New Weekly Feature: Reader of the Week

Good Thursday morning!  Today is the first installment of my Reader of the Week.   This new feature will highlight a blogger who reads my blog and leaves a comment.  Everyone has a fair and equal opportunity to be selected.  Each week I will randomly select a winner by reading through the list of people who leave me a comment on one of my posts.   With 500 people reading my blog every day, there is a lot of opportunity to bring attention to yourself.  It’s that simple.

Kim Hutchinson:  Running on Ink

This week’s Reader of the Week is Kim, from Running on Ink.  Kim is a mixed media artist who incorporates photos of her family into her work.  She has a witty sense of humor, often leaving thoughts on her pieces by gluing on words found from an old textbook.  The piece above is one of my favourite pieces.   Her signature blue is highlighted with pretty colours, text and rubberstamping.  Did you notice that the artwork is held up by a bent fork?  Kim constantly surprises her readers with unique art created from unusual “stuff.”   Kim is a long-time cyber friend, so I thought it was fitting to introduce my new feature with Kim’s blog.

For a chance to be featured as my Reader of the Week, simply leave a comment on one of my posts.

Names will be chosen at random.

Tutorial Tuesday: Scallop Edge Flower

Here I am a little late in the day, wondering how I should introduce this fold.  Quite often I’m torn about divulging my weaknesses to my readers.  My sister, Cathie, firmly believes that I should stand tough and keep my hardships to myself.  So far I have listened to her, but this time I am overriding her advice, and I’m going to admit that I had difficulty with this design.  Yes, folks, Beth had a very difficult time trying to follow the video tutorial, and almost scrapped the tutorial.  But, because it was shot before I went to bed last night, I had no time to prepare a new tutorial.  When will I ever learn to shoot earlier the week previous to posting?!  Beth, of Nana’s Memories and More is always quick to whip up her own version of my tutorial.  Beth,  please give me a critique of the tutorial–if you try it that is.  I might have scared you, and all my other readers, away.  If anyone does try this, please get back to me and let me know how you made out.  That said, I am not letting this technique get to me–I will try it until I accomplish the results I want.  I still haven’t decided if I am going to post this in my index of tutorials.  What do you think?

The video I followed can be found at After Midnight Art Ranch.  Good luck!

Supplies:  Scallop Circle Nestability

Cuttlebug machine and folder

Variety of ink

Sponge

Double-sided paper (mine is Stamp’n up DP)

Cut out four scallop circles.  Emboss.  Two pieces of paper can be laid on top of each other with great results.

Sponge colour onto the embossed side and along the edges.

Here you will see I distressed the edges of the backside of the circle (on the left).  The embossed part of the paper was distressed with ink (on the right).

I used two coordinating colours of ink.  By inking one colour randomly over your image, and inking a second colour randomly once again,  you will end up with lovely results.

Only two colours of ink were used.  The designer paper helps to make it look more interesting.  Sponging overtop of colours resulted in it looking like I used more than two ink pads.

Fold in half.  Be sure to fold in between the scallops.  Edges won’t match exactly, but that is okay.

Fold over the left side of the half circle so that the left edge touches the center of the half circle.  Ensure the bottom edges are lined up.

Take the far edge that you just folded to the center of the half circle and bend it to the left.  You want to make sure the bottom edges are shaped into a sharp point.

Next, turn the paper over so the back is facing up.

The top edge that my newly painted nail is pointing too (Donnie is still out on whether he likes it or not–I think it is his way to say I went overboard and he doesn’t like it–LOL.  It’s kind of how my girlfriends husband reacted to her pink hair die job–right Kim!) is drawn down so the edges meet on the left as seen below.

This is what the backside looks like now.

Open the scallop circle up, and cut down the long centre line.

Fold each petal as you see in this photo.

Attach petals to a circle with glue dots.

Wow.  16 photos, and lots of talking later, you’re now ready to put your flower onto a project or card.

For a full list of my tutorials, click on “Tutorials” on the top of the page.

Don’t miss out on my weekly tutorials–subscribe today.

Tutorial to be Posted This Evening

My weekly tutorial will be posted this evening.  Until then, enjoy this Drywall Stitching.  This technique came from the Technique Junkie Newsletter.

Hello from Snow

One of the nice things about blogging is the friendships that are developed through cyberspace.  I have several cyberfriends, and one of them sent me this adorable dress, all the way from Mexico, for Snow.  Audrey, of Audrey’s Cards by Design was just as excited to see Snow in the dress as I was.  Thank you, Audrey, for this adorable dress.  Snow received lots of comments when we went for a walk yesterday.  She is being groomed up nice on Wednesday, so I’ll have more pictures for you.

Snow is 3 pounds and her dress is a tiny xxsmall.

Odd Bird Planet Earth Day Challenge Winners

Congratulations to Tiffany at Ink Blots for winning the Odd Bird Planet Earth Day stamp.  But wait, that’s not my only winner.  Beth from Nana’s Memories and More will receive an Odd Bird Planet stamp and a goodie bag  from me.

Tiffany’s name will be entered into a draw for the grand prize of $100, $50, or a coupon for 25% discount.

Ladies, please e-mail me your mailing addresses to:  scrapbook4ever@yahoo.ca