Moments of Joy

I made this card with stamp images that I won from Innovative Stamp Creations . It was a random drawing of names of people who participated in one of their challenges. It came as a sheet of beautiful floral and fauna images and words. I only used these two images so far. The dandelion type flower is large and so pretty. The butterfly has beautiful detail. On kraft paper I stamped the flower in Brilliance Moonlight White, Encore Honeydew (has a wonderful shimmer), and Versa Magic Tea Leaves. I embossed the white with clear ep. I also stamped the flower using the Castaway inkpad. It's a faint detail that you can see a bit in the closeup picture below. It takes on a peachy color on the kraft paper and it's just peeking out from under the white embossed flower. The butterfly is stamped on white cs in Vintage Photo Distress ink and embossed with Walnut Stain ep. I coated it with Crystal Lacquer and added dots on the bottom wings with new Adirondack Dimensional Pearls in Lettuce. I added some sparkle with a Stardust gelly roll pen but I didn't capture it very well in the photo. I finished it up with a velvet ribbon, HodgePodge Hardware, and some dew drops.

The butterfly image is also stamped directly onto the card and the cut out one adhered on top. I sponged the butterfly before adding the lacquer with Tea Dye Distress ink for some depth.

It's a very simple and subtle card. Have a great day!

Another ISC Challenge and How about the new American Idol?!

Today Shelly posted the second Innovative Stamp Creations challenge here and I jumped right in knowing I will be away for the holiday weekend and won't get any stamping done. This one is a color challenge. I don't actually own any SU! cardstock...never have. GASP! you say? Does one actually say "gasp"? I think not. Anyway, I just pulled colors from my own stash that I thought were similar. See, I actually started stamping before I ever heard of SU! and shopped regularly at a very quaint little rubberstamp store in our village which was owned by a wonderfully talented woman. Since I already owned mega amounts of stamps and paper before I decided to try SU! I did not feel it necessary to buy all of their ink and paper too. So, there you have it, not that you asked. Onto the card:I stamped the butterfly image in Versa Fine Vinage Sepia on a vanilla cardstock and cut it and the brown scallopped mat with my nestabilities. The image is painted with ArtQuest Pastelle's. They are a very shimmery cake paint that you add water too, kind of like h20's. I added tiny rhinestones down the body and used a larger one for the Prima flower center. The small Prima is painted with the Pastelle's also so it would contrast a bit with the flower underneath. The brads are from my stash. All paper I believe to be Bazzill. I inked the edges of all panels with Ranger Distress Ink in Walnut Stain. IRL the butterfly is very shimmery and pretty, but that's hard to capture in a photo without getting a completely washed out glare.
I did try out a different ISO setting on my camera and turned off the flash so I could capture the richness of the colors and I really love how it came out. Of course I used photoshop to tweak it. If you have a SLR camera and are interested in furthering your education with it a great place to gets tips is at The Pioneer Woman's photography section. It's not a technical or training blog...but rather a person who loves to photograph, is self taught, and explains in plain english (with lots of humor) exactly what she's doing and how you can do it.

And last, before I go to bed, I want to state for the record that David Cook, our new American Idol, was my favorite from the beginning and I was never so excited to see anyone win before! He is so humble and just an amazing artist that I couldn't have seen anyone else more deserving than him win. I can't wait for his first CD!

I am off bright and early Saturday morning to our summer house in the Adirondack's where my dh will be tearing out the kitchen and hopefully replacing it too! It's going to take a few trips and a lot of elbow grease, but man, that kitchen has been the same for as long as I can remember...and trust me, it's been a while! With that, I wish everyone a wonderful holiday weekend! Goodnight!

ISC Blog Challenge

I can't believe it's been 5 days since my last post...I am really slackin'! I finished up a challenge for Innovative Stamp Creations that was posted on Shelly's blog and finally had time to photograph and post them. The challenge was to create a tag or tag art. I guess mine is a little of both since it's a tag that's mounted as art. I used shipping tags I bought at Staples and stamped the dresses in Versa Fine black. They are colored with Copics and accented with a Sakura Stardust pen. I cut them out and popped them up on layers from the Basic Grey Infuse line (on the pink dress below the pp is BG Sultry). I also stamped randomly the same dress image randomly on each panel in black pigment and embossed with Walnut Stain distress ep. The ribbon and fibers are from my stash...no brand in particular. I added accents with dew drops and Prima and Bazzill flowers. I finished the look by inking the edges of both panels with Distress Ink in Walnut Stain.

This is the first time I have used these stamps. I had previously posted this card where I used a dragonfly image from the same sheet of stamps. I really don't know what the sheet name is. I was just on my way out of a rubberstamp show here on Long Island last year, having already exceeded my spending limit (like I actually have one of those, ha!) and I just wanted to take a peek at this table I walked past earlier when it was crowded. Well, I saw some samples with this dragonfly and I had to have these stamps! They have some really great images and I am glad I finally pulled these out-they are really cool looking! Hope everyone is having a great night!

Not a bad finish afterall...

I was just having one of those days...can't stamp worth a damn. I just hated everything I made. But I was determined to make something out of this mess. I had the idea in my head but it just didn't pan out on paper like I had hoped. I bought a rubber sheet of images at a stamp show in November and although I was madly in love with many of the images I just hadn't figured out how I was going to use them yet. After I added the grass and weeds (or wildflowers) from Gelatin, I decided to make the dragonfly, image from innovativestampcreations.com, perched on one of them. I had a foot hanging off so I drew in some extra grass with a brown Sharpie marker to give him some added support. The grasses are stamped in Versa Magic Gingerbread and Pearlescent Biege and the dragonfly with Perfect Plumeria. Some of the weeds have added shading with a copper Copic marker. I then sponged all around the cream cardstock with the Gingerbread and Beige. The sentiment from Paperbag Studios is stamped in Memories Artprint Brown. I used a Sakura star dust pen to add sparkle to the dragonfly and the dandelions...or puffy flowers as I may refer to them :) Distressed edges, Prima flowers, and a touch of lace finished it off. After all of my frustration with it I was actually pleased with the result. All cardstock is from Die Cuts With a View and Bazzill. Oh, almost forgot...I spritzed the entire cream colored panel with Tattered Angels Vanilla Breeze Glimmer Mist (I love these!). The whole image had an overall sheen that is really pretty irl!