Buds and Bling

Hello! Today I have a card I made from Pure Luxury White and Fresh Asparagus, using my new "Border Bling" set with the Free with Three this month, "Elegant Elements". I had not yet used this pretty floral corner from the free set and noticed how nice the round flower centers would pick up the the little circles in my bling! Isn't that nice match? I colored directly onto the stamps with Memento markers to create the different shades in the flowers and leaves. I colored the flower petals with Dandelion and then brushed a bit of Lady Bug near the centers working outward, the yellow may be a little hard to see, but I like how they bled into each other and it softened the red,this is why the outer part of the petals don't appear to have a hard defined edge. To bring out the "pearl" part of the greeting, I added two adhesive pearls over the oink buttons. Ribbon is stitched Pure Luxury.

I could have stamped the florals in the opposite corners or connected the open sides with a little row of straight bling from "Bring the Bling" to make a beaded frame, but I'll save that for next time! I was liking the simplicity of this. :) I also like the way the ribbon treatment turned out, I feel like I was having a "What would Carolina do?" moment! ;)

Hope you had a wonderful weekend, we did! Special post about that in a bit!

Memorial Day and OWH!

Eek, I am so sorry I spaced out on the Memorial Weekend Blog Hop I told you about a couple weeks ago (can't believe it's been two weeks since I posted that!)!! Had some stuff going on this week that the holiday completely snuck up on me, not to mention my kids are in school today(make up for a snow day) so I keep forgetting what day it is now! Did any of you get a chance to participate? Here is the link for the Operation Write Home blog hop if you didn't get a chance to check it out over the weekend!

Here is a quickie card I put together ( yes, two days late but I did get it up on Memorial Day at least!) using "Border Bling" and the "Where Your Heart is" set, these blingy frames are nice for framing images as well as sentiments,and sometimes it is fun to use a smaller image or die cut inside the frame so that bling really acts like a "border" instead of a "label" like I did here. TIP: It would have been SO much better if I'd held off off on adding the pearls and embossed a larger Labels Four die border around my dots to form a nice embossed border outside the bling, oops! There I go, goin' crazy with the pearls again hee hee!

Where Your Heart Is" is featured in "Our Favorite Products" in the Cardmaker July 2011, their Stars and Stripes issue!
They are also featuring Operation Write Home in their "Readers Reach Out" section this month, I hope you can donate some cards, please check out this issue for more details on sending cards or go to the Operation Write Home website! Thanks CardMaker for supporting this terrific organization!


Our Gina K Designs Inspiration Blog Hops continue tomorrow, stay tuned!

Blinging up the Border Bling!

Hello! I hope you are having a great holiday weekend! Have some fun stuff to share with your for my new "Border Bling" , I really wish I'd had more time to experiment with the set before our party and the hop devoted to it on Friday, but you can bet I will have a lot of things like this to come! I am more excited than ever about this set now that I had a little stamp time yesterday to play with more possibilities. As you can see on the "Border Bling" page, it is a perfect match for Labels 1, 4, 9, and 14 and the Oval Nestabilities sets. But I know there are a LOT of other when you next them into larger shapes or use them as borders around other shaped die cuts, the tiny elements inside are what do the trick. I believe thy will also fit Labels 5, 18 and 21 very nicely, but I don't have those dies in hand yet to say for sure. If you happen to have them or another die you find that works, I would love to know, please share with us! :)
First I stamped the flourish above and below the border that matches Labels 1. Isn't it pretty what that adds?

This is exactly the same but turned sideways, another great look!

And here I have stamped the flourish again on either side. Love how fancy!

Now I am adding the smaller oval to the inside. When you stamp all the borders, notice how they have larger bling in the middle on each side. Line these up over the lines on your block when adhering, and then when you stamp, position the lines of the block so they are intersecting with the border already stamped, then you know it will be centered and straight. See how the white lines on the block go right through the dots on the label on stamp?

The fun thing about oval border, since they are oblong, they look so different when they are positioned vertically or horizontally, and give you lots of flexibility with all the sentiments stamps whether they are formatted more vertically or horizontally.

When I started stamping this I was going for a fancy looking medallion, something like a Label 16 that I could just cut around the borders with scissors (which works very well, as I will show you in an upcoming post!) but I noticed how this would also look great in a round die! Yeah!!

And here I've added some of the Silver Liquid Pearls to select dots, keeping it symmetrical by embellishing the same ones on each side. Oh, I almost forgot, did you notice?! See how I also stamped the little curved element and corner images from the set into the Labels One border around the oval, how's that for blinged up?! Fancy fancy! Remember, if you are going to cut this out, with scissors or a die, be sure to wait to add the pearls, they will NOT go through your machine LOL! I got a little excited about my tutorial and the fun of adding the pearls I wasn't thinking, hee hee! (I did manage to cut around it, but had to give it plenty of time to dry and be super careful snipping around those pearls on the ends...)

Whether you're a pro or novice with the Liquid Pearls, for best results I think you'll be happiest with stamping with an ink that is a very close match to your liquid Pearls color so that if you are a teensy bit off or don't get the dot filled completely it will be less obvious. Also, if you don't plan to cover every dot the uncovered stamped dots will blend more with the dimensional pearls in your design. Having said that, tough, I definitely plan to do some "Border Bling" designs using multiple colors!

