Purple Onion Happy Holidays

I'm so happy that I discovered Purple Onion Stamps!!  They are such fun to make cards with.  I'm starting to think about the holidays and decided to use Juniper, Silver, Winter Bough and Winter Adornments to make a snowy little winter scene card!  Here is how it turned out...

I'm a huge fan of stamping and coloring on Kraft card stock with Prismacolor pencils.  They work so well together.  I don't think I've ever seen a card done using this technique that I didn't love!  Hmmm...I'm thinking I might need a new Pinterest Board!!  Here are some close-up pictures.  I live in Florida now and I don't miss shoveling snow, but I do miss the storms and watching the snow falling and blanketing everything in white so adding the snowstorm to this card brought me home!  

Here is how the card looked after coloring it and before adding the snow.  I think it needs the snow don't you? The chunky embossing enamel from Stampendous does the trick!!

I hope you like this card and it inspired you to start working on your own holiday cards!  Thanks for visiting.

Janet

Supplies used:
Stamps:  Purple Onion: Juniper, Silver, Winter Bough, Winter Adornments, Winter Wishes  
                                      Sentiment Set
Cardstock:  My Favorite Things Kraft Cardstock, Stampin' Up Ballet Blue (discontinued)
Ink pads:  Memories: black, Versafine: black
Prismacolor Pencils: 
•  Medium blue - Blue Lake (1102) 

highlight color - Light blue - Powder Blue (1087) 

shading color - Dark blue - Ultramarine (902)

• Red - Crimson Red (924) and shading color- Mahogony Red (1029)

• Dark brown - Chocolate(1082)

• Medium green - True Green (910) and shading color - Dark Green (908)

• Lime green - Chartreuse (989) and shading color - Olive Green (911)

• White (938)

• Black (935)

• Pink (929)

• Sunburst Yellow (917)

• Colorless Blender Pencil

Miscellaneous: Impression Obsession: small snowflake dies, Stampendous: Shabby White Embossing Enamel

Boo-tiful Day

This adorable little Halloween card was inspired by one I saw on Kristina Werner's blog.  The stamps are from a Lawn Fawn set called, Monster Mash. I thought it would be really quick and easy but I couldn't get the monsters as bright as I wanted them.  I tried coloring with Distress inks like Kristina did but I didn't have the right colors.  Next I tried Tombo markers and didn't like that.  Then I tried Copics...didn't like that either because the purples weren't right.  I remembered that reinkers are very vibrant when used as watercolor paint so I tried that and was finally happy with the results! 

Painting with reinkers is easy and fun.  Stamp your image onto watercolor paper (I used Canson Aquarelle that I got at Micheals).  Then use a paint brush and water to paint.  You can blend colors to make new ones, you can add water to soften the color and make it look paler and you can layer colors because they are transparent.  This makes blending pretty easy to do.

Here's a pic of the inside of the card.  Isn't the little baby one-eyed monster cute?  

Thanks for looking :)
Janet

Supplies Used
Stamps:  Lawn Fawn: Monster Mash
Cardstock:  black linen, Canson Aquarelle watercolor paper, purple & green glitter paper, purple swirl paper from a Halloween paper pack
Reinkers: Tsukineko: Lemon Yellow, Poppy Red, Orange, Olive Green, Peony, Chartreuse; Vivid: Purple; Stampin' Up: River Rock
Miscellaneous: Score Tape, foam tape
  

Life is Good

I am still loving my new Lawn Fawn stamps and dies!  There is something about them that makes me want to use really bright colors and when I do, the completed cards make me smile.  I hope the people who receive them have the same reaction.  I used reinkers to watercolor this card because they give me the brightest colors ever.  I think they might even be brighter than my Copics and they are really easy to blend!

Here's a close up of the little crab in the hammock.  I popped up the palm trees, hammock and crab to give the card dimension.  

Thanks for taking the time to visit.  Hope you are having a wonderful week!

Janet

Supplies used:

Cardstock: My Favorite Things: Kraft, Stampin' Up: Pool Party, Canson Aquarelle 

                  Watercolor paper, Core-dinations: Yellow variegated stripe

Stamps: Lawn Fawn: Life is Good, My Favorite Things: Dots Background

Ink pads: Versafine: black, Distress Ink: Frayed Burlap

Reinkers: Tsukineko: Lemon Yellow, Tangerine, Poppy Red, Chartreuse, Olive Green

                 Stampin' Up: Sahara Sand, So Saffron

                 Vivid: Turquoise

Dies: Lawn Fawn: Life is Good

Miscellaneous: Twine, foam tape, Ranger ink tool, paintbrush, 

  

   

Pink and Lacy

I had some friends over to make cards today.  I did three projects.  Here is the first one.  I used a cute retired set from Stampin' Up called Sweet Summer.  I think pink and white lace are perfect together so decided to use both on my card.  I didn't have any designer paper that I liked with the flower stamp I used so I made my own using a scroll background stamp from Hero Arts.  It needed some pink to make it match the flowers so I added dots with a single dot stamp from Printworks.  I can't believe how often I use that little stamp but I seem to be grabbing in all the time!

