Cruisin' Alaska's Inside Passage with Tim

Finally, after weeks of thinking about this trip I have met about 30 of the cruising crafters on-line. Wow what a terrific group this is! Already bonding as we explore transportation options, excursions, and special opportunities to find creative products for sale. Everyone is so jazzed about the trip we can hardly stand it! While the creative fun with Tim Holtz is still ahead we started our own warm-up exercise. Many of the crafters are making 50 ATC's for swapping. So I have gotten busy and jumped right in! I used my Ranger Acrylic dabblers for the blue ice the bears are walking on and the background for the doll in a parka.

Jennifer’s Turn

My friend Jennifer from Thimbles, Bobbins, Paper and Ink is joining me in a few challenges. Last month I suggest waterbrushing alcohol inks on acetate. This month it is Jennifer's turn to select. She chose to work with coloring embossing paste.

I started with basic white embossing paste and tried to color my paste with perfect pearls. That did not work. I moved on to coloring the paste with Lumiere acrylic paint. These colors are very intense and colored the paste wonderfully. I tried several colors from soft pastels through metallics and found this blue to be my favorite for this butterfly medallion.

I am pleased to know a new option for coloring my embossing paste. Thanks Jennifer for the challenge! Jennifer has colored her image with multiple colors...you will definitely want to look at her blog!

A special tribute for Lenda

Oh my, my heart is heavy...I started regularly participating on internet messages boards 6 years ago on the HGTV-holiday crafts board. This group of women shared many delightful crafts and were always available to support one another. Although I got involved in lots of crafts through this board, I came to realize I wanted to focus specifically on card marking. As things go I lost contact with some good on-line buddies but Lenda and I had stayed in touch and as the years went on she too became involved in papercrafts.
Last summer she joined the Stamp Shack where I spend most of my online time now and I was totally surprise when I found my friend lurking. I posted a welcome note and we chatted through a few messages. But she had much going on in her life so we didn't write very much. I indeed was surprise when I didn't receive a Christmas card or a follow-up response to my e-mail for that had been our tradition. Just recently I made a special card for her but I had an urge to check-in on her here before I sent it so I went back to the crafting board where she spent so much time. I learned that my friend had passed after Thanksgiving to join the other crafting angels. Now she leaves a very empty spot in my heart.
Year after year we would talk about begin excited for springtime, anxious to see the first flowers and the opening of our porches. My springtime card for Lenda reflected that conversation we had so many times. I share the card I made for Lenda with you as I send it off to her family with my sympathy.

Take a new look at felt!

This week my friend Tami over at Dapple Designs was the first guest challenge artist at the Stamp Shack. She posted a fun challenge to use felt in a papercrafting project and shared some examples of glittered felt she purchased by the sheet. As I checked out the local JoAnn's super store I found felt by the sheet that looks heat embossed. I had tons of fun creating a card with the animal skin embossed felt. For under 50cents a sheet this embossed felt was less expensive and provided more texture than some speciality printed paper. To give the felt some stability for cutting I ran it through the xyron and cut with the paper attached.


My 2nd project was creating an art journal which I plan to begin using on my cruise with Tim Holtz. Again I used the felt as a background this time a piece embossed with flourishes. I stamp a transparency with one of Tim's new ATC stamps and color with sharpies and added stickles on the back for some accents with bling. I love birds and am excited that many finally arrived in town today as part of their annual migration. Spring is on it's way! So I cut a bird from swirls grungeboard and painted it with Radiant Rain. The liquid H2O twinkle are wonderful to apply in this new product's dauber bottle and wow great sparkle too. Since my book was larger than the xyron I decide to glue the felt directly to the book cover and trimmed the edges after it dried. Next time you are in a craft store definitely look at the felt and check out what new choices you find. Thanks Tami for the encouragement to try something new!