Mixed media and Jumbo Daisies by Asia King

April flowers

Greetings! Your favourite Foreign Correspondent Asia here . Guess what? The sun is finally shining and who knows, maybe Spring is finally on its way to the UK? In case Mother Nature is still unsure whether it’s time for Spring, I hope this project will make it absolutely clear – yes, it IS time! LOL.

The project I am sharing today has been inspired by Kate Crane’s all year long challenge of journaled calendars (BTW here you can link up April pages and while you’re at it you might also like to join this fab Journaling challenge at Fashionable Stamping Challenges). Kate is a very inspirational mixed media artist and her signature style is easily recognisable in her colourful and vibrant art journaling.

For quite some time now I’ve been trying to make a journaled calendar to keep track of all important dates and here’s my April page.

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For my page I reused parts from an old calendar I kept. It was so pretty that I just had to find another use for it.

My background was created with acrylic paints, Inktense pencils, Colour Wash, Glimmer Mist and Cosmic Shimmer Mist sprays. I used a brickwork stencil to add gessoed texture and to add some colour highlights.

Those fabulous flowers are Stampendous Jumbo Daisy with a free (how fabulous is that?) template.

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Jumbo flower templates – helpful tips

And I thought it would be helpful to share a quick tutorial on how I use the free templates from the new Stampendous Jumbo flower stamps.

(Click on the photos to enlarge).

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

I hope you enjoyed my April Daisies . Have a fabulous week!

Big hugs

Asia

Becky Higgins Project Life – Stampendous Style

Ready to HOP??  Until Sunday night you can comment on the blogs of our participating Design Team Members and our blog here. Each comment counts as one entry to win our Project Life/Stampendous prize package! Prize includes 12 assorted Project Life Page Protectors, and BRAND NEW (so new you can’t buy it on our website until Monday) Stampendous Vintage Alphabet Upper Case and Lower Case Perfectly Clear Stamp Sets. This prize is a $50 retail value! And we’ll give 3 of them!! Uh Huh!! So get hopping and commenting!

Stampendous NEW Vintage Alphabet Perfectly Clear™Stamps

If you’re still messing about with stickers for Journaling Titles… well, you’ve got to have this alphabet. A stamped alphabet means never running out of a letter again! You saw them yesterday on Kristine’s layout. Here they are on a layout prepared for us by BlogStar Rhea Weigand:

Squirrel!

This layout also features Stampendous Smashing Notes Perfectly Clear Stamp set.

Now leave a comment below then HOP on over to these other blogs and leave a comment there as well. We’ll be back Monday with the names of the winners!

Janelle Stollfus

Kristine Fossmeyer

Leadonna Kimmel

Kristine Reynolds

Cyndi Bundy

Tobi Crawford

Jamie Martin

Finally – Remember that our April Challenge is still going strong!! Use Micro Glitter on one of your creations and link it to the F.E. Linus link  button in our right side bar! You’ll be entered to win some of our newest Micro Glitter colors! You can read all the details by clicking on the Challenge link at the very, tippy top of the page or HERE!

We’d also love to see what you can do with Project Life (or similar page protectors) and Stampendous Stamps and Essentials! Send your links to submissions@stampendous.com and we’ll do a follow up post linking to everyone who participated!

Easy Scrapbooking with Project Life and Stampendous Stamps!

Our Design Team has been having fun all week with Becky Higgins, LLC Project Life page protectors. The good folks over there were nice enough to send us some so that we could show you how Stampendous Stamps can really enhance this easy scrapbooking method that’s absolutely on fire right now.

Our newest team member is celebrating Spring planting in Oklahoma with her darling page! Be sure to check out (and welcome to the team!):

Jamie Martin

Also check out a terrific wedding layout from our very own

Lea Kimmel

She used some of our newest Perfectly Clear Stamps to be featured in Michaels Stores on her layout.

And our Design Team Member

Kristine Reynolds

is back today with an adorable page celebrating some really cool chicks in her life! You’ve gotta see this page, it’s toooo cute!

