Monday, March 29, 2010

TSG48- It's A List!

Hello everyone! I hope that you all had a wonderful weekend!! I will keep this short since I still have a bunch of orders to get out today but I wanted to share this card that I made for this week's TSG Challenge, It's A List. I've stopped trying to 'plan' my cards while I'm stamping and have just been content on playing instead and I am loving the results! I usually photograph my cards with a white background but the details of the card seemed to blend into the background too much so I borrowed this idea from Heather to use a coordinating piece of colored paper for the backdrop :)

I used the brand new mini set Sweet Pea that was illustrated by our newest artist Chris. I looooove this set! The images were stamped in Versamark, embossed in black and water colored with a paint brush and various SU inks and markers. The style of this card is pretty random but I love how everything seems to come together at the same time!
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Make sure you stop by the TSG Blog to get the details for the challenge and to find out how you can win a TSG gift certificate!


Sunday, March 28, 2010

New stamp sets available!

There She Goes Clear Stamps


Saturday, March 27, 2010

It release party time!!!

Join us right HERE for tonight's release party! The official chat doesn't begin until 6:00 PM Pacific Time but feel free to stop in at any time during the day to say hello :)

Sorry I haven't posted anything new in the last couple of days but besides working on getting ready for the release, I have been working on a doozy of a card! I can't wait until it is finished so I can finally share it :D

Thursday, March 25, 2010

I loooooove poppies!


Today is day three of the There She Goes blog hop challenges where you have a chance to win the stamp set being previewed today by the Trendsetters! All you have to do is go to each of the participating Trendsetters blogs and comment on their sneak peek post. After you have commented on everyone's blog, hop back over to the TSG Blog where you can enter your name into the Mister Linky located at the bottom of the post.

If you have made your way here from the fabulous Heather's Blog, you are right on track! If not, you may want to head over to the TSG Blog to get all of the details about the Blog Hop Challenges and what you need to do to have a chance to win free stamps :)

Seriously, I LOVE poppies! They are among my favorite flowers. Every time I see one, I immediately think of my gramma :) We have been extremely close my entire life and one of things we used to always do together when I was younger was to take a walk through her beautiful garden talking about the different plants and everything else that just happened to come up. To this day, the poppies she grows are my favorite part of her garden! The petals are always so bright and silky :)

When I first started working with our new illustrator Chris, one of the first things I told her was that I needed a realistic poppy set! Being the amazing artist she is, she was able to create my perfect poppies. You guys are going to have so much fun coloring these flowers! They are also great for layering, which you know I am all for ;)

For my project today, I wanted to create a vintage style frame decoration. I first created the clouds in the background then stamped my images in VersaMark and embossed in black before watercoloring with a paint brush and various SU inks. I used my sewing machine to stitch around the edges a couple of times and sponged the edges with creamy caramel and a touch of close to cocoa. The butterflies were added to the outside of the frame with sticky tape,
Jessica
I was having issues with my sewing machine acting up and didn't notice that parts of the stitching were coming out. Instead of scratching the whole project and starting over (like I normally would have done) I kept sewing around then trimmed off the excess string and just left it the way it was. I am so glad I did because it turned out to be the perfect touch for this project!

I know that poppies are traditionally red or orange (or at least that is what the sentiment on my project says lol!) but I really wanted to color mine in pink for some reason. So for the sake of this project, we are just going to pretend that it is a washed out red, ok? Good.
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Now hop on over to the lovely Jessie's blog to see what she has created for you!

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Sweet Pea / Chem. 101 Blog Hop Challenge

Today is day two of the There She Goes blog hop challenges where you have a chance to win the stamp sets being previewed today by the Trendsetters! All you have to do is go to each of the participating Trendsetters blogs and comment on their sneak peek post. After you have commented on everyone's blog, hop back over to the TSG Blog where you can enter your name into the Mister Linky located at the bottom of the post.

If you have made your way here from Holly's Blog, you are right on track! If not, you may want to head over to the TSG Blog to get all of the details about the Blog Hop Challenges and what you need to do to have a chance to win free stamps :)

Today is such an exciting day! Not only are we showing you more sneak peeks, but we are showing you the first set illustrated by our new artist Chris Dark!! You are going to loooooove these sweet peas, they are beautiful and so much fun to color!
Sweet Pea is a 3”x4” mini set that includes a total of 8 stamps and will sell for only $7!
Jessica

It wasn't long after Chemistry was released that I started to receive requests from people asking if I would create a mini set of sentiments that could work together with Chemistry that weren't love related. After lots of thinking and research, I have come up with Chem. 101 (name courtesy of Michele L.!). These sentiments are so much fun and if you already own the set Chemistry, this mini set is a must have! 

