Cupcake Wishes Take Two

I had so much fun coloring this cupcake that I had to do it twice. Here is the Copic version> I had to go with a more masculine look this time. 

Doesn't all that chocolate frosting look delicious. I was so happy with how this card came together.

Frosting Colors: E23, E27 & E79

Cake Colors: E30 & E33

Wrapper colors: B95, B97, & B99

Sprinkles: B97 with Wink of Stella over them.

My favorite part of this card is the Sunburst around it. My husband walked in and said it made the cupcake pop and ask to be eaten. I trimmed down the cupcake panel to 4 1/8" x 5 3/8". I took my sunburst center and had the circle over the middle of the cupcake and taped it down with purple tape. 

I started out by applying Distress Oxide in Vintage photo really dark on the outside edges and then softening it up to a lighter shade close to the cupcake. I made sure to leave a white border around the cupcake. When I pulled the stencil off, it looked OK but not great. I wish I had taken a picture. So I grabbed a lighter shade of Distress Oxide in Brushed Corduroy and starting at the outside edges (no stencil) I just started blending it in toward the cupcake. I blended right over the top of the Vintage Photo. I blended darker at the edges and lighter toward the cupcake. I could have put the light brown down over all of it first if I had known I would need it but I actually like the color tone the Vintage photo took on with the Brushed Corduroy blended over it.

I finished off my stamping my sentiment on a separate piece of card stock and blending the two Distress Oxide inks over it, keeping the edges the darkest.

Supplies used:

Cupcake Day-cupcake & sentiment

Radiating Rays Stencil-mine is from My Favorite Things but I imagine any sunburst stencil will work

Thermoweb purple Tape

Distress Oxide in Vintage Photo and Brushed Corduroy

Cupcake Wishes

I colored up a couple of these cupcakes using both colored pencil and Copic markers. I am sharing the Prismacolor colored pencil one today.

This stamp set comes with this great cupcake stamp and so many great sentiments. I am sure it will get used often. 

I started by coloring the frosting using my pencils and Gamsol. This is just 2 colors of pencil. If you haven't used Gamsol before, it can be super easy to use and get a great blended lock without a lot of time spent. Below is a short video showing how I did the frosting.

I colored the cupcake & wrapper with just one pencil color each. For the wrapper, I just colored very heavy or very lightly to get the 2 shades and then just ran a paper stub with Gamsol on each strip to smooth them out.

I used an embossed piece of card stock framed with a scallop die for the background. I wanted the cupcake and sentiment raised a little bit but not as much as foam tape would so I just cut two pieces of 110lb card stock and glued them behind the cupcake. I finished off the sprinkles and inside the swirls of the embossed background with some sparkly pink gems.

Supplies used:

Cupcake Day-cupcake and sentiment

Scallop Stitched Frames rectangle die

Provo Craft Divine Swirls embossing folder

Prismacolor Colored Pencils

Gamsol

Hey Lady

Hello everyone. I am so excited to get this stamp. I love the Cuddlebug line from Unity Stamp Company and Ladybugs are a big favorite of mine. I colored up a bunch of them the other night so you will probably see a few more cards. 

I cut this panel out with a double stitch die. I wanted it narrower than the die cut, so after I cut it once, I moved the die over, tried to align the top and bottom stitches with the die and cut it again. I mounted it on a red card face and then punched 1/2" and 5/8" circles from black and stuck them along the edge. This was a quick and easy card to make.

Wings: R27, R29 & R59

Body: N1, N2, & N4

Face N1 & N2

Top of head: C3 & C5

Hands: C5 & C6

After I got the card assembled, I decided to use some Stormy Sky Distress Oxide mixed with water to outline the ladybug image just a bit.

Supplies used:

Cuddlebug Ladybug

Double Stitched in & out Rectangle die

Sorry you Caught a Bug

I just ordered the most adorable Cuddlebug Ladybug from Unity Stamp Company. I am having to wait for it to get here, so I decided to ink up this stamp I have had for a while. She is from a kit called "Lucy the Ladybug Fairy" and she is to cute. My son has told me I need more get well cards so I used that sentiment from the kit.

I went with some bright pinks instead of the traditional red.

Dress & Bow: RV32, RV17 and RV19 with G99 for the deepest shadows

Dots and shoes: C4 and C6.

Hair: E50, E53, E55 and E57

Skin tones:  E00 & E11, 

Stem YG61 and YG63

Flower petals: B21 and B22 

Flower center: Y15 an Y26

I cut the pink card stock with a chevron cutting plate and matted everything with black card stock.

