Vacation....Fun Times!

Last week we went on a much needed vacation....  DH, DS, & soon to be DIL went up to Union Grove WI to the Red Power Round Up - an antique tractor show featuring International Harvester tractors & equipment.  My guys like Internationals and own quite a few so this is a real treat for them.

It was lots of fun - the weather the first day was a bit chilly but the second day was beautiful!  They were restoring a tractor during the 3 day show which was fun to see the progress.  There were all sorts of tractors big and small, vendors selling lots of cool goodies - I bought some neat vintage looking fabric that I'm going to turn into an apron and not sure what I'm going to do with the rest.  We also ate some good food but I did notice one thing....folks in Wisconsin don't like to eat like we do in Indiana.  Not one Elephant Ear, Corn Dog or Funnel Cake in all of the food vendors there!  We were amazed.

The going to and coming back from the show was an adventure all on it's own - we had to go through Chicago....going (at 5:00a.m.) was really fast - traffic was moving about 85mph!  Way to fast for this country girls liking.  Coming back we were in bumper to bumper traffic almost the entire way at anywhere from a crawl to about 50 mph.  Needless to say it took much longer to get back than it did to go.

We stopped in Valparaiso to eat going and coming back (we actually stayed over night coming back) at the Industrial Revolution Eatery!  OMG that place is awesome!!!  It's a one of a kind place dedicated to the folks that built and help make America great.  They call it Upscale Industrial but it's got a definite Steampunk vibe to it that I LOVE!  The deco is brick and steel girders with a train that runs over head.  Lots of great old photos of men and women from the Industrial Age doing what they did best...building this country up into what it is today.  

The food is really great - we at lunch (going) and supper (coming back from WI).  We each had something different and everything was wonderful as was the service.  Dh said he would drive over there (about 2 - 2.5 hrs from home) just for the food - LOL!!

Finally we ended up at Rochester Indiana and the Gathering of the Orange - an antique tractor show dedicated to Allis-Chalmers tractors which my oldest DS was showing one of his farm tractors & a garden tractor.  LOTS of beautiful orange tractors and equipment on show there as well.  DS was very excited because he recently restored his tractor and this was it's first official tractor show.  

And we're back home...exhausted but refreshed. 

Googley Eye Summer Welcome!

Happy Monday!   I hope you've all had a wonderful start to your week!  Today I wanted to take up a challenge from AAA Cards - #67 - Googley Eyes.  Since it's the first day of Summer as well I thought it would be fun to make them dual purpose - Summer Googley Eye creations.

My first card - Summer - was created by stamping the lobster & sentiment on smooth white cardstock which I framed with a few borders from the Club Scrap Boardwalk kit. 

The second card is a quickie using a "cut-a-part" also from the CS Boardwalk kit to which I added the googley eyes.  Isn't that crab darling?  I finished off the card with a bit of beautiful blue ribbon

Supplies:

ClubScrap.com - Cardstock, Ribbon, Cut-A-Part, Border, Stamps

Imagine Crafts - Memento Dye Ink

Googley Eyes

Dad - Love you....

I wanted to share a really fun Father's Day card using some of the new Delicata Ink colors from Imagine Crafts....

I am so in love with these inks!  They are metallics to start off with and they have a beautiful shimmer that just takes them over the top in my book.    Everything you see was either stamped or inked with one of the various colors now available.  

The cool graphics on this card are due in part thanks to Seth Apter and his amazing dies & embossing folders available through Spellbinders.  The fun bursts and planet dies went so well over the laser beam embossing folder, it really brought the whole "out of this world" theme together.

Be sure to stop by the Imagine Crafts blog 

to see how it all came together.

Sharing Some Beauty...

Taking a crafting break so I thought I it would be nice to share a few flowers pics with you....

I love these peonies... 

Bit of a 50's Flashback Today...

Yes I wanted to share a couple cards I made using some of the fun 50's stamps available at JFF Stamps.

This card was so much fun to make...the glasses were colored with Memento Dual Tip Markers and covered with a bit of Clear irRESISTible Texture Medium.  The Record was stamped with Black Shimmer Delicata Ink which gives it such a pretty finish and the saddle shoes are embossed with black EP to give them the shine those shoes had.  The fun cherry background paper is from Club Scrap.

My 50's chick is dressed in her finest poodle skirt and pink accessories.  She was stamped, colored and mounted on cardstock again from Club Scrap.

