CSI case file #55: Life's a picnic

Hello! We are continuing the birthday celebrations at CSI this whole month, and this week, we are scraplifting or being inspired by a layout from the very first case file. You can find the first case file here. This is this week's case file: 

I scraplifted my own layout for case file #1:

I was inspired by the design and by the tone-on-tone paint stamped background. I also used clear elements and twine. Here's my layout for this week:

From the evidence I used: spoon accent, leaves, flowers, and tone-on-tone pattern. From the testimony I was inspired by 'favourite' and also added a small stamped bird to my journal spot. The layout is about one of my son's favourite things to do, having a picnic, which has to include sitting on a blanked and eating a specific type of cheese.

I used one of my older Hero Arts stamps and stamped leaves all over the background paper with paint, aiming for imperfect impressions. More stamping was added on the background with Archival Ink Coffee, and I stamped some flower branches on the patterned paper used as a photo mat, as well as lots of sentiment stamp.

The spoon, knife and fork as well as the journal card comes from Karen Burniston's Sizzix Place Card & Silverware die and were die cut from mat board and quickly coloured with Distress Stains (Tumbled Glass, Brushed Pewter and Shabby Shutters). The Birds on a Wire were also cut with one of Karen's die, from woodgrain paper. The little bird was stamped on the journaling block and then the journaling was printed on a transparency, leaving space for the bird.

The little tag was stamped on a watercolour scrap and the acorn cut from an old patterned paper from KI Memories.

I always enjoy altering patterned paper with stamps, ink and paint, to make it more my own and to fit the layout better. The dragon fly has been in my stash for years and I was happy to use it. I found a perfect sentiment stamp for this page, 'life's a picnic' and used it as a title.

Thank you for the visit! It is a bit quiet here on the blog since I am visiting family at the moment. Enjoy your weekend!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Dies: Sizzix: Place Card & Silverware, Birds on a Wire
Stamps: Hero Arts/Basic Grey: Serenade Beautiful CL638, Lucille Be Silly CL635, Floral Wine Background CG442; Hero Arts/Studio Calico: My Happy ST508
Ink: Archival Ink Jet Black; Distress Ink Gathered Twigs
Stain: Distress Stain Brushed Pewter, Tumbled Glass, Shabby Shutters
Paint: Adirondack Aqua
Surfaces: Sizzix Little Sizzles white mat board; Prima, Heidi Swapp, BasicGrey and KI Memories patterned papers
Embellishments: Tim Holtz Idea-ology Word Band; MME transparent dragon fly

Snow Pop-Up Layout tutorial

Hi everyone! Today I am sharing a step-by-step tutorial on the Sizzix blog, for a scrapbooking layout with fun techniques and pop-up surprises.

Since it is January, I decided to do a snowy layout and scrapped some photos from a cross-country skiing outing from a few years ago. The techniques I used would work for any topic, and can easily be adapted to cards or other types of projects. For instance, if you would do just one of the panels, that would make a great mini card.

I've always loved the look of dry embossing on the background of a layout, it adds just the right amount of detail and texture. Three of the panels are actually flaps, and hides a pop-up, using Karen Burniston's pop 'n cuts dies. Pop-ups aren't only for cards, but can add a fun interactive element to layouts and mini-books, and offer extra space for journaling and photos.

To see the step-by-step photos and instructions for how I made this, head over to the Sizzix blog.

Thank you for stopping by!

Anna-Karin

Lace Love

Hello! This week, our challenge at Simon Says Stamp and Show is 'Lace Love'; real lace, die cuts, stamps, rub-ons etc. I am looking forward to seeing all the gorgeous creations posted to the challenge and don't miss the DT projects, my team mates amaze me every week with the projects they come up with.

As a child, I collected pretty pieces of lace, ribbons and fabric, and decided to use some of them on this tag:

My tag celebrates the lovely texture and lightness of lace and what goes better together with lace than vintage fabric and a quite a bit of machine sewing. The fabric was glued to a manila tag with a glue stick, just in the middle and then pieces of lace were layered on top. Two of the pieces of lace were dyed with Antique Linen Distress Stain first. I stitched everything to the tag with my sewing machine.

I inked only one word from two sentiments from Tim Holtz Stuff to Say and Words for Thought sets, and stamped them on the tag with Coffee ink. To do this, simply tear off two pieces of sticky notepad and mask off the rest of the stamp when inking the word that you want to stamp, then remove the masks and stamp. It is a great way to get more out of your sentiment stamps.

The sweet Tim Holtz image was stamped twice on Specialty Stamping paper with Coffee Archival ink.  Archival Ink looks absolutely stunning on Specialty Stamping paper (as does all inks I have used on the paper). I coloured the image lightly with Distress Inks, Antique Linen on the wings, Tattered Rose on her face and Tumbled Glass on the crown. I cut the wings and the crown out from one of the images and adhered them on top of the focal image with foam dots, for dimension.

