VIDEO: Zebra Madness + Watercolor Smudging

*Compensated affiliate links used where possible at zero cost to you. No posts are ever sponsored or paid.*

You know how there are some categories of images that you can't resist? Here are some of mine:

• Mail themed stamps
• Leaves
• Bunnies
• Text stamps
• Owls
• Big florals
• Platypi
• Zombies
• Monsters
• Zebras

So I'm in trouble today, because this sassy little zebra is out and he's RIDICULOUSLY cute. The set he's in has some baby themed elements, but I didn't make baby cards and I could not stop putting zebras on things!!

This first card was so fun to make. I stamped all the zebras, and then used the matching die + masking paper to mask them all off. I ink blended Sprout all over them, and then at the very edges of the card, ink blended Buttercup to make the center of the card glow. EEK they are cute. The sentiment is from this set. PS - they have a sale going on ink cubes and full sized ink pads FYI.

Now the technique on the next two cards is what I show you in the video below so I won't bore you with the details - it's a technique I have another video for, using a different medium, and that video is linked in today's video. It works great with either medium! This new amazing lattice style die I cut with white cardstock and glued it onto a black card base to tie in with my sassy zebra. The sentiment is from the same set. Love the little halo created by masking with the die cut here and smudging with these watercolor crayons, too.

This card was done with the same technique, but with Post-it tape and watercolor crayons instead of a die cut. I love this look so much. The sentiment is from this set. You'll see this in today's video as well. The way I do it, there's "light" in the center of each section, making it look sort of rounded.

I love a good literary quote too - that's sort of this week's theme! So this beautiful botanical set was perfect for a clean and simple card with one of my favorite writer's quotes. I just stamped and die cut it for a little dimension and stamped the sentiment.

Here's the video - come back for an amazing quick cucumber salad recipe if you're a cucumber fan! 

Here are all the supplies I used today:

Marabu Art Crayons | BLICK Art Materials [ BLIC ] Safari Friends Bundle [ C&9 ] Seasonal Branches Bundle [ C&9 ] Triple Step Blooming Heart Bundle [ C&9 ] Plaid Card Front Thick Die [ C&9 ] Plaid Card Front Thin Die [ C&9 ] Sprout Ink Pad - Concord & 9th [ C&9 ] Buttercup Ink Pad - Concord & 9th [ C&9 ] Ink Cubes Bundle - Concord & 9th [ C&9 ] Adhesive Remover [ C&9 ] Scotch 3M POST-IT MASKING Labeling... [ SSS ] Avery 6465 Removable Multipurpose... [ AMZUS ] Pre-Cut & Scored Cardstock [ CTC ] Art Anthology BIG CRAFT MAT 24x36 311473 [ SSS ] MISTI Stamping Tool [ MSP | HA | SSS | ELH | MFT | UNT ] Rotatrim Professional Series Cutter -... [ BLIC ] LightView 2in1 LED Magnifier for... [ BRG ] Teflon Bone Folder - Ellen Hutson LLC [ ELH | SSS ] Crafter's Companion GEMINI... [ SSS ] Scor-Pal MINI SCOR-BUDDY Scoring... [ SSS ] Storage Envelopes, Medium 25pk,... [ ELH ] CheckOutStore Stamp & Die Clear... [ CHC ] Extra Large -50 pk, Avery Elle Stamp... [ ELH ] Mermaid tidy towel case and glue... [ ETS ] Lawn Fawn STAMP SHAMMY Cleaner LF1045 [ SSS | CST ] Airtable: Organize your stamps & dies [ ART ]

Okay - I believe you need to know yourself in the kitchen - and what I know about myself is there are some processes I don't have the patience for, and one of those is canning (with limited exceptions - I do love making marmalade.) But I found this AMAZING process for making a cucumber salad that is now a favorite. It's basically a quick and dirty pickling process - but you pickle haters - it doesn't make pickles - it makes a sweet/tart cucumber salad sort of like those you find in Japanese restaurants - or at least the ones here. I love it. This was in our old 4H cookbook from junior high, and I copied it into my "cookbook" that I really need to update - it's a notebook with page protectors that has a bunch of stuff I'll never cook from magazines and stuff - I need to just whittle it down to my faves and probably get it all into google drive.

But anyway - here's how it goes.

• Thinly slice two cukes - I've used regular cukes and English ones - just whatever you like or have.
• Thinly slice a red onion. (Don't sub another onion - onions are very task-specific)
• Season the cucumbers and onions with a teaspoon of salt (I use Real Salt - it's much less salty than table salt, so you may have to adjust) for an hour in a salad spinner or colander. I wear gloves and toss the veggies and salt to be sure the salt is evenly distributed. Toss the liquid after an hour or so.
• In a small saucepan, mix 1 C. white vinegar, 1/2 C. water, 1/2 C. sugar.  Heat on high and stir until sugar is dissolved and it's clear - 3-5 minutes.
• Pour over the veggies (yes, while it's hot), and stir in 2 TBS fresh dill, finely chopped. Cover and stick in the fridge, if you don't eat it all when it gets to room temp. So yummy.

This dish is great with something with a high fat content, like brisket or pulled pork, IMHO. Or anything fried, or with dumplings, etc. One of my fave Chinese restaurants in the late 1900s served something similar to this except with chiles in it prior to every meal.

