Essentials By Ellen March Release Blog Hop

Hi Friends! I'm so happy to be celebrating the new Essentials by Ellen release that we've been previewing for awhile! There are a lot of fun products in this release. You may have come from Brandi Kincaid (illustrator of Bravehearted and Life is a Circus), but if not feel free to start at the beginning with Carissa Wiley.

This Clever Sausage set has already gotten a lot of use when making birthday cards for my youngest son's friends. The combination of modern styling, punny sentiments, and popular occasions make this set super useful!

Clever Sausage comes with dies, but you certainly don't need them to make a card. This card is completely stamped and masked without dies (except for the party hat, because I totally forgot to stamp that one before stamping the dog : ) )

I colored the scene with copics. These simple shapes make coloring a snap. It might be hard to see, but I put glossy accents on the skateboard wheels.

There's also a fun circus theme throughout this release. These cards are from the Bravehearted set. I really love that the main word in each sentiment is sized to perfectly fit inside the lion's mouth. Love this graphic style!

As you can see, my main (pun intended) orange copic marker is running dry, hahaha! I decided to roll with it, and use it to my advantage to make a textured mass of curly hair for the lion's mane. Then I masked the bottom and sponged some stripes from the Skinny Stripes die that I turned into a stencil.

The 2-in-1 Box Die is a great size for little birthday gifts like jewelry, washi tapes, small candies, a gift card, so many different things! It's smartly designed, as you use the same die for both cuts, and just flip one of the cuts over when you're putting it together.

You can orient the box vertically like this, or horizontally like the next project. Gotta love the options. It's fun to decorate your box just like you would a card. I sponged rainbow stripes from the Skinny Stripes Die and used a bird from EBE Backyard Bird Friends set.

The tag is a die that comes with the box. I cut a second tag in white, cut most of it off, and used that as a custom topper for the tag. The sentiment is from Totally Random Sayings Vol #2.

You can also just put the sentiment directly on the box, just like you would with a card. This sentiment is from the Good Times Set and it fills the space well.

TIP: if you want it to be able to flatten for mailing or storage, make sure to only adhere the two sides together. The top and bottom flap will remain loose. Depending on what's in your box, you may want to reinforce the bottom flap to keep the contents in.

Finally, I used the 2-in-1 Box Die as a base for this cute circus car, and the 2-in-1 Box Die Circus Add-On to add all the circus-y details, like these over-sized wheels. 

I cut out an extra set of the gold wheel trim pieces so each side of the black tires are detailed. Here's a rear view of the circus car.

The All Inside Bear is the perfect scale to sit inside this circus car. AND, he gets to use his little hands to hold the bars on his cage! Ha! He's either holding on for balance, or he's wanting to come out. The little bear from Bear Ware 4 is another good addition to the festivities inside.

Here you can see how the bears are arranged. I have three narrow strips going across the bottom of the open-ended box (not visible when you look thru the car). The bears are attached to these strips.

The happy dotted pattern on this circus car comes from the the Wonky Backgrounds set. Did you notice the sentiment on the car? It's in two parts ... "wishing you a beary" black strips on the left, ...

... and a "happy birthday" vellum banner on the right. The small flags on top come with the add-on set, and the large flags on top are from the Little Lady dies. One other thing I'd like to point out is the gold details on the top of the car. Look familiar? These are the wedge pieces from inside the gold wheel die cuts!

Here's another view from underneath.

As always, the car folds flat for mailing and storage. The vellum "happy birthday" banner that flies on the right side of the car will fold behind the car so it fits perfectly in the envelope.

Hope you liked these two circus-themed cards, as well as the clever sausage birthday card!

Prizes:
We’ve got super fun prizes!!! One random & lucky commenter will win $25 to the EH shop and one will win the whole March Essentials by Ellen release!!! To enter for a chance to win, make sure to leave comments at each stop along the hop! Comment before Thursday, March 12th at 11:59pm PST. Winners will be notified by email.

I now have the pleasure to send you over to my friend Laurel Beard, who I'm sure has some fabulous projects to share!

Thanks so much for checking out all my projects!

- Kelly

Supplies Used (Affiliate links, thanks so much for your support of my projects and blog!)

