Hi you guys! Today Hero Arts is having a blog hop to celebrate the 2011 Joy To You holiday catalog going up in the online store. I’m so excited to be playing along!
I had a hard time deciding what stamps to use — there are so many great ones to chose from! Finally, I settled the cling Merriest Christmas Wishes set and the Pool Designer Papers! (You know how I love pool! Oh yah!)
And here’s what I came up with!
I love playing around with solid stamps like this because there’s so many things you can do with them. You could go ahead and stamp it in a nice blue color and you’d have a sweet, tweet scene in no time. Or you could try the kissing technique. But I didn’t want to do either of those! Nope, not me. Instead, I stamped it with VersaMark ink and embossed it in clear, then colored it with inks.
Here’s a closer look so that you can see the embossing better — you gotta tilt it to get it to really show up.
And, here’s a little step-by-step on how I did it! First, I stamped the bird on new Pool Designer paper — just love this pattern because it goes with everything. (Each pack of paper includes 12 8.5 x 11″ sheets, 4 each of 3 designs.)
Then I grabbed my sponge daubers and distress inks and colored in the bird, then wiped it off with a dry paper towel. Love using sponge daubers for coloring things like this because their small size lets you put the ink right where you want it. (Full supplies at the end of the post.)
Then I kept going and colored the rest of the scene. The embossed parts made a resist and the ink easily wiped away. To finish off the card, I just trimmed it and added it to a Pool Notecard stamped with the Tree Trunks — in Soft Pool, of course! A little teal gems, some ribbon, and the message and I was done! (Just love all the messages in this set — especially this one.)
(Supplies: Hero Arts Merriest Christmas Wishes set , Pool Designer Papers, Tree Trunks, sponge daubers, Pool Notecard, clear embossing powder, and VersaMark ink. EK Success border punch. Distress inks in barn door, broken china, vintage photo, and walnut stain all by Ranger. Grosgrain ribbon from my stash. The photo overlays are from Katrina at Pugly Pixel.)
Now, remember how I mentioned a giveaway? Yep, Hero Arts is giving away a great prize (including new Pool notecards + envelopes!)! The lucky winner will be chosen on August 5th from all the comments received on each stop in the hop, so be sure to comment + visit them all!
You can comment about anything you like, but I’d love to hear about something that gets you in the holiday mood. It was 104 when I was stamping this, whew! So I listened to music and pretended like those snowflakes weren’t melting. :)
Here’s the full hop in case you’re just joining in:
Your next stop on the hop is the super talented Tami Hartley’s blog — she made FOUR amazing cards! Go check ’em out!
Joyful hopping,
Lisa, I LOVE this card and I love this stamp set…it’s on my short list of must haves!
Beautiful – the red is a great addition and you’ve really made me think twice about the solid stamps!
Very pretty card – love the way you have placed the sentiment.
We played Christmas songs and had my Mickey Christmas statutes out in the office. I made a Birthday card in Halloween colors and glitter to convey the idea of cool Autumn nights. Just right for this past Saturday. I really like this stamp – I want to use it for making my mother’s Christmas cards. Cardinal is VA’s state bird after all. Thanks for sharing all the pics on how you made the card. Only 144 days until Christmas! Thanks for sharing.
I love the colors and thank you for sharing how you created….I am going to try this technique today. . .
such a cheerful Christmas card, great project!
I really love this card… even if its 104°… it definitely reminds me of the holidays. I just love using embossing technique. Tks for sharing.
Stunning! This is by far my most favourite stamp from the new release – and I LOVE what you’ve done with it! Definitely gonna be a hot seller for sure :)
Wow and more wow!
Lisa, this is my favorite card…I love the technique you used, I love the trees and I especially love that little bird!
I love how the red pops out on the card & how clean it is!
Cute card. It seems as if the little birdie has put a song in the air.
I love the little bird! How cute!
Beautiful card and I love the pool papers as well. As to what inspires me to start Christmas cards, I would have to say actual snowflakes and an approaching deadline. Right now I don’t even want to think about snow as it will come soon enough and I would rather enjoy the sunshine!
Such a gorgeous card Lisa! Love the red bird. :)
Love this card. It’s my favorite one of the blog hop. I’m definitely going to have to get this stamp
I love the colors that you have used. I’ve used aqua and red for the past two years for my Christmas cards.
Love the colors and the techniques you used. Great card!
What a lovely card. I like the idea of stamping it on the script paper, to give that nice background effect.
Lisa, this is absolutely gorgeous! Love the color combo and the overall design. Fabulous!