I use stamps from all different companies these days.  My piece today uses Papertreyink.com stamps “Pond Life”.

I use to be stickily a Stampin’ Up girl, but too many fabulous companies have popped up that need my money, lol.  Really, I just can’t resist a great stamp set when I see it.  This is one set I just had to have.  So we are going on a little trip to the pond today with this tutorial.  Grab a cup of your favorite coffee, tea or soda and follow along.

Let’s get started. 

Supplies:

Stamped Water lily with Salmon ink on a 3.75″ x 3.75″ piece of Whisper White Card stock.

Add some Blush Blossom marker to the bottom of the images.

Added Barely Banana marker to the center tip of the images.

Colored over the images with a Versamark Marker.

Heat embossed the images with clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

This set has these great stems in them.  Since these stamps are unmounted you can take this stem and bend it when you stick it on the mount.  Nice to make different shaped stems and grasses.  It looks funny to have straight grasses.

Stamped stems by first loading stamp with Versamark and then More Mustard ink before stamping.

Heat embossed stems with clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Stamped lily pads, by first loading the stamp with Versamark, then Lettuce ink and then added some More Mustard marker to the edges of the stamp before stamping.

Heat embossed with clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Sponged on Peach Bellini ink.

Sponged on Aqua Ink.

Sponged on Terra Cotta ink.

Sponged on Stream ink.

Added some more lily pads with Lettuce ink, but stamped off once on my scrap paper before stamping on the card stock (also known as a second generation stamping).

Added some more stems with Lettuce ink.

Stamp the Cat tail head stamp with Ginger ink.

Added a shadow under some of the lily pads and lilies with a Going Grey marker.

Added a fine line of black marker under the lilies to really give them dimension.

Added Ginger ink to the bottom left corner of the card stock.

Stamp some more lily pads with Lettuce ink.

Added some hand drawn grasses with a black marker and put a fine line of black marker down the right side of the cattails.

Added White Gel pen highlights to a few of the grasses, tops of the lilies and tops of the cattails.

Stamped Canvas background stamp on a 5 1/8″ x 5 1/8″ piece of Cool Caribbean card stock with Aqua ink.

Stamped Canvas background stamp on a 4.75″ x 2″ piece of Blush Blossom card stock with Salmon ink.

Sponged Stream ink on the top right corner of the Cool Caribbean card stock panel.

Sponged Ginger ink on the bottom left corner of the Blush Blossom panel.

Assembled card and added Copper Brads.

Here it is finished measuring 5.25″ x 5.25″.

Hope your day if filled with the wonderful sounds of lapping water and frogs croaking. 

Until my next post. . . . . . .

Michelle

Moo Cards ROCK!

I had so much fun making my sample Moo Cards for Innovative Stamp Creations Moo Card Challenge (see challenge details below).  Moo Cards are all the rage right now.  Moo cards are like Artist trading cards but measure 1 1/8″ x 2 3/4″.    These little cards are addictive.  At first, I was fretting about the small area I had to work with on the cards.  I’m a big scene type stamper if you hadn’t noticed, lol.  But once I got started I didn’t want to quit.  I even altered a tin for my moo cards to reside in.   You can even make magnets out of these cards and give them as a special gift. 

All images for my samples are by Innovative Stamp Creations.  Here is a link to their on line store:  http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ischomepage.html

I was first introduced to Moo Cards at an Art & Soul Retreat I attended back in May.  I was so amazed at all of the creative variations people could achieve on such a little area.   People were trading them like crazy and there I was not even knowing what a Moo card was.  I apparently live a sheltered life here in my little stamp room, lol.  Did you all know about these cards?  Have you made any?

Here are the details for the challenge:

Innovative Stamp Creations Challenge C7   (key word ISCC7)

Moo cards are like Artist trading cards but measure 1 1/8″ x 2 3/4″.  Play along and upload your Moo card creations to your blog and/or an on line gallery for a chance to  WIN a FREE Innovative Stamp Creations Stamp Sheet “Art4Frames II” and Tin!  Super easy to enter, use Innovative Stamp Creations stamps only on your design, then post your link in the comments section on Innovative Stamp Creation’s Blog found here:  http://www.innovativestampcreations.blogspot.com/

A random name will be chosen and announced on the Innovative Stamp Creation’s blog on July 20, 2008.  I can’t wait to see what you come up with, play along!

