Quick Cards from Leftovers

Time to clean the desk again … and use up some of those images and papers that seem to reproduce with wild abandon on my desk.

You’ll all recognize Tim Holtz’s Crazy Birds … well, this one is from a mini set. I love the smaller size — perfect for a 4Bar card (about 4 7/8 x 3 1/2, when folded). The background was made by spritzing Heidi Swapp sprays (mustard, chartreuse and sweet cherry). Layered, glued, added some Lawn Fawn sequins, and that’s a wrap! Oh, and a liberal dose of clear Wink of Stella on the bird. Bam!

These frolicking girls (by Crafty Individuals/Magenta)  have always tickled me. This was stamped a while ago on some leftover card stock that was colored using Faber-Castell Gelatos. The card stock, as you can see, is very textured, so the girls didn’t stamp as smoothly as I wanted. But a part of me is okay with the sketchy look. The paper is an old scrap from Paper Source. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Fabulous Finds Friday — Cosmo Cricket

The watercolor look was in style at the Craft & Hobby Show last month, and Cosmo Cricket is right on trend with some great new products, including this cool resist-infused watercolor paper that is so fast, easy and fun to personalize.

I played with various coloring mediums, including:

… Faber-Castell Gelatos in two shades of pink and a coral. I scribbled them on a craft sheet, then spritzed them (and the watercolor cards) with water. I picked up the color with a water brush, then brushed on the card.

The next two cards I went retro and pulled out my old Sparkling Pastelles Watercolor Palette from USArtquest. I had forgotten how much I love these watercolors!

(I also swished a bit of these colors on the envelopes, which I forgot to photograph.) I could have made a dozen in a few minutes.

For my fourth card, I spritzed first with water, then sprayed with Ranger’s new Cracked Pistachio Distress Stain Spray. Yum. I love this color! Because I wanted a touch more glitter I added a light spray of Perfect Pearls Blue Smoke.

On all these cards, I wiped away bits of color that landed on the white and gold resist parts, just to give them more clarity. I especially wanted the white to pop.

I used another nifty new Cosmo Cricket product — the Splatter Caddy.

The white plastic-lined container is a great spray box … and when you’re done, it folds into a neat package for easy storage:

Thanks for stopping by! There is still so much more to report from CHA.

Fabulous Finds — Ken Oliver Colors, Stamps and More

Another crafting star was born at the Craft & Hobby Association Show … Ken Oliver. It was Ken’s first time starring in his own booth, and he did it with flair, introducing several cool new products, including coloring agents, papers and stamps.

Let’s start with his exciting Color Burst color treatment. Color Burst is a concentrated watercolor product in a powder form. To use it, first spritz your watercolor paper with water. Then squeeze the Color Burst bottle to spray out the colored powders. The powder reacts with the water and … POW! Bursts of color!

You can use Color Burst with stencils, over an embossed or wax resist, etc. You can spray more water to help blend the colors, move the color around with a brush or even a heat tool, and more. The vibrant colors make fast, easy, beautiful backgrounds and designs. As Ken says, “just sprinkle and spritz.” Color Burst will be available by mid-March.

Check out these samples:

And these pretty blooms:

Ken also introduced his Click It ink pad, a retractable, pivoting 1 x 1 inch raised dye ink pad. The velveteen pad gives a great color application whether you are stamping an image or edging a tag. It’s compact and I love the hangable chain that is attached.

PEGz™ stamp sets are individual letters that you click together to form words. Have you ever tried to line up alphabet stamps to create a greeting? Not so easy. Until now. (Look for them in your stores by the end of February.)

Look how easy they are:

Then there’s Stick It, a thin, dry adhesive specially formulated for use in intricate die cutting. When you first lay it down, Stick It is repositionable, giving you some sticky wiggle room. After a while, it becomes permanent. You apply Stick It to your cardstock before die cutting, then just peel off the liner after it is cut.

As for stamps and paper … Ken has definitely mined his small town roots. His Hometown images are vintage, nostalgic and beautiful, whether on paper or stamps. Paper designs include the Studio Collection (a soft, more colorful vintage feel), Watercolored Memories (vibrant botanical prints) and Pitter Patterns (geometrics.) I’m hoping to play with these soon!

Check out Ken’s blog at www.kensworldinprogress.com. His products are being distributed through Product Performers.

Organizing My Mists

In my continuing efforts to get organized, I decided to work on my mists, sprays and daubers. (I didn’t take a before picture, but you can probably use your imagination to envision the mess! Oh, they were in a jumble.)

Now look:

The first thing I did was put a small piece of sticker paper on the top of the bottle. Then I added a dab of the ink/spray color to the top so I could easily see the colors.
This box has my miscellaneous sprays — Maya Road, ColorBox, Mister Huey, Heidi Swapp, Stephanie Barnard, etc.

This box below has all my Ranger inks: Dylusions, Distress, Acrylic Daubers, etc. (Yes, I need to add color to the tops of my Distress Inks.)

I also have a smaller box for my Hero Arts paint and ink daubers.

Now I can actually find the colors I need! What a pleasure!
Think I’ll go mist something…