Whisper White Ink on Holiday Card

Usually instead of white ink, I stamp in Versamark and emboss with white powder.  For this card, I used the white ink which is more subtle and doesn't give quite as crisp a white. I think it goes well with the Baja Breeze cardstock and ribbon.

This is one of the sets in my Use It and Move It series.  I do plan to make other cards with this set before I let it go.  To see the sets I do have for sale, visit me at Lovely Layers Art.

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Stamping on Ribbon

Archival Ink by Ranger is just amazing.  It stamps so beautifully on all kinds of surfaces and is permanent.  I first bought it for mixed media so I could mist over or go over with Mod Podge but now I use it on almost everything.  For these cards, I stamped the ribbons with black Archival Ink.

For the background, I cut a stencil on the Silhouette and then went over it with metallic white craft paint.  After it dried, I used watercolors for the blue and purple tones. Easy and so inexpensive.

Creating your own stencils on the Silhouette and many more techniques for using stencils are in

Scrapbooking with Stencils class.

All of these techniques can be used on cards as well. This self-paced class has over 4 hours of video instruction and is only $20 US.  Click on the class name for more info.

Thanks for visiting today!

Peaceful cards

Just because I've made all the Christmas cards I have to make, doesn't mean I have to stop making them does it?

I hope not, as I do enjoy making holiday cards.  I can always save them for next year.  These are made with Raisin Boat's new set  Merry Nature .  I combined it with an image from Lovely as a Tree by Stampin' Up! for one of the cards.  Also had fun playing with mists and distress inks on the backgrounds.

Thanks for stopping by! Hope your week gets off to a good start!

Holiday cards - check!

Ok, this never happens.  I have my holiday cards done!  Not only my cards but my mother's cards as well.  While I always love doing them, it is so nice to not be under pressure to finish.

This year, I got an early start thanks to my Raisin Boat stamp rental subscription.  I've enjoyed the variety of stamps.  I do think though this will be my last month as I've completed Christmas and I don't think I would use the same sets enough each month to keep going.  For the holidays, I chose sets that had some coloring and just stamped up a bunch of images before returning a set.  I also used the subscription to add a few new images for our card classes this fall.

Also, I got a little smarter in that I didn't get hung up on a design that took hours and hours to make the cards.  It was tempting with this elf on the rooftop.  I CASEd this almost exactly from one on the raisinboat.com site.  The difference is the roof.  Their card had individual shingles.  I did two like that and they were just too time consuming - and messy as I had to use a hot glue gun to get the shingles to stick after embossing all the edges.  Talk about putting in the hours!  I don't know exactly how they made their sample, but my best efforts at replicating it just took too long.  So I did 3 long shingles on each card and left it at that.  Plus I only did 8 of these for my cards and concentrated on other designs like the one on top that is mostly coloring with simple assembly.

Most of my cards this year feature these adorable little elves.  The 'snow' is using white fabric paint.

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Naughty or Nice?

 Christmas ornaments can be irresistible to a kitty cat.  A shiny bauble dangling above their heads.  How can you resist that?

For the card I used Raisin Boat's "Naughty or Nice?" set.  I split the front so that when you open one side to see only the kitty you get Naughty and when you see the dog you see the "nice."  The papers are Bella Blvd's Christmas Countdown.

It was a fun card for our card class this week.

Thanks for stopping by today!  Hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Holiday Card Video 2013: Stenciled Snowflakes

My art supplies cabinet is bulging with wonderful products I use in scrapbooking and art canvases.  I thought it would be fun to use some of them on a card.  You can sub out a lot of the things on this card for whatever you have in your stash.  The only thing you really need is heavy gel.

The stencil is from Hobby Lobby.  It was back in the home stencil section.  They have a lot of great choices and they are cheaper than the ones in the scrapbooking section.  A very detailed stencil works best for this technique.