One more thing, the WINNER OF TUESDAYS BLOG CANDY IS. . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . .  .

Robyn A, Who wrote:

Beautiful card Michelle, who wouldn’t be thrilled to receive it? Thanks for the opportunity to win it, it would be great to see your work in real life.

Robyn, congratulations and please e-mail your address to mzindorf@aim.com so I can mail this card right out to you.

Thanks to all who commented.  Stampers are the nicest people! Until my next post. . . . . . . . .

Today’s piece is dedicated to all the Stampin’ Up stamp hoarders.  Now you know who you are, a few of you have even asked me to use some of my old, but loved stamps in projects.  I was a hobby demo so I never felt the need to get rid of my old stamps when new ones came out.  So I have around 300 Stampin’ Up sets, that is what is left after weeding out sets that weren’t my style.  We won’t talk about my unmounted stamp collections in this same post. You all will think I’m a stamp junkie or something, lol. 

Let me hear about your stamp collections/addiction in the comments section of this post.  If you are getting this by e-mail update, click this link to leave me your comment:

http://zindorf.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/2008/07/09/toil-blossoms-scene-tutorial/

I know I’m not the only one that will chose new stamps over new shoes, let me hear from you. 

Anyway, I have used Stampin’ Up sets “Toile Blossoms” &  “Lovely as a Tree” in today’s piece. 

Let’s get started on the tutorial. 

Supplies:

Stamped Toile Blossom images on a piece of 5″ x 5″ Whisper White card stock with Palette Noir Black ink.

Colored the center of the flower petals with a Prismacolor Deco Pink marker.

Added just a little Prismacolor Magenta marker to the flower petal centers.

Colored the leaves with a Prismacolor Chartreuse marker.

Colored the shadow (dark side) of the leaves with a Prismacolor Light Olive Green marker.

Colored over the leaves and flowers with a Versamark marker.

Note:  Be careful to color the white parts first and then the colored parts so the color doesn’t smear onto the white part of your image.  You can clean the tip of your Versamark marker my coloring on scrap paper for a second.

Heat emboss the images using clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Brayered Soft Sky ink at the top of the card stock.

Brayered Not Quite Navy ink at the very top of the card stock, not covering the Soft Sky ink entirely.

Stamped Tree image with Palette Noir Black ink.

Sponged More Mustard ink on the bottom of the card stock. 

Note:  The embossed images resist the ink.  Just wipe the ink off the images with a paper towel.

Sponged Old Olive ink at the bottom of the card stock using a swiping motion from the bottom let corner toward the top right.  This was done to simulate grasses.  Also, sponged Old Olive Green ink in the leaf area of the tree.

Added just a bit of Black ink to the very bottom of the card stock.

Colored the tree trunk with a Going Gray Marker and added some grasses at the base of the tree with a Prismacolor Light Olive Green marker.

Sponged a bit of Basic Black ink on the right side of the leaf area of the tree and just a faint hint of black under the tree for a shadow.

Added White highlights (specks) on the left side of the leaf area of the tree with a white gel pen.

Sponged heavily some Not Quite Navy ink at the top of the card stock to give the sky some interest.

Used a black fine line marker and traced along the bottom side of the flowers and leaves to create the look of a shadow.  Also colored along the right side of the tree trunk with the black marker.

Used the ticket corner punch on the main image panel and the Not Quite Navy panel.

Used my piercing tools and a fine tip black marker to do some faux stitching all the way around the card stock.

Added some gold brads and here is the completed card measuring 5.25″ x 5.25″.

Hope your day is filled with blooming flower gardens and shade trees.

Until my next post. . . . . . .

