Creating Kindness: Celebrate

Hi Everybody! Happy Thursday or whichever day it might be in your part of the world. I'm happy to have you stop by today because today is the Creating Kindness Blog and Video Hop day. Myself and some other talented Stampin' Up! demonstrators from around the world have gotten together to share some fun projects and video tutorials as well!

Our theme for this month's hop is "Celebrate." There is always so much to celebrate at this time of year (Winter Holidays, New Year's Eve, and five December birthdays for me)... but right now, as I've taken a couple of days off of work, I am choosing to celebrate the little things. For me, that means some time in my craft room to experiment with my supplies. That's something to celebrate, right?! So, as I celebrated my alone time in my craft room I tried this new (to me anyways) technique. I don't know what it's called so I'm calling it Alcohol Stamping and I've got a video tutorial at the end of my blog post. Here's what I made with this fun technique...

Believe it or not, this technique is so easy! I started with a piece of Shimmery White Cardstock and sponged it with Tempting Turquoise and Melon Mambo (the purple hue in the middle is where I overlapped the two colors). After that I took a stamp from Flirty Flowers and a Stampin' Spritzer filled with rubbing alcohol and spritzed my stamp. I pressed it firmly onto the sponged background, held it there for a couple of seconds to let the paper absorb the alcohol, and lifted the stamp off the paper. The watermark-like effect is visible immediately and is stunning! I dried off my stamp and block with a paper towel and repeated the alcohol stamping multiple times until I had the background I desired.

I added a silver embossed "celebrate" sentiment (from Weather Together), some Glitter & Clear Epoxy Shapes (145632) which are new in the Occasions Catalog, and some Black Metallic Thread. I wanted the background to be the star of show so I tried not to over do it. The background is layered on a Basic Black mat and that is popped up on dimensionals on a Pool Party card base.

Want to try this technique out for yourself? Here's a quick video tutorial with some tips to help you out. 

And that's it for today folks. I am sure glad that you've stopped by to visit my blog today and I hope you will continue on the hop by heading down under to my visit my friend Cheryll! Just click her name or the next button below. 

In case you didn't know Sale-A-Bration has just begun! It's the best time of year to buy all of your favorite things as you get rewarded for every $50 you spend! It's also an amazing time to join my team-so if you've been thinking about it let me know. I'm happy to answer any questions and generally enable you to fill your craft space with fun things.

Have an amazing day you guys!

Maria Willis

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Let me know if you have any questions!

Email: mariawillis@hotmail.com

Want a great discount on Stampin' Up! Products and to have a fun new stamping family? Join me on this fun adventure! I can't wait to be your super excited Stampin' Up! side kick and support lady! In case you didn't know, you can join Stampin' Up! just for the discount and never sell a single product. If you want to know the details just let me know. If you're looking for a discount on your favorite hobby (stamping and paper crafting with Stampin' Up! products) and want to earn money doing it... let me know! I'd love to talk with you whatever your interest might be! If you want to see a little more info go ahead and click the button below. Looking forward to hearing from you!

Creating Kindness Blog Hop: Support or Friendship

Hello everybody and welcome to another Creating Kindness (Around the World) Design Team Blog Hop. This month our theme is Support or Friendship and I had a hard time deciding what to share with you today. After a lot of thought I've decided to share a card that I've made for a friend that I went to high school with.

This friend has Multiple Sclerosis and has not been well lately. She is such a lovely person and is always keeping a positive attitude. I've decided to send her a card so that she'll know that I'm thinking about her and in hopes that it will help keep her spirits up.

I used a technique that I've never tried before when I made this card. I used my Flourishing Thinlits Dies with my Big Shot to deboss my background. I used watercolor paper for the background because it is softer and thicker than normal cardstock and I thought it would hold an impression better.

I layered my watercolor paper on top of some cheap fun foam from my dollar store, put the framelits on top with the cutting side up, put a cutting plate on top and cranked it through the Big Shot to press the die into the paper. It worked like a charm!!

Then I used sponge daubers and Lemon Lime Twist, Emerald Envy, Island Indigo and Elegant Eggplant to cover the entire background with ink. I gave it a little flick with water to lift some of the color and added a heat embossed sentiment to finish it off.

I've made a quick video to show you how I did this technique and put the card together... 