Tomorrow, everyone will be back with more of Project Life together with Stampendous! We’re hoping some of you are getting excited about stamping the Project that is your Life! We’ll have some really cool prize packages with some of our best scrapbooking products and LOTS of Project Life page protectors to get you going. And we’ll keep going as well…who knows what we might scrap in the future…we’ve gotta admit, it’s pretty addicting!

Project Life – Even more fun with Stampendous!!

Becky Higgins’ Project Life has taken the craft and scrapbooking world by storm. Lots of folks have embraced the commitment to simply scrapbook one single page or a two page layout of ordinary life per week. A way to celebrate all that is normal and right with your world, or even the special occasions or big events that happen with some normal life in between.  Here’s the Project Life Philosophy -

The Project Life system includes divided page protectors, books for them, and little, pre-printed cards you slip into pockets next to your photos. It’s designed to be easy and quick for folks who think they don’t have the time for more “creative” scrapbooking.

But what if you have lots of stamps, glitter, glue, and creativity? What if you love embossing, Fran•táging, and breaking out all those goodies you’ve collected? Yep, you can use the Project Life approach, too! You can embrace the trend, AND use your stash!!

We asked Becky Higgins to send us some Project Life Page Protectors, and we challenged our Design Team to see if they could document real, everyday life using Stampendous stamps and other products in the little compartments of the Project Life system! It was out of their comfort zone a bit, but we think you’ll be amazed as always at what they’ve created!  Pop over today to Janelle Stollfus’ blog and then come back tomorrow for some more inspiration. Be sure to leave comments and we’ll have LOTS of Project Life Page protectors to send to some lucky winners along with some cool Stampendous products for documenting your everydays and special days!

Janelle Stollfus

Spring Fun – Coloring Skin with Copics – Rhea Weigand

Hello, Rhea here today bringing you quick tips on coloring hair and skin with copic markers and an even easier tip on making an ordinary A2 card a little more special.

Today I chose to play with V270 Kiddo Hop.  I thought she would be great to practice hair and face.  We will be using Copic Markers in the following colors

HAIR = YR27 YR21 YR24

SKIN = E50 E51 E53

Start with the darkest color YR27.  Lightly flick your color “away” from your shadows out or your darkest areas out.  For instance, where the pony tales gather out towards the ends.  Or, from the roots out.  Flicking does take practice, practice, practice!  I hold my marker very differently than when normally coloring.  I find holding it straight up and down and barely touching the paper helps.  Also flicking it away from me helps.  Practice on scrap paper and do it over and over until you get the feel.  Practice doing it different ways.  You will find your flicking groove…I promise.  Flicking is a very important technique with Copic coloring.  I use this technique in many different things such as flower details, folds in dresses even general coloring….all the time!!!!  So do practice

Next with the middle color, YR24, extend your darkest color but only a little bit.  Start well within your dark area and flick a little past the end of the dark marker. You want to leave lots of white at this point.  White will be your end highlight color.

Finally, use the lightest color YR 21 to extend color even more…but remember to leave white for your final highlight.  I could go into light source but I will leave that for another day.

Coloring skin is easy to learn on Kiddo’s, Fran has left such delightful areas in them to get really creative.  With E50 color the entire face. This lays a basis for the other markers to blend smoothly.  Ok, so I have to talk a little about light source.  Imagine the sun is coming from the side of the basket of flowers.  So this is going to be the brightest part of her face.

Now that we have established where the sun is coming and where the brightest part of her face will be. We can now add the shadow.  With E53 add or flick from the outside in just a bit as shown.

With E51 blend by flicking or in circles … I prefer to flick.  You will still see a little line.

Finally with E50 do a final blend where the marker lines are gently tapering to the lightest part of the face.   If you want to deepen shadows you can return to beginning of the steps and repeating process.

