Masking techniques with Musical Jamboree stamp set from Stampin' Up!®

When I saw the Musical Jamboree stamp set in the latest Stampin’ Up!® Annual Catalogue, I just had to have it because that wolf looks so much like my own dog.

So far I have made three cards using this fun stamp set, all of which you can see here.

Creating beautiful backgrounds to show off your dies

No new products today – just some great examples of how you can create beautiful projects where the die-cuts are the stars of the show.

I had fun creating backgrounds to show off the Friendly Silhouettes Dies. Let me walk you through them.

For these first two projects, I masked a circle using a punched/die-cut sticky note, then brayered the background using Crushed Curry and Poppy Parade ink pads. You could sponge, too – but if you do, make sure you sponge away from the centre of the mask or you could dislodge it.

For the top card, I then lightly splashed with water from a fine paintbrush. Allow to dry, then dab it dry with a tissue. This creates this lovely effect which can look like seed heads blowing on the breeze, fireflies, rain or, on a dark blue background, like snow. It’s such a simple effect and so versatile.

For this card, I brayered as before, but instead of splashing, I used that same very fine paintbrush to paint fine lines following the edge of the circle. With ideas clearly way above my station, I call this the Van Gogh technique.

For the third card, I took the leftover template from the bullrushes in the first card and used this as a mask. I sponged with Pumpkin Pie to create a background image, then removed the mask and brayered around the top edge of the card in Melon Mambo. The beauty of brayering is that you can give it a go in any colours and get some lovely effects.

Want to have a go at fun techniques like this? If you’re in the UK, why not talk to me about joining my remote classes?

Meerkat Week: Silhouetted meerkats

I take my hat off to the first person to come up with this silhouette idea. But there are so many versions of this by now that I can’t work out who was the originator.

Begin by masking and brayering a lovely bright sunset, then all you do is stamp your image, then colour the whole lot in black. How easy is that?

Brayering is easy but most people, in my experience, give up too early and are disappointed with their results. The keys are:

1. Start OFF the edge of the paper so you don't get a hard line where the ink begins... AND

2 Keep going: brayer over and over and over again until you get a good even colour distribution. 
 

Flowering Desert Week: Hot and fiery sunset cactus scene

This month I celebrated my team achievers with some colourful cactus cards with a brayered sunset background and the Dot to Dot embossing folder. I love the warmth of this colour combo...

If you’d like to join my Stampin’ Up!® team, there really has never been a better time to join. Right now you can join for £99 and get £170 of craft supplies of your choice. Upgrade to the tote option, for £125 and you get all those craft supplies AND the beautiful tote!

Please get in touch for more info, or you can join right now by clicking here.

Brayered sunset Flowering Desert card with video tutorial

I love brayering and the new sponge brayers are so much more user-friendly than the old rubber one which people seemed to have trouble with.

I created this colourful sunset background to show off my new favourite stamp set, Flowering Desert. Take a look at how to make the brayered background in my short video below...



I’ll have lots more Flowering Desert projects to show you in the coming weeks, so please watch this space.

Wonderful brayered Rooted in Nature cards

I do love to brayer... as you may have noticed. The new sponge brayers are so much quicker than the old rubber version, and I made these cards in minute by brayering across a whole piece of A4 Whisper White cardstock. Then I cut it into three pieces to top these cards.

Perfect positioning was achieved with the Stamparatus and bam! Three cards made in minutes, to celebrate my lovely team members who have gone above and beyond this month. They all get a voucher, too – happy mail!

If you’d like to find out more about becoming a demonstrator, please click here, email me or if you’re ready to take the plunge, you can join my friendly team here.

Dashing Deer - simple or stepped up?

Which do you prefer? The vibrancy of the brayered card above? Or the simpler version below?

The card above was one of our projects at last week’s Crafty Friday. The ladies loved the brayering technique and had fun creating their own colour combinations. The one above is Rich Razzleberry, Melon Mambo and Crushed Curry.

Dashing Deer brayered Christmas card

I was inspired by this beautiful card by Dawn Olchefske to make a festive version using the gorgeous Dashing Deer stamp set.

