Hey cupcake…

…how you doin’? *wink*

HAHAHAHA…I was going for a Joey Tribiani kind of impression. 

Hello and welcome to PDD Friday!  Thanks so much for stopping by to see what I’m up to!

For today’s project I used the cupcakes from Studio G Series 28.  I was thinking of doing another fairy kind of theme, but decided against it for now…there’s just too many fun stamps to play with to keep things the same! 

Here it is:

Studio G Series 28

I feel like running back into the scraproom to add more things to it because it seems like it just needs more, but I’m trying to restrain myself! *LOL*  I did however turn back to my alcohol inks and make more custom background paper.  Now that I’ve got my inks out, I can’t stop PLAYING!  Plus, because of the alcohol factor in the inks, it’s pretty easy peasy to do and it all dries so quickly.

I again went with the SC220 sketch – albeit very loosely again.  I was loving the custom paper as panels for a background!

Close-up

I applied a little twist that was different than PDD Wednesday’s custom paper.  I also applied some white metallic mixatives to kick the shimmery-ness up a knotch!  I tried my best to show it here:

Metallic Mixative adds a little shimmery glimmer

…it’s really one of those you have to see it in person to really get it, but I tried tilting the card to the light  a few different ways to capture the way the metallic mixative and Stickles capture the light and make it shimmer!  It’s preeeeeetty…

For the cupcakes themselves, I paperpieced them by stamping the images first on the alcohol inked custom paper and then stamping the image next on white cardstock that I had already stamped my Polkadot Pie Sprinkled background stamp on.  I cut each portion out and assembled together using a combination of glue and pop dots!

(P.S. Don’t let the photograph fool you either, the colours of the custom made paper are much more vibrant IRL!)

I feel like this post seems so awkward and stilted, like I’m all over the place…please excuse me…although it’s Friday and I had a couple of days off, I haven’t been feeling very well lately – or rather, I feel like my body is trying really hard to fight something, so it’s felt like a pretty long week! *LOL* This weekend holds for me a HUGE cleaning spree in the scraproom as I really need to get myself together and kick it up in high gear to get ready for some awesome things to come!  April is going to be FAB-U-LOUS, lemme tell ya!

First, my wonderful new Design Team that I’ll be leading (*blush* yeah, me! I know! What’s Marti thinking?! *LOL*) OFFICIALLY get underway!  If you have not had a chance to visit these talented ladies, you are MISSING OUT!  I already happen to know that they are SUPER excited to be a part of the team and rarin’ to get their projects going and out for all the world to see!  With the wonderful projects they’ve already got on their blogs, I can only just imagine how much they’re going to blow me (and hopefully YOU!) away with their PDD creations!

Secondly, if you haven’t yet noticed, below my blog title is a little menu bar.  In the link called Silly Skittle’s Spotlight, you’ll see that it’s an area dedicated to some in-depth product focus that I’ll be looking into.  Not just your typical write up and examples of what you can do…but the spotlight area will REALLY put specific products, techniques and projects into the spotlight for their own 15 minutes of fame – hopefully longer because the products I’ve got lined up to show are AWESOME!  The April spotlight will be focusing on ALL THAT SHIMMERS, so you are definitely NOT going to want to miss out in it!  We’re talking PERFECT PEARLS (some in-depth review on them and a comparison with it’s very close rival PearlEx), DIMENSIONAL PEARLS, LIQUID PEARLS and BRILLIANCE INKS.  I’ll be showing different ways to REALLY use them (from basic to a little more complicated, messier and way more fun!) and of course some projects to exemplify each of the techniques.  So hopefully you’ll stay tuned because you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

April also means that Marti from Pez-a-Doodle Designs has some aaaaawesome things in store for you!  Not only will the Alcohol Inks Lights & Brights be arriving (I am SO looking forward to getting my hands on those!) but there will be a PDD NEW RELEASE! Heeeeey! w00t!  I am just about bursting at the seams with excitement, I can’t even TELL you how fabulous the new releases are!  I could screech!  Those who shared a table with me at the Copic Certification class have actually already gotten a sneak peak at the goodies, so SHHHH!  It’s a seeeecret! *excited wriggling*  Is it APRIL yet or WHAT?!

That’s it for me today, wish me LOTS of luck with the cleaning…I’ve turned the place upside down and inside out, I don’t even know HOW to start!  But I hope to come back at you with a nice clean space ready to get down and dirty with shiiiiiiimmery goodness!  I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

MATERIALS
All hyperlinked products and materials are from Pez-a-Doodle Designs

Stamps: Studio G Series 28, Polkadot Pie Sprinkled Background
Ink: Alcohol Ink, Metallic Mixative, Versamagic Dew Drops, Brilliance Dew Drops, Memento
Paper: Glossy Cardstock
Embellishments: Stickles, Rhinestones
Tools/Other: Foam ink applicator, blending solution, pop-dots

CURRENT MOOD:  CURRENTLY LISTENING TO:

Enchanted fairies…

…for a fairy happy birthday!

