Distress Stain Storage

I recently came across a 50% off sale for the Tim Holtz Stains, so I figured it was the best time to complete my set.  They came shipped in these flimsy boxes, and each box fit 18 bottles.  Lucky me, they sent me two!  I decided to use them as my new storage.

I added some pieces of cardboard in the bottoms of the boxes to add strength, and then I set about decorating them.  I used some fabulous vintage papers my friend, Nancy Lynn, sent me.  I met her on a couple of the Tim Holtz cruises, and here's her blog:  Using Up All That Stuff.  She gets the best stuff!  She was very generous and sent me several sheets of ledger, music & journal papers.

Aren't they great?!

I tore the sheets into smaller pieces, then used the Distress Inks and the Wrinkle Free Distress technique.  I also added some Walnut Distress ink on the edges.  I attached them to the boxes with Modge Podge, overlapping them as I went.

I love the way they came out, but they're a little tacky.  Any suggestions on getting rid of that?

I used Tim's suggestion of inking sticker sheets, and when dry, punching out a 3/4" spot to label the tops of each bottle.  Love it!  I wanna do somethig like this for my Distress pads.

Here's some more pics of the finished boxes:



Kelly's Home-Made Dress Form (Part I)

I thought she was crazy, but I gotta admit, not only was it fun making, but it just might work!  My daughter decided it'd be much cheaper to make a dress form using duct tape and expanding foam than to buy one.  She's always making costumes for her Anime conventions.

I came down to the kitchen and found her wrapping herself in Saran plastic wrap (kind of a funny site to see someone trying to wrap themselves in Saran wrap!).  I decided to pitch in to help and realized I should start taking pictures.

After wrapping her with duct tape, I then had to take sissors and cut up the back.  Very nerve-wracking because she gets crazy for this stuff!  She was wearing one of her favorite t-shirts.

T-shirt intact, she then started taping it back together with adhesive tape, inside & out.

Now, for the fun part ... filling it with expanding foam!

She used 5 cans, and we decided to let it dry before adding more.  We put it aside, and while eating dinner, I noticed that the foam had expanded outside the form! Good thing we quit!

It's still drying some 5 days later.  Kelly's still not home from her convention, so this story is to be continued ... Check back again on Thursday to see pics of the finished dress form, and this year's awesome costume she made!

June Techniques Class

 

Happy Summer everyone!  I've been wanting to create a shaker card for a while now, especially since I've collected quite the bag of plastic packaging!  Does that mean I've been purchasing too much? 

I got this new stamp set by My Sentiments Exactly! called "By The Sea Sentiments."  Just love it!  I'm crazy about text and alphabets, and anything nautical or beach themed.  This set suits both loves ... the shapes are created with text.

I chose the starfish and stamped with Tim Holtz Distress Tattered Rose, and then used the Brushed Corduroy Distress Marker and colored just one edge of each fin.  I then used an AquaPainter to blend the colors a bit.  I also inked the edges of the paper towards the center.

The frame was made with Soft Suede cardstock, also inked w/Brushed Corduroy.  I added some gold brads that I used Tim's Distress Hammer on.  When I was ready to put it together, I realized I couldn't find my bag of sand!  I've got soooo much stuff in this craft room, that I can always find, but that darn bag of sand always eludes me!  After wasting most of my day searching for it, I finally broke down and took a trip to Michaels.  You know I then divided that bag of sand into 3 smaller zip bags and put them in a few different places!

Here's a better look ... even with my glasses on, I can't figure out what the words say ... maybe I blended the colors too much?  lol

 

For the card base, I used Regal Rose cardstock and Crumb Cake.  I stamped on the Crumb Cake with Versamark ink using the retired Cheesecloth background stamp.  I also distressed the edges and inked w/Brushed Corduroy as well as the sentiment, also from the same stamp set.

 

My next card was using the old fashioned dry embossing technique using a light table, brass stencil and stylus tool.

After dry embossing, I took both the cardstock & stencil to my foam mat and used the stencil to pierce the design in the paper. 



I layered the Whisper White onto Sahara Sand, and after stapling a piece of  Not Quite Navy taffeta ribbon with my Tiny Attacher, adhered that to a piece of Not Quite Navy.  The card base is Crumb Cake, and the butterfly is stamped with the Butterfly punch and some DSP from the retired Blueberry Crisp.

 

This last card was also dry embossed the old fashioned way.  I then removed both the cardstock & stencil, and using sponge daubers, I lightly tapped color over the image.  I used Powder Puff Chalk Inks in the colors of Biscotti, Purple Passion & Very Berry.  After removing the stencil, I tapped a little more Biscotti ink in the center.  I then paper pierced the corners using my paper-piercing template.

