National Craft Month - Altered Projects

It is now officially Spring and I have to tell you that I love the longer days, the chirping birds and even the muddy shoes! LOL To me, there is no bigger sign of spring that the sight and sound of birds outside on the trees; wouldn't you agree?

So, in honour of spring, here is an altered birdhouse. The papers are from Urban Lily. The birdhouse is from the dollar store. But what I think really makes the bird house is the swirling butterflies. The butterfly images are from Hero Arts and are coloured with Copic markers, all available at Scrap Shotz. The entire birdhouse has been liberally sprayed with Tattered Angels glimmer mist, also available at Scrap Shotz.

 Here is the front view...

Here is the side view...

Do you alter? Can you share with me your altered projects?

National Craft Month - Rolled Stamping

 seriously under-utilize my stamps! *blush* I love them; I can see the versatility in them; and, I happen to have a lot of them! *blush*

I was recently in the very hurried need of a card and challenged myself to make a stamped card. One of the techniques that I like and have not used much is Rolled Stamping. Now I am not sure if that is the "official" name of the technique but it certainly describes the following pictures!!!

You will need a stamp set that is NOT a lined drawn image; 2 colours of ink and of course paper.

Cover your stamped image with the LIGHTEST colour first.

Then with the now inked image, tip the stamp on its edge and "roll" the edges of the image on the darker ink so you are only inking the EDGES.

Then stamp! I used 2 very different colours so you could see the areas of the ink and stamp. You may prefer a more subtle look and use shades of the same colour.

I randomly stamped the image on my card front and then embellished each of the flower centres. Voila! A quick and easy card for a special birthday girl!

Can you show me your stamping???

National Craft Month - Super Fast Cards

I aspire to being an intricate and beautiful cardmaker but I personally find the smaller real estate of a card to be horribly intimidating! *blush* I seem to do better by keeping the card simple and sincere.

Below is a set of cards I made in 15 minutes with only cardstock, glimmer mist, a special stamp and a few snippets of organza ribbon.

Here is a close-up

I hope to see your set of simple and sincere cards!!! Please link me up, ok?

March in National Craft Month

I cannot believe it is March already; can you? This March at Scrap Shotz, I'd like to share with you a series of projects, tips and tricks and inspiration. You can incorporate these ideas into your home decor or cards or layouts. Let's have some fun, shall we?

To kick off National Craft Month, I'd like to share some instructions on how to make the tissue paper flowers on my layout below.

Handmade, slightly imperfect flowers are all the rage now. They can be distressed, coloured with glimmering mists or jazzed up with some Copic air brushing. Either way, flowers are fun and oh so easy to make.

I used white tissue paper. The tissue paper I used had a matte and a glossy side. Using my circle punch, I cut a swack of circles all the same size. You could definitely use different sizes of circles but I like to challenge myself to complete projects in 30 minutes or less!

Next, gather up the circles and insert a brad to hold the circles together. Then "fluff" up the circles by scrunching them. Now you have a colourless but cute flower.

You can choose any option to colour your flower now. I used two different colours of Tattered Angels glimmer mist because I like the depth that the secondary colour gives it. After the glimmer mist dried, I "painted" on some Ranger Glossy Accents and dusted on some Pink Paislee Pixie Stix. I love the look; do you?

Here is a side and aerial view of the flowers -

To finish off my floweers, I used my Hero Arts stamps and coloured them with my Copics.

I hope to see your tissue paper flowers too!

Supplies used:  Urban Lily (pattern papers); Zva Creative (gem swirls); Tattered Angels glimmer mist; Doodlebug alphas; Heidi Swapp (chipboard question mark); EK Success circle punch; Hero Arts stamp; Copic Spica Marker

Thanks for letting me share!