Welcome to Stampotique DT

Stampotique Designers Blog has a new Design Team and the challenge is to create a welcome card for them. Here is my card. I am really looking forward to seeing what the Design team creates. Stampotique stamps are so much fun to use.

KSS Monday

How quickly time flies when we're having fun. Today is the last day of January and today will be my last post as KSS Guest Designer. It certainly has been a fun month starting with the grand opening of the forum and gallery.
I created my card using several of the weekly challenges as my focus. I will start by saying that this was NOT a 10 minute or less card, as I am somewhat circle-challenged. I started with Connie's Friday sketch challenge. I used Lisa's Stock up on Occasions theme of St. Patrick's Day (added a few Good Luck items). As for Makiko's Make It Glamorous with Glitter challenge, I used a bit of bling instead of glitter. Does that count? Julie's Word of the Week is "Live". I figured that with a green beer, we could live it up in celebration of St. Patrick's Day.
Now to my card. It is an actual circle card. I used stamps from Multi-Step Cup of Warm Comfort, Multi-Step Shamrocks and Clover, Multi-Step Lucky Horseshoe, and Ready 4 any Holiday. The background layer is stamped all over with the large and the small shamrock. The square sentiment layer is stamped in Bottle. The narrow rectangle layer has rows of green rhinestone at each end. On the circle, image layer I stamped the green beer and masked it so I could stamp the two horseshoes. Notice that they are open at the top so they can catch the good luck and not spill it. The horseshoes have tiny beads attached for the nails. The beer has a fluffy foam mady with a Diva ice white pearl pen. It almost looks good enough to drink.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color Recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack)
Shamrocks - 1 willow, 2 clover, 3 bottle
Green beer - 1 willow, 2 juniper, 3 lemonade, 4 citrus
Horseshoes - 1 lake mist, 2 slate, 3 jet black 



Remember When

This week Simon Says Stamp and Show a childhood memory. Critter Sketch challenges us to use a circle and distressing. Tuesday Throwdown also challenges us to use distressing. These challenges worked hand in hand and this is the card I created.  The circle is obvious. The childhood memories are reading to my younger brothers and sisters and swinging on the swing. There is a lot of distressing from the distress inked edges, the sanded core'dinations background, and the torn paper frame around the image. The image of the children is from Rogue Redhead Designs. The sentiments are from Artistic Outpost Playtime.

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 29

This week the Compendium of Curiosities challenge comes from p. 50 of Tim's book. We are doing weathered wood grunge. Ever since Tim used the rickety house during the 12 Tags of Christmas, I have looked at it in a very different way. I no longer see it as only a haunted house. For this challenge I used the rickety house. I reversed the cut. It's embossed with the brick texture fade. I painted it with a white dabber and once it was sanded, I used Vintage photo distress ink. The art in the windows comes from Suze Weinberg and I used fragments over the art. The background is from Tim's paper stack.

CHAPTER 1: Changing Form/Feb 2011 Challenge--Week 1

"Alice crouched down among the trees as well as she could, for her neck kept getting entangled among the branches, and every now and then she had to stop and untwist it. After a while she remembered that she still held the pieces of mushroom in her hands, and she set to work very carefully, nibbling first at one and then at the other, and growing sometimes taller and sometimes shorter, until she had succeeded in bringing herself down to her usual height.

It was so long since she had been anything near the right size, that it felt quite strange at first; but she got used to it in a few minutes, and began talking to herself, as usual. `Come, there's half my plan done now! How puzzling all these changes are! I'm never sure what I'm going to be, from one minute to another!"

-- Chapter 5, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Well, just like Alice we have been through quite a few changes! But our familiar Alice challenges have arrived safely in at their new home, The Altered Alice blog, although in a new monthly form.

To reflect all these changes, the challenge is to make something that features a dress form, OR to make something that changes in form! While it is not required that your project include Alice in Wonderland, we do encourage it. If your project features Wonderland you will get two chances in the prize drawing instead of one, and what a prize it is!

