Chaos & Happiness

 The stencil course is all about finding ways to use your stencils in different ways and/or your cover dies as well. I tend to shy away from products that are messy because I dislike the "clean up" process. My craft space is outside of my home so I have to go inside to clean up anything that needs water.  I am lazy sometimes and put it off... then end up with a stencil or tool that is harder to clean than it should have been had I done it right away.  So...on to the project.  I chose a cover die to use as a stencil for my project.  The Radial Butterflies Cover Die seems like a challenge for me because of its simplicity.  That statement probably seems odd but that's how it felt.  It's simple but almost too simple.  I was striving for some way to make it look more interesting and using it as a stencil for building up dimension is just what I needed.   I cut two of the cover dies out of Nina solar white cardstock and adhered them together for more stability, knowing that

January 2023 Challenge I am still very new to watercoloring, but I think eventually I'll find my niche'. I used a 5x7 watercolor paper for this one because I loved the size of the stamp and didn't want to lose a lot of the image by having it only be an A2 size.  It's the Bewitching Rose stamp from the Craft your life project kit from Altenew.   I heat embossed the image using versamark ink and antique gold embossing powder.   I painted the image with the 24 pan watercolor set  and then added the sentiment from the same stamp set applied with  obsidian ink . I added some bling with Altenew's gold sequins .  I also added some white splatter from the pan set and some gold nuvo mica mist spray.  I adhered the panel to a 5x7 card base with a layer of craft foam and called it done. 😉  

 I have a few guys that I buy cards for, but making them a card is so much easier now that I have finished this course with Jen.  It's called For The Guys .  She gives so many tips on how to make it more guy themed.  The one thing that bummed me out was that there were a few stamp sets I fell in love with, that Altenew doesn't carry any more.  Over all though, I loved the course! For my card, I used blue tones but kept the image as a flower.  I enjoyed making this one because  I love using embossing powder to build up images.  The flowers on the card were created using the Folk Flowers stamp and die set along with the coordinating stencil for the background.  It's a 5x7 card with some decent layers for added dimension.  I chose not to use the stamp on the flower image so that it would be less of a flower and more attention to the leaves. The die cut flowers were inked up with Iceberg Crisp Ink and each time I added a layer of ink, I used versamark ink and clear embossing

I tend to overthink things way too much.  It causes me to have a creative block and then take FOREVER to post a project.  I finally had more me time and less overthinking so here we are. For the next course from Altenew academy, I made a card using simple direct to paper inking technique where I took each color of ink and ran it across the paper. I then added some water with a small mister bottle, dabbed the access water off and used my heat tool to dry it.  I used all of the colors in the Rainbow Prism set of mini ink pads to create a background and cut out the die cover image String Panel for the card panel and adhered it to a black base.  The pieces from the die cover were used to stamp and cut out the cactus images from the Be Strong stamp and die set.  I popped them up with foam tape and cut out the sentiment using the Featured Sentiments die set .  I cut three different sizes to raise them a tad more for focus on the sentiment.  Inside I added an additional sentiment along with

  I am participating in the Monthly Inspiration challenge on Altenew's website this month.  So for my submission I chose the Floral Acanthus stamp and die set from the Craft Your Life Project kit.  I also used the Fine Tulle stencil and the trailblazing inks for the background splatter and color on the die cut "hugs".  The flowers and leaves were done with alcohol markers from Altenew.  I list them below in the last photo.  The colors are off because I usually just snap a pic of the image to keep track of the colors for my reference.  The jewels are from Pink Fresh Studio.  The card is a 5x7 because I love the flourishes and the perfect size of the stamped floral images.  They needed a good size card. 😉 Natural light and a brightness boost. Indoor lighting late at night... Thank you for stopping by!💛