Clever Sausage by Julie Ebersole, Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps Clever Sausage by Julie Ebersole, Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies Two-in-One Box, Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies Two-in-One Box, Circus Add-On, Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies Bravehearted by Brandi Kincaid, Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps Bravehearted by Brandi Kincaid, Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies All Inside by Julie Ebersole, Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps Skinny Stripes by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Designer Dies Bear Ware 4 by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps Bear Ware 4 by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Designer Dies All Inside by Julie Ebersole, Essentials by Ellen Designer Dies Wonky Backdrops By Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps Leading Ladies - Little Lady By Brandi Kincaid, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps Leading Ladies - Little Lady By Brandi Kincaid, Essentials By Ellen Designer Dies Backyard Bird Friends by Brandi Kincaid, Essentials by Ellen Clear Stamps Totally Random Sayings Vol. 2 by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps Good Times by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps 36 Pan Set, Altenew Watercolor Paint Uni-ball Impact Gel Pen, White Black Jack, Catherine Pooler Ink Pad

Altenew You're a Star Cards

Hi Friends! I've got a quick post today with two cards I made from the cutest little set from Altenew ... the You're a Star set! At $5, this set really gives you a lot of punch for your $$$.

It comes with two stars, and when stamped together, it makes a colorful barn star. I had fun trying out different color combinations, and stamped a row of each.

At first I stamped them evenly and perfectly spaced out. That didn't look so great, so I changed to stamp them randomly and closer together.

This set also comes with a tiny star, so I stamped that in between the spaces. The sentiment from the set is gold embossed on vellum and wrapped around the panel.

Here's a second card with that same formula for the background of stars. I have to say the two layers are very easy to line up, so making rows of them was not at all stressful.

I added the adorable fox from Hug Me and labeled him as a star. Doesn't he look like one too, the way he's posing? I was able to use the small star to customize his little shirt.

Hope you enjoyed these cards!

Thanks so much for stopping by!
-Kelly

Supplies Used (Click on the affiliate link images to purchase, thanks so much for your support of my blog!)

You're a Star

Hug Me

3D Monarch Butterfly from the Colorado Craft Company

Hi Friends! I am so excited to share this Monarch Butterfly shaped card from Colorado Craft Company! It's another very large scale stamp design, so I thought it would be really fun to turn it into a shaped card. I was going to do this with the giant slice of rainbow birthday cake from my earlier post, but settled on this butterfly instead.

The original image has a key cleverly worked in the middle of the butterfly. Since I was making a shaped card that I wanted to be able to stand on the wings, I selectively inked the stamp so that the bottom of the key did not stamp, especially where it overlapped the lower left wing.

Then I went back with a felt tipped pen and filled in the missing pattern on the butterfly wing (lower left). You can see where I wasn't perfect, and there's a slight horizontal line from the key. But now we just have the butterfly remaining, without the key.

I repeated these steps to get a second butterfly. Would you like to see it stand?!

Ta-da!! The body is adhered together, but since the wings are free, I scored and bent them so it looks like the butterfly is flapping its wings! This also allows the butterfly to stand on its own.

The center body of the butterfly needed some modification, since it used to be a key and all : ) I got lucky, and the key detail on the top of where I trimmed it off kind of looks like a head with two antenna (what are the chances?!) The rings around the key also look like part of the body. I added some random markings with a white gel pen, and think it looks close enough to a body (or at least doesn't stand out that it's really part of a key).

Having the two sets of wings really gives this butterfly a ton of dimension. My favorite kind ... the dimension that easily folds flat for mailing and storage!

I watercolored each section one-by-one. Once I finished painting one section, I watercolored the mirror section on the other side of the butterfly so I'd get the colors pretty close. I really like having the second layer's colors peeking through. It looks 3D, even when the butterfly is laying down flat.

I really had a ton of fun putting this 3D butterfly together! I currently have him sitting on my desk, so I can enjoy him before he flies off to another garden.

Thanks so much for stopping by!
-Kelly

Supplies Used (Affiliate links, thanks so much for your support of my projects and blog!)

