I Colored…It’s Been a While

I needed to color and I always need thank you cards so I did this today. Combining the two means I was efficient 😉

I found the frog sketch online, but no name with it, so I’m unable to give the credit I’d like to an amazing artist.

I printed it off and colored it using copics and pencils. I put together a digital background and cut the background and the colored frog panel out on my Silhouette then layered them onto a card.

Thanks for stopping by!

Xoxo

Christmas Card Making Has Begun

Last year, my husband asked me to make cards for him to use at work. Challenge accepted!

I’m starting early this year 🙂

I don’t have the attention span to make many of the same design, so card making doesn’t go as fast as it might. But I enjoy it more this way 🙂

So here are the first three 🙂

This one was  quick and simple. I cut out the image and matted it. The “paper” behind it is a pattern from the Silhouette store that I also had my machine print and cut out before layering it all on the card front.

Project links: Blue on Blue dot pattern, deer scene

 

This second one is simple enough, but there’s a tweak. Having the patterns available in the Silhouette Store is great, especially if you’re doing digital work to save a little time (Have I mentioned that I’m a little short on time these days?). But one of the drawbacks is that they’re NOT EDITABLE. For example, you can’t change red and white striped paper to something like the striped paper below…except I did. I figured out how to alter an unalterable item. Maybe some of you already figured out a way to do this, but I’m feeling a little magical right now 😉

Project Links: Red and white striped pattern, Deer ornament

 

For this third one, I pulled out some stamps to help finish things off 🙂 I forgot how much little things like that can add to a card.

Project Links: Card

Thanks for stopping by!

xoxo

Lots of Work, But Not A Lot Accomplished

I dusted off my jewelry making stuff this week. I’ve tried to make numerous and handy things.

I have failed every single time, but it has been quite sometime since I’ve played with the sparkly pretties.

Then, I spent about three days on a coloring project. It’s turning out okay. I will probably like it when I’m done, but I can’t finish it. Not until I place an order for ink to refill some of my markers.

But today, today I actually finished something! Nothing great, but after this week of creative road blocks, it feels good to complete something.

I found the image on deviant art last year and printed it off. I found the printed version today in a little stash of things to color later. I’m grateful to artists who are generous enough to let people like me color their line art. I linked to their work down below so you can check out more work like this 🙂

I used patterns from the Silhouette store to create the mats for the picture, printed them, then cut them out. I chose this one because I really wanted to work on hair today. And, because unicorn… It’s very faint, but it’s there 🙂

 

Thanks for stopping by!

xoxo

Image, red pattern, yellow pattern (both for card front)

Because Summer

My kids go back to school soon, but that doesn’t mean summer is over. I’m trying to hold on to that a little bit longer, so I worked on this.

It’s a digital stamped I used in Craft Artist 2. I transferred the whole image and just the stamp image into my Silhouette workspace. I did a print & cut with both pieces.

With print & cut projects that I plan to color (like this one) I actually print, color, then cut – because I don’t have to be exact and stay in the lines. I’ll be cutting off the mistakes.

Sadly, this method backfired on me this time. I went too far out of those lines and didn’t realize it until I had the image cut out. I went back in with my craft knife and gave the beach girl a closer trim.

Before the trim 😉

Thanks for stopping by!
Xoxo

Digi Stamp

If At First You Don’t Succeed…

Some days I make something and look at the finished project and I’m happy with it. Some days, I’m shocked because it turned out better than I hoped. Those are the times I sit back and say, “I can’t believe that worked.”

This week, there were no days like that. I feel like I struggled for every card I finished – and I only finished three of them. I’m not even posting one of them. I know if I force a project and it’s just not my “thing,” I hit walls like this. But that wasn’t the problem this time. But I also know, that I need to push through those walls. Sometimes pushing through leads to ideas I’d never have thought of, and they worked.

This week, there were no days like that, either.

But I thought I’d share, and even show some of the things that just weren’t working for me.

First up, is the happiness card.

