Christmas Carols!

Celebrate the Season is this week's theme on the Stampendous Design Team. To me, a major part of celebrating the season is listening to and singing Christmas Carols!  This beautiful French Horn from Dreamweaver reminds me of all the wonderful carols we hear throughout the season!

Christmas Music

Supplies
Stampendous
MG08 Lime Micro Glitter
EP113 Ruby Red Opaque Embossing Powder

Dreamweaver
DWLG676 French Horn Stencil
DWLG731 Holly Flourish Stencil
DWLL332 Picasso Stencil
DWDGP Gold Embossing Paste
DWDPK Dreamweaver Palette Knife
DWLM2010 Paste Spreader

Plus
1/4" Stencil Brushes
Brilliance Inks - Pearlescent Thyme, Rocket Red
May Arts Ribbon
Neenah Papers Classic Linen Cover 80# Red Pepper
Neenah Papers Classic Crest Cover Natural White 80#
Double-sided tape
Heat Embossing Tool

Instructions

Step 1:  Fold a 7" x 10" piece of Red cardstock in half to form an A7 card

Step 2:  Stencil the Holly Flourish image around a 4 3/4" x 6 3/4" piece of Natural cardstock using 1/4" stencil brushes and Brilliance ink, use the Picasso to keep colors clean

Step 3: Attach a piece of sheer gold May Arts Ribbon around the Holly Flourish layer, then attach that layer to the front of the card

Step 4:  Paste emboss the French Horn stencil on Natural cardstock (3 3/8" x 4 1/2") with Gold Embossing Paste using a Palette Knife and Paste Spreader, remove stencil and place in water for cleaning

Step 5:  While the paste is still wet, cut a straw at an angle and use it to carefully apply Lime Micro Glitte to the pasted holly leaves, and Ruby Red Embossing Powder to the berries, apply only a little at a time to prevent it from getting on the French Horn, don't try to tap off any extra yet, let paste dry

Step 6:  Tap off any extra glitter and powder, use a heat tool to set the powder, be careful not to heat too long

Step 7:  Tape the French Horn layer to a red mat (3 1/2" x 4 5/8"), then to the front of the card

Check out how my team members "Celebrate the Season"!

Stampendous Blog

Laura Drahozal

Kristine Reynolds

Lea Fritts

Louise Healy

Pam Bray

Pam Hornschu

Happy Creating,

Louise

The Great Pumpkin

Fall is my FAVORITE time of the year! I love the crisp, cool air, sunny days, colors, you name it, Fall is fabulous! So when I heard the theme this week  for the Stampendous Design Team was Create Fall, I was thrilled! The team has been sharing lots of great samples for the Christmas season from the July 2015 Stampendous Catalog, so now we are turning to our Fall creations. We hope you enjoy them!

Today I'm sharing The Great Pumpkin stencil, with a combination of Chameleon markers, Dreamweaver Paste, and Stampendous fabulous Frantage Embossing Enamels.

Supplies:

Stampendous:

EJK07 Encrusted Jewel Bronze Kit
FREG023 Aged Silver Embossing Enamel
FREG025 Aged Copper Embossing Enamel
FREG026 Aged Black Embossing Enamel
EP102 Pirates Gold Embossing Powder
FRG08C  Bronze Glass Glitter
FRC05 Taupe Color Fragments
FRM04 Tea Stained Mica Fragments

Dreamweaver:
DWLL3036 The Great Pumpkin Stencil
DWDGP Gold Embossing Paste
DWDPK Palette Knife
DWLM2010 Paste Spreader

Plus:Cardstock by Bazzill Basics Paper®
Classic® Epic Black & Classic Cream Linen Cover Stock by Neenah Paper®
French Country Collection Montage Paper by Graphic 45®
Chameleon™ Markers (YL2, YO3, OR4, OL3, BR5, CB, BK4)
Micron Pen (Black 02) by Sakura®
ZipDry™ Paper Glue by Beacon Adhesives™
Glue Dots
Heat Embossing Tool

Instructions:

