Baby Clothesline

Hello Everyone. Hope you are all enjoying the warmer Spring weather. I have windows open and lots of cleaning projects going on...but there is always time for creating too.

First up is a baby girl card. Yeah, I was supposed to have gotten this out about a month ago but I just didn't have the right stamp. Te He, you'd laugh if you saw my craft room but I had a particular image in mind. I love the Stamping Bella Ketto's clothesline stamps. I knew that Mary Maxim had a similar stamp so I went shopping after teaching class on Saturday. I found this little cutie and ran home to give it a whirl.

The stamp is wood mounted called appropriately, Baby Clothesline, by Art Gone Wild. The posts aren't part of the stamp but I just added my own. I used my prismacolor pencils, gamsol, and blendng stumps this time. I even gave a whirl at adding some grass to make it a little more realistic. I love the way Paula Tracy and Linda Heavens do this but I am not so great. I have a new motto - practice, practice, practice or you will never feel comfortable doing it. If I can encourage people to feel comfortable with their Copics, I should be able to practice what I preach in other areas as well.

I actually cased a card from Linda Heavens for this layout. I didn't have all the elements but I came pretty close. Cardstock is Bazzil, the DP is from K&Company's Small Wonders Baby Girl 12x12 pack. Deckled rectangle Nesties, Ribbon Tag Trio, and Martha Stewart Daisy border punch finish it off.

Have a great week. Thanks for stopping by!

Cathy

Easter Basket

Well another week has flown by and it's actually been two since I posted. We took a quick little trip to Maryland last weekend to see my sissy for her birthday and then on down to Richmond, VA to visit with my daughter and brother. The weather was gorgeous and put me into a Spring fever mode. 76 sure beats 40!

I thought coloring this little basket would improve my mood from the dreary, rainy weather of Michigan. This stamp is from Impression Obsession and is a rubber cling. Lizzy had them in her studio and I just had to scarf it up. Lizzy and I spent the day together yesterday heading to Livonia to visit Scrappin and Stampin which is in liquidation mode. Yes, another local shop is heading out. :( This was the shop Justin sent me to to take Paula Tracy's pencil coloring class in January. How sad is that...I just found it and then they close? Anyway, Paula is still going to be teaching but now she will be doing it in small classes at her home. I'm signed up for the May 1st classes. Whoo Hoo.

Ok, sorry, I digress. Back to the card. I decided to bring out my pencils, stubs and gamsol to shade this up. Mostly because I tried with my Copics first and I didn't like the way it turned out. My second try with Prismacolor pencils gave me alot more depth and shading. I used DP from an 8x8 paper pack by October Afternoon titled Ducks in a Row that I bought on my first excursion to Scrappin and Stampin. I backed it up with Prisma cardstock that I bought on clearance this weekend. The sentiment is also by Impression Obsession. I distressed the panel with Versa Magic Pink Petunia chalk ink. The saphire rhinestones are by Kaisercraft. I liked the way they had a small silver border. It dressed them up a bit! The ribbon is Offray from my summer Mary Maxim clearance buyout. (Still have about 100 yards of it so you might be seeing it for awhile. Te He)

Note that I used Spellbinders Deckled Rectangles as a border to the main image panel.

That's it. Have a wonderful week. If you celebrate Easter, I hope your preparations and festivities go smoothly. The DH still doesn't have his passport back so we'll be staying in Michigan. Some wonderful friends have adopted us and have invited us to share their meal. We'll miss our usual gatherings, but we're thankful for the offer and are looking forward to the new tradition.

Love Ya,
Cath

Mumu sways your way..

Helle Everyone! Hope you all had a great week. Can't believe how quickly they fly by. For today's post, I have another Mo Manning digital image. Mary Maxim will be stocking this from Stampavie in a photopolymer clear stamp.



Meet Mumu. Isn't she darling? She was fun to color as well. This is going to be the card for my April Copic's classes at Mary Maxim. I finished her up yesterday and made a quick stop to find some coordinating papers. Loved what I was able to find. The DP is from TCP Studio's Mediterranean Summer collection titled Whitewash. It's double sided and has vibrant oranges and soft blues. I thought it brought out the colors in my image beautifully. What do you think? Of course, I'd have preferred to have the paper first to coordinate with my Copics but I did this one in reverse and it worked out just fine.

My theme for this class is "Blender gets a workout". I'd like to demonstrate new techniques as we explore the versatility of copics. This class will be all about using the blender pen. I layed lots of color down and then softened it to white in places to give you a weathered fabric feel. I also used the blender to soften the shading of the gound beneath Mumu's feet. And I even shaded the silk flower to match my copic colors and again added the blender pen so that the blue "ran" at the center.

The embellishments came together by accident as I was trying out different layouts. I had pulled some precut nesties shapes (rejects from previous layouts) and the Fluer De Lis pendant jumped out at me. I added a gemstone center to the flower and raised this on dimensionals. The center blue strip was cut with a Friskars punch.

Mary Maxim will be carrying Mo's new photopolymer stamps from the Stampavie line. They should be in stock soon and I bet they'll be as popular as they are in digital form.

I can't wait to get this off to Brenda so that she can post the copic color list. This should be a real fun class.

Have a great week and thanks for stopping by.

Cath

Copics anyone?

Hello everyone! I know, I know, it's been forever since you saw me here. A couple of things have gotten in the way. First, I have not been able to figure out how to use my new photo software with my new computer. Therefore, I have not been able to upload pictures. I finally broke down today and gave it a whirl on my old computer. It's on it's last legs but it's trying. The next item that got in the way is that I am finally getting into teaching beginner Copic classes at Mary Maxim's in Fort Gratiot, MI. It meant spending some time picking the picture, Copic colors and cutting out enough for 10 students to have a practice image and a final card.