To add color to the gel, I used Perfect Pearls.  You can also use ink.  Since the Perfect Pearls are a powder, they don't dilute the gel.  You only need just a little bit.  The gel dries clear so all that white color disappears. Whatever color you add, go light as it will dry a lot darker. Here is the gold snowflake still wet.

Here's the video at YouTube:


This is the 3rd of my holiday cards.  The other videos are O Holy Night  and  Washi Tree. Thanks for watching!

Snow in the Trees

This card is CASEd from the class I took from True Stamp from Raisin Boat.
Click here to view more details

I changed the background a little by adding some perfect pearls over the top of Baja Breeze ink.  I wanted a glistening background.  It is through their class I discovered white fabric paint.  They used Liquid Applique which I couldn't find; however, Michaels and Hobby Lobby carry fabric paint that works beautifully and is so inexpensive.  It makes pretty snow.

Tomorrow I'll have a new holiday card and video to share with some other great product from the craft store.

Holiday Cards: Washi Tree Card

Got Washi tape?  Some cardstock?  A few rhinestones or enamel dots?

You can create a really easy and fun card.  Actually you can create a lot of them in very little time.

I cut my triangle with a craft knife; however, if you have a Cricut cartridge with a triangle, a Silhouette or any other electronic die cutter, they would go even faster.

For the embellishment, I had these rhinestones from Bazzill.  A less expensive option are the rhinestones in the jewelry department of the craft store.  Just attach with glue dots or Glossy Accents.  I added a bit of extra adhesive to these as well.

The star is Studio Calico's mistable.  A punched or die cut star would work well, too.  You can add a greeting or leave it to the inside of the card.

Here's the video at YouTube



I've stamped a lot of cards from Raisin Boat stamps to color which might be a bit ambitious. So if I don't get them all ready, these are a card I can put together fast with supplies on hand.

Church window card

I guess I'm just all off track on my holidays.  Earlier in the week was Easter and now Christmas. :-)

Last week I shared the church card I made with the O Holy Night set rented from Raisin Boat.  I did several of these as well.  The idea came from their website. My change was to make the window vellum.  I cut out the center and added a vellum panel colored blue that was also stamped with the image just in a lighter shade of brown.

Old punches came in very handy for the greenery.  I did a dozen of these cards and practically everything was older product from my stash.  Doesn't it feel good to use it up?

Thanks for stopping by!

Holiday Cards 2013 - O Holy Night

It's time already.  Time to be thinking about Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I know that Halloween displays just went up and children are going back to school but you know the holidays will be here before you can blink.  So I've started my Christmas cards.

Most of the credit for the early start goes to Raisin Boat (raisinboat.com).  I subscribed to their stamp rental program a couple of months ago and have gotten 2 Christmas sets. Since I get the best deal if I only keep each set for 1 month and then return them, that gives me incentive to stamp, stamp, stamp and get those cards done or at least in process.

The card above will be for either my aunt or my mother's cards this year. The church looks so much like the one I grew up in.  The building is gone now and the congregation is in a newer building constructed when I was in high school.  It is roomy yet doesn't have the same charm.

 I did a dozen of these cards and then 2 more for the Operation Write Home box.  The video shares the complete process and a few tips on creating multiples faster including:

• Color only a portion of the image.  For this one, I left the church white so I only colored the wreath, door and a few other areas.  That saved a ton of time.
• Add interest with stickles and other embellishemnt AFTER you get your card complete.  That way if you run out of time, those extras can be left off and you still have a pretty card.

Here is the process video at YouTube:

I love renting seasonal stamps because a set like this would likely only be used for one season anyway.

Thanks for watching!

Peace on Earth

A very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone!

While it is snowing on the little bird in my card, we are not expecting snow here.  In fact, I walked today in near 60 degree sunshine with only a light hoodie needed for warmth.  Hard to believe last year, we were on the eve of my first white Christmas.

Hope you are safe and with those you love this holiday season.

Card Ingredients:  Stamps:  Four the Holidays (greeting) by Stampin' Up!; Bird by Martha Stewart
Cardstock:  Going Gray and Bordering Blue
Watercolors:  Watercolor Wonder markers from Stampin' Up!
Pearls:  Pretties Kit by SU!