1. Fold a 7" x 10" cream card in half to create an A7 card
2.  Tape patterned paper (3" x 7") near the top fold of the paper, and green (2" x 7") under near the bottom edge, place a small black strip (1/4" x 7") over the seam.
3. Place the stencil on the left edge of a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of cream cardstock and outline the openings of the stencil with a Black Micron Pen, move the stencil to the right side and trace another pumpkin along the right side.
4. Trace 6 extra leaves on cream paper.
5. Color the two pumpkins and the extra leaves with Chameleon Pens, cut out the extra leaves and edge with the black Chameleon.
6. Place the stencil in the middle of the two colored pumpkins and paste emboss the image with Gold Embossing Paste using a Palette Knife and Paste Spreader, remove the stencil and place in water for cleaning.
   
   
7. Sprinkle the wet paste with a combination of Chocolate, Aged Copper, Vintage Mahogany and Pirate Gold embossing powders, let dry, tap off extra powders, then heat emboss the powders.
   
   
8. Mount the pumpkins on a 4 1/8" x 5 3/8" black mat, then sprinkle the bottom area of the pumpkins with a combination of aged silver and aged black embossing powder topped with Bronze glass glitter, taupe color fragments, tea stained mica flakes and heat from underneath until the embossing powders melt and hold the texture items.
   
9. Mount the pumpkins to the card front, and add more powders and elements along the bottom and heat from below.
10. Use glue dots to add the extra leaves near the base of the pumpkins.

See more great Fall ideas at these team members:

Stampendous Blog

Louise Healy

Amy Hurley-Purdie

Happy Creating,
Louise

Frilly and Fabulous Week 3!

Break out the frou frou! For the month of February, the Dream Team are going Frilly and Fabulous! Vintage, retro, or modern, adding extra charm with fun Fran•tagé products fromStampendous, ribbons and lace from May Arts, buttons, crystals, charms, or even creating your own dimensional decor! A snippet or a pile, whatever your creative heart desires! Remember to link your creations using the Inlinkz tool on the Dream It Up! blog for a chance to win the stencil of your choice! Bonus points for using Dreamweaver and/or Stampendousproduct in your work of heart.

Mine aren't exactly "frilly" this week, but I think they are "Fabulous"!  When I first saw the new Frigate stencil (LG763), I thought,  "What in the world am I going to do with that!" But when given a challenge of something outside my comfort zone, I like to think I can create something presentable!  I had so much fun designing my sample card for Dreamweaver, I decided to create a whole class using the Frigate! I'll be teaching it at Memories and Beyond in Downers Grove, IL on Tuesday, March 3rd, click here for the details. Here's what I've been playing with:

LG763 Frigate stencil, Glossy Black Embossing Paste on white cardstock, let dry, cut out bottom edge
LX7029 Spiral dots, stenciled with blue inks using a stencil brush, on white cardstock
May Arts braided twine tied in sailor's knots

While it's not very "frilly", I like how the background and ship look together. The knots really added the finishing touch to the card.
So then I decided to design a 3 card class around this stencil. Here are the cards we'll be creating on the 3rd:

Stenciled using Memento Inks and stencil brushes
LL332 Picasso was used to create the "clouds"

Gold Leaf Technique using Metallic Gold Embossing Paste as the base

Matte Black Embossing Paste with Metallic F/X Powders

For more frilly fun, visit the "A" team:

Dream It Up!

Leadonna Kimmel

Louise Healy

Laura Drahozal

Lynn Mercurio

Pam Hornschu

Jamie Martin

Happy Creating,

Louise
An InLinkz Link-up

February Flutters

Are you ready for the new Dreamweaver challenge for the month of February? It will be a short month of posts for the Dream Team, but we're pretty excited to share with you our versions of"February Flutters", meaning anything that flutters. Heart flutters, wings that flutter, breezes, sails, etc. So, come along for the ride and link your own "flutterings" to the Dream It Up! blog for a chance to win the stencil of your choice. 

Meanwhile, here's my "fluttering" for the week featuring the beautiful new Sailboat stencil (LG755).  We will be creating these in my class at Memories and Beyond on February 25:

LG755 - Sailboat and LL332 Picasso
Paste with glitter

LG755 - Sailboat
Leafing technique

LG755 - Sailboat
Letterpress technique

Be sure to leave me some encouragement before flitting over to the "A" team blogs: 

Dream It Up!
Laura Drahozal
Lyn Bernatovich
Pam Hornschu
Heidi Erickson
Louise Healy 
Cyndi Bundy

 

Happy Creating,

Louise

Holiday Celebrations Week 3!