STAMPOTIQUE ORIGINALS is sponsoring our first challenge with a generous $30 gift certificate, and their fabulous design team is going to play along!

Here is my project to inspire you:

My first project as Design Team member is a dimensional one. The idea came about as a combination of items just fell in place. The modified shadow box was made from a kit from Club Scrap. It was the monthly project from a few months ago, which I never got a chance to work on. The paper dolls were a gift to me from my sister who knows I love Alice. Combining these items, my Alice image stamps and sentiments, and some related ephemera, I created an Alice lover's wall hanging. How does this relate to the challenge? There are images of Alice in various sizes, and the whole idea of paper dolls is to change the clothing. Most of the ephemera relates to Alice changing in size. What is hard to see from the photos is the contents of the shadow box area. Inside, there is an image of the Mad Hatter in the background, a glass bottle with the "Drink Me" tag, and a crown.

Now let me explain how this new monthly challenge works:

1st Sunday of the month: The new challenge will be posted with the link tool, and a few of the design team samples will be posted.

2nd Sunday: Additional design team samples will be posted.

3rd Sunday: The last of the design team samples will be posted.

Last Sunday of the month: A winner will be announced and some of your projects may be given an "honorable mention".

We are starting a week early with the February challenge because we didn't want to leave you with a gap, so we will spread the design team samples over four weeks and the winner will be announced on February 27th. You have a whole month to submit your creations, so we are hoping that a lot more of you will decide to play along!

Enter your links on The Altered Alice before 8 p.m. EST (GMT - 5) on Friday, February 25th. A winner will be announced on Sunday, February 27th. Check back at The Altered Alice each Sunday between now and then for more inspiration!

Bloggers Challenge Friday

This week Bloggers Challenge was birthday cards. I created this card based on another challenge to create a card using something with an A or B. Well, Alice - butterflies -  and birthday all fit the criteria. The background, although scanning faint, is a paint stamped diamond pattern. Alice and the fawn are painted with Creative Inspirations paints and the butterflies are covered with sepia accents.
Can't wait to see what everyone else has done.
Now for a shameless plug--my first posting as Design Team member on The Altered Alice challenge site will be Sunday. Hope to see you there too.

Cling Pearls

Last week's Try That Technique was to use the Cling Pearls technique from the Oct/Nov 2007 Technique Junkies newsletter. To create the background I used blue and a bit of purple pearl ex. I have to admit that it's a messy technique. To fix the pearl ex I had to use an acrylic sealer spray since my old faithful Workable Fixative wasn't strong enough. Luckily I used some of my favorite colors since I was wearing them for a while. The frame is the window die cut from Heartfelt Creations cut from gold metallic paper. The image is from Stampland. Isn't she elegant!

Three New Artistic Outpost Releases

Artistic Outpost has three new collections just to get your creativity going. Ephemeral Backgrounds, Think and Wonder, and Songbirds are available both unmounted and mounted and pre-trimmed.

Ephemeral Backgrounds:  Multiple vintage images to accompany all of our images. This set includes postcard snippets, sheet music, and antique ledger large 3.75 x 5" stamps.

Think and Wonder:  Beautiful collages, adorable children adorn this collection. Featuring some of our favorite quotes by Dr. Seuss.

Songbirds:  You will find so many beautiful uses for this unique vintage set of stamps. Elegant and musically inspired images featuring vintage bird illustrations.

Aren't these wonderful images and fun backgrounds. Here are a few cards I created using the new stamp sheets.

Image and Sentiment from Think and Wonder

Images from Songbirds and Ephemera Backgrounds.

Images from Ephemera Backgrounds with a few from Songbirds.

Be sure to check out the galleries featuring the beautiful cards, tags, and mixed media projects by our super talented design team.

Gerrie Johnnic - Lisa Somerville - Judy Hayes -  Lynn Stevens  - Stephanie Severin - Suzanne Czosek 

To celebrate these releases, we are offering 15% off your entire purchase. Now through February 14th, use coupon code January2011 at checkout, and you will receive 15% off all items.

