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Just had to share this version of the collage - a few drops of aqua and orange alcohol inks on the right side of the image and look at the great results!
I have been making these collages non stop for a couple weeks as more and more stores order in this limited edition stamp!
I have had so much fun creating collage pieces for the Believe Poinsettia collage - I stamped the image onto our shimmer Frost White Cardstock and colored it in with colored pencils - then put Glossy Accents and alcohol ink onto it. The results are random - and each piece turns out differently. I have been making them for each store that orders in our Winter Wonder program. Here's a few up close shots - so you can see how beautiful the colored pencil looks underneath layers alcohol ink and lacquer!
To see a list of who has the Winter Wonder program in their store go here.
Things are hopping at Memory Box this week! Blog Blitz (over $300 worth of prizes to win over at the Outside the Box blog, you can check it out by clicking here) is going strong - be sure and tell your friends about all of the contests and get them to leave a comment or "like" us on facebook for a chance to win. We also have shipped out our Winter Wonder release to stores this week - so new ideas and products will be arriving at store shelves soon! The first store to receive this release will most likely be Scrapbook Memories in Wisconsin - they have such a strong Memory Box following that they ordered a double program early in anticipation of the rush! Thanks so much to Brenda and Maureen at the Scrapbook Memories stores!
I am signing a special Believe Poinsettia stamp that we are releasing for a limited time:
For stores that order in the entire Winter Wonder program, I will be handsigning all of the stamps. For a list of stores that are ordering the entire program click here.
Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend - we are heading to Ellensburg, WA to listen to my daughter Emma play in a statewide piano recital.
Is she nervous? No.
Is she excited? Yes, but not for the recital. She can't wait to go to Winegars for ice cream! We discovered this ice cream place last summer during a hiking trip - and can't wait to visit there again!
I thought I would share with you a little behind the scenes look at what it looks like to prepare for one of our smaller programs. We have a collection of stores around the United States that have our entire Soiree Shimmer Paper collection - and we create new displays seasonally to show how to combine stamping and computers to create some fun and elegant invitations, announcements, tags and place card holders. In the spring, the displays tend to focus on weddings - but this time of year the ideas are more holiday themed - like the gift card ideas above.
We print the text onto our cardstock - like the Frost White above. For large amounts of invitations, we suggest taking your computer file (Word document or photoshop pdf file) to a place like Office Depot to have them print it on their color copy machines - the text comes out crisp and bright!
You can print a small area or big area - depending on the card. In the example above, a strip that tells the recipient who the card is from is combined with the new Thistle Distressed Dots paper and the snowglobe/polar bear image (C1409 Fred P Bear and D1407 Snowglobe).
Here we printed the "happy birthday to francis" in a fun font with multiple colors, leaving a space above the text for us to stamp the F1402 Brilliant Maple. This allows you to get 4 cards out of a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 paper - just print it, then cut it up and mount onto some 24 karat Soiree Shimmer cards.
It's fun to get the pets involved too! Here, Oscar posed with a Santa Hat!
It actually took more time to get a picture than it did to make all 12 cards!
I used photoshop to work on the photo, erasing the background around his head and adding text in the open space. Then, a few Design Adhesive stickers from the Flurries collection and some silver glitter were added to create a few snowflakes floating above the text. Our new Slate Shimmer color was a perfect match for his fur!
Party invitations are perfect for the Soiree paper - just create a "text box" in Word, red background with white type. Leave a space above the text box - then once the paper is printed, stamp the D1414 Winterberry Wreath in a beautiful brown ink, like Versacolor Pinecone. A bird sticker (from the In the Forest Design Adhesives pack) and some red glitter is a nice finishing touch.
I got out my sewing machine to create a border for one of the samples. After I stamped out the Mod Border D1319 I ran the strip through my machine without any thread. Sponge a soft brown ink along the edge - like Versamagic Gingerbread - and the layer gets a special treatment.
We used the same idea to create a "path" where a turquoise snowflake was falling across the text of another Christmas card. Here, the D1417 Pine Branch is stamped in silver - and the base card is our beautiful Lagoon Soiree color.
The stores that carry the full collection have (12) shimmering colors, available in 4bar cards and envelopes, A2 cards and envelopes and A7 envelopes on our custom shelving. These samples and more are displayed with the cards and envelopes - go by these stores to see them in person:
Not close to one of these stores? We'll post some of the ideas soon - so you can see them!
Hello Memory Box fans! I am excited to share with you an invitation to go over to our Outside the Box blog and enjoy a full week of inspiration and prizes! Our extensive and super talented Design Team has put together a Blog Blitz to help launch the brand new Winter Nature Collection of stamps and patterned 8 1/2 x 11 papers! Check in often on the Outside the Box blog, there will be several posts throughout the day each day (through Sunday!) with wonderful ideas and chances to win some Memory Box papers and stamps!