So my first card is a sample of the card we did in class today...



The image is a clear photopolymer stamp by Gillian Roberts titled Being Together from the Stampavie line. Mary Maxim's will be stocking these after finding them at the recent CHA show. They've been a little slow getting their stock in however, so I used the sample they gave out at the show. I used a friendship sentiment inside but left the front of the card focused on the Copic colored image.

I know this was a pretty detailed first card to make but it used some techniques we learned in class; layering colors and sometimes blending colors. Some of us even used the colorless blender to add texture or erase mistakes.

We had 10 women that attended this class and I had a ball. I hope I wasn't too overwhelming with my not so quiet voice and the limited time we had to do a sample and then a final try at our card image. I think that everyone did a great job substituting with colors they owned or sharing with their neighbors. 17 colors were combined to make this image come to life and although I would have liked to make it just a little fewer to get everyone started, I knew that to get the true feel of the markers it takes multiple colors to do it. One good thing is that I had lots of brown to work with so we doubled up alot and the E31 sure got used alot.

I can't wait to do my next class - Monday, March 29th. I'm hoping to color a Mo Manning image that is also being sold by Stampavie in clear photopolymer. Mo used to sell her images digitally only but has recently made a select few available in "rubber". I can't wait for Mary Maxim's to get these in - everyone knows how much I love Mo's images. They just scream to be colored.

I'd like to give a little shout out to Maria from Sarnia, Canada - whom I finally got to meet in my class today. Although, I'm not sure why she was in a beginner class, she's great! She brought some of her creations with her and they were beautiful. Check out her blog here. So glad to meet you Maria - I look forward to creating with you in the future.


Next up is a Birthday Bella I made for my nephew Addison. I know that I've colored this up before but I changed the colors a little. The main reason was I made this in NY and forgot my teal colors in MI but I actually like the way the red sections link the red background paper. It also pulls the red from the DP which is by Cosmo Cricket. I love, love, love this paper.



Coloring was done with Prisma pencils and gamsol. The image is The Birthday boy by Stamping Bella. Pretty easy once you get the coloring done...of course that took me about an hour and I'm sure my 5 year old nephew didn't much notice the time I put into it but I had so much fun bringing this little guy to life!


Lastly...I made this bride up as an Engagement congratulations for a friend's daughter. The stamp is by Whipper Snapper Designs titled Modern Bride.



I saw this in Mary Maxim's and have had it for months. I just have not made the time to put her together. I was pleasantly pleased that she took a little over 10 minutes to color. Once you get the color technique for skin, highlighting and such the color selection choices you have to make become much easier. I find that E11, E00, and E000 work for me. These three are now my "go to" and became the largest part of the stamp. Next use two complimentary reds for the flowers, greens for the stems, and yellow for the hair. I actually used the same face, hair, and reds from the class I did today so that students could see the versatility of their stash. The cool blue highlight gave the impression of shadow but let you know the dress is white.

Glitter highlights in the hair and along the back of the dress helped give dimension and a small pearl became the only jewelry needed for this bride! Here's a close up for you...



The design paper here is by Me & My Big Ideas and is simply titled, Specialty Cardstock. It's filled with bold colors and some glitter highlights. This particular page did not have glitter but I loved the black, white, soft teal combo.

That's it for today folks. Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Cath

Happy Valentine's Day...

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. I hope you all have plans to do something fun today. I have some errands to run, one of which is to pickup my new computer and I can't wait. My current computer is working like it's on it's last legs - kinda like I did last year. It's slow and locks up all the time. Can't wait to zip along on my new one.

Today's card is a simple creation I made for my hubby. I didn't want to make it too frilly so I pulled out some K&Company Valentine's paper, my heart Nestabilities and my Sizzix letters - Endless Love. A leftover piece of ribbon and an old button make this good to go.

I'll try to get back this afternoon...but I've gotta run to pickup my computer.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by.

Cath

Valentine wishes...Huggabugg style

I love Stamping Bella stamps and this is a new one I bought when I ventured to Scrappin and Stampin in Livonia, MI last month. I wanted to test my Paula coloring skills on an image that she didn't show us and I had great fun. Once you know the basics it is sooo fun to build on them. This is beeemine huggabugg...isn't she darling? I colored her in shades of pink to match the K&Company Valentine paper. The silky sheer ribbon is from my Mary Maxim stash and though I was tempted to add an embellishment, I thought that it would draw your eye away from the little cutie so I just added a border from Martha Stewart and called it a day. Note that I did add some glitter to the anters and also some black fine glitter to her hair to make it shine. She looks so girlie to me and I fell in love.

Hope you enjoy!

Thanks for stopping by.

Cathy

Biker Birthday - Unity Style

If you haven't guessed, January is a big birthday month and I've been busy trying to keep up with it all.



This stamp is from Unity stamps and I was lucky to have gotten it as a Christmas present from my Sissy. I have seen it in cyberland before and thought it would be great for the DH or his biker friends. It came just in time for the DH, Tom and John's b-days. I made this kinda quickly and didn't stew. I did some simple coloring with my Copics in light greys to highlight the pipes and then added Stampin Up! Crystal Effects on the black tanks and wheel wells to make them pop. I colored the lights in a soft yellow and then again added the Crystal Effects to make them shine. The circles were made using Nestabilites classic large and small circles. The sentiment was again computer generated. A Harley sticker embellishes the right corner and that makes this a wrap. Nothing fancy but then, men like simple right?

Hope you are enjoying your week.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cathy