Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Caught A Bug?

Here's another get well card for my hospital art project. I used Tilda with Bee, cutting off the bee's antennae and replacing them with wire ones, since Tilda was going to be positioned off the edge of the card front.

I found some Sonnets "Sky Paper" by Creative Imagination for the background, drew my own tree using Copics, Bic Wite Out and Raspberry Fizz Ultrafine Flowersoft. My Martha Stewart Garden Trellis deep edger punch was the inspiration for the fence; I added a strip on the bottom, scored it to resemble planks, then laid some cross pieces at the top and bottom. Sage Ultrafine Flowersoft was used for the grass.

Diamond Stickles were used on the bee's wings for a touch of glitter, after colouring in a bit of skintone and yellow on the left wing to give them the illusion of transparency.

Then I thought Tilda really shouldn't be allowed to be outside with just socks on, so I stamped Tilda Picking Peaches (just the bottom of the stamp) and cut out her shoes. Well, Tilda is being only a tad naughty now; kicking off her clogs before climbing the fence and saying hello to her bee freind.



The inside is just a simple sentiment over Basic Grey Lemonade Saltwater Taffy paper. Both sentiments were run off on my computer and coloured in with Copics.


Here's the list of Copics used for this project:

Skin: E00, E11, R20
Hair: Y21, E97, E99
Shirt and socks: V91, V93, V95, V99
Jeans and clogs: B000, B21, B34, B37, N0, N4, N6
Bee: Y21, Y35, Y38, N3, N6, N8
Tree: B000, E21, E25, E27, E29, G82, G85, G28, G94, G99

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Paging Dr. Edwin

Here's the first of nine cards I am creating for an art collage project for our hospital art gallery.

I started with the "Bartender Edwin" Magnolia stamp, made him a labcoat, stethoscope and pills (instead of the tray of drinks he usually holds). I added a pen, Post-It Notes and scissors in his lab coat pockets. On the bottles and stethoscope, I used All Night Media's Liquid Embossing gloss (Licorice Opaque and Clear Gloss Finish).

My Cuttlebug was used to emboss and cut the sentiments (outside and inside), to cut the corner dies and blue swirls using a Sizzix die.


The inside of the card.




The card was decorated with a Dollar Store flower, Martha Stewart branch punch, Michael's pearls (the blue ones were coloured with my Copics) and a clipbord charm I just happened to have on hand. The patterned paper layer of the background is raised on foam dimensionals, as is Edwin.

The background paper was just perfect; the EKG (although showing quite the arrhythmia) is called Blips and Beeps Robo Stripe by TPC Studio.

Here are the Copics used:

Skin: E00, E11, R20
Hair: E21, E25, E27, E29
Shirt & Tie: BG10, BG72, BG75, BG78
Labcoat & Belt: C0, C2, C5
Pants: C0, C2, C5, C10
Shoes: N3, N6, N9
Scissors: YR00, YR04
Post-It Notes: Y11, Y15, Y19
Pill Bottles: E02, E04, YR00, YR21, YR24, W1, W3
Sentiments and Pearls: B34




Whew! One down, eight to go...

Friday, April 2, 2010

Happy Easter (Egg)

Good Friday we have a tradition in our home... ever since my daughter was very young, we would colour Easter eggs together while watching Jesus Christ Superstar (and a few years ago she and I would have the pleasure not only to see the show live, but to meet "Jesus" himself, Ted Neeley after the show). If you want to read more about that, then head over to my other blog and read THIS POST all about it (with pictures!).

Anyway, as per usual, today was our day to paint eggs. While daughter perfects the art of wax and dye versions, I hand-drew just one:



I drew Lazy Summer Day Tilda on a regular, blown-out chicken egg in pencil. Then, because I was hoping to use my Copics to colour her in as normal, I outlined the pencil with my Copic black Multiliner 0.3. However much to my dismay, the ink refused to set. When I went to erase my pencil lines, the marker started to smear! Gaaah!

So I went over it all again with my fine point Sharpie, then took the egg to the sink to wash away the Multiliner ink and pencil graphite. Which meant now I couldn't use Copics to colour her in. I had to resort to using my older "Fibracolor" markers, which are nothing like the wonderful blending you get with Copics. Ah well... I added Diamond Stickles to her wings, and viola! Done.


I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend! Now I have to get some sleep so I can get through cooking and cleaning for Easter dinner tomorrow.

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Easter Card and Organization

With just a few days to go, I still haven't finished my Easter cards! Yikes!

Well, I got ONE done so far. Just a simple card with no extra drawings this time. I guess I'd better get busy tonight to get the other two finished...

Here is a closeup of Tilda on this one. I used lavender Stickles on the egg, and popped her up on dimensionals over some cute paper. These sheets perfectly matched a heart I had previously made for another card but never ended up using - made from a Spellbinder's scalloped heart die, then run through my Cuttlebug for the dot embossing. Copics were used to colour it and then I sanded it down a tad to highlight the dots. Of course, Tilda was coloured with Copics.



I thought I'd include a few photos of my Magnolia stamp organization today. I have 34 of these cute stamps already, and I soon outgrew the small container I was storing them in. So I went out and bought another D ring binder to match the others in my room, plastic dividers and heavy duty top loading full sheet plastic pockets. I cut off the tabs on the dividers and adhered regular copy paper to each one to make them more sturdy to slide in and out of their pockets.

Binders
Each page has two stamps; I stamped a sample and then labelled them with some peel off sticker file folder labels. I then keep the stamp itself on the package it came in; it sticks nicely to the outside of the clear envelope! So when I want a certain stamp, I simply pull out the sheet and peel it off the package. Easy peasy!

Magnolia binder
You may have noticed that spreadsheet on the left... yes, I keep a spreadsheet of all the stamps I have, and want to get in the future. I record the stamp name, an image, where I bought it, when I purchased it, and a few comments about it. It's an easy way to ensure I don't accidentally get a double! (Yes, I AM OCD, how'd you guess???)

I found that when I stacked up the pages though, that I had to alternate the location of packages on the pages; so I adhered the packages on the top of one sheet, the bottom of the next, so the pages would lay flat. I have already nearly filled this binder! (Oh what a shame....) ;)

Magnolia binder side view
You may have noticed I have a binder for my Spellbinders on that shelf too. I only have six sets so far, but I store them in a similar way. I purchased full page size magnetic sheets, adhered them to the plastic dividers for stability, then slide them into the same heavy duty plastic pockets. The dies snap to them very well, and it's so easy to see what I need and where it needs to go back! I didn't like that sticky tape they come on; it would often get stuck on my cardstock when I ran them through my Cuttlebug.

Spellbinders

Here are the card details:

Background purple paper: K & Co
Matted paper: Magnolia
Stickles on egg: Milled Lavender

Copic colours:

Skin: E00, E11, R20
Hair: Y21, E25, E31
Dress: BV00, BV11, BG10, BG72, N0
Boots: BV00, BV11, N0
Egg: BG10, BG72
Chick: Y11, Y21, YR23

Well, time to get into gear and start thinking about those other cards I need to do. Oh yeah, and plan Easter dinner and some egg painting too...

Looks like it's going to be a busy, but fun holiday weekend! Happy Easter everyone!

My Magnolia Cards