the CLASSroom

I Do Wedding Card by Julia Stainton

It's a lovely time of year for a white wedding. We have a fresh dusting of snow and it's that special season when we celebrate love and the special people in our lives.It seems very appropriate that tomorrow we are attending what is a very special wedding in our family. My oldest son and his lovely fiancee tie the knot and I couldn't be more excited.

(image credit: Vincent Kember)

One of James and Shannon's beautiful engagement photos inspired this design. This is my favourite photo of them and I really wanted to work it into the card.

Truth be told, this card I designed wasn't the one I had planned in my head. Designing can be like that and projects can take on a mind of their own. When that happens, you might as well just go with the creative flow. While this card isn't the over-the-top floral and embellisment-laden design I had wanted to create, simple and elegant with the focus on the couple themselves is perfect for James and Shannon.

  To start off this design, I used one of my favourite photo techniques that is so easy to do and adds wonderful texture and interest. The Claudine Hellmuth Sticky Back Canvas is perfect for so many different art and mixed media techniques but it is also perfect for clean and simple design as well. Did you know that you can run these sheets right through your printer? Oh the possibilities! No specific settings needed, just put the sheet into your printer and print your photo. I love the black and white look but colour works great as well.

Once my photo was printed, I trimmed it down,removed the backing and adhered it to a piece of Craft-a-Board, a great chipboard-type product.

Next I wanted to die cut the image but as the Styled Labels die was on a angle, it was difficult to line up. I certainly didn't want to cut off the wrong part of the photo. A piece of vellum to the rescue. I die cut the vellum out with the die and then placed it over the image where I wanted it. Because you can see through vellum, it made it easy. Then I lined up the die over where the vellum lay and ran the whole thing through my Sizzix Big Shot.

I love how clean, crisp and pretty the die cut turned out.

Which in turn made it very difficult to add too much to the design. Everything seemed to take away from it. And so...

...the best solution was to keep it simple.

• a very simple sentiment using white canvas letter stickers
• a simple white on white embossed dot background
• a simple trinket pin and charm to dress it up

To finish the inside, I turned to a simple Now and Forever stamped sentiment. The  two little canvas chipboard hearts were created with more sticky-back canvas and Craft-a-Board to coordinate with the front.

 Wishing you a lovely and creative weekend! Thanks for stopping by the CLASSroom!

Supplies:

 

InLinkz.com

Wedding Simplicity

Do you ever need a card and you simply have VERY little to no time to create it? We were so thrilled for my niece as she got married this summer! Life has been an absolute whirlwind, but it was important to me that I create a special card for them.

Within 15 minutes I was able to create this card from start to finish. Be certain to click on the picture to make it bigger to see the embossed detail.

The new Memory Box alphabet dies are fabulous for using on cardfronts - the scale is perfect!!! You simply snap them apart and file down the nubs.

Cut a piece of Letterpress cardstock to 4" x 5 1/4" size and use tissue tape to hold the letters in position. Cut.

TIP: Pat tissue tape on blue jeans before adhering to avoid damaging the soft Letterpress cardstock when removing the tissue tape.

Run the completed project through your die cut machine using your embossing folder. The letterpress cardstock embosses beautifully - super crisp and clean looking!

Attach to the face of your notecard and add a pearl heart. I love how the notecard color peeks through from behind their initials. The hardest part of this project was taking pictures of this very white surface - in real life the look is so simple and elegant. We wish my niece and nephew a wonderful life together!

H33 Cardstock, Graphite	Essentials by Ellen, Letterpress 110 lb. Cardstock, White (10pk)	Memory Box Dies, Classic Upper Alphabet	Accent Pearls, Hearts
Lifestyle Crafts Embossing Folders, Whimsy

InLinkz.com

Memory Box Die Sandwich Information

This weekend we celebrate the wedding of my nephew and soon-to-be niece. The day of their engagement my nephew planned a wonderfully romantic day, starting at sunrise with a hot air balloon ride. So in keeping with the theme of their wedding reception I wanted to create a card that used a hot air balloon. Well, lo and behold I could not find an appropriate stamp in my collection - imagine that - LOL! Julia to the rescue - she went "spotting" through our stamp collection and found the Hero Arts Flourish Ornament.

