Splitcoast Tutorial: Pocket Front Card

It's my turn to share a tutorial over on Splitcoast! I dug way back into my old favorites and remembered this simple pocket card I used to make 100 years ago when I first started stamping. Easy and fun! Here's the Pocket Front Card.
Head over to the tutorial page for the measurements and folds! I filled my pocket up here with die cuts from Impression Obsession - the grass and hyacinth leaves were colored with some Colorbox spray mists, and everything else was colored with Copic markers. I love this gnome and his little poseable parts!

The sentiment panel and the heart are 'floating' on acetate strips - my favorite adhesive for those? Super glue!

IO Products:

DIE1055-Y Sitting Gnome

DIE038-J Grass

DIE1049-X Flowers and Leaves

DIE135-F Heart Set

DIE1058-ZZ Stitched Tag #5

B12339 It's the Little Things

That's all I know!

Splitcoast Tutorial: Gel Plate Stamping

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is sponsored by Ranger - one of their authors is sharing how to do a little Gel Plate Stamping! There are a variety of small sized plates in different shapes, and they look like fun!
I didn't have Oxide sprays so I pulled out my box of Colorbox mists, which are super saturated... you  could smoosh Oxide ink pads or other dye inks onto a gel plate too. I have an 8x10 gel plate that I cut into smaller pieces, so the little section here is about ATC size, and I've got a small square, a card front size, and a long narrow one that fits the margin of my journaling Bible. I misted with 2 spray colors, then with water, and pressed it onto watercolor paper. After stamping the image, I used the same mists to cover the rest of the flower outside the printed block, then added shading with pencils and highlights with white paint and a white pencil. 

The sentiment is one of mine (C13811 One Day); the floral stamp is a sneak peek at one of the new spring slimline sets from Impression Obsession that will release April 5th - they are gorgeous! I'll come back to add the link in when the release goes live, so if you're interested please check back with me!!

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.

Splitcoast Tutorial: Adhesive Resist

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is brought to us by Ranger Ink! They're sharing an Adhesive Resist technique that can be done with matte adhesive.

I don't have Ranger's matte adhesive, but I have a jar of matte Mod Podge, so I used that instead - my application was a little uneven, which I like after all! I think Elmers Glue-All will work too and I will try that next time, but the Mod Podge has a little more body to it.

The stencil I used is called Both Way Stripes, and it's from A Colorful Life Designs (remember code DinaFan10 at checkout if you want to save 10%!). I masked off each section to brush on the ink, but then went back in and overlapped a little of the color. This stencil is amazing because - there are 5 striped sections, but 4 of them fit perfectly on an A2 card! Well designed.

The dies I used are brand new Spring designs by Anna Wight - this is a sweet little combination of 3 different sets! I especially love the wreath, and I have another idea for it that I'll be trying soon. For the opening, I cut a circle in my stenciled panel. The back panel is connected with a 1/2" hinge at the top fold.

Product links:

DIE943-Y Magnolia Wreath

DIE949-K Spring Bird

DIE965-Y Small Tags

CL931 Little Songbird clear set

Here's a closer look at the stenciling... I'm fascinated by the little fiber marks in there - not really sure what caused that effect!

Couple other things... I have just 2 of these bracelets in my etsy store - these were prototypes testing different bangle styles. They're so cute!

I've also added some loose handmade beads (half strands) to the store, in case someone else might want to make a bracelet or incorporate paper beads into their other jewelry work. If not - they're really pretty hanging above my desk!

My daffodils are pushing up... and I'm working on Fall and Winter stamps today. All the ironies of an industry designer.... cheers!

Impression Obsession - Old is New

With such a huge collection of wonderful stamps from so many artists, sometimes the older stamps in the Impression Obsession catalog find their way out of the spotlight. We don't want them to be forgotten, so from now on you'll be seeing our team feature them regularly. We hope you're inspired!

