Showtime and A Cut Above class homework

It's been a while again - oh well, I try... Thought I'd do a post including some of the Singin' part of my blog! 

Since I last posted, my chorus, City of Lakes Chorus, had a successful 60th Anniversary show "60Carat Harmony" (April 14th) at Bethel University.  Yes, the chorus (not me!) has been around for 60 years!!  What a great history of camaraderie and harmony!

We sang 12 songs, including "How We Sang Today" with any past members from the past 60 years who wanted to come onstage.  It was so fun to see some familiar faces!  My former quartet, Chord Company which retired about a year + 1/2 ago, got to sing at the after show party we call an Afterglow.  Here we are in the dressing room wearing our chorus costume.  That's a lot of glitter there! 

Here's a photo of the whole chorus, courtesy of Annette our videographer.  Can you find the 4 of us?  Hint - two are in the front row and two are in the center section.

And if you'd like to see a clip of  the chorus singing "So Long Dearie", go here.

Speaking of anniversaries, here's card I made today for my parents' anniversary next Monday.  I'm taking the latest Online Card Class - A Cut Above so I brought out a Tim Holtz die cut "Bird on a Branch".  Since it was an anniversary card, I thought it should have 2 birds so I cut a mirror image & cut that bird off its branch.  Added part of cut branch going down on the card.  The inked background used the Distress Stain with Rock Candy Distress Stickles technique I learned in Tim's Creative Chemistry 101 online class.  Very shimmery in real life.  Stamps are from my favorite company, Hero Arts.  The grey bird is stamped with the Newspaper Background; the blue bird is patterned paper from My Mind's Eye.  I doodled a bit on the branch using my new Distress Markers.  (Yes - they came into my LSS finally - the entire set!!)  I am NOT a good doodler - oh well, my parents will love it anyway :)

Hope you had a fun and crafty weekend!  Thanks for stopping by!!

Happy Easter & Tim Holtz Creative Chemistry 101 gallery closing

Happy Easter to everyone celebrating!  I got up early and traveled to my parents' home a bit south of me.  They wanted Chinese food from their favorite place but it was closed!  Luckily, the nearby grocery was open and we bought the traditional fare.  My dad was NOT happy; in fact, he pouted a bit - not a ham lover there - LOL.

Was at Archiver's again last night with the crafting girls - there were 6 of us busily talking, shopping and occasionally creating.  I managed to make 4 cards and am sharing three of them here.  The Tim Holtz's Creative Chemistry 101 class ended on Monday and the After Class Gallery closes tomorrow.  So I used some class techniques to create final cards to upload.  Getting a head start on my Mother's Day cards! 

Remember, you can still sign up here to take Creative Chemistry 101 - no longer interactive but still amazing with all the videos Tim shared!

Card one has a lot of Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint!  I had some Grungeboard from Tim's ScrapFest class so used some of the letters to create Queen Mum for my friend/vocal coach Mary who's a "Queen of Harmony" (Sweet Adelines International Quartet champion) from 1964.  After the Crackle Paint dried, I applied Weathered Wood and Broken China Distress Stains.  I put Wild Honey and Fired Brick Distress Stains on the crown.  The embossing folder is one of Tim's that I just bought after seeing him use it in class; the paper is his kraft Core'dinations.  Very fun.

I used another embossing folder from the same set on this next card.  Funny thing - there was still some purple from sanding the above card so there's some purple tint on my Tumbled Glass Distress Core'dination paper!  For this one I made a layered flower using paper from Lawn Fawn's Bright Side paper pad - so many fun patterns in that pad!  The center of the flower is the center popped out of a Grungeboard capital O!  Thought I'd make use of it - covered with Crackle Distress paint and inked with Wild Honey and Fired Brick Distress Stains.  The "leaves" are ribbon from May Arts - love this ribbon!!  The sentiment is from Hero Arts Celebrate Every Day clear set.

The final card uses a lot of Perfect Pearl mist that I made using reinkers, Perfect Pearls, and water.  Just sprayed it on watercolor paper and blended it a bit with some extra water.  Before I misted, however, I had stamped with the Hero Arts Fabulous Flourish that had a bit of left over acrylic paint from the tag I did for the class.  Tim was always reminding us not to waste the leftovers, so I just stamped it on some watercolor paper (yummy - from Hero Arts), not knowing when I'd use it.  It was perfect for this project which I'm entering into this month's Hero Arts contest.  It's one of the sketches turned a bit.  Once the mist dried, I overstamped with Hero Arts Newspaper Background inked with Victorian Velvet Distress ink and misted.  The shimmer is amazing in real life!

Hope you had a wonderful weekend! Thanks for stopping in!

