What Key? An Alice In Wonderland LTC

I absolutely love Alice in Wonderland and was thrilled when a last minute spot opened up in this swap.  With little time to carve a stamp and create a card I decided to look for really cool rubber stamp images and find one I could carve.  When I found the image of Alice reaching up for a key it looked really unique, so I decided to try carving it.  It's not a huge stamp; but, it took FOREVER to carve due to all the little cuts that had to be made.  I also had to find the image of a keyhole and key to go with the Alice stamp; but, they were pretty easy to find and carve.  

For the outer layer I used black paper and coated it with Tim Holts Black Soot Crackle paint for a cool textured effect.  For the inner layer of paper, I covered the paper in two different Tim Holtz distress stains (broken china and peackock feathers) and then I sprayed it with Dylusions spray ink in White Linen to tone it down a bit.  Next I stamped a really cool damask type rubber stamp on top in black to make a really cool custom made background paper.  

I very carefully cut Alice out (omg this took eons to do for the whole set of cards) and colored her in with Tim Holtz distress markers.  For the keyhole I used a blending tool and some Tim Holtz distress ink in Victorian Velvet to to color the paper and cut that out as well.  I glued both Alice and the key hole down with a glue stick and used the key stamp for the back of the card.  

This was a very time consuming card to make for a last minute sign up.  I loved the way it turned out in the end though so it was totally worth the effort.  

Firefly

I joined a Wendonverse tracker hosted by Aiphid simply because I saw the list of participants and could not resist a swap with such awesome card makers.  For this swap you had to make a card based on the work of Joss Whendon.  He has done a lot of work that has rendered a cult like following; but, there was nothing I was taken with or all that familiar with.  

At first I decided to do a Toy Story card; however, I found one of his TV shows on Netflix and decided to check it out.  From that moment on o became an official Firefly fangirl.  I was devastated to realize this incredibly awesome show only lasted one measly season.  Seriously how does this stuff happen in TV land???

I quickly abandoned my Toy Story idea in favor of a Firefly card.  Once I had my stamps carved I set out to may my LTC's.  I struggled quite a bit making this card.  I kept wanting to color it in fully;  but, I hated the way it looked. After trying several ideas, I decided to phone a friend for help.  I got a few suggestions and played around with the card some more and came up with the final version in the pictures.  I used a little bit of a Tim Holtz distress ink and a blending tool to add a slightly more distressed look to the patterned paper and I used one his his distress makers to highlight some of the words.  Add a couple of gears and another patterned paper to frame the cards and you have a LTC!  

Funny Story

I joined a swap where we had to create a card based on a funny story.  It turned out to be a really fun swap filled with all kinds of stories that made me laugh.  

Here is the story behind this card...

Once upon a time, not so very long ago (August 2014), Sharkboy returned from summer vacation with his dad's family with a collection of bags that needed to be unpacked. If I don't unpack bags right away I don't unpack them for at least six months, so I have learned the hard way that I must unpack all bags immediately for the sake of my sanity and good housekeeping. I very quickly enlisted Sharbkoys help with this task and in no time at all I was holding up one item after another asking "Clean or not clean?". He begrudgingly obliged me; but, when we got to a swimsuit he started to say "Not clean"...then he stopped himself mid sentence and said very matter of factly"Oh, it doesn't matter because that is a bathing suit." ME: *sputtering* *disbelief* *was this child raised with wolves on a surrogate planet*. "Um, it absolutely DOES matter!!!!!!" Dead serious he ignores my blatant display of horror and disbelief and says "No, you don't need to wash them because they go in the water." *SIGH*... We had a very serious talk about why Swim suits need to vow washed after each wear which included eye rolling and some not very well thought out arguments on his behalf. The end verdict was swimsuits DO get washed! I love this story; but, in order to make a not sucky card, I had to find something cool to carve and then it hit me, one of my most favorite albums from high school was Sonic Youth's Washing Machine album. I very happily based my card on that and was pretty happy with how it came out even though it is a pretty basic card. :) 

Dr Who Villians

As a newly converted Whovian I was super excited to join a Dr Who Villians swap even though I am just learning who the Villians are.  I ended up making two cards for this swap because I was not happy with my first card.  I actually almost threw out my first set of cards; but, I'm glad I didn't because a lot of people enjoyed them which truly shows that art is subjective.  

