It's been a while

Well, I haven't been blogging, but that doesn't mean I haven't been stamping!  I've been playing with some new techniques/styles.  Here are a few:

 On StampTV, Gina K had done a card similar to this using gold card stock for the background and a cross stamp for the focal image.  I hate wasting the expensive metallic paper, so I made mine by using versamark and embossing powder just around the edges of plain white card stock.  I didn't have a cross stamp, so I used two die cut labels instead.  For the cross piece, I cut it in half and overlapped them a bit behind the top piece to make the proportions better. Then I used a filigree stamp to stamp the whole thing at once wit hversamark and embossed it with gold embossing powder. Then I added pearls and an embossed sentiment.

This black and white card uses a technique shown on Splitcoast Stampers.  The center is kept smooth while the rest is embossed. I think it gives a great look.  I forgot I used it in the above card, too, but it's really hard to see.  The butterfly is also embossed, and the flowers are heat embossed.
 The pink and brown butterfly card uses the same technique, although also difficult to see. (Hopefully, when I get my new camera, I can make a light box so I can take photos instead of scanning my cards).  The butterfly here is stamped rather than embossed.  The flourish is stamped, then it and the butterfly body are embellished with my new fun toy, the i-rock.  It's really easy and lots o fun.  Sure beats brads and eyelets.  I got mine for cheap from Scrapbook Steals and I love it!  Gotta get some more colors and styles!

This card uses more i-rock gems.  It uses a waxed-paper background technique that I also learned on StampTv.  It did take several coats of ink to get the design to show up clearly, but it was worth it.  I love the way it looks.  I also used stickles on the bee wings.  The white paper is embossed using the same Cuttlebug folder I used for the waxed-paper technique.

Yet another technique from StampTv.  I used it a long time ago and recently tried it again and love it. It is an embossed line design created using rubber bands on a brayer, then inking in the background.  I did another similar one using gold embossing powder and red, green, and brown for the ink colors.  Beautiful!

The background paper here is done with a "smooshing" technique.  I've seen several variations of this online.  For this one, I split open a sandwich bag so that it would open flat.  On one side I scribbled with 3 different colors of marker, then misted it with water and closed it back up, smooshing the two sides together.  Then I opened the bag again, laid the cardstock on top of one side of the bag and gently rubbed the back of it to settle it into the ink.  I love the watercolor effect of this.  I made several different styles of waterfall cards, all with the same message, which I'll put in another post.