To make an ordinary A2 card a little more special I love to use the new Spellbinders A2 Bracket Borders.  So easy and you can use them from any angle of the card.  They also work on a 5×5

Thanks for visiting today and I will see you again next Thursday for another tutorial.  Happy Crafting  -Rhea

Mixed Media – NEW Stamps – Tobi Crawford

OK!! Here is something you are going to LOVE – along with a sneak peek at one of our NEWEST Jumbo Flowers, a mixed media canvas treat from the talented BlogStar Tobi Crawford !

Hello Stampendous! fans! It’s Tobi Crawford here with a mixed media project using some new stamps available at your favourite retailer very soon!!

1. I covered the 8.5×11 canvas with vintage dictionary paper and added some yellow orange paint on top. The blue paint splatters were done with a metallic paint by Lumiere (and the splatters are actually a stencil. Random but not!). Once the paint dried I stamped the images (Jumbo Calla Lilly) with Black Archival Ink.

2.   Paint in the image with watered-down acrylic paints. FYI, I watered down the paints so I could still see the stamped lines.

3.   Once the paint has dried, draw over the stamped lines with a black pen.

4.   Cover the images with the masks. (Templates are included FREE with the newest Jumbo Cling stamps!)

5.   Using a sponge dauber, go around the outside of the mask. This will add a shadow to the images.

Done! Doesn’t that look great with the shading??

My mind is reeling with ideas with the other jumbo stamps and I’ve got some fresh canvases ready and waiting! Thanks for joining me today!

[Just a quick Stampendous Note: You could also use the outside of the template and paint your flowers first. then stamp your flowers over the dry paint, and then mask them with the inside template before applying the background. This would save you having to trace the lines]

Four seasons of Stampendous by Asia King – part 2

Hello Stampendous Friends, your favourite Foreign Correspondent Asia King here. Are you ready for part 2 of my Four Seasons concerto? If you missed part 1 with the close up pictures of my project, you can check it out here.

Well then, let’s begin. All my pages were made in the same way, I just used different stamps and embossing powders. For the purpose of this tutorial I will show you the steps for one of the pages – and it only seems right to feature my Spring page here .

Step 1 – here’s what you need:

- Fresh Bloom and Ruffled Bloom cling rubber stamps

- White and Black detail embossing powders – these can be found in the Detail Embossing Kit

- DCWV 8″x8″ Luxury Paper Stack – or any other pearlised papers

- clear embossing ink, water brush, Inktense pencils (Crimson & Cherry)/water colour pencils, Tim Holtz Vintage Cabinet Card die, heat gun

Step 2:

- die cut a Vintage Cabinet Card panel from the pearlised patterned paper, choosing the colour theme accordingly to the season

- using clear embossing ink stamp 3 flowers onto the die cut panel and 3 flowers onto scrap pieces of the same colour theme paper

- heat emboss with white and black detail powders

Step 3:

- using a waterbrush pick up some pigment directly from the pencil and colour in the black embossed flowers

Pearlised paper works great when colouring with Inktense pencils – the colour with ‘travel’ and blend beautifully without losing the ‘shine’ from the pearlised paper. It dries quite quickly but it will stay wet for long enough to blend it more if needed. And if you go over the line – no worries. Just use your waterbrush to lift off the excess colour.

Step 4:

- repeat the process to build layers of colour as desired.

Step 5:

- fussy cut the flowers

- add a blob of Beacon’s 3 in 1 craft glue in the centres of the flowers

- embellish the centres with pearls, Champagne Glass Glitter and Pearlised Mica Fragments (these can be found in the Pink Encrusted Jewel kit)

Step 6:

- swipe the edges of the card panel with clear embossing ink

- heat emboss with Aged Rose Embossing Enamel

- add accents with Pearlised Mica and Rose Fragments - you can use 3 in 1 glue as adhesive

Step 7:

- I like to seal my encrusted jewels with a drop of Beacon’s Fast Finish – it dries clear and it smells lovely, too!

Step 8:

- die cut 4 Cabinet Card panels from black cardstock and 4 panels from chipboard (or cereal box)

- glue black panels and chipboard ones using and old glue brush and Claudine Hellmuth’s Multimedium Matte. Make sure to immediately put your brush in water to avoid hardening – unless you don’t mind it becoming an embellishment .

