This Little Card of Mine

In honor of the National Cherry Festival....

that started yesterday in Traverse City -- SURPRISE!  A cherry card!   My sister has been keeping me in touch with what's happening in her store and business is booming.  This is her first year as the owner of a cherry products store during Cherry Festival.  She had no idea what to expect.  And she seems to be enjoying every minute.

Supplies:  All Doodlebug

Hmmm... maybe another way I could honor the CF is to go downstairs and get some cherries for a snack.  Kroger cherries aren't nearly as good as fresh in Michigan but, hey, it'll have to do.

Happy Independence Day!

I have wanted an American flag for a long time and haven't had one in years.  I just never got around to getting one.  I finally got one for the 4th of July and it made me so happy to put it up.  The older I get the more the flag means to me .. I get kind of choked up when I see one.  (I know, I'm a sap) 

I know that July 4th reminds us of parades, picnics and fireworks.  I hope we will all remember what this holiday is really about as we enjoy time with family and friends.  Have a wonderful 4th!

Christmas in July

OK, not really.   But Nichol challenged us in a recent blog post to not just use red and green at Christmastime.  So I thought I'd give it a try.  This is another card using Claudine Hellmuth's Studio line paints.   This time I used Modern red which is one of my very favorites in her line.  It's such a unique red.  I painted it on sticky back canvas.  Then I heat embossed with some Ranger Antiquities embossing powder.   You don't know it but this card is an example of how far I have come since succumbing to the messiness that comes with using Ranger products.   Ask Jennifer.... in the past if it wasn't perfect I wouldn't use it or would do it again.  Did I emboss this perfectly?  Uh, no.  In places it rubbed off.  But I decided to call that distressed and call it a day!   Progress, huh?

Other supplies:  Hero Arts notecard and background stamp; Ranger Distress Ink around edges; Fiskars cloud decorative scissors; Letters from Hobby Lobby (forget the name)

Playing with paints

I was in the mood to play with Claudine Hellmuth's Studio Line paints -- another great line of products from Ranger.  If you haven't played with these, wow.  You just have to.  Like butter!  :-)  One of the things that I love about them is the colors.   For this card I painted the sticky back canvas (one of the best products ever).  I wanted to create a background with this wonderful brown color.  I zapped it with the heat gun.  Then I stamped using embossing ink and heat embossed the image with white embossing powder.   Such a cool look.  Then I applied a little distress ink to the edges of the paper.

 

One of the cool things about the sticky back canvas is that it sticks more than once.  The best way to paint this is to stick it to a craft sheet.  Then you can slop the paint on over the edges (Claudine Just might be mortified at the concept of SLOPPING it on!  :-)  ).  It still had enough stick-um to stick to the paper.   Wondering how you clean the craft sheet?  Just use a craft scraper and easily scrape the dry paint right off. 

Supplies:  Bazzill cardstock, Making Memories patterned paper, Hero Arts flower, pearls and greeting stamp, Studio line sticky back canvas and paint, Ranger Distress Ink embossing ink and Ranger embossing powder

I was distressed like the ink!

OK, that's a big exaggeration but I decided to use a color I absolutely never use -- purple!  And I ended up with a look that stumped me at first.   It's just so dark for me.  But for heaven's sake I can't always use the same colors!  :-)   Here is the result and then I'll give you instructions....

I started with a manila tag.  I used clear embossing powder to stamp this Hero Arts background image and then heat embossed with black embossing powder.  See how the embossed look is a little spotty?  That was actually intentional.  For a more solid black look I could have used black ink for the embossing.  Once it was cooled and dried I started with Ranger's Distress Ink in dusty concord (the color I obviously bought but never use!).  Over top of that went Broken China (a favorite).  And then I used some Black Soot along the edges.   In the end I kind of liked the result.  Just goes to show that I need to leave my comfort zone every once in awhile.

Other supplies:  Bazzill cardstock; Creative Impression silk ribbon; SEI button; Hero Arts greeting stamp (stamped using Black Soot Distress ink)

And the winners of the giveaways ....

were randomly chosen and here they are!

The winner of the $25 gift certificate from Eclecticpaperie.com is CASS!

The winner of the Card Creations book is RACHEL IN SACRAMENTO!

Congratulations ladies.  I will email the winners since some of you who entered have very similar names!  :-)   And  many thanks to all of you who stopped by and left a comment.

Alcohol ink with resist

Another card featuring Ranger Alcohol Inks that you can get at Eclectic Paperie.  You start this technique with some gloss paper.  I used a background Hero Arts stamp and stamped on the gloss paper with Ranger Watermark resist ink. 

 

Zap it with a heat gun just a bit to set it.  Then, choose an alcohol ink and squirt some on your craft sheet.   I started with Ranger's Aqua ink.  Roll a brayer over it and then start randomly running it over the gloss paper.  Keep doing it until you have as much as you want.  I then repeated with Pool and Citrus colors. Keep rolling it on and adding colors as you like until it looks good to you.  It's really fun to see how your creation changes as you add colors.  And here is the end result....

 

 

 

I didn't have a green flower so I used a white Prima flower and inked it up with Ranger Distress Ink shabby shutters using the ink blending tool.  Easy!

Other supplies:  Hero Arts Notecard, greeting stamp and background stamp; Ranger glossy paper; Doodlebug patterned paper; SEI patterned paper and button; Bo Bunny double dot paper

A note on Ranger gloss paper.  You may be wondering if you can use photo glossy paper.   According to Tim H. most of them have emulsions that react with the alcohol inks and make it too sticky.   There are other gloss papers out there and some will work, some will not.  You'll have to experiment.  I've only used the Ranger paper because I KNOW it works but feel free to experiment.

