Showing posts with label ranger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ranger. Show all posts

Monday, February 24, 2025

MM08

Diamonds are a Mandala's best friend! This is my first attempt at a Diamond Window Mandala and it's maybe a 47% match to the idea that was in my head. So you'll probably be seeing something similar before too long. (I'll let you decide if that's a promise or a warning, lol!) :)

Peek-a-Boo Diamond Window Mandala
and outlined with Letter It Fineliners


Monday, February 17, 2025

Liquid Pearls Winter Bluebird Card

Did you know that dry Liquid Pearls will act as a resist for diluted colors? It's a similar technique to using a heat embossed design as a resist for watercolor, and is currently one of my very favorite things to do with my growing collection of shimmery colors. Head over to the Ranger Project Tutorials Page to see, step-by-step, how I created this shimmery winter bluebird card, featuring Dina Wakley's adorable Scribbly Birdie Stamps and Simon Hurley's beautiful Stained Glass Stencil.


MM07: Paint Pens on Kraft Cardstock

It's a wild and whimsical Mandala Monday featuring pink, white and pale orange Posca Pens as well as my trusty Letter it Fineliners in my 6x6 Dina Wakley MEdia Kraft Journal.*

*This particular item is out of print, but if you're looking for a journal that's cool and super sturdy, anything from the Dina Wakley MEdia range will not disappoint!!!

Tuesday, February 11, 2025

SOS541: Thrice as Nice

You may already have guessed that this fortnight's challenge at Shopping Our Stash involves THREE of... something. In fact we'd like to see you use three (or more) patterned papers on your card. Not to brag but I've used twelve!


In the interests of full disclosure, I just got this adorable Simon Hurley Road Trip stamp set from Ranger and I was dyyyyyying to "test drive" it, but not only did I use a dozen different ancient patterns to piece it, they were all SCRAPS, so I feel like I did come down on the correct side of stash usage for this one.


Just FYI, the first company to make an all-wheel-drive car that's plaid will get my money. Meanwhile, there are lots of other beautiful and inspirational cards for you to see at SOS, before you start planning what you'll link up with us this time. The "Thrice as Nice" challenge will run until the evening of Monday, February 24th.

Monday, February 10, 2025

MM06: Rub-on Transfers

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon the organizer containing what I thought were a few leftover packs of rub-on transfers (in fact A LOT of leftover rub-on transfers) and became utterly re-obsessed. Thus this is my first ever Rub-On Transfer Mandala Monday. (Probably not the last one lol!)

Monday, February 3, 2025

Painting with Perfect Pearls

It's a Perfect Pearls Mandala Monday with extra shimmer and shine in my large Dina Wakley Journal from Ranger, which has the thickest and sturdiest cotton rag watercolor paper I've ever used; it's seriously dreamy and will stand up to any amount of paint, water, ink, sprays, gesso... pretty much ANYTHING you can think of.


Did you know you can watercolor with Perfect Pearls Pigment Powders? It's super easy, you don't even need to use Perfect Medium OR set the colors afterwards! Just add a bit of the powder to some clean water in a palette, mix it up well... et voila! You've just made your own pearlescent watercolor. Combine shades together and make custom colors, or use them as they come. For soft subtle tomes, mix just a little powder in; for bolder hues, add more pigment.


This mandala was painted using the newest additions to my Perfect Pearls collection: Iris, Turquoise, Sunflower Sparkle, Blush and Perfect Bronze. Outlines added with Letter It Fineliners.

Thursday, January 23, 2025

Perfect Pearls GAL-entine's Day Card

I love the GAL-entine's Day and GAL-oween trends; they're the perfect excuse to celebrate our closest friends! I also love Ranger's Perfect Pearls, because they are indeed the PERFECT way to add color and shimmer to light or dark cardstock. I'm on the Ranger Project Tutorials Page today with the step-by-step process for using them both wet (like watercolors) or dry (by stamping or stenciling over Perfect Medium) to make a GAL-entine's card that really shines.

Tuesday, January 21, 2025

All That Glitters...

...doesn't necessarily show up well in a photograph. Case in point: this card, made for our Glitter Me Happy challenge at Shopping Our Stash, has three different shades of Stickles Glitter Glue on the watercolored flowers and foliage, plus a mat of salmon pink glitter paper. Can you tell that from the pic? Nope! It's still a pretty card, though, and a nice reminder that you still have a week to participate in the current challenge.


