A New World (Ink) Order

I have had zero "free" crafting time this month, sadly. I have traveled every week in April - my next trip is in a few days. I've been hopping with the MISTI team all month and been in a few other blog hops, so I've done lots of projects for those, but not any real unstructured play time. Until yesterday. I finished the samples that I needed to get done for The Collins Show on Sunday, and declared Monday a play day after work.

I have my pre-order from the catalog, and the stamp set to play with was a no-brainer. It's the Crafting Forever set, and it rocks. One of the sentiments says "Crafting forever - housework never."

And the people said -"Amen."

I wanted to try out the new masking fluid I got - it's from Schmincke, it's ammonia-free, and works beautifully. I had tried the Molotow masking pen with no real success - I found it got gummy during application, and doesn't work equally well on different papers. But regular frisket/masking fluid smells like the devil and I hate using it. So this - which is in a container with a very fine tip - made me feel like Goldilocks in the perfect bed. Easy to apply - even to those tiny paintbrushes - doesn't gum up and doesn't stink. I'm super happy with it. It comes in blue tint as well as colorless - I like the blue, because my vision isn't good enough for the colorless one.

So I masked off the little pot and paintbrushes, and then built the background around them. I just finished it with a sentiment from the set. This is going to be a much loved set, I can tell. The other images are adorable too. It was very fun to watercolor.

InLinkz.com

I did a video - and I'll be honest - I love doing videos for lots of reasons. I love teaching, so that's my favorite part. But right up there is the forced peace that takes place when I'm filming. I film with my phone, and so to start a video, I have to put it on do not disturb, and manually turn off all notifications so they don't interrupt my app. It's like that first time it snowed every year when I lived in New York - everything gets really, really quiet.

Sometimes, of course, I forget to turn it all back on, and then people think I'm dead. But it's really, really nice when it lasts. When social media is a big part of your job, like it is in my job - all the messages, and emails, and notifications can get crazily overwhelming, so taking a break from it is awesome. And as you know, the actual phone part of the phone I'd be happy to live without forever.

So yes, I highly recommend doing something creative every day. With your phone turned off. :)

In related news - on my Show Me Sunday team Facebook live a few days ago - I was stamping out the new In Colors I got to preorder, to show the team where they fit in the lineup of our existing colors.

When I was doing it, I stamped them with the balloon image from Super Duper in little groupings with like colors. But what we found surprised us! The new Fresh Fig, which I expected to group with our purples, made a lot more sense in the burgundy range, as it is very warm. Pool Party was much more green than blue, and I had previously had it in the blues. So after the call, I became obsessed with grouping all my inks properly, so I stamped out ALL the colors that will be current in the new catalog and grouped them this way: Reds, pinks, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, purples and neutrals. Here's how it turned out - so if you have a compulsion to ROYGBIV all the things - this is the order that makes the most sense to me.

It was easiest for me to stamp and punch them out and move them around to where they made sense. I wrote the color name on the back, and then once it was the way I liked it, I glued it onto a piece of Whisper White.

Now I just need to put the actual ink pads in the right order in my storage and my mind will be at rest. :)

Hope you find that helpful.

A few final notes!

• If you do not have a demonstrator and want the new catalog, fill out this form.
• If you are coming to Salt Lake in November, I'm having a retreat. It's at the bottom of this page.
• If you want to be stock up on retiring products - the most economical way is a no strings attached starter bundle - you'll get $125 worth of goodies for $99, and the ability to pre-order from the new catalog starting May 2. NOTE - the Curvy Keepsake die is retiring, and blender pens are going up by $2 a package in the new catalog - so now is the time to get both of those. Retiring items are while supplies last merchandise - so don't wait if there's something you want - it might sell out.

Loveyameanitbye.

Hip Hip Hooray!

I just got back from Stampin' Up!'s OnStage event in Shreveport.

I haven't driven through East Texas since I was a kid, and I forgot how beautiful it is. Tall, beautiful trees, mile after mile of peaceful farms and ranches, and 60 billion brand spanking new baby cows dotted across the Ireland-green grass.

I was particularly excited to drive through Carthage, where the movie Bernie was set. My all time favorite description of Texas is from this movie - and Carthage is forever immortalized here in this clip from the movie. Completely accurate. :)

I was lucky enough to have my team member Katherine with me, and on the 11 hours we spent in the car, we pretty much fixed all the world's problems, so you are welcome.