KSS Monday

This week my KSS Monday card is a combination of my new Multi Step Invisible Snowman set of stamps, the Friday sketch challenge from Connie and the Tuesday Pantry challenge (embossing folders) from Makiko. I took the liberty of turning the sketch on its side so I could add the sentiment. Have you visited the KSS forum lately? There are daily challenges from the Crew members and lots of valuable information. Visit the gallery there for inspiration and ideas.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color recipes: (All inks are Adirondack unless noted)
Hat -- 1 lake mist, 2 slate, 3 smokey grey (Versafine), 4 Jet Black
Scarf -- 1 watermelon, 2 cranberry
Pipe -- 1 latte, 2 caramel, 3 espresso
Eyes and Mouth -- 1 slate, 2 jet black
Carrot -- 1 peach bellini, 2 sunset orange, 3 rust
Buttons -- 1 sail boat blue, 2 denim

Hello-Goodbye

This is my entry for the Alice challenge. It is a Hello/Goodbye card in honor of the Oh Alice blog team members--hello to those who are staying on at the new challenge site and goodbye to those who are leaving to go on to new endeavors. This is the last challenge at the Oh Alice site. Beginning next Sunday the challenges will be found on The Altered Alice blog.
This week's transition challenge is to travel "Back down the Rabbit Hole" challenge-back to the beginning-Create a HELLO card (for OR a "Goodbye" card)-it's all about what it looks like on the other side of that Looking Glass, right? The prize is a WONDERFUL Nikki Sivils  prize pack for ONE lucky winner. Please note that the winner will be announced next week on the Altered Alice challenge Blog. All creations must be  THERE in order to enter.

Simon Says Stamp and Show Polka Dots

When I saw that Simon Says Stamp and Show polka dots, the first thing I thought of was clowns. However, I don't do cute very often. Well, I had borrowed this stamp from my sister (Thanks Pat) a while back because I thought it was a cool stamp. So now I had my clown. Polka dots isn't usually my thing either, except this designer paper which is somewhat distressed looking and some of the dots have a kind of glitter, giving the paper a cool texture. I backed the image with a copper metallic paper cut with a spellbinders die. Add a philosophy tag from the Tim Holtz line and the sentiment from Artistic Outpost stamps. The image was colored using my Creative Inspirations paints to give him a brightly colored outfit with a bit of shimmer. The end result is a clown with polka dots card that is more to my style of stamping. What fun!

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 28

This week the Compendium of Curiosities Challenge was Colorful Layered Fragments from p.57 of Tim's book. I decided to go with a French post card theme this week. Ok, I wanted to use my Moulin Rouge stamp from the set of Tim's stamps that are autographed. I've been wanting to use this stamp for quite a while and it seemed the perfect one for this week. I used the very large oval fragment and stamped the Eiffel Tower. I used copper, pearl, stonewashed, and latte alcohol inks on my fragment. The background was done with denim and fired brick distress ink. I love the way everything came together.

It's time to Celebrate

This is not a new image, but it represents a new era. First, I'm so excited to announce that I've been chosen to be on the Design Team for The Altered Alice. For those of you who know me through my blog and otherwise, you know that I am a big fan of Alice in Wonderland. I have been playing in the challenges at Oh Alice ever since I discovered them.  Well, today is the last challenge at Oh Alice; Jess, the current Mad Hatter has decided that she needs to move on. However, the wonderful news is that Lynne Phelps has taken over the hat and is the incoming Mad Hatter of the twisted tea party. Here is the information in her words:
"In Wonderland, Alice learned that everything changes so the important thing is to be true to yourself. That is true for the Alice in Wonderland challenges as well, which will be changing and growing in new directions. When our current Mad Hatter, Jess, decided it was time to move on, I just couldn't let the Alice in Wonderland challenges die so I have stepped up to the plate as the new Mad Hatter of our Twisted Tea Party!
You will find our same familiar challenge Chapters but they will be in a new monthly form, beginning on the first Sunday of the month and posting the winner on the last Sunday of the month. The design team will provide weekly project posts to inspire you along the way! In between challenge posts, we will continue to feature our familiar reviews of Alice in Wonderland artwork."
This week's challenge starts at the Oh Alice blog. This week's mission is to travel "Back down the Rabbit Hole" challenge-back to the beginning-Create a HELLO card (for OR a "Goodbye" card)-it's all about what it looks like on the other side of that Looking Glass, right? The prize is a wonderful assortment of Nikki Sivils  papers and embellishments. Your cards should be posted on The Altered Alice blog. Winners will be announced on Saturday, and the new monthly challenge will begin on Sunday.
Come join us and our mad Wonderland friends as we continue our journey. See you there on Sunday.

