Month: July 2013

great pen + little pad of paper.

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I found this small ‘mixed media paper pad’ at Michael’s and I’ve been playing with it for both stamping, but also doing art journal-y stuff inside. Here’s one I made, inspired by a kids T-shirt I saw. I’m big into using a journal or pad of paper to experiment and learn on. To get used to ideas, to make sketches, and to try stuff out without any pressure of it being a good finished piece.

The “oh WOW!” in my art journaling/mixed media work lately is this eraseable pen. I’ve been playing with it a lot – and most of the time if I’m using a lot of fluid color over it, the erasing happens on its own. Pretty cool stuff!

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Just a messy little experiment in supplies – just wanted to share. I’m loving the thickness of this paper, and this pen is pretty awesome since I can make lines, mark stuff off, and even plot an art journal page before actually starting with color.

If you’re wondering about my color – this is Dylusions ink sprays used in water brushes for fluid color. The stamps are also Dylusions.

Happy Crafting – and experimenting!

A little (KP) stamping & fun…

It’s summer here, and I have been keeping to a strict (minimal) work schedule the last three weeks as I’ve had loads of family and friends and good times. I mean I turn my computer on once a day, then turn it all the way off (unheard of!!) until the next day because we’re busy with fun family stuff. Most days I don’t make it up to the studio even! Which is AWESOME, but, I feel ready to jump back into more creative work! I knew just what to kick it off with too.
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I am a fan of the Kelly Purkey products for Simon – and I knew I had to use her June/July (sold out) kit for this food truck adventure page…

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I had SO much fun layering bits and pieces from the kit onto this page about one of our food adventures. There will be several pages about this day, but I wanted to use this kit for these ones. I *love* how Kelly’s products work so well for my style of scrapbooking. This was major fun to make.

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My photos are 3×5 on this page – I’ve started printing my iPhone photos that size just to mix it up a bit and because it was the same price as 4×6 so I figured, why not?

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The ombre effect on the good life card is so cool – I’m glad I got it used before it got buried in my stash. Can you tell what fun I had playing with this? Oh yes, and one more thing! This layout is my (late!) entry to this week’s Simon Says Stamp & Show challenge “a little stamping” as I finished this layout off with just a little stamping from the kit set.
While our challenge is “a little stamping” – you can interpret that with a small amount of stamping, a small stamp – whatever you like! Be sure to visit the blog to see all of the other creations and to enter. This week’s prize (as always) is a $50 voucher to Simon Says Stamp! The winner is randomly drawn – you can enter by posting to your blog, flickr, or other site too. See the blog for entry details and rules as usual.
I might be late due to my summer vacation – but it’s better than nothing. Plus I had a most excellent time taking my time today, being leisurely and creating something fun. A story I wanted to record and with products I just love. Crafting just doesn’t get bettr than that!!

Before I go – a little birdie (ok, Simon’s instagram account) told me.. simon

Enabler alert… new KP releases came out today! Here are some of my favorites:

You can find all the new exclusive products in the shop – and if you want to pre-order the August/September KP project kit you can reserve yours now too!

snapshots from a (secret) crafty mission…

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Above you see photos from a secret (fast) crafty adventure that took me to Colorado for some filming of videos for an exciting project I’m a part of. I can’t share more until August – but I’m REALLY excited to be working with such talented ladies and I can’t wait to say more.

Really, the studio is just full of exciting things as I’m also working on some small on-line (instant download) classes that I hope to start unveiling in September right here on my blog…

Summer break is just full of things in the works – so please do stay tuned!

 

Hero Arts: Stamp Your Story blog hop

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Hero Arts is having a blog hop today (start here) to celebrate their newest stamp collection, and I’m honored to be taking part in it! The Stamp Your Story collection is one that I’m really loving, and have already used a number of times. You can see a card I made here with stencils + stamps, a layout with the stamps + neon daubers here, and a super quick card here. Today I’ll be sharing two new layouts that I made, with the help of these stamps to really tell my story.

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The arrow stamp is absolutely a favorite because it can be used as an arrow, or as you see in my layout below as a banner as well!

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I always love documenting my daughter’s fashion choices and pointing out things that are favorites in this moment for them to later reflect on and remember. They love looking back and remembering favorite outfits.  Before I share my second layout – let me take a moment and share some of my favorite stamps from this line…

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What I’m loving is that the fonts and sayings will be great on a wide variety of layouts, but they’re also fun for cards and mixed media projects as well. The splatter and the arrow are my most used already – but truly I could happily collect every stamp in this collection! Here’s another layout using many of my stamp favorites-

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On this one I layered stamps, and got a bit messy too which is always fun.
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LOVING that checklist stamp for short journaling, and of course “best time ever” is going to be a favorite.

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Supplies used in these layouts:

The entire Hero Arts Stamp Your Story line can be viewed in the digital version of the catalog here and is available in stores now. Also, I want to mention that there will be a giveaway for this hop, with the winner drawn randomly from the pool of comments left on ALL of the blog hop stops… so you might want to be commenting!

For more details, and to start from the beginning of the hop start at the Hero Arts blog. Here’s a list of the other participants in today’s hop.

http://michellewooderson.blogspot.com
http://sideoatsandscribbles.wumple.com
http://www.kwernerdesign.com/blog
http://www.layoutaday.com
http://www.kellypurkey.com
http://www.jennifermcguireink.com
http://krcreations.blogspot.com
http://papertrufflez.com

Thanks to Hero Arts for inviting me to join in the fun – you’ll definitely be seeing more of these awesome stamps from me right here on my blog in the future!