36 Pan Set, Altenew Watercolor Paint Uni-ball Impact Gel Pen, White Her Own Wings, Colorado Craft Company Clear Stamps Black Jack, Catherine Pooler Ink Pad

Altenew Build-A-Flower: Canterbury Bells Release Blog Hop + Giveaway

Hi Friends! Happy March ... just a little closer to Spring and flowers here in the northern hemisphere!

You may have come from the blog of my friend Ashlea Cornell, but if not feel free to start the inspiration parade from the beginning with the Altenew Card Blog. 

Altenew BAF Canterbury Bells

Until (and even after!) we see them in our backyard, the build-a-flowers from Altenew are a great way to spread cheer. The newest set, Canterbury Bells, is not only gorgeous, but also giant and quick to fill your card.

I really love that with just using one of the Canterbury Bell images, you have a beautiful floral card. No arranging needed. I did add a few of the secondary flowers to give it a little more interest and variety. Although these tiny flowers have coordinating dies, I chose to stamp them directly to the card base and then layer the die cut Canterbury Bells on top.

The black and white stripes on the bottom are the Gradient Lines washi tape and are a quick way to ground the flower.

Here's what three of the Canterburry Bells looks like! You've got a nice wildflower bouquet! I really had an easy time lining the four layers up, so it was fun to just stamp a bunch of these at once and have a lot of extras for future cards.

The patterned background is my favorite Faceted Stars background stamp.

For this card I cut off a few of the bottom bells so the main flower would fit well on the Fine Frames Diamonds Die Set. Then I used the smaller diamonds to make a triptych, and the smaller floral outlines to fill those smaller diamonds.

Finally, I used the Hand Drawn Tile Stencil to fill the card base. The same corner design is used, and makes a nice pattern where it overlaps in the center of the card. 

Lots of fun ways to use this large layered floral!

Prizes:
To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a $30 gift certificate to 5 lucky winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew Card Blog and/or the Altenew Scrapbook Blog for a chance to win. We'll also draw a winner to receive a $15 gift certificate from comments left on each designer's blog in the blog hop. All winners will be announced on the Altenew Blogs on 3/8/2020.

I'm pleased to send you to the next stop on this blog hop, the very talented Erum Tasneem!

Thanks for stopping by!

-Kelly

Supplies Used (Click on the affiliate link images to purchase, thanks so much for your support of my blog!)

Altenew BAF Canterbury Bells

Faceted Stars

Gradient Lines Washi Tapehttp://shrsl.com/257hv

Fine Frames Diamond Dies

Hand Drawn Tile Stencil

Rainbow Birthday Cake from the Colorado Craft Company

Hi Friends! These rainbow cakes have been popular on pinterest for probably a decade now, and I thought it would be fun to make one ... on a card!

The stamp set is from the Big & Bold line of the Colorado Craft Company, and is called appropriately enough Birthday Cake. I love the sentiment that comes with this set ... "Let's celebrate something today ... so we can have cake" YES! Fabulous plan! I love to eat cake!!

True story: I picked my youngest son up from a birthday party today. The birthday boy's mom offered all the other parents there some birthday cake. Every single parent said no thanks. Guess who happily took the piece of cake?! Yumm : )

Each layer of cake is watercolored, and then dotted with the same color, only with less water so that the color is a little more intense. I also made several dots with a white gel pen.

After masking off the cake, I brushed the background with ink. I thought it still looked a little plain, so I went searching for a smaller stamp to fill the space. As soon as I saw the sketchy wheel stamp from Essentials by Ellen Wonky Backdrops I knew that was the perfect choice. It's fun, it's modern, it's got a lot of energy, and it actually looks like an aerial view of sliced cake!

I've really been loving these larger scale stamps that have come on the market recently. This birthday cake has seen a lot of use already, with all the teenage birthday cards I make. So happy to have it!

Thanks so much for stopping by!
-Kelly

Supplies Used (Affiliate links, thanks so much for your support of my projects and blog!)

Birthday Cake, Colorado Craft Company Clear Stamps Wonky Backdrops By Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen Clear Stamps 36 Pan Set, Altenew Watercolor Paint Green Tea, Catherine Pooler Ink Pad Tiara, Catherine Pooler Ink Pad Uni-ball Impact Gel Pen, White