Glittery Madeira

I really love the new Madeira stamp.  I wanted to create an all-occaision card to have in my stash for thank yous, etc.  I stamped the madeira image in ice blue chalk ink, and then added glitter using my quickie glue pen.  I’ll add a sentiment later for whatever occaision I use it for. 

Make A Wish Birthday

My neighbor watches my daughter while I’m working, and her little girl was turning 5.  I needed a special card that she would love.  I know two of her favorite things- the color blue, and ballet. 

For the gift card that went with her birthday gift I made a smaller 3×3 card -

I used my new Doodlebug Cupcake glitter to make the “5″ really sparkly!

Geeta’s Birthday

Many of you know Geeta- one of the wonderful A Muse instructors who runs A Muse Addicts.  Her 40th birthday was last week.  Of course, being on vacation meant my brain was still not working (a whole week later), and so her card was a little late – yikes!

I know Geeta loves purple and jewel tones, so I tried to make something to go with that color palette. The problem is, that is soooo far away from what I usually do that I think I was crippled by the colors!  Still, it’s good to push myself outside my comfort zone- even if it’s not my favorite result. 

Happy belated birtday Geeta!

Elise Thank You

Thanks for all your nice comments on the Copic shading.  I’ll work on doing some more posts with a step by step to show the progression.

I needed a thank you card for my neighbor’s daughter, who helps take care of my plants and mail, etc when we’re out of town.  I just love the sweet little Elise stamp, and thought she would be perfect.

Copic Shading

I’ve been working on my shading with Copic markers.  I wanted to use some larger images to practice what I’ve been learning.  (GASP), I have used another stamp company besides A Muse and Memory Box! I think this is a first   My LSS owner gave me a couple of these American ArtStamps to make samples with, and I’m really loving these funky people.

I wanted to keep the card base fairly simple to showcase the beautiful image and the shading techniques, so I just added a simply Memory Box design paper to a 4 3/4 square card.  I didn’t have a wide range of greens to shade with, so I used some of the lighter greens that were too bright for the darker Moss color I used on the bottom.  I was able to fix that by applying Warm Grey #2 on top of the lighter green, blending it in nicely.  I love this technique, since I don’t have two or three versions of each shade of color that I own.

I also didn’t use the blender pen on this image, other than in the blue areas.  I simply used the greens and the warm grey to blend over and over into each other.  Here’s a close up of the coloring….

Finally I added a little clear Spica glitter pen here and there for some sparkle.  I will say the biggest thing I’m learning is that it is a process, and it takes several layers of coloring, shading, going back again and again to get it right.  Luckily I love coloring and find it theraputic   The best thing is that it also makes it hard to ruin it- you can usually find a way to fix it!

In case you’re interested- here are the Copics I’ve used.  For the green on the tree I used Moss, New Leaf, Grass Green, and Warm Grey #2.  I also added Warm Grey #6 to the undersides of the tree to make the Moss darker.  The yellows are buttercup yellow, mustard, and a little light camel.  Blues are Manganese blue and powder blue.  The snow is powder blue only, faded with a blender pen.  Browns are light camel and caribe cocoa.  The red is Cadmium red, and shadows on the boots were made with Warm Grey 6.

Let me know what you think!  Would you be interested in more posts about Copic coloring?  Thanks!

Boy oh boy!

Okay, so enough of the Holiday images for a bit- it is still July after all!  One of my best friends from college is having her first baby this fall.  I made this card for her shower, using the clear Baby Wishes set. 

I’ve been practicing my Copic coloring on some non-A Muse images (gasp!).  They are larger images and so a little easier to practice the shading.  Good news is, I’ve seen people do great shading detail on inchies, so I know I’ll be able to do the same on A Muse images!

Monochromatic Cheer

Heather’s weekly Share Your Spark Challenge this week was to make a monochromatic card.  I have been dying to use the new vintage cards, so I decided to make mine in shades of black & grey.

I used my new Memento London Fog (grey) ink to create the cityscape image in the background.  I filled in a few windows with silver stickles to add some sparkle and interest.  I then took my Doodlebug Paper Frills (my favorite), and cut one of the strips down the middle – I realized that by only using half of the strip, I got a more vintage feel.  Finally, I stamped the “good cheer” from the new Peace & Cheer clear set in the corner (it’s easier to see in person). 

Thanks Heather for hosting another fun challenge!

Amuseapalooza vacation-style

I was on vacation with my husband’s family for the Amuseapalooza week.  Although I was very sad to miss out on all the fun, we had a great time in North Carolina.  One rainy day, I pulled out my card stash, and everyone was really excited to make some cards- it was too funny!  No one had ever stamped before, so it was fun to see what everyone came up with.  Here’s some pictures of the cards they created….

This is a great color combination – I will have to use this one!

 

These last two are something I’d never thought of doing- stamping in black and then shadowing in another color- very cool.  Unfortunately somehow I missed the pictures of our nine year old cousin’s cards – but they were amazing!

Dashing through the snow….

Here’s another one I made for AP celebration.  I wasn’t happy with how it came out, so I tried again with another version.

Version 2…

I used A Muse stitched ribbon for the road, and then added liquid applique for the snow.

Cheers!

Yet another Amuseapalooza card for you.  This one is fun- it could be for New Years or any party – love it!  I love that it’s a silhoutte too, as I don’t have many of those.

I used an A Muse bluebird notecard, and then used Chalk smoky blue ink to stamp the cityscape twice.  I then used yellow stickles in a couple of the windows for some sparkle.