Two canvas butterflies flutter across the tag, one with a piece of lace as its body, the other with a cute mini wooden spool wrapped with a strip of old magical book paper. Both butterflies were inked with Vintage Photo, as was the wooden spool.

The other butterfly, with a lace body. The flower trim was dyed with Antique Linen Distress Stain, which gives just the perfect amount of an aged look.

I punched a hole through the fabric with my Crop-a-dile and tied another piece of dyed lace through it.

Join us this week and you can be the lucky one to win a $50 gift voucher from Simon Says Stamp.

Thank you for the visit! Have a lovely week!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Stamps: Winged Things 1, Words for Thought, Stuff to Say
Ink: Ranger Archival Ink Coffee; Distress Ink: Antique Linen, Tumbled Glass, Tattered Rose, Vintage Photo
Stain: Distress Stain Antique Linen
Surfaces: Ranger Specialty Stamping Paper; vintage fabric
Embellishments: Maya Road Mini Butterflies Canvas; Maya Road Wood Mini Spools; Tim Holtz Idea-ology Trimmings; Hero Arts Lace Ribbon; Melissa Frances White Lace Trim; vintage lace

CSI case file #54: See it is snowing

Hello! We have a new feature at CSI:Color, Stories, Inspiration. There will be a sketch added to the case file the second case file of each month. Emma Stafrace will be sharing her fabulous sketches with us. I hope you can join us this week. Here's this week's case file and sketch:

I loved both the case file and the sketch and decided to do a snowy layout, but using mainly warm colours:

From the evidence I used: tissue paper, tickets, dots, text pattern, music pattern, mixed media background, and string. I used a song title as inspiration for my journaling, 'See it is snowing', which is a famous Swedish song about the first snow of the year. The children rush out with the sleighs and have fun in the snow. This was the first time my son sat on his own in snow, so the song worked well together with the photos.

I used watercolour paper for the background and covered it with music tissue wrap using Multi-Medium. I mixed two mixes of yellow acrylic paint, with some water and washed over the layout, wiping some of it off and letting some of it pool at the wrinkles. A tree and snowflakes were stamped on the background with blue acrylic paint (always clean your stamps immediately after stamping with paint.

I cut tickets from patterned paper and used them for the banner and used a bunch of scrap patterned papers.

I stamped a winter definition stamp and a circle stamp with Stazon Jet Black ink. For the white half circles, I sponged white paint through a stencil. The music pattern on the tissue wrap, only peak through here and there.

Snowflakes were die cut from different text patterned paper scraps.

Thank you for looking! Have a great weekend!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Dies: Sizzix: Fancy Labels Movers & Shapers, Mini Snowflakes, Snowflake Frame
Stamps: Stamper's Anonymous: Mini Holidays, Winter Sketchbook; Hero Arts Seasonal Memories LL007, circle
Surfaces: Tim HOltz Idea-ology Composer tissue wrap; Prima, BasicGrey, October Afternoon, Jenni Bowlin, MME, and Bo Bunny patterned papers; watercolour paper
Ink: Stazon Jet Black
Paint: Adirondack: Lemonade, Snow Cap, Aqua; Making Memories yellow paints
Stencil: The Crafter's Workshop Mini Paint Lids
Adhesive: Claudine Hellmuth matte Multi Medium
Embellishments: Baker's twine

Embrace the old

This week our challenge at Simon Says Stamp and Show is 'Embrace the old'. It's a fun and broad topic: use your favourite old supply or technique, make something look old, be inspired by something old etc. I love old things and I had a project featuring vintage vehicles in my head for a while.

I love these vintage train, ship and car stamp sets by Tim Holtz and wanted to do a piece showcasing them. It ended up being a wall-hanging inspired by old post cards. Manila cardstock colored with Distress Stains (Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Pumice Stone, Brushed Pewter) forms the base. When dry, I stamped the large Folded Paper Background stamp by Stamper's Anonymous with Pumice Stone ink. I've used this stamp before to frame mini-book pages, and thought it would be perfect here. I cleaned the stamp and inked it up unevenly with Archival Jet Black ink and stamped it on top of the Pumice Stone impression.

Layers of stamping in different inks were added on each panel. The main vehicle, post card and one or two more stamps were stamped with Jet Black ink. Each panel got a sentiment stamped with Archival Ink Vermillion, probably my favourite red ink. I used Graphic 45 alphabet stamps to spell the sentiments. The rest of the stamping was done with Frayed Burlap.

On this card, I embossed the sentiment with red embossing powder, since I wanted it to be visible on top of the black boat. The vehicles were coloured lightly with Distress Inks and a craft nib.

A word band was attached to each panel with brads. I also used some game spinners and all the edges were distressed.

Here you can see the great shine the Brushed Pewter Stain gives to the background. I rubbed black and silver paint into the sentiments on the word bands.

The three post cards hang together with Sprocket Gears and jump rings. I thought it was a pretty fun way of binding the wall-hanging together.

