Fun with STAEDTLER – Over A Rainbow of Options

Over the Rainbow by Debi Hammons

We’re celebrating the new Hot Air Balloons in our April Release this week, along with our blog Collaboration with STAEDTLER. Our in-house sample artist, Debi Hammons, colored this gorgeous new image with our trusty Karat Aquarelle pencils. We use them for everything here. Not only are they great for coloring, and watercoloring, just look at the cool effect of highlights you can achieve by just slightly changing pressure on the pencil! Stampendous Owner and Chief Artistic Officer Fran Seiford made a terrific video demonstrating colored pencil techniques with her favorite Aquarelles. It’s been one of our most popular videos ever!

We hope you’re tagging along with us for a whole week of fun with STAEDTLER! Since 1835 this company has catered to artists worldwide to provide the best in art products! They can trace their family making of pencils back to 1662! Wow! Now that’s the kind of history you don’t find everywhere!  Our artists and crafters love using STAEDTLER products and you’ll see why! Be sure to visit all the blogs and leave a comment on EVERY one! That will increase your chances of winning one of the two prize packages from Stampendous and STAEDTLER.

Here’s who is on your hopping path today:

Cyndi Bundy

Suzanne Czosek

Tenia Nelson

Kim Stewart

Kelli Mowat

By the way, so you don’t have to ask, we use VersaFine™ Onyx Black Instant Dry Pigment Ink from Imagine Crafts/Tsukinkeo® on Mohawk Color Copy 98 Bright White Cover for all of our samples.

Teatime Reflections – Layout by Asia King

To bring our fantastic sojourn at Tea Time to a close, we have a terrific tutorial from BlogStar Asia King. She’s here to dwell on her obsession with tea time and it’s accessories, plus she’s got a gorgeous project for you to make!

Hello Stampendous friends! Asia here and today I am inviting you for tea . When I first saw these awesome teapot stamps I squealed with joy, because I immediately knew what I would create with them. I have this thing you see, I just love vintage teapots and tea cups. I have a small collection at home which I am really proud of . So I made a scrapbook page to ‘celebrate’ my little teatime obsession…

As I also happen to have a set of beautiful teatime themed serviettes, I was able to include some napkin art in my layout. Can life get any better than this? lol .

Let’s begin.

Step 1:

- prepare your pattern papers, napkins and photos you’d like to scrap

- arrange your papers in layers and distress the edges

Step 2:

- adhere the papers to the base cardstock with re-positional adhesive. I find it difficult to work on a page when the elements don’t stay in place. With re-positional glue dots I can always rearrange the items if necessary

- cut out elements from your napkins and adhere to the page with Beacon’s Fast Finish medium

Step 3:

- for the banneer choose paper with a subtle background

- stamp cling Royal Teapot and cling Queen Teapot with brown ink

- colour the images

- cut out the teapot flags for the banner

- finish off with ribbons and pearls

Step 4:

- add a sprinkle of Shabby White Embossing Enamel and Vintage Lilac Embossing Powder over the main background paper

- heat from underneath to melt (if the layers are too thick, this is when re-positional glue stuff comes handy!)

Step 5:

- emboss a selection of chipboard shapes with Shabby White, Vintage Lilac and Aged Wine Embossing Enamel

Step 6:

- heat emboss ornate corner embellishments with Shabby White enamel

- make sure to wait until they cool down – it will take a bit longer that you might expect…

Step 7:

- to create a ‘secret’ journaling card you will need: old postcard, Tim Holtz Tag & Bookplates die, Rusty Hinge distress ink and blending tool, Coffee Archival ink, cling King Teapot and Luggage Labels

- die cut the tag from an old postcard

- ink the reverse side with Rusty Hinge ink

- spritz the background with coffee (I know, I know…but coffee works better than tea for this!). The ink will react with water and create a mottled effect

- stamp the King Teapot with Rusty Hinge

- stamp a chosen label from the Luggage Labels set with Coffee Archival

- add a sentiment. I found this sentiment long time ago and I’ve always loved it. Not sure who the author is, sorry. If you don’t have a favourite quote, make sure to check out our collection of the Digital Downloads - lots of WordArt inspiration there!

Step 9:

- stamp the cling Kettle On onto a patterned journaling card with Coffee Archival

- add bling to your photo and the rest of the page. I used Beacon’s Gem Tac to fix the gems in place

Step 10:

- adhere all the elements. Mount the photo onto 3d foam pads allowing sufficient room underneath for the secret journaling tag

- add final embellishments and flowers. For a shabby chic look alter the blooms by swiping Boss Gloss over the flowers and heat embossing them with Frantage enamels

To finish I also added a Ruffled Bloom. The flower centre was embellished with Champagne and Lavender glass glitter and little pearls.