Hope you've enjoyed this trip back and if you have time you might want to try your hand at a 50's Flashback card and join the JFF Blog Monthly Challenge!  You might be the lucky winner of a JFF Stamps Gift Certificate!

Faux Calico Fabric Stamping Technique

Hey everyone!  I hope you're all having a super inky week.  If not, maybe you can find a few minutes to stamp an image or two just to tide you over till you can really get inky.

Today I wanted to share a really fun idea I've had rolling around for a while now - Faux Calico Fabric!  If you can't tell I'm a child of the 70's...calico was everywhere back then and I loved it!  I have 2 favorite calico memories...the first is a doll that was popular back then - Holly Hobby.  She had a pretty little calico dress in blues that I just loved.  Had a small doll and a lunch pail with her on it. Still have the doll somewhere...not so sure about the lunch box.

The second memory is about a dress I had.  The town we lived in was having a huge 1976 celebration which I believe coincided with our fair.  Part of the fun was people dressing up in  "old tyme" cloths.  Mom made her and I matching dresses in red calico.  Loved it!  My dad even entered the old tyme moustache contest and had one of those white hats with red/white/blue hat band.  Lots of fun!

So on to the technique....

Faux Calico Fabric Stamping

So, these were what sparked the idea...they are mini stamp sets from Rubber Stamp Tapestry.  They have several stamps in each set that are meant to be stamped repeatedly to make a frame or image.  I thought it would be fun to turn them into faux fabric.

The set I'm using today - Summer Floral -  has 5 images shown above.

I am also going to be using a couple stencils from ClubScrap.com and of course my Memento Inks from Imagine Crafts.

I started off by taping off the design I wanted to use...

and chose my inks.  I am using 3 colors of pink/red for the flowers; a fun purple for the berries and a trio of green for the foliage.

I started off by stamping the largest flower with the darkest red - Rhubarb Stalk.

I then stamped the smaller flower using Rose Bud and Angel Pink - which ended up more purple because I hadn't cleaned off the residual black ink from a previous stamping.

Next the leaves - Bamboo Stalk, Pear Tart and Olive Grove.

Finally I added the Berries using Lilac Posies.

I used a sponge dauber and Rich Cocoa around the edges of the stencil to really set the design off.

And here's how it turned out! 

Next I made a bird using the same technique using blues and the same set of green inks.

Added the leaves & berries...

And a touch of Grey Flannel around the edges... 

And there you go!

Supplies:

Imagine Crafts - Memento Dye Inks; Sponge Dauber

Club Scrap.com - Stencils

Rubber Stamp Tapestry - Stamps

MISTI - Got mine...

O.k..after much mental debate late last week I decided to order a MISTI Stamping tool by My Sweet Petunia.  Not sure if you've heard of it or not but the original tool has been around for a couple years now.  The original MISTI (6.5 x 8.5" stamping area) had a few problems after it was first released (cracking at the hinges mostly) and had a price tag of around $60-70.00* - Now they are $60.00*.  Too rich for my frugal (read cheap) self.  

NOTE: this may sound like a commercial but it's not...I'm not being paid or compensated in any way to talk about this...  It's just a new toy that I'm excited about ;)  LOL!!

So they got their problems taken care of and wow, lots of people started getting them dispite the price.  I think 9 months to a year ago they came out with a Mini MISTI (4.75 x 6" stamping area) - $45.00*  and they now have a Scrapbook MISTI (12.25 x 12.25" stamping area) - $100.00*.   

*NOTE - These prices are the My Sweet Petunia prices - some on-line stores and/or auctions are charging LOTS more so be sure to price around.

Still a bit pricy for me so I held off until last week.  I got an e-mail from Scrapbook.com that they were offering a $10.00 off coupon on their MISTI priced at $47.99.  Of course that's what it took to push my cheap self over the line and I bought it.  Woo Hoo...  

So I rec'd it and love it!  It arrived a couple days into my big card sample stamping week and I can't tell you how much paper it saved me.  Up until then if I got a bad image I had to start over.  It didn't happen that much but when it did it was very frustrating.  WELL....  I didn't waste anymore paper after I started stamping with the MISTI!  I don't have too much trouble on plain white cardstock but stamping on watercolor, mixed media or colored (textured) cardstock is a pain.  The watercolor and mixed media paper has a different texture and is very absorbent - it really sucks up ink and leaves you with a weak image many times no matter how well you inked the stamp.  Of course textured cardstock poses it's own issues depending on the texture in the paper.

