21st Century Pillow Book

I was totally stoked about this week’s StampInsanity Challenge. We were to use something metallic on your project - papers, embellies, hardware, etc. Well, being a silversmith…this was SO up my alley! Short of making a ring using one of Beth’s images…I knew I wanted to go all out and be as crazy and metallic as possible! A couple of weeks ago, I experimented a bit with regular old tin foil. And I enjoyed it so much, I wanted to do it again! Click HERE to see that post. So I used a Fiskars Texture Plate (wood grain), and rubbed my foil on it. Awesome result. I happen to also have a wood grain stamp that I thought would be cool to use too. So I stamped it and brushed Perfect Pearls on the image. It’s a little tough to make out the colors, but I used Purple and Blue. Both fabulous metallics! But I felt that the foil was too overpowering, so I layered some vellum on top of it. I love how it muted the foil, but allowed the imprint of the wood grain to show through. And that little piece...

It’s the last Wednesday of the month, so you know what that means! It’s Bombshell Stamps Hump Day Hop time! This month it’s all about Geography (something I am not so good at!). Here’s what Kas wanted us to do this time around: Kids with their new colored pencils and cute backpacks remind me of how much I miss school….NOT. But it did inspire this month’s blog hop. Please remember, if you can tie it into the theme…GREAT. The theme for this month is Geography: Travel, foreign lands, exotic colors. Maybe show us how your Bombshell would look if she came from an exotic land. Maybe she would be traveling by motorcycle, or perhaps she would be a pilot. She could even be a pirate avoiding scurvy and looking for an exotic date??? I, once again decided to multi task for this hop. I used Kathi’s Sketch Challenge and Meredith’s monthly challenge. Here’s the sketch: Meredith said: “Please create any 3-D creation! I challenge you to let your imagination go wild and do your best to reach out of you...

It’s time to say goodbye and hello over at Smeared & Smudged . It’s the end of the term for the DT, and while some of our team will be returning, others will not. But, we will be welcoming in some new faces too! So, it’s a bittersweet ending. Terra, Kelli and I wanted to have a “last hurrah” hop for the DT, but of course we needed to make it into a challenge! So, I decided that since we all now have so many awesome Smeared Ink sets, lets all make projects that use 3 or more sets of Smeared Ink stamps ! I’m hearing through the grapevine that some of the ladies are none too thrilled with my little challenge. I, however, loved it and thought it was a lot of fun! I made a card using FOUR different Smeared Ink sets. Holy City (the cemetery), Chicks Dig Guns (the heart), Nymphs (the frame), and Lil Grumpies (the sentiment). I think they all worked so well together! I pop dotted the frame and the heart, which gave the card fabulous dimension, and really directs your eye to the 2 tombst...

If you are here to see the latest StampInsanity challenge, for some reason, I can't get it to post above this one. I wrote the SI post days ago, and now it won't post on top! So, please scroll to the next post. Thanks! I’m stoked! I LOVE Simply Betty stamps, and I am so excited that they finally have their own challenges!!! For this first challenge, it was a photo inspiration. Check it! How rad are those socks?! Well, when I saw the picture, I instantly knew what I was going to do…because I already had the purrfect Christian colored in! I had done him up a couple of weeks ago. I was stumped on his skateboard, so I asked my niece her opinion (since she was watching me color anyway). She told me to make his board tie dyed. Weird. She is SO not the hippie type! But I went with it! And it came out pretty rad! You’ll need to click on my pic to really see his skateboard. And check out the Basic Grey paper I had in my stash! The little strip under Christian’s feet? It’s perfect! I ...

It's time for that latest StampInsanity challenge!!! This week it's all about embossing! Beth wants us to "show off your mad embossing skillz!!!" So...since it's something I LOVE to do, I had a blast with this challenge!!! I embossed 3 times on this card. First, I embossed my light blue paper with a Fiskars Texture Plate (and then chalked the heck out of it!). I embossed with Verdigris colored powder (Ranger)around my sentiment. Lastly, I embossed in clear around the edge of my card, to make my blue ink pop. You can see all of my embossing a bit better in this photo. Feel free to click on any of the images to see them bigger. Isn't the sentiment I used fabulous? It's one of StampInsanity's latest. And I think it's awesome! I will totally be using this one a lot! Now it's your turn! Let's see your fabulous embossing skillz! Join the Groovy Gurlz for another awesome challenge! Want some more inspiration? Check out the rest of the Gurlz!!! Hav...

