Happy Friday!!!
Stopping in to share a super cute little image with you from our most recent release at Sami Stamps!

This card is nothing like what I originally envisioned for it.  I used Mr. Pencil Peep on this card, but he was totally giving me a Harry Potter vibe from the beginning!  I tried so hard to come up with a great idea to turn it into that, but nothing was working out.  So I switched gears and want with something else.

I still wanted this cutie to be colored like Hedwig though...or at least like a white snowy owl.  So I fussed around with that for a good long while.  I didn't want to do just flat shading, I wanted there to be feathers and puffs...not sure it looks like that...but he's still cute :)

Then I set to working on my background.  I decided to do some ink blending around an embossed frame.  So, using my rubber embossing mat in my Cuttlebug, I embossed this fun design into my card front and then created a mask so I could ink the background around it.  After that was done, I cut out my owl and was starting to assemble everything, but really felt like the whole card was too plain.

So I put the die back into place that I had used for the embossing, and then used the same inks to blend on the inside of the frame.  Having the frame in place allowed for there to still be this nice white border so there is separation between the inside and outside areas.  Once it was all colored, I flicked on some white, black, and purple shimmer sprays.  Much better!  Plus now if you look close, you can see that his glasses are see through!

I printed just his glasses onto some transparency!  Cutting them apart was a bit tough but you just have to take it slow and really focus.  Before I adhered the transparent glasses, I outlined the eyes and added the white highlights in with a white gel pen so that they were a little bit bolder.  The transparency was dulling them down a bit so they needed some touching up.  Then I took some glossy accents and added little dots to the eyes and stuck the "glasses" down!  Worked like a charm!

I embossed my sentiment from Honey Bee Stamps Beautiful Life set onto some vellum and then flagged the ends and added it to my card with tiny strips of foam tape.  Scattered a few shimmy dots of glossy accents around the card and it was done!

You have just a few more days to enter our Anything Goes challenge, so don't miss out!  Just be sure to use a Sami Stamps image!!

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
    As You Like It-Favorite Shaped Card Base (I don't really get into making anything other than the standard A2 size card base.  It's easy for me to visualize this style card and find great ways to use that space, whereas if I try to do any other shape, the design gets muddy or I just can't make it flow well enough.)
    Fussy and Fancy #171-Let's Fly Away
    Penny's Paper Crafty #292-Anything Goes

Thanks for visiting! <3

Happy Tuesday!
We have a fun new challenge for you today at Tuesday Throwdown.  We want to see Sparkle!!
And our fabulous sponsor this week is Honey Bee Stamps!!!  I'm so thrilled to have them as a sponsor!  Their products are absolutely adorable and every release they just get better!

I'm totally smitten with their stamps...not only are they gorgeous, but they have taken on a huge roll in my strive to overcome my creative rut.  And honestly, I think their designs are perfect to work with when searching for inspiration because they are lovely, yes, but they are simple in that loveliness.. So you don't have to always think of complicated techniques to pair with the stamps.  They are gorgeous on their own and I love that!

So I shared my tips on getting through a rut last week.  While I was making that card, this card happened to pop out as well :)

There is nothing overly complicated with this card and yet I feel like it is absolutely striking!  Again, to focus on getting my creativity flowing again, I stuck with the techniques and materials that I love, so sparkle, watercolors, and embossing.

I embossed all of the flowers that I used from the Country Wreath set in white onto watercolor paper.  Then I did super simple washes to color them.  Nothing fancy, just cover the image with water and drop your colors on.  Move them around a bit until they fill the image the way you want them to and then let them dry.  Simple as that.  It satisfies that desire to watercolor without having to think super hard about getting the right blend or not dropping too much water into the image.

I did blend a few colors together on each of the images.  For the flowers I did a blue and pink.  Nothing too crazy but just enough to change the colors from flower to flower.  And the leaves are all just 2 different shades of green.  Once everything was dry, I fussy cut them out.

For the background, I didn't want anything that would pull away from these super pretty flowers, so I stamped a simple stripe background with the Winnie & Walter Scenery: Stripes set in a super super light blue.

Then cut out a stitched rectangle frame with my Silhouette and mounted that to the card front with some foam tape.  I also applied a heavy coat of some Spectrum Noir Clear Shimmer because...why not? :)  Once that was all put together, I started assembling my flowers.  I wanted there to be a heavy cluster in the bottom right and a small cluster in the top left.  So I started with the bottom right and got everything arranged the way I liked it, adding foam tape to some and regular tape adhesive to others so there was a variation in their heights.  Then took the left over pieces and added them to the top left corner.