Supplies used:

Lucy the Ladybug Fairy

Chevron Background Cutting Plate

Sending Bright Days card

I couldn't resist this boot stamp when it was released from Unity Stamp Company. It came with an adorable wagon as well. This was a pretty quick and easy card.

 I found this perfect paper in a 6x6 paper pad at Tuesday Morning. I just picked colors from the boot paper to color up my image. The yellow paper says "look on the bright side" which is a great match for the sentiment that came in the kit.

Below are the colors I used.

Supplies Used:

Joy and Brighter Days-boots & sentiment

Paper pad from Tuesday Morning,

Copics in YR30, Y11, Y13-boots

R22, R24-tulips

YG11, YG13-tulip leaves

YG13, YG17-grass

Inspire-Mixed Media card

A friend of mine just encouraged me to sit down and play and see what happens. I've been too uptight about trying to get everything to come out perfect. So I figured mixed media of a sort would be a good way to loosen up. I really don't do mixed media and am not even sure if there are rules or not. So I watched a couple of simpler videos and it seemed to be about layering. 

I just picked up some stamp sets from Unity Stamp Company from their Layers of Life line. I picked one with several pieces to it and pulled out my dusty Vicky Boutin art crayons and Iridescent Glaze.

I started with a heavy weight piece of card stock and my lightest blue and green crayon. I scribbled the blue on a piece of acetate, sprayed it with water and mixed it around with a brush. Then I kissed it to the paper in a few spots. I did the same thing with the green color. I dried that layer and then used the blue on the acetate again but this time I mixed the water in with the the brush I had used with the green crayon to get just a little different shade and kissed that the the paper. Reversed for the green and dried it up again.

The next step was to take a couple of the background stamps and scribble them with art crayon and spray them with water. I stamped off the excess on scrap and then stamped them around the card stock randomly, again using the blue and green crayon. I then used some Vicky Boutin Iridescent glaze mixed with tiny bits of crayon and a Tim Holtz stencil to layer on some texture.

I grabbed the word stamp from the set and some Distress Oxide ink in Antique linen to add just one more layer onto the card base. I colored up a scrap of paper the same way and used it for the sentiment from the kit. I stamped the flower twice and used the warm set of Vicky Boutin art crayons to water color it up, then fussy cut them. 

I trimmed down the card background and the sentiment and mounted them on black. I mounted this to and A2 card base.  I glued down one flower and then used 1/16" foam tape to pop up the sentiment and the other flower.

Supplies used:

Layers of Life: Spring Inspired

Vicky Boutin art crayons-warm and cool set

Vicky Boutin iridescent glaze

Tim Holtz stencil-Bubble

1/16" foam tape

Red Flower Birthday Card

Hello. Today I pulled some color inspiration off some cards on Pinterest. I decided to water color today so I stamped this image on some Canson XL water color paper using Versafine Clair ink in Nocturne. I used Gansai Tambi watercolors and just picked 2 reds to do very basic water coloring. 

I cut the flower panel down and stamped a birthday sentiment in the same ink. I tend to use birthday sentiments more than any other because I always seem to need those cards. I used a 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" red piece of card stock for the backing, then cut down a black piece an 1/8" smaller and then another piece of white water color paper 1/4" smaller. I cut some scrap black with a scallop die and mounted a smaller piece of red on top. Those were cut to match the width of the white card stock.

I assembled the black and red strip and mounted those off center onto the white piece. Then I wrapped a piece of black ribbon around the center and taped it to the back of the white card stock. Then taped all the background pieces together with my ATG gun and mounted them to a card base. I took the flower panel and mounted it to black card stock trimmed 1/8" larger. Then I used foam tape to mount that to the card.

Supplies used:

Lean, Pretty Please-flower

Hugs, Kisses & Birthday Wishes-sentiment

Sizzix Scallops & Zigzags dies

Gansai Tambi 36 color set 

1/8" black picot ribbon

Canson XL Water Color paper pad 9"x 12"

So Sorry sympathy card

 Hello. I colored up this image fulling intending to so a Spring type card. I guess it didn't really want to be one when I got around to assembling it. I used a past Kit of the Month from Unity for this flower image.

I colored the flowers using 3 marker combos. For the darker flowers I used RV34, R56 and a touch of R59. For the lighter flowers, I used RV32, RV 34 and a touch of R56. I used the 2 greens on the leaves and for the surrounding area, I started with C2 right up against the flowers and blended out with each of them until I got to the lightest C00. A great die to finish the edge and some black organza ribbon where all the card needed to finish it.