But let's talk about dill for a moment. Despite everyone's grandmother in Texas growing dill and using it in their pickles, I have NEVER been successful growing dill - it literally dies as soon as I get out of the car after buying a plant. Is there a native Texas variety I'm missing? I have a very green thumb, so this is frustrating, and with the exception of basil, herbs do very well here - as a matter of fact, they are the only things in my yard that survived #SixDaysinTexas. So I'd love your Texas dill tips.

Loveyameanitbye.

CURRENT COUPON CODES
15% off anything at Marker Universe or any of their other sites - Understandblue15.
10% off the whole store at A Colorful Life Designs - LydiaFan10
5% off at LBC here with code LYDIA5
Phone stand for filming link below in the banner - 20% off sitewide with code UNDERSTANDBLUE

Clean & Simple with Black Cardstock

*Compensated affiliate links used where possible at zero cost to you. No posts are ever sponsored or paid.*

No one loves a clean and simple card more than I do - it was such a relief when I finally realized that was my natural cardmaking style. It's not my style in my art journal, by any means, but it's where I'm most at home in cards. I love white space, but as I learned in an Edward Tufte class, there's no higher resolution than black and white on paper - no screen will ever give you that - and so I started adding black cardstock and coloring to my clean & simple cards and I loved them even more. They need each other to shine! So I have some clean and simple cards featuring black cardstock today with some adorable Concord & 9th stamps & dies. 

First up - possibly the greeting of the year - a layering, stippled YAY stamp! I decided to do it in turquoise and red because I wanted to see how it would look for 3D glasses. But then I couldn't find my 3D glasses to see what it looked like, so you will have to tell me! :) I combined it with the sentiment only set Kids are Grand and left the rest clean. I love that this set includes grandparent/child sentiments. 

Speaking of kids, there's also an adorable builder set that goes with Kids are Grand. I used the sentiment and the cute, layering sun die from Kids are grand and then built my own little girl - each top and bottom can be mixed and matched, and you can make boys or girls. I repeated the black matting layer to make it crisp. 

Probably my favorite thing is the new Painted Petals Turnabout Toolkit. I decided to do this in black & white too, just stamping all four rotations in white pigment ink. But my FAVORITE feature of this bundle is the little single die that cuts out ALL the sentiment strips at once! Oh my gosh! And I'm such a dingbat, when I first saw it I thought it was some kind of brick die, but all the sentiments are on a single stamp, and this die cuts them all at once with no border!! It also has a stitched circle die I used to cut the opening and two large word dies. This one is a toolkit so it comes with the jig, the adhesive eraser, temporary adhesive, stamps, dies and instructions.

Raise your hand if you want something to make quick & repeatable birthday cards for 2021? This simple, two die set is it - a huge greeting and a flurry of balloons, sized perfectly to take up the whole card front - these are freaking awesome to use with backgrounds from your UFO pile. If you want to see how I created the background I cut the sentiment and some of the balloons from, you can check out this video tutorial. 

The super cool thing about the balloon die is that some of the balloons are solid and some cut out for piecing like I've done - tons of combinations you could make for the balloons. I stuck with my black & white theme, piecing the black cardstock back in in come places, but you could combine patterned papers, watercolor washed paper, foil, glitter paper - all sorts of fun things. 

Here are all the supplies I used today. Come back for a carne guisada recipe!

Yay for Birthdays Bundle [ C&9 ] Petite Pals [ C&9 ] Kids are Grand [ C&9 ] Perfect Pairings Birthday Dies [ C&9 ] Painted Petals Turnabout Toolkit [ C&9 ] My Sweet Petunia [ MSP ] Pre-Cut & Scored Cardstock [ CTC ] Art Anthology BIG CRAFT MAT 24x36 311473 [ SSS ] Rotatrim Professional Series Cutter -... [ BLIC ] Teflon Bone Folder - Ellen Hutson LLC [ ELH | SSS ] Crafter's Companion GEMINI... [ SSS ] Scor-Pal MINI SCOR-BUDDY Scoring... [ SSS ] Storage Envelopes, Medium 25pk,... [ ELH ] CheckOutStore Stamp & Die Clear... [ CHC ] Extra Large -50 pk, Avery Elle Stamp... [ ELH ] Mermaid tidy towel case and glue... [ ETS ] Lawn Fawn STAMP SHAMMY Cleaner LF1045 [ SSS | CST ] Airtable: Organize your stamps & dies [ ART ]

Whenever I modify a recipe, I keep the notes in Google Drive. This carne guisada recipe came to me from a friend, and that's what you'll see at the beginning. But as groceries got weird and hard to find early in the pandemic, I started subbing a few things and also shortcutting some things as I grew tireder of cooking haha. The one I made Sunday was the best so far, so read all the way through the notes of this recipe before starting, and enjoy!

Loveyameanitbye.

CURRENT COUPON CODES
15% off anything at Marker Universe or any of their other sites - Understandblue15.
10% off the whole store at A Colorful Life Designs - LydiaFan10
5% off at LBC here with code LYDIA5
Phone stand for filming link below in the banner - 20% off sitewide with code UNDERSTANDBLUE