Hopping with Sean and Regina!

Hi everyone! Thanks for playing along in our November blog hop! The Blog Hop with Sean & Regina will now be featuring Gina K. Designs stamps only for our monthly blog hops starting this month! A lot of us have started to create our holiday cards. There are some amazing new stamp sets by Gina K. Designs that were released in October and we are sure to be inspired in the upcoming November release as well!

You should be coming to this blog from the beautiful blog of Lori McAree. If you've just stumbled across my blog, feel free to go to the beginning of the hop at Sean Fetterman's blog, Card Crafty Club.

This month, we are honored to be joined by Rebecca Oehlers, a Gina K. Designs Illustrator who has created some beautiful stamp sets for Gina K. Designs available in the Stamp TV Store!

The blog hop designers have been busy creating a card or cards that we hope will inspire you to create some beautiful Christmas and winter themed cards for your family and friends. Enjoy yourself as you hop along for the holidays!

OUR BLOG HOP SPONSOR!

Becky Oehlers is a member of the Gina K. Designs Illustrator Team! Becky’s style is really fun, crisp and clean. They are used to make wonderful cards with just the right message or can be used to add some fun to your scrapbooking pages. In addition, Becky is one of the best card designers and artists in the craft world.

Go to Becky’s blog to look at the great things she has been up to AND view the card samples she has created with her newest stamp set “Mistletoe Memories” that was released yesterday during the Stamp TV October Release Party. Becky’s blog address is: http://hemidemisemiquaverdesignblog.com/.

I am using the wonderful new Stamp TV kits for my cards today. These cards feature stamps from the Merry Little Christmas set in that kit, along with the wonderful papers!

I adore this house! It works great if you love to color, but it's also wonderful done like this - a little rustic Merry Home for the Holidays! The printed papers are in that same kit. Do you know what a STEAL this kit is? Lemme tell you! Two full stamp sets, a 6x6 patterned paper pack, ribbon, brads and solid cardstock for $49.95. SQUEEE!

Just had to do this same layout in a different color combo. I love that paper. Love it! Ok, there's a lot more inspiration for you, so leave me a note, follow my blog and hop on over to the lovely and talented Kay Simmons!

The rules are simple:
1. Visit each participating blog on the list below.
2. Leave a comment for the blog host designer.
3. Become a follower of each participating blog.

If you follow rules 1 – 3, you will be eligible to win the grand prize of a Becky Oehlers stamp set for Gina K. Designs.

At the end of the hop, a random winner will be chosen for the Blog Hop Grand Prize using comments and followers from each blog. We have decided to keep the hop open from Friday – Monday. We do this because some people that want to participate need more time to get through the entire hop.
The deadline for leaving comments is Monday, November 19 at 8pm CST. The winner will be chosen and announced on Tuesday, November 20, 2012.

Grand Tags

Chilly nights are here, and days are just cool enough to keep bunnehs inside. Work continues on the studio, and I'm hoping I'll be moved in by Thanksgiving! Yeehaw! Being inside most of the time now gives me a little more time to play with my toys.

I created this card for one of the Hope You Can Cling To challenges on Splitcoast Stampers. Tenia challenged us to use music as our inspiration, and include pink.

I used Tami Mayberry's Grand Tags set by Gina K Designs. I love this set because it does all the thinking for you. I stamped the image twice, cut out the piano, and popped it up on foam.

I'm thinking of so many of my friends up and down the East Coast who are under the aim of Hurricane Sandy. I hope everything can get back to normal very soon, and that everyone will be safe. I'm off, now, to start on Christmas orders. If you would like custom made cards, leave me a message with your email and I'll get back to you.

Ta for now!

~ky

Recipe:
Cardstock - Gina K Designs Pure Luxury
Patterned Paper - My Mind's Eye Indie Chic, Saffron
Inks - Memento Rhubarb Stalk, Potters Clay
Rhinestones - Basic Grey
Ribbon - Hobby Lobby

Practice makes perfect

Mom always told me to keep trying until it worked. Then she told me to keep practicing, not until I got it right, but until I COULDN'T GET IT WRONG. My Mom was amazing, and I miss her daily. Her advice comes back to me every day. So, listening to her voice, I took another stab at my hardest card making technique - one-layer cards.

YIKES! Almost as hard for me is the CAS (clean and simple) style. Here are 2 samples of my recent efforts.

Both cards used Theresa Momber's Whimsical Wishes stamp set, by Gina K Designs. I embossed the pink card with my Spellbinder's nestabilities die, and cut a matching piece of scrap cardstock to use as a mask. I buffed on the Spun Sugar distress ink, leaving it lighter in the center.

I stamped the image in Picked Raspberry, and used my distress markers using the thumping technique on the leaves. I added just a little bling to the centers of the flowers. I am pleased with how it turned out. But I was compelled by Mom's voice reminding me to practice until I couldn't get it wrong.

This is the second card, using the one-layer and CAS styles. Being a graphic designer, I often struggle with balance in my designs, especially when I'm working off the cuff. I didn't have a plan for this, but I just kept going. I was trusting my practice to lead a so-so project into a wow project.

What works: Having three strong elements on the lower left needed balance on the right. If you look at it, the 'weight' of the midge with one rhinestone, and the four graduated rhinestones on the right, it adds up to the 'weight' of the three circles because the space between the right-hand elements adds to their value.

Weight - if you look at a card and your eye is following a triangular pattern, that is one of the most pleasing alignments, you should feel like the card is centered. If you look, follow the triangle, but your eye comes to rest on one side or the other, that is unbalanced, or side-weighted.

I could have chosen to stamp the sentiment in teal. That certainly would keep it even more clean and simple, but it wouldn't balance the weight. The lighter color of the sentiment reduces it's focal importance to keep the card balanced.

Ok - enough of the technical stuff. I enjoyed making this card, and I think I'm a little more practiced at CAS and one-layer design. Thanks, Mom!

And thank you, too, for stopping by.

~ky

Recipe:
Pink card: Cardstock - Gina K Designs Pure Luxury
Ink - Distress Ink and Distress Markers
Rhinestones - Basic Grey

Blue card: Cardstock - Gina K Designs Pure Luxury
Ink - Memento Teal Zeal, Peanut Brittle
Rhinestones - Basic Grey

Last Flowers

Welcome to Fall! That means most of our beautiful plants are dumping flowers and leaves, or at least putting out one last show for us. 

This stamp set is by Theresa Momber, through Gina K Designs - Tropical Nature. I love this set because of this big flower image. It is so much fun to color!

The festive color of these blooms just begged for a bright backdrop. I am trying to use up all the rest of my older paper packs because I want to buy the new stuff. Tee hee! Oh - I'm part of another challenge group that inspires you to pull out your old supplies - stamps, paper, tools, even techniques! Pop by to get a daily dose of inspiration at Stamping With The Oldies. I'll see you there!

Happy inking!

~ky

Recipe:

Cardstock, Gina K Designs Pure Luxury

Patterned Paper, Basic Grey Lime Rickey

Dies and punches, Spellbinders and EK Success

Ribbon, Hobby Lobby

Ink, Memento and Copic markers