I was rummaging around in my blue scrap drawer (looking for the piece of blue vellum that I was sure was in there) I discovered a pretty, sparkly blue paper that already had adhesive on it.  Score!

I also made my tag in a circle shape and used foliage and a gem.  The hardest part for me, also inspired by Brandi, was to keep my tag sentiment-less.  I always feel like I need to add sentiments to projects.

Working outside the comfort zone today...good stuff.

Can you just imagine this little garland hanging in a frosty window?  Ho ho ho!

12 Tags of 2016 - Day 7 (Sketch)

The 12 Tags With a Feminine Twist challenge for Day 7 is to base our tags on the provided sketch.  I went literal and followed  guest designer Melania Deasy's lead to make my tag.

Here is the sketch we used:

I wonder if my tag has a little too much going on.  I was hoping I had plain silver washi tape in my stash but I only had patterned so that's what I went with.   C'est la vie...

I didn't have the right color of blue pearl for the center of the snowflake but here's a little trick that I picked up somewhere a bazillion years ago...Copics.  I just colored it with one of my Copic markers and wa-la!  The perfect blue.

Ho ho ho!

12 Tags of 2016 - Day 3: Foil

Oh my!  I've had this DecoArt foil for well over a year - maybe 2? - and I love the idea of it, but haven't used it yet.  Enter the 12 Tags of 2016 With a Feminine Twist: Day 3 challenge.

The general foiling rule is that you need to use a laminator.  I don't officially have a laminator and that's my excuse for not doing it.  Carissa showed a technique using glue though so I gave it whirl here.

Can you see it?  It's hard to see, but I added foil on the bottom of the skirt, little spots on the skirt and her hat.  I wish I had some little bells to add to the bow, but not a one is in my stash.  But the glue trick worked - woot woot!

Carissa also showed how to stretch a die by cutting it twice.  Sweet technique!

After the fact:  So after I linked up my tag I decided she need a little more oomph.  I added some sequins to finish her off.

Jingle, jingle, jingle...

12 Tags of 2016 - Glitter

Day 2 of Ellen Hutson's 12 Tags of Christmas With a Feminine Twist is all about glitter.  Let's bling it up, shall we?

Designer Julie Stainton used a reindeer die cut with gold glitter and I instantly flashed back to this die that I haven't used in forever.  I blinged up my reindeer with some glitter too and kind of went vintage-y with distressed edges and an old book page.

Merry Christmas!

12 Tags of 2016 - Day 1

This is so wonky doing the tags in a random order.  :)  I'm just getting around to the Day 1 tag.  Ellen Hutson's team teamed up with Art Impressions in this combo challenge (Mix It Up Challenge and Teal, Green, Red & Pink color challenge for the first day of the 12 Tags of Christmas with a Feminine Twist).

I love Art Impressions images - fun and funny.  I've had this lady for a long time and she never fails to make me grin.

The colors on my tag are similar to those on guest designer, Sandy Allnock's:

Happy Holidays!

12 Tags of 2016 - Watercolor

Day 8 of Ellen Hutson's 12 Tags of Christmas With a Feminine Twist has us using watercolor techniques on our tags.  Well, as luck would have it, I just picked up the new Color Bursts assortment from my LSS the other day.  What a great excuse to whip them out!

I used Cerulean Blue on the background of a tag I cut from watercolor paper (similar to GD, Marie).  I also added a smidge of shading on the mountains (the diecut I *accidentally* picked up at the same time I got my color bursts...) using watercolor crayons.

Let it snow!

12 Tags of 2016 - White & Gold

Day 9 of Ellen Hutson's 12 Tags of Christmas With a Feminine Twist is all about gold and white.  The inspiration tags were fab and it was easy for me to hop to it with their inspiration.  My tag is very similar to designer, Sharon Harnist's.

I think it helped that outside my window it's beautiful and snowy white - not a regular occurence for us in Seattle!  

Ho ho ho and Merry Christmas!

12 Tags of Christmas with a Feminine Twist 2016

Ellen Hutson does the 12 tags of Christmas with a Feminine Twist every year and I love participating.  It's a great way to get my hands dirty and bits of paper strewn around my creative space at this time of year when I would likely ignore the Muse's need to express herself due to the business of the season.  Oh yeah...great way to get some spiffy looking gift tags made too to personalize those pretty packages.

Like I said, and no doubt everyone is experiencing as well, there aren't enough hours in the day in December.  I will be creating my tags out of order but as long as they GET created I'm good with it.

Day 4 the challenge/inspiration was to use felt.  Jennifer McGuire shared some great tips for working with felt in her video.  I see people using felt and think it looks fab but I always forget about dipping into that particular stash of mine (it's in a drawer I don't access often).  I took the opportunity to pull it out though and created this little tag.

When I grabbed the felt stash a black felt tag fell out.  It was meant to be, I decided.  No idea why I cut a black tag way back when but I think it really makes the rest of the elements pop.  The bow is made using a Memory Box die and red felt and I added some felt snow on the bottom as well.  The bow was a little tricky to attach - liquid glues weren't cutting the mustard - so I ended up using a hot glue gun.

Stampotique Word Up Weekend Inspiration

Hello, friends!

My Stampotique Facebook share for Word Up Weekend this week is a very clean and simple (gotta love CAS!) card.

I started with a kraft cardstock base and stamped Mash Up using Versamark ink.  Using Memento Black Tuxedo ink I stamped the Wildflower Verse along the bottom, masked that off and stamped Spidergrass.  A quick bit of dry embossing on both sides of the sentiment and I called it done.

Feel free to share your Stampotique creations on the Stampotique Facebook page.

Have a great weekend.  :)