Thinking Inking

Birthday Wishes and Copic GIveaway

I have a floral birthday card to share today, as well as some Copic news and a very cool giveaway, courtesy of Imagination International/Copic! 

For the card, I started with a Lockhart stamp, Cottage Flowers, and paired that with some new October Afternoon paper, Farm Fresh. 

The Copic markers that I used are shown below in two rows; click on the images if you need to see something larger. In addition to the markers, I also used  clear, mint, and buttermilk Spica Glitter Pens. 

Orange Zest ribbon and vintage buttons, as well as sentiment (Mega Mixed Messages) are PaperTrey Ink. I used two Spellbinders dies, a Classic Oval Nestability and a double-ended tag, trimmed on one end, and I used a gold metallic paint pen to edge the focal image with. 

Now how about that Copic news that you've been scanning through this post for? Copic has added some new regional certification instructors, and to welcome them, is giving away a fabulous prize on each of the blogs listed below! What is that prize? It is the winner's choice of either an ABS-1 OR any twelve Copic Sketch colors!     

To enter, please leave us (any or all of the people listed below) a comment letting us know either how you use Copics, which Copic products you use, why you love them OR why you wish you had Copics.

In addition to one winner from each listed blog, Copic will be reading through comments. If they find a testimonial that they really like, then they will contact that person to use his or her story for the CHA booth and would then give the person an equal prize to the random winners. In other words, make your comments good! There will probably be two or three winners chosen total on comments, as well as the one winner for each listed blog. These will not be announced right away. The drawing begins on Wednesday, November 11, and ends on Saturday, November 14 at 9pm, CST. Please be aware that ending times may vary a bit on the different blogs.

Blogs to visit: 

Marianne Walker, Copic Product Specialist Extraordinaire, Certification Area: Floater

(Debbie Olson) Copic Blog Team, Certification Area: Floater

Sherrie Siemens Copic Blog Team, Certification Area: Western Canada

Sally Lynn MacDonald Copic Blog Team, Certification Area: Northeast US and Eastern Canada

Sharon Harnist Copic Blog Team, Certification Area: Southern Midwest

Lori Craig Certification Area: Central Midwest

Colleen Schaan Certification Area: South

Michelle Wooderson Copic Blog Team

Kathy Sanders does not currently have a blog, but we'd certainly like to welcome her too; Kathy's certification area includes the Northern Midwest and Chicago area. 

It's really exciting to see how these markers have migrated from the graphic design and fine arts fields to be embraced by paper crafters and altered artists as well. The addition of more certification instructors should make it simpler for you to receive instruction in your area and perhaps even sit in classes at a local stamp store. As Martha would say, "It's a good thing!"

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Now, for a little bit more about my trip, for those who want to know. Have you ever seen so many markers on one table? These are being packed into 72 piece stampers sets.

Here several of us are in Marianne's office, which is tidy, by the way. Maybe she should come help me clean mine!

He are some of those nice people in the warehouse who get Copic Markers and Various Inks out to the stores--we love them!

How about an aisle of Various Inks? Think of the number of times you could refill markers with all of these. . .

 

I wish that I had had better lighting for this picture; Ken, the president of Imagination International and an art professor, was giving us a lesson in sketching and airbrushing. He was pretty amazing to watch!

 

Finally, for you cat lovers out there, this is the warehouse cat. He startled me, but I think I returned the favor when my flash went off. He looked much more pleasant before I snapped his picture!

Thank you for visiting, and I wish you luck in winning some of these fabulous Copic prizes!

Snowglobe, Plum Crazy Style

Although I didn't have any plum colored patterned papers on hand, I had to take Cath up on her Plum Crazy Moxie Fab challenge! I'll probably try it again in a more formal setting, but for today I printed some digital papers from Shabby Miss Jenn's Shabby Snowkisses line at 6" x 6" on high resolution matte paper. These papers were the basis for my color choices on the Lockhart image, Nicholas and Kitty. Click on any image to see it larger.

I pulled a bright yellow-green from the word paper, choosing Copic YG0000 and YG11 for the trees. 

 

Next I chose some plums and blues, Copic Booo, B21, V91, V93, and V95.

 

I wanted to add a bit of texture to the snowman's coat, so I cut a scrap from one of my husband's hole-y socks and saturated it in Copic Clear Blender Solution.  (He won't miss it.) I also added some cool gray shadows on the snowman. The cardstock that I'm using here is Neenah Natural White, which is a bit warmer than a true white, but not as dark as a cream cardstock. I chose it because the base colors in the paper seemed muted and vintage. (Obviously, coloring on a warmer base influences the color of the markers as well.)