 
I would never know that this was a Christmas stamp when used upside down and pieced. I am quite tickled with the end result... it feels so "weddingy."

Begin by printing your sentiment on the cardstock. Stamp the Flourish Ornament on a sheet of decorative 5th Avenue paper.

TIP: Add a hint of color for depth to your designer papers using Copic markers.

Finish off with a little bling!

MEMORY BOX DIE SANDWICH INFORMATION

We have been receiving questions regarding the Memory Box Die sandwiches and so I thought I would share a couple of quick pictures and my thoughts to hopefully assist you.

 

If you already own Nestabilities then simply use the exact same sandwich you are used to. If you do not and are starting from scratch then the most important component to add to the products that come with the Big Shot or Vagabond is the Solo Thin Die Adapter. As you can see in the photo above this adapter comes with instructions printed directly on it. This makes it super easy to use.

I have positioned the plates askew for the photograph above - when cutting you will want to have them positioned directly atop one another.

Following is the sandwich as pictured starting at the base:

• Solo Platform
• Solo Shim (this comes with the Platform, but because it can be damaged after loads of use it can be purchased separately)
• Solo Thin Die Adapter
• Extra shim if necessary - this can be as thin as a piece of copy paper to as thick as a piece of Craft-a-Board. Some machines and dies have a "sweet spot". If you cut out your die image and it is not quite cut all the way through simply add a shim to your sandwich.
• Acrylic Plate or Cutting Pad - I typically keep my extended pad out because it can be easily used for the longer dies such as the rosette. (These cutting pads are too wide to fit in the Cuttlebug.)
• Cardstock
• Memory Box Die - Position with "blade" side facing down towards cardstock. I like to hold my die in position using tissue tape - this helps keep the alignment perfect. Yes, it's the perfectionist syndrome - LOL!
• Acrylic Plate or Cutting Pad

Now simply send your sandwich through your Big Shot, Big Kick or Vagabond. Many of you have also asked what you can use in your Cuttlebug with the longer dies such as the Rosette. Unfortunately I have not a perfect solution for this and so I must admit that my preference lies with with Sizzix machines because of the longer plates and sturdy machines. Now don't go running out and purchasing a new machine blaming it on me - LOL! But, I do believe that you will appreciate the ease of using the longer plates and not having to mess with "rigging it" to try and get the shorter plates to work.

I hope that you find this information helpful. Thank you for once again stopping in here in the CLASSroom - have a lovely weekend!

 
stamps: Hero Arts Flourish Ornament

ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic Markers - BG70, BG72, T2

paper: Melissa Frances 5th Avenue 6x6 Paper, Memory Box Pool Cardstock

accessories: Memory Box Piestra Tile Die, Memory Box Sparkling Diamond Jewels

Adding Dimension and Texture to Your Stamping, by Sharon Harnist

 

Today I would like to show you how to add some texture and dimension to your stamping, to create some interesting effects!  In the photo above, you'll notice a protruding branch that adds dimension to the Memory Box Nesting Birds stamp I used.  Here's how I created it:

First, I stamped the birds with Memento Tuxedo Black ink onto Neenah Natural White cardstock and then base coated the nest with Copic E31 marker:

 

Coloring the nest first, provides a base of color so the white cardstock doesn't peak through our final finished image.  The birds were colored with Copic R00, R01, T1 & T3 markers.  I didn't have just the right color of Flower Soft I wanted to use for the branch, so I combined Flower Soft's Ultra Fine Black & Toffee colors together to make my own custom color!

 

If you haven't tried Flower Soft's new Ultra Fine line, I think you will be very pleased with the different texture these create!  Next, I cut a piece of Flower Soft Wire to the length I wanted, to form the branch. The Flower Soft Glue is the best type of adhesive for this technique, as it is thick, stays where it is applied and latches on to the Flower Soft material fabulously!  I applied the glue to the wire and then sprinkled on my mixed Ultra Fine Flower Soft.