That’s all for now! Thank you for popping in today and I hope you’ve enjoyed this little Tea Party . If you’d like to see more of the close up pictures, please visit my blog .

Big crafty hugs

Asia

Would you like a spot of Tea?

Our Royal Tea Time stamps are so fun to color, fill with glitter, emboss, etc. They just add an elegant, Fran•táge touch to your party invitations, cards for Mum, and general friendship greetings. When combined with our Digital Downloads Royal Tea Time 1 and Royal Tea Time 2 you can make stunning invites and clever greetings with these great images. Best of all, with FREE Shipping on U.S. retail orders over $50 you can get the whole set and sip in style!

Keep Calm by Cyndi Bundy

Tea Time by Stephanie Lee

Our clever Design Team is at it again with more fantastic examples of this terrific bunch of images!

Janelle Stollfus

Lea Kimmel

Kristine Reynolds

Chalkboard Teapots with Tobi Crawford

This week’s focus on new stamps from our April Release is our fun Teapot series! Fran has just outdone herself designing regal, elaborate, fun, Fran•táge images fit for inviting the Queen to tea!  Plus, we’ve created Digital Downloads of fantastic phrases, invitations, and all time favorite, classic Stampendous images so you can have tea parties all summer long!  Royal Tea Time 1  and   Royal Tea Time 2  Here, BlogStar Tobi Crawford demonstrates a fun technique to get that trendy chalkboard look with our new teapots. At the bottom you’ll see links to other Teapot images our Design Team have posted on their blogs! Take a look:

Hi there! It’s Blogstar Tobi Crawford here with a quick tutorial on the ever-so-popular

“Chalkboard Technique!”

It’s inspired by the beautiful chalkboard art we now see all over the media, print, and of course Pinterest. What you may not know is that you don’t need stamps that are specifically made for the chalkboard look, and you may not know that it’s super easy!!

Here’s what you’ll need:

Supplies: black cardstock, VersaMark pad, Detail White Embossing Powder, white pigment or hybrid ink, and a stamp. Today I’m using Cling King Teapot and Cling Kettle On. (Not shown: white Sharpie)

1. Step one – stamp teapot with VersaMark and cover with embossing powder. Heat until shiny. Once the embossing powder has cooled doodle a white frame around the teapot with a white Sharpie.

2. Using your finger, smudge some white ink around the image to give the black cardstock that “chalky” look.

3. Cut out the chalkboard you’ve created.

4. Find some fabulous coordinating papers and create a card!

That was easy, right? I just LOVE this chalkboard trend and every time I play around with a new image I wonder if it would look good done with this technique – and this teapot (and sentiment) look fab!  Now check out what other Design Team members have done with these Teapots:

Jamie Martin

(an earlier sneak peek post)

Jamie Martin (new post)

Kristine Reynolds

Artist Elements by Rhea Weigand

Quick Stampendous Note: If you’re going to put “everything but the kitchen sink” on a gorgeous canvas like BlogStar Rhea Weigand has done in this post, you should do it while our website is offering FREE Shipping on retail orders $50 or more shipped to a U.S. Mailing Address!!

Hello, this is Rhea sharing one of my favorite new releases from Stampendous.  I chose to design Artist Elements  on a 5×5 canvas.  This little canvas has everything on it but the kitchen sink.   Layers of tinted Fast Finish, Layers of card stock and bunches of aged embossing powders as well as, Fran•táge elements!!!

Yes, it includes one of my favorite things, tinting Fast Finish Decoupage.  Fast Finish is a thin and fast drying decoupage by Beacon.  Tinting it is easy.  In a small container pour a little Fast Finish.  Put a few drops of dye in.  The more ink the darker the decoupage.

For this project we are going to use.  Dusty Concord, Peeled Paint, Fired Brick and Faded Jeans.

Apply clear Fast Finish to the canvas and the back side of the paper to apply to canvas.

Only use the tinted Fast Finish on the top of the paper.  Tear paper and do a quilted sections covering the canvas.

Stamp the image with Memento Ink

Dry brush color on the image with these Distress colors.  I like to use chalking applicators from JoAnn’s 

Before we start embossing.  Need to cut apart the Make Art from the rest of the image.  Both this sentiment and brushes will need to be layered with matching card stock and attached to the canvas as shown.

Because we are working on a canvas using Boss Gloss and applying with a brush will work best.  Start by doing the edges with Aged Gold

With Aged Marine, Wine, Scarlet, Ochre, Hunter emboss little puddles leading up to and on the tips of the brushes.