Chem. 101 is a 3”x4” mini set that includes a total of 10 sentiment stamps and will sell for $7
Jessica
Now hop on over to Jessie's Blog to see what eye candy she has to share with you :)

I have included a short tutorial on how to make your cut out images look more polished using the Chemistry & Chem. 101 stamps sets. Enjoy!
(Click to enlarge)

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Let the Spring Fever hoppin begin!

Today is day one of the There She Goes blog hop challenges where you have a chance to win the stamp set being previewed today by the Trendsetters! All you have to do is go to each of the participating Trendsetters blogs and comment on their Spring Fever sneak peek post. After you have commented on everyone's blog, hop back over to the TSG Blog where you can enter your name into the Mister Linky located at the bottom of the post.

If you have made your way here from Heather's Blog, you are right on track! If not, you may want to head over to the TSG Blog to get all of the details about the Blog Hop Challenges and what you need to do to have a chance to win free stamps :)

The set that we are showing off today is a fun spring themed silhouette set. There are a few different elements/scenes in this set that not only work great together but can also be used on their own! The card I made today features 12 of the 30 stamps that are included in this beautiful set. I have been having so much fun playing around with this set and I know that you are going to enjoy it just as much :)

Spring Fever is a 6”x8” stamp set that includes a total of 30 stamps and will sell for $24
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The next stop on the hop is my girl Jessie and I know that she's got some great eye candy to share with you!

ETA:
I have added two more pictures of some tips and tricks using the new Spring Fever stamp set! Enjoy :) I used Mercy's sketch challenge for the layout on both of these cards!

(Click to enlarge)


(Click to enlarge)

Monday, March 22, 2010

Release Week begins!


Did you guys see all of the great things that are going on at TSG right now?? Lots of fun stuff!! One of them being the TSG Changing Of The Seasons Spring Sale :) Make sure you check out the TSG Store to see which sets are on sale this season!

Today is also the start of release week- wahoo!! I can't believe that it's here already, that was a quick month! The TSG Challenge this week is all about simplicity and we are to create a one layer card. The only exception is that we can use an image popped up on dimensionals :D You know that I am loving that!

For my card today,  I used one of the sale sets Let's Get Together. Even though I am not a coffee drinker, I LOVE this stamp set!! It is one of my favorites right along with my #1 Special Delivery :) The cup was stamped onto Whisper White cardstock with Momento Tuxedo Black then paper pieced the cup with VeryVanilla, the holder with Kraft and used my blender pen to add some color to the circle. I stamped the coffee bean onto Kraft and colored in using my blender pen and SU ink. Before adhering to the card with dimensionals, I stamped the coffee bean outline image a few times and colored them in. I stamped the rectangle and sentiment in the bottom corner then used my Ruby Red marker to add the check mark. It was a pretty quick card to make but it doesn't look plain :)
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Card Recipe:
Stamps- Let's Get Together (There She Goes)
Paper- Kraft, White, Very Vanilla
Ink- Momento Tuxedo Black, Close To Cocoa, Mellow Moss
Accessories- Dimensionals, blender pen, SU markers

Friday, March 19, 2010

Announcement Day!!

You guys have been waiting all week to find out what the big announcement(s) that TSG is going to be making and now you only have a few more hours to wait! Join us tonight right here on the TSG Forum to make sure you are among the first to find out what all of the excitement is about! Everyone is welcome (even if you have never been to the TSG Forum before) and we love to meet new people :)

Keep reading to check out Danielle's great Dollar Find Friday project!


Thursday, March 18, 2010

Put on those stunna' shades-

cause this card is bright!! I made this card about a week and a half ago for my darling nephew who just turned four. He's my crafty companion ;) I used the new Bear Hugs set along with the Make A Wish set and isn't it great how well they coordinate! Which means that it would also work well with the Hunny Bunnies set, oh think of the  possibilities!!!

All of the images were stamped on watercolor paper with versamark and embossed with black embossing powder. I then water colored with a regular old paint brush, SU inks and markers before cutting out and layering the different images. This was the first card that I made using this technique and I have since learned a great tip. After you are done coloring/ cutting your images, go back and use a marker along the edges. It will hide the white cardstock from showing and give the images a cleaner look. You can obviously tell that I didn't do that on this card lol!
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I believe that one of you may have asked how many dimensionals I used on the other birthday card... well, here is a good idea ;)
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Don't forget to come chat with us tomorrow evening for our Friday Night Chat! There is going to be some fun things going on and you will definitely want to be the first to know :)

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Happy St. Patricks Day!

