Det snør, det snør, tiddelibom {Rachelle Anne Miller}

Hi, crafty friends. The sentiment on this card probably won’t make much sense to you unless you’re Norwegian, but it’s the first line of a Winnie the Pooh song about snow (I found a voice recording of it here if you want to listen). Now, Winnie the Pooh isn’t in this card, but I have some cute Polar Bears from Rachelle Anne Miller. I love this image, and realized once my coloring was done that I had printed a no line version on the back of the panel. I probably intended to use that, as I prefer no line for “white” things. Oh well, I wasn’t starting over, and I’ve colored these polar bears in a no line version previously, so maybe having black lines this time wasn’t such a bad idea after all?

I took a quick look at the colors I’ve focused on recently to try to choose something different and opted for this blue green combo. I colored the image with Copics and added a horizon in the distance with a few trees scattered about.

I made sure not to add to many trees so there would be room for the sentiment, which I stamped in Oceanside ink from Concord & 9th. The sentiment itself is from the Snøstorm stamp set from byCino. I die cut my panel using the lartest die in the A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX 1 set from My Favorite Things, before I sprinkled on chunky white embossing enamel from Stampendous. I made sure that none of the granules covered the sentiment or the eyes of the polar bears before melting the powder from the back.

I adhered my panel to a card base I’d covered with a quarter sheet of Oceanside cardstock from Concord & 9th. This is actually a side fold card. I usually make top fold cards, but I didn’t have any landscape oriented card bases on hand and didn’t feel like breaking open a new pack of cardstock. Long live lazy crafting, right?

Very cool color palette for this one.

Have an adventurous birthday! {Purple Onion Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. I’m sharing a fun, one layer birthday card today, featuring lots of cuties from the latest Amongst the Pines collection from Purple Onion Designs. I love every single collection Stacey Yacula creates for Purple Onion Designs, and this is a great outdoorsy one!

I created a fun water scene with Hazel, Skip, Rip, Paddle and the Rainbow Falls background, all from the latest release. There’s a bit of masking involved, but I love creating cards like this! I stamped all the critters using My Favorite Things Extreme Black ink, which is Copic friendly. I added masks for all of them, then stamped the background using Fadeout ink from Inkon3, which is an awesome ink for no line coloring. I colored the background first, then all the critters, before stamping the critters again, this time using Obsidian ink from Altenew. This is a pigment ink and not at all Copic friendly, so I do this once all the coloring is done. Using a Misti and a sheet of acetate makes it easy to line the images back up to stamp on top of the previous stamping.

I stamped a sentiment from the coordinating The Great Outdoors Sentiment Set using Blue Yonder ink from My Favorite Things. The blue matches the water nicely, and the sentiment isn’t too much of a distraction from the main scene when it’s tone on tone. I used an extra fine point white Sharpie to create ripples in the water and the foam created from the waterfall, and my card was complete.

Considering I colored the entire card front on this card, I don’t think I used too many markers.

Warm holiday hugs {Rachelle Anne Miller Creative Studios}

Hi, crafty friends. It’s time for a Christmas card, right? I love Rachelle Anne Miller’s Polar Bears, and I’ve made a fairly monochromatic card with a little bit of no line coloring, some ink blending, and a stamped sentiment. Super simple.

Isn’t this image the sweetest, with mama bear and her two cubs? For some reason, I love coloring polar bears, and to make them look “white” (although real polar bears aren’t really white), I always do no line coloring whenever I create cards with polar bears.

Once my coloring was complete, I made a quick mask from Post-it tape to cover up my polar bears before I used my Wintry Forest stencil set from Pinkfresh Studio along with inks from Altenew (the colors are Misty Morning, Cloudy Sky and Nimbus) to create my background.

I die cut my panel using the second largest die in the Additional A2 Layers die set from Waffle Flower Crafts, adhered it to a panel of Enchanted Evening cardstock from Papertrey Ink and then onto the card base.

I stamped a sentiment from the Scripty Xmas stamp set from Mama Elephant using Enchanted Evening ink from Papertrey Ink and added some white dots to the cub’s hat with a white Gelly Roll 05 pen. And that finishes the card. I decided not to add any embellishments to it.

Oh, how I love blue for Christmas cards.

Naturally, lots of blue for the coloring, too.

May all your wishes come true! {Purple Onion Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. I’m here today sharing a 4 bar card. I love creating cards of all sizes, and this is a fun one, I enjoy the smaller format.

This is Wishing from Purple Onion Designs, illustrated by Stacey Yacula. It’s one of the larger stamps from Purple Onion, and it’s actually the first Purple Onion stamp I ever colored up, which means it holds a special place in my heart. I wanted a soft look and stamped the image in Fadeout ink from Inkon3 before coloring.

I love no line coloring, and no line is perfect for an image like this, which has just enough detail to make it interesting, but it’s still large enough to get soft gradient in colors and not too fiddly.