Welcome to week two of the Dreamweaver Stencils Design Team challenge "Holiday Celebrations!". We are creating everything but a card this month to show you how truly versatile these beautiful stencils really are. We hope you will be inspired to create something of your own and join our challenge this month. Just link your creation at the DREAM it UP! blog using the linking tool or email a photo and description of your project to lynell@dreamweaverstencils.com, you may win a prize!

This month we are also using the wonderful adhesives from Beacon Adhesives in our work. It's true, the right tool for the job makes it much easier, and the different products from Beacon allow you to work with virtually any media.
This week I've created a Christmas mirror to decorate your home with or to give as a gift to a dear friend at this wonderful time of the year. You are going to think I work for IKEA, but really I just love the clean lines of their various products because they are the perfect base for so many craft projects! Here's my project using a red square mirror from IKEA (only $2.99):

This has a few more steps than some projects might, but they are all easy, and dry fast (an important feature in these busy days leading up to the holidays!).

• Start with a red mirror, or paint a natural mirror red with an acrylic paint
• Tape LG731 Holly flourish stencil along the bottom right corner of the mirror using removable tape
• Use a palette knife and paste spreader to apply Metallic Gold Embossing Paste
• Remove your stencil and place in water for cleaning later
• Use a soft brush to carefully sprinkle Metallic F/X Powder Kiwi on the holly leaves and Kimono Red on the berries
• Heat with an heat tool until the paste is bubbly and dry to the touch
• Clean and dry your stencil
• Repeat these steps with the stencil now in the upper left corner of the mirror
• Tape LL3009 Christmas script stencil in the upper right corner of the mirror with removable tape
• Use a palette knife and paste spreader to apply Metallic Gold Embossing Paste
• Remove your stencil and place in water for cleaning later
• Use a soft brush to carefully sprinkle Metallic F/X Powder Kiwi on the holly leaves and Kimono Red on the berries
• Heat with an heat tool until the paste is bubbly and dry to the touch
• Clean and dry your stencil
• Use a piece of Swiffer cloth (you know, the ones for dusting!) to careful wipe away the excess powders (there might still be a little sheen on the surface of the mirror, it actually looks pretty in the background of the design
• Color a piece of Tim Holtz Grungepaper with Distress Stain peeled paint and dry with a heat tool
• Tape LG700 Lg poinsettia stencil at one corner of the colored Grungepaper with removable tape
• Use a palette knife and paste spreader to apply Pearlescent Embossing Paste
• Remove your stencil and place in water for cleaning later
• Use a soft brush to sprinkle on Metallic F/X Powders - Goldfinch in center, Kiwi on the leaves, and Pixie Dust and Kimono Red on the flower ( you want most of the paste covered, but it doesn't have to all be covered)
• Pick up the piece and tap from underneath to help "jump" the powders around to finish coating the paste
• Flip it over a waste basket to tap of some of the excess powder
• Heat with a heat tool until bubbly all over the image, cool well
• Cut out the image leaving a small green edge all the way around
• Clean and dry your stencil and repeat the steps for a second poinsettia
• Use a Swiffer to wipe away excess powders from the poinsettias
• Tape LG720 Lotus stencil to part of the Grungepaper and use the same steps as for the poinsettia to create two Lotus flowers (except there is now Kiwi powder on these)
• Cut out the images
• Use a Black Micron 02 pen to outline holly leaves from LL3005 Holly and swirls stencil using left over pieces of the green Grungepaper, or you may need to stain some more depending on how you did your flowers
• Cut them out in clusters or as individual leaves 
• Arrange the flowers and holly leaves on the lower left edge of the mirror
• I used Beacon Adhesives 3-in-1 Advanced Craft Glue to glue everything in place. Notice I did not glue to the edges of the pieces, just in the middles so the edges could lift up and have more dimension
• The mirror comes with two eye screw hooks which I attached on the back near the very top of the mirror, then threaded a beautiful green ribbon from May Arts through them and tied a bow to create a beautiful hanger for my mirror

The other team members have more great ideas for you this week, so leave me a comment then hop on over to check them out!