Thanks for stopping by today! Let me know if you try this technique out and what you think of it. I hope you'll continue along on this hop. I can't wait to see what the rest of my teammates have chosen to share this month. If you'd like to keep on hopping, just click the next button below. 

Have an amazing day and I'll see you back here soon (to be specific... I'll be back in just three hours with another post because I have two blog hops today!).

Bye for now!

Maria.

Continue the hop by hopping over to our incredibly talented guest designer: 

Jessie Holton!

Want to shop with me? No problem, just click the button below. 

Let me know if you have any questions!

Email: mariawillis@hotmail.com

Want a great discount on Stampin' Up! Products and to have a fun new stamping family? Join me on this fun adventure! I can't wait to be your super excited Stampin' Up! side kick and support lady! In case you didn't know, you can join Stampin' Up! just for the discount and never sell a single product. If you want to know the details just let me know. If you're looking for a discount on your favorite hobby (stamping and paper crafting with Stampin' Up! products) and want to earn money doing it... let me know! I'd love to talk with you whatever your interest might be! If you want to see a little more info go ahead and click the button below. Looking forward to hearing from you!

Creating Kindness Blog Hop: Texture

Hello and welcome to this month's Creating Kindness (Around the World) Blog and Video hop (yes, we really have a video hop on YouTube)! If this is your first time to my blog, my name is Maria Willis, and I'm a Stampin' Up Demonstrator from a small mountain town called Boulder Creek, CA in the United States. I'm so glad to have you here. Today our theme is "Texture" and our design team has done our best to bring you some creative ways of adding texture to your own crafting projects.

For my card I decided to use Stampin' Ups! new Embossing Paste. It's great for adding texture to any project. I decided to keep my card simple to let the medallion pattern and vibrant colors take the spotlight. On this card I used a color combination of Daffodil Delight and Bermuda Bay. 

I used Basic Black cardstock in hopes of having the colors boldly pop off of the page and I like the way it turned out. After applying the paste and letting it dry I used sponge daubers  to apply color. The sponge daubers allowed me to apply the color lightly or heavily as I pleased. It also turns out that black is a good color to use as a background for this embossing paste as it provides a very forgiving background.

What you cannot see in my photos is how sparkly these cards are in real life. After sponging them with color I painted them with Clear Wink of Stella. They are so sparkly and pretty! If you're interested in seeing what they look like when the Wink of Stella catches the light I hope you'll check out my video.  In my video I've got some tips for keeping your background and edges clean as well as how to care for your embossing paste tools. I also show the full process of how to make these cards with measurements included and helpful tips along the way.  Here's a link to the tutorial video:

If you watched the video you saw that the card I featured today is actually the second card  that I made using this technique. The first card was more of an experiment that started with spritzing color onto the embossing paste (it worked but the color faded over the course of the week). Once I realized that the color was going to fade with the spritzing technique I decided to try with sponge daubers and I was able to get much more saturated color with this technique. The Clear Wink of Stella is a fun addition but not just because it sparkles. In the video you can see that the solution in the Wink of Stella helps to drag the ink color around blending the colors seamlessly.  Here's a look at both of the cards. My original card was done with Lemon Lime Twist and Island Indigo inks.   The colors aren't all that different but the Daffodil Delight and Bermuda Bay card is a lot more vibrant.

If you're interested in creating texture on a project without using embossing paste then check out my post from yesterday. Here's a link and a sneak peek... just click HERE.

That's it for today folks! I hope you'll keep on hopping along with us to see the amazing ideas the rest of the design team has to share. Next you'll be heading over to Satomi Wellard in Japan!

Thanks for stopping by and have an amazing day! 

Maria.

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Want a great discount on Stampin' Up! Products and to have a fun new stamping family? Join me on this fun adventure! I can't wait to be your super excited (possibly way too enthusiastic... No! That's not possible!) Stampin' Up! side kick and support lady! In case you didn't know, you can join Stampin' Up! just for the discount and never sell a single product. If you want to know the details just let me know. If you're looking for a discount on your favorite hobby (stamping and paper crafting with Stampin' Up! products) and want to earn money doing it... let me know! I'd love to talk with you whatever your interest might be! If you want to see a little more info go ahead and click the button below. Looking forward to hearing from you!