Crazy Crafters February Blog Hop

Welcome to the Crazy Crafters February Blog Hop!! I am so excited that you have joined us whether your joining us for the first time or have been following since we started. This month we wanted to showcase the amazing new products from the Occasions Catalog. I'm sure you have already seen some stunning projects from the girls before me and plenty more to come.

If your on the right track you should have just come from Angela Lorenz's blog Angs Crafty Cards, if you haven't don't worry there is plenty of time to get back on track by viewing the full line up at the bottom of this blog.

I had a lot of fun with this blog and really wanted to make something a different with these amazing products. To do this I jumped onto youtube to learn something new and stumbled across a technique I just had to try. It is called a Waterfall Card and the youtube tutorial was made by Dreaming About Rubber Stamps <---Click the name to see the full tutorial 

Without further delay this is the card I created for this months blog hop! There are a few technical issues I still need to work on but I am excited to have had a play with this new technique and I hope you do too.

 I love the look of this technique and cant wait to try a few different variations of this, I just love flowers and couldn't help but use this new paper from the Occasions Catalogue teamed with one of the stamps from Peaceful Petals

I couldn't resist continuing the beautiful paper into the card to frame whatever message will one day be written here :)

The following Photo's will demonstrate the waterfall effect accomplished with this technique by simply pulling on the ribbon the image folds away to reveal a hidden message.

The thing to remember when making this sort of card is to allow a decent amount of room between your pull down card and the brads holding the sides. This was my main error with this card the position of mine are too close causing the last tab to be quite difficult to pull down. We live and learn and I will be keeping that in mind for next time. 

Supplies: 

Inks

Basic Black, Melon Mambo, Tangerine Tango, Pear Pizzazz, Jet Black StazOn

Cardstock

Pink Pirouette, Whisper White, Watercolor Paper, Watercolor Wonder Designer Series Paper

Stamps

Peaceful Petals Clear Mount - Wood Mount

Chalk Talk Clear Mount - Wood Mount

Tools 

Blender Pens, Framelits Chalk Talk Collection , Simply Scored, Stampin' Trimmer,  Stamp-A-Ma-Jig and Big Shot

Adhesives

Sticky Strip

Embelishments

Ribbon, Eyelits

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog and this blog hop I hope you enjoyed your visit and maybe even discovered a new technique. Now it's time to pass you along to the next blog in the line up Aroha Mills-Barlow at ScrapTasticMama

Have a wonderful February and I look forward to seeing you back here for the March Blog hop

Full Line Up:
1. Sue Wdowik at Nigh Nigh Birdie
2. Carolina Evans at Studio Evans
3. Kate Benade at Stamping with Kate
4. Tamie Holt at Tamie Luvs Craft2
5. Teena Maher at Stamping with Teena
6. Barb Conroy at The Stamping Queen
7. Angela Lorenz at Angs Crafty Cards
8. Sarah Rae Oakes at Stampin' Up! with Sarah <----You are here
9. Aroha Mills-Barlow at ScrapTasticMama
10. Kylie Bertucci at Crafty Kylie
11. Deb Raymer at DebzHouse
12. Michelle Mills at hello day cards
13. Alex Trofimov at Pink Crafty Mama

Undefined Stamp Carving

Hey everyone I hope you all had a wonderful start to 2014 I sat down the other day and started playing with a new Product from Stampin' Up!, the Undefined Stamp Carving kit and let me tell you I'm hooked!

When you first order the Undefined stamping kit you will receive4 wooden mounting blocks, a stampin' write marker, 2 carving tools, rubber, mounting foam, instructions and some templates as shown below.

At first my kit sat in my craft room for a few weeks without me touching it as I couldn't think of anything to carve and I didn't want to just carve anything just for the sake of using it. Finally I decided to make a set based on my favorite mythical creature the unicorn, I haven't really ever seen very many Unicorn stamps and decided I would love to add one to my collection.

Once I decided I took my time to plan out my stamps and draw up the designs an then the fun began! When transferring your image always make sure when your looking at the image on the rubber it is back to front to what you want stamped out.

Once you are happy begin to carve I started with the fine carving tool taking care to go all the way around my images and carving out the fine details before going in and removing the larger area's.

This is the stamp set that I carved, The words were the most challenging to do but the most important thing I learned from this experience is to take your time. walk away from the project and have a break if you feel your concentration slipping as I got the best results when my mind was fresh and focused.

I still have one square wooden block and some rubber and mounting foam left but haven't decided on the forth stamp in this set yet so for now I will stick with my unicorn, my font and my little star :) I haven't had a really good play with the finished stamps yet but I did put together this simple little card to show them working together.

I hope you enjoyed my little blog about the Undefined carving kit and hope that if I have inspired you to try your own hand carved stamp that you will share your efforts with me I would love to see everyone's creations!

Supplies:

Ink
Melon Mambo, Bermuda Bay, Gold Metallic
Cardstock
Basic Black, Whisper White, Watercolor Paper and Sweet Sorbet from Sale-A-Bration
Stamps
Undefined
Tools 
Simply Scored, Stampin' Trimmer,  Stamp-A-Ma-Jig, Undefined
Adhesive
Sticky Strip