French Foliage Faux Tile

Here's another Artisan Award entry. I tried to show a lot of variety in the work I sent in. This one uses a fun technique and is very masculine.

After I stamped this I embossed it in Clear embossing powder so it really did look like tile. Check out this close up view.

Here's what I used:

Stamps: French Foliage, Happiest Birthday Wishes

Card stock: Wild Wasabi, Garden Green, Early Espresso, Very Vanilla & Well Worn DSP

Ink: Wild Wasabi, Garden Green, Early Espresso, Crumb Cake & Versa Mark

Tools & Accessories: Simply Scored with Diagonal Plate, Clear Embossing Powder, Heat Tool, Mat Pack, Paper Piercing Tool, Early Espresso Marker, Regals Buttons, Linen Thread, Large Oval Punch, Decorative Label Punch & Sponge Daubers

Thanks for all the encouraging comments many have been leaving me regarding my entries. I really appreciate your kind words.

Rose Tiles

The You Are Loved set from the Holiday Mini is much more versatile than just for Valentine's Day. I love the beautiful floral designs and the sentiments included. I used the pretty rose image to create this faux tile focal point on this card.

The Simply Scored Scoring Tool makes it easy to score the 3" square into a 1" grid to do the faux tile. Then stamp and highlight the edge of each "tile" with some sponged on color. In this case I used Crumb Cake. The background is rolled on with the Love Blossoms wheel.

I recently got the Ovals Sizzix Die, so now using the oval Embossed Designer Frame is so much easier. No more cutting out the oval shape by hand! The medium sized oval is the perfect size for the outside and the smallest one fits inside the frame. (as does the Wide Oval Punch)

The butterfly was cut using the Beautiful Wings Embosslit and then I sponged it and spritzed with Vanilla Smooch for some shimmer. A few Basic Pearls and some Chocolate Scallop Dots Ribbon and you have the finished card.

Enjoy your weekend!

Bloomin' Beautiful Quilt

I combined elements from one of my favorite samples in the new catalog (check out page 85) along with a Top Note die quilt and a few of my own details to create this birthday card for my Mom.She's a quilter so I knew she would love the Top Note quilt. If you look closely, I also did a faux tile effect on the Eggplant layer by scoring diagonally at 1/2" intervals. The elements I copied from the catalog sample are the way that the piece of Styled Silver Hodge Podge Hardware was attached using Linen Thread and buttons. Since I don't have any of those pretty new latte buttons yet, I had to substitute what I had on hand along with a Filigree & Rhinestone Brad. I also loved the way the artist colored the image and added the blossom definition to the vase, so I did that as well.

Stamps: Bloomin' Beautiful, Dream du Jour, Fancy Flexible Phrases and Tags So Much
Card stock: Always Artichoke, Elegant Eggplant, Whisper White, Perfect Plum Designer Prints, Haiku & Le Jardin paper
Ink: Black Stazon, Always Artichoke, Perfect Plum plus various others to watercolor

Since the challenge on Stamp Something this week is to stamp something with a birthday theme, I'm entering this card there...just in the nick of time! There's still time to play along - until 7:00 tonight...so get busy and stamp a birthday card!

Have a good one!

Morning Soft

Today I would like to start off by saying thank you so much to all the nice people who have been reading my blog and leaving such nice comments lately. I really do appreciate each one! This past week I have been a bit down and you all have really lifted my spirits more than you know.



Todays card uses a technique that was shown in the January Stampin' Success magazine called Faux Tile. I used the scoring blade on my Fiskers paper cutter to score at each 1" of my plum card stock on a diagonal. Then I used the Floral background stamp over the top of it. The result looks like a tiled background where the scored lines create a subtle grout line. I'm sure you could give even more definition to the "grout" lines by using a darker ink for the background stamp if you chose to.



This beautiful Morning Glory image is from the Morning Soft stamp set. I stamped it onto water color paper with Black Stazon and then used my aqua painter and inks to color it. The finishing touch was a stick pin adorned with clear beads and pearls from the Pretties Kit.


I received this blogger award from both Maren at Zany Not Crazy and Heidi at Embellished Dreams . (Maren actually nominated me a while ago and I couldn't figure out how to include the badge (duh! turned out to be so simple)...and then I forgot. ooops!) Anyways...both of these ladies are extremely talented...so make sure to check out their blogs! Thanks Maren & Heidi! I need to do some blog cruising later and I'll pass this award onto some other great blogs...but right now I need to prepare card kits for a class tomorrow.

OK...I finally had some free time to spend blog hopping...there sure are some great ones out there!!! Here are a few that I am passing on the Excellent Blogger award to...I'm sure you will love their work as much as I do, so be sure to check them out! Nancy at iSTAMP , Shelley at Mocha Memories and Marilyn at Stamp With Marilyn.