confetti by lexi

alphabet soup - literally!

today's the day and i couldn't resist coming back for a release day bonus post! new stamps and goodies, including alphabet soup, will be available for purchase on papertreyink.com at 10:00 pm eastern time. but first, i've been dreaming of an alphabet soup/comfort food soup can mash up all week. mostly because this little tester can has been sitting on my desk since before stamp-a-faire - actually there are several more, but this one got the job today. i decided on a high contrast black and white background on the card base and simply layered the prepared andy warhol can on harvest gold cardstock and popped it up on foam tape. meta pop art!

and with black and white still on the brain, i whipped up one more clean and simple creation. i just love this stamp in black and white - it's so crisp and graphic and fun. i adhered it to a soft stone card base for a little color contrast and added a sentiment strip created with red embossing dymo tape. you're just my type! (yes, i do love a good pun!) and there you have it - for real this time! thank you so much for stopping by and leaving sweet comments - it's always makes my day! and hopefully i've helped you see how much you really need this fun stamp...

as always on release day, nichole has the full august product preview along with the design team's release in review (and contest!) on her blog. i can't wait to see what amazing things they've created. they're so good at making me want it all...

happy shopping!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available tonight!!)

InLinkz.com

alphabet wall art

good morning! we've made it to day five of the papertrey ink august countdown to new stamps and one more look at my new background stamp, alphabet soup. today, i'm going big - instead of cards, i've put together two examples of personalized wall art.

i love personalized items in kids rooms - letters, monograms, framed birth announcements, etc. by isolating a single letter, the alphabet soup image would be perfect for just that sort of artwork. i knew right away that i wanted to create this with secret agent. the idea of "highlighting" the letter both with color and the magnifying glass was so fun and i couldn't wait to make it happen!

like several other projects this week, i isolated the j to ink and stamp in orange zest. unlike those, i then masked it to ink and stamp the rest of the image in blueberry sky. i continued the orange and blue theme over to secret agent himself, adding in the blue details by fussy cutting and paper piecing those pieces right over the orange layer. i chose smokey shadow as my "black" for a bit more of a soft look. and i included acetate on the magnifying glass - of course!

next, i had to challenge myself to create a girl version. i wasn't sure what i was going to create around until i remembered super succulents. my girls are so into succulents! once again, i isolated and masked to get the c in green (for colleen!), while stamping the rest of the letters in pink.

using the various die cuts and stamps in the set, i created a hanging garden and hung it from the alphabet panel. because the focal image is smaller, i decided to go with a busier leafy background layer in soft stone. it's a little like wallpaper and it's the perfect backdrop to the plants! big sis mignon was a little annoyed that i didn't highlight the m. and i have to say i agree, but i'm thinking i should have done L!

well, that's a wrap from me officially. although i may have to post again tomorrow - so many ideas, so little time! definitely check back. until then, be sure to head over to nichole's blog for the daily scoop and links. and then start finalizing your list for when everything goes live on papertreyink.com tomorrow night...

is your wallet ready?!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available august 15th)

InLinkz.com

hi, friend!

happy saturday & welcome to day four of the papertrey ink august release countdown and another round of cards using alphabet soup. today is all about isolating individual letters on the background stamp. while the stamp is so much fun on it's own, there might be letters - or words! - that you want to use separately. although completely unplanned when i designed this image, the word "hi" popped right out to me and demanded attention...

using the same technique from the baby shower invites, i isolated the letters h and i together using post-it tape and stamped them in black. the letters are puzzle pieced together with no touching or overlapping, so isolating them is actually pretty easy. then i stamped the full stamp in versamark, right over the black letters as well, and embossed with clear embossing powder. a mini star sequin to dot the i finishes the sentiment off perfectly.

from there, it was clean and simple all the way! i trimmed out the alphabet soup image and cut a strip of patterned paper in the same length to fill the leftover space. then i added them color block style to my card front with foam tape for added depth and interest. i'm really loving the alphabet with tone on tone embossing - i definitely keep going back to my embossing powders this week, which is rare!!

next up, another clean and simple design. this time, i isolated and stamped "hi" without the rest of the alphabet, positioned toward the lower right corner of a 4 bar sized card.

i finished off the sentiment with the word friend from colorful words and dotted my i with an enamel dot, in limeade ice and turquoise respectively, to coordinate with the strip of patterned paper i added off to the side. a die cut arrow was the perfect addition - i love how the black and white dots play off of the colorful chevron!

