Splitcoast Tutorial: Side Flap Trifold Card

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is a Side Flap Trifold Card - it's a very simple layout, basically made just by cutting away one quadrant of a full sheet of cardstock (with a couple of other cuts for ease in folding). It's also a great vehicle for innie-and-outie sayings, and I have several of those in one of my favorite sets! 

Speaking of favorites - meet Abigail, one of my new favorite stamps! I got my first order from Joggles yesterday, and in my quest to fill my cart up enough to get half-price shipping, I happened upon this beauty. This girl is enormous - you can see the full image and the size of my mask below - anyway, I love that she can come peeking up onto my card in her glorious ring-for-service bell bonnet. I'm thrilled. 

Most of the rest of my order was marbling paint which was on sale, and hopefully I'll have brain and time to play with that soon! I really hope it will work on paper beads.

All four sentiments are in my Dude clear set, or you can grab this sentiment in rubber here: 

D13695 No Stopping Me

I used a few stencils from A Colorful Life Design, and they are:

Suds Stream

Landscape Rays

Rays

Marvelous Masks Deckled Rectangle

If you order from ACLD, please feel free to use my code DinaFan10 for a 10% discount on your entire order!

That's all I know! Happy Wednesday.

Seriously.

Impression Obsession - Die Cut Obsession

There are so many amazing dies at Impression Obsession - this special Monday feature lets them have the spotlight! We hope you're inspired!

This card was from a catalog release, and I don't think I've shared it here! Anna has designed a fun collection of tags that can be used in a variety of different ways, and I love her signature stitching. 

DIE937-S Stitched Tag

The circle die is part of  a nesting set - these are great layered with plain circles as well.

DIE834-YY Stitched Pinked Circles

The puppy image is HERE - that is one of Nola's... and the sentiment is from this clear set.

Stop by and see all the IO dies HERE - don't forget the sale section for some great bargains (half price!!) on dies you might not find again, and also be sure to check out the other designers' blogs for die cutting inspiration - see the I.O. blog for all the details! Have a great week!

Guest post!

I was asked to write a post for the Color Magazine blog - such an honor to be able to share a little about my portrait work and the heart behind it. I hope you'll take a peek!

2020 Spring Summer Coffee Lovers SUPER SPONSOR!

If you love a hot beverage, you'll love the Coffee Lovers Blog Hop - you can find all the information on links, prizes and how to play along by clicking HERE! Warm up your coffee, tea, and cocoa stamps and add a card to the hop, or just hop along for the inspiration and comment for chances to win!

I'm happy to be sponsoring the hop once again - two lucky participants will receive a $10 gift code to my Etsy store and a commenter will win a coffee-themed die set from Spellbinders. Also, please enjoy a discount when you shop in my store, using the code below! Clicking the graphic should add the code to your cart automatically once your total is $20 or more, and that coupon is good till the end of the month.

To continue the love on Etsy, I wanted to highlight a few images from Di's Digi Stamps - Di has some adooooorable digital images, and she's just opened up a store over on Etsy where you can find all kinds of delightful images like these for instant download! I picked a few of the tea-themed images, but there are many more to choose from! 

I printed these images onto watercolor paper and worked in layers to color each little scene. On the roses and cup here I used Karin Markers for even base layers. My favorite handy palette is full of QoR watercolors, so I used those to add shading and details.

I had some perfect sentiments for these cards from A Jillian Vance Design - the particular set I used is retired but all these sentiments are included in a newer coffee/tea sentiment set called Hug in a Mug - if you're looking for some tidy one-liners for your cards, be sure to check that set out!

Another sweet tea theme, and those macarons - yum!

One more just for fun - this one is called Strawberry Tea, and those berries were so fun to color up! Strawberries are one of my favorite summer treats. I did use a little bit of colored pencil on these for darker shading in a few areas.

I used a stencil for the background on this card... that one is not released yet, but I'll share a secret - A Colorful Life Designs will be coming out with a few coffee themed stencils on June 1st! The one I used here has some drips and a coffee ring - you'll love them. Enjoy a 10% discount over there with my code DinaFan10 any time!

That's all I know today - enjoy the hop, and thank you for visiting me - I hope you'll pop over to Etsy to check out my store as well as Di's Digis! Cheers!

Impression Obsession DT Challenge: Play With Your Food

The Impression Obsession team's challenge today is to create a project with a food theme!

Before I get going, I want to make sure you're on IO's mailing list - it is a great way to keep up with sales and announcements! For example, in the most recent newsletter, a new feature was announced! Every two weeks, check for a 25% discount on a new curated group of themed products! The first grouping is a selection of stamps for cards you might send while we're social distancing (lots of my Introverting stamps in there, plus some other favorites!). 

You can sign up for the newsletter at the bottom of any page on the IO site. Go now! :) 

I picked these two sets to share today because they are also ON SALE, and if you love them you'll want to get them before they go away forever! 

WP753 Layered Sundae

CL754 Layered Twist

I referred to this other blog post where I used these stamps, because I listed my ink 'recipes' there and they worked really well. I did make one little change, using Versafine Clair for the darkest brown layer.

The oval in the Quilted Frame die was a perfect size match and I love all that stitched detail! I added a little stenciling to the background too - that is the Teeny Harlequin stencil from A Colorful Life Design.

Be sure to visit the other designers' blogs for inspiration on this week's challenge - see the I.O. blog for all the details! Remember, you can play along with us for a chance to win a $25 gift certificate!

Splitcoast tutorial: Tea Bag Stamping

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is called Tea Bag Stamping - our author shares some tips for using the delicate filter paper of a tea bag as a substrate for stamped images! This was a lot of fun, and I thought the vintaged background would be perfect for these new stamps from Red Lead Paperworks!

The tea bag paper is delicate, but I love the staining in it, and it took a variety of coloring media very well. I started with watercolor, which mostly went through the paper, but stained a few areas nicely. Colored pencil also did well, with a careful touch (use Prismacolors, if you have a choice!). Zig Real Brush markers seemed to work the best. I didn't try alcohol markers but those should work fine as long as they're compatible with the ink you use.

The stamp set I used is HERE - I'm almost embarrassed that it took me so long to find and support this sweet little company because looking through their stamp collection felt like coming home. I'm an incurable old soul, and I love all things vintage, bookish, artsy, fairies, birds, botanical, along with thoughtful words... there are gorgeous stencils and collage packs - and it's a Missouri business, too! 

A little more about my order - first of all, you guys, the envelope was hand-addressed...

...and then covered with stamped images - which is fun in itself, but also a great way to introduce your product and show sizes in person. Like that little winged girl with the jar and the bird... those will probably be mine in a future order.

These are the stamps I ordered, and they're tied together with some beautiful dyed seam binding - lovely touch!

This collage pack was free with my order - lots of fun things to add to projects, as well as some project idea cards...

And this is just adorable...

Here are a couple of other things from my order - this stamp is pretty much a snapshot of my soul...!

...and these little labels will be so much fun to add to cards for crafty friends.

I know I'll be back to Red Lead - I hope you will pay them a visit to see if anything inspires you!