Join us this week and show your interpretation of 'embracing the old', as always our fabulous sponsor Simon Says Stamp gives a $50 gift voucher to one random participant.

Thank you for stopping by!

Happy Crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Stamps: Stamper's Anonymous Folded Paper Background, Stamper's Anonymous Tim Holtz: Postcards, On the Railroad, Artful Voyage, Road Trip, Postcards, Warehouse District; Graphic 45 Antique Typewriter Wood stamp set
Ink: Archival Ink Jet Black, Vermillion; Distress Ink: Frayed Burlap, Pumice Stone, Walnut Stain, Stormy Sky, Black Soot, Barn Door
Stain: Distress Stain: Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Pumice Stone, Brushed Pewter
Paint: Adirondack Pitch Black, Silver
Embossing powder: Adirondack Cranberry
Surfaces: Ranger Manila Cardstock
Embellishments: Tim Holtz Idea-ology Sprocket Gears, Game Spinners, Word Bands, Jump Rings, Brads; We R Memory Keepers eyelets

Winter Cottage

Happy New Year!!! We are starting 2013 with a new challenge at Craft a Scene, Winter Cottages. I love seeing little cottages in a snowy landscape, so this was a great challenge theme for me. This month our sponsor is Delicious Doodles, and I used one of their images for my card:

I hardly ever use digital images, being more of a rubber stamp person, but I really like this lovely winter landscape. It was printed on glossy cardstock and coloured with dye inks, mainly light blues and greys, and red for the cottage. To frame the image, I stamped some Stampscapes branches at the corners. Highlights were added with a white gel pen.

The cardbase if dry embossed and sanded kraft-core cardstock and the white frame was die cut with Framelits.

I hope you'll join us this month and show us those wonderful winter cottages.

Thank you for stopping by!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:
Stamps: Delicious Doodles A Crofters Winter; Stampscapes: Leafless Limbs 052C, Crooked Limb 097E
Ink: Adirondack: Aqua, Slate, Pebble; Distress Ink: Barn Door, Pumice Stone, Stormy Sky; Jenni Bowlin Weather Vane; Archival Ink Jet Black
Die: Sizzix Framelits Rectangles
Embossing folder: Sizzix Dot-Matrix
Surfaces: Core'dinations Tim Holtz kraft-core cardstock; Kromekote glossy

CSI case file #53: Follow you dreams

CSI:Color, Stories, Inspiration is turning one year today! What a great first year it has been, esspcially seeing how many wonderful layouts that have been posted every week. We have some fun surprises planned to celebrate CSI's birthday this month, don't miss checking out the site. A big thank you to Debbi Tehrani for starting CSI and for all her work with it.

Here's the first case file of the year:

I did a 8.5 x 11 inch layout:

From the evidence items I used: flowers, metal and embossed paper, and from the testimony items I was inspired by the inspiration words and the dream topic. When thinking about what to do for this case file, I came across a stencil that I hadn't used yet and remembered two gorgeous cards by my friend Anne Gaal using this stencil. I was inspired to do something similar, but on a layout instead.

I used Specialty Stamping cardstock from Ranger for my base (love it), and carefully inked through the stencil using dye inks and a Colorbox Stylus Tool applicator. I started from the bottom with Weather Vane, and continued with Soap Powder, Shaded Lilac, Tattered Rose and Lemonade, blending each colour a bit with the one below. I used a grey pen to get into the small areas of the trees. I had to move the stencil twice to do the whole lenght of the paper. Then I splattered a bit of water on the paper for some extra texture.

The title letters were die cut from Specialty Stamping paper and glued to the base cardstock for a tone-on-tone white effect. I used Word Play for the large letters and Typeset for the smaller, adding a little Tim Holtz crown on top of the 'F'.

I have a lot of photos of my son walking or running away and though this one worked nicely with the message of following his dreams. I used some Tim Holtz flower ribbon and a piece of lace trim at the base of the layout.

The butterfly with die cut from vellum and embossed, the body of the butterfly was die cut from Specialty Stamping paper.

A word band finished the layout, I rubbed a bit of white paint into it to highlight the text. I didn't want to add too much stuff to this layout, but tried to keep it simple with the focus on the trees and the message. I wrote a little bit of journaling on the back of the layout about the importance of daring to follow your own dreams, even when they might seem hard to reach (and maybe even especially then).

Thank you for the visit!! I hope you'll join us this week at CSI. If you have never tried the CSI challenge, I hope you'll consider doing so, they are wonderful and so inspiring.

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

Dies: Sizzix: Word Play, Birds & Butterflies set, Typeset

Stencil: The Crafter's Workshop Mini Aspen Trees

Ink: Jenni Bowlin: Weather Vane, Soap Powder; Distress Ink: Shaded Lilac, Tattered Rose; Adirondack Lemonade

Embellishments: Tim Holtz Idea-ology Trimmings ribbons, Word Bands, crown charm; lace trim

Surfaces: Ranger Specialty Stamping paper; vellum