A Fun Tag

I needed a break from all things Distress and Cheryl Waters, Lead Fiskateer at Fiskateers.com, had just the ticket, er tag!  She issued a challenge to create a mixed media tag using at least five tools and three different mediums.  I came up with this!

My mediums were colored pencils, white craft paint, pigment ink pads (Fiskars and ColorBox), Ranger Glossy Accents (on the bubbles), Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist and Fireworks pigment ink spray.  The tools I used were Fiskars desktop rotary trimmer, #5 scissors, interchangeable border punch with Lacy Doubles cartridge, Tim Holtz/Tonic paper distresser, my computer (sentiment) and stamp from Studio G.  You might not see in this photo but I first ran the tag thru my Big Kick with the Fiskars Netting Texture Plate to give a tile like embossed grid.  The dark blue swirl and dots in the upper right corner are Cloud 9 Raindots.  All paper from my scrap bin.

I'll be back in a day or two with more Tim tags from class.  See you then!

Creative Chemistry 101--Day 3 Tags

We are on day 5 of class.  See the title of this blog post?  Yes, I'm running behind!  No classes on the weekend so I do have time to catch up.  Here are my day 3 tags

I do not have the full compliment of Ranger products so I'm substituting where necessary.  I do want to improve my Ranger stash but will do so over time--and I'll go back and recreate the tags with all things Ranger as I acquire new, fun things.  I think it will provide an interesting comparison.

The first tag  illustrates the Alcohol Ink Agates technique.

I used Ranger Alcohol Inks, Mixatives and Glossy Card Stock, Tim Holtz Stamper's Anonymous stamp set and StazOn Jet Black.

The next tag shows the Archival Resist Technique.  I do realize that my sentiment is crooked and made a note in my stamp binder to watch for that the next time I use that stamp.

The surface is Ranger Glossy Card Stock.  I also used Tim Holtz Distress Ink, StazOn Jet Black and Memento (orange/yellow/red).  The leaf stamp is by Stampendous and sentiment is from Wendy Vecchi.  The dots are just regular old bubble wrap and the chevron grid pattern is from plastic needlepoint canvas cut at right angles.

The third tag was a troublesome little thing but I really do like the result.  It was worth all the effort, took 4 tries!, at least to me.  Now that I've had some practice, I don't think the next time will take so long.

This technique goes straight onto a manila tag.  The embossing folder is from The Paper Studio.  The stamps are from Fiskars Harlequin set.  I used StazOn Jet Black and Tim Holtz Distress Inks.

Thank you so much for looking.  I'm elbow deep (and oh so colorful) in Day 4's tags!

MEET THE COFFEE CATS!

Starbucks, Kona and Java came to live with us about 11 years ago.  They got their names when Kona found a coffee bean under the kitchen sideboard and started batting it around.  The vet's office called them the coffee cats on their first visit and they've been the coffee cats ever since.

I put together the layout of my fur babies for a weekly scrap lift challenge that I've been participating in with the Fiskateers.  Cat photography credit goes to our fabulous cat sitter and professional pet photographer, Sylvia Brown.  She is wonderful and life without Sylvia would be difficult for our little family.

I wanted to use coffee themed embellishments but I didn't have any!  What's a scrappy crafter to do?  Make them yourself!  The coffee bean border came first.  This is what I used:

No, this is not a medical tool, ha ha!  This is a stamping tool.  I cut a piece of fun foam into an oval.  I then bent the oval in two and cut a shallow slit down the middle, taking care not to cut it into two, separate pieces.  In order to work with such a small stamp, I stuck it on a craft stick with a mini glue dot.  I practiced a bit on scrap paper.  By varying the amount of ink and pressure, I made the solid and split side coffee bean images with the same foam stamp.  I used Anna Griffin chocolate pigment ink.

The little hearts on the right side are paper scraps stuck to some Dollar Store stickers.  I cut them out and adhered them sticker image down.

The cups are homemade paper piecings.  I found some images that I liked on the Web and copied them to MS Power Point.  Then I resized them, printed them and created the different pieces.  I would share the templates but I sort of destroyed them in the process of creating!  The rising steam tendrils were created with Autumn Leaves Flourishes stamps and white Stampendous pigment ink.  Please note that I printed the photos on matte photo paper to make sure that my pigment ink would work.

Other than scraps of cardstock and bits of patterned paper, I used one sheet of DCWV textured cardstock for the background, Making Memories Alpha Stickers (CATS), Heidi Grace Satin Letter Stickers from the Harvest Row line (Java), Cloud 9 Rub On Alphas, Outdoor line, (Kona), a black Zig writer and a Marvy Uchida gold opaque pen for Java's cup doodle.  This was a frugal layout!

Today is World Card Making Day and I have a scrap table with a few new cards in process.  Hope you are making cards today, too!  Scrapbook Royalty is accepting cards for their Cards for Troops campaign until November 1.  If you would like to help, details are on their site (link is on this blog to your right).

Thanks for looking--and meeting my kitties!  Have a wonderful weekend!

CHRISTMAS IS COMING!

Are you ready?  If you wait to the last minute, like I usually do, you have 92 days left!  "We" still have a bit of time to get crafty though.  Take a look at this little quickie gift card holder/bag I made.

Here's my template.

I cut and scored plain white cardstock then punched the top with the Fiskars Threading Water border punch.  Next, I stamped snowflakes (Making Memories acrylic stamps) with Colorbox silver pigment ink.  Once the ink was dry, I added Terrifically Tacky tape strips as indicated on the template and assembled.  For the ribbon handle, I punched holes with a hand punch and threaded Heidi Grace pink velvet ribbon through the holes.  I knotted the ends of the ribbon to hold the handle in place.

The tag is just a little rectangle of scrap white cardstock, folded in half, with a snowflake stamped on top.

I'm looking forward to using this silver ink on navy blue cardstock and gold ink on dark green and maroon cardstock.  The possibilities are only limited to your imagination!

Thank you for checking in and best wishes for all your holiday projects.  Until next time, my stamps are calling!