Hi everyone!  I’m back and I’m CER-TI-FIED! Copic Certified that is! 

Yesterday was the Copic Certification course and I made the two hour trek over to Brampton to play with markers!  It was so funny, when I booked the day off and my co-workers were asking me where I was going or what I’d be doing, I was like…oooh you know…*coughs* colouring *coughs* HAHAHAHA…some people just don’t get it.

Anywho, I was a teeny, tiny bit late getting into the class due to the insane amount of traffic I had to weave through…*sighs* if you were on the 401 yesterday and saw a black Honda with a crazy little asian driver at the wheel looking slightly deranged, that might have been me!  If the crazy little asian driver looking slightly deranged had ink stains on the fingers that were gripping the wheel in a death grip, that really WAS me! HAHAHAHA…

So the class went very well!  It was so informative and really got to the background of Copics and the nitty gritty of the right papers and inks and techniques!  You can’t get any better than having Marianne Walker walk around to each of your tables to demonstrate each individual technique!  I definitely have a lot to practice, but after the class, I’m definitely not as intimidated by the markers as I once was!  Now where’s MY COPIC BLINKIE!? *LOL*

The other day was a very bad day for me too.  I was baaaad!

Studio G Series 28

Wood Mounted

 

Studio G Series 27

*SQUEALS* They are so.freaking.CUTE!  I’d roll all over them and throw them up in the air à la Demi Moore in that one movie, however, like my Stickles, my Studio G’s like to be un-rolled on – I imagine the wouldn’t stamp as well…

So before my hubby could get bent out of shape about the purchase (he still doesn’t really know about it actually…what’s a marriage without a little mystery in it to keep it exciting!? *LOL) I turned around and USED them! ALREADY! I know!!!  Avid Studio G collector I am no more! I am a Studio G USER!  Join me, won’t you?

Inside of the card says: "Have a fairy happy birthday!"

Close up view

Oh I *LOVE* those fairies!  I love the WHOLE set!  I LOVE Studio G’s! *hyperventillating*  HAHAHAHA…you just can NOT go wrong with this set…it’s so whimsical and fancy free, plus there are also some cute images in it for a more cutesy look!

I used SCS sketch challenge SC220 for the basic idea for the card idea – twisted it around a little bit, but the spiritof the sketch is there!  To add to the woodsy, foresty, fairy feel, I pulled out my glossy cardstock and alcohol inked my background.  I ran out of the felt for my ink applicator tool, so I used the foam and it worked just as well.  Using Lettuce and Eggplant on my foam applicator, I randomly stomped on my glossy carstock until the entire cardstock was inked.  I turned to my wonderful blending solution and soaked my foam blending tool and dabbed that all over my inked carstock to create some wonderful effects with the ink that was already laid down.  But I wasn’t done yet!  Next, I squirted Stickles and Glitz Stickles in Patina and another colour I can’t remember and I blended that wonderful glitterlicious goodness ALL OVER to create an awesome glittered, alcohol inked background.  It’s GOOOOOR-JUS! 

Next, I stamped my Enchanted stamp into versamark and then covered it with wonderfully smooth, rich, creamy Versamagic ink and heat embossed for the raised look on my oval nestability shape.  I left the die on the shape while I chalked around the perimeter.

Lastly, my wonderful fairies got a little treat of what I learned from my Copic class and the blending techniques.  They’re so tiny you can’t really see it, but I also heat embossed them too to make them REALLY stand out and I shimmered them up with some shimmer from my Sakura glitter pens.  A little pop-dots and they were soaring all over my card!

That’s pretty much the basics of how I got my card together!  Thanks so much for stopping by and visiting me!

