Blog Blitz - New Happy Octopus and Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments by Jean Okimoto

Welcome to our Spring Collection Blog Blitz!  Watercolors are the backdrop for the new Happy Octopus, Underwater Scene fishes and Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments on today's card.  

Hello, Jean Okimoto here with a nautical design  - and a few techniques.  I'm hoping it looks like the octopus is emerging from the water and greeting the fishes.  

Create a quick ombre look with Blue Breeze Kaleidacolor.  Follow the instrucions on the container to move the individual inkpads together for brayering, but separated for storage.  Spritz the smoother side of watercolor with water.  Ink a 4" soft rubber brayer by rolling  it repeatedly (about 25 times) over the inks.  Cover the entire inkpad by rolling it in one direction instead of  back and forth.  

Hold the inked brayer horizontally (to prevent drips) and spritz it with water - two spritzes are better than one.  Roll the inks onto the damp watercolor paper.  Air-dry it for a few minutes.  

Spritz it lightly with water, wait a few seconds, then heat-set  both sides to minimize curling. Cut it with the waves and frame section of the Happy Octopus set - run it through your machine with the waves running horizontally instead of vertically.

Here's an easy way to select a specific section of the paper to diecut the fishes - 

Cut the fishes from a Post-It - use the offcut to select the area you want to cut.

Place the die back into the cutout and cut the fishes, exactly where you want them!

Cut the octopus head twice from watercolor paper.  Attach a scrap of black cardstock behind the eyes of one head.  Layer the second head behind it for dimension.  Cut the tentacles.  Attach the head and two tentacles behind the waves.  Slip two tentacles between the wave slots and tape them behind the waves.  

Stamp the greeting from the Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments set on the smoother side of watercolor paper with Electric Purple Radiant Neon.  Emboss it with detail clear powder.  Cut it into a strip with the scalloped edge of the wave section.

Attach the diecuts to a Violet Notecard - use foam dots for the fishes, greeting and octopus head.  Color clear gem stickers with a Sharpie or Copic Marker that matches the greeting.  The ink is much pinker that it appears on the inkpad.

Want a chance to win the whimsical Happy Octopus die set?  Add a comment on  this post by Sunday, March 3rd at 11:59pm EST.  One comment will be selected at random to win the set.  There will be a chance to win one of the new release items each day this week through Sunday.  Winners will be announced on the blog on Monday, March 4th at 6pm EST.  Good luck!

Big thanks to everyone from Sunday's GREETINGS FROM BIRCH PRESS class at Impress!  Hope you like the cards - and all of the techniques we used with those great dies and stamps.  Thanks also to  Ann, Erin and Lynne for your help in finding the supplies we needed for our cards.

Be sure to comment on all of the Design Team's blitz posts.  Hope you're a winner!

Supplies

 

94227 Happy Octopus craft die

94224 Underwater Scene craft die

CL5240 Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments clear stamp set

Birthday Fishes by Donna Sledzik

Good morning everyone and welcome to the Memory Box 2019 Spring Blog Blitz!  We hope you will join us each day for inspiring ideas and a chance to win prizes!  

For my card today I used only a portion of one of the dies.  I think it's fun to see how to get the most out of your supplies.  Laura's great card on Monday showed her using the whole die and I am only using the fish from the die to create my card.

To create this card I die cut the fish 4 times from watercolor paper and glued them on my card front.  I also used watercolor paper for my card front.  

Once the glue was dry I sponged over the fish background with Distress Inks.  I misted the background with plain water and let the ink drip and blend.

Once the paper was dry, I stamped the word "sending" using black ink.  I used a distress inked strip of paper and stamped the "birthday fishes" sentiment with Versa Mark ink and heat embossed it with white embossing powder.

I adhered the card front to a white card base using foam tape.  

To finish the card I glued some clear embellishments to the front.

Would you like to win the new Oceanside Typewriter clear set that will coordinate with all of your beach/nautical stamps and dies?  Leave a comment to this post by Sunday, March 3rd at 11:59 pm EST.  One comment at random will be selected to win the stamp set.  There will be a chance to win one of the new release items each day this week through Sunday.  Winners will be announced on the blog on Monday, March 4th at 6 pm EST.  Good luck!

Good luck everyone and thanks for stopping by!

