Garden Clogs....

Hi everyone! I'm back from vacation...there is no place like home, that's for sure! We had a wonderful time and I'll post some photos of beautiful Colorado later on. I sure missed my stamp room and computer, probably a good thing to take a break though. I colored lots of images while I was gone...you didn't think I'd leave ALL my supplies at home, now did you?

This card is appropriate this time of year because I am knee deep in my garden every day.....picking ripe tomatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, green peppers, jalepenos and onions. Every day I make a fresh batch of salsa and a big bowl of cucumbers and onions. Yummayyyyy...and Lord knows I need all the veggies I can get after pigging out on vacation!

These fun clogs and matching sentiment are new stamps from Karen Lockhart. I colored them with Copic markers, using the same colors over and over to create many layers of depth with just one color. I love the gradation you can get with simply layering one marker, yet they still blend beautifully. To soften any areas that get too dark, just go over that area with the colorless blender. Colored image is cut and embossed with a Spellbinder's Nestability Die Template then mounted a SB scallop cut square. I love the finished look that the embossing adds to a focal image.

Base card is stamped with a Cornish Heritage Farm background stamp called Climbing Floral Background(you can see the actual stamp under my cards). Isn't it sweet and subtle? My dear friend Lisa Strahl, whom I roomed with at CHA, gifted it to me. Check out her blog, she is just the nicest friend ever and she is SO knowledgeable in the stamping industry. She was nice enough to give me lots of pointers and gave me the grand tour of the Ranger booth at CHA. Plus she personally introduced me to Tim Holtz, how about that? Lisa is now a Certified Ranger Instructor so I listened closely when she spoke about all things Ranger! I neeeeed more Ranger products!! Plus she has the cutest PINK streak in her hair. (and she stole my brush at CHA...LOL!)



Here's my tip of the day: This is one of those touches that I add to my cards all the time, almost like a secret signature on my cards. I call it the *messy stitch*. Take some snippets of ribbon (especially when you want to hoard your ribbon, just use a little bit), adhere them down to your card, and then machine stitch over the ribbon. The messy part comes in to play because I just stitch back and forth three times. That's it...three messy stitches. They are not perfect but that's the look I go for.



Supplies used:
Cardstock (Stampin' Up! Soft Sky, Memory Box Blue Poppy, My Mind's Eye Tres Jolee, Papertrey Ink (white)),
Spellbinder's Nestabilities Die Templates(square and scallop square), Ribbon (velvet by Maya Road, other unknown), Copic markers (B000, B00, G40, 0), Lockhart stamps (Garden Clogs and sentiment), Stampin' Up! dimensionals, machine stitching