MATERIALS
All hyperlinked products and materials are from Pez-a-Doodle Designs

Stamps: Studio G (Series 27)
Ink: Alcohol Ink (Lettuce, Eggplant), Versamark Watermark Pad, Versamagic
Medium: Copic Markers
Embellishments: Stickles/Glitz Stickles, Rhinestones, Sakura Glitter Gel Pens
Tools: Foam ink applicator, Blending Solution, pop-dots, embossing puff

CURRENT MOOD:  CURRENTLY LISTENING TO:

Memoirs of a(n Anya) Geisha…

…am I the only person that whenever a book or movie has been touted the most artistic, wonderful, fabulous piece of literature in the whole entire universe, has to go out and read/see it and I think it stinks?  So after all the hubbub of the poignantly masterful work in literary fiction/non-fiction, I went and got the book, Memoirs of a Geisha.  I mean, it was an okay book and everything, but I just could not really get too into it.  Meh…that was the same thing The Wrestler (apparently it won a bunch of awards and stuff and I completely hated it) and She’s Come Undone which I got because it was on Oprah’s book club.  I hate succumbing to celebrity endorsement and whatever it is you would call it when a celebrity schleps for stuff, but I figured, hey a book club liked it and it got a bunch of awards and stuff…but Wally Lamb and I…our literary minds are definitely *not* on the same wavelength.  Anywho…with all of that, I present to you my Anya Geisha for today’s Wednesday Pez-a-Doodle Designs post!

I actually started this Anya a couple days ago but was having a little creative mental block when trying to put the rest of her together.  I worked backwards from how I normally start a project – instead choosing colours and colouring her in first before checking to see if I would have any papers to match.  I was loving how the pale pink and green looked so striking against the black of her kimono!  Thank goodness I had the basic colours of papers and to help tie it all together, I got out my glossy cardstock and alcohol inked a coordinating background for her using my felt ink applicator tool and the three main colours of my Anya in alochol ink. 

As myscaproom is already a battlezone anyway, I wasn’t afraid to pull out all the stops and get REALLY messy!  After the alcohol inky-ness of it all, I took my smallest rectangles and ran BOTH sides of them through my Xyron (the little one that looks like an X and wastes a WHOLE lot of the sticker making stuff0.  One of the sticky sides, I covered entirely in my custom coloured glitter (you can’t get any more matchy than that!) and then stuck it onto my card using the other stick side.  It is soooo prettifully glittered IRL, I’m trying not to swoon or sound like I love myself too much right now, but it’s so SPARKLY!  I didn’t use a sketch for the card, but I’m sure there’s probably one out there that looks just like it…for the fans (digital download from Squigglefly) I covered the ENTIRE fan in Studio G black glitter glue (SO FREAKING FABULOUS, I definitely need to pull these out more – comes out with a different finish than Stickles but totally cool in its own way – nice and fine and smooth!)  After it dried out, you could still see the apple blossom branch outlines so I coloured the blossoms in using Stickles. 

All the main elements are pop-dotted for that pop-dotted effect and I used a little more of my yummily scruffy and fuzzy fibre – in pink this time instead of the green.  I was thinking of tying both pink and green on, but decided on the less is more idea since everything was already so sparkly anyway!  It is non-sentimental and therefore can be used for multiple occasions!

If you’re thinking of starting up some play time with alcohol inks (what can you NOT colour or re-colour with these must-have little bottles?!?!?) this is just a reminder that Marti’s got ALL the alchol ink on SALE – and that’s including the NEW Lights & Brights line that will be in and available for shipping whenever the magical, Ranger fairy gets up off her slow behind and gets them shipped out to retailers already!  On that note, the magical Ranger fairy did see to it that the new 2009 CHA releases have gone out!  Marti’s got those AVAILABLE now and ready to be shipped!  YES, RENEE, my wonderful 2009 CHA prize winner!  It looks like your prize is ready to come home to you!

Also, don’t forget that the PDD DT call is still ONGOING!  If you are planning to submit an application, the due date for all submissions is March 15!   In just a couple weeks I can TOTALLY start giving out REAL hints as to why you do NOT want to miss out on being a part of this FABULOUS team!  *SQUEALS* Eek, I get so excited just thinking about what’s coming!

Looks like that’s it for me today!  Thanks so much for dropping by and seeing what I’m up to.  Please let me know you were here or what you thought of today’s project if you have a moment!

MATERIALS
All hyperlinked products and materials can be found at Pez-a-Doodle Designs

Stamp: Geisha Anya (Digital Image) by The Greeting Farm, Oriental fans (Digital Image) by Squigglefly
Ink(s): Alcohol Ink  – Lettuce, Pitch Black and Pink Sherbert from the new Lights & Brights line (for polished stone background and for custom colouring glitter)
Medium: Copic Markers
Tools/Embellishments: Stickles, Glossy paper, Studio G glitter glue, Felt ink applicator, rhinestones, loose glitter for custom colouring, fibre

CURRENT MOOD: HAPPY CURRENTLY LISTENING TO: RADIO

All that SPARKLES…

…is glitter, Glitter and more GLITTER!