 

Supplies

 

94224 Underwater Scene craft die

CL5240 Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments clear stamp set

CL5236 Bold Friendly Greetings

Hugs Card by Isha Gupta

Hello and Welcome!  It's Isha  sharing a clean and simple spring themed card with you using the new Spring 2019 stamps and dies. I am longing for spring after the long winter, so it was natural to think of florals and butterflies keeping the crisp clean breeze in mind :)

I started by creating a white watercolor cardbase. I then added various paint colors to it, concentrating towards the center. I then added a few splatters too. Let this piece dry. Meanwhile, I die-cut the butterfly and the floral wreath. I adhered the wreath to a piece of vellum. 

I added color to the butterfly front and back layers, once dry, I layered them together and finished it by adhering a gemstone. Adding that pop of pink really gives this card that extra something :)

I stamped the sentiment in the center and adhered all the pieces to the card.

Here is a close up

Easy isn't it? Just keep a lot of white space and you will have a fun, airy CAS card, Hope you got inspired by this card. Have a wonderful crafty day! 

Want to win your own Butterfly Frond craft die? Leave a comment to this post by Sunday, March 3rd at 11:59pm EST. One comment at random will be selected to win the die. There will be a chance to win one of the new release items each day this week through Sunday. Winners will be announced on the blog on Monday, March 4th at 6pm EST. Good luck!

 

Supplies

 

94242 Cottage Flower Circle Frame craft die

94230 Butterfly Frond craft die

30087 Circle Basics Set

CL5236 Bold Friendly Greetings

Blog Blitz Begins with Watercolor Technique by Laura Fulcher

Greetings friends.  We have already started to introduce you to the latest release, but this week there is a chance to win prizes.  We hope you will join us each day through Sunday to see new samples and for a chance to win a daily prize.

The latest release has many new nautical items, so I wanted to use a watercolor technique that would pair well with them.  I first saw the technique over on Splitcoaststampers, and you can see the original tutorial here.   To make the background, you will need watercolor powders (I used Color Burst), coffee filters and some inkjet photo paper (glossy paper won't work).

Place a coffee filter onto a nonstick craft sheet and sprinkle it with powders.  You won't need a lot!

Spritz the filter with water

Place the filter on top of the photo paper

Check on the paper.  My first attempt had missing spots of ink.  Keep pressing the filter onto the paper till you get the background you want.

This is what my finished paper looked like.  It is hard to tell from the photo, but the glossiness of the photo paper really makes the watercolor "pop" and become really vibrant.  You can use the paper for backgrounds or use your favorite parts for diecutting.  Another hint...I have tried using the liquid metallic watercolors, but they never dry on the paper.  Stick to the regular colors.

These are the two papers I used for my card.  The blue/green for the background and the yellow/orange for cutting out my fish.  I didn't like that paper very much for a background, but it was a great paper to cut out fish that would be speckled or striped.  Never throw away paper that isn't your favorite.  I guarantee there are parts that will work great for diecutting.

Now, let's talk about assembling your card.

When you cut out the Underwater Scene, this is what you get:

I cut out the coral part from white cardstock and cut out multiple fish using the orange paper I had made.

I wanted my finished card to have a dimensional look to it, so I used some foam sheets you can buy in a craft store kid section and cut out a circle.  I did this a second time and then glued the two together for extra depth.  The fish were added to the background at different heights.  The biggest fish was glued down with a glue stick, the long fish used thin foam tape, and the small fish used thick foam tape.  I liked the look of different heights so that it looked like some were "deeper" in the ocean.

Here is a side view.  I glued a piece of acetate behind the coral/seeweed and then layered all the pieces of the card.

To finish the card, I used a sentiment from the Oceanside Typewriter Sentiment clear set.  If you make many ocean/seaside cards, you are going to want this set.  It has the best "punny" sentiments to pair with your dies and stamps.

Want to win your own Underwater Scene die?  Leave a comment to this post by Sunday, March 3rd at 11:59pm EST.  One comment at random will be selected to win the die.  There will be a chance to win one of the new release items each day this week through Sunday.  Winners will be announced on the blog on Monday, March 4th at 6pm EST.  Good luck!

 

 

Supplies

 

94224 Underwater Scene craft die

CL5240 Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments clear stamp set

Cottage Flower Circle Frame St. Patrick's Day Cards by Anne Thompson

I decided this week to make some cards for St. Patrick's Day.  In going through the newest 2019 Spring Collection, I settled on the COTTAGE FLOWER CIRCLE FRAME die 94242 as the focal image for my cards.  Those little flowers made me think of four-leaf clovers, though I ended up treating them as blossoms.