After all that was done, I realized I hadn't added a sentiment or figured out what I wanted that sentiment to be.  So I pulled out the Beautiful Life set and started testing which sentiment would work.  I totally meant to stamp more than just the Beautiful...but forgot and then couldn't find a good place to put the rest.  So I left it at just the Beautiful stamped onto some vellum and embossed with Liquid Platinum.

I scattered a few Sparkling Clear Sequins around the arrangements and added a little bit of Ice White Pearl Pen to the centers.  Love love Love!!

I hope you will stop by Tuesday Throwdown to see the rest of the DT's creations and then join in this super fun challenge!!

I'd like to enter this into the AAA Cards challenge - Blending!

Thanks for visiting! <3

Happy Friday!
It's time for a new release at Sami Stamps and just in time for school to start, we have Pencil Peeps!  These guys are adorable, you don't want to miss them :)

We also have a few new ladies on the team!  Meet Rae Ann and Tracey!  Stop by their blogs and show them some love! 

Since I'm still working through my crafty rut (see THIS post for more on that), I struggled a bit to get something put together that really made these sweet images shine.  The first few ideas I had failed miserably...but I was determined to push through.

I'm working with Mrs. Apple Peep today for my card.  She's just so fancy!  She deserves a ton of sparkle!  But who knew working with glitter was a pain in the behind....

I've watched so many other videos of people using glitter and cleaning it up with a swifer cloth like it was not big deal...not me!  I still had glitter all over after "clean up"...hands, face, floor...legs...yeah I was totally covered!  So I had to rethink the whole sparkle idea.

Fortunately, I have this awesome glitter washi tape from Best Creation in my stash!  I tested it out a little bit to see what I could do with it, and turns out it takes marker really well!  So I pulled out a burgundy color that I'd also use on the apple so the color was consistent throughout the whole card, along with a light grey to give me a silverish color glitter.  Colored up several stripes and then cut it into varying widths.

All of those cut stripes of glitter tape were then affixed to a piece of vellum.  The cool thing about washi tape is that it's low tack, so you can put it onto cardstock to make cutting it apart much easier.  Then just peel it off the cardstock and put it on your card front!  Worked like a charm!

Once the background was done, I colored in my image with my ShinHan markers, layered it onto a scallop cut piece of vellum so that the background wasn't covered up, but the image something to keep it separate.  Added a sentiment, and some sequins to finish it all off!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  Have a great weekend! <3

That dreaded rut....something I push so hard to avoid and yet somehow manage to fall into more often than I should....it can be very depressing to hit that stage, especially when your job and income rely on you Not falling into a rut.

I've been stuck in this for a few weeks now.  It sucks.  My mind has been completely blank.  What once was filled with so many swirling ideas that I never had enough time to complete became an empty void of cricket chirps.  I felt like nothing as going to pull me out and it infuriated me.

But I want to let you know, if you ever fall into a rut...there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  Don't give up or throw in the towel.  Just keep pushing yourself forward, no matter how frustrating and depressing that blank void is.

I can't say that I've fully pulled out of this rut yet...but I'm making progress and that makes me happy.

A few things to try if you find yourself there:
~Search the internet for inspiration
~Organize your supplies.  Sometimes being reminded of what you have can help inspire you.
~Browse back through your past work.  I know that seeing some of my old cards can often trigger an idea or make me balk at how awful that card was and push me to remake it :)
~Get outside!  Work in the yard or go for long walks every day.  Clearing your head and working with nature can be great inspiration.
~Give yourself a couple days off.  Maybe your brain just really needs a break.  Grab a great book and just chill.

But the one thing that worked for me (since I tried everything above..repeatedly) was to pull out my favorite supplies and force an idea out.  I just started watercoloring and stamping stuff.  It was all horrible and probably a waste, but every time I blended something together or inked up another stamp, a new thought came to mind.  It may take a little bit of time and lots of random playing around, but if you're using the supplies and techniques that you absolutely love, something will trigger!

So my favorites are all featured in today's card, which is my breakthrough card that I will cherish forever because it became my light at the end of this horrible rutted tunnel.

First fav is ink blending!  Who doesn't love a great color combo to feature on a card?  And for me, I can never resist a blue/purple combo.  This background was inked with Peacock Feathers, Faded Jeans, and Dusty Concord.  Of course, you can't do a distress background without some water drops.