 

For the nest, I also used the Flower Soft Glue to outline the stamped nest and form some "twigs" for dimension -- then I sprinkled on the Toffee Ultra Fine Flower Soft.

To create more texture, I used the Tim Holtz Paper Distresser to rough up the edges of the piece of Webster's Pages Petite Papers-Hollywood Vogue background paper I adhered to a Memory Box Licorice notecard, using Scrapbook Adhesives 3D Foam Squares.  The foam squares were also used to raise the stamped image and create more dimension.

 

Part of a Zva Jet black swirl frame adds even more texture (and bling!) to finish this card that could be used for either an anniversary, wedding or general love occasion!

Thanks for stopping by the CLASSroom today ~ hope you have a wonderful weekend!  ~ Sharon

 

Stamps: Memory Box Nesting Birds
Paper: Webster's Pages Petite Papers-WonderFALL & Hollywood Vogue, Neenah Natural White cardstock, Memory Box Licorice notecard
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Copic Markers: E31, R00, R01, T1, T3
Accessories: Flower Soft Ultra Fine-Black & Toffee, Flower Soft Glue, Flower Soft Wires, Zva Jet black swirl frame, Tonic Tim Holtz Paper Distresser, Scrapbook Adhesives 3D Foam Squares,

Forever Begins Now Card by Julia Stainton

Love must be in the air as wedding season kicks off with the beautiful weather. If you have a wedding to go to this year, consider making a special hand-crafted card for the event. The new Basic Grey Cappella line makes wedding themed projects elegant and timeless treasures.

There is nothing I love more than flowers on a project. For this card I'll show you how to create your own rolled flowers out of simple paper strips and inspired by Becky's ruffle trend post, add a sweet little lace ruffle. Here's how to do it.

Start by creating your 5.25" square card base from Neenah Classic Cream Cardstock. I've used a piece of Robin's Egg Cardstock by Memory Box as a thin mat and also for some accents. I seriously love this color and it matches Cappella perfectly! Adhere the layers of gorgeous Cappella patterned paper from the 6x6 paper pad.

To easily create ruffled lace, thread a piece of Farmer's Market twine onto a needle and straight stitch through the holes of some Prima lace. I suggest cutting a piece of lace approximately twice the length you wish to cover.

Place a piece of Wonder Tape along the edge and adhere the ruffled lace to the project, evenly spacing your gathers as you go. Press down well. You may wish to apply a tiny dot of Glossy Accents to the ends of the thread to adhere them in place.

To create a rolled paper flower, cut two strips of 1"x12" Cappella 12x12 paper.

Adhere ends slightly overlapping and then fold the strip in half. Your strip should be approximately 1/2" x 23". Crumple and twist the strip in your hands until it is pliable and easy to form.

 

Starting at the center, adhere your flower to a scrap piece of paper. Twist, turn and roll paper as you go. I like to use a hot glue gun as it adheres well and dries quickly. After your flower is as large as you wish, trim excess paper from beneath your flower and adhere to project.

 

I've added a couple Jenni Bowlin Buttons to my embellishment cluster and a Maya Road Crystal Trinket Pin. The little Classic butteflies were punched from some of the Robin's Egg cardstock stamped with the Vintage Text Scrapblock by Cornish Heritage Farms.

 

The "Forever begins now" sentiment is from the Wedding Centers stamp set by CHF. Here it is stamped onto more Robin's Egg cardstock with Jet Black Archival Ink by Ranger. The little tab is created by die-cutting the paper with the Labels Four die by Spellbinders. Some mini staples from the Tiny Attacher hold it in place.

 

Thanks for stopping by the CLASSroom today! I hope this inspired you to get creating!

12 Days of Christmas - Day 7: Alterable Items, Canvas Album Part Four by Julia Stainton

One of the fabulous things about the Prima Canvas Album is all the wonderful techniques and ways you can alter it. For this page, I've had a lot of fun with altering surfaces with paint and trying out a really fun way to give your photos an easy and unique look. Thanks for joining me.