Finally add all of the wonderful elements.  Apply Aleene’s Paper Glaze and spread with finger or tip of bottle.  Sprinkle  white mica first.  Here are the elements used:

• Canary color fragments
• Purple color fragments
• Hunter color fragments
• Marine blue color fragments
• Royal blue crushed glass
• Green crushed glass glitter
• White mica fragments

Elements – NEW for April 2013

Our newest Fran•táge images for Spring 2013 are our wonderful new Elements images.  These are terrific collages of various images on one theme. And our Design Team really had a great time with these! Our Phone Elements can create anything from a terrific card to say “miss you! call me!” to a stylish phone message center! This would make a terrific Mother’s Day image as well for those of you with moms who love their phones!

Phone Elements by Kristine Reynolds

Phone Elements by Cyndi Bundy

Phone Elements by Suzanne Czosek

Check out the cool Elements projects our Design Team Members have posted so far this week:

Kristine Reynolds

Lea Kimmel

Jamie Martin

Kristine Reynolds(2)

Cyndi Bundy

Check back tomorrow for more fabulousness with our new Elements! AND – Be sure to check out our May Challenge – we’d love to see you participate! The prizes are amazing!

New Elements and Project Life by Asia King

BlogStar Asia King is back again to introduce this week’s focus – the new Elements stamps in our April Catalog. These 5 images focus on a collage of several elements on a particular theme, the ones she’s chosen to use are the Typing Elements and Phone Elements. These are big stamps, meant to be the focus of most of a card.

W093 Typing Elements

W094 Phone Elements

Since Asia is in the UK, it takes a little longer to get our goodies over to her. So she’s also bringing the Elements into our Project Life event we did a couple weeks ago.  Suzanne Czosek also did a Project Life page that didn’t get included in the original event, so we’d love you to go look at it as well.

Hello Stampendous Friends! It’s time for another inspiration with Asia King . Today I am playing with Becky Higgins’ Project Life. My super talented DT Sisters have recently provided lots of inspirational eye candy for you with their Project Life pages – in case you missed it, be sure to check it out here. Project Life is all about celebrating your every day stuff so I decided to scrap about the thing that ‘happens’ to me every day….(except the weekends! lol) – my job. One of the things I love about crafting is that it’s a way of recharging my batteries after a challenging day. Crafting helps me to ‘leave’ my work behind. So you might say that scrapping about my work would defeat the object lol .

That’s why in my page I wanted to focus on the ‘little’ things I enjoy about my work place, like beautiful aubretias trailing down the wall nearby, sipping coffee from my ‘Best Wife in the World’ mug (given to me by my hubby, just to clarify!) or shopping in the new Polish deli shop at lunch time. But most importantly – all the lovely people I work with whose optimism and sense of humour really brighten my days .

Let’s start with the supply list:

Stamps: Cling Typing Elements, Cling Phone Elements, Cling Blossom Spray, Perfectly Clear Smashing Notes, Perfectly Clear Big Top Type, Perfectly Clear Vintage Lowercase, Perfectly Clear Vintage Uppercase.

Essentials: Aged Wine Embossing Enamel, Aged Ivory Embossing Enamel, Stamp N Bond powder, Sunflower Micro Glitter, White Detail Embossing Powder.

Other: Project Life page protector – Design A, coffee spritzed papers, alcohol ink markers, clear embossing ink, Sepia or Coffee Archival ink, Black Memento ink, ColorBox chalk inks, selection of photos.

1. Spritz some coffee over white card and allow to dry.

2. Cut two panels from the coffee card to the size of your journaling pockets.

3. Stamp the Typing Elements and the Phone Elements onto your journaling cards with brown ink.

4. Stamp Blossom Spray along the edges and in corners with black Memento ink.

5. Stamp the word ‘office’  in Google colours onto scrap coffee papers with a selection of alpha stamps and using ColorBox inks. Add to your photo some additional journaling and a ‘Google maps’ pin.

6. Colour the flowers with the alcohol ink markers.

7. Stamp an accent letter from the Vintage Uppercase set with clear embossing ink and sprinkle the image with Stamp N Bond powder. Warm the heat gun for a few seconds then heat the powder just until it melts.

8. Quickly sprinkle the image with the Sunflower Micro Glitter. Press the glitter with your fingers to aid bonding.

9. Fix the letter to your card with small staples.

10. Sprinkle your cards sparingly with Aged Wine and Aged Ivory embossing enamels. Heat the powders from underneath.

11. Stamp various expressions from the Smashing Notes set directly onto your photos using clear embossing ink. Heat emboss with White Detail embossing powder.