I liked that circle idea so much I had to try the same design on black with the White Opal Liquid Pearls! Another tip: my white craft ink pad is to dry right now to leave a good impression for a guide for the pearls without re-inking so I tried stamping it with Versamark instead and embossing it with white EP. What I found is that the Liquid Pearls want to slide off the slippery embossed dots, so I don't recommend doing that if you can use an ink (that will be flat and dry instead!), just a heads up! This still looks okay to use on a card, but isn't perfect like the gray one above...

Okay, more to come! I am too busy trying different things and coming up with more tips for you to finish my card with it just now! ;) TTYS!

inspiration hop, Day 1: "Border Bling" and "Vogue Vases"

How about that release party last night?! It was so fun to mingle and chat with so many of you, thanks for coming out! Today starts our first day of inspiration hops with the design team for all the newest sets from Gina K designs! The first set is my new "Border Bling", made to fit and embellish several of my favorite label and shaped Nestabilities dies, as well as coordinate with "Bring the Bling", (already one of my best sellers!) Be sure to watch Gina's video using this new set with the Liquid Pearls if you missed it last night , if that doens't make you want them I don't know what will! And I say we bug her for all the remaining colors too LOL!)

Here is the sample I peeked yesterday, it uses paper from the new Stamp TV "Vintage Chic" kit, (these sets are really a match made in heaven with it's bling, and sentiments that match pretty much all of Gina's images, will be fun to mix them up!) this border is stamped in black on a Labels Four die cut and then enhanced with one of the smaller bling elements in the set (that are made to fit into corners of the borders, mats, etc) in gray.

Don't you love this quote? Any of you know who* said it? (hint: she is FABULOUS and I would have included it but didn't have room on the plate, we needed more bling MORE than her name LOL! No, it's not Gina, but that's a good guess, hee hee) I am head over heels with this font, too, it is very vintage and so sassy with the bling and for all your girlfriend cards!

Another thing I love about these borders is how they can fit quite a few more dies than meet the eye. Here you can see I have used border designed to fit a Label Fourteen die (the greeting is popped out, it is awesome to be able to remove these when you want to use them on your own or with a different quote or image, but still put it back in to be centered) and then a large scroll element to create a more intricate label to fill in this larger Labels Nine die cut, isn't that fun the way you can customize these to fit your purposes or make them fancier or simpler?And here is the Label Fourteen die cut with a sentiment die cut layered over the same die cut i showed above. I haven't even had time to make a card with it, it has been crazy with school finishing up! (But just had to share this idea, I couldn't wait!)

To go along with this star quote, I added some new bling shapes, so now in addition to the pearls, you've also got RHINESTONES and stars to play with! Hope you will spy some of them along our hop today, I will be using a few of them on samples in the following hop days, so stay tuned!

Next up, we have Theresa's "Vogue Vases" set, which has such a cool art deco or old Hollywood feel, a little bit of line art but also the great silhouettes Theresa is known for! Here I embossed one of her vases (the other is an exact line art match so you can use the other for paper piecing or line them up to use together to make one vase) in black, and then shaded the ferns by thumping two different green markers on them before stamping. If my cropping of the vase looks unusual here, I had a completely different idea in my mind, but accidentally lopped off the top of the fancy die cut label it was on, oops! Rather than scrap it, I just did a tight crop to remove the curvy edges of the label, and to "make it work", I had to come up with a new layout, one that I will admit is MUCH more interesting that my original plan! Incidentally, this is how most of my better layouts come about, trying to make the boo boos work! So don't be afraid of mistakes, embrace the opportunity! :)

I added her long border that can be used as a shelf OR just as a decorative element, that's gonna be a fun stamp! I sponged the edges of the Grass Green Pure Luxury with a deeper green ink and added some ribbon from the new StampTV kit. Still can't get enough of the new Key Lime!

Aren't you just loving how everything looks so beautiful together in this release?

Gina K

AJ Otto

Carolina Buchting

Cathy Tidwell

Deb Felts

Donna Baker

Giovana Smith

Janice Whiting

Jennie Harper

Jimmi Mayo

Lee Murphy

Melanie Muenchinger

Michelle Woerner

Sharon Harnist

Theresa Momber

Tina Gilliland

Vicki Dutcher

You're invited, check it out!

Hello, and thank you for coming to my blog today! I'd like to personally invite you to our Gina K. Designs May Release Party! We have a fun evening planned for you - chatting, prizes, challenges, stamp sets reveal, design team shares, and most importantly, at the end of the party you will be able to go shopping!

If you came from Michelle Woerner's blog, you're at the right place. If not make sure to head over to StampTV (link to StampTV's main forum) where you will find a list of all those participating in today's hop.

Here's a sneak peek of one of the cards I will be sharing at the party!

It uses my newest set, "Border Bling", made to enhance your favorite Nestabilities, (I know you'll love the fabulous sentiments included!), with a little "Bring the Bling" in the corner there, see? Yes, they coordinate! (You can't have one with the other...!) So excited for this one!! :) Thefull card and many others from me and our team tonight, be there!

Really hope to see you at the party, here are all the details:
• When: Today, Thursday, May 26
• Where: StampTV Release Party Forum
• Time: 7 PM to 9 PM (CST)

Head on over to Lee Murphy's blog to see what sneak peek she's sharing with you today and see you back here tomorrow for the beginning of our four day Inspiration Blog Hop series for May!

Thanks again for hopping with us!