Once I finished my coloring, I added my panel to a 4 bar card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I created some texture to the dandelion fluff by using my Quickie glue pen and sprinkling on Rock Candy Distress glitter.

I adhered scraps of a Doodlebug mini paper doily to opposite corners of the card to add to the soft, delicate look I was aiming for. Using Sour Apple ink from My Favorite Things, I stamped a sentiment from the A Beautiful Day sentiment set from Purple Onion Designs onto Sprout cardstock from Concord & 9th, cut it down to a strip and mounted it on foam tape and adhered it to the top right corner of the card, before finishing off with a trio of crystals from Papirdesign.

Very soft color palette.

I hope you like the present you told me to buy for you {Alex Syberia Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. Today is the final Instagram hop for the Alex Syberia Designs Kickstarter campaign. We’re all sharing cards with the products in the kickstarter release and there are plenty of prizes up for grabs, so head over to Instagram once you finish reading this blog post 😉

For my final card I’m focusing on the Birthday Wonderland stamp set, and I used both trees, the raccoon and the bear for my card, in addition to one of the sentiments.

I decided to go for a no line look in the background with the trees and used black lines for the two cute critters.

Once my image was stamped and colored I cut it down significantly and mounted it on foam tape to a top fold landscape card base I created from Enchanted Evening cardstock from Papertrey Ink.

There’s something about this bear that reminds me of Yogi. That might actually be the reason I colored his hat green. These two have such character, but the bear’s my favorite, just don’t tell the raccoon.

I used a white Sharpie with an extra fine tip for the dots of snow (is it snow?) on the trees.

Simple, subdued color palette for this card.

Have a magical holiday {Purple Onion Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. I hope you’re not tired of all my holiday cards yet, because I have another one to share today. This time, it’s featuring Jolly the snowman from Purple Onion Designs. He’s got to be the cutest, happiest snowman ever, right? I know I say that about all the snowman stamps I use, but this guy is special.

I created a very simple scene for this card, stamping the snowman in Fadeout ink from Inkon3 before adding a mask, then stamping the snowballs using the same ink. I then added a mask to the snowballs and a curved mask on top to create a curved horizon line.

Every once in a while, I break out my airbrush system. I actually keep it out on my desk, but I have a big desk and don’t usually sit close to it. I love the airbrush system, it’s such an awesome way to get a layer of color quickly. Coloring an entire nighttime sky with Copics takes a while, airbrushing it is faster. Use colors that are darker than what you think you want, and make sure there’s enough ink in the marker before starting. I used B99 and B97 for this sky, and it’s wonderfully dark and the perfect backdrop for the lighter colors of the snowy scene in front.

Once I finished the airbrushing, I carefully removed the masks and did no line coloring of the rest of the scene. At this point, I’ve colored snow so often, I can do it in my sleep. This snowman is pretty easy to color too, most of the areas are pretty big surfaces, so it’s a very forgiving image.

After I finished my coloring, I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment in the sky. The sentiment is actually from the Scripty Xmas stamp set from Mama Elephant, I kind of forgot for a second that I was creating a Purple Onion card, I was a little lost in a creative zone. After heat embossing the sentiment, I sprinkled on chunky white embossing enamel from Stampendous to create my super snowy scene, making sure to remove any granules that landed on top of the embossed letters before melting the granules from the back.

I trimmed 1/8″ off each side of my scene and adhered it to a white card base I created from white cardstock from Papertrey Ink, deciding not to add any embellishments. I figured there was enough going on already with all the snow.

As usual – lots of colors used for the snow. The two blues at the very bottom after the break are the colors I used for the airbrushed sky.

Happy holidays {Mo’s Digital Pencil}

Hi, crafty friends. I have a super simple card to share today. Sometimes, it takes forever to create a card (or at least, it feels that way), other times it goes so fast. Today’s card falls into the latter category. I guess there’s something about a time crunch that makes be efficient – I definitely work better under pressure.

I love Mo’s elves, and this is Little Elf Kippa. The original image faces the other direction, but I flipped it in Photoshop so that he or she is facing right instead of left – one of the many advantages of using digital stamps. I also printed it at about 12% opacity for a no line look, only keeping the eye and eyebrow dark before printing.

Once the image was colored, I used the largest die in the A2 Stitched Rectangles STAX 1 set from My Favorite Things to create a faux stitch border. I then white heat embossed a sentiment from the Mini Messages stamp set from Mama Elephant in the center of the darkest bauble, before adhering the panel onto a top fold card base I created from Enchanted Evening cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I added a few diamonds from the Urban Chic mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to finish off the card.

Simple color palette for this one. It was super fast to color too, which isn’t usually the case with no line coloring.

Hugs {Lee Holland Designs}

Hi, crafty friends! I have a super clean and simple card to share today, featuring the Polar bear and penguin image from Lee Holland Designs. The coloring took a while, but the rest of the card only took a few minutes.