The card base is Soft Suede with some Elegant Eggplant Textured cardstock on the bottom half.  The Whisper White was run through the Big Shot using the Perfect Polka Dots folder.  I wrapped this w/Elegant Eggplant grosgrain ribbon.  As a finishing touch, I stamped the saying using the Tiny Tags set and the Biscotti Chalk ink and punched out with the Jewelry Tag Punch.

I just realized that this card has both the old fashioned dry embossing technique, as well as the quick, modern use of an embossing folder.

May Techniques Class

Had lots of students for this month's (late) techniques class!  Maybe I should hold late classes more often!  lol

Here's a look at the cards we made during class:

I designed this first card, and it's a technique I found a video for on the Stampin' Up! Demonstrator website.  That's one of the great benefits of being a demonstrator--I love that website!  Lots of great ideas, inspiration, tutorials, and my discount!  lol

Anyway, I don't remember what they call this technique, but I call it tie-dye.  Very cool technique, and my students loved it!  I was a little worried because there's a lot involved in this card (besides all the cutting!), and there's a lot of drying time.  The colors are Rich Razzleberry, Not Quite Navy, Old Olive, Crumb Cake & White.  This has to be one of my most favorite color combinations!  I also used the fairly new Stripes embossing folder and one of the brand new Bitty Banners Framelits from the brand new catalog debuting today!

This 2nd card is a tri-fold gate card.  I copied this card exactly as I found it on a tutorial by a fellow SU demonstrator, Dawn Olchefske.  Here it is opened up:

I love the Lucky Limeade, but I'm not a big fan of Calypso Coral, but I had faith in Dawn's design, and everyone really liked the colors.  It looks difficult, but it's very simple.  We used the SU scoring board to create it and some of the 2012 In Color Patterns paper.  Also, the Apothecary Art stamp set and the Labels Framelits collection.

And, I usually finish off my classes with a quick simpler card, because my students learn so much and are so busy during class, that they get a little burned out by the end of class.  Here's the last project:

Just a very simple design I got from another fellow demonstrator & friend, Jen Peel.  In fact, this design inspired me to get the Elementary Elegance stamp set from the Sale-a-Bration catalog, and I'm so glad I did.  The frame is embossed with white embossing powder, and the sentiment is punched out with our Curly Label punch and popped up with a Dimensional.  Too simple, so we made three!

And, I changed up Jen's design by creating them from 3 of our new In Colors!  These are Gumball Green, Midnight Muse and Raspberry Ripple.

I'm going to have another techniques class next Wednesday--morning session at 10am and evening session at 7:30pm.  If interested in joining us, please contact me by Tuesday, June 5th.

May Tag 2012

Today, Kelly & I finally got to work on Tim's tag for May 2012, and just in time to post to Tim's blog!  I'm really not into the sewing theme, and when I woke up this morning, I was laying in bed trying to decide what I'd do for a different theme using the same techniques.  We ended up staying within Tim's theme, and I really like how it turned out.

I started out by stamping on the pattern with an illegible script background stamp I've had for years ... nice to finally use it!  (I have waaaaay too many stamps!  lol)  It's by Dawn Hauser for Inkadinkado, and I used Ranger's Olive Archival Ink.  I crinkled the pattern up a little bit before adhering it to my tag with a Ranger Glue Stick.  I then stamped the dress (another Dawn Hauser for Inkadinkado) with Black Archival Ink.  I used the "Genuine Article" stamp from the Stampin' Up! Stamp of Authenticity set (love this set!) using Red Pepper Adirondack Ink.  The edges of the tag were then distressed and inked with Vintage Photo Distress.  The crinkle ribbon was colored with Antique Linen Distress, and I added some of the lace ribbon from Stampin' Up! that I colored with a little Vintage Photo distress.  We used Tim's ruler ribbon along the bottom like he did, not neither of us felt like pulling out the sewing machine for the detailed stitching like he did.  lol

Next was the wooden spool ... boy, did we curse Tim while sanding these!  After having surgery on both rotator cuffs, sanding this spool flat was a bitch!  But, I love the dimension!  I used my finger to add some Antique Linen Distress to it, and highlighted it with some Vintage Photo Distress.  For the fiber that's wrapped around the spool, I wanted something thin, so I have these cool fibers that came from inside my husband's work boot shoelaces!  When he replaced them, I saw what was inside and stashed them into my fiber jar!  I colored it with some Vintage Photo Distress, and wrapping it around that spool was quite a chore!  The spool was so small for my big hands, and both the fiber & spool were a little slippery from the ink, so I had a tough time tying the knot.

