It's funny how sometimes the simpler projects end up being your favorites. That's the case with this card. It's very simple, but for some reason, it's remained one of my faves. I think the other reason I like it is because it's one of the few that actually came together quickly! For me, quickly isn't usually a word I associate with my crafting!

The background paper is from Basic Grey and I inked around the edges a little with Broken China Distress Ink. I added a strip of black magic mesh and a strip of felt border over that. The felt border was bright white, so I pounced on some more distress ink to tone it down (I can't remember which color, but it was probably Tea Dye or Frayed Burlap).

The butterfly stamp is from Hero Arts. I stamped it with Versamark on a piece of glossy paper that I had previously colored with alcohol inks. I like to make a bunch of background papers ahead of time so I have them on hand when I need them. I embossed the image with black embossing powder, cut it out and mounted it on the felt border with a foam dot. I finished the card by adding a little bling to the felt and stamping the sentiment.

Quick and easy!

Sparkly Dragonfly Card

The heat wave here in the east is finally starting to subside! Needless to say, we didn't spend much time outdoors this week. So, I had a little time to make this card. My initial plan for this project was to make a black and white card, but somehow it evolved into this. I embossed the background with my circles Cuttlebug folder. Then I found a white Spellbinders die cut in my stash and stamped the dragonfly. Thanks to my new friend Jo (at http://www.jpodinc.blogspot.com/), I went to Michael's this week where a bottle of Marcasite embossing powder jumped into my basket! Since it followed me home, I decided to emboss the dragonfly with it. It's hard to tell in the pics, but the image ends up having a lot of sparkle to it. Then I added some flourishes in black ink. Because the whole black and white idea wasn't working for me, I added distress inks to the background. I used Broken China, Peeled Paint and Dusty Concord. Then I used my exacto knife to cut around the wings and pop them up for some dimension. My daugter told me it looked like a dragonfly kite, so I added the three ribbons at the bottom. The last touch was to add some Opalite inks around the edge to make it pop a little.

I've had some Opalite pads for a while now, but I never really used them. They're great! They're interference pigment inks and when you open the lid, all the pads look white. But, when you apply the ink to dark paper.....MAGIC happens! It's kind of like having Perfect Pearls in an ink pad. I'll definitely be using these more in the future.

To get a better view of the Marcasite embossing powder, you can watch Jo's video that she made to show off her beautiful Paris themed tags that she made for the tag swap we were both in.

http://http//www.youtube.com/user/jpodinc#p/a/u/0/Vp7hCgHbzJI

She's very talented! Hi Jo!

Happy crafting and stay cool in this summer weather!

Butterfly Card with Outline Stickers

I hope everyone had a Happy 4th of July yesterday. We were fortunate enough to be invited to a friend's house who lives in Secaucus, NJ to watch the Macy's Fireworks Spectacular. The view from her house was AMAZING. I recorded a small portion of them and put it on my You Tube channel. You can watch it here:

http://http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YXhcWUDrE4

Since I'm such a butterfly fan, I wanted to make a card that had a large butterfly as the focal point. I used a DCWV textured card for the base and I tried stamping it with Versamark using a harlequin stamp, but it didn't show up very well. I added a piece of purple cardstock that was cut with a nestibilities die and then run through the swirl folder of my cuttlebug. After I inked the high spots with a darker purple ink, I traced the edge of the diecut with an embossing pen and then heat embossed it with gold embossing powder. The gorgeous butterfly sticker was mounted on a piece of handmade paper and then I cut around it. For the finishing touches, I added some bling to the butterfly's wings and tied some fiber around the fold of the card. I adhered the butterfly's body down flat with adhesive and popped up the wings with some foam dots to give it some dimension. Then I added the sentiment with another sticker.

I know a lot of you have seen similar stickers on the Paper Wishes site under the brand name "Dazzles". I have purchased some of these, but most of my Outline sticker collection came from a great company called Pop Ups by Plane Class. They have a great selection, including Dazzles, and I'm fortunate enough to see them at a stamp show I attend every year. Here's a link to their site:

http://www.imacrs.com/popups.htm

Be sure to check them out. In addition to their sticker line, they also carry metal templates and a gorgeous selection of specialty paper! They have a wonderful gallery of cards to get ideas from as well as some video tutorials.