Here's a close up of the flowers.  I used Copics to color them.  I didn't use traditional blending groups, but the colors blended very well and made coloring easy.   I used Spellbinders dies to make the pink frame around the flowers. 

I kept the pink and lace theme going to the inside of the card.   

Thanks for stopping by!
Janet

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  Stampin' Up: Pink Passion & Mellow Moss, Cougar Opaque White
Stamps:  Stampin' Up Sweet Summer, Hero Arts Florentine Scroll Background, Printworks Single Dot
Inks:  Momento Tuxedo Black, Distress Inks: Bundled Sage, Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry
Copics:  Flowers:  R29, RV04 & RV32
              Leaves: YG67, G82 & YG11
Dies: Spellbinders Labels 17
Miscellaneous: Stampin' Up Pearls, white & silver twine, foam tape

Birdhouse Buddies

I recently got my first order of stamps from Purple Onion and I adore them!  Stacey Yacula draws the cutest little animals.  You can't help smiling when you look at them!  The single flying bird on this card is called Robin and the two sitting on the branch are Star and Sky!  Aren't they perfect with this little birdhouse from Marianne Designs?  This was such a fun card to make :)

I stamped the birdhouse on watercolor paper, colored it and then used the die to cut it out.  Then I stamped the branch onto white card stock and colored it.  

Did you ever have one of those serendipitous moments when you find a new technique by chance?  Well that happened to me with this card.  I have been looking at Pan Pastels and finally bought a few.  The Pthalo Blue Tint is wonderful for adding skies to stamped scenes so I rubbed some onto the background of this card.  I thought there was an awful lot of plain space and wanted to zip it up a bit so I got a stencil, some ink and a sponge and started rubbing the ink onto the background over the Pthalo Blue Tint pastel.  When I lifted the stencil the magic happened!!!  The light purple ink was there but rubbing the sponge over the stencil removed some of the blue pastel so there were subtle white spots there too!!!  I hadn't expected that and I got so excited that I kept moving the stencil and adding more...then I went and got a light blue ink and kept going.  It was so much fun, I know I'll be trying this for a background again!  It was really fun to lift the stencil and see what was underneath!  If you try it, I'd love to know how it works out for you and to see what kind of a look you get so please send me a link!

Next I sprayed the background with Krylon clear matte spray to prevent the pastels from rubbing off.  Then I hung the birdhouse from the branch using foam tape to 3-D it.  Next I stamped and colored Robin, Star and Sky using Copic markers and attached them with foam tape.  Look at Robin flying near the birdhouse...the sizes couldn't be more perfect together...right???!!!

Sorry the next picture is a little blurry. I thought it was better than this.  I already mailed the card so I can't take a clearer picture.  I still wanted to post a close up picture of Star and Sky...they are soooo cute!!

Here is the inside of my card.  I'm still hooked on using coordinating washi tape to decorate the inside of my cards.  Fast, simple and cute.  Gotta love that!

Thanks for stopping by.  Please post a comment and let me know what you think of my background technique.  I like hearing from you!

Janet 

Supplies Used
Cardstock: Canson Aquarelle watercolor paper, Cougar Opaque white, Stampin Up Almost Amethyst, Black Linen
Stamps:  Purple Onion Robin, Sky and Star and Perch and Marianne Designs birdhouse/die, Stampin' Up Wonderful Words
Copics:  C00, C01, C03, C05, C07, R29 I think E51 and E53 on the faces but put the markers away before listing them so I'm not 100% sure
Reinkers: (used to watercolor the birdhouse) Tsukineko Poppy Red, Peony & Chartreuse and Stampin Up Sahara Sand
Ink Pads:  Momento Tuxedo Black, Stampin' Up Almost Amethyst and Bliss Blue
Miscellaneous:  white twine, The Crafters Workshop stencil by Julie Balzer #361 Tiny Circles, Pan Pastels Pthalo Blue Tint, Krylon clear matte spray.