PDO - I'm all Ears

Welcome my friends!  I'm here today to share a card featuring one of the newest digital stamp sets by Polka Dot Orchard called I'm All Ears.

You can get your hands on this adorable set right HERE in the Polka Dot Orchard store.  The design of the set lends itself really well to a slimline card so that's what I did.

So, let's talk about making this card.  I started by printing the stamp and sentiment out onto 80lb Neenah Solar White cardstock.  I then cut it down using a slimline die from Trinity Stamps.  I also printed it out onto regular copy paper.  I cut the copy paper version out carefully and spread a thin coat of Tombow Mono Multi liquid glue.  I set the mask aside to dry.  Time to color the bunny and the carrot.

I used Copic markers to get some nice vibrant coloring.  For the bunny I used E30, 31, 33 35 and 37 for the fur.  For the inner ears and toe pads I used R30 and R32.  The nose was T5.  The carrot was YR18, 09, 07, 04 and 02.  The greenery was G28, 19, 16, 14 and 12.  I added touches of white gel pen in some of the highlight areas.

Next I lined my mask up over the colored image and got to working on the background.  I created a mask for a hill and the sky.  I just freehand cut a wavy pattern with cheap cardstock.  I lined up the top part of the hill mask to color the bottom.  I used blending sponges to add Lucky Clover and Mowed Lawn Distress Oxides.  

Then I switched out the masks to work on the sky.  Again, I used blending sponges with Chipped Sapphire, Salty Ocean and Tumbled Glass Distress Oxides.

And now my favorite part, peeling off the final mask!

Oooooooo!  Isn't it fabulous???  I splattered on some clean water and blotted it off to create some added texture.  I dried it completely with a heat tool before moving on to the next steps.

I cut a simple white rectangle layer to put behind the bunny panel.  I created the card base out of 110lb Neenah Solar White.  I cut the striped paper with one of the larger slimline dies from the Trinity Stamp die set.  I thought the white on the striped paper was too stark so I sponged Salty Ocean along the edges of the paper.  I glued it onto the white card base.  I added a generous amount of foam tape to the back of the bunny panel and attached it to the striped paper.  Card complete!

Here's another look at the completed card.

Thank you SO much for visiting today.  I hope to see you back again!

~Kristina

PDO Collaboration Wednesday - part two

Kirsty Lowden and I had SO much fun the last time we did a collaboration, we thought we'd do it again!

We are both using the Polka Dot Orchard Cake for Me stamp set illustrated by Jeanie Hays.  Which you can purchase HERE in the PDO store.

We are also using sketch 22 from Freshly Made Sketches.  You can check out all of their awesome sketches HERE.

And the Color Throwdown palette #548.  You can find many more palettes on their page HERE.

Let's take a look at the card I came up with.

I have to say this is not a color palette that  I would normally work with but it's always good to go outside your own creative box!

When I started looking through my paper stash for the right colors, I wasn't really happy with anything I found.  What's a gal to do?  Create her own paper of course!  I got out a ruler and three Copic markers, RV21, V12 and BG32.  I thought these were a pretty close match to the color palette. I just kept making repeating lines diagonally until I was happy with the result.  

Next I printed the cake and sentiment out onto Neenah Solar White 80lb cardstock.  I rummaged around in my Prismacolor pencils until I had two pinks, two purples and two aquas.  The pinks are PC993 and PC1012.  The purples are PC934 and PC932.  And the aquas are PC992 and PC905.  I concentrated the pencil coloring where I wanted it to be the darkest.  I used a blender stub and gamsol to blend the color out.  I went back and added more color until I was satisfied with the blend.

I colored the sprinkles on top of the cake with one of the purple pencils and went over it with a Stardust gelly roll pen.  I used the same Stardust pen to color in the "white" portions of the plate.  I also dotted it over the pink cake section to give it a bit more bling.  

I fussy cut the cake out and went around the edge of the cut piece with a black marker.  I then cut the plaid paper I created down to two 1" x 2 3/4" pieces.  I went around those edges with a black marker.  I then cut the aqua dotted paper to 3 1/4" x 2 3/4"and repeated the black marker around the edges.

Now let's make a card!

I started with a white landscape, top fold card base.  I lightly sponged lavender ink along the top and bottom to reduce the starkness. Next I cut a piece of pink cardstock down to 3" x 5 1/2".  I glued this to the card base in the center.  Before I added the patterned papers on top of the pink, I sponged the edges.  Aqua on the aqua dotted piece and pale pink over the plaid piece.  I put foam tape on the back of the colored cake image and added it as well. 

I went back to the Happy Birthday sentiment and cut it out.  Since the sentiment is slightly arched, I decided to fussy cut it instead of making a rectangle piece.  I then glued this to lavendar cardstock and fussy cut again.  And just to give it a bit more pop, I sponged a darker purple along the edges.  I added foam tape and stuck it in place.