All three cards are the same design with just a change in notecard colors, papers, and bows.

These are the three dies I used:

• COTTAGE FLOWER CIRCLE FRAME 94242
• CIRCLE BASICS 30087
• CHEERS JOTTED SCRIPT 94075

• select a green notecard; cut the Cottage Flower Circle Frame and "cheers" from medium green cardstock
• cut a circle from white cardstock that is the same size as the Cottage Flower Circle Frame
• use a glue pen to attach the flower frame to the white circle; add the completed image to the card front
  
• add tiny pearls on the littlest blossoms and ones slightly larger on the other 12 flowers in the frame
• add more pearls to the tiny separate sprig and use a glue dot to attach it to the bow
• use a larger glue dot to secure the bow inside the circle
• use a large glue dot or foam pop dot to adhere the gold shamrock coin inside the circle 
• use a glue pen to attach the green letters to the white outline "cheers" and attach it to the card

• select a lime green notecard, white cardstock, Key Lime Distressed Dot paper, lime green bow
• assemble in the same manner as the first card

• select a blue-green notecard, blue-green striped paper, white cardstock for "cheers", and a blue-green bow
• assemble as the others omitting the white circle behind the flower frame

I LOVE all of the frame dies in this new collection!!!  So much fun to think of ways to use them!

Happy Crafting!

Going Nautical by Trina Pham

Hello there.  Trina here and I have a nautical masculine birthday card to share today.  I was rummaging through my drawers and came across some much forgotten brads.  Well, maybe not quite forgotten because I didn’t think I had any left.  Anyway, they gave me the idea to create a porthole sea scene with the Sailboat Frame die from the new Spring Collection.  

Of course you could use a wood background stamp and skip this part, but I did the faux wood technique to create my background.  Started with a panel of Smoky Slate cardstock and used a scoring tool to score lengthwise every 3/4”.  Turned the panel 90 degrees and scored some perpendicular lines in between those lines.  Next took a white pigment inkpad and dragged it down lengthwise accoss the panel.

Try not to work it too much.  You don’t want it to be uniform.  The process was repeated using Pumice Stone distress ink.

Finally a Smoky Slate marker and ruler were used to draw in the lines for better definition.  I found this technique worked better with the felt inkpads instead of the spongy type.  It also helps that the inkpad is not dry.  The panel was set aside to dry.

In the meantime, the water scene circle was die cut from hot press watercolor paper, then watercoloured with distress oxide inks.

The sailboat pieces was die cut three times from white cardstock and stacked for dimension.  It was pieced together onto acetate then excess acetate was trimmed off.  This was done to make it simpler to handle.  The clouds are a single die cut layer.  The “porthole”  frame was created by die cutting from dark gray cardstock with two sizes of circles from the Circle Basics set.  Adhered the frame over the watercolored scene and added the brads.

The sentiment from Bold Friendly Greetings was stamped with Blueprint Sketch distress oxide ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder.  Adhered the panel to a white card base, then mounted the circle scene with fun foam.  Drew in a few seagulls and added highlights to the water with a white gel pen to finish.

This is just one of the many beautiful products from the Spring release.  Make sure to come back starting Monday for Blitz Week.  Thank you for stopping by.  Enjoy your weekend!

Supplies

94226 Sailboat Frame craft die

CL5236 Bold Friendly Greetings

30087 Circle Basics Set

You make me Smile Card by Isha Gupta

Hello and Welcome!  It's Isha  sharing a clean and simple spring themed card with you. Today, I want to share that we don't have to color the full die-cut images to achieve pretty results. Leaving a bit of white space leaves the project with an airy feel, which is quite important for CAS one layer cards :)

I started by creating a white cardbase and sponged a bit of salty ocean distress ink to create the background. I then die-cut the floral wreath and added a bit of Shimmerz paints to it, let it dry. Meanwhile I die-cut the butterfly and added some distress ink for a pop of color.

Now I stamped the sentiment and then adhered the die-cuts. To finish, I adhered a few crystals from Studio Katia.

Here is a close up

Easy isn't it? Just keep a lot of white space and you will have a fun, airy CAS card, Hope you got inspired by this card. Have a wonderful crafty day! 

 

Supplies

 

99952 Devonshire Wreath craft die

94110 Butterfly Heart Frame craft die

CL5237 Best Life Typewriter Sentiments

New Cottage Flower Circle Frame and Bold Friendly Greetings by Jean Okimoto

The new Cottage Flower Circle Frame is ready for spring...and so are we!  It's fresh, delicate and perfect when you need a quick card.  Finish it off with  a message and dotted strip from the Bold Friendly Greetings Clear Stamp Set.  

