Keep rockin', funny sheep!

These sheep are so funny! I would love to give credit for them, but I really don't know their origins.

I saw them on a website that sells stuff directly from China, very inexpensively. A lot of the stamp sets are direct copies (ripoffs) from actual companies here in the USA. I try not to buy stuff if it's something I know is a copy, although I will buy dies in basic shapes. I fell in love with these sheep and tried to find out where they were copied from. My reverse image search just brought me back to the Chinese site. I think I've seen these guys before, but I couldn't say where or when.

Anyway, after searching for a couple of weeks without finding them, I went ahead and ordered them from the Chinese site. I stamped them in My Favorite Things Hybrid ink on watercolor paper, and colored them with whatever colors had dried in my palette. I think they may be Gansai Tambi. I had fun messing up with the background, and I forgot to color the guitar. Oh well.

I cut the main panel with a wonky stitched rectangle, and foam mounted it onto a card base. The pink card base was stamped with a MFT background stripe in Simon Says Stamp Wisteria die ink.

I love watercolor. Even when you mess up it looks ok. Works for me.

If you know where these sheep came from, please let me know, OK?

Monster greetings

I was too late for the sketch challenge, and I couldn't decide whether to share this one or not. But, keeping it real, here goes.

I had colored up an entire 8.5 by 11 sheet of card stock with these cool monsters from My Favorite Things. They are called Monster Sized, and they are very cute.

While I followed the sketch to the letter, I felt that the card was lacking something. I drew in some black stitching lines around the center panel, but it still doesn't please me.

My goal last week was to color a lot with my Prismacolor Pencils, and I did do that. I also ordered a set of Polychromos pencils and used them for a bunch of the monsters, too. While I couldn't tell much difference in the results, I will say coloring with the Polychromos was more pleasant. They blend nicely, of course, but I used the Gamsol anyway. 

I showed some of these over on Instagram (@cardsanddogs) for the Daily Marker's 30 day color challenge.

The dark purple one on the end of the 3rd row was done with my Zig Clean Color real brush markers. This is totally the wrong paper to do that on, so he'll hit the can.

I also discovered that my Scan and Cut was seeing things that are not there. 

The nice expert on Facebook told me that my machine needs re calibrating. I sure hope that helps. I just got a new blade and cutting mat for this .

MFT Sketch Challenge 367

Wow, 2 sketch challenges in a row! I must be on a roll here.

This is for My Favorite Things Sketch Challenge 367. Here is the sketch:

I used My Favorite Things' Meant to Bee stamp set, with a beehive, clouds, and bees. I used a kraft card base of 100 lb Neenah Desert Storm card stock, and used an old background stamp from Red Rubber. The bees and beehive are colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. The white frame is from MFT also. The background is stamped directly on the kraft with Versamark. This background stamp is a few years old, and isn't big enough to cover the front of an A2 sized card. That's why I was excited to see MFT had a full-sized honeycomb background. You could say that it was a companion stamp to the Meant To Bee set.

Here's my whine:

I tried to get a couple of MFT items in mid-December, but I hesitated and they went out of stock. But wait-- they are in stock over at Simon Says Stamp! So I ordered from them on December 9th.  That was a big mistake since they were out of stock on at least 2 of the MFT items I ordered from them. Did their online store mention this? No. Long story short, they cancelled 2 of my items, and the ones they didn't cancel came in on January 11th.  Yes, one of them was a Christmas stamp, which I'm betting wasn't one of the ones they were holding up for. So, that'll show me, don't be so impatient or it will come back to bite me. My impulse purchases don't always work out.

Fun fact:

My brother is a beekeeper and I got the BEST honey from him, ever.

Sketch challenge part 2 (and maybe 3?)

Here is another entry in My Favorite Things' Sketch Challenge # 366. I love this challenge! The dogs are stamped and heat embossed on water color paper, then colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. They are then cut with the next-to-smallest of the MFT Wonky Stitched Circle dies. The patterned papers are from MFT also. The dogs are from the Lucky Dog stamp set, and the sentiment is from Top Dog. I chose the sentiment from Top Dog since it is not so tall and would fit on the skinny strip from Blueprints 27.

Do you chose sentiments based on what fits? Or do you decide ahead what you want and then design it to fit?

I didn't want to cover up much of the bottom dog, so I went with a skinny strip.

Anyway, here is a bonus card based on the same sketch, but featuring the cute bugs from Waffle Flower Craft's Rock On stamp set. I used MFT patterned paper for this one.

I also decided to put the sentiment IN the last element and skip the strip altogether.

Dog gone lost

Today's card is for My Favorite Things' Sketch Challenge 366.

The cute dogs from MFT's Top Dog are peeking out of the Triple Peek-A-Boo Windows. They were colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. The card base is a kraft top folding A2 size.