and last, a monogrammed notecard with my own initials. i simply isolated the L and stamped it in bright buttercup and then isolated the D and stamped it in hawaiian shores, offset and slightly overlapping. after trimming it out, i layered it on black and added the complete focal piece to a soft stone 4 bar note card over a strip of dots from comic strip paper collection. super easy - and monogram notes make great gifts! there are so many fun fonts on this stamp - i'm considering cutting apart a second one to have all the letters individually as well.

once again, that's all i've got, but i'll be back again tomorrow! don't forget to check out today's official scoop and links on nichole's blog - it's all about halloween and the design team is killing it as usual!!

enjoy!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available august 15th)

InLinkz.com

brides & babies part two

hello! it's halfway day in the countdown to papertrey ink's new august stamps and my third day of projects with my new background stamp, alphabet soup. i thought i'd follow up yesterday's invitation post with a couple of cards for the same occasions. first up, a fairly simple wedding or love card. i stamped alphabet soup in versamark on soft stone cardstock and embossed it in a satin pearl embossing powder (it was take one of the invite yesterday and i thought i grabbed white! #saveallmistakes) 

i trimmed it to 4-1/2 x 3 which falls just at or inside the image edge - the perfect front layer panel for a smaller 4 bar notecard. in keeping with the graphic typography theme, i added a big silver chipboard ampersand and finished it off with a heart stamped on a punched circle. the circle felt out of place flat, so i dug around in the bottomless studio and found an ancient page pebble that did the trick just fine. for now, i've left the card blank inside, but i think it would be perfect for a wedding with "congratulations mr. & mrs." or for valentine's day with "i love you & me" - an extension of the ampersand fun!

next, i turned to babies again, with a rainbow pastel typography card. to create the rainbow background i stamped the image twice, isolating rows to stamp them in different colors. i used a simple lightweight piece of gridpaper for my mask - the stamp is sticky enough for it to stick to the areas i don't want to ink while i inked up the ones i wanted. once again, misti helped. first i covered the middle row and stamped the pink and yellow, then i cleaned and covered those and stamped the orange. then i moved my stamp (usually i move the paper, but i had it nestled into the corner and it was better to keep it there) and repeated the same steps with green and purple, and finally blue.

don't you love all that color?! to mix up a little, i fit the panel to the card at an angle and trimmed the edges away. i added a sentiment strip (b is for baby in keeping with the alphabet theme!) straight across the card, careful not to cover too much of one color and finished it off with a silver rattled die cut tied with a black and white bakers' twine bow. i chose to stick with black and white, keeping these add-on elements simple so that they could pop against the color. plus the color needs to shine the most!

so that's my two cents for the day - i'll be back again tomorrow! as always, be sure you read all the scoop and click all the links on nichole's blog. there's so much good stuff coming this month and so much eye candy to see on the way. today is all about thanksgiving inspiration. remember all new stamps will be available on august 15th...

stamp, post, repeat!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available august 15th)

InLinkz.com

alphabet soup showers

welcome back to day two of the papertrey ink august countdown to new stamps and my second post using my new background stamp, alphabet soup. this set came to life first as a printed invite for a customer who was hosting an alphabet bridal shower. each guest gets a different letter that should guide their gift purchase. fun idea, right?! so i thought i'd share a couple of stamped versions of the original printed one (click to see it on instagram).

first up, the same basic invite in soft stone and white. i printed the invite wording in a warm gray on a half sheet of soft stone cardstock leaving room to stamp alphabet soup in versamark above which i then embossed in white. after trimming about 1/8 of an inch off of each side, i backed it with a half sheet of fresh snow linen cardstock to add a little more texture and pop.

like the original, i tied on a large silver letter (adhesive chipboard from michael's), hanging over the stamped image and secured with a little washi tape on the back. not only is this how the guests know what letter to shop for, but they are asked to detach the letter and include it on their gift. (we also created an alphabet garland out of these same letters - i love coordinated party details!)

with the gift in mind, i decided to create a gift tag next. i started by spreading pearlescent embossing paste over a quarter sheet of cardstock, coated my stamp in versamark, and stamped it in, peeling it away carefully. once it was dry i trimmed around the image and cut it into two tags, adding a hole to tie on another big silver letter balanced by a sentiment strip near the bottom. while i created this to coordinate with the invitation, it could easily be a monogrammed stand alone gift tag for any occasion!

when i was originally researching the wedding shower alphabet theme, i found that there were way more baby alphabet shower ideas out there. it's definitely a fitting theme for babies, too! so i decided to create a couple of those with the new stamp as well. this time, instead of adding a letter to be removed, i've highlighted the assigned letter in the same color as the invite and changed the note at the bottom to reflect that - plus a few other words too. pink or blue, a baby's due!