Step 9:

- cut a length of white strong ribbon. Use mists, ink sprays and distress stains to colour the ribbon. Add water with a mini mister so the colours blend in easily.

Step 10:

- layer your base chipboard panels about an inch apart. Decide which way your book should fold, depending on any dimensional elements

- using Matte Multimedium adhere the coloured ribbon across the chipboard panels about 1/3 down from the top.

- adhere your Fran-taged pearlised panels to the chipboard panels using Multimedium. Use large paper clips to hold the panels over the ribbon until the glue sets

- add some calendar rub-ons (Prima) in the bottom right corners of the panels. You can easily add rub-ons over the enamelled areas

- layer your embellishments and sentiment panels over your seasons pages. Complete your project with additional trinkets as desired.

I hope you enjoyed the second part of my Seasonal Concerto and I can’t wait to see your seasonal beauties! If you have any questions – let me know in the comment below .

Big hugs

Asia

Four seasons of Stampendous by Asia King – Part 1

Hello Friends! Your Foreign Correspondent Asia here. Last week I finally felt that Spring was on its way to the UK. Blankets of snowdrops and first shy daffodils were trying very hard to send Winter home . And whilst talking about seasons, I thought I would share this little beauty with you today. Just like the famous composer Antonio Vivaldi, I wanted to compose a concerto of the four seasons – in my own way .

I didn’t want this post to be too picture heavy, so I am going to break it down into two parts. Today I will share the individual pages of my Four Seasons accordion book and next week I will show you the ‘technical’ steps.

So let’s start with… Winter!

I started by waving my baton, errr… the heat gun that is, got the orchestra of Fran-tage powders to tune their instruments, and before I knew it, the music was filling in my craft room…

For my frosty season I used the cling Old World Map and the Suitcase World sentiment stamp. The map was first heat embossed with Silver Detail embossing powder and coloured with Inktense pencils. The sentiment was heat embossed with Black Detail embossing powder. The snowflakes were adorned with Teal Mica fragments and Sky Blue embossing powder. Then I ‘framed’ the sentiment panel with Detail Capri embossing powder and the background panel was Fran-taged with the Aged Teal Embossing Enamel. All these beauties can be found in one magical place – Fran-tage Encrusted Jewel Kit in Teal. (available soon in the US)

Now… let’s cheer for Spring!

And with Spring I bring you a handful of Fresh and Ruffled Blooms, heat embossed with Black (for the foreground) and White Detail (for the background) embossing powders.

The flower centres are all bathed in Champagne Glass glitter and Pearlized Mica Fragments. The background panel has been embellished with the same Mica Fragments and a generous sprinkle of Aged Rose Embossing Enamel. These gorgeous jewels can be found in the Pink Encrusted Jewel Kit.

Now, let’s get ready for…Summer!

Oh, I so love Summer evenings in a garden full of wonderful flowers. Sadly my garden is not very inspiring, so perhaps this gorgeous Seed Catalogue stamp will inspire me to fill my garden with beautiful blooms. Just so I can see the world that will be Beautiful . With the Summer season in mind, I ‘seasoned’ my page with Aged Hunter and Aged Rose embossing enamels and added Champagne glass glitter and Rose Colour Fragments.

And now, Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you… Autumn! Or Fall, depending on your point of view .

My Autumnal page is swept with a gentle brush of the Ruffled Butterfly‘s wings and the leaves falling off the trees, dancing in the wind. Can you see all those golds, coppers and bronzes sparkling in the Autumnal sun? That’s the sparkle of the Vintage Mahogany embossing tinsel, Bronze Glass Glitter, Golden Sand embossing powder and Aged Copper embossing enamel – from the Bronze Encrusted Kit. (also available soon in the US)

I hope you enjoyed my Stampendoulicious seasonal symphony . Stay tuned for the 2nd part with the step by step assembling  instructions for the accordion book.

