We have great stories!

Yes, we do! You know, as a librarian, that I'm going to go ga-ga over book or reading related stamp sets. This one is so cute it hurts.

I colored the little My Favorite Things' Pure Innocence Bookworm girl with Zig Real Brush Clean Color markers, put her on an ombre background and embellished her with some Nuvo Jewel Drops. In hindsight, Crystal Drops or enamel dots would have shown up better.

By the way, here is my messy desk and photo setup. I still don't have the right lighting setup, but the lamps are kind of in the way when I work. Oh well.

So sorry!

Ever look at a scrap in your pile and say, I'm going to toss that. Well, maybe if I don't use it soon. Well, maybe, just maybe I'm so stubborn I force things.

So, I had a piece of white card stock with a practice blend of Distress Inks that had gone south. It was OK, just not what I ever needed. So, stubborn old me put even more color on it, splashed on some water and dabbed it off, and slapped a white die cut flower over the two colors.

I used My Favorite Thing's "Roses in Bloom" die, and another sentiment from MFT's "Deepest Sympathy" set.

I have on order some Nuvo Jewel Drops which I will add when I get them. I just didn't want to wait to post this, since it has been a while.

Amazon tells me I'll be getting it today, but the package tracker says USPS plain as day. Doesn't their software recognize national postal holidays? That will be tomorrow, at the earliest, for sure.

I dig you!

I wanted to try the background technique of stamping all over, embossing in white, and watercoloring the images. It always looks so good when the pros do it. They are pros because they make it look so easy! When Amy R does this technique, she often puts a layer of velum behind the main image, but I've lost my velum. I know it is in there somewhere, but do you think I could find it? Not today.

Well, since that wasn't working for me, I broke out an oval of white and essentially obliterated the area behind it.

Oh, and when you do this technique, the white eye dots just don't cut it. I went back in with a gel pen to blacken the eye dots. I suspect this background technique is better with non-human (or human-like) images.

I used the My Favorite Things' You Gnome Me stamp set for these cute guys and the sentiment. I colored both the background and the main image with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers, and added sparkle to the main image's clothes with a Spectrum Noir clear glitter pen.  I'm still working on how to watercolor a big fluffy beard.

I had this card all done and was making the photograph when I realized I hadn't painted his belt yet. I'm still considering this card an experiment. I may or may not try this again, as it seems a little busy to me.

I used the stitched scalloped die and sentiment strip from MFT's Blueprints 27, and a cross stitched oval from Gina Marie designs.

Random thank you notes.

Today's entries are random thank-you notes I made with leftover flowers I colored last week. These are all on Kraft colored bases. The flower above is My Favorite Things' Fancy Flowers, colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers, and the two cards below feature flowers cut with MFT's Stitched Flower dies and water colored with my Mission Gold set. The background on the bottom part was tone on tone stamping with Versamark.

The script thanks is from The Alley Way Stamp's Jibber Jabber set. It's an oldie but goodie.

And here, completely off-topic, is a picture of me and my badly colored sign at the West Palm Beach Women's Rally yesterday.  I was trying to use my Sharpies up, and at least 2 of them DID seem to dry up on me.  When it comes time to making more protest signs, I'll use my Brother Scan N Cut to make the letters bigger and tidier. I'm not afraid of glue!

Hey, how about the felt ears on my bucket hat? It was WAY too hot for knit hats here in south Florida.

More sympathy

Once again, I'm doing a sympathy card. This time I'm using my My Favorite Things Fancy Flower Card Kit. I stamped the flowers and leaves on Bristol Smooth card stock and colored them with Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers. The kit included the dies, but try as I might I couldn't line the stamps up on the back of the connected dies like Amy R can. To save time I cut out all the flowers and leaves with my Brother Scan N Cut. Maybe next time I'll use the dies, LOL.

I used my new (to me) rectangle dies from Gina Marie designs, and hand cut a banner for the sentiment from a scrap of the lavender paper.

I'm loving these flowers, but doing sympathy cards is getting me down, and I don't even need one at this time. I guess it's better to do them in advance.

On a happier note, I finally got a stamp for the back of my cards with my name on it. When I was primarily making cards for Operation Write Home, I only stamped the name of this blog on the back. I actually got 2 stamps, one whimsical with a hand
print, and one a little more sophisticated with a dragonfly.  Which do you like better?

With sympathy, and flowers

So today I decided to break out the stitched flower dies I got back in, I think, November. I had to have them, yet Christmas cards took priority, you know?

Anyway, I cut these cute stitched flower dies from My Favorite Things from some Bristol smooth card stock, and colored them with my Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers in shades of blue, pink and purple, with yellow centers. I layered them up using glue dots, and decided to do the sketch challenge at MFT. After I piled on all the flowers you really couldn't see the bottom of either rectangle, but it's there, really. The yellow leaves had been in my images cup for over a year. They were cut with a Spellbinders die from a watercolor experiment gone very wrong. Save!

 Anyway, flowers seem to always seem appropriate for sympathy cards, and I need them more often than I wish I did. The sentiments are both from the MFT set called Deepest Sympathy. I used a linen background stamp on the front of the pink card, using a light pink ink for a tone on tone look.

Beary good greetings!

In keeping with the theme of using up images I've already created, here are 2 friendly bears waving you a beary good birthday!

The bears are from My Favorite Things' Polar Bear Pals set, and are colored with Spectrum Noir and Copic markers. The card base was stamped with the fish bucket in Versamark, and the sentiment was heat embossed for a little texture. Everything is flat to send through the mail.

I have a bunch of these bears pre-colored, except for their scarves. I decided to do the scarves after I chose the other card colors. I'm glad I did, because I never would have thought to do a brown scarf on a polar bear, LOL.

Even the snow was pre-cut and hanging out in my desktop bowl of miscellaneous stuff. I wonder what will get my (short) attention next?