Valentine Design

This week the Blogger's Challenge is theme pattern papers. I chose to use paper from Tim Holtz's Vintage Shabby paper stack to create a Valentine Card. Valentine, by the way, is also the challenge at Tuesday Throwdown. I love this particular paper stack because of the cool colors. The background panel is done with one striped pattern. The rosette is done with more of a scroll pattern. The heart in the center and the little heart are from Kitchen Sink Stamps. The rickrack across the bottom actually turned out to be too pink, so I went over it with Victorian Velvet distress ink to tone it down. The panel is also edged with Victorian Velvet. Burgundy Stickles was used to edge the rosette and heart. The flourish is made with pearls and rhinestones. It adds a pretty bling to the whole card.
Color recipe for KSS stamps: (all ink used is Adirondack)
Rose Heart -- 1 pink sherbert, 2 raspberry, 3 wild plum, 4 cranberry
Small heart -- 1 pink sherbert, 2 wild plum, archival black for sentiment 

I'm excited to announce that I have just been selected to be on the Design Team for Class Act Stamps -- the Chapel Road Division. Look for artwork starting around the end of February.

Aged Tiles

This week the Try That Technique challenge  is Aged Tiles from the April 2008 Technique Junkies Newsletter. I love the antique look of this technique. I thought that the perfect image for this card was the Outpost from Artistic Outpost. I kept the card fairly monochromatic to maintain the feeling of tranquility.

Chapter 46 Queen Alice

In Wonderland, Iracebeth is the Red Queen of Crims and Mirana is the White Queen. Iracebeth and Mirana are sisters who couldn't be more different: while the White Queen is kind and gentle and is loved by everyone, the Red Queen's answer to everything is "Off with their heads!"

To honor our Royal Highnesses, the challenge at Oh Alice is to choose which Royal Court you would want to have rule over you, the Red Queen's or the White Queen's???
So the challenge this week is to create a card/project that is either mostly white or mostly red.

Since I truly value my head, I obviously went with Mirana, the White Queen. I will admit that Iracebeth is much more colorful (and definitely easier to scan), Mirana certainly has a kind of beauty.

To create my card I dug into my white cardstock. The base card is cryogen. It has its own sparkle. The card panel uses paper from the Paper Temptress. I wish you could see the shimmer and elegance in this tuxedo striped paper. Next I cut the fancy Heartfelt Creation window and die cut a piece of two sided adhesive. I removed the backing paper and attached the window to the card. I removed the other paper leaving just the adhesive attached to the card. I covered the entire adhesive window diecut with white glass bead glitter. The Queen Alice image was painted using Creative Inspirations paints. The die cut scalloped oval was edged with silver paint. The sentiment was printed from the challenge with a Dymo writer.

In addition to Oh Alice Fabulous Friday challenged us this week to use paint in our creation.