I printed the image with a 10% opacity onto X-Press It blending card before coloring. Whenever I want to color things that are supposed to look close to white (ice, snow, polar bears +++), I prefer doing a no line version. To me, there’s something very distracting about black lines on an image that’s supposed to look white, so I prefer the softer no line version. I colored the image with Copics, starting with the sky, then ocean, ice floe, polar bear and finally the penguin and his little scarf. I prefer doing the black towards the end, it’s just good practice to avoid getting it into nearby areas where you don’t want it.

Once I finished the coloring, I die cut the panel using the second largest die in the A2 Stitched Rectangles STAX 1 set from My Favorite Things, before mounting it on foam tape onto a white card base I created from white cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I die cut the word klem (hug) twice from white cardstock using a die from Kort & Godt. It’s actually a Christmas die that says juleklem (Christmas hug), but by using only the latter part of the word, I have a completely different use for the die, which I love. That’s the whole card, I decided not to add any embellishments, I wanted to keep the focus on the image.

Loooots of Copics for this deceptively simple scene.

Your friendship means so much {Purple Onion Designs}

Hi, crafty friends. I have a card to share today featuring the two cutest bunnies you ever did see. April and Bella from Purple Onion Designs are actually both from the Spread Kindness collection from 2018, but the Purple Onion Designs images are timeless and will never get old. Purple Onion Designs is having their anniversary sale right now, too. We’re celebrating 19 years of beautiful rubber stamps and all Purple Onion Designs rubber stamps (with just a few exceptions) are 25% off until Sunday, so if you’ve had your eyes on some of the gorgeous new stamps from the latest “A Special Day” release or some older ones, like the one’s I’ve used for my card today, this is your chance to get a great deal. Saving 25% means you can buy more stamps, right?

I stamped April (the bunny on the swing), masked off the rope of the swing, stamped the Perch from the A Sweet Summer collection from 2013, and then stamped Bella (bunny holding flower) to the right of April. I also masked part of the branch before stamping the Countryside horizon stamp from the A Happy Little Place collection that came out in 2021. I used Fadeout ink from Inkon3 for a soft noline look in the background. The different collections from Purple Onion work so seamlessly together, the possibilities are endless.

When I color full panels like this, I usually color the sky blue, but I wanted to shake things up a little for this card and gave it a soft sunset vibe instead. I live far enough north that the sun doesn’t really set until really late at night in the summer, but a girl can pretend, right? Anything goes when it’s a card, it doesn’t have to be very realistic – not that a bunny on a swing (or one holding a flower for that matter) is very realistic to begin with.

I lost track of how many layers of green I added for the grass. I wanted it to be light and soft looking almost fading into white in the background to make the foreground stand out, and darker in the foreground so the critters would look like they belonged to the scene. I started with the lighter colors for my blends, then kept introducing darker greens towards the bottom and fading up into the background until I found the intensity I was after.

Once I finished coloring in the scene, I added a sentiment from the Together stamp set. The sentiment comes in one line, but I wanted a stacked look for this card and cut it in half to make it fit the space I had in the scene. I used VersaFine Onyx Black ink to get crisp dark lines. The bottom half looks a little bolder than the top because I needed to stamp it twice. I probably should have let it air dry between the two stampings, but I was impatient and used my heat tool to speed along the drying, which seems to also have made the stamping bleed a little. Note to self for next time, I guess.

I trimmed off 1/16″ on all four sides of my colored panel and adhered it to a white card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I thought about leaving the panel a full size, but I really like the border the white cardstock gives, it’s a nice little frame.

I find it odd that I rarely use more colors for full panels like this than just a simple image, but that tends to be how it is around here.

Get Cracking on Christmas – July

Hi, crafty friends. We’ve reached the third Thursday of the month, which means it’s time to get cracking on Christmas. This is a series Jenn Shurkus created a few years back. The intention is to use the supplies you bought the last holiday season and didn’t get around to using AND to make you less stressed come November, because you’ve already got a bunch of holiday cards made. I enjoy making Christmas cards all year, so Get Cracking on Christmas is PERFECT for me.

For today’s card, I no line colored this selfie with the penguin and snowman from the Selfies with Santa stamp set, designed by Stacey Yacula for My Favorite Things. I love this stamp set and went with a pink to yellow winter sunset in the background, and a grayish green and brownish orange for the rest. Somehow it works. Onto a card base I created from Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, I stamped snowflakes from the Flurry of Love stamp set from My Favorite Things using Fossilized Amber Distress Oxide ink. I didn’t have an ink in the same tone as my coloring, but the yellow works.

I mounted my the selfie at an angle using foam tape, die cut the Merry Script die from Mama Elephant several times from Ocean Tides cardstock from Papertrey Ink and stacked them together for dimension. I stamped and white heat embossed the word CHRISTMAS from the Itty Bitty Holiday stamp set from My Favorite Things, and adhered that below the die cut word with 6 additional strips of cardstock behind it for dimension. To finish off the card I adhered a few sequins from the White Orchid sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

Lots of colors for this one.