Until then…

Big hugs

Asia

Around the Interwebs with Stampendous

We’re so excited when folks use our products. Several of our Design Team Alumni naturally have a sizeable Stampendous stash, so when they break it out to do something special it always warms our hearts. Our DT is such a big, happy family, that it’s like having your daughter come home from college for the weekend when one of our gals plays with some of our goodies. Here’s what we’ve spotted around the web recently.

Taylor Usry playing with our Jumbo Sunflower and Imagine Crafts inks!

Melinda Gleissner takes on Art Journaling!

Taylor Usry plays with our Farm Life Perfectly Clear Stamps!

Melinda Gleissner Plays with Kiddos!

Taylor Usry visits Paris from her craft room!

We’re keeping our eyes open for fantastic Stampendous projects from past Design Team Members or anyone, for that matter! Let us know at submissions@stampendous.com if you post something on your blog that you’d like us to mention! And be sure to enter our February challenge! Only a few more days left!

BlogStars are Back!! For Good!

We’re revising our BlogStar system, and we’re so excited. We’ve convinced three of our Design Team to take on the role of permanent BlogStars.

Rhea Weigand, Tobi Crawford, and Asia King will each be bringing you one project per week using the latest Stampendous images and products. We hope you’ll grow to love their varying styles. All three are fantastic artists, and we’re thrilled to be bringing them to you. So let’s get started:

Good Morning!  Rhea here, and today I am bringing you Botanical Blooms by Stampendous.  How exciting because they asked me to give you a step by step on how I made this card.  I will be doing this for you each week and I am jumping for joy!!!!  So let’s get started.

When we are done you will have instructions on making this design.  You can use it to do a class or just for yourself

Stamp 2 images with Archival Ink.

Why Archival Ink?  Because we will be dry color washing with Distress Ink and will need a permanent waterproof ink.  If you were to use a pigment ink or memento ink your coloring would cause smearing.

You will need the following Distress colors.  Tumbled Glass, Peeled Paint, Worn Lipstick and Squeezed Lemonade.

With Tumbled Glass and sponge mini applicator apply a very light coat to the background only.  The mini sponge applicator is very important.  It looks like an eye make up applicator and there are 2 kinds that are perfect.  They can be found at JoAnn’s and Sofft Art Sponges online.  These applicators have the same sponge tip as a finger dauber which allows the color washing to glide smoothly.  If you use a cheaper version, such as a dollar store brand, you will not be happy with your results since the color will skip and be uneven.

To get the color even and soft you will barely touch the paper.  You can always add more color but you can not take it away as you will see as we move on.

Next, lightly apply Worn Lipstick to the flowers.  Then with Inkssentials Craft Nib go back with Worn Lipstick and carefully apply a little more to the inner part of the flowers.

Now with the Squeezed Lemonade apply a bit to the flower centers and a little here and there to the background for variation.

With Peeled Paint lightly wash the leaves not worrying about staying in the lines.  This will also add to the background.

Add more Tumbled Glass to darken the light areas left in the background

Now that the images are colored, you will trim one image around the edges.  The other will be cut into 4 – 1 3/4″ squares.  Next it is time to emboss the entire image with Stampendous Chunky Clear.  Wipe VersaMark all over the front and dip into the chunky clear powder.  Before I heated it I sprinkled a little of the Crystal Micro Glitter on top.  This will melt into the powder and be beautiful.

Tip:  I keep my most used embossing powder in a food storage container.  Keeps it much easier to use and no waste

Here it is after it is heated.  Super shiny and full of sparkle!

Now all you have to do is mat and assemble and embellish and you are done.  The card is a 6×6.  You could also do many different variations of this design.  You could easily add a sentiment.  Try doing a smaller version and leave off the smaller squares.  Try leaving off the large background and just do the squares.  Emboss the background on dark paper!  This image is very versatile.  Maybe I will do another version in a few weeks

Thanks for visiting, and I would love to read your comments!  I would also love to have you become a follower of my blog!  Happy designing  Rhea