Hi everyone, Jean Okimoto here with a simple design for any occasion.  Add a dimensional look to your cards by pressure-embossing the delicate dies, then topping it with the diecut.  

Cut textured white cardstock with the 4" Circle Basics die.  

Separate the frame and the blossom stem of the Cottage Flower Circle Frame.  Pressure-emboss the frame onto the circle diecut.  

Cut the frame from smooth white cardstock.

Here's a tip  -  make it easy to attach the diecut frame to the embossed frame.  Just add  tiny dots of glue to the soon-to-be-hidden sections of the the sturdy embossed frame instead of the delicate diecut.  Press the delicate diecut onto the embossed frame.  

Stamp the dotted strip - from the greetings set - on white cardstock with Brilliance Pearlescent Thyme. Dry the ink,then trim it to about 4-½" long.

Stamp the greeting - from the new Bold Friendly Greetings Clear Stamp Set -  onto white cardstock with Brilliance Pearlescent Orchid.  Trim it with the 1" x 2-¼" Rectangle Basics die.  

Cut the blossom stem from green cardstock.  Attach pink felt to adhesive label paper (or a sticker sheet) and diecut just the flowers.  The adhesive backing stabilizes the felt and keeps adhesives from soaking through the fabicc.

Cut the small Simple Garden Pot from silver cardstock.

Attach all of the pieces to a side-folded 5-¼" square card - use foam dots for the greeting.

Very big thanks to everyone from Monday's SIMPLY ASIAN class at Impress!  I appreciate how so many of you drove and/or ferried to Tukwila  after days of snow, ice and slush.  Thanks also to everyone who helped shovel your driveway so you could get to Tukwila.  And thanks to Ann and Shari for helping everyone fill their shopping baskets with the new Spring Collection.   See you again at this Saturday's BIRCH PRESS GREETINGS Class at Impress!

Supplies

 

94242 Cottage Flower Circle Frame craft die

99999 Simple Garden Pots craft die

30086 Rectangle Basics Set

30087 Circle Basics Set

CL5236 Bold Friendly Greetings

You Are Mer-Mazing by Melissa Rusk

Happy Wednesday! Today I have a card to share using some of the latest release. These dies and stamps are so much fun!

I loved the mermaid from the Mermaid Wonder Frame die and I cut her out in a white paper. I colored her in with Copic Markers. I took the fish from the Underwater Scene die and did the same thing. Cut out in white and then colored with Copic Markers.

For my background I used a piece of glossy photo paper. Using two different colors of liquid water colors I placed drops on the paper. Then I took my mist bottle filled with water and sprayed over the drops.

The sprays of water will send the color in different directions on your paper. If you get any pooling of color near the edges, just place a paper towel next to the paper to pull away the excess water color. Let the paper dry and then you can trim it down to fit on your card.

I finished the card off with the cute sentiment from the Ocean Typewriter Sentiments stamp set. I added some clear gems and some clear Nuvo drops to make bubbles on the water.

I hope you try out this technique, it's super fun and you get a different look each time you do it depending on how much water you spray and in what direction.

 

Supplies

 

CL5240 Oceanside Typewriter Sentiments clear stamp set

94222 Mermaid Wonder Frame craft die

94224 Underwater Scene craft die

Love Card by Isha Gupta

Hello and Welcome!  It's Isha  sharing a clean and simple, tall format card using various stamps and dies. I love creating different card style so today I have cluster and layers :)

I started by creating a white cardbase. I then stamped some hearts using very light ink colors. I  flicked some pink and gold splatters to it.

Now, I cut a panel using watercolor paper and colored it using pink watercolor, let dry. Meanwhile I die-cut a white twig, a vellum heart and the word "LOVE" using gold and white cardstock. Adhere the white LOVE word to the gold shadow die-cut.

I then die-cut the pink panel using "Heart Board" die. Once all the die-cuts were ready, I simply adhered all the pieces to the card forming a cluster.

Here is a close up

Hope you got inspired by this card. Have a wonderful crafty day! 

 

Supplies

 

94104 Heart Board craft die

94021 Snowberry Sprigs craft die

94119 Love Jotted Script craft die

32238 Have a Heart die set

CL5238 Have a Heart