Winter Solstice

Monday, December 21, 2015

Only 3 hours and 45 minutes of daylight here today. Now the sun barely rises to the top of the trees. Since we have too much daylight on the 4th of July to enjoy fireworks winter solstice is our time to celebrate with vibrant fireworks and added sparkle of snow and glistening trees. We celebrate that with each new day we will have more sunlight. I am very excited to share with you my interpretation of nature's beauty that we enjoy during this time of year.

I created this card's background with the Stencil Stamping Technique:

I used 2 small pieces of tape to attach a stencil (Tim Holtz, flourish stencil) to watercolor paper. Lightly tapped Ken Oliver's Color Burst powders through the stencil openings and misted. When pleased with the 1st image removed the stencil. Gently place the bottom side of the stencil which is still covered with lots of color on top of a fresh 2nd piece of paper.  Hand press color onto paper and removed stencil. I continue coloring the cardstock and drying as needed.

I added some special sparkle to the card. I stamped the top left corner with a Hero Arts Sparkle Border stamp and colored with Stickles. Layered snowflakes at the bottom left and added a few sparkling gems. Strips of glitter add sparkles to the side edges of the card.
   
I am submitting this card to this month's Craft Stamper's Take It, Make It Challenge. Here is the blog link.

Thank You for stopping in!  
May your holidays be Merry and Bright!...Jan

A Christmas Card Favorite

As always I made lots of holiday cards this year and this is one of my favorites.

Distress ink colors: fired brick, broken china, peacock feathers, and pine needles and as needed fern green archival as well as Memories unicorn white pigment ink.

The poinsettia is stamped in archival fern green ink and water colored on Strathmore paper. The center is accented with opal liquid pearls and overall with Wink of Stella.

Dies: Tim Holtz- mixed media die set ( lattice piece) and Tim’s winter greens die set (evergreen branch). The small package tag is from a retired SU die set.  I colored it with a round blending tool to achieve the background color as well as darker color on the word “Merry”. Tim’s faded dot stencil was added over top.   A bokeh technique was used for the background.  Mercury Glass stickles around the evergreen.

Happy holidays!...Jan

Challenge for Artsy Inkers

INK15 Warm-Up activity 

Hi Artsy Inkers!

Please start your timer for 30 minutes now.

Artsy Inkers certainly have a wide range of embossing supplies and experience using them.  During your  30 minutes you can explore the various textures of different types of embossing powder and try simple ways to create heat embossing with alternative adhesives you have on hand. There are NO Rules for what you create.  Hopefully this activity will help you explore new ideas for you to incorporate EP into this week’s challenges. 

Here are some possible ideas of what you may want to create as you warm-up your creative juices:

        Create a  swatch sheet for your winter colors or ones you have limited experience using.

I embossed each tape separately. Used anti-static bag before any embossing.

OR:.Use your traditional methods to prepare paper surface with anti-static method and heat emboss powder. Try using what you have on hand to adhere the embossing powder:

Sakura Quickie glue  looks like a ballpoint pen

Glue dots

Double stick tape

Hot glue

Or any other adhesive you have on hand

OR—Create new hand-drawn embossed designs, or accent edges with embossing powder; or emboss die cuts; or emboss items other than stamped images.

Or make a  small gift card to explore using these techniques.

OR anything else you would like to try!   

Happy creating!...Jan