The second card I made was called "Limited Edition Cyberman".  I really loved this card.  I used one blend of blue, yellow and silver alcohol inks for the cyberman and cut him out.  For the base layer I used another blend of alcohol inks in yellow and orange and painted that layer with Tim Holtz Hard Rock Candy Crackle paint.  I glued the layers together, adding foam dots behind the Cyberman to make him pop out, then I added a black frame to finish the front of the card.  The back of the card was pretty simple with some orange patterned paper and a small Dr Who stamp. 

Now let's talk about the first card.  I absolutely loved the image when I found it and wanted to do a darker card in black and a kind of bright maroon color; but, shockingly I did not know about Versafine ink and I was not able to get crisp black images with my Ranger Archival ink, so I abandoned that idea and decided to go with cool winter colors instead.  I used a shimmery blue ink to stamp my stamp and added a cutout of Dr Who mounted on foam dots for dimension.  Snow-Tex was used to add a snow like texture to the bottom of the card and I added a double frame to the image in shiny blue and white cardstock.  

For the back I stamped an additional snowman stamp in a shimmery pink ink; but, it did not show us as well as I had hoped.  When the card was finished I knew I was not happy with it; but, I had put SO many hours into carving and making this set of cards.  For me the best solution to this problem was to consider this a bonus card for the swap and make a new card.  I'm so glad I did that!  The swap host Eyeoremama was very gracious and did not mind sorting the additional card for the swap and the other swap members were very kind when leaving their "found card" comments on both the Snowmen and the Cyberman.  

Wildflower's- An Alice Bonus

I really love Alice in Wonderland, so when a last minute spot opened up for this swap I jumped on it.  Unfortunately the Post Office lost my return set of cards, so I decided to make a bonus Alice card for anybody who would be willing to send me a copy of their card.  

One of the tough things about doing an Alice in Wonderland card is coming up with something fresh and new.  So many of the characters and images have been done by other card makers; therefore, I really wanted to try and pick something that might not have been done before. When I found this quote from the original Disney movie, I knew it would be perfect. 

I am in so many swaps right now and am struggling to pull my cards together, so I needed a relatively easy design for this card. Ranger Alcohol inks are my secret weapon when I am short on time!  They have the ability to make any stamp come alive.  For this card I used four colors of alcohol inks that you might find in nature and I stamped my image on top.  Next, I sprayed a frame layer with Dylusions Ink Spray and glued the layers together with a glue stick.  I really liked the way this card turned out.  I did finish the back; but, due to time constraints I was not able to carve a new Alice stamp for the back.  I recycled one of my stamps from my "What Key" card. 

Delivering Justice

When I saw this image I knew I had to use it for a card, so when I saw the Seven Virtues tracker I knew I had to carve it.  I decided to call the card "Delivering Justice" as Batman is delivering his own brand of Justice to the Joker in a fierce and powerful way. 

I used Tim Holtz Distress markers and a gray Prisma marker to color this card in.  I played around with coloring it quite a bit and settled on two versions that I really liked, so I decided to do both.  The front of the card is a more bold rendition while the back of the card is more streamlined and pared down.  I covered the front of the card in mat Mod Podge which turned out to be a mistake.  Mod Podge is a water based glue and the distress markers are also water based which caused them to bleed a bit.  It did not completely ruin the card; however, it is somewhat noticable.  Lesson learned.

In The Trenches

I created this card for a Mod swap in which you had to use Mod Podge in the construction of the card.  I have always wanted to carve an image with rain, so this was the perfect swap to carve a "rain" image.  

I used water colors to paint this image and added a black mat frame.  A Dymo label maker was used to emboss the word "Valor" on a piece of tape which was then added to the bottom of the card.  Keeping with the rules of the swap I painted the whole card in glossy Mod Podge to add that glistening rain effect to the card.

For the back of the card I layered another piece of paper and stamped the image of a soldier smoking a cigarette to tie the front and back of the card together. 

I'm not the best at watercolors as it is a relatively new technique to me; but, this card provided a great opportunity for me to practice my skills.  If there has been something you have wanted to try or get better at, I want to encourage you to go for it!  The only way to improve is through practice.  You might not be thrilled with your first few attempts; however, if you keep at it you just might master the skill and add another technique to your arsenal to create more fantastic pieces of artwork down the road.