I chose a couple of stamps that are old and new - part of the Serendipity Stamps line that was recently acquired by IO. I stamped the Winter Doe image in dye ink, and then used a wet brush to blend some of the forest areas and add shadows below. Here's the full image:

SS-297-H Winter Doe

I love the orientation and size of this stamp - it's 4-3/4" wide, so it's wide enough to go either direction - perfect for a vertical one-layer CAS card or on a horizontal panel of a layered card. This sentiment is one of my all-time favorite quotes too:

SS-1349-F All Shall Be Well

For the base panel, I used this newer Cover-A-Card from my line - it's a great one for adding wood texture to cardstock, tone on tone. I love it!

I love this card design and it was easy to complete - I'd consider using this stamp for one-layer winter cards - so easy to do, and any color would work! 

Don't forget the discount if you're shopping today: 

Be sure to check out the other designers' blogs for inspiration - see the I.O. blog for all the details! 

Impression Obsession DT Challenge: Falling Leaves

The Impression Obsession team's challenge today is to create a project with fall leaves.

I love this catalog sample - this is a fun and easy technique, just stamping the leaves with dye ink and spritzing lightly with water. The water does the work of lifting the color and making this faux watercolor look! These are the stamps I used - they're recent additions to my stamp line. The background text was stamped in a lighter hybrid ink - that's the 'to everything there is a season' text and I love the curve of it with the leaves!

D13818 Leaf 1

E13817 Leaf 2

D13816 Leaf 3

These leaves are really versatile, as you can imagine - you can fill in the open spaces with color, or make a tone-on-tone background... lots of ideas with these! I've just always loved this misting technique with leaf images.

The word stamp is embossed with gold powder - that stands out so nicely (and you know how much I hate embossing, so that says something!).

Be sure to check out the other designers' blogs for inspiration, and remember you can enter these challenges too, using your Impression Obsession stamps! See the I.O. blog for all the details - you might even win a $25 gift certificate!! We'd love to have you join us.

Splitcoast Tutorial: Smackdown Technique

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is the Smackdown Technique - this actually is a technique I've used almost as long as I've been stamping, but never knew it had a name! 

I love using this technique in scenic stamping, especially for grass, so I pulled out this add-on set from last month's kit from Hero Arts, supplementing with a few small stamps from the main kit set. I masked off a circle using a reverse mask cut from contact paper. I used the Smackdown technique in the water as well, brushing in the ink and then stamping over it repeatedly with the water texture stamp from the main kit. More details were added in with a Posca pen and a white pencil, and I added the debossed detail with a die from Maker's Movement.

Such a simple and fun technique! Have you tried it?

Splitcoast Tutorial: Acrylic Stencil Deboss

It's my turn to share a tutorial over on Splitcoast! It has been my pleasure over the last few years to work with Clearsnap to present tutorials using their products, and with the announcement that they will be closing.... this is our last collaboration. I'm truly so sad to see them go.

Supplies used:
ColorBox® Art Screens Trios - Disco
Spellbinders Coffee Brewing die set
A Jillian Vance Design - Perk Up clear set
Simon Says Stamp - Small Folded Banners die set
Impression Obsession Ornament Flourish die set

This week's technique is called Acrylic Stencil Deboss, and I hope you'll visit the tutorial page to see how it's done! The technique begins with a stencil impression, which you can achieve using a die cutting machine - you'll need to have an embossing pad on the bottom, then cardstock, and your stencil on the top. The Crossover II machine I have works great for this technique, since I can set the pressure to accommodate the extra thickness - those are on sale this month, so if you've been thinking about a new machine, now is a great time to get one at 30% off!  

Here's a second sample -I used the same stencil, but used the back side of the cardstock for a reverse impression. This truck die set from Spellbinders is one of my favorites!

Supplies used:
ColorBox® Art Screens Trios - Disco
Spellbinders Truckin' Through the Seasons die set
Spellbinders So Many Sentiments Etched die set
Maker's Movement Pierced Circles Nested Essential Die Set
Impression Obsession Treat the World cling stamp

I hope you're having a great week! I'm overwhelmed, not gonna lie! School starts next week, the State Fair starts Thursday, I have stamp art deadlines looming, commissions in progress, and a mountain of products to review, and I just saw that new Fall dies are in the chute... all good things, just all at once.... acckkk! How do you balance life when you're overwhelmed?