This card is a triumph of stash-usage in that nearly everything on it is not only elderly, it was mostly leftover bits that were ready to roll. I used Distress Oxide Inks to make an ink-blended sunset; placed the (leftover, white glossy) Honey Bee Palm Frond panel on top and matted on the salmon glitter cardstock. I added Stickles to the pre-diecut Lawn Fawn Happy Hibiscus and Tropical Leaf (in Sunburst, Wine Cellar and Garden State) and cut stamens from a scrap of bright yellow glitter paper which... you guessed it... doesn't show up either! The sentiment is from an older set of Paper Rose Studio Sentiment Sheets and the small scattering of bright pink sequins are from Eyelet Outlet.

SOS539: Glitter Me Happy runs until the evening of Monday, January 27, 2025, so join us today!

Monday, January 20, 2025

MM03: Deconstructed

It's a Wavy Gravy Macro Mandala Monday in which we focus on the detail of the patterns rather than an overall design.

Tombow Dual Brush Pens, White Posca and Letter It Fineliners in my Dina Wakley 6x6 Kraft Journal from Ranger

Tuesday, January 14, 2025

SOS539: Glitter Me Happy

All that glitters... is welcome on a card for our new challenge at Shopping Our Stash! You can use loose glitter, Stickles or Stickles Glitter Gels, glitter glue, wink of Stella pens, shimmer pens, glitter paper... the choice is yours! I've used two of the above, can you guess which ones?

I made a background using one of my all-time favorite combinations: Stickles Glitter Gel in Galaxy with Simon Hurley's Grand Greenery Stencil on deep (DEEP) Matte Black Alcohol Ink Cardstock from Ranger. You can see how very very sparkly it is, even in the photo, which has probably only captured about 60% of its glitteriness. Those thin chipboard butterfly stickers are from the big box store and super-duper stashy: the last two in the pack and I bet they are ten years old? I used a sheet of DCWV black glitter paper as a lower layer; I originally had just a black cardbase, but I realized pretty quickly that since the butterflies had a thin outline of white I had better add a bit more white; which I did in the form of the cardbase and the layer directly under the design panel. The cardstock sentiment strip is from an older pack by Paper Rose Studio, and was the perfect finishing touch to my 5x6" card. 

Check out the SOS Crew's fabulously sparkly inspiration, then start planning what you'll link up with us this time. SOS539: Glitter Me Happy runs until the evening of Monday, January 27th.

Monday, January 6, 2025

Ranger New Year Card

A New Year's toast to all the makers: May 2025 be our most creative year yet! Follow along as I kick off January with a super-sparkly card tutorial thanks to Stickles Glitter Glue, Stickles Glitter Gel and Tinsel Embossing Powder. It's on the Ranger Project Page, where there is literally always something new and wonderful to inspire YOU! ♥

MM01: Butterfly

It's a Magnificent Monarch Mandala Monday thanks to this beautiful glossy butterfly photo snipped from the back cover of a magazine last year and saved, "to do something with"; in this case, the "something" turned out to be a mostly symmetrical mandala in coordinating colors in my large Dina Wakley Media Journal from Ranger.

I hope your first full week of 2025 is off to a warm(ish) and wonderful start! ♥

Friday, January 3, 2025

Gift Wrap Wrap-Up

I've said it before and no doubt I'll say it again, but here it is now: Papercrafting supplies are AWESOME for wrapping gifts! Washi tape, journal cards, scraps of patterned paper or wrapping paper, ribbon, florals, chipboard shapes... they are all outstanding items to make your gifts truly unique!




(There's a tutorial for these Dylusions Dyamond Board ornaments on the Ranger Project Page!)


Saturday, December 28, 2024

Five Faves of 2024: Ranger Edition

I'm proud to have enough favorites from my posts for the Ranger Tutorials Page to make it difficult to choose! Having said that... it WAS difficult, lol! Click the bold text under each photo to get to the full tutorial on the Ranger Blog.

...much of the time I use Liquid Pearls dimensionally and Stickles more or less flat; but as a matter of fact, you can PAINT with LP's and make ridges with Stickles. 
(Also there's always just the right shade of Archival Ink to coordinate!)

...apart from the fact that I'm in love with the bears from Simon Hurley's Winter Woodland stamp set, my favorite thing about this project was the realization that I could emboss sequentially on each of the three layers of Simon's Dazzling Diamonds Layered Stencil Set

...I had a plan going in but it morphed into something completely different and much, much, cooler...  which is always exciting. Dina's Pocket Circle Stamp Set was the pivot; Letter It's Family and Loves sets were crucial.