So this is what it looks like out of the package....you get the stamping "folder", a few pieces of grid paper, foam pad and a couple of very powerful magnets.  It's designed to be used with cling mounted stamps but with help from the foam pad you can use acrylic stamps and I've found you can also use it with unmounted stamps as well!

So with acrylic and UM you use the foam sheet and I also covered the foam pad with one of the pieces of grid paper just to keep the foam clean.  The foam pad drops right into the MISTI and stays put - nothing else needed to keep it secure and in place.

Since I UM all of my stamps I'm going to just leave the foam in from here on out.

Here it is ready to stamp.

So, let's try stamping a piece of watercolor paper with one of my new stamps from Club Scraps - Boardwalk kit.  It is UM with a coating of Aleene's Tack it Over and Over on the back.  

Position it, let the lid come down and pick it up.

When you raise the lid the stamp is held just where you needed it.

Ink up the stamp, close the lid and stamp the image.  You will notice it's a bit light as the watercolor paper absorbs the ink.

So, you simply open the lid, ink it up and restamp until you get a really great image.  

TIP: You will notice in this photo I have an embossing folder under the clear door.  The door doesn't lay completely flat when it's open so when you go to ink up the stamp is puts a bit of stress on the hinges.  I don't want to break it so I figured out that if you slide an embossing folder under the door it holds the acrylic piece completely flat so you can ink up the stamp without fear of damaging the hinges.  

And here's my lovely dark image on watercolor paper!  It took 3 times to get the entire image deep rich black lines but hey, it's worth it - I didn't have to throw away a piece of costly watercolor paper.

Now I must warn you that depending on how long ago you applied the Aleene's Tack it Over and Over to the back of your stamp some of it may stick to the door.  No worries, it came right off as did the excess ink that I got on the door when inking the stamp up.  My Sweet Petunia does sell special cleaners and such (which I don't have yet) to help keep your MISTI looking new.

I would say that if you have an extra $45.00 laying around (for the MINI) it's well worth it.  It's even better if you get it on sale.  I'm still skeptical about paying the $60.00 or 100.00 for the other two but since I mostly just make cards the mini works for me.

So there you go...my honest unbiased opinion about the MISTI.  Hope that answers some questions that several of you have asked over the past few months.

Turn Any Stamp into a Silhouette Image

As you know this week at Imagine Crafts they are celebrating weddings since the season is in full swing.  Today was my turn to share a fun technique using the VersaMarker to turn my swan stamps into silhouette images!

Here is the "Congratulations" wedding card I made using the technique.

If you'd like to take a peek at how this card was created, please stop by...

Silhouette Stamping

I'm sure you've been wondering where I've been the last several days....  Every year Just For Fun Rubber Stamps hosts a large stamping convention down in FL - in addition they usually release all of their new stamps at the same time.   Due to some unforeseen circumstances they didn't get the stamps until Monday...which I rec'd on Tuesday.  The only hitch is that they need the card examples by next Friday which wouldn't be so bad but I'm going out of town on Wednesday so I have exactly one week to make as many samples as possible.    

I've been stamping, coloring and creating cards as fast as I can....  I've got about 60 cards done  (in 3 days) and I've got probably another 20-40 more to go depending on if my steam holds out....it's dwindling quickly though...after about the first 40 fresh card design ideas are becoming harder and harder to come by.  Oh well, at least there is sunshine at the end of the rainbow...just a few more to go and I'll be all set ~ at least that's what I keep telling myself - LOL!!

Selective Embossing Technique

This week over on the Imagine Crafts blog is Wedding Week!  Since I recently finished the invitations for my son's wedding in August I thought it would be fun to re-create it with a bit of a different look with the help of the VersaMarker, Delicata Black Shimmer, White Shimmer and Silver inks and the Selective Embossing Technique!

And here's how it turned out.....

To see just how I made this invitation and it's components 

please stop by the Imagine Crafts blog here - 

Selective Embossing Technique

Inside the first flap

Main invite & pocket holding the rest of the info.

Invitation

Extra bits pocket...

RSVP Postcard

The whole deal....

Can you tell I'm excited and ready for August to get here?

Have a lovely day friends!

Supplies:

Imagine Crafts - Delicata, VersaMark Ink Pad, VersaMarker, Embossing Powder

Club Scrap.com - Rubber Stamps

Cardstock - Bazzill.com

Glitter Cardstock - American Crafts

Vellum - Unknown