Michelle

I have a little butterfly action for you on today’s tutorial and also I’m giving this card away as blog candy.

All you need to do to enter for a chance to get this card is leave me a comment here on this post.  If you are getting this blog update by e-mail and you wish to comment, please click this link that will take you to my blog so you can comment for a chance to win this card:  http://zindorf.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/2008/07/08/isc-flutterby-tutorial-blog-candy/

I’ll use a random number generator to pick a number on Thursday morning, July 10th.

The images used in today’s tutorial are by Innovative Stamp Creations from their “Flowers & Elements” & “About Me” Sheets.  Here is a link to their online store:

http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ischomepage.html

Ready for some Emboss Resist, Resist?  Let’s get started on today’s Tutorial. 

Supplies:

Stamped Butterfly with Palette Noir Black ink on a 3.75″ x 5.25″ of Whisper White card stock.

Colored in the image with a Prismacolor Sky Blue Light marker.

Darkened the middle of the image with a Faber Castell Black marker.

Colored over the entire image with a Versamark marker, by coloring the light parts first and then going to the dark parts.

Heat embossed the image using clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Over Stamped butterfly image with the Flower image using Craft Going Gray ink.

Note:  if you don’t have craft ink you can load your stamp first with Versamark then your Classic ink before stamping.  The Versamark will let your embossing powder stick to your image.

Heat embossed the image with clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Colored in the flower using an Aqua Painter and Barely Banana ink. 

Note:  While your ink pad is closed you can squeeze the lid down on the pad to create a little pool of ink on the lid in which to water color with.

Added some Going Gray ink to the top half of the flower.

Colored the entire flower with Versamark marker.

Heat embossed it with clear embossing powder and a heat gun.

Used the Barely Banana ink pad directly on the card stock, covering all of the it.

Sponged More Mustard ink on ramdomly, but leaving the lower left corner light.

Sponged on Really Rust ink.

Sponged on some Baroque Burgundy ink.

Sponged a little black ink to get really dark under the butterfly and at the top of the card stock.

Added a Going Gray marker shadow at the bottom of the flower.

Traced fine line around the bottom of the flower and butterfly to create some depth. 

Added some Faber Castell Yellow marker on top of the embossed flower to punch up the color a bit. 

Heated the embossing powder on the flower to melt the marker in a bit.

Assembled card and added ribbon, brads and punched photo corners.

Here the card is finished measuring 5″ x 6.5″.

Thanks for checking out the tutorial today.  Why don’t you give emboss resist, resist a try?

May your day be filled with dreamy sweet smelling flowers and butterflies.

Until my next post. . . . . . .

Michelle

Quick post this morning.  I purchased this large dried gourd at a flea market for 75 cents, about 2 years ago.  Yep that’s right, it’s been hanging around in my stamp room for 2 years, lol.  My husband put a not so perfect hole in the front of it and drilled some small holes in the bottom for drainage and small holes in the top of the neck so I can run some twine through to hang it. 

This gourd is very blemished, even after sanding it with Sandpaper, so I decided to make it very rustic looking.   

No tutorial today since this was pretty much straight stamping.  I used Black Stazon ink to stamp the images. 

The images are by Innovative Stamp Creations :

http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ischomepage.html

Since I was using unmounted stamps, I could using them without any mount and wrap the rubber around the gourd to stamp it.  I held the stamp in my hand, inked it and then pressed it to the gourd.   Where the images didn’t stamp as dark as I would like I colored them using a Black Faber-Castell marker.  The flower was colored in with a Brown Faber-Castell marker.  These markers are nice.  They are Indian ink and very fade resistant.

After stamping and coloring I finished it by spraying Clear High Gloss Polyurethane on it for protection.  My husband woke up this morning, saying what is that smell, lol.  Don’t worry folks I took it out side to spray it, but brought it in the house to dry.

It’s not the fanciest birdhouse ever created, but I like it’s rustic charm.  :)  Hopefully some bird family will enjoy it too.

Hope your day is filled with peace and sunshine.

Until my next post. . . . . . . . .

Michelle