The event was awesome as usual, and of course we got the first look at the new catalog at CentreStage on Friday night, so if you heard oohs and aahs, it was coming from Shreveport.

It's fantastic. I was completely amazed at the extra coordination of some of the products - this is a trend that has been growing at Stampin' Up! and I love it. It stretches your crafty dollar. So for example, the bow in the Holly Berry Builder Punch also matches the bow in the Baby Bear set. Each catalog brings us more of these product mixes and I love it - it respects the investment that all of us have made in tools and supplies, and rewards it.

But my absolute favorite one of these coordinations is in this upcoming catalog. Remember this Home For Christmas DSP from the 2016 Holiday catalog? I LOVED the retro look of this paper and the beautiful way they were colored.

Well that style is back in the new catalog in a big way in my absolute favorite product suite - the Birthday Delivery suite. It's a stunning vintage, storybook stamp set in the style of Home For Christmas / Greeting Card Kids / Storybook Friends line of products. It's like a children's book come to life and it is BEAUTIFUL. It was one of the prizes at OnStage, but I didn't win it, so I have to wait for my pre-order to show you more.

But the coolest thing about this suite is that the dies that match the stamp set ALSO match the DSP - so you can cut out as many foxes, banners and other images as you want and they are perfectly colored and oh so cute.

So I'm breaking one of my own rules for the very first time, and posting a card that I did not design. I've never done this on my blog before, because I want you to get my work here, not someone else's. But our make & take was so cute, I just had to show you. Christina Nielsen - a concept artist at Stampin' Up! designed this card - it's her original work, not mine. And I love it so. This is the DSP cut with the dies - both the fox (which matches the stamp set) and the banner he's holding. Then we stamped the presents and the sentiment on the banner - thank God Katherine brought her MISTI. The suite also features new honeycomb balloons in Real Red, Daffodil Delight and Pool Party, and some baseball-style stitched ribbon, in addition to the stamps, dies and paper.

EEK I love him so, so much.

We all lined up at the Big Shots to cut them, and I didn't have tape, so my die cutting is a bit off, but you get the idea. I can't wait to cut 40 billion of these out.

One of the stamping demonstrations showed how to make "Golden Book" style cards with the yellow pattern in the DSP stack - it was adorable.

If you want to get your paws on this catalog, you can request one here if you do not already have a demonstrator. You won't be disappointed!

Now on to the important stuff - the people.

Here we are eating Papa John's by the valet stand because our hotel restaurant food was slow, cold, expensive, and served by grumpy people. We made the best of it and had fun.

This was our team dinner at a really nice steakhouse not far away. I'm not 100% sure our waiter thought we were sane people.

Frenchie modeled the ADORABLE apron we got at CentreStage - see the In Color straps? That's Lemon-Lime Twist - AMAZING new color. Hard to see here - but there's a rose on that white pocket - beautiful, graphic image from a new stamp set. Really cute apron.

Sharon is showing off her beautiful gift from Bev for promoting to Silver! Bev couldn't be with us, so she let me surprise her with it.

Caron was MILDLY excited about her prize patrol!

We have so much fun at these things. I look forward to them and wish they happened more than twice a year. There's not enough time in the world to hang out with my crafty tribe, and it was just glorious. We are all looking forward to seeing each other in November in Salt Lake - and then NEXT November in Orlando - we found out that the 30th Anniversary celebration is going to be where our conventions first began, and I could not be happier. :) I most definitely will have a retreat prior to the event.

If you want to be a part of this fun, join us here. I'd love to see you at my next team outing.

PS - the new catalog starts June 1. The retirement list is here.

 Once the retiring list is posted, as of today - all items are while supplies last. Shop here while the shopping is good!

Loveyameanitbye.

And Now For Something Completely Different!

Sometimes it's good to get out of your comfort zone.

Eleanor Roosevelt said "Do one thing every day that scares you."

Well, clearly Eleanor didn't live in Texas, because that's just normal life for us here. Blearily entering the bathroom at 4:30 without your glasses and having to kill a wolf spider the size of your cat generally qualifies for something "that scares you."

However, I don't think this is what she had in mind, because she obviously lived in a blissfully predator-free environment and was free to focus on her personal development.

I will join her in that space AFTER the spider killings when you try to test your own boundaries, because I did that recently.

On March 12th, I sprinted through the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center in the rain - looking for early spring inspiration photos for a watercolor class I was taking with my friend Lori.