I designed the strip along the side in Craft Artist 2 (so sad they’re not around anymore) using a combination of paper layering and then stenciling (all digital). Once I had what I wanted, I exported the pieces and dragged them onto my Silhouette work space. I used a saying that I love, but up until now haven’t figured out a place to use it. I’m still not sure how I feel about using it here, but it’s done 🙂

The challenge here was finding the best way to transfer all those letters onto the card in one piece – I don’t enjoy lining up letters and words just right, it takes too long and I could be doing something fun, like coloring 😉

So the answer I came up with was matting the words. This worked great. I created the mat for the saying using the Offset feature then filled it in with black. It wasn’t quite what I was going for – the letters and words weren’t as connected as I wanted them to be – so I did another offset.

It looked great but cut terribly.

After printing the elements I needed, I loaded my paper into my Cameo. Instead of doing one cut to cut out the exterior mat, it tried to cut out everything. I tried over and over to get it to do what I wanted. Finally, on like the 5th try, a light bulb went off over my head. And in case someone else finds this helpful, I’m going to share that light bulb moment.

When using the offset function, you’re essentially creating another layer. I typically group those layers so I can move them around my workspace easier. Now, remember how I wanted that third mat/layer? I selected my grouped item and used the offset function. What I didn’t realize, was that it was creating a mat for BOTH layers. When I went to cut it, it wasn’t cutting how I thought I’d designed it. THE FIX – ungroup them, “unstack” them, select ONLY the mat that was just created, and offset just the mat. After I had all my pieces done, I layered them, centered them, grouped them, and printed the saying (again), then FINALLY, SUCCESSFULLY cut that thing out how I wanted it.

So here’s the next card.

Once again, I designed the background in Craft Artist and got it into my Silhouette work space. I added a sentiment I found in the Silhouette Design store and then added a bird on a branch silhouette (I’m sure you’ve noticed, there is no bird on a branch on this card). I actually tried two or three different bird on a branch silhouettes. The plan was to add the details in and color it – like I’ve done with so many other projects.

It didn’t work.

New idea.

Use one of the stamp and metal die sets to find something that worked – a humming bird fit what I was trying to do. I colored it – and I was happy with how it turned out. Then I lined the image and the metal die up, taped things down and ran it through my die cutting machine. I went to remove it and realized my die slipped at some point and it didn’t cut the image correctly. I stamped and colored again, then lined up everything, added extra tape this time to keep things in place and it FINALLY worked. I put that bad boy together and declared the card done.

Here’s a picture of the card with some of the things that didn’t work. There were more things, but I’d already thrown them away.

I hope you had a better week doing whatever it is you do.

Thanks for stopping by!

xoxo

Thank you, Butterfly saying, stamp and die set, bird I didn’t use

Today I Thought of You

Sometimes, I make cards with specific people in mind and for specific purposes.

Often times, I make cards because I need to create.

That’s what happened with this card 🙂

The background is pattern from the Silhouette Store, as are the two files I combined for the greenery and butterfly.

I printed off the background and cut it out. I turned the cut files into a “digi” stamp of sorts then printed it off, colored it using my copic markers and prismacolor pencils, then printed it off and layered everything on to the card front.

Here’s a picture of part of the process.

I’m not sure who this is for, or where I’ll use it, but I can ALWAYS use a card like this.

Thanks for stopping by!
Xoxo

Pattern, Floral Stem, Flower and Butterfly

My Pixscan Works Now!

Silhouette released V4 of their software and I finally just did it. I always worry that my computer will do something stupid and I’ll lose work, so I backed everything up and pushed the upgrade button. And now my pixscan mat works! (It didn’t work for me on the previous version.)

I used it on this card – I’m not sure how I feel about this card yet, though. But I got to use the pixscan feature and that’s really what I wanted to do 🙂

I used markers and colored directly on the stamp then stamped down. There were repeated passes to get the fish to this point, but I was trying to practice.

Anyway, here’s the card. Thanks for looking 😀

xoxo

Fish Stamp set, Fish Bowl file, embossing folder is by We R Memory Keepers, but I can’t find a link for it