For the final touch I found several sequins in my stash that made a good match!

Want to see what my partner in crime Kirsty came up with??  You know you do!  Head on over to her blog right HERE and check it out.

As always, I appreciate your visit!
~Kristina

PDO - Love Grows Here

Happy Saturday everyone!  Have you had a chance to hop along yet with the Polka Dot Orchard Love & Friendship inspiration blog hop yet?  If you haven't, check out all of the details on my post from yesterday.

Now, let's talk about the new PDO digital stamp set I'm using today.  It's called Love Grows Here and you can get your hands on it right HERE.

It's a fabulous succulent focal image with lots of great sentiments.  There are so many possibilities!  I wanted to keep my card simple today.  To let you know it's totally ok to just color bits and pieces of a larger floral image.  Don't feel overwhelmed, I promise it will be all good!  Let's see what I created.

I kept if very simple.  I printed the heart image out onto Bristol paper.  I then used Zig Clean Color real brush markers and a water brush.  I would lay down a little bit of color where I wanted it to be the darkest and used the water brush to spread it out.  

The colors used are:

Light Green 41

Violet 80

Pale Rose 230

Turquoise Green 42

Olive Green 43

Geranium Red 29

To jazz it up I bit, I carefully went over all the colored areas with clear Wink of Stella.  I also added it to some of the larger, uncolored blooms.

I chose to use the larger font size "Hello Friend" and printed it out onto white cardstock.  I added it to a black piece of cardstock and trimmed it down to have a very narrow border.  I went ahead and fussy cut out the flower shape and liberally added foam tape to the back.  I adhered it to the dark gray card base.  Then I used liquid glue in the middle of the sentiment strip and foam tape on the ends.  This way it's flush over the heart but will have support where it hangs over.  And that finishes up my card for today.

Large floral images don't have to be intimidating.  Color a little or color a lot.  It's totally up to you!

Toodles!

~Kristina

Love & Friendship Inspiration Blog Hop

Valentine’s Day may be over and done for this year, but Polka Dot Orchard is still celebrating with our Love & Friendship Inspiration Blog Hop. The creative team has amazing creations to share with you featuring some of our newest releases! We have two $10 gift cards for two lucky winners chosen randomly from the comments. You have until February 24th, 11:59pm EST to leave a comment on each of the blogs, including the Polka Dot Orchard blog letting us know that you completed the hop. We will announce the lucky winners on February 26th on the Polka Dot Orchard blog.

Hiya!  I'm SUPER excited to be participating in the Polka Dot Orchard Love & Friendship blog hop!  Polka Dot Orchard is celebrating a huge release of 20 new digital stamp sets.  Yes, 20!!  You can find all of them right now in the Polka Dot Orchard shop!

For my project today I am using the One Stellar Friend set.  Here's a quick look at the set.

So let's look at my card and then talk about all the details.

This set just needed to have a galaxy background.  Who am I to argue!  I cut a piece of watercolor paper down to A2 size.  Then I got inky with my Distress Oxide inks and lots of shimmery water.  The colors I used were Wild Honey, Seedless Preserves, Peacock Feathers, Salty Ocean and Black Soot.  I'm sure you have seen other tutorials and videos on how to create these backgrounds so I won't go into all the details.  My secret to this one was using a shimmer spray to help the colors blend together.  I tried to capture all the shimmer in this picture.

Once I had dried it for the last time, I went back and splattered it with clean water and dabbed it up.  Then I followed it up with splatters of white paint.  I set it aside to work on the next part...the moon!

Of course a galaxy card needs a moon.  I cut a 3 1/2 circle out of watercolor paper.  I used Hickory Smoke distress ink for the gray bits and then went over the open areas with Antique Linen distress ink.  I found it easiest to smoosh my ink onto a block, spritzed with water and then use a paint brush to apply the color.

I laid the moon aside so I could get to the coloring of the girl.  I printed her out onto a Copic friendly cardstock and got busy with the coloring.

Helmet: N01, N00 and 0

Skin: E31, E30 and R20

Yellow: Y17, 15, 11

Teal: BG49, 45

Hair: E29, 27, 25, 23

Once I was done with the coloring, I added glossy accents over the entire helmet piece.  Make sure you let this dry completely before putting your card together!

Let's build a card!

I added the galaxy panel to a top fold A2 card base.  Next I added the moon in the bottom right corner.  I made sure the moon hung over the edge of the card and I just flipped it over and cut the excess off.  I put foam tape on the back of the girl and added her right on top of the moon.  I printed the sentiment out on the same paper I used for the girl image.  I cut it down into a strip and glued it on top of a purple strip just slightly larger then the sentiment.  I glued the entire strip down on the card.  One out of this world card complete!

Make sure you stop by all of the design team member pages!

Just click on the names below to take you to the other blogs.

PDO Blog

Crystal

Rosemary

Pam

Kim

Kristina <--- you are here

Lisa

Kirsty

Larissa

See you again soon!