The flowers were more fun to make then find!  We went on a little hunt this afternoon, and we couldn't find a little bouquet of flowers anywhere--paper or silk!  Not in Michaels or Joanns.   We looked in Scrapbooking, Bridal, and Floral, and I didn't want to spend $10, so we ended up with a stem of these daisy-type flowers that I cut apart.  It was nice to pull out my melting pot again, and we really enjoyed inking these and dipping them.  Very cool!

I colored mine with Faded Jeans, Barn Door, Spiced Marmalade, Peeled Paint & Mustard Seed Distress Inks.  I stuffed the 5 stems into the spool, and just as I was about to trim my stems to the bottom of the spool, Kelly showed me that she left hers sticking out and I thought that looked pretty cool, so I just trimmed them shorter.

I didn't have the oval charm base that Tim used, so we used his typewriter charms and paper from his Lost & Found paper stack.

There's not much color in the section of paper I used, so it's a little difficult to see.  Kelly's charm came out way better.  Here's her tag:

Our tags are very similar, but she used strings from burlap to wrap around her spool, and she inked her flowers from the center, where I inked the tips of the petals:

Love how that red one turned out!  Here's her colorful charm:

And, finally, here's what the Master's tag looked like:

I taught two classes here yesterday, so after preparing for those on Tuesday, teaching yesterday, and then today's tag, I'm a little burned out.  Here's the mess I get to clean up:

Tim Tags--March 2012

I had my kids home last week, and while here, I got my daughter, Kelly, to work on the Tim Holtz's March tag with me.  She had worked on one of the Christmas tags, and she had such a tough time with the technique, that it kind of turned her off.

She wanted me to watch a BBC series with her called "Sherlock Holmes".  I'm not that into British TV, so I made a deal with her ... I'll watch an episode with her, if she makes the tag with me.  We both ended up ahead!  The series is fabulous, and she really enjoyed making this tag with me!

Here's mine:

We really had a great time working on these mosaic butterflies!  I'm actually a big fan of mosaics, so I couldn't wait to get working on this tag.

Here's a close-up of my butterfly.  We wanted some colorful papers, so we used the In Color Hostess Paper Pads.  I used Old Paper Distress Embossing for my "grout".  We also used a Stampin' Up! butterfly die since I didn't have Tims.

I used one of the snaps on top of my small flower.  I wish these weren't discontinued.  I just love the look!

I didn't have Tim's woodgrain background stamp, so I used my Stampin' Up! woodgrain stamp.  I definitely like Tim's better.  (Mental note to purchase that one.)  I used one of Tim's sayings and misted with my Perfect Pearls Mist--Perfect Pearl.

Here's Kelly's tag:

She used the Stampin' Up! Canvas background stamp.  The stamp isn't large enough for the entire tag, so when she stamped the top, the image overlapped a little.  She's even more anal than me, so she tied the ribbon around the tag to cover up the imperfection.  She needs a little more Tim training to "embrace imperfections."  lol

She wanted different colors than me, so she chose an older SU Hostess paper pad.  She also cut much larger pieces, and used Walnut Distress Embossing Powder.

Here's a look at Tim's tag:

We made due with what we had, but I definitely got to get that background stamp!  Much more detailed than mine!  I might have to get his buttterfly die too.  Ka-ching!

Where in the World is MY Vagabond?

That's what I'd like to know!  lol  On Tim Holtz's blog today, he gave a link to the Sizzix website where they're having a contest called "Where in the World is Your Tim Holtz Vagabond?"  What you need to do to enter is post a picture of your Vagabond.  Simple.  They're going to award prizes for our creativity, and until supplies last, each participant will receive a sheet of limited edition stickers for the Vagabond, plus a set of their new guage keys.  Tim has a video on their website here that shows you how to use the guage keys.  I probably could've used these a couple of weeks ago when my Vagabond broke!  Yup ... you heard me ... broke.  I almost passed out!  Seriously.  My little electric friend just spit everything back out where I was shoving it in and made a bang.  After that, when I hit the button, the bottom roller wouldn't roll, and something was clanking around inside.

I emailed Sizzix, and much to my surprise, I was told that not only would they send me a new one, but they'd ship it right away!  What?!  I just needed to send them the broken machine for their quality control department to look at, and a copy of the receipt for proof of ownership.  Since we couldn't locate my receipt, they sent me a FedEx label to ship it (their cost), and said they'd send me a new one when they receive it.  Whoopeeee!

I received the label and shipped it March 2nd.  I emailed them a couple of days ago to see if they received it, and I received this response yesterday:

It says they received my Vagabond, but not the paperwork yet.  She's going to send a new one out right away and get a tracking number to me.

But, what about the contest?  Never fear ... just in case I don't get my new little baby before the contest ends, I'm just gonna post the pic of the email in the meantime!  ha  Is that creative enough for ya?