Seasonal Scene Building

Hello Crafty Friends. With the holidays, work demands and sickness hitting me, I am finally back in my craft room working on my next class for the Altenew Educator Certification. The Seasonal Scene Building course was quite a challenge for me. Since most of my Altenew Stamps and dies are floral or phrases, I had to really dig in to see how I could create a scene. I tried creating a Planter box with the Wood Pallet stamp, then placing an array of flowers tucked into the box.

Kim G - Seasonal Scenes Building

To start, I lightly ink blended Mountain Mist on the top of my card base. I stamped my planter box in Silver Stone on separate piece of cardstock, then cut it down to size and placed it at the bottom of the card. 

I then stamped several flowers from the Angelique Motifs stamp set. I was in a blue and orange mood and thought these flowers were quite bright and cheery.

Kim G - Seasonal Scene Building

I then stamped several of the leaves and stems to get foliage and cut the larger stems apart in order to get greenery to place around my flowers. I played with the placement of the flowers and leaves and came up this arrangement.

Kim G - Seasonal Scene Building

I would love to have a planter box at my house with these colors of flowers. Thank you for taking the time to look at my project.

Supplies
Cardstock: Neenah 80lb Solar White
Ink: Altenew Mountain Mist, Silver Stone, Bamboo, Parrot, Olive, Sunkissed, Orange Cream, Firebrick, Buttercream, Warm Sunshine, Artic, Persian Blue, Sapphire, Soft Lilac, Lavender Fields, Midnight Violet
Stamp Sets: Wood Pallet, Beautiful Day, Angelique Motifs with coordinating Die

Celebration Stencil Techniques

KimG - Celebration Stencil Techniques

Well hello there! It has been a very busy few weeks since my last post. Between my work and my son's school activities, there hasn't been a lot of time for crafting.

I finally found some time to take the Celebration Stencil Techniques class. I love stencils, so this class certainly did not disappoint. I am always happy to learn new techniques or figure out how to improve on what I am doing.

I only have a few stencils from Altenew, so I reached for my favorite one "Layered Dahlia". I just love how they layer together to give your project dimension and flare.

KimG - Celebration Stencil Techniques

I had not played with my Nuvo Embossing Mousse in quite some time, so I dug it out to use for this card. I ended up using my fingers to apply the mousse as I wanted a very light layer of the mousse and I did a better job with my finger than with a palette knife. I stenciled the first layer with Altenew's Gray Denim and then used Nuvo's Cornflower Blue for my top layer. Then I popped my sentiment up with some foam tape. I am a sucker for grays paired with a color.

KimG - Celebration Stencil Techniques

I love getting "inky" and have to say, by the time I finished, I had embossing mousse all over my craft area! Thankfully it was easy to clean up. Thanks for taking the time to see my project.

Supplies:

Cardstock: Neenah 80lb Solar White, Stampin' Up gray scrap

Ink: Altenew Gray Denim

Dies: Stitched Square Die, Birch Press Design Thanks

Miscellaneous: Nuvo Cornflower Blue Embossing Mousse, Foam Tape

Let It Shine

Hello there! It has been a busy time for me with school starting back up for my son and a lot happening at my job. I finally found some time to finish up my "Let It Shine" class taught by Carissa Wiley. I love Carissa and her teaching style. She makes me smile when she laughs during her classes and videos.

This class shows various ways to add some sparkle and shine to your cards. I could relate as I am always putting some kind of sparkle on my cards. I am just drawn to it.

KimG/Let It Shine

I decided to put glitter on some 1" wide Score Tape. I love this technique and love the results it gives on a card. I used Altenew's Build-A-Flower Rose stamp and die set. 

KimG/Let It Shine

This is probably one of my all time favorite sets. It looks so real and it is so easy to stamp. The color combinations you can use is endless.

I used mirror cardstock for my sentiment. I have a TON of glitter and mirror cardstock in various colors in my stash, so I decided I needed to make use of some of it.

KimG/Let It Shine

I hope everyone has a great Labor Day weekend.

Supplies:
Stamps - Build-A-Flower Rose and die set
Cardstock - Neenah 80 lb. Solar White, DCWV Foil cardstock
Inks - All Altenew: Citrus Burst, Fresh Lemon, Snapdragon, Marigold, Autumn Blaze, Firebrick, Mountain Mist, Volcano Lake, Lagoon, Emerald
Miscellaneous - 1" Score Tape, Martha Stewart Fire Opal fine glitter

For the Guys Class

Today's project is from the "For the Guys" class taught by Jennifer Rzasa. I loved how she showed different ways to think out of the box to create masculine cards.

 I am the only female in our house and I work in a male-dominated industry, so I happen to have lots of masculine crafty items. However, I do not have a lot items from Altenew that would work for a masculine card. The majority of my Altenew crafty stash is floral and quite feminine.

