DT Thursday time! Sandie has a fab project for us to follow along with today!

Continue reading DT Thursday: Create a Box of Floral Tags with Sandiebella!

Hey hey! Elaineabella here with my usual Spotlight Tuesday post, except this week it’s CRAZY TUESDAY! Not only that, it’s DOUBLE CRAZY TUESDAY!

That means there are SIX stamps and “CUT IT OUT” DIES on offer at Crazy Tuesday prices today and only for today! Check out the inspiration below to see why you need them, then click on over to the store to grab them before the prices return to normal! (by midnight tonight!)

Continue reading Spotlight On: DOUBLE Crazy Tuesday August 2018 Offers!

Elaineabella here with a Marker Geek Monday post for you!

Now, I know, it is still summer. Believe me, I know. I’m over it. Every year, around July/August I start longing for October, and I have a deep desire to colour all of the autumn related things. This works pretty well for all the release colouring I tend to do around this time (hint, I just finished the next release and it is brilliant), but not so well for getting all the fun summer themed stuff done. Oh well! Anyway, I’m still in a bit of a funk, but I’ve been feeling drawn to my coloured pencils, so I thought I would play around do a little autumn themed colouring.

As a follow on from my last Marker Geek Monday post HERE, I decided to use blending solution with my pencils again, which is something I fell out of love with years ago. Here, now, in 2018, I’m back in love. Hooray! I spent a little time testing out some of the blending solution options I have on hand, to see what worked best, with each of my coloured pencils.

I won’t go into the testing in full depth, but a few observations for you:

• Out of the options I have on hand, Winsor & Newton Sansodor performed best, closely followed by Zest It Pencil Blend. The Sansodor seemed to move the pigment around a little more.
• Copic Colourless Blender worked quite well, which is good to know in a pinch! Isopropyl alcohol (rubbing alcohol) would also work.
• I did not care for Turpenoid at all, and I didn’t find the results to be that great.
• The paper you use, as always, makes a difference. It isn’t always a huge difference, but it is often noticeable. Moving the pigment around on my preferred paper vs a cheap plain cardstock was much easier, although the cheaper cardstock did also yield decent end results.

That’s it for now, I’ll leave you with today’s colouring and my dreams of autumn…

Stamp Used: The Littles Pumpkin Friends (coordinating die also available)

I stamped the image on hot press watercolour paper and coloured using Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencils with Sansodor to blend.

Colours Used: Skin – Light Flesh, Cinnamon, Medium Flesh, Dark Sepia Hair – Bistre, Burnt Sienna, Dark Sepia Scarf & Pumpkin Stalks – May Green, Olive Green Yellowish Dress – Violet, Mauve, Dark Sepia Pumpkins – Terra cotta, Sanguine, Burnt Sienna Hedgehog – Nougat, Van Dyck Brown Fox – Nougat, Sanguine, Indian Red Ground – Bistre, Van Dyck Brown, Dark Sepia Sky – Light Ultramarine, Ultramarine

Note: One thing I remembered while colouring was that my least favourite thing about colouring using this method has always been colouring skin. It always turns out a little dirty/patchy looking to me. With that in mind, I’ll probably grab my Copics for that area next time, or use the pencils without the blending solution.

Over To You!

What do you prefer to do when colouring with coloured pencils? Do you use a blending solution, or just the pencils?

Share your personal favourite Stamping Bella creations with us. We LOVE to see what you’ve been creating with Stamping Bella stamps. Share a link to your latest Stamping Bella card in the comments below, or an old favourite you made a while ago. Tell us what your favourite stamps are. Are there any additions you would like to see to the range? Let us know!

Another way to connect is by joining us in the Stamping Bella Sistahood Facebook Group and share your pictures.

If you are posting your images online, we would love to see them on Instagram and all the platforms mentioned above. To make it easier for us to find you just use #markergeekmonday and/or #stampingbella as a hashtag. Even better tag me @markergeek and @stampingbella . We love it when you connect, so don’t be shy!

Until next time, HAPPY STAMPING!

MWAH

Elaineabella

Hey hey! Elaineabella here. As I prepare to get back into the swing of things, and bring you some more regular weekly posts here on the blog, I thought this would be a great time to create an updated list of all the Stamp It Saturday posts we’ve done so far. Hopefully you will find it a useful reference for posts you wanted to look back on, or perhaps you will spot some interesting posts that you missed! Read on for the list.

Continue reading Stamp it Saturday Up To Date Post List

Where oh where does the time go?  Honestly I feel like it was 5 minutes ago that I sat here writing last Friday’s post.  My friends and I have been discussing it  a lot lately.. like when our kids were so little.. reminiscing.. sniffling.. you get the ideaR.

My mom came to visit last night and is staying for the weekend.  I sat with her and the kids and we were laughing and joking and really having a good time last night.  This morning, while the kids were sleeping, we were talking and she said to me “you really are friends with your kids aren’t you”… I wasn’t sure if she was judging me or complimenting me LOL.. I said YES I love the fact that I am friends with my kids and they know that they can come to me for everything and anything  BUT they know when and if they cross the line and they respect me as their mother and what I say.  That’s what is important to me.  If not handled properly I can understand how being a “friend” to your child  can go the wrong way. Who said raising kids was easy?  they should be SHOT. LOL (just kidding.. kinda)

So enough blabla.. let’s have our Bellarific Friday show commence!

This week’s Bellarific friday features our AUGUST stamp of the month!  TINY TOWNIE BONNIE LOVES BOWS

Let’s see what our baberoonis came up with! p.s. dies are limited in quantity and once they are gone they go back up to full price!

Elaineabella here, with a new Spotlight feature post! Today I’m throwing the spotlight on one of my personal favourites, just because!

Tiny Townie Susie the Succulent (coordinating die available)