Here I've colored the cat (Copic E41 and E43), as well as the gift (V12 and V15).

Here I've colored the base of the snowglobe as if it were wood (Copic E41, E43, and E44). (The patterned paper had some browns in it, and I wanted to add a few more of those with the base.) I had also colored the snowman's carrot nose but forgot to put those markers in the picture: YR15 and YR18.

Here I've added shadows to the base of the snowglobe (Copic T0 and T1), as well as some Star Dust Stickles. It is mounted with foam tape, and ribbon is PaperTrey Ink Plum Pudding Stitched Grosgrain.  Buttons are PTI's Plum Pudding Vintage Buttons, and punch is an Embossed Curve Slim Edger Border Punch. Have you taken the Plum Crazy challenge?  You might be surprised at how much you like Plum!

Autumn Blessings: Apple Basket

I finally finished canning the last of our apples this week, saving out only enough to make a pie for company Saturday night. You know I can't can all of those apples and not get a blog post out of them, so. . . how about an apple basket card tonight? 

I started with the apple basket image from the Just Rite Autumn Blessings set, which fits the 2-1/4" x 3-1/16" oval stamper. I stamped it in Memento Rich Cocoa ink and colored it with the Copic markers pictured below. Since I used so many markers, I labeled them in categories. 

 

After coloring the apples in yellows and reds, I chose papers from a Cosmo Cricket Early Girl Mini Deck--perfect with these colors.  The next thing I tried was something I don't usually do, making ruffles, which is Cath Edvalson's Moxie Fab challenge for this week--fun challenge! The natural twill is 1-1/2" wide, gathered with a double row of stitching close to the top. (In this short a distance, you could probably get by with a single row of stitches, but the point of a double row is that the gather is usually flatter, AND you don't lose the whole piece if you break a thread while pulling. (Don't ask me how I know about that. . .) To get a nice full ruffle, you will want two to three times the length that you intend to cover. Mine is closer to twice the length of the card front because I knew I had a piece to layer on top of it and didn't want it to be super-full under my image.

I used some Scor Tape to hold the ruffle down firmly, and I wrapped its edges around the back of the card, leaving some fullness on the sides.

I used a Spellbinders Classic Oval die to cut out my focal image, and a Labels Five die to mat the focal image. Buttons are PaperTrey Ink Vintage Buttons.

And like a proud Mama, I have to share one picture with the four varieties of canned apples: from left to right, we have cranberry applesauce, apple pie filling, cinnamon spice applesauce (hiding behind my card), and plain applesauce. Here is a link to the applesauce recipe that I used as a base recipe. (I wasn't entirely pleased with the apple pie filling recipe, so I  don't think I'll share it. For the cranberry applesauce, I just cooked a recipe of whole cranberry sauce and beat it smooth in my blender before adding it to the hot applesauce and canning according to the Ball site.)

That's it for today. Have a great weekend!

Button Santa Spinner

Today I have a cute little Holiday Button Bits card to share with you, a Santa Spinner card. Remember when spinner cards were all the rage a couple of years ago? As soon as I saw this little Santa and the gingerbread man from PaperTrey Ink's Holiday Button Bits, I could just picture them as spinner cards!

There are several ways to make a spinner card; Cambria Turnbow did an excellent tutorial for SplitCoastStampers, using a small circle punch and connecting the two holes with two long cuts. That's the best option if you don't have a Stampin' Up Word Window punch, probably. If you do have an SU Word Window punch, check out my Gingerbread Boy stepped-out tutorial below this post; I took pictures as I made the gingerbread boy.

Santa is colored in the Copic markers shown above (most of which are available as PTI Trios), and then dressed in a Pure Poppy Vintage button. I poured all of my Pure Poppy buttons out on my countertop to find one that was just the right size for Santa--that's the fun part! 

Patterned papers are from a package of the Merry Days of Christmasby My Mind's Eye, and cardstock is Spring Moss and Kraft from PaperTrey Ink.

Thanks for stopping by, and don't forget to check the gingerbread boy post below  or Cami's SCS tutorial if you would like to make a spinner card. Just be warned: making the image spin is highly addictive. . .
 

October 2009 PaperTrey Release

I've already shared much of what I made for this month's PaperTrey Ink release, but I have a couple of other pieces to share tonight. This was such a  fun release, a joy to work with.

First up is a Vintage Ornaments piece. Dawn McVey did a beautiful job with this set. I've loved her samples on her blog this week! I wanted to use some of last month's Holiday Cheer papers, so that dictated my color scheme for this card. The little tag is stamped with Versamark on a clear base, and heat embossed with Filigree detail white embossing powder. I wanted words on there, but I didn't want to hide the ornament, and that was my solution.