The ladies loved having a go at brayering at Crafty Friday last week and all produced two cards, including this one - or a version of this... as some of them decided to go “off piste”! I love the vibrant colours, although they have blended into each other (that WAS the intention) so you probably can’t identify them at a glance: Rich Razzleberry, Melon Mambo and Crushed Curry.

Come back Wednesday for our second vibrant brayered creation!

A celebration in Bermuda Bay

This card was heavily inspired by Yana Smakula and I just knew the Bermuda Bay would be perfect for my friend and downline Kelly.

I brayered the whole piece from top to bottom using Coastal Cabana and Bermuda Bay (Kelly’s favourite SU colour), then embossed in copper using the spots from Dragonfly Dreams. I couldn’t find any word stamps in my collection which were big enough to stand out in the centre of the project, so die-cut the “celebrate” from copper foil instead. 

Some of the leaves are cut from the Delightfully Detailed laser-cut DSP, while others are die-cut using the Tropical Thinlits.  Hope she liked it!

Botanica Bliss brayered card

I’ve rediscovered brayering since the arrival of the new sponge brayers, and used it to create a set of thank you cards to accompany this month’s orders.

I stamped using the Botanical Bliss stamp set, with its striking bird and delicate leaves, which stand out well against the brayered background.

I’ve used the Subtles Embossing Folder again - I just can’t get enough of it. It’s definitely a must-have product and I highly recommend it. It turns any piece of cardstock into textured cardstock for a really elegant look.

Out of this world X-Files card

A fun project for you today. My illustrator daughter, a big X Files fan, put me up to this X-Files card and we had fun brayering over some die-cut clouds from the Up & Away Thinlits set. The trees were easy – they come from the must-have Waterfront stamp set – and the words are stamped using the Labeler Alphabet. 

But how to make a UFO? That happened purely by chance, using the Pretty Label punch. Take a look...

Brayered background with Delightfully Detailed laser-cut paper

I do love a fancy background technique. Well, I say “fancy” but often they are really easy to create, as with this one which is simply brayered with Grapefruit Grove, Poppy Parade and Lovely Lipstick. 

It goes really well with the Very Vanilla laser-cut paper laid on the top. But what do you think of the colour combo? Be honest, I can take it!

Delightfully Detailed laser-cut paper with brayered background

Another project from my brayering session. For this one, I masked a panel and brayered in Pacific Point, graduating it towards the top so it faded out. On top of this I sprinkled some water and allowed it to dry, which gives a lovely effect.

To create a focal point, I trimed a section from the Delicately Detailed Laser-cut DSP and sponged in different colours. It’s not easy to stick down but I used some tiny dabs of Tombow which did the trick.

Some Soft Sea Foam sequins finish it off - I'm in love with these!

Tropical Chic with a brayered background

I thought it was high time I tried the sponge brayers so gave them a whirl for this card. I’ve always loved playing with background techniques and enjoyed creating this graduated look with Pool Party, Bermuda Bay and Pacific Point.

It’s a six-colour combo, but I think it works... and sometimes you need two or three shades to really make the most of a brayered background. 

I topped it off with some Tropical Chic flowers and some beautiful leaves from the Delightfully Detailed Laser-cut Designer Series Paper, which is a total must-have as it will add a real “wow” to your projects. This special paper is Very Vanilla on one side and Whisper White on the other, which is perfect for sponging as I’ve done here with Soft Sea Foam and a hint of Old Olive. 

Mix It Up Monday: Springtime Foils get the In Color treatment

What’s this? Flowers? You don’t see pretty floral cards here very often, do you? But I absolutely love this new Designer Series Paper which is part of the second wave of Sale-a-Bration freebies and fits in nicely with today’s Mix It Up Monday colour combination from my In Color charts. 

There’s copper in the paper, which I’ve brayered in Basic Black (you should see my brayer now!) and also coloured with Blender Pens using Berry Burst and Tranquil Tide ink. The flower from Happiest of Days goes perfectly with these flowers, too. The paper is called Springtime Foils and is free with a £45 order. Take a look here:

15 Stampin' Up!® products you can used for Mixed Media projects

Yes you CAN use SU products for mixed media, as I’ve been enjoying finding out lately. I decided to make a list of some of the items you can use. I bet you already have loads of these, so what are you waiting for? Get messy!

