Kenny K Harley Time to get your bling on

One of the reasons I started blogging was so that I could get more involved in the inter connections of the rubber stamping/scrapbooking world. Join in the forums and partake in the challenges. So I'm submitting a card for my first ever challenge. I found a card challenge that really spoke to me. Over at Kenny K's Krafty Girls the challenge this week was all about bling. It's time to get your bling on! Shiny, sparkly, blingy, bling bling! The more bling the better. How appropriate for my first challenge as I've been hoarding a stash of bling, and  my favorite color is GLITTER!
The image I used is Carmen Electrifying a digi stamp from Kenny K's Downloads. I loved coloring her as it really helped me with my skin technique! ;) She's so sassy, and I knew she would be great on a Valentines card.  I used glassy accents on her boots and glasses.
I'm also making my way around the web and finding other challenges to play in.

Challenges:
Kenny K's Krafty Girls Bling
Crafts And Me Challenges Pink and Sparkly
Paper Take Weekly Challenge:  Happy Highlights
The Corrosive Challenge Blog #141  I {Heart} You
Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge Challenge#55 Polka Dots
Deep Ocean Challenge Blog  Challenge #17 Sparkle
Lilly Pad Cards SSSPP Challenge
Stampin With The Dragon Challenge#2 Anything goes
Cupcake Craftroom  Anything goes
Crafty Purple Frog Challenge Show Us Some Love
My Time To Craft Your Favorite Embellishment
Craft Us Crazy Valentine/Love
Simon Says Stamp Challenge Anything Goes
Anything Goes Challenge Blog To The One I Love
Color Create #88 Pink and Green
Cute Card Thursday You're A Gem
Simply Create Too Challenge#5 Love Is In The Air
The Poodles Parlour Valentine/Love
Card Makin Mamas Something Old
Wags'n Whiskers Stamps Valentine
Truly Scrumptious Something Forgotten
The Pixie Cottage #105 Love and Kisses
Really Reasonable Ribbon's Ramblings  #40 Valentines theme
Little Darlings Challenges #16 Polka Dots
Paper Creations Ink #17 Love/Romance!
Crafter's Companion #20 Love Is In The Air

 These are all such great challenges!  I hope you'll stop by and play along with them!

Thanks so much for dropping by to see what I've been busy with. I truly appreciate all the awesome comments that you leave for me to read.





Copics used:
Boots: RV21,RV23,RV13
Bottoms: YG00,YG01,YG03
Skin: E000,E00,E13,R00,R20
Skull cap: V12,V15,V17
Hair: E50,E51,E53,Y11,R25,R29
Smokey eyeshadow W1,W3 Lips R20
Glasses: C3,C5,C7
Spica pens Gold and Clear

Paper: Bo Bunny Smoochable
Glossy accents on boots and glasses

Making clay embellishments

Today I wanted to share a step by step picture tutorial on how to make clay embellishments for your cards and scrapbook pages. 

 I used white Sculpey Premo clay. You need to sit on it for a half hour to warm it up. I ran it through my pasta machine that I use just for clay. Run the clay through on setting #1 about 20 times to soften and condition it and to get all the air bubbles out. Or do it by hand and roll the clay out with a rolling pin. My pasta machine has a motor on it so it usually just takes a few minutes.

Lay the clay out on your work surface and cut out shapes using cookie cutters. Take a rubber stamp(deeper etched stamps work best but I've used all kinds)and stamp it onto your versa mark pad, then stamp onto your clay. You need to play around with the pressure. The clay is soft at this point and you may need to slowly peel the clay off of your stamp. This is where your patience comes into play

 

Using eyelets, place onto your clay and push down. I then picked the cut out clay up and poked through the eyelet with a stylus. I've forgotten a couple holes and found they still poke out after they're baked as long as the eyelet has gone all the way through the clay. 

 

I used perfect pearls powder to paint the clay. Use a dry brush. I used about 4 different colors on each piece.(Any kind of bronzing powder will work) I then used my stylus to press indentations where I wanted the rhinestones to sit. You'll have to glue them back in securely after the clay cools completely. I used SU crystal effects to glue them in. Just flick the stones out and place a small drop in the indentation. I save all my broken jewelry and with a fine wire cutter I open the prongs and pry the rhinestones out to use them in clay making.