~Kristina

PDO - Valentine's Day tags

Welcome back to my little crafty corner of the world!  Polka Dot Orchard has just had a HUGE release of brand new digital stamps in their store.   Click HERE to check out all the new goodies.  Today I am using Love and a Fabulous Cupcake illustrated by Crystal O. Minkler and Love Grows Here illustrated by Kimberly Wiener.

I cut two tags 2 3/4" x 5" out of a pale pink cardstock.  Next I measured the space available to put the digital stamp.  I had drawn out a quick sketch so I had some idea what I wanted to do.  Next I reduced the size of the cupcake and printed it out on Neenah Solar White 80lb cardstock.  I set this aside for the moment and went to work on the background.

I had two different ideas for the background and I just couldn't decide.  So I did both!  I used red ink with a brush and stencil to create the one on the left.  For the one on the right, I used the same stencil but used Nuvo Glimmer Paste in Raspberry Rhodolite instead.  I laid them both asided to air dry.

Now back to the cupcake stamp.  Like the backgrounds, I couldn't decide on which medium to use.  I thought I would use colored pencils to create a softer look to go with the tag on the left.

I used Gamsol and Prismacolor pencils.  The colors used were: 

Wrapper - PC947 and PC1082. 

Frosting - PC992, PC995 and PC105. 

The cherry/heart - PC1030 and PC925.

For the glimmer paste tag I used Copic markers.  I love the bold colors you can get with them.

Colors used:

Wrapper - T7, BG78, BF75 and BG72.

Frosting - W5, W3, W1, W0 and 0.

Heart/cherry - R59, R37 and R32.

I fussy cut them both out with scissors and added some detail with white gel pen.

While the gel pen dried, I got back to creating the sentiment.  Like I said at the beginning of the post, the sentiment is from the Love Grows Here set.  I wanted the tag backgrounds to shine through so I thought printing the sentiments onto vellum would be perfect.  And it was!  I trimmed them down to thin strips and wrapped them around to the back of the tag.  Then I used a strong adhesive to keep the strips in place on the back.

I cut out pieces of foam tape to add to the back of the cupcake.  Even a tiny little piece for the cherry stem!  Peeled of the backer pieces and added them to the tags.  I searched through my ribbon stash and found ribbons to work with both of the tags.  And that's all there is!

Here is a side-by-side comparison.  Can you pick a favorite?  I can't!

Remember, head on over to the Polka Dot Orchard shop to check out the latest and greatest!

Thanks for stopping by!

~Kristina

PDO Technique Thursday

Howdy friends!  Today I've got a card AND a technique to share with you.  I am using the Beary Best Friend digital stamp set from Polka Dot Orchard.  You can find it HERE in the Polka Dot Orchard store.

The tecnique I'd like to focus on today is paper piecing.  You may not think about paper piecing with digital stamps but you totally can!  Let's take a peek at my finished card and then we'll dive on in.

And here we go!

I started by printing out the digital stamp on to all of the different papers I wanted to use in my card.

Next I cut out all of the parts and pieces I needed.

Then I used Copic markers to add a bit of depth and dimension to the pieces.  

I set the pieces aside to work on my base layer.  I'm excited to make my first slimline card!  I printed the same digital stamp onto the base white layer.  I created my own mask using copy paper and got to work creating my ink blended background.  I used Bundled Sage, Stormy Sky and Antique Linen Distress Oxide inks.

Once the blending was complete I removed the mask.  To add a bit more interest to the blended background, I splattered it with water and dabbed it up after 10 seconds or so.  I did also add some Copic marker detail to the bear.

Here is what it looked like after I used liquid glue to add the bits and pieces.  I also used foam tape for even more dimension on the fox's scarf and the cuffs and band of the bear's sweater.  Stay tuned for a side view.

I layered my finished panel onto a navy card base.  I also used one of the sentiments from the same stamp set.  I printed it onto white, layered it onto navy, layered again onto white and added foam tape to the back.  All finished!

And a side view to see the added dimension.

I really appreciate you stopping by and I hope you give paper piecing with digital stamps a try!

~Kristina

Supplies used:

Tombow Mono Multi Liquid glue Shop at: SBC | EH	Therm O Web Foam Tape Shop at: SBC | EH	Copic Marker R22 Shop at: EH	Bundled Sage - Distress Oxide Shop at: SBC | EH
Antique Linen - Distress Oxide Shop at: SBC | EH	Stormy Sky - Distress Oxide Shop at: SBC | EH	Copic Marker YG63 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker R20 Shop at: EH
Copic Marker B95 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker W00 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker W0 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker W1 Shop at: EH
Copic Marker W3 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker W5 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker YR21 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker YR23 Shop at: EH
Copic Marker E13 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker E17 Shop at: EH	Copic Marker E18 Shop at: EH