KSS Monday

Hi and Happy KSS Monday. I can't believe how fast January is going by. This is my third week as Guest Designer for Kitchen Sink Stamps and I am having so much fun working (really playing, it's too much fun to call it work) with the stamps. Today I am featuring stamps from the new release Multi Step Bunch O' Balloons and Multi Step Li'l Elephant. As soon as I saw the balloons , I knew I wanted to put them together with the adorable elephant. My layout is based Connie's Friday Carte Challenge. You can find the different crew challenges at the Kitchen Sink Stamp Forum.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack)

1st balloon -- 1 cloudy blue, 2 sailboat blue, 3 stonewashed, 4 denim

2nd Balloon -- 1 shell pink, 2 cool peri, 3 purple twilight, 4 eggplant

Elephant -- 1 lake mist, 2 pebble, 3 slate, 4 archival black

Masking challenges

The Compendium of Curiosities challenge this week is  Distress Misting Masks from p. 60 of Tim's book. By coincidence, Simon says Stamp and Show masking. Stampotique also has the challenge of masking.The masks I used are the music mask from Tim Holtz and the butterflies from Heidi Swapp. The distress mist is a combination of shabby shutters and pine needles distress inks and sparkle perfect pearls. Over the masked butterflies I added outline stickers which i distressed with black soot alcohol ink. I added rock candy and antique linen stickles inside the butterflies and antique linen distress ink for the flower centers. The sentiment is a See-D stamp and roughly translated means best wishes.

Bloggers Challenge 186

I love it when a few challenges work together. In this case it's a sketch, a color, and a technique challenge that worked themselves into my card. First, Bloggers challenge was a sketch (on the left) challenge  this week. The challenge at Oh Alice is to share something that helps you capture your holiday memories, like a layout, mini-album or picture holder of some kind, OR to use an icy blue color scheme! I don't scrap, therefore, it's icy blue for me. At Tuesday Throwdown the challenge use background stamping on your project.

To begin my card I created the background panel by stamping images of the white rabbit using the Depth of Field technique from Technique Junkies on light blue paper. The next panel was

embossed using a portion of a Cuttlebug embossing folder. I especially wanted the clock with the gears around it. I used a blue panel and highlighted with denim distress ink. For my third panel I cut out an image of the white rabbit and dressed him in blue, using Copics. The sentiment was stamped on white satin ribbon with Stazon ink. "Oh my ears and whiskers"; that was fun!

Angel

I had a lot of fun today letting my muse run wild. This card meets the criteria for two challenges. The Sunday Challenge at Ink on My Fingers was diamonds. This week Simon Says Stamp and Show some masking. The image and sentiment stamps are from Stampotique. First I stamped Angel in fuschia. I masked her and stamped Angelboy behind her. I masked him and then using a gold paint dabber on a background stamp, stamped the diamonds. Finally I stamped the angel definition and added the flower. The image panel was matted with a blue panel and attached to a gold card base.

Critter Sketch Challenge 47

This week Critter Sketch is hosting a sketch challenge. My card has images from Beyond The Sea, an Artistic Outpost stamp sheet. The image was colored with Creative Inspirations paints. The background panel was texturized using and embossing folder and then highlighted with fairy dust for the shimmer. I think it gives the look of waves shimmering in the sunshine.

KSS Monday

It's time for another Kitchen Sink Monday! This week I decided to share a Valentine's card with you. Yes, Valentines Day is only a little over a month away. I used the new release, Multi Step Sweet Heart Roses. I think that this heart is so beautiful.

My card is a CAS card (clean and simple). I think the heart image speaks for itself. I first made the frame from light pink cardstock using a Cuttlebug folder. I cut out the center oval. The hearts were stamped on a white panel to fit beneath the frame. I stamped the first heart and then masked it. I then stamped the second heart. For a sentiment I stamped the xoxo (kisses and hugs). I highlighted the frame with spun sugar distress stickles. This gives the frame a pretty sparkle. The panels were attached to a deeper pink base card.
Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what delightful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Created by Hand for the Play Date Cafe

This week there was a color challenge at the Play Date Cafe--grass green, gold and silver. By coincidence the challenge at Created By Hand was  “In with the New/Gold”.  On my card I used a stencil with gold stencil paste to create my image. The image panel was cut from grass green cardstock using a Spellbinders die. the background panel is silver metallic cardstock which was embossed in a texture fade. The sentiment is from Club Scrap. The base card is metallic gold. Of course, scanning flattens the shimmer of the metallics, but IRL it's there.

