Meet the verve divas challenge (with quick tutorial)

I have not had the opportunity to play all of the meet the verve divas challenges but was feeling particularly ambitious AND i liked this sketch so i took the plunge!









And here is my card:

And a closer look at the details:

Again I was playing with the Halloween Trails set from Inkadinkado - this time stamped in encore purple metallic ink - much more purple IRL. The tag is stamped in encore silver. The background is another dimensional pearls and ink blending foam experiment. And of course some of Cat's gorgeous purple shimmery bead pops.

The background is quick and easy. Gather supplies; 2-3 colors of dimensional pearls acrylic paints, ink blending tool and foam, cardstock. Using ONE color at a time - squirt liberally on to a foam piece and dab randomly over the cardstock - you want it thick and texture-y in spots. don't cover the whole thing.

Repeat with other colors until you are happy with the results.

another late sketch ...MOJO monday as in last monday...

Today's card uses Julee's sketch challenge from last Monday:











And here is the card:

The background was brayered with a kaleidacolor ink pad in Desert Heat (here.) Again I used a stamp from the back-in-stock Inkadinkado Halloween Trails clear stamp set - available here stamped using a Gold Encore ink pad (get it here.) The background is a perfect pearls technique from the book Paper Transformed and here is how you do it:

Gather your supplies: 3 colors of perfect pearls, ink refresher, mini mister with plain water, small paintbrush, black cardstock and crumpled paper towel. Spray the cardstock with the ink refresher and gently rub it into the paper.

Mix a bit of water with each of the perfect pearls to form a creamy paint (this is where i love my ranger craft sheet - i just mix it right there.) paint random squiggles of paint on the black cardstock. now mist it with water so the paint starts to run and bleed. move the paper around so the paint runs and covers the paper. you may have to mist several times around to activate the paint. (Sorry i forgot to take a pic of this part EEK!)

Next take your crumpled paper towel and dab it up and down on the paper to pick up excess water and some of the paint to form a sort of "vein" look. I hope to get a bit more practice on this one - you'll see it again at christmas hee hee!!

Hope you enjoyed this one!!

ooops! a little late for technostamper...but i have a tutorial!

hi all! i know it's been a bit sparse here lately but i have been SO sick! very frustrating as i rarely get sick because i don't have TIME to be sick! but i did manage to get some shipping done (woo hoo!) and a little play time in.


Today i have TWO cards for you based on MJ's sketch (yes i am WAY behind as her next one comes out tomorrow!) the second card includes a tutorial on another way to use dimensional pearls and the ranger foam ink blending tool. so here is the sketch:

I was SO excited when my latest Inkadinkado shipment arrived as it included the Halloween Trails clear stamp set that has been on back order. It put me in the mood to pull the whole stack back out again and play with them.

So here is card #1:

The bats and spiders are both from Halloween Trails and the pumpkin is from the Cats and Bats set and the little spider is from the Creepy Crawly set - you can order them all here. the two background panels are stamped with lightening black brilliance ink - stamps black but has a gold shimmer - perfect for halloween or what?!?! the little spiders are stamped with gold encore ink. the inks can be purchased here. The pumpkins are stamped in black memento, also available with the other inks, and colored with copics. the glitter around the pumpkins is stickles and the other glitter dots are the new $1 studio G glitter glues only available on the web here.

And now the second card:

In addition to the Inkadinkado order a Tsukineko order also arrived and it included more of the gorgeous kaleidacolor ink pads. I just knew Autumn Leaves would look stunning paired with the solid Inkadinkado stamps. Take a look at these wonderful pads here. And now for the tutorial on the two background panels above.


Gather your supplies: 2-3 colors of dimensional pearls acrylic paints, ranger FOAM ink blending tool, white cardstock (yep that's it!)

Squeeze a generous amount of each color onto your foam. (Really a bit more than you see here). I used Lettuce, Terra Cotta and Butterscotch for nice fall colors.

I applied the paint two different ways to get two different looks. For the first panel I stroked the foam tool diagonally across my cardstock piece. I wanted the colors to stay somewhat separated. I added more paint and continued down until the whole piece was covered. On the second panel I dabbed the foam onto the paper in a random motion similar to applying alcohol inks. experiment and see what YOU come up with! (My Ranger craft sheet is HEAVEN when doing stuff like this because i can make a big mess and then wipe (r scrape) it right back off and keep going.)

Next I stamped my imagge using the Kaleidacolor pad. These pads are great because they keep the colors separated when you are not using them:

After I stamped my image i took the ink blending tool and a fresh foam pad and smudged Terra Cotta ink around the edges of the white circle so it was not so harsh. I LOVE this tool because of the soft gradient look it gives with almost no effort.

i plan to have another tutorial with the foam blender and dimensional pearls up tomorrow so be sure to check it out!

hugs and thanks for stopping by!!