For this page, I thought it would be fun to create a page without paper. Actually, if you look closely, the flowers are made from paper but for the rest of the design...it's paper free. And that includes the photo. I started off by painting my own background right on the canvas. You don't need to do anything to the surface first, just brush on your paint. I've used brush strokes in Blank Canvas, Painterly Pink and a tiny touch of Landscape Green to create this artistic styled background. To get this effect, use a dry brush and brush on the paint with horizontal and vertical strokes until you've built up the color the way you want it.

 

Allow paint to dry well.

My second step was to add a stamped Bracket Block Scrapblock to the canvas page. This helps anchor the design. The Adirondack Paint Dabbers are really great for applying paint to rubber stamps and give a beautiful impression much different from the look you would get with ink. On this page I've used Hazelnut. The paint also works really well on top of the painted background layer.

After the paint has dried well, the next step was to add the photo.You can either use a digital photo or like me, scan in a vintage photo, edit and then print directly onto Claudine Hellmuth Sticky Back Canvas. The 8.5 x 11 sheets fit perfectly into your printer and print. I used a black and white image but color images also print well on this canvas. An ink jet printer will work well with this technique as well as a laser printer.

 

As you can see, it gives the photo a lovely texture and the detail comes out well on this surface. I used my Tonic Guillotine Paper Trimmer to cut out the canvas as it works well on heavy paper and other surfaces.
 

To create my own custom embellishment, I used Craft-a-Board and die cut it with the Spellbinders Nested Bird die, medium size.
 

A really easy way to cover chipboard and Craft-a-Board is alter it with Distress Crackle Paint. I used Shabby Shutters and then while wet, sprinkled it with Martha Stewart Glitter.

After it's dry, you can see how it gives a great textured look  and a touch of shine. I had scraps of Sticky Back Canvas left over after trimming my photo and used it to make an easy pleated ribbon here. I also grouped together Confetti Cake White Flowers, a sweet Basic Grey Button and the gorgeous Say it in Studs Pastels bling embellishment.

 

A third way I used Sticky Back Canvas on this project was to stamp a sentiment on it. Love is the key comes from the Key Expressions stamp set by CHF.

Here's how I added it in along with some of the Shire ribbon lace  I've been using on each page. I love how easy the sticky back canvas is to adhere to your project.

 

Here's a close-up of the other flower cluster. It uses another Say it with Studs embellishment and some Basic Grey Bling.

A close-up of the final project...

 

If you're just joining us and would like to see the other Canvas Album Pages, you can find there at Part One, Part Two and Part Three.

Thanks so much for stopping by the CLASSroom! We hope you are enjoying the 12 days of Christmas.

SEVENTH DAY BLOG CANDY

On the seventh day of Christmas my goodie box could be:

• Seven Alterable Items (Canvas Album, Clear Buttons, White and Cream Art Flowers, Manila #8 Tag Set, 8"x8" Crystal Clear Plastic, 8 1/2" x 11" Crystal Clear Medium-Weight Plastic, Craft-a-Board)

To participate in this random drawing please leave your answer to the following question as a comment to this post. Please limit yourself to one comment only. The last day to submit a comment to this post will be January 6th at Midnight. We will post the winners (which will be drawn using a Random Number Generator) for all twelve days on January 7th.

As you can probably tell we enjoy trying different things here in the CLASSroom along with carrying different products in our store. It is so very important to us that we educate you fully, showing you how to use the products we carry. Please tell us below which products (products we carry ) you would like to see more education on.

Don't forget the following 12 Days of Christmas blog candy drawings --- be certain to answer the question on each individual post to be included in that drawing!

• Favorite Scoring Tools
• Two Soldeirng Starters
• Three Inchie Art Packets
• Four Cournish Stamps
• Five Fab Fine Art Fixings
• Six Dies for Cutting

Wedding Pearls by Susan Roberts

Oh it is so much fun to be at Ellen's studio and rummage through her supplies!!  *insert gleeful giggle here*  I had never used Liquid Pearls before.  So when I saw them sitting there, I knew I was going to have to give them a try.