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 26

This week the challenge at Compendium of Curiosities was rusted grunge from p. 45 of Tim's book. There are so many of Tim's die cuts that would look good in rusted grunge. I went with the shield and combined it with stamps from the  Artistic Outpost My Knight stamp set. The background is done with  Wild Honey and Broken China distress inks mixed with copper Perfect Pearls spray and then embossed with a texture fade. Wow! what a look.

Color Throwdown with Wet Stencil Technique

This week the challenge at Color Throwdown is to use the colors always artichoke, baja breeze, and cameo coral (or colors similar). The Try That Technique challenge at Technique Junkies was the Wet Stencil technique from the April 2009 newsletter. I love this stencil from Club Scrap. The flowers are so pretty and the stencil works well with the technique. The sentiment is from Northwoods and the butterfly is a die and embossing folder from Cuttlebug.

Simon Says Stamp and Show Your Newest Stamp

This week Simon Says Stamp and Show your newest stamp. I needed this challenge. I got kind of far behind in using my newest stamps. My card is created using two of my newest stamps. The sentiment is from the recent Club Scrap kit, Vogue. The heart is from Kitchen Sink Stamps new set Sweet Heart Roses. I decided to keep it simple since The sentiment and image says it all.

Bloggers Challenge 185

This week Bloggers Challenge is a color challenge. We are to use the colors yellow, brown, and green in our art. I decided to follow the sketch  given by the Critter Sketch challenge for the format. The first thing that came to my mind with these colors was something in nature. However, I was more in a steampunk type mood and this is what I came up with. I used paper from my Graphic 45 Steampunk pad for the main image and the strip behind her head. The larger, yellow background was embossed in a Cuttlebug folder. The sentiment is from Tim Holt's Odds and Ends stamps. The green card base complements the yellow and brown of  the card I think. Anyway, this was a fun change from the past weeks of holiday stamping.

Cheers and Happy New Year!

Happy Kitchen Sink Stamp Monday and Happy New Year! I am so excited to be the Guest Designer this month for a stamp company that I have truly grown to love. My card was made using the new release Multi-step Champagne Celebration. There's nothing like a little taste of the bubbly to help celebrate a new year. I decided to keep it simple. Gold and black are such elegant colors and go so well with champagne. I did add glossy accents over the champagne glasses for that added glass effect.

Hopefully you have had a chance to visit the new KSS forum. The New Year's Eve kick-off was so much fun. It's obvious that a lot of work went into getting the forum up and running. Keep checking there for information and fun activities.

A new month means a new challenge at KSS. (From now on the new challenges will be announced in the forum.) This month Maria is challenging us to create a card (using KSS stamps) in 10 minutes or less. I didn't time my card this week, but I probably would have made it if I had all my paper pulled out and we didn't count the drying time of the glossy accents. Why don't you play along with our challenge for fun and upload your creation to the KSS gallery using the keyword: KSCC31. Hope to see you there.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what delightful creations they have made. Cheers!

Angela * Connie * Julie * Lisa * Lynn * Makiko * Maria

Color Recipes: (All inks are Adirondack unless noted.)
Champagne glasses -- 1 sandal, 2 peach bellini stamped off, 3 peach bellini, 4 starlite silver (Brilliance)
Bubbles -- 1 sandal, 2 peach bellini
Sentiment -- embossing ink, embossed with gold powder.

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 25

I haven't been posting as much lately, but I'm back for the New Year.
I have two exciting announcements. I am  now a Design Team member for Artistic Outpost stamps. I am so happy since I love AO stamps so much. And I am a Guest Designer for Kitchen Sink Stamps for the month of January. The KSS stamps are also some of my favorites.
Here's today's blog image.

The Compendium of Curiosities challenge this week is Scribble Stain Distress from p. 34 of Tim's book. I thought that I would use some brighter ink for the background, so I went with Fired Brick along with Tattered Rose and Dried Marigold. The background was stamped with stamps from Tim's regal findings and slight alterations sets. The bird cage and bird were die cut. The ticket and sentiment are stamped from odds and ends. It feels good to be back doing challenges.