Week 2 of Tim Holtz's Creative Chemistry 101

Another busy week cramming Tim Holtz's online class in with everything else I do.  I was at Archiver's for Scrap Mania last night with three friends - we had a great time and I was able to finish the rest of my homework from week 2.  Took my photos when the sun finally came out here this noon and now I'm ready to post.  Get ready for another long one - LOL.

Here are all the tags from week 2 - such a great bunch of techniques & colors all in one photo:

If you know me at all, you know I LOOOOVE purple.  So you will see lots of purple in my work :)  Here are the tags from Day 6 - Distress Markers:

Left to Right:  Watercolor with Markers, Blending with Markers, Stamping with Markers Tecniques



I have an entire set of the Tim Holtz Distress Markers on order - do you think they came in time for class?  No!  So I snagged a few singles at Archiver's.  My coloring was limited since I was making do with 4 colors - Wild Honey, Peeled Paint, Fired Brick, and Dusty Concord (of course).  I used a fun set of small wood mounted butterflies from Hero Arts - love these!

Day 7 was all about Embossing Basics.  I like embossing and have tried these techniques before but clearly haven't mastered them!  Here are the tags:

L to R: Nostalgic Batik, Rusted Enamel, Distress Powder Resist Techniques

I really had fun with this one, especially with all the purples.  Can you see my artsy effect on the left?  For this batik effect, you were to iron off the embossing powder after you used it for a resist inking effect.  Well, some newspaper burned into my flower and it wouldn't come off - looks kinda cool, don't you think?  On the middle tag I didn't brush off enough embossing powder to be able to grind in enough browns but I still like it.  And of course I love my Hero Arts Fabulous Flourish done in Dusty Concord Distress Embossing Powder!

Day 8 revolved around paints!  I got out my paint dabbers and had a blast.  Here are the tags:

L to R: Paint Dabber Resist, Crackle Paint Resist, Shattered Stains Techniques

On the left, we stamped on stickyback canvas - I just had ATC sized pieces so I cut one into a shape and did a sentiment with Snow Cap paint - fun!  I love the Crackle paint on the middle tag.  And I had a blast with some fun Grungeboard shapes we got from Tim Holtz during a class at ScrapFest 2010.  On the shapes I spread Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint and, once dry, inked them with Distress Stains.  Never thought I'd use that skull - LOL!  Amazing technique!!

Day 9 - are you tired yet?? - we used Perfect Pearls.  Here are my tags:

L to R - Perfect Distress Mist, Perfect Distress, Perfect Splatter Distress Techniques

Wow - was this amazing!  Like a lot of people, I've made my own mist with water and Perfect Pearls but I learned how to make mists using reinkers, water and Perfect Pearls.  Made one with Peeled Paint, Broken China, and Dusty Concord (of course - lol).  The one on the left just was made with spraying the mists, middle one I put the pearls onto the stamped image, the last one had little puddles of Perfect Pearls - that was the most fun!

Finally - Day 10 Dimensional Mediums and just one tag for that day:

Rock Candy Distress Stickles Technique

Washed the tag with Distress stains, dried and stamped, then spread Rock Candy Distress Stickles over the entire tag.  Very shimmery, pretty effect!  And that's it for the technique tags.  Now for a card using a technique from Week 2.  This one using the Perfect Splatter Distress technique:

Love the specks of gold on this one, but I didn't like it as much as the tag I did with this technique.  Thanks to Tim Holtz for an amazing couple of weeks - I learned a lot and enjoyed all his videos!  Thanks for stopping and hope you had a crafty weekend!

Scramble Time - No Foolin'!

To celebrate April Fool's day, Kim hosted a Scramble on the Hero Arts Flickr Group using the date 4-1-2012:  Four like elements, 1 patterned paper, 2 colors (minimum), 0 black, 1 ribbon, 2 stamps (minimum).  I managed to get two cards done.  With Easter coming up, I quickly did two Easter cards using the same stamps.  Here they are:

Sorry for the shadowy photo - it's past 7pm here - that's my excuse!  I used 4 Hero Arts flowers, Picadilly paper from Basic Grey, green and buttercup for my colors, Crushed Olive for the ink, May Arts ribbon, and 3 stamps - an Easter bunny from an Archiver's set by Hero Arts, the Newspaper Background from Hero Arts, and a sentiment from Celebrate Everyday by Hero Arts.

Here's card 2 - yes, I was quick!

This one had 4 buttons - would've added thread but ran out of time.  This time the Newspaper Background is stamped on the rectangle with the sentiment stamped over it.  I raised this panel up with foam dots over the patterned paper - a different piece from Picadilly by Basic Grey.  A different green ribbon and a bright pink card base - done!  Well, two cards done for Easter - I'd better get hopping though (LOL) if I'm going to get the rest done and in the mail by Wednesday!

Thanks to Kim for a fun Scramble!  I'll be back soon with my post of week 2 from Tim Holtz's online class....