 I bake my clay in a toaster oven that I use for clay. Follow baking instructions on pkg. Mine were baked at 275 for 30 minutes. Do not touch the clay until it has cooled. I've read somewhere not to use your regular food oven or baking trays that you cook food on.

 I used a background Christmas stamp from a 4 sided stamp block to make the heart.(Stampendous Holiday quad cube) 

 My favorite color combination in pinks and coppers.  I also made the paper using dye inks, metallic pens, and a plastic page protector.

 Clear as mud? And yes I will do a tutorial on the paper soon.

Sky's the limit now baby! Kraftin Kimmie Cordelia

I woke up this morning feeling remarkably smarter. Maybe it was from all the new blog things I learned yesterday. Really, it's like learning a new language...this pc, web, html stuff. I keep telling my older sister, Ann that if she wants to keep her mind young she needs to exercise it...do some crossword puzzles, learn a new language. Keep your mind active. I'm glad I'm able to follow my own advice for once.  It works. Well maybe I'm not actually smarter but definitely doors in my mind have been pried open.


Today I learned something new again. I decided this just might be the day I could teach myself how to add a watermark to my pictures.  After all if I could set up a blog and even add a blinkie, I could do anything now...Maybe even climb Mount Everest...Some of you card makers have the most beautiful flourished signatures on your work that I dream about having for my own...one day. Thanks to the awesome tutorials at splitcoast stamper I was able to kind of  figure it out. I downloaded Gimp and played around in that program for a couple of hours. Things were not working out for me in the sizing (scaling) departments and I had to try about 4 times before I got it to where I could work with it. I was torn between calling defeat and waiting my my darling husband to get home form work so he could figure it out for me. He's not getting home till tomorrow night so I thought I'd give it one last try. And it worked! Not too shabby...nothing fancy but at least it's a start. And what an awesome feeling to know I was somewhat capable...sky's the limit now baby.

I was so excited today to share my new shiny blog with my bff...but I had to wait because I wanted to blog next about the birthday card I made for her.  Her birthday was at the end of December and I had given her gifts but of course, being a scrapbooker/rubber stamper/card maker I didn't have a special card made to give to her at that time.*shake head here if you can relate* Well I got it finished today and asked Jan to swing by after work because I had to give her the card today because I really wanted to show her my blog. I think somehow the essence of giving got somewhat distorted with that request...oh well...
In the midst of making this blog entry she was at my door and I was able to finally give her the birthday card. So here's Jan's glitterfull  card...made with tons of love and a kraftin' kimmie mermaid stamp called Cordelia.

Learn as I go! Bombshell Stamps-Man's Ruin

Hello blogger world! And a warm welcome to all my followers...um...that would be all 0 of you so far. lol.
I'm going to keep this short and sweet because I don't have a clue what I'm doing and what I really want to know is if I can figure out how to post a picture here.




I've been a card maker and scrapbooker for the last 20ish years and have just recently fallen in love with the Copic markers! Maybe a little obsessed! I've nick named them,"My precious". hehehe.
It all started off very innocently last June when my bff gave me my very first Kraftin Kimmie stamps. They were Talullahbelle, and Clarabelle the fairies.
I used to own the whole beautiful set of Prisma pencil crayons. I think it was the set of 120?  Could have been more, as it seemed like there was every color I could dream up and then some in that set. I never really used them and then they somehow got misplaced in my last move four years ago. Anyway it was the biggest set Michael's carried at the time and at least I was able to use a 40% off coupon to purchase them. *Sigh* Well collecting the Copics have certainly helped me deal with the loss of my crayons!
...Okay back to how my love of Copics began...All I really had left to color my stamped images with were those Zig pigment brush markers so I used those. Then I googled those fairies and saw how beautiful they could actually look if colored with the Copics! That was it for me! I began collecting them in November 2011 and so far now I have 144.
I also fell in love with the kraftin' Kimmie stamps and my collection of those has grown from 2 to 21.
Thanks Kimmie for having such an awesome boxing week sale!!!


 The pictures I added are of the very first time I used my Copics. Watched a few Youtube videos and thought I would give it a go. The stamped image is  called Man's Ruin from Bombshell Stamps