Thankful Butterflies

butterfly Candy SpiegelDespite the cold and 2-feet of snow stacked outside my front door, I thought it was time for a little summer. I’ve been hooked on blue and green lately, so I created this thank you card.

002I started with an orange Shimmer Sheetz. I ran it through an embossing folder and then lightly sanded the color off of the top of it.

I added a strip of paper from Bo Bunny.

003Next, I added glitter to Elizabeth Crafts Designs butterfly, flowers and leaves stickers. To see a video on how easy this technique is, click here. I love Elizabeth Crafts Design Glitter because you can color on it with your Copic, Tombow or Distress Ink markers. This is the ONLY glitter I know of that is safe for your markers.

004Here are the colors I used …

005After coloring, I used a craft knife to carefully cut out each piece and adhere it to the card.

butterfly Candy SpiegelI used dimensional foam to adhere the flowers and butterflies to the card.

Then, I added a bit of ribbon and cut out the word “Thank You” from an Elizabeth Craft Die.

I hope you enjoyed this brief peek into summer!

 

 

 

Technique Thursday: Elizabeth Craft’s Stickers

Welcome to Thursday!

Today’s technique is going to use Elizabeth Craft’s Stickers. These simple outline stickers come in a plethora of designs — florals, elegant candles, silly birds, tea sets and more.

We’re going to be working with Glitter Ritz glitter, double-stick adhesive and Copic markers, along with the stickers. Believe it or not, this special glitter can actually be colored with Copics, Tombow or Ranger Distress Ink markers. So, you only need to buy one color of glitter and then use the markers you already have on hand.

Here’s a sample I made …

 

And here’s a video I made a while back that explains the whole process …

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9jbDY12YYA&feature=plcp

It is the first video I made and I didn’t realize I was holding the card upside down, but you get the idea.

Stop by Capture A Memory on Thursday from 2-6 p.m. and I will have stickers, glitter and markers for you to try — or bring your own markers and see how they work on this special glitter. See you then!

Simply Stickers

When I was a child, I had a sticker collection. I kept them in one of those spiral-bound, magnetic photo albums and loved the opportunity to trade and add to my collection. It was all the rage in the early 80s and even though times changed and I outgrew my collection, I never seemed to outgrow stickers. In fact, they were one of the things that drew me to scrapbooking in the first place.

These days, my friends rarely use stickers in their scrapbooks. They prefer die cuts or flowers or buttons or just about anything except stickers. I understand where they are coming from. In the early 90s we all sprinkled our pages with tiny Mrs. Grossman’s stickers — a look one of my friends refers to as a sticker sneeze. Like a sneeze where tiny droplets go everywhere, we covered our pages with tiny cartoon butterflies in colors nature never intended. It’s a look that is not only out of style, but never had any basis in art whatsoever. There was no place to rest your eye; no focal point; no triangle — just an odd mix of photos and tiny stickers.

So, I understand why many of my friends cringe at the word sticker.

But, given the right style, the right attention and the right design, stickers can still participate in amazing scrapbook pages.

 

On this page, I used stickers for the title, as a journaling block, and as accents. They, along with the plaid and denim papers, are all made by Simple Stories and are part of their Summer Fresh line. I love this line and have used it on many projects and pages so far. It reminds me of days gone by when life was slower and simpler. And I love the color palate — yellow, red, denim, blue and green.

 

Here, I used a sticker border on the edge of the denim paper for a unique look. I love that they match perfectly — something not all companies can achieve. I also added a few word stickers to fill in a blank space.

Here’s another look at the border … the scallop is the sticker, the plain denim is paper. Simple Stories includes several fonts on their letter sticker sheet. I used two of them for the title.

The flowers and jars are also stickers.

 

And, since I like to alter everything, I used my Cricut to create labels for the jars after my husband made the pickles. Here’s a better photo:

 

I used the Preserves cartridge to make the labels both for the lids and the jars. The word pickles uses the Opposite Attracts font and I used my Gypsy to weld the letters together into a word. I used my Xyron to turn the words into stickers and adhered them to the labels.

Finding an adhesive that would stick to the jars was challenging, since they are not smooth. However, Glue Lines by Glue Dots seemed to do the job just fine.

 

Fun with Stickers

When I was young, I collected stickers. I had an old photo album that I filled with my finds and I looked forward to meeting and trading with other sticker collectors.

Even though I no longer put them in an album, I still enjoy playing with stickers and I love using them on my layouts. Besides reminding me of my youth, they are quick and easy and often provide just the right accent.

I have some friends who disagree. They never use stickers.

But, stickers do not have to be flat and, according to them, boring. With a few simple tricks, you can make your stickers fantastic.

On this page, using products by Basic Grey, I added dimension to the stickers by adding foam squares underneath the stickers.

The process is simple.

1. Take the sticker off its backing and turn it upside down.

2. Place foam squares on the back, but leave the paper covering the top layer of adhesive on.

3. With a small paint brush, or your finger, apply baby powder to the back of the sticker. This will render the adhesive useless, so your sticker will no longer be sticky.

4. Then, remove the backing off your foam adhesive and stick it to the page.

I used this technique on both the title and the owl to add dimension.

Stickers can also be layered, trimmed off the edges and accented with glitter, Stickles, brads and other things.

Or, you could buy already embellished felt stickers, like the butterfly on this page.

My cat, Winnifred, certainly loved this page. She came by when I was trying to photograph the page.

Every time I tried to take the page, she grabbed hold of that butterfly. Silly, kitty!