I finished teaching my last 5 classes of 2010 at Impress Rubber Stamps this last weekend - and used the new Believe Poinsettia stamp here. I painted our Frost White Shimmer Soiree cardstock with Twinkling H2O's to achieve the watercolor look on the card - just the flower, leaving the background plain. I will be hand-signing all of the Believe Poinsettia stamps in this release. To see a list of stores that are going to carry the full line of Winter Nature stamps you can go here.
While it was a relief to finish the last of my classes, it's also a little bittersweet that everything is over! 3,000 projects were cut this year to accommodate the Class Tour for 2010 - dozens of cities, dozens of stores and many, many wonderful students! Thanks everyone who came and took a Memory Box class from me and also from all of the wonderful Memory Box instructors we have out there! i look forward to another tour next year!
They know that Santa's on his way...
Remember that Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks movie - When Harry Met Sally. For some reason, every time I hear that "Santa's on his way" chorus, I think of that movie. Is it even in it?
It must be - I think they are picking out Christmas trees or walking through the city as it's playing. That song has such a warm feeling to it and brings back all sorts of memories for lots of people. I designed the patterned paper at the bottom of the card with this feeling in mind - everyone is scurrying around, preparing for Christmas, walking through tree lots or driving to the mountains to cut down your own. This pattern is available as a 6x6 piece in the Tinsel 6x6 paper pack.
Seeing trees all lit up with twinkling lights and glittering with ornaments is such an iconic image. I designed the Spiral Tree (E1400) with that in mind:
Each spiral circling in towards the center - I embellished many of the circles with a sparkling Diamond jewel sticker. Did you know we have a large range of jewel and pearl stickers?
Lots of colors to choose from! The color chart above shows all of the beautiful shades they come in - and there are so many in a package! They work great on projects year round - from flower centers to reindeer noses!
By far this is my favorite project from the new collection. The 3 penguins are the stars here. As you all know - I can't get enough bird imagery these days - and these fun little guys are the latest incarnation of our penguin images.
The image is Sleek Penguins (C1383)
I designed them to be quite simple - I had in mind that I would be dressing them up in scarves and hats. Ribbon scarves? Little punched out paper hats with pompoms? I tried a few things and they all looked great.
But the colors and patterns in the Tinsel paper collection worked so well, I decided to use those!
I added a couple of layers of paper - and a greeting - and that card was a cinch to make!
Oh, and the Snow Day ( B1378) image?
It's one of our signature "double" stamps. The snowflakes image is mounted on the side of the stamp - 2 stamps for the price of one! Think you might be having a "snow day" this winter - better get this stamp!
Some of you probably remember, or might even own, the vintage glass ornaments that were decorated with real glass glitter. Well here's a way to make your own paper reproductions!
The Ornament Cheer Block (E1408)
works great with the "In the Forest" Design Adhesive:
See those striped images? They lay over the ornament shapes in the Ornament Block. Just position, burnish them gently onto the paper and add some glitter.
The background paper is a piece of our "Vintage Ornaments" 12x12 - also from the Tinsel collection. The detail on this sheet is amazing - each ornament even has tiny little hand drawn wire hooks!
The ornaments range in sizes on the paper - I love pushing out the circular ones and then adding them to projects with a little bit of foam mounting tape to make them 3D!
I was on my way to a glass blowing studio the other day when I came up with this idea! My daughter Emma went to a Tedx conference in the nearby city of Redmond and during one of the presentations she was inspired to try glass blowing.
One of the speakers at the conference happened to be a very bright 14 year old girl (actually, this particular conference was put together by lots of bright kids - including Adora Svitak, a sparkling little genius who organized and hosted the event at the Microsoft campus in Redmond). Anyway, the speaker was comparing her art background at her school to the art background her little sister was receiving at a montessori program. She switched back and forth between images on the projection screen - comparing her drawings to her little sister's drawings. Then she showed some glass art she had done - first showing some beautiful glass bowls - and then some art that seemed to thrill the entire audience.
An ornament? No.
A crystalline hummingbird? No.
It was a glass sculpture of bacon of all things. A strip of bacon with arms and legs - oh, and meat vision. After that, the speaker lectured about the relationship between creativity and intellect. That is to say, when intellect goes up, creativity goes down. And as the world get more intelligent, creativity is on the decline. She spoke about this for about 20 more minutes - but I'm pretty sure that Emma had tuned out the rest of that lecture just thinking about glass blowing.
How do I know? Well, she asked about glass blowing lessons about 10 times a day after that. So, we went to Uptown Glass Works and enrolled ourselves in a couple of basic sessions - it will be fun to do something {creative} in 3 dimensions - instead of my usual 2 dimensional projects!
The glass studio was filled with glass ornaments - and I thought that a card with a circle of our 12x12 Peace Dove paper "suspended" by a string of glittered Design Adhesive stickers (from the Flurries pack) would look great.
Simple and quite graphic - I thought about putting a "cap" on the ornament, but left it simple. Just an extra layer with the Joy Outline (A1379) was enough.
When I get a few glass blowing sessions under my belt, I'll share some real ornaments with you!