TIPsy Tuesday - Making Felt Embellishments

Felt shapes are very popular in scrapbooking embellishments.   You can do your own with your die cutter or punches and a needle and thread.

Here is how I did the little mitten:

I cut the mitten with the Cricut (using SCAL software but you could cut any image using a cartridge)

Then I took the negative space and used that as a pattern to draw my mitten on felt.  I flipped the pattern and the felt over drawing and cutting from the back side.





I cut it out with scissors and whip stitched around the edges.



It's easy to cut out your own felt shapes just use your die cutter to make a pattern for you.  I found the negative image to make the best pattern.  It is easier to trace inside an image rather than around the edge.

Thanks for visiting.  Have you entered my giveaway?  Scroll down to yesterday's post to leave a comment or click here.

Ingredients:  Stamps: Cute Christmas from Stampin' Up!
Cardstock:  Baja Breeze, Real Red
Twine:  Martha Stewart

I'm trying to get my Christmas cards for myself done this weekend.  This one was a class card this week.  I won this designer paper as blog candy last January.  I'd saved this "We wish you a Merry Christmas" paper all year because I knew how much the ladies loved music paper.

Also, I got a Two Peas order in today with an American Craft album and a lot of random designer paper. I've always used Creative Memories albums because I like that you don't have to use page protectors; however, lately it seems no matter how much I glue I use things do come off my pages over time so I thought I'd try a different approach for an album.

Lately, I'm really into pulling together papers from lots of different collections so I went through the Two Peas store searching for paper in certain colors and bought things that had those pretty tone-on-tone small prints - often the 'b' side of the papers.  There is a layout coming together in my craft space that has at least three different manufacturer's papers.  So hopefully I'll soon have something other than holiday cards to post :-)

Well, better get the dishes done and get back to those cards!  Hope you enjoy your weekend.

More Wise Men

Here are the last of my Mother's cards.  I did 10 of these using Stampendous Cling Wise Men stamp.  It takes a full hour to color each one!  Fortunately I can do this and watch television.  I put them on a larger card so the Wise Men wouldn't be so crowded.  The background cards came in a set with matching envelopes.  Since they were a plain white, I sponged on Not Quite Navy from Stampin' Up! and Ranger's Dusty Concord over a gold embossed image to dress them up.  The ribbon is some organza from Hobby Lobby's fabric section.

In my video this week, I mentioned those little gold gems.  I was sad to see that Hobby Lobby didn't have any on their racks or a place holder for them that I can tell.  I'm going to have to find another source as I'm practically addicted to them for holiday cards.

Thanks for visiting!

Ornament cards video

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving weekend!  I cooked, we ate, I decorated for Christmas and made lots of cards.  These are part of my Mother's cards for this year.  I did a similar card a few weeks ago using fabric and ribbon for the ornament.  This time I used papers and cut many of the ornaments with a circle cutter.  The video shows the entire process.

Watch at  YouTube


I'm trying to wrap up my cards this week.  As always, doing Christmas cards is fun and creative.  It is time though to get on to other projects.

Thanks for visiting today!  Stay tuned for a giveaway coming up in the next few days...

Ingredients:  Stamps:  Magic of Christmas by Hero Arts: Four the Holidays by SU!
DSP:  My Mind's Eye Life is Beautiful; Cosmo Cricket Christmas paper from last year
Ribbon:  Making Memories
Cardstock:  Wild Wasabi and gold from Stampin' Up! 

Another Christmas Card

Here we go with another Christmas card.  I'm working this weekend to get my Mother's cards done and a few more of mine.  Although I started months ago, the time to get them done has slipped up on me!

Hope you are having a fun holiday weekend!

