(NT) Welcoming Committee

As you may have noticed, I had a super busy week at work and did not get a chance to post much... I'm hoping next week will be less busy, so that I can share some of the cards that are piling up on my crafty desk...

As a quick share today, I've got a card using Neat & Tangled's Itty Bitty Welcoming Committee. I used my Prismacolor pencils to color in the image, and backed it against a baby-themed patterned paper. As embellishment, I found some great pastel-like sequins.

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

SOG- Summer Fae

Quick pop-in to share that another one of my cards is up on the Some Odd Girl blog. This time, I'm tackling a summer-inspired fairy. :)

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Sneak Peek: Painting with Mae

Pop on over to Some Odd Girl blog to see my card for today! :D

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Salt 'n Pepper

As you probably know, I'm a huge fan of Torico's work. So, grabbing Recipe for Happiness was a no-brainer. This adorable set features a chef (I call him François) in several poses, along with a few kitchen objects and clever sentiments.

I have a small collection of cooking/baking-themed patterned paper and I thought this stamp would be perfect for them. I started by choosing my paper and adhering it to a top-folding A2 card base (4¼x5½"). I die-cut a stitched circle out of some taupe paper and a sentiment banner out of white cardstock. I curved the sentiment from Recipe for Happiness and stamped it onto a banner.

I stamped François with black hybrid ink onto my marker paper and colored him in with Copics. I kept the coloring very simple and added a couple of details with a white gel pen. I did not get the matching dies for this set, so I simply fussy-cut him, leaving a small white border.

I layered all my elements together and finished the card with 3 small enamel dots.

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Copic colors:
Skin - E00, E11, E13, R20
Mustache - E33, E57, E59
Outfit - W2. W4, BG01, B05
Bowl - R08. R45 
Ladle - E33, C02. C04

(SSS) Purple Florals

Today's card features a lovely stamp called Friendship Blooms. It features some lovely flowers along with great sentiments. For this card, I just used the flowers and leaves. Friendship Blooms also has a matching die set, but I didn't pick it up (I just fussy-cut my images).

I wanted to go with an unexpected palette, so I colored the flowers in shades of purple. I used a bright green for the leaves and added a few highlights with a white gel pen. I adhered the flowers to a piece of white cardstock that was die-cut into a circle and matted with a purple scalloped circle.

I kept the background of the card neutral, adding a strip of bright chartreuse leaf pattern to a simple gray paper. I happened to have the sentiment from Mama Elephant's Carried Away set on my desk, so I adhered it to the card.

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Caffeinex2

Today is the kind of day that requires extra caffeine, so I'm sharing 2 coffee-inspired cards. Both cards are using stamps from The Greeting Farm -- Latte Anya and Cafe Ian.

I used Copics to color them both in, and made a very simple background out of patterned paper. For sentiments, I went with a chipboard sticker for Anya and a die-cut word for Ian. As always, I scattered a few enamel dots.

I'm off to brew another cup of liquid gold and try to wake up...
Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Unicorns

I'm over at Some Odd Girl blog today with 3 (yes, that's right, three!) cards featuring the trendy unicorn theme. Check it out! :)

~Elle~

Hello Dots

I often feel drawn to cards that have clustered elements to them. It's fascinating to me because it's so different from what I usually aim for (clean and simple), but there's so much visual interest and depth to clusters. And I cannot seem to get them as effortlessly as I'd like.

I've come to realize that a lot of those cards are created by crafters who do scrapbooking - and after watching several scrapbooking videos, I can definitely see that inspiration. I, myself, haven't done scrapbooking. So, clustering is a bit of a mystery -- but one that I'm driven to master.

So, here's an attempt using Echo Park Sentiment Words die, along with a small tag die (retired) and some fun patterned paper. A strip of sparkly gold cardstock and a handful of enamel dots and sequins and the card was done.

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Chatty Sunday: Card Set 1 (Avery Elle)

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I'd been wanting to make a few card sets for my stash - things I can give away as a gift or have on hand when I need to send a bunch of cards. I decided to warm up with a simple set of cards using just one stamp set - Avery Elle's Woodland Wonders. This adorable stamp set features several critters and sweet sentiments.

I decided to keep my cards super simple and use the same supplies and layout. The variations were subtle and came from the critters, colors and sentiments.

I used warm colors and very simple patterns, figuring these cards would be great for baby occasions -- baby showers, thank you cards and congratulations.

I colored the critters in quickly with Copics, adding fairly subtle colors without too much contrast. This means the images stood out, but not too much.

I wanted to add just a subtle touch of embellishments, so I opted for enamel dots.

I didn't use a whole lot of dimension for the cards, as I wanted to make sure they could be easily mailed.

I packed the set with matching kraft envelopes and tied it with a pretty piece of ribbon.

Even though the cards were simple, creating them still took a bit longer than creating a single card. My biggest obstacle was deciding on what kind of layout to use. I think this is one of the occasions where a card sketch would be super helpful, so that's what I plan to do with the next card set.

All in all, I really enjoyed creating this set and I'm looking forward to jumping into creating another.

Thanks for reading,
~Elle~

Copic 101 - Which colors to buy?