And that leads to my next fav which is sparkle!  I sprayed the entire background with a shimmer spray.  I just needed a lot of sparkle to make me smile :)

I also took the Beautiful Life stamp set from Honey Bee Stamps and silver sparkle embossed the outlines of the hearts.  Then went back over just a few of those hearts with a clear embossing powder and embossed the solid heart.  This helped make a few of the hearts pop on the card.  I also white embossed some itty bitty hearts around the background too.

Next favorites - Vellum and Stitching!!  With such a colorful busy background, I didn't want to cover it up or try to put a sentiment directly on it since it would probably get lost.  So I took a simple piece of vellum and white embossed my sentiments on that.  Then did a zigzag stitch across the top to affix it to my card.

When you focus on using your favorites, I feel like it can really pull great ideas out.  Maybe all of your favorites don't work together on one card, but some of them will definitely mesh well, and that is a great start to get your mind working again.

If you've ever hit a rut, leave me a comment and let me know how you pulled out of it.  I love to hear other peoples ideas, because while it is never fun to fall into those dreaded ruts, it happens and knowing ways to get out is always a huge help!

Thanks for sticking around for this long winded post!  I know it was lengthy, but I wanted to share all of my thoughts with you :)

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
    Addicted to Stamps #207-Make Your Mark
    Fab n Funky #316-Anything Goes
    Penny's Paper Crafty #291-Anything Goes
    Word Art Wednesday #244-Anything Goes

Love to everyone! <3

Happy Tuesday!
Quick little post for you today as we kick off another fun challenge at Tuesday Throwdown!  Our theme this week is New Addition and our awesome sponsor is All Dressed Up!!

We were provided with some super cute images, but I decided to use an older image for my card called Cute Got Cuter.  It doesn't appear to be in her shop anymore though...but look at that face!  He's so sweet!

I kept the layout pretty simple and just added a few glitter paste chevrons and some silver foiled chevrons.  I had a ton of those cut out from a project I did awhile ago and have been trying to figure out what to do with them.  Turns out adding a bit of glue and then covering each chevron with some foil works great!  And now they are pretty embellishments!

I decided on watercoloring this sweet pup with my Inktense pencils because...well...I'm obsessed with those now :)  The paper I used wasn't all that great and it didn't move the color around as nicely as I wanted, but I think in the end the image turned out cute anyhow!

I wanted to keep the sentiment relatively simple so I chose this adorable little saying from a Hero Arts set and embossed it in Liquid Platinum onto vellum.  Flagged the end and stuck it behind my little pup.  A few black splatters before assembling everything helped to finish off the card!

Be sure to stop by Tuesday Throwdown for this fun challenge!

Thanks for visiting! <3

Heelllooooooooooo!!!
It's been a little while!  My absence these last few weeks has been because we took a vacation!  We had a couple of weddings in Michigan to attend, so we made it our full vacation for this year!  We went to the beach, spent lots of time with friends.  We even went the Michigan's Adventure and had a total blast!  I love vacations and doing all the things that we enjoyed as a kid :)

But now we are home and life has to return to normal.  And what better way to come back than with a brand new Sami Stamps release!  This one pairs perfectly with our Getting Stronger release from a couple weeks ago because this times it's all about the ladies!

My card features the Strong image.  I love her!  She's classy and feminine but also isn't afraid to hold her own.  Such a perfect image!

To highlight this beauty, I did some fun watercolor washing for the background, mixing together a pink, purple, and green.  While that was still wet, I splattered some glitter paint around it as well so it has some sparkle.

It's super hard to see, but the white card front has actually been dry embossed.  I created my own custom stencil with my Silhouette by repeating the word "Strong" in an area that would fit my card front, and ran it through my embossing machine to get the design embossed on the paper.  It's a perfect subtle detail for the card.

The image was colored with my pencils.  The layout was inspired by the sketch at Case this Sketch, though it doesn't follow their design exactly.  I liked the idea of having the details through the center of the card with the sentiment across the middle area.

For my sentiment, I knew I wanted it to be on vellum but I didn't have any stamps that said what I wanted them to.  So I printed it off onto some white cardstock, and then traced it onto the vellum!  Super simple and it's exactly what I want!

Everything is finished off with a few Sparkling Clear sequins from Pretty Pink Posh!

Stop by Sami Stamps to see this awesome release, and then join in our Anything Goes challenge!!

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
    CAS(E) This Sketch #183

    Incy Wincy Designs-Anything Goes
    Word Art Wednesday #242-Anything Goes

Thanks for visiting! <3