After digging through my stash, I was able to find Altenew's Feeling Dotty stencil and knew this would work for a masculine card.

KimG/For the Guys

I decided to use foil for this card to give it a little pizazz. I used Deco Foil Transfer Gel on the stencil, then once it was dry I used Deco Foil Amber Watercolor foil. This foil has silver, gold and some copper colors in a water-color pattern. It makes a great masculine card.

KimG/For the Guys

I used the Alenew Mega Greetings "Hello" die as my focal point.

I went with a cream colored background as the white was just to stark with the brown. This is a very clean and simple card, yet looks quite masculine. My 15-year old son actually said he would like a card like that, so that is pretty high praise in my humble opinion.

Supplies Used:

Deco Foil Transfer Gel and Amber Watercolor foil

SU' Espresso and Very Vanilla cardstock

Altenew Feeling Dotty Stencil

Altenew Mega Greetings Hello

Easy Ink Blending Techniques

I love the look of ink blending, so this class did not disappoint! Amy does a beautiful job of ink blending and I found a few techniques in her class to help me make my ink blending look smoother and cleaner.

KimG/Easy Ink Blending Techniques

For my card I decided on a monochromatic look with an accent of Black embossing powder. I started my ink blending with the Ranger blending sponges, then switched to my Clarity Stamp Blending Brushes to smooth out the colors.

KimG/Easy Ink Blending Techniques

Pink and Black is one of my favorite color combos and I am really pleased with how this card turned out. Very clean and simple.

I used Altenew Baby Pink in for my card base and for the card top I used Altenew Magenta, Fuchsia, and Baby Pink for a dark to light fade. For my sentiment, I used Fuchsia so my sentiment strip would pop out.

KimG/Easy Ink Blending Techniques

Supplies Used:
Ink: VersaMark Ink, Altenew inks in Baby Pink, Fuchsia, and Magenta
Cardstock: Neenah Solar White
Stamps: Altenew Henna Elements
Embossing Powder: Nuvo Jet Black
Tools: Ranger Ink Blending Sponges, Clarity Stamp Ink Blending Brushes, Scallop punch from my stash.

Clean and Simple Boutique Cards - Round 2

KimG/Clean and Simple Boutique Cards

After last week's set of failures (in my opinion). I decided to give this class another go and only create one project and concentrate on how to make it better.

I continued using Altenew's Beautiful Day stamp set with the outline stamp and the 3rd stamp from the flower. I feel my stamping came out much clearer and even better aligned. I used Alenew's Persian Blue and Sapphire inks.

KimG/Clean and Simple Boutique Cards

I opted to use specialty paper this time around and grabbed my favorite silver mirror cardstock. I used Altenew's Creative Edges: Lace Die on the silver to give the card some interest and texture.

KimG/Clean and Simple Boutique Cards

I added a touch of Persian Blue splatters and used a sentiment from the Beautiful Day set. I backed my sentiment with just a hint of mirrored silver cardstock, then popped it up with foam tape. I am much happier with the results of this project (round 2) than what I submitted the first time.

Supplies Used:
Cardstock: Blue cardstock from my stash, Neenah Solar White 80lb cardstock, Mirrored Silver cardstock
Ink: Altenew Persian Blue and Sapphire
Stamps: Altenew Beautiful Day
Dies: Altenew Creative Edges: Lace Die

Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

Today I have 3 cards to share for the Clean & Simple Boutique Cards class. While I am not happy with the results of my final projects, I am posting them to show the work I have completed. 

I absolutely loved the class and worked on each mini class within the class. It always makes it easier when you have the same supplies being used in the class. I then changed my projects up, just a bit.

For my first card, I used the foiling technique. I have been foiling for quite a while, but use a different method. For this project, I used WOW Bonding Powder and WOW Fab Foil (which I have never used before) and was not pleased with the results. I had great ink coverage with my VersaMark ink, sprinkled the bonding powder on my image and the powder did not adhere to the ink which then caused my foil to not melt onto the card.

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

While my card didn't turn out all that bad, it was not the results I was wanting and multiple attempts gave the same results. The card kind of has an artistic impression to it.

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: Neenah Solar White, Old Stampin' Up cardstock from my stash

Ink: Altenew Persian Blue Ink, Altenew Jet Black Ink, VersaMark Ink

Other: WOW Bonding Powder and WOW Fab Foil in Dark Blue

Card 2 - Faux Letterpress/Embossing

My second card was another project that I struggled with. I had issues coming up with the "perfect" sandwich for my die cut machine. I either had too much pressure or not enough and finally picked the best card out of all of the many I made.