One of the questions I see most often when it comes to Copics is what colors to start with -- what are the must-have colors, and what else is absolutely necessary for starting out with Copics. And it's a really tough question to answer because it depends on a lot of things -- what's being colored, whether you prefer a bright palette or a more subdued one, whether you have other coloring supplies, and so on.

But Copics have 358 colors and it's pretty overwhelming to go through all the colors and decide which ones work best. One of the things I usually recommend is keeping track of color combos that other artists and crafters use (Pintrest is great for this), but that can take quite a long time and some of you might want to jump into coloring sooner.

So, I'm going to share a list of 50 Copic marker colors and go over some possible uses for the colors. I tried to build a list that lets you build several palettes - ex. taking a pink and adding it to the reds for a lighter red combo, etc. - in addition to the basic 3-color palette. So, if you just want to get a yellow, you can go with a 3 yellow marker choice and build your collection by color type.

My list was built around coloring cute people and critters, with a few colors for backgrounds. I love bright, saturated colors, so that's what my palettes are composed of. If you're looking into coloring nature or more realistic images, you'll want to tweak the list and substitute some of the brighter tones with more natural colors.

Note that these are colors that I use most often and that it's not an absolute must-have list. I like having a lot of contrast between my colors and I don't work too hard on blending them together absolutely perfectly. I tend to work in 3s (light, medium, dark) and color relatively quickly.

You can make beautiful things with fewer colors or with completely different marker combinations. So, do continue to experiment and find colors that will best work for you. :)

-E (Earth colors- browns)-
Skin tones: E00, E11, E13, E15
With these colors, you can build a light skin tone (E00, E11, E13) or a darker skin tone (E11, E13, E15). You can also use the darker colors for environment such as wood.

E50, E53, E33, E57, E59, E79
These colors cover the blond (E50, E53, E33, E57) and brown (E33, E57, E59, E79) hairstyles. They can also be used for environments like sand (E53, E33, E13) or for clothing and fur (ex. cream color E50, E53; medium brown E57, E59, etc).

-R (reds/pinks)-
Pink: R11, R20, R22
This is a light and bright pink palette that can also be added to the skin tones for blush or used as a gentle baby girl color.

Red: R08, R46, R59
This is a bright and true red palette that's very vibrant. You can tone down this palette by adding a gray undertone.

-RV (pinks)-
RV11, RV34, RV66
This is a darker pink and works great for floral images or combined with a cooler palette.

-V (violets)-
V12, V06, V17
This is my go-to combination for purple, so I actually haven't got many more Violet markers beyond that.

-BV (blue violets)-
BV11, BV13, BV17
These colors give a much more desaturated/blue tone, but they also work great to add extra dimension to your shading or to use as a blue undertone for dark/black hair.

- Y (yellows)-
Y11, Y15, Y35
This is also my standard yellow palette. I prefer my yellows to be warm, so these colors are more on the orange side and work great with the YR markers.

-YR (orange)-
YR21, YR14, YR68
I don't use orange a whole lot, but it's useful to have a few colors that you can add into your other palettes. YR21, for example, can be used with pinks to add a peachy undertone. Or you can use E15 with YR68 for a darker orange.

- YG (yellow greens)-
YG13, YG17, YG67
These are mainly grassy greens and what I gravitate toward with green. I don't use green too often, so I mainly stick to things that help with environments (ex. folliage, grass,etc).

- G (greens)-
G21, G46, G29
These are darker pine greens that work well for environments especially.

-BG (blue greens)-
BG11, BG32, BG49
This is a good aqua/teal combination. You can also use BG11 to do subtle shading on white - it brings extra depth and makes white look whiter (ex. snow).

- B (blues)-
Light: B00, B02, B05
I use these colors a lot, especially for sky and water. They are bright and saturated, so they fit in great with other bright combinations. I also use this for baby boy colors.
Dark: B41, B45, B37
This is a darker combination you might want to use with clothing like jeans. I also use B41 and B45 on white clothing to add extra depth.

-W (warm greys)-
W2, W4, W6, W8
You can use these for coloring light gray (ex. elephant W2, W4, W6) or a darker color that's closer to black (W4, W6, W8). The warmth of these can also be comforting if it's used on sympathy cards.

Grays are especially great to start with because you can use them to practice shading and as an undertone for other colors. So, if you're missing a rich red, you can color your image in gray and add a bright red over the top (see here). If your budget only allows for a few colors at a time, start with the grays and then add middle colors of each 3-marker set on the list. This will let you build up your shading, but still have more than just a monochromatic look.


And there you have it. I hope this list is helpful to some of you out there.
Thanks for reading!
~Elle~

Whimsy!

I have a whimsical card over on Some Odd Girl blog! Check it out. :D

Elle

Snuggly thanks

Today is a snuggle-with-blankets-and-a-cup-of-coffee kind of day, and what better way to illustrate it than with The Greeting Farm's Snuddle Anya? How about being thankful for it with a cute thanks die?

With this card, I did something a little different -- I used patterned paper as an accents instead of having it be a background. It was fun and it makes the card look different and unexpected. I chose to go with a rainbow stripe and dug into my scraps pile for a simple stripe.

I also added a few signature enamel dots to bring out the colors I used on Anya.

Thanks for reading!
~Elle~