I've learned something important about myself since I've been designing stamp sets, the dates of holidays completely sneak up on me lol! Since I am always a couple of months ahead in designing stamp sets for different holidays, as soon as I'm done I feel like that holiday is over. Like right now, Easter is over in my mind because we just released our Easter stamp set and now I'm on to different things.

So when I found out yesterday that *today* was St. Patrick's day I was shocked! Wasn't that, like, weeks ago??? Apparently not :P. At least I remembered just in time to make sure Kylie wore green to school today :)

Needless to say, I don't have a St. Patrick's Day card to show you today but I do have a card that is green so that totally counts right? I made these two cards as part of a set. You may recognise these cards because they are the same card (but with different colors) that I made last week for the TSG yellow spring flowers challenge. I made each of my leaving Trendsetters a card to thank them for all of their hard work during their Trendsetter term. I used a different color for each person and used a color that reminded me of them :)

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Only 3 more days until the TSG announcement of fun is made!!

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Lord have Mercy!

I am so happy that I had some time to stamp so that I could play along in Mercy's great sketch challenge this week! When I started this card, I knew that it could only go 2 ways. It was going to either turn out gorgeous or like a rainbow puked on my cardstock lol! Thankfully, I love how this turned out and if I may be so bold (get it??? Bold???), I'm pretty sure that this is in the top 5 favorite cards of all time that I have created!

I can't take all the credit though ;) As I'm sure you might be able to tell, I was greatly inspired by Kim's amazing watercoloring skills as well as by her use of color and stitching. I have been a watercoloring fool all weekend and I am loving it!! I have been doing a lot of experimenting with using both SU inks and markers and the results are fabulous :) I have a new favorite way to color now! And of course we can't forget about Mercy's great sketch! This sketch was nice and simple and perfect to showcase these bright colors and fun images. These two aren't called Trendsetters for nothing ya know ;)

For each of the DP's, I cut to size, stitched, sponged edges, added a black and white mat then adhered to card base. All of the images are from the Make A Wish set and were stamped onto watercolor paper with versamark then heat embossed with black embossing powder. I did this at least 3 times for most of the images. I then colored the images using a paintbrush and SU inks & markers. The images were cut out (some were cut apart) and adhered back together using various thicknesses of dimensionals. The circle was die cut with a Nestability, I kept the white paper in the metal frame while I sponged the light blue so that the edges would stay nice and bright white before adhering to the black scallop circle. One final touch that I added after the card was completed, was to take the SU markers and run them along the edges of all of the cut images to give them a cleaner look. Obviously, it would have been way easier if I had thought of this before actually adhering them to the card lol!

I made this card  for my FIL's birthday. I can't even tell you how hard it was to let it leave my craft room but don't worry, it wasn't long before it came back :) Matt brought it back home after we left his parents so that he can build a frame for it. Isn't he so sweet? So for now, it is sitting in my light box, with all of the lights shining on it like a spotlight lol!!
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Side view of card-
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Card Recipe:
Stamps- Make A Wish (There She Goes)
Paper- Black, white, DP by Imaginisce, watercolor
Ink- VersaMark, Momento Tuxedo Black, Soft Sky, various SU inks for watercoloring
Accessories- Dimensionals, sewing machine, paint brush, sponge, black embossing powder, nestabilities, SU Markers

Monday, March 15, 2010

TSG46- Danielle's Sketch & TLC264- DP by Me

Good morning everyone and happy Monday! The card that I have to share with you today was made for a combo of two different challenges. The first challenge is this week's TSG challenge which is a sketch brought to us by our Trendsetter of the week- Danielle! The second challenge is the TLC challenge that Holly hosts over on Splitcoast which was to create custom DP.

To create the custom DP, I stamped the images (from Bear Hugs) with Momento Tuxedo Black onto Very Vanilla cardstock then colored them with a blender pen and SU inks to patch the coordinating designer paper.

For the bear, I stamped the bear image a few times with VersaMark onto watercolor paper, embossed with black embossing powder then water colored the pieces I wanted with a paintbrush and SU inks & markers. I then cut out the different pieces and adhered them together using dimensionals.

I sponged the edges of all the DP's with Chocolate Chip ink.


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Card Recipe:
Stamps- Bear Hugs (There She Goes Clear Stamps)
Paper: Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla, DP by My Minds Eye
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, VersaMark, Close to Cocoa, Creamy Caramel, Bravo Burgundy, So Saffron, More Mustard, Cool Caribbean, Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive
Accessories: Ribbon, Nestabilities, dimensionals, blender pen, SU Markers, paint brush, SU Punch, sewing machine, Tim Holtz felt blender.


Sunday, March 14, 2010

I've fallen off the face of the earth!!