...here's a shocking true confession: this was my first time using Stickles Glitter Gels; I hadn't realized how much more dense the colors are, that they look fab on dark cardstock, or that each shade has a different combo of chunky glitter shapes. Needless to say I was immediately HOOKED!

...in this case the occasion (baby or bridal shower) and featured product (Glossy Accents) were suggested by Patti Behan, I love getting a "headstart" that way. Letter It's Shower Clear Stamp Set made it work.

BONUS PROJECT
(I did say it was hard to choose lol)
...have serious amounts of stenciling and use the fab Liquid Pearls in several different ways!

Monday, December 23, 2024

Putting the "Mental" in Ornamental! :)

'Twas the Mandala Monday before Christmas and all through the house, shiny, sparkly ornaments of all varieties... vintage, new or even hand-drawn... are making spirits bright as we prepare for the Big Day!

Drawn with Letter It Fineliners; watercolored with Tombow Dual Brush Pens; highlights of golden metallic marker

Wednesday, December 18, 2024

Holiday Sampler

Nothing says, "Warm Holiday Wishes" quite as well as Simon Hurley's Nordic Knit stamped in red, green and neutral Archival Inks from Ranger, then studded with LOTS of beautiful holiday-themed Eyelet Outlet Brads! This card has thirty-seven (37!) brads from eight different brad styles... can you spot them all? Scroll down for a hint!


Working from top to bottom: 1/16" Round Brads (Brown Mix); Poinsettia Brads; more 1/16" Round Brads (Brown Mix) as reindeer eyes; Heart Brads; Pine Cone Brads; 1/16" Round Brads (Red Mix); Cardinal, Cardinal Profile and Female Cardinal Brads; Snowy Trees and finally 1/16" Round Brads (White). And in case you're wondering, "Did you really pierce a hole, place the brad, and secure the prongs for every single one?" Check out the photo below, which shows the back of the design panel.


Check out the Eyelet Outlet Store for all the holiday embellishments you could possibly need!

Monday, December 16, 2024

Dyamond Board Doodle Trees

It's a TREE-mendous Mandala Monday featuring a terrific TREE-o of Dylusions Dyamond Board Small Trees, doodled with Letter It Fineliners and then tinted with all my favorite green shades of Simon Hurley create Dye Inks


To make the trees into a card, I embossed Simon's Stitched Snowflakes background with Ranger's Cottontail Embossing Powder, applied Breakup Blue ink on top, then cleaned the excess ink off the embossed flakes.


A mat of dark blue cardstock, a sentiment from the Sketched Snowmen stamp set, and a little machine stitching complete the design.


As we cruise into the final full week of holiday preparations, I hope you're having fun getting ready for the big day (if you celebrate Christmas) or the big night (if you celebrate Hanukkah)!

Saturday, December 14, 2024

Build-a-Plaid Bags

Wendy Vecchi's NOT Your Ordinary Card Collection from Spellbinders is entirely awesome, but if I had to pick just *one* element that I love the very most, it miiiiiight be the Build-a-Plaid Layered Stencil Set. Mostly because it is SO fun to use and you can make a different design every single time! Or in this case two similar but different designs:

I've used my favorite holiday-centric Wendy Vecchi Archival Inks from Ranger to create one bold holiday plaid in green, and one in red. I used the Christmas Add-On Stamp and Die Set to make layered poinsettias in coordinating colors and accented them with foliage from the set. Fancy ribbon tied to the bags' handles completes the design, while spreading cheer... and, alas, tiny showers of golden glitter... all over the land! :)

Thursday, December 5, 2024

Dylusions Dyamond Board Ornaments

Just in time for the holidays, Dyan Reaveley has designed Dylusions Dyamond Boards in festive shapes like baubles, stars and trees; available in two sizes for extra variety. Perfect for making garlands, place settings, gift tags and more. Follow along on the Ranger Project Tutorials Page as I decorate them with Letter It stamps and stencils, Ranger Archival Inks and Stickles Glitter Gels to create super-colorful multi-layer Christmas tree ornaments...



...which also make awesome package decorations or name tags!


I cannot tell a lie: I really LOVE this project; I hope you'll check it out! ♥

Monday, December 2, 2024

MM49: On the Map

It's a Marvelously Mappy Mandala Monday on which I wish safe and stress-free travel to all who are flying, driving, riding or sailing home after the Thanksgiving holiday! ♥

Letter It Fineliners and Posca Paint Pens on a vintage atlas page