I found a cool tutorial by Laurie Wilson with a great idea on how to keep the pearls a uniform size, evenly spaced and straight.  Check this tutorial out.  She suggests that you use your hole punch(es) to create a template.  I decided to use an Ornare Border Stencil to give me a guide for punching.

To make sure that none of the Liquid Pearls found it's way under the template and to insure that the template didn't move as I worked, I used masking paper.  And to make sure the entire strip of paper didn't become stuck on the card stock, I folded both ends under.  This gave a place to grip on both ends allowing me to pull up evenly.  (If you don't have masking paper then a thin piece of paper such as printer paper could also be used.)

I decided to experiment with a couple of different sizes of hole punches.  Placing it on the card stock, the Liquid Pearls were applied.

As soon as I was finished making the pearls, I pulled the template away from the card stock.  You do not want the pearls to set as there is some overlap onto the template.  If the pearls set/dry, then you can't pull the template off without pulling and misshaping the pearls.  (Yes, I know this for a fact!  lol)  After pulling the template off, you may need to rework the pearls a little to get rid of any points that may have been caused by the lifting of the template.

Many moons ago I took a cake decorating class.  Making these pearls reminded me of making rounded shapes with icing on a cake.  In order to get a rounded top instead of a point you have to first STOP squeezing the bottle so that the flow of Liquid Pearls stops.  Then, with the bottle tip, "catch" the point and swirl it around the outer part of the "blob" (technical term) and tuck it in at or near the bottom of the pearl.  (Think of how you twist your hair into a bun tucking it at the base to hide the ends.)  Here are some nicely rounded pearls.  The arrow shows which pearl is enlarged below.

You can see how the point has been swirled around and tucked in at the bottom of the pearl.

I wondered how the pearls would look in a design other than a straight line so I made another paper template using the same Ornare Border Stencil.  I made a floral shape (actually ended up looking more like a star or snowflake!) using every third hole of the flower on the stencil.

Aren't these fun!!

The bride, a Karen Lockhart image, was colored with Copics.  I colored a couple of images and decided to go with the lighter of the two.

The main difference between the images is the amount of blender pen used.  As I practiced with it I learned that it is more of an "eraser" than a "blender".  It pushes the ink to either side of the nib.  The more you apply, the more ink gets pushed away.  In the picture on the left you can see exactly where I used the blender pen on the gown and veil.  Because I applied so much more blender solution to the picture on the right, much more ink was pushed away which caused the image to appear lighter.

I just love this sentiment from Mona Lisa Moments' "Wedding Centers".  It may be called "Wedding Centers", but I think they make fabulous front-of-the-card sentiments, too!  It was stamped on Memory Box's new "Sugardrop" designer paper.  The white card base is Neenah "Solar White".  Memory Box's "Parsley" and "Begonia" colored card stock were also used.  The image and sentiment were stamped with Memento "Tuxedo Black" ink.

Have a wonderful day and Happy Crafting!

 

Simply Elegant Wedding Notecards

I remember when I got married - I wanted everything to be simple, yet elegant. Unfortunately there were SO many things to do and fortunately I didn't know anything about card making back then - LOL! Otherwise I would have probably tried to put together my own invitations or at least thank you notes.

 

Kim Hughes new I Thee Wed is truly stunning! As soon as I saw this elegant silhouette bride and groom I knew exactly what I wanted to share with you! Arturo notecards have such an incredibly elegant appearance to them, with their soft deckled edges. To make this notecard above, I simply stamped the image using Versamark Ink on to the Celadon Green and embossed the image using Pearl Embossing Powder. I used the Wedding Bells on the corner of the envelope. I think that this creates a truly beautiful and easy WOW card.

 

Simply select a notecard that is similar to the couples wedding colors or use white or soft white. Create a set of these for the bride and groom in VERY little time and gift them with a set of ready to go thank you notes that are simply elegant!