But no worries, I finally found my way back up to civilization :) I have been busy this week doing a lot of organizing, scheduling and working ahead to so that I can try to find a better balance between my work and family. Right now I spend waaaaay more time working than with family and that needs to change! I have finally realised that as much as I would love to do everything on my own (and the fact that I hate asking for help!) I simply can't. There just is not enough hours in the day to be a business owner/post office runner/ secretary/school bus/child care provider/artist/illustrator/wife/mother/domestic goddess/cook/pet sitter etc. So I put together a list of things that could easily be done by someone else and brought up the idea to the Trendsetters. These wonderful group of ladies stepped up without hesitation and within a few hours I had all of the jobs taken over! I can't even tell you how much of a relief it is to have some of my work load taken off my hands. So I would like to send out a huge THANK YOU to my wonderful Trendsetters! Not only are you ladies the most talented stampers, but you have big hearts too!

I have some very exciting things planned for TSG with a big
announcement coming on Friday so keep an eye out for that ;)

So now that I was able to get a ton of stuff done this week thanks to my little elves ;), I actually had some time over the last couple of days to stamp! To make up for my absence on the blog lately, I have scheduled a whole week of cards to share with you! I absolutely love the cards that I have created and I think that my mojo has finally made a return with the plans to stick around :) I hope that you will come back every day this week to see my newest inky creations! In the meantime, make sure you hop on over to the TSG Blog where you have the chance to win one of the Trendsetter's fabulous cards!!!!

Monday, March 8, 2010

TSG45- Yellow Spring Flowers

It is Monday which means that it is time again for another TSG Challenge! This week our featured Trendsetter Sandra is challenging us to create a spring card that features flowers and incorporates the color yellow. The perfect challenge to chase away those winter blues! You can read all of the details about this challenge, along with how you can win a gift certificate to the TSG website, here on the TSG Blog.

For my card, I used the brand new mini set Dance. I absolutely love the versatility of this set! It is great for creating your own DP as well as making gorgeous 3D flowers. I got the idea of making the flowers 3D from Maki who I can always count on to find new ways to use stamp sets that I hadn't thought of :)

To make the flowers 3D, I cut each of the petals down to the center, folded each petal in half then bending the edges back up so that it almost has the shape of those folded fans we used to make as kids. Clear as mud? Good ;) I am going to be sending this card to my friend Wendy who is my bumblebee that brings me sunshine :) :)
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I hope that you guys will play along in our challenge this week and I can't wait to see what you come up with!!

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Stampbook Saturday

Visit the TSG Blog today to see the rest of this Stampbook Page that I made!

Have a great weekend everyone :)
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Friday, March 5, 2010

Friday Night Chat & Dollar Find Friday!

Join us tonight for the Friday Night Chat right here
on the TSG Forum!! Everyone is welcome :)
Click image to enlarge and find out all the details.


And make sure you stop by the TSG Blog today to
check out the fun Dollar Find Friday project I made :)

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Get inspired!

Make sure you stop by the TSG Blog today so you can see
some great ideas on how to use your TSG Stamp sets!!!


Monday, March 1, 2010

Case a new Trendsetter!

Have you guys stopped by the TSG Blog today to read the BIG news??? We have announced the newest Trendsetters to join our team along with the announcement of a brand new illustrator!!!! If you haven't seen it yet, make sure you go straight there when you leave here :)

The TSG challenge this week is to case one of the new Trendsetters to help you get to know them. I chose this card made by the fabulous Heather.

Part of the challenge was to change at least 3 things and the things that I changed were-
*color of cardbase and ribbon
*type of ribbon
*Stamp set used
*Used circles instead of squares
*Used a scallop corner punch on the corners

I used the brand new stamp set (that was just released this weekend!) Make A Wish. I'm not kidding when I say that this is the only birthday stamp set that you will ever need! Don't believe me? Go check out all 65 of the stamps in the set for yourself!!

I started with a Melon Mambo card base, stamped the sentiment and adhered the ribbon and knot. I stamped the 'yum' circles onto white cardstock then punched them out with a 1 1/8" circle punch. I added them to the card base with dimensionals before adding my little cupcake that was colored with a blender pen and SU inks. It's almost impossible to tell from the picture but I also added some sparkle to the cupcake with my Stardust Gelly Roll pen.
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Inside of card-
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Ok, now off to the TSG Blog you go to find out who will be joining the Trendsetters for the next 6 months!!

Card Recipe:
Stamps- Make A Wish
Ink- Momento Tuxedo Black, Ruby Red, Melon Mambo, Taken with Teal
Paper- Melon Mambo, Basic Black, white
Accessories- Scallop Corner Punch, Dove blender pen, Stardust Gelly Roll Pen, Dimensionals, Circle punch, Ribbon