Christmas Card class card

Our next card class is for holiday cards.  We used this stamp set last time and it will be the only repeat.  Last time we embossed the image.  This time I CASEd the technique from the Stampin' Up! catalog - at least it is what I think they did.  I inked the image in a gold color - River Rock to match my background cardstock - then I sponged on a bit of dark brown ink around the edges and stamped. We will have to clean the stamp between stampings but it is a very fast card to put together.

I snagged this ribbon at the Mighty Dollar store earlier in the year.  The rest are all SU! papers.  I'm doing better with my cling stamps thanks to some advice I got on Splitcoaststampers.  Press the acrylic block onto the cling stamp and hold for a few seconds to get good adhesion.  It really works.

Thanks for visiting!

Ingredients:  Stamps:  Come to Bethlehem by Stampin' Up!
Ink:  River Rock and Ranger's Vintage Photo
Paper:  Not Quite Navy, River Rock, Ruby Red, Gold and Bravo Burgandy

Naughty or Nice?

Kristina Werner has been doing her holiday card series. One of her first cards used an Inkadinkado stamp with a kitty on it.  I looked for it at Archivers a few weeks ago and they didn't have that one but had this cutie instead.  It sure fits my Jasper as he is a playful kitty but usually very nice.  Yesterday, he brought us a present - a dead field mouse - on the back patio.  Yuck! Oh, I mean "good kitty."

I tried to color my kitty like Jasper but my model was most uncooperative as you can see here.

The rest of the colors go with these Crate Paper Peppermint collection papers. I know I'll want to make some more of these when I find more ribbon.  This is Basic Grey ribbon and I used every inch I had to make 5 cards.

My Christmas card box is filling up little by little.  This year, I'm finding doing anywhere from 4 to 10 cards of one type is doable and interesting.

Hope you have a great day!  Thanks for stopping by.

Ingredients:  Stamp Ornament Kitty Mini by Inkadinkado
DSP:  Peppermint by Crate Paper
Ribbon:  Basic Grey
Cardstock:  Riding Hood Red by SU!

TIPsy Tuesday - Curled Cling Stamps

Today's tip only applies to Stampin' Up! "clear" stamp users. Hopefully you won't even need this at all.  However, if you ever get a stamp mounted like I did, it might come in handy.

When you purchase Stampin' Up!'s clear stamps (what everyone else calls cling stamps), you must adhere the label to the stamp.  When I did this greeting stamp, I got the label on a little too tight so that the stamp didn't lay down quite flat.  Whenever, I would try to adhere the stamp to an acrylic block, it would pop back off.  That is a problem once you ink up and try to stamp; the stamp drops off the block messing up your paper!

Now I kept trying to press the stamp onto the block harder.  And you know the definition of stupidity - doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.  Well, finally I tried something different.  I couldn't take the label off and redo it, so I used sharp scissors to cut through the label in a couple of places and that helped the stamp to lay flat.  Now it doesn't drop off as much - any more than any other cling stamp.

These Christmas cards are for my aunt.  I'm doing a mass production of about a dozen cards.  She only sends a few.  The background is created by applying distress ink and a little classic Not Quite Navy to my craft sheet, spritzing with water and then dipping the paper into the ink.  I use a paper towel to remove the excess and let it dry.  There is quite a bit of gold embossing to make these special without any fancy embellishments.  I wanted to keep the flat so there would be no extra postage.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Wise Men

Did I need this Wise Men stamp from Stampendous I spotted at Archivers a few weeks ago?  No.  I have two other wise men stamps already.

Could I resist the intricate design and keep it out of my shopping basket?  Well, apparently, No to that too!

I'm so glad I didn't resist.  I loved coloring in this image with a big assortment of Stampin' Up! markers.  It is time consuming but so far my favorite Christmas stamp.  I'll probably do my Mother's cards out of this one.  Have you picked a holiday stamp yet?

Thanks for visiting today!

Ingredients:  Stamp:  Cling Wisemen by Stampendous
Cardstock:  Wisteria Wonder and Rich Razzleberry by SU!
Gems:  Hobby Lobby jewelry dept.