My family loves planes. Like, really loves planes. Me? I think they’re cool…but I really know nothing about them. I’m more of a car chick. We have a small airport by us that has an Air Show every year for Labor Day. Obviously, the special planes they show during that holiday weekend need to fly in earlier, so we decided to visit said airport for a look see. We drove in at the perfect moment! Just as we got there, a huge C-47 was landing just across the way from us. It was big, and majestic. And this, coming from a car chick, is a big deal! We were able to get up close and personal with the plane (which happened to transport paratroopers back in it’s day), and Gene and Nix actually got to look inside of the bird! On it’s side, as most planes have, was some awesome artwork…which is what inspired this layout! Take a look at that beautiful bombshell! And of course, I colored in the Bombshell Stamps’ Angel to coordinate. My photo looks a bit more faded then how it is in real ...

To check out my StampInsanity post for today (and you really should!) please click HERE . Thanks! Now on to the hop! Today Smeared & Smudged has a member wide blog hop going on, and they always prove to be creep-tastic! Our theme this time around is Orange! Not a color I tend to work with too often, but I really went for it this time! So much so, that I am also entering it into Macabre Monday’s Monochrome Monstrosities challenge as well! How’s that for Orange??? Even the cardstock I stamped on is called Iced Orange (Prism)! I broke out my Smeared Ink Lil Grumpies set, because I haven’t played with them for a while and they were starting to get mad at me. He’s stamped in Chestnut Roan (Color Box) and colored with my Spectracolor Design and Prisma pencils. I think he turned out fabulous! Coloring these guys is just so much fun! I added a wee bit of dimension with some leftover paper that I had embossed a while ago with those fabulous swirls. A little more ink, a lotta glue, and ...

If you are looking for the Smeared & Smudged Blog Hop, please click HERE . Thanks! Yes, yes…it’s StampInsnaity Challenge day…but alas…my computer or printer or Photoshop is wonky this week. Not really sure what it is…but all of my images are suddenly printing blurry. Like, real blurry and pixilated . And I had such a fab card I was gonna make for this week too!!! The challenge is to make a one layer card. That’s right ONE layer! Which is awesome with me because that’s all I used to do! But, that meant I needed to print out my card from scratch… which, given the wonkiness of my technology…couldn’t happen. Luckily, I had a card made for an occasion such as this one! No, it doesn’t fit the challenge, but you’ll forgive me right??? And if someone can someway figure out how in the heck to fix my “issues,” then I will certainly make the card that I had intended to make! But for now…please enjoy this one! This is of course from the Katie with a Cure set. I love coloring Katie and her r...

Did you know that Smeared Ink has a challenge every week??? It does! And YOU can vote for the winner! Entries are all up for voting every Thursday-Friday. If you’d like to check out all the deets, click HERE , then click on “Challenge.” This week, the challenge is to use metal or metallic colors on your project. And, as a Silversmith, I love working with anything metallic! So of course I needed to play along!!!   So it’s pretty hard to photograph this card properly, but I hope you can see the main image! It’s the Water Goddess from Smeared Ink’s Goddess set. Here’s a different photo, in slightly different light. You can click on any of the photos to see them bigger. I took some plain old tin foil and rubbed the image into it. SI’s stamps are so deeply cut, it was easy to do! Then, I experimented with coloring her in…to almost no avail. The only medium that I played with that actually stuck was Staz On ink. I tried lots of mediums…but they all came off. So I very gently rubb...

This chick is pissed off! I’m not sure who made her so made, but I’m glad it’s not me!!! This is my latest card for Smeared Ink . I broke out the tried and true Chicks Dig Guns set. I love this set. It’s crass and full of sass! Yeah…that was cheesy. But it’s true! Check her out! In her skivvies with a loaded rifle. Looks like she tried to make her opponent dance a bit. See those bullet holes on the bottom of the card? My guess it was a dude that ticked her off… I inked her up on some textured white cardstock. I wanted to give this card a gritty, grainy feel. She’s done up with my colored pencils. I had found the “I can’t shoot you…” piece in my box of “Mom to Go” from K. & Co. I thought it was hilarious, and it inspired me to make this card. But I thought it needed a second line…so I made the “But I wish I could.” I inked it with Tattered Rose & Milled Lavender Distress Inks, which I also applied to the background of the card. Sorry that this photo is a bit blurry. But you c...