And me thinks that this silly girl went completely OVERBOARD with it! It’s hard for me to deal with crafter’s block. I get so frustrated and irritated with myself when I sit down to make something and I come up with ABSOLUTELY nothing! Then I get more frustrated and then of course it doesn’t help me come up with anything…

Anyway, today was one of those days…I sat down and looked around and…nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Blah.

So I reached for a big, huge jar of not-so-fine glitter that I’ve had for over a year and I decided to play!

I started with this…

And with a little tweak, a couple light bulbs going off and my good ol’ friends ALCOHOL INKS, came up with this:

Red Pepper

Stonewashed

Lettuce

Wasn’t really sure what to do with them separately, so I took a little bit of each and ended up with this:

…and from there, I ended up with THIS:

So is there such a thing as glitter overboard? What on this card did I not glitter? *LOL* Another question would be, is there anything that Alcohol Ink can not re-colour? I love, Love, LOVE this stuff! From being so scared to try it out to colouring everything I can get my hands on using it! *LOL*

The card is also a very loose interpretation of Mojo Monday’s sketch:

There was already a lot going on with all the glitter, so I decided that I would omit a few of the extra embelly-like things and just stuck to the basics of the sketch. Hope it hasn’t deviated too far from the original sketch to not actually COUNT as a Mojo Monday sketch…LOL…when I get started in the scraproom, it’s hard for me to go back to the other room to look at the other details I’m missing. I usually only remember a few distinct details of the sketch and go from there anyway…but thanks for looking!

MATERIALS
All hyperlinked products and materials are from Pez-a-Doodle Designs

Stamp: Fairybella (okay, I just made that one up, I can’t actually remember the ACTUAL name right now, but I know for sure it’s by) Stamping Bella
Ink: Adirondack Dye Ink
Medium: Copic Markers and Sakura Glitter Gel Pens, Alcohol Ink
Paper: Plain white cardstock (100 lb)
Embellishments: GLITTER

CURRENT MOOD: COMPLACENT CURRENTLY LISTENING TO: BENJAMIN BUTTON BLATHERING ON AND ON…

Confessions of a CHA Convention-er (Part 10 – Nestabilities)

I apologize that there was a lack of posting for my last day, but everything shifted into warp speed (kind fo like my sickening experience on Space Mountain…*LoL..cough* Suzanne…) but more on that later, on to some crafty goodness!

First off, if you missed the announcement, both Marti and I are hosting ULTIMATE CHA giveaways to commemorate our first time attending CHA. Courtesy of the lovely Pez-a-Doodle herself, I am giving away a great portion of Tim Holtz’s Advantis line of grunge-y goodness – you can get the complete 411 on that by clicking >> here <<. The official contest deadline has been extended from the 28th to the 30th to give me some time to catch up with all your comments, suggestions and questions! To double our giveaway fun, Marti is giving away the entire, I repeat the entire, not yet released LIGHTS and BRIGHTS line of alcohol inks.

HOLY MOLY! If I could win them, I would definitely try!

Okay, I am also excited about a couple more things that I’ve got listed for me to chit-chat about (after six days, can I just say how EXHAUSTING all this excitement is???)

Now if you’ve been a visitor for some time now, you’ll kno wjust how much I’ve been COVETING all things nest-like…as in NESTABILITIES! *swoons* so can I just point out that it’s nice that Marti knnows people? And that it’s nicet hat I know Marti???? HAHAHAHA…Iknow that I’m probably the last to know this, but our own Terri (terrikrafts) from The Board is a carrier of the beloved Nestabilities?! Where have I been? I know! so this weekend, missy me has placed an order for her own precious sets of nesties…all.For.MEEEE!!! I am already cursing the post for their slowness because I want them NOW! So if you’ve been dying for a set or two, drop me a line and I will hook.you.UP! Terri is the BEST! You can never go wrong with her, she took good care of us Cricut board girls this weekend, lemme tell ya!

If you’ve already got Nesties, let me also point out that Terri is already accepting pre-orders for the NEW releases that we were able to see with our own eyes! Even better than that (yes, I know my announcements keep getting better and better – so keep reading!) she will also have IMPRESSABILITIES! If you have not seen these babies in action, let me tell you, they are a must have, not just a must want!

So as you can see, they are nice and pretty AND folder-less! That’s right, anywhere placement without the folder! Plus, as the lovely Wendy from Spellbinders has pointed out, the soft metal and the low retail costs makes it easier to buy TWO – one to keep whole and one to cut up into multiple, smaller portions to use however/whichever you like!

Stay tuned for my CHA wrap-up…I’ll finally be HOME!

CURRENT MOOD: THE WALKING DEAD CURRENTLY LISTENING TO: ENGINES