Dream It Up! 

Linda Neff 

Laura Drahozal 

Stacey Rumsby
Lyn Bernatovich 
Pam Hornschu 
Heidi Erickson 
Louise Healy  
Cyndi Bundy

Happy Creating,

Louise

Awesome in Autumn!

This has been a busy month for the Dreamweaver Stencils design team! We have been featuring the beautiful glitter from Art Glitter in our Awesome in Autumn creations and spent a week creating fall designs combining our stencils with the fabulous stamps from Quietfire Design.

Follow the trail of bling on the Art Glitter blog, and the Dream It Up! blog. Play along with the monthly challenge of "Awesome in Autumn" and link your creations to the linkytool on the Dream It Up! Thursday posts for a chance to win some stupendous stencils and glamorous glitter! As if that wasn't cool enough, Art Glitter is offering a 20% discount this month if you use the code DW20 and...

Stencil with Style is also offering a 20% discount this month if you use the code SWS20!

Today I am sharing two sparkly goodies that I created a while ago, but I just love them and they show two techniques for you!

First is the beautiful Maple branch (LJ906) stencil that you may have seen on some of the other blogs this month.  This was done in the double glitter technique using Art Glitter Rock Moss Microfine glitter in all the stencil openings, then while the stencil was still in place, I used stencil brushes and ink pads to color the image. The microfine glitter is pretty easy to stencil over. The background was covered with Crystal Ultrafine glitter.

LJ906 - Maple branch in the Double Glitter Technique

The second card was created by first paste embossing the  Rooster stencil (LG732) with Metallic Gold Embossing Paste on black cardstock, removing the stencil (place in water for cleaning later), and sprinkling the whole image with True Red Ultrafine Opaque glitter, tap off the excess glitter and let the image dry thoroughly. When dry, use an x-acto knife to scrape away the glitter in some of the areas to expose the gold paste again. Cut out the rooster and mount him on decorative papers.

LG732 - Rooster in gold paste with True Red glitter, then scraped

I hope you have enjoyed our month of Awesome in Autumn and will consider joining our fun! Now head on over to the other team member blogs to check out their creations!

Kristi Parker  (our guest designer this month!)

Art Glitter  

Dream It Up! 

Lea Kimmel 

Louise Healy (that's me) 

Stacey Rumsby 

Terrece Siddoway 

Wendy Jordan 

Pam Hornschu 

Cherylynn Moser 

Happy Creating,

Louise

Dreamweaver and Woodware Day 6!

WOW! What a great week filled with so many beautiful ideas for the upcoming holidays! We hope you've all enjoyed the week as much as we have!
If you missed day 1 click here to check it out

If you missed day 2 click here to be inspired.

If you missed day 3 Click here to see it

If you missed day 4 click here for more great ideas

If you missed day 5 click here for even more!

The annual Dreamweaver and Woodware Christmas in August extravaganza week is wrapping up! We have had a Monday through Saturday of knock your Christmas stockings off  fun and inspirational ideas for the upcoming holidays. All that you need to do is hop back and forth across the "pond" on each day, oohing and aaahhhing as you go, and leaving us plenty of holiday love. In return, you'll be entered to randomly win one prize package for a UK commenter, and a second prize package for a US commenter, featuring products distributed in the UK by Woodware...including Dreamweaver and Stampendous!

Prize includes four stencils, one die, and two stamps, selection may vary.