Ways to use Irresistibly Yours DSP (Sale-a-Bration)

I promised to show you several ways to use the new Irresistibly Yours Designer Series Paper and here they are... I’d love to hear of more ways that I haven’t covered if you know any. There is one other way to use this gorgeous paper that I haven’t mentioned... and that’s to leave it completely untouched for a really subtle and classy look. But if you’re looking for subtle and classy, you’ve come to the wrong place!

For those who haven’t yet seen this paper, it’s white with a glossy white pattern, opening up a world of possibilities because most inks will stick only to the matt section. So you apply your colour then polish it with kitchen paper to expose the white pattern again. It’s like magic!

Let’s take a look at the methods I’ve used in more detail. Clockwise, from top left...

Stamp on it
We’re stampers, right? So why not stamp on this fab paper. I particularly like combining methods for this, eg brayering a background on the flowery or leafy pattern, then stamping with Hardwood on top. Here, I’ve simply experimented with stamping some solid flowers and leaves.

Spritz it
I used six drops of reinker in a half-filled spritzer bottle; Coastal Cabana at the top and Old Olive at the bottom. Use more drops (or less water) for a more intense colour. This does take a while to dry but you could speed things up by using alcohol instead of water.

Colour with markers
I tried both kinds and decided this method was probably best for the striped pattern. Both types of marker worked well, although you do need to clean off the glossy areas quickly if you’re using Blendabilities.

Brayer it
Perfect for larger areas and, if you’re after a uniform colour, you can forget all those pesky brayering rules about starting at the edge of the paper and working your way in. Just brayer away until you get colour saturation. If you prefer a graduated look, then you need to remember all those rules about starting off the edge of the paper. Just play around until you get something you like!

Sponge it
Sponge Daubers are perfect striped paper; for other patterns, use an actual sponge. You can sponge just one area, various colours, or do the whole lot. Although, personally, if I was going for a uniform colour, I’d brayer it instead (see above).

DTP (Direct-to-Paper) it
This is a grungier technique but I had fun here creating a night sky using various blue ink pads (Lost Lagoon, Coastal Cabana, Marina Mist). I find the old-style ink pads are easier to use as they slide along the cardstock better. But, for fun, I tried simply dropping the new-style ink pads onto the cardstock, which created quite a pleasing effect.

So, now it’s time to get yourself some Irresistibly Yours DSP - which is FREE with a £45 purchase before the end of March. And don’t forget to let me know if you come up with any more methods of using it! My challenge now, I suppose, is to make all of these pieces of paper into finished projects. Don’t hold your breath!

Around the World Stampin' Challenge - Tap Tap Tap

It’s time for another Around the World Stampin’ Challenge! This time, for AW25, the theme is gratitude, which I had to confess threw me for a while, until I realised that all I had to to was make a thank you card! 

Here is my rather high-maintenance effort; I threw everything at this card and it’s only now that I look at it next to the challenge image that I see I may have subconsciously mirrored the background of that photo!

I began by brayering a piece of Whisper White cardstock, building up the colours using Crumb Cake and Baked Brown Sugar at one end, and Pool Party and Bermuda Bay at the other. I love the look of brayering and don’t do it often enough. 

But brayering wasn’t the end of this background; next I stamped on top using Gorgeous Grunge splatters in Whisper White, and some subtle images from the same set in Island Indigo, stamped off so they weren’t too harsh. 

It still wasn’t enough; I liked the look of the typewriter key stamp from Tap Tap Tap but thought it would be too big on this project, so found the similar image from Kinda Eclectic and used that instead. 

I still wanted more from this background, so I finally had to decide which was the top so that I could emboss it. My Big Shot is quite tight, and I forgot to account for this so some cracking did occur, but I don’t mind as it fits in with the grungey look of this card. 

After colouring the typewriter, I cut it out, then stamped the sentiment separately. I hand-drew a longer piece of paper around it, cut it out and stuck it on; you can see the join if you get really close!

Hope you like it! Why not have a go at the challenge yourself? Just visit the Around the World Stampin’ Challenges blog for more details! 

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