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

I enjoyed working on this card and I still like how it turned out. I think my favorite part is the paint splatters!

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: Neenah Solar White 80lb., Black cardstock from my stash, Vellum

Ink: Altenew Hydrangea, Altenew Aqualicious, Altenew Pinkalicious, VersaMark

Other: Hero Arts White Embossing Powder

Card 3 - Luxury Papers

While I didn't use luxury papers for this card, I did use a cover die to add a background for interest.

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

I used Altenew's Gradient Stripes Cover Die in a Bazzill cardstock. The cardstock has some texture to it which adds some additional interest to the card. I stamped my flowers with Altenew's Build-A-Flower - Sakura stamp and die set.

KimG/Clean & Simple Boutique Cards

I hope you like my projects. This is one class that I will review repeatedly as I really liked the projects shown throughout the course.

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: Neenah Solar White, Bazzill Yellow cardstock from my stash

Ink: Altenew Iceberg, Eastern Sky, Ultramarine, Firefly, Grass Field, Fresh Lemon, Maple Yellow, Honey Drizzle and Jet Black

Stamps: Altenew Build-A-Flower - Sakura stamp and die, Altenew Sentiment Strips

All About Layering Class 2

I finally found some time to work on my second class in the Altenew Educator Certification Program (AECP) "All About Layering 2" taught by Nicole. Nicole is a great instructor and shows you some of the best ways to line up your stamps for perfect layering (of course for me, it took some practise!). Thankfully, I already owned many of the stamps sets discussed in this class. I was really torn on which set to use for my project and decided to use my "go-to" set Peony Bouquet stamp and die set. I seem to reach for this set repeatedly!

KimG/All About Layering 2

For my project, I made an A2 top folding card using Neenah Solar White for the card base and the top layer of the card. I did a light ink blending of Spun Sugar Distress Oxide ink leaving some white space in the center. I then took a small mister bottle and gave it a couple of spritzes of water.

I stamped the outline of the peony flower and leaves in VersaMark ink then heat embossed it with WOW Metallic Gold Sparkle Embossing Glitter (I love this stuff!). At the bottom of the card I added an additional peony using Rose Quartz, Puffy Heart and Cosmic Berry inks using the matching die to cut it out.

I pulled the sentiment from Altenew's Persian Motifs and heat embossed it with the Gold Embossing Glitter.

KimG/All About Layering 2

Lastly, I used gold mirror board to give my card a little more shine. I love pink and gold together.

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: Neenah Solar White, Mirror Gold Cardstock

Altenew inks: Rose Quartz, Puffy Heart, Cosmic Berry

Other inks: Spun Sugar Distress Oxide ink, VersaMark ink

Embossing Powder: WOW Metallic Gold Sparkle Embossing Glitter

Altenew Stamps & Dies: Peony Bouquet, Persian Motifs

Altenew Academy

After a very long hiatus on this tiny blog of mine, I am back! I was recently asked to participate in the Altenew Educator Certification Program. This came as a very nice surprise for me as I had forgotten that I had applied quite some time ago. I am a huge Altenew fan and have quite a collection of Altenew products!

The first class is All About Layering 1. Altenew's layering stamps are hands-down my favorite stamps. Vintage Roses was the first stamp set I purchased from Altenew. This class was awesome. I learned new tips and tricks for layering my stamps. I still struggle with the Vintage Roses set and when I put some of the techniques taught in this class, it made the layering much easier. I need to really sit down and practice some more with this set, but I had fun making my card.

I made an A2 card using Vintage Roses and Painted Butterflies. The sentiment is from the Painted Butterflies set. For the roses, I started stamping with the darkest color first and worked my way to the lightest. I got much better results this way. I popped the butterflies and the sentiment up with some foam tape, then added some sequins for some sparkle.

KimG/All About Layering 1

I hope you enjoy my first project.

Supplies Used:
Cardstock: Neenah Solar White, Stampin' Up Daffodil Delight
Altenew Inks: Buttercream, Fresh Lemon, Snapdragon, Firebrick, Jet Black, Eastern Sky, Ultramarine, Frayed Leaf, Forest Glades, Evergreen
Altenew Stamps & Dies: Painted Butterflies, Vintage Roses
Sequins from my stash

Craftaholics Anonymous Handmade Gift Exchange

Once again I participated in Craftaholics Anonymous Gift Exchange.  This is my 2nd one I have done.  It is so much fun.  My giftee saw some of the coasters I made on my li'l ole blog and said she really liked them, so I knew what I was going to make for her.

Christmas Coasters for my giftee

I also sent her one of my redneck wine glasses that I make for my friends.

Turquoise Redneck Wine Glass

I had so much fun putting everything together.  I hope my giftee enjoys them as much as I did making them.

Until next time!