 The Holiday Trees set from Heather Nichols is absolutely charming. I couldn't resist using Kraft cardstock--in honor of Pine, of course! In the background, I've used the new Background Basics: Text Style II. Ornaments and snowflake centers are Stickles, Star Dust and Christmas Red.

I also have another 2009 Holiday Tags card, but this one with a clean, modern look and non-traditional colors. I used a Spellbinders Classic Circle Nestability to cut, emboss, and mask my circle for airbrushing with a Copic BG13 marker. The leaves are colored with a Copic YG63 marker, and then I used a clear blender pen to push the color out of the mistletoe berries. I was sorely tempted to make the berries red for a punch of color, but I stuck to the true white of all of the mistletoe berries I've ever seen. While I'm much more a vintage girl by nature, there's something about a clean look that I am drawn to.

I have some other new release cards almost finished, but I'm still working on blog posts for them. They'll be here this week. If you need any more details about anything I've posted from this release, today or over the past few days, that information should all be in my PaperTrey Ink Gallery. Thank you for visiting!

Take Note Inspirations

As a home schooling mom, I'm always looking for ways to get my fourth grade son organized and motivated. With Mish's "Books to Read" sentiment in PaperTrey Ink's soon-to-be-released Take Note stamp set, I had a perfect sentiment to create a little reading list for him! I'm hoping he doesn't mind the buttons and ribbon; at least I didn't put a bow. . .

I chose some Cosmo Cricket Jack's World papers (Lessons and Wake Up) for my backgrounds, thinking that they were sufficiently cheery while still being academic and not "sissy."  I used the Copic markers shown below to color that little pencil--LOVE that pencil image! (All of the markers shown except for E31 are available here.) Ink colors are New Leaf, Pure Poppy, and Orange Zest, and Fresh Snow (for the box on the green patterned paper), as well as Memento Tuxedo Black. Vintage Buttons are New Leaf and Lemon Tart (a button that leaned darker than most in the bag). Ribbon is New Leaf Stitched Grosgrain. By the way, these darling little notepads are no longer a pain to get cut in half; they will be sold in both cream and white staring on October 15 at PaperTrey Ink, and you won't have any pesky margin line up half of your pads that way either!

Since I made Benjamin a notebook, of course I needed one too--one with bows, preferably, and lots of pink! I used Pure Poppy, Sweet Blush, and Berry Sorbet cardstock, as well as Fresh Snow, Berry Sorbet, and Pure Poppy ink. Vintage buttons are Berry Sorbet.  On my notebook, I added a couple of pieces of cardstock to the back panel to slip the backing of a new notebook into. (I didn't do that on Benjamin's, assuming that the notebook would be destroyed by the time the paper was used up.)

Stamps sets used other than Take Note are Polka Dot Basics II, Giga Guidelines, and Background Basics: Text Style II. They are all new sets for October's release except for Polka Dot Basics II. I used a Spellbinders Petite Scalloped Circle die to cut my scalloped border for the "This and That" sentiment, which is inked in Berry Sorbet, with Pure Poppy added on the top and bottom edges of the stamp.

Mish makes such fabulous little notepads, and this collaborative set with Nichole will be a wonderfully useful set to add to any stamper's arsenal.  Thanks for visiting, and be sure to see what everyone else did with the notepad assignment!

Betsy Veldman

Dawn McVey

Becky Oehlers 

Geny Cassady

Heather Nichols

Lauren Meader

Lisa Johnson

Nichole Heady

Melissa Phillips

Michelle Wooderson

Niki Estes

Autumn Blessings

It's been a cold, rainy day in the U.P.--very fall-feeling, and the perfect kind of day for making a warm-toned card with pumpkins on it.  I chose a center and border from the Just Rite Stampers Autumn Blessings set, along with the 2-1/4" x 3-1/16" oval wooden stamper.

I stamped the image in Memento Rich Cocoa ink and colored it with the Copic markers shown in the stepped out pictures below, finishing the image with three of the new Spica Glitter pen colors, Sand, Mint, and Peach.

I don't normally pair a G21 with YG93 and YG95, but I had let my green get a little dark and a little yellow, so I used the lighter, purer green to tone down the olive and regain some highlights in the leaves.

I added Spica Glitter pens after this and die cut the image with a Spellbinders Classic Oval die, before constructing my card front from the Cosmo Cricket Earth Love Mini Deck papers.  (And Nutmeg is ON THE WAY!) A bit of sanding  and sewing, a button, and a length of natural twill finished it off--one more card for the stash.

