Two More Hero Arts Cards from CHA

A few days ago I shared a couple of the cards that we made in the Hero Arts workshop at CHA.  If you missed it you can find that post HERE.  Today I have the other two cards - I think these two are my favorites but all of the cards were really nicely designed.  Once again - these are cards I made in a workshop and they were designed by Jennifer McGuire who led a great workshop with the Hero Arts team.  If you have never seen Jennifer's scraproom you should visit her blog and look under the organization label HERE - it is amazing and so well organized!  Scroll down to see several posts and videos that show her space in detail.

 This card was so much fun to make.  We started by creating the background.  The swirl image was heat embossed in white on watercolor paper before we started the class.  We dabbed distress stain in two shades of blue (Broken China and Faded Jeans) all over the background, sprayed it with some Perfect Pearls mixed in water and set it aside to dry.  It looks like a mess at first but dries to create this wonderful pearly, swirly background.  The stamp used for the background was the Flower Dot Pattern.

Here is a closer view of the background - I definitely want to try making more of these (first I need to get this stamp - it really appeals to me and is so versatile).  This is one of the stamps from the Basic Grey collection.  Hero Arts has teamed up with Basic Grey to produce a coordinating line of stamps and paper.  If you want to see the stamp used on another card with very different colors, check out Jennifer McGuire's blog at THIS POST.

We stamped the sentiment on white cardstock and tore it to create the snow edge.  The sentiment is from the Snowflake Ornament set of clear stamps.  The wood grain circle behind the snowman is from the My Happy set stamped in Soft Pool Shadow Ink.  This stamp set is part of the Hero Arts/Studio Calico collaboration.  The little clouds are stamped with a stamp in the Hooray set and the clouds were punched for us before class with a Fiskars punch. The little snowman is from the CG364 Smiling Snowman clear stamp set.  We hand cut the snowman and added the gems for his eyes, buttons and the top of his hat.  The carrot nose is also hand cut.

The second card made use of a non-holiday image to create a holiday card.  The large stamp is from the Artistic Fern Sizzix Textured embossing folder and stamp set - yet another partnership that Hero Arts has made.  These will be available in October.

In this photo you can see how perfectly the stamp and the folder line up (you would stamp first and then emboss the stamped image).

There were two holes punch in the embossed card front and we threaded a ribbon through to tie a bow on the front.  The card kit included a layer to go between the card base and the stamped image but I chose to leave it out so more of the red base would show on my finished card.

The ornament image had been stamped on the patterned paper and heat embossed for us.  The stamp is from the Decorate Your Holidays set and we simply added some pearls at the centers of the designs on the ornament.

I completed the assembly of this card at home and added some foam dots to raise the ornament from the surface of the card.

The fern is a very pretty alternative to a Christmas tree.

For the finishing touch we added some clear rounded gemstones.  These give the card a lot of sparkle.

We are having beautiful weather here in Massachusetts - a little cooler and much less humidity.  It is birthday celebration weekend #1 so things will be pretty busy around here! I hope you have a great weekend!

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Hero Arts Cards from CHA (& a great sale from Creative Charms)

Today I have a couple of cards to share with you.  These were part of the Hero Arts workshop at CHA and were designed by the ever-so-talented Jennifer McGuire.  She is a wonderful teacher and the class was very well organized.  We made a total of four cards and I have two to post today.

Each card spotlighted a different technique.  For this card and envelope we did some double stamping to create a shadow effect.  First we stamped the image with white ink and then we came back with the blue ink and purposely shifted the stamp a bit so the offset would make a shadow.  I think a few of my stamps are a bit too far off - they make a very deep shadow!

We worked with a variety of stamps.  Some of these snowflakes are from the Magic Of Christmas set and some are from the Snowflakes set.  We also added tiny hearts.  The blue strip with the words was already stamped for us with the Holiday Background cling stamp.  We could choose various sentiments to complete the card - this one is from the Merriest Christmas Wishes set.  A felt snowflake topped with a button and a bow is placed just above the sentiment strip and the card is generously sprinkled with bling.

The second card was made with the image stamp from the Merriest Christmas Wishes cling stamp set.  The background of the card is stamped with the Holiday Background cling stamp.  The technique we used was "kissing."  After we stamped the main image with the soft sand shadow ink, we took some clean snowflake clear stamps and placed them on the wet ink just "kissing" the surface.

The clean stamps picked up a bit of the wet ink and left soft snowflake images in the background.  We accented these by adding pearls to the centers.  The bird was accented by coloring it in with markers and a ribbon, button and twine bow finish the card.

Both of these cards use small gems or pearls and I have some good news for you - Creative Charms is offering a couple of super deals this week only.

The first deal is for one of every set of gradient gem stickers and gradient pearl stickers for only $7.99.  This is a $30 value and there are 912 pieces - that's a serious amount of bling!  Click HERE to go to the page for the Gradient Gem and Pearl Sticker Sale.

 If you are looking for larger and fancier bling there is a second amazing deal - all of the basic colors of the Vintage Jewels for just $6.99.  There are 108 of these fancy gems included and the normal price would be $22.50.  Click HERE to go to the page for the Vintage Jewel Sale. 

There is also another giveaway on the Creative Charms blog this week - you could win one of the sets of Gradient Gem and Pearls Stickers.  Just go to THIS POST on the Creative Charms Blog, follow the blog and leave a comment for a chance to win this great prize.