i simply isolated the letter i wanted to feature using post-it tape and inked it up in the color of choice. then after stamping and cleaning it off, i inked up the whole stamp in versamark and embossed it all in clear - right over the colored image (misti helped!).

the result is a tone on tone image, with one letter in color, all shiny and pretty. because you ink the individual letter in dye ink first, and ink over it again all at once in versamark with the rest of the letters, it's not really that many steps. i suppose it's a little more time intensive if you're having a big crowd, but totally cute and worth the effort. i wish i had time to do a full alphabet for you today!

the only bad news really is that cards in these pale and pastel colors are so hard to photograph - especially when it's dark and rainy all day! none of these pictures truly do these invites justice, but hopefully you get the idea. i love seeing graphics i create for invites turned into stamps - it's so much fun to incorporate different stamping techniques on invitations!

that's all for today - more tomorrow! but first be sure to click all the links on nichole's blog for new eye candy every day! remember: all new product will be available on august 15th from papertreyink.com...

you're invited!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available august 15th)

InLinkz.com

introducing alphabet soup!

good morning! welcome to day one of the papertrey ink august countdown to new stamps and a new pieces of confetti offering. introducing alphabet soup, an alphabet background block. i love a good background stamp and this one will be so fun for a variety of occasions. first up, with school (so sadly) looming, i have a couple of teacher cards... 

the size of the background block is such that it can also be used as a focal point on a standard A2 card, with the full image showing - or in the case of this card, i guess you might call it a focal background. there's room for the image to have a little white space on all sides, plus a little extra at the bottom to fit a sentiment without covering it up much if you stamp it towards the top like i did. and wouldn't you know it? i created a sentiment strip (white embossed on true black) to ground the coffee and apple for teacher. ha! (aka: have you played make it monday yet?!) 

one idea often leads to another. and after stamping alphabet soup directly on the card above, i wanted to create a layer with it. not surprisingly, chalkboard art came to mind! i stamped it in versamark ink on smokey shadow cardstock, embossed in white and then stamped it again in white slightly offset from the first image. then i smudged a little extra white ink to chalk it up a bit and trimmed it out. like the first card, i placed it toward the top of my card, using it as a focal background more than a simple background. no sentiment strip this time - instead i stamped it in pure poppy off to the left to balance the apple, which is popped up on foam tape with the coffee cup. i wanted a little extra pop of green as well, so i created a straw for my cup this time using new leaf ink to coordinate with the leaf on the apple. i simply masked off a skinny rectangle on a scrap of white cardstock with post-its and used an ink blender to color it in, so i could cut it out with a white border to coordinate with the rest of the image. add a pocket to the inside of these for a coffee shop gift card and you've got a great back to school treat or thank you for teacher!

that's all for today, but i'll be back tomorrow. until then, be sure to head over to nichole's blog for more scoop and design team links - laurie's showcasing alphabet soup as well! and remember, all new product will be available from papertreyink.com on august 15th...

happy countdown!
:) lexi

 

supplies used ~ alphabet soup (available august 15th)

InLinkz.com

sneak peekin'

hello stamping friends! here's a little peek nichole posted of my latest pieces of confetti stamp set, actually a background stamp. i'll be sharing countdown projects here for the next few days - all new products will available on the fifteenth...

abc-ya tomorrow!
:) lexi

make it monday with sentiment strips

good morning! it's my turn again for papertrey ink's make it monday and i thought it would be fun to focus on quick and easy stamping and a clean and simple layout design after all the painting and ink blending during stamp-a-faire. while i love all that stuff, clean and simple will always be my first love. 

so i'm sharing one of my go-to layout strategies that i'm calling sentiment strip grounding - using a sentiment strip to ground images. the give me a hand card above is one of several examples i share from my past countdown stash. it's not so much a specific card layout as it is a strategy for grouping and grounding images around a sentiment in an interesting way. 

it's a perfect strategy for managing your white space on clean and simple cards like the one i make on camera using comfort food. the sentiment strip gives the impression of a table top, a place for the ice cream pint and bowl to rest. all together, the words and images play off of each other for a clean and cohesive look.

of course the strategy isn't only for clean and simple. if white space isn't your thing, add some patterned paper, or if more is more, i say go for it! it's one of those tricks that can be incorporated into a variety of design styles - anytime you don't want floating images really.

 

so check out the video, stamp some fun sentiment strips, and link up over on nichole's blog. i can't wait to see what you create!

happy stamping!
:) lexi