One more day to go....

before the giveaway drawing.  I'll be picking two winners tomorrow night.

Also, I have heard from several of you that you would like to follow my blog via Google Reader and it wasn't working right.  It's fixed now!   So go ahead and add my blog and you should get updates.  Thanks for your patience.

Ranger Alcohol ink

Eclectic Paperie featured alcohol inks in their newsletter so I figured I'd make a project with them.   I started out making this card to demonstrate an easy technique with Ranger Alcohol inks.  I sort of randomly cut this piece of glossy paper.  I figured I'd do the inking and then cut it down to be less dominant on the card.  Well, this ended up being a better combo of colors than I expected (it's always a guess on how these will turn out for me because I'm using some of these colors for the first time).  And the edges are where the darker colors landed that give this dimension.  So.....  I had to figure out how to use this size as it was.  Not the biggest problem in the world but not what I planned....  The lesson to be learned from this is that it may be best to determine the shape and size of the piece you're inking first.   Can you cut out pieces of it?  Of course!   But depending on where the inks landed you may get a very different look.

Here's how you do this technique.  You will need a Ranger craft sheet - which is a really important item to have when working with distress inks and alcohol inks.  It isn't your ordinary mat -- nothing sticks to it!  Even things like UTEE will come right off.   You need this mat for this technique.   You'll want to be careful with it -- don't fold it, keep it rolled.  I keep it in the package you comes in.  You take some Ranger mixative --I used gold.  It comes in gold, silver, pearl and copper.   It gives your project a bit of metallic look.

Scribble some of it on the craft sheet - randomly.  You don't need a ton (actually you should use the least amount of this) and don't worry about what it looks like.  Then take whatever colors of Ranger alcohol ink that you want (I used rust and butterscotch).  Scribble them on top.  I used two colors.  The fun thing about alcohol inks for me is that you never know what you are going to get and every piece is totally different. As your final step squirt some Ranger Alcohol Blending solution on top. (You use this same blending solution to clean your craft sheet and get the ink off of it.)  Once you've done that you take a piece of Ranger glossy paper.  Turn it glossy side down right on top of the ink on the craft sheet.  And twist it (move it around).  There is no wrong way to do this.   I found when I picked it up that there were places that weren't covered so I just dropped it right back down on the ink!    Every time you do a new creation emerges.  You'll notice as you pick it up that the inks move around.  So if you don't like it exactly as is you can move it around and watch the inks flow to where you want them.   You can just let it dry or zap it with a heat gun.  This is such a fun technique!  I hope you enjoy it.

(I wish my photography skills were better.  I did my best to show you the metallic, marble finish of this.  In real life it's actually a bit more subtle but the flash is picking up the metallic in an exaggerated way.  The second photo is scanned.)

 
 

Funny how when you look at something photographed or scanned you see things you aren't crazy about.  Wishing I had dipped it in ink one more time but oh well....  :-)

Other supplies:  Hero Arts kraft notecard and greeting stamp, Jenni Bowlin patterned paper, Ranger Distress Ink Walnut stain (stamped greeting), Ranger Distress Ink tea dye (around edges of Kraft paper), Ranger Liquid Pearls (white opal)

An exciting day (and a great day for TWO giveaways!)

I was so thrilled when Daisy from Eclectic Paperie invited me to be the EP Friend in their newsletter (it's going out today).   I met Daisy and Joy from EP at CHA and they are just two of the nicest people you would ever want to meet.  Since then Jennifer and I had the chance to share a table with them at Ranger U a few months ago. I've mentioned their store before but if you have not been there be sure to stop over.

Jennifer, Joy, me and Daisy

I love patronizing businesses of really great people.  They are carrying Hero Arts, Ranger products and Copic markers -- three of my favorites!  I made a card using some of the products that they carry...

 

To make the butterfly I used a manila tag.  They work perfectly with Distress Inks.  I heat embossed the image with white embossing powder.  Once it cooled I used a Ranger blending tool to apply Tim Holtz's Distress ink in Broken China followed by Antique Linen.  I used Old Paper around the edges.   This butterfly shape was done using a Spellbinders Butterfly die.

For the background I used Antique Linen Distress ink around the edges and then used a Hero Arts stamp to stamp the image in the same ink.  I like using that color for a more subtle background.  Stamping with distress inks gives you a really soft look. 

 

Other supplies:  Hero Arts note card, greeting stamps, leaf stamp and pearls,  Creative Imaginations silk ribbon, Cuttlebug swiss dot embossing folder; Making Memories patterned paper

And now for the TWO giveaways....

I told you how great the folks at Eclectic Paperie are and here is proof positive... they have given me a $25 gift certificate to their online store to include in the giveaway drawing.   You can get alot of goodies trying to spend that thing in their store!  Thanks Daisy!

And for the 2nd giveway....

 I saw that the PaperCrafts Card Creations 7 is coming out very soon.  Most years I have had something in those issues and I'm sad that this year the call for cards slipped by me so I haven't gotten a preview of it.  But I always love these so I figured while I was ordering one for me I'd order one for one of you!  I don't have it in hand and I'm not sure when it's coming but I figured you wouldn't mind waiting!  :-)  

I will be drawing two winners  Tuesday, June 30. To be entered in the drawing just leave a comment on this post.  Thanks for stopping by and good luck!

Over the next few posts I'll be using more products from Ranger that you can pick up at their store.