Thank you for visiting!

My Heart Melts 4 You

I have a winter card for you tonight AND some exciting news that I forgot to share in the hubbub of World Card Making Day! First, my card: this sweet little image is from the Snow Signs set (FireCracker Designs by Pamela). I inadvertently left off his twiggy hair, which I had fully intended to stamp on the patterned paper layer in brown ink. . . By the time I realized it, there was no going back. I hope he won't be too embarrassed by my omission!

He is colored in the Copic markers shown below--yes, that many! Who knew that one could use so many colors on something that is mostly white? He is stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black ink, and his sign is stamped in Turquoise Gem Versamagic and Raspberry Fizz PTI ink. (He has interchangeable words that fit his signpost--very clever!

The warmer shading that you see around his edges is from the PTI Chamomile Distress cube that I sponged him with to help him to coordinate with my Cosmo Cricket Jolly by Golly Mini Deck papers. (The large backdrop pattern is a 12" x 12" sheet, Breezy Freezy.) Ribbon and button are both PaperTrey Inks, Aqua Mist grosgrain and a Raspberry Fizz vintage button. I added dots of Diamond Stickles in the background for snow.

Now how about that news? Perhaps you've already seen it on the Cosmo Cricket blog, but there's a new paper line in town, Nutmeg! It, too, comes in Mini Decks--woohoo!  (Okay, all of you card makers out there can't let me down--we have to show Eric and Julie that there IS a demand for mini decks, right?) I love my mini decks, and I know that I will love Nutmeg too--so warm and homey!

When I can get an extra mini deck, I promise to share. Well, that's it, my sweet snowman, and my big news. Have a wonderful day!

PaperTrey Ink's WCMD Festivities

I just checked Nichole's blog and saw that PaperTrey Ink also has some fabulous WCMD challenges going on today. Prizes include a never-sold set, Floral Fusion, as well as an "I want It All" package from October's releases--a $200+ prize!   You have until 7pm EST on Tuesday, October 6 to finish and link to one of Nichole's four challenges. That gives you some time. . . What are you waiting for?

I took Nichole's WCMD Challenge 1, Japan.  For it I used the Out on a Limb Revised and Out on a Limb Sentiments sets, as well as Guidelines Two and the butterfly from With Sympathy. Here is the image from which I drew inspiration. (I chose a limb and an airbrushed background because of this piece.) I used a Spellbinders Long Rectangle die to cut, emboss, and mask my focal image, and Copic markers BG13 and Y32, along with my Copic Airbrush System, to airbrush a background. 

That winds up World Card Making Day for me. With all of that card making today, I'm ready for a restful weekend! Thank you for visiting.

P.S. I have a giveaway posted just below this post. 

Celebrate World Card Making Day!

So, are you making cards today in honor of World Card Making Day? I'm hoping to get some made; in fact, I've been playing with new stamps every spare minute this week! I can't share those quite yet, but I still have a couple of things to share today, one card now, and one late this afternoon.

First is this fall flowers card made with PaperTrey Ink's Autumn Abundance set, as well as Vintage Labels and Mega Mixed Messages.  I used the Autumn Abundance papers and Orange Zest Satin ribbon. The Copic markers that I used to color the image are PTI's Orange Zest Trio, Ripe Avocado trio, Y32, and some earth tones, all pictured below.

Here is a close-up of the little flower vase; I think it's my favorite image in the autumn Abundance set, especially paired with this paper! I used a Spellbinders Labels 1 die for the focal image and a double ended tags die, cut off, for the tiny tag. 

My next card to share will be a seasonal challenge card on the CLASSroom blog. Every hour, on the hour, between 8am PST and 2pm PST, and new challenge will be posted there, along with blog candy; if you have time to stamp today, be sure to check it out! 

Many prizes are still up for grabs at the Moxie Fab World blog and the Paper Crafts Connection blog in conjunction with today's festivities, and Splitcoaststampers has huge WCMD events planned as well.

If you know of other fun celebrations of World Card Making Day, feel free to leave a link in the comments section so that others have a chance to visit those as well. Thanks for visiting, and I'll post my second card later today sometime after it goes up on the CLASSroom blog. If I get a chance, I just might be able to scrounge up some giveaways then as well!

P.S. Just a reminder that if you are shopping in the  Paper Crafts/CK Online Store, here's a 25% off discount code for you, valid from midnight on 9/21/09, MDT through 11:59pm MDT on 10/12/09 in the scrapbooking store:

25% off discount code: 

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