I have two more cards to show you - and they are also wonderful.  I also have some photos of the new items that Hero Arts showed at CHA.  They have made some great partnerships with Sizzix, Basic Grey and Studio Calico for some wonderfully coordinated products lines.

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La Blanche Stamps at CHA

Today I have another photo intensive post to share.  One of my favorite discoveries at the Winter CHA in Los Angeles was the La Blanche stamps.  If you missed my first post about this company you can find it HERE and you can visit their website HERE.  These incredibly detailed and elegant stamps have a style that appeals to many people and are becoming very popular.

Crowds would gather around the booth when Jacqueline was demonstrating her technique for coloring and embossing the images.  She often uses a lot of UTEE (ultra thick embossing enamel) to finish a piece with a hard glossy coating.

There are more step by step photos in the post I linked above.  She uses distress inks and pen nibs to color the images.

The booth was full of incredible examples of art made with these images.  There were lots of fabric flowers and laces added to collages that have a very "old world" style with a twist.

You can click on any of these photos to enlarge the image and see the details more clearly.  Believe it or not, there were even more samples on display - all of them were simply amazing!

I hope you enjoyed this "virtual visit" to the La Blanche booth.  Even if this is not your typical style it is easy to appreciate the talent it took to create these beautiful samples.

While at CHA, I had a chance to meet up with Joan who is an internet friend.  We have emailed back and forth when she needed some help with Design Studio.  Joan is a big fan of the LaBlanche line and sells them in her online store.

Joan was lucky enough to receive this lovely piece as a gift.  You can read about her meeting with Jacqueline HERE and also see the stamps that she will have available for sale soon.

Just a quick reminder - the Creative Memories "FANtastic" sale celebrating their Best Brand win will end tonight (Thursday) at 11:59 p.m. (Central Time).  The discounts are up to 40% with over 150 items on sale.  You can shop on my CM personal website HERE if you do not already have a consultant.  Please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions.

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Room Names at Albany House

While I was staying with my sister and brother-in-law, I did a few little projects around the Bed & Breakfast. One of the hard things about running this type of business is that you need to keep very busy during the busy seasons so you will have enough income to tide you over the slow times.  If you are busy with the day to day cooking and cleaning, it is hard to find time for "extra" projects.  One of the projects that I was able to help with was to identify the guest rooms so it would be easier for the guests to be sure they were in the right room when they first go upstairs.

Before I left on my trip I did some work with my Gypsy and Design Studio.  I wanted to weld the letters of the room names so that they would be easier to apply to the doors.  My first trial was done with the Gypsy Font cartridge (only available in the Gypsy).  I thought it looked OK but the "feel" of the letters was not quite in keeping with the style of the B & B.

 Next I tried this font from the Songbird cartridge.  This one looked like a keeper so I set  up a file to cut the vinyl.  I made the words 2 1/2 inches tall.

I had sheets of 12 x 24 vinyl and I decided to do each name twice so I would have a backup in case something went wrong when the names were applied to the doors.  The extra exclamation points were for the apostrophe in "Eagle's Nest" and the extra "l"s were for another project.

To cut the vinyl I used the regular blade set at 3 with medium speed and pressure.  This makes a "kiss cut" so the letter is cut out but the backing sheet stays intact.  The vinyl cuts very cleanly and I was able to put the words quite close together with no problems in  cutting.

I brought the cut vinyl (still on the backing sheet) and some transfer tape with me on the trip to Wisconsin.

After CHA, I had some time to work on applying the names to the doors.  I cut apart all of the words and "weeded" the sections (weeding is the process of removing all of the unnecessary pieces of vinyl from the backing sheet).  The "hook" tool in the Cricut tool kit works very well to do this.

I always feel like I should save the scraps but the Cricut Vinyl is very thin and sticky and it is too difficult to keep the pieces from adhering to each other.  I want a clean and easy word application so I sacrificed the excess vinyl.

I applied the transfer tape to the weeded words...

...and then gently peeled back the word from the original vinyl backing sheet. To keep everything in order, I put the tape with the vinyl back on the transfer tape backing sheet until it was time to add the names to the doors.

 I simply lifted the words on the transfer tape and centered the words on each door.  Then I burnished the vinyl area and made sure that the names were securely attached.

The rooms with the short names were simple to do.

For the two word names I took extra care to line up the words.  You could use painter's tape to set a straight line but it is fairly easy to "eyeball" the placement.

Vinyl is fun to work with and it cuts very easily and neatly.  You do have to be careful to keep the packages up and away from small hands.

With a very small investment in materials and a slightly larger investment of time,  I was able to create these identifiers for each of the guest rooms.

 Today was a "re-entry day" for me - there is always so much to do and to catch up with after a long trip.  I have moved all of the crafty items to my studio and now need to put them away and to photograph some more of the workshop projects.

 A few people let me know that a photo of me and my friend Joe was on the DCWV blog.  We were in the Halloween Advent Calendar workshop and when this photo was taken we were working on the little pockets that hang from the embroidery hoop frame and hold either a trick or a treat.  Since I am always behind the camera it was nice to see this "action shot" of myself from the show.  The class was a lot of fun and I will assemble my calendar and show you how it turned out a bit later this fall.


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