Supplies used:

Be My Bird-flower image

My Condolences-sentiment

Black sheer organza ribbon

Simon Says Stamps Bracket dies

Father's Day-Forest Guy

I started my Father's Day cards today. I made a couple of backgrounds and decided to use them for this card. 

I started by taking a half sheet of card stock and used a pencil to draw about a 1/2" around the background stamp I was planning on using. I used Barn Wall and Walnut Stain Distress Oxides for the red one and just streaked it on the paper using the edges of the ink pad.It looks like a hot mess at this stage. For the blue one, I blended Broken China, Mermaid Lagoon and Peacock Feathers randomly over the card stock. 

I then took my Vintage Burlap background stamp and stamped over both of them with Gina K Amalgam ink. I cut the red one into strips that I will be using on another card. I used a stitched rectangle die to cut the blue one down and mounted it on black card stock.

I ripped a piece of black card stock about 2 to 2 1/2 inches wide and took 2 thin pieces of the red background and mounted them behind it. I colored Forest Guy by using Barn Wall Distress Oxide ink as a water color on the shirt. Then I used colored pencils on the rest and to add shading to the shirt. I used the scraps from trimming down the blue background and stamped the sentiment and cut it apart and outlined with a thin black pen.

Supplies used:

Forest Guy

Vintage Burlap

Distress Oxide inks

Cuddlebug Lions

I love the Cuddlebug line by Tierra Jackson for the Unity Stamp Company. This lion was no exception but I have guys in my family that wouldn't appreciate the flower wreath on the lion. I wanted to find a way to use it with and without the wreath without damaging my stamp.

I made this cute little guy first just as he is. I colored him with Copics and used some patterned paper and a sentiment from the kit.

My next step was to find a way to perfectly mask out the wreath. For this card I colored him with Copics and then I hand drew a crown and typed up my own sentiment. 

The video below shows the quick and easy steps I did to mask out the flower wreath. 

Supplies used:

Cuddlebug Lion

Misti Stamp Platform

Happy Easter napkin card

The Unity Stamp Company has a month long challenge going using a decorative paper napkin as the base for a card. This is my entry. I used a simple, striped napkin to start with.

I started by separating the plies of my napkin and wrinkling the decorative layer just a bit. I mod podged my napkin on to some 110 lb card stock. Once it was dry, I cut it down with a stitched rectangle die.

The umbrella stamp is from the April Kit of the Month and Happy Easter is from the March kit of the month. I used the following Copics to do some very basic coloring on the umbrella. 

I fussy cut the umbrella out and then mounted it on a lacy nested circle die from Gina Marie Designs. The entire thing was mounted to navy card stock and then added to a card base. I used some clear sequins for the embellishments.

Supplies used:

Have & Hold

Gather Love

Frilly Lace Nested Circle die

Vintage suitcase cards

Hello. Today I made 2 different cards using the same layout and stamp but with 2 different looks.

I started with a vintage looking suitcase stamp from Unity Stamp Company's April Kit of the Month.

For the first card, I stamped it directly onto Neenah Desert Storm kraft card stock. Then I used a cool gray and warm gray colored pencil and some Gamsol to make a shadow around the image just to pop it off the page. I pulled out my scallop rectangle stamp for the border and added a sentiment. A really quick and easy card.

My second card started by stamping the image on white card stock and using colored pencils and Gamsol to color it. I used a stitched rectangle die to cut that out and mounted it on black card stock that had been die cut with a scalloped rectangle. Then I mounted all of that on a kraft card base. A little more time consuming but still a pretty quick card.

Supplies used

Have & Hold -Kit of the Month set

Rectangle Scalloped Border

Abundant Blessings -sentiment

Nested Rectangle Scallop die

Wild About You

I created this card by using 3 different Itty Bitty stamps from Unity Stamp Company and a new background from them and Brutus Monroe.

I started by stamping the lion, masking it off, then the hippo and last the alligator. I used Gina K Amalgum ink.

 I used my Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol with some paper stumps to blend it out to do all the coloring. All the following pictures show the colors used.

I cut the panel with a stitched rectangle punch. I stamped the Heart Swirl background stamp in black and then blended a couple of Distress Oxide inks randomly over it. I trimmed that down and mounted it on black card stock. The sentiment is from a 4th Itty Bitty set embossed in white.

Stamp sets used

I'd Be Lion

Hippo Birthday

Later Alligator

Wild About You

Heart Swirl