For my grand finale I have chosen the beautiful Pine cones (LG675) stencil from Dreamweaver Stencils. I'm sure you will agree that it is a fabulous stencil. Today I am showing you the same technique on two different papers to demonstrate how you can change the look of the image dramatically depending on the paper you choose. Here they are:

LG675 - Pine cones on smooth cream cardstock
Metallic Gold Embossing Paste and
Metallic F/X powders - Kiwi, Forestry, Cocoa and Amber Glow

LG675 - Pine cones on black linen cardstock
Metallic Gold Embossing Paste and
Metallic F/X powders - Kiwi, Forestry, Cocoa and Amber Glow

They were both done in the Molten Magic technique (can you tell I LOVE this technique!) using the exact same products following these simple steps:

• Tape the stencil to cardstock with removable tape
• Use a palette knife and paste spreader to apply Metallic Gold Embossing Paste over the design
• Remove stencil and place in water for cleaning later
• Use a soft paint brush to sprinkle the F/X powders over the design (remember, it will look messy)
• Lift the paper and tap from underneath to further spread the powders
• Tap off extra powders into a trash can
• Heat with a embossing gun until the whole design is bubbly
• Let cool completely
• Use a Swiffer cloth to gently wipe off any excess powders from the paper and paste
• Mount into a beautiful card, adding some fabulous May Arts ribbon and a 3" embellishment pin from Dreamweaver Stencils (I used white pins and colored them with a gold Krylon pen)

Here are the close ups of the pine cones:

The extra dimension this technique gives the design is amazing! The gold paste shines through anywhere there was no powder, adding a beautiful metallic shine!

I hope you've enjoyed all the beautiful cards you seen this week and will contemplate joining our monthly Dreamweaver challenges. We love to see what you create too!

Remember, the products featured here can be purchased in the UK from stores listed on the Woodware UK site!

Now it's time for you to leave a comment and move on to the next designer for today:

Dream It Up!

Woodware UK

Cherylynn Moser

Jessica Griffin

Jane Gill

Laura Drahozal

Terrece Siddoway

Dorothy Adam

Heidi Erickson

Louise Healy (you are here)

Lyn Bernatovich

Lea Kimmel

Stacey Rumsby

Deb Frost

Wendy Jordan

Pam Hornschu

Cyndi Bundy

Happy Creating,

Louise

Dreamweaver and Woodware Day 5!

If you missed day 1 click here to check it out

If you missed day 2 click here to be inspired.

If you missed day 3 Click here to see it

If you missed day 4 click here for more great ideas

Welcome to the annual Dreamweaver and Woodware Christmas in August extravaganza week! Monday through Saturday we will be knocking your Christmas stockings off with fun and inspirational ideas for the upcoming holidays. All that you need to do is hop back and forth across the "pond" on each day, oohing and aaahhhing as you go, and leaving us plenty of holiday love. In return, you'll be entered to randomly win one prize package for a UK commenter, and a second prize package for a US commenter, featuring products distributed in the UK by Woodware...including Dreamweaver and Stampendous!

Prize includes four stencils, one die, and two stamps, selection may vary.

I teach at several stores in the Illinois and Wisconsin area and today  I am sharing three cards that I designed last fall for classes. The beautiful Heart Ornaments stencil - LJ921 had just been released and, needless to say, it was a big hit. When I teach a class, I like to use one stencil and teach 3 different techniques to use with that stencil (or any stencil really!). Here they are:

LJ921 - Heart Ornaments
Metallic Gold Embossing Paste with green glitter on the needles while the paste is still wet,
and gold leafing (red leafing) added to the hearts after the paste was dry

LJ921 - Heart Ornaments
Molten Magic technique with Pearlescent Embossing Paste
and Metallic F/X powders sprinkled on wet paste then heated until bubbly

LJ910 - Rolling Hills dry embossed for the background
LJ921 - Heart Ornaments pasted on acetate with Regular Embossing Paste,
colored with stencil brushes and inks when the paste is dry,
dries white glue for the drips on the hearts,
Regular Embossing Paste sculpted onto the branches and sprinkled with Crystal glitter while wet
This card was inspired by one our very talented team leader, Pam Hornshu, had created for CHA that summer.

So there you have it! Three very different cards with the same stencil. I hope you've been inspired this week to start your holiday cards! Don't miss our grand finale tomorrow when all the designers will be playing along. It's going to be fabulous I know!

Remember, the products featured here can be purchased in the UK from stores listed on the Woodware UK site

Now its time for you to leave a comment and move on to the next designer for today:

Woodware UK

Dream It Up!

Wendy Jordan

Louise Healy (you are here)

Francoisé Read

Pam Hornschu

Lea Kimmel

Happy Creating,

Louise