As you can see, these Elements stamps are just perfect for everyday life scrapbooking, especially documenting your office/working endeavours. Their vintage look adds a really quirky contrast against their modern ‘equivalents’ .

Thank you for popping in here today and I hope you enjoyed reading about this project. As always, I’d love to know what  you think!

Happy crafting!

Big hugs

Asia

How Does Your Garden Grow?

We’re Celebrating Flowers this Week!

Our April Catalog is just bursting with new blossoms of so many varieties for your Mother’s Day, Birthday, Get Well, Sympathy, and All Occasion stamping! Get ready to scrapbook your Spring Garden, or just enjoy a bouquet of gorgeous blooms. Our Design Team LOVES to stamp and color flowers, so you’ll see lots of terrific samples on their blogs this week! You can get yourself a whole garden full with our FREE Shipping offer! Add some of our new Digital Downloads, too! There’s a terrific set of sentiments perfect for all our new floral stamps – Flowery Phrases Digital Download

Among our new flowers are three brand new Jumbo Cling Flowers. We’re very excited to be able to continue to offer these with the FREE templates so that you can mask off the flower or it’s surroundings for all sorts of terrific effects. Here our own National Sales Manager  (and Decorative Painting guru) Tammie Wilson has created a fantastic wooden frame featuring the new Jumbo Bird of Paradise!

Jumbo Bird of Paradise Frame by Tammie Wilson

Jumbo Calla Lily Pail by Janelle Stollfuss

Jumbo Cling Rubber Peruvian Lily Scrapbook Page by Suzanne Czosek

BlogStar Tobi Crawford has created a fantastic tutorial today demonstrating a great use of the free template in each Jumbo Cling Rubber Flower set.  Check it out here:

Tobi Crawford

Then take a gander at these other great floral projects using new flowers from our April Catalog Release (be sure to leave some sweet comments on their blogs!)

Arty Carty 1

Arty Carty 2

Jennifer Dove

Kristine Reynolds

A bit of Housekeeping -

Did we mention FREE shipping? Enjoy FREE shipping on our website at www.stampendous.com on retail orders over $50 shipping to U.S. addresses until July 31! We can’t wait to see what you make with our products!! (be sure to share on our Facebook Page, Flickr Group, or email us at submissions@stampendous.com)

Winners – we’re still waiting for some winners of the Project Life event to contact us with mailing info. Hint: if you don’t want your prize, we know Barb Macaskill wants it!  Email your mailing info to submissions@stampendous.com so we can get your prizes on their way!

Remember tonight is the deadline to link to your Micro Glitter projects for our April Challenge. May’s Challenge is Fabulous Florals and starts Friday!

Fabulous Florals Galore!

Our new April Catalog is chock full of gorgeous flowers for you to use for any occasion! Birthday? – Flowers are great! Get Well? – Of course you’ll send flowers. Mom? – Yup! Flowers are her fave! Anniversary? – Of course! Flowers just say it all for every occasion! And our Design Team did an amazing job on the flowers in this catalog, too! (Plus, yeah, there’s FREE shipping on orders over $50 on our website! Get a whole garden full while you can!)

Jumbo Peruvian Lily by Cyndi Bundy

Spring Bouquet by Jennifer Dove

Fuschia by Kristine Reynolds

Snapdragons by Suzanne Czosek

The potential for gorgeous flowers is just unlimited! Our botanical fruit images are fantastic for any occasion as well. Check out the things our terrific Design Team have posted so far this week!

Jennifer Dove

Rhea Weigand

Kristine Reynolds

Cyndi Bundy

Can you say FREE SHIPPING??!!

We’re so excited to announce FREE SHIPPING on retail orders over $50 on our website through July 31!  (U.S. orders only)

Your orders will still be filled by local retailers or our warehouse, same as always, but now you can go crazy, because shipping will be FREE!

April 2013 Catalog

Make your shopping list from our newest April Catalog images,

Stampendous Micro Glitter

our January Catalog Essentials,

Surfer Kiddo by Kristine Reynolds

collect all the Kiddos you’ve been wanting,

Jumbo Bird of Paradise by Cyndi Bundy

or snag our limited edition Jumbo Cling Rubber Flowers while they’re still in stock!

Stuftainers™ Thick

Looking for an amazing storage solution? Check out our Stuftainers™ and save big on these items that normally have higher shipping charges!

You don’t need a promo code, your free shipping will be credited as soon as your retail, U.S. order hits $50!

Visit www.stampendous.com today and start your shopping list! You can use our Wish List at the top of the home page to keep track of things you’d like to have! Items can be added to your cart from your wish list or moved to your wish list from the cart!