I texted them to her, and one in particular stood out to her, and she suggested that we sketch it, along with our sweet friend Lisa Spangler - who was already a daily watercolor sketcher, so that wasn't intimidating at all. #not

We all agreed, and over the next three weeks, we worked on it bit by bit. First, as taught in our class, I did a quick value sketch - not capturing details - just figuring out where darks, mediums and lights are. I did this in Payne's Grey - probably my favorite watercolor color. I also took the opportunity to swatch out some colors I felt like matched the original scene and photo.

Here's the value sketch.

I love this sketchbook - strangely enough, Lisa and I ended up buying the same book - it's really nice because it lies flat and has a built-in bookmark.

Even in this loose rendition, the scene was intimidating. All the plant life was scaring me.

But I pressed on for a few weeks and eventually ended up with this.

InLinkz.com

And here's the original photo.

Somehow, Lisa and I both missed that notch out of the building on the left. Oh well. We survived!

At many points during the sketch exercise, I thought I had ruined it, but I reminded myself that it was practice. No one was going to be hanging this in the Louvre. I was just learning. And it became so fun and challenging.

It was so inspiring that Lisa and I, who were together in Ohio last weekend, decided to try a few more sketch exercises with no expectations of finished work. It was very fun. Well, except for our skies exercise, which I totally ruined. :) But I learned a lot.

After that I did smaller cloud/sky studies - masking them off with washi tape and trying different colors and techniques.

Then, because Gina Krupsky from Gina K Designs was sitting next to me, I got to play with a new release called Stately Flowers. It's part of a state flower series illustrated by Melanie Muenchinger, a fellow Austinite and friend. Lisa and I abducted the Indian Paintbrushes and bluebonnets and did a challenge with May Park at our table. Here's that page. I went for no-line coloring..

InLinkz.com

I really enjoy just taking a page, trying something, and taking notes. It's like a visual diary. I'll always remember laughing with Lisa when I look at these and that is worth as much as the lessons.

Anyway - it's just really different, and that's why I love it.

So speaking of different, I was super excited to see some new stamps that were designed with the MISTI in mind. SUPER innovative and creative, these really blew my mind when I saw them and how they worked, and so I was stoked to be invited as a guest to hop with a sneak peek for them. The level of engineering this took amazes me. I hope there are more coming.

The premise behind them is this - take a stamp that's designed for the MISTI, and rotate it 90 degrees for four iterations of stamping to create a cohesive, multi-colored design that is perfectly aligned. NOBEL PRIZE PLEASE.

SO - here is the card I made with the amazing Triangle Turnabout background stamp and the Say Hello dies.  The black triangles are embossed and shiny.

YES - that is ONE background stamp, rotated three times. SQUEEEEEE! So many possibilities.

InLinkz.com

And yes, of course I have a video, but you can't see it until you look at the next card with the Many Mandalas set - I designed this to be a wedding card. I did a progression of blacks and greys and used all the matching dies to telescope the images.

InLinkz.com

Hard to see here - but there's glitter at the tips of each side of each mandala, and a rhinestone in the center. It's very sparkly and fun. The sentiments are from the same set - it's a ginormous set!

This set comes with an acetate guide to help you align the images totally perfectly. It's so easy to use in the MISTI. I started with black, then went to Basic Grey, then Smoky Slate, then Smoky Slate stamped off once, then the smallest die cut.

It's so clean and graphic. I had so much fun creating these, and they are super quick and easy. You can see everything in this video. Then come back for the blog hop and your chance to win some goodies from Concord & 9th and My Sweet Petunia.

These stamps release tomorrow at Concord & 9th, so this is just a sneak peek of the full release. Be sure and comment on all the blogs in this hop for a chance to win THEIR FULL RELEASE! That's worth $130. You can also win an original MISTI, so get those comment fingers ready! And you will not believe what people have done with these products - so fun. I've seen some peeks already.

So here's the list of everyone sneak peeking today - have fun!

Iliana Myska of My Sweet Petunia
>>Lydia Fiedler of Understand Blue<<
Ilina Crouse of Creativity Within
Jeanne Streiff of Inky Paws

Maureen Wong of My C.A.S.E. Studies

Ceal Pritchett of Simply Beautiful

Concord & 9th

Many thanks to the C&9 and My Sweet Petunia teams for having me as a guest - I had a blast. I'm actually at OnStage in Louisiana today, so I will have some FUN things to show you when I get home. I look forward to your comments and I hope one of you wins these crazy prizes. Good luck!

Get out of your comfort zone today - you will be glad you did! 

Loveyameanitbye.