July 23, 2016
4 Comments
Hiya sistahs!
we are back from our 5 days at the Cape.. it was soooo amazing,. we whale watched… we went to Province Town, Martha’s vineyard.. ate steamers.. and lobsters.. shell hunted.. it was the best 5 days! Now we are back in Montreal for 2 days and then back to our HOME BASE: Toronto… A whirlwind I tell ya!
Hope you all had an amazing week too
This week’s theme was a Mojobella sketch
lets see what our baberoonis came up with shall we?
AliceWERTZabella used DONTTALKTOMEBEFOREMYCOFFEEabella
Carlabella used LIZZY LAPTOP
Danabella used UPTOWN GIRL REBECCA loves to READ
and the inside with the sentiment
FAYE-W-J-abella used Uptown girl PIPPA loves to PLANT
Kerribella used TINY TOWNIE HAYLEY the HERO
Sandiebella used UPTOWN GIRL FAITH the FAIRY
Shelabella used BALLOONABELLA 2.0
Stephabella used UPTOWN GIRL MOLLY
How amazing are these? LOVVEEEE
Now for our INLINKZ CONTRIBUTORS CLICK HERE and scroll to the bottom of the post
and now for our emailed contributors!
Next week’s theme is ONE LAYER WONDER card.. only ONE layer sistahs using a CURRENT Stamping Bella Stamp (you can search in the search box on top right to see if your stamp Is current)
We would LOVE to see your creations!
July 21, 2016 10 Comments
July 20, 2016 31 Comments
Gasp. Pencil!? What? Yes, this is a Sandy-Allnock-Guest-Post, but this time for Cakeabella, I got out my Prismacolor pencils!
You might find some stamps in your collection that have tiny areas to color. And if you’re struggling with getting a paint brush or marker nib in those tiny areas, give your pencils a try. Maybe even in combination with other mediums – let the pencils do the tiny work! I made mine do it all. Coz that’s how I roll! 🙂 Watch my video below, or click HERE to see it in HD on YouTube.
PS In case we didn’t meet last week – I’m a crazy colorist and I post a couple videos a week, so if you’re a visual learner, come on over and visit on my blog and YouTube channel and we can have some fun. Oh and be sure to visit on Instagram too…since I’ll be sharing more Stamping Bella fun there all month, too!
July 19, 2016 6 Comments
Hey all! Elaineabella here today with a fun new feature here at Blogabella. We have so many fantastic stamps in the Stamping Bella collection but sometimes it’s easy to overlook the little gems in the collection amongst all the excitement of new releases. This little feature is a way to celebrate either a complete line of stamps like “The Cool Chicks” or “The Wobbles” or “Uptown Girls” or “Tiny Townies”, or just a particular stamp we think needs another moment in the spotlight. If you’re new to Stamping Bella this should be a great feature to follow, to discover fun stamps you may not have seen, and to get inspiration for using them.
Today I’d like to shine that spotlight on one of my own favourite lines within the collection: THE COOL CHICKS! Now, these little guys have their own section on the website, but they do not like to be restricted. They keep popping up all over the place, hanging out with the Tiny Townies, Bunny Wobbles, Woodsies, generally getting into mischief. They are so dramatic, so expressive and just too funny. They are also a breeze to colour!
Behind the scenes Emily and I share a lot of laughs about the crazy Cool Chicks. Seriously. Emily will send me an image to colour and I will marvel over the amount of character and expression in those tiny little loons. I love getting all of the Stamping Bella images to colour, but I definitely have a particular soft spot for those pesky little chicks.
One of my favourite examples is Tiny Townie Peyton Loves to Pretend.
Just look at those chicks. The one on the left is all “Oh Peyton you look amazing!”, the one in the middle on the right is SO embarrassed, and the one on the end flat out refuses to look. Because yes, look at her, she’s wearing a chicken costume. She is ridiculous and at the same time completely awesome. Admit it, you’ve been one or all of the chicks at some point with someone in your life. I know I’m often the one in the middle on the right. He’s just sick of it – he’s seen it before and he’s had enough. In fact, he’s going to rant about it in his journal.
Here’s a card from the fantastic Bellariffic Babes aka the Stamping Bella DT. Love giving their work another moment in the spotlight too – they totally deserve that!
Another favourite of mine is the fabulous The Chicks that Couldn’t Even stamp set.
The chicks, the sentiments, the whole package. Love it. So very perfect for adding to a planner when you’re having a spectacular FAIL of a day/week/month/year. Brilliant for sending a notecard to a friend who is having a rough time and who appreciates a little humour. The one flat out and face down on the floor? That’s me this week – I have labyrinthitis and I CANNOT EVEN. I could not, even if I wanted to. The one leaning against/sliding down the wall? That was me outside the supermarket the other day (or truth be told almost any time I go to the supermarket).
Some inspiration from the Babes:
The Cool Chicks have also been adding a little mischief and humour to the festive range. Caroling Chicks is a definite favourite in this house, and recipients of my Christmas cards featuring this stamp last year found it delightful and hilarious. It’s the one on the far right that cracks me up – look at that expression, he’s had enough. Is it the carols? Is it the whole festive palaver? Did the antler hat on the chick in front just tip him over the edge? 😉
Love this card by Lesliebella which shows how perfect this stamp is for a clean and simple Christmas card. The image is so full of character and humour, just add a little colour and you’re good to go! The chicks are so quick and easy to colour that you could easily produce multiples.
Not to forget another fantastic festive image featuring the chicks: Trimming The Tree has them creating holiday mayhem with the baubles. The one on the left with his bum in the air? I can’t even.
Look how TracyMacabella used this one on a gorgeous Christmas tag:
Back to the Tiny Townies, if you check out Tiny Townie Sage loves Science you will see the most adorable thing ever.
Look at that chick with the huge glasses. He has NO idea what’s going on, he just wears those glasses to look smart, like his little friend with the safety goggles on. I think Sage is pretty much on her own with the experiments, or she’ll be cleaning up after the chicks. 😉
Check out Stephabella’s gorgeous and colourful card. Perfect!
Some of the chicks now come as little separate stamps in each set (see Tiny Townie Peyton Loves to Pretend). This means you can make up your own scenes with them or add a little Cool Chick drama wherever you like! I know they cheer me up whenever I see them. What other images do you think you could sneak a chick into with adorable/hilarious effect?
If you’re looking for some colouring tips and suggestions to get you going with this fun line of stamps, we’ve got them for you!
I’ve also created a little playlist on YouTube where I will add any videos I upload featuring the Cool Chicks stamps. Watch the current selection below or in HD over on YouTube.
NOTE: the Cool Chicks don’t have to be yellow, that’s just how I see them! You can colour your chicks whatever colour you like. Maybe they fell in some fluorescent paint, or dyed their feathers blue. Maybe one of Tiny Townie Sage’s experiments went wrong (probably because of the chicks…) and they ended up with weird colourful spots. Just have fun!
Hopefully I’ve inspired you to get those Cool Chicks stamped up and made into cards to help spread a little fun and laughter! I know I’d be delighted to get some colourful Cool Chick fun in the mail and I’m betting you know someone who could benefit from a little chicky cheer!
Share your personal favourite Cool Chick 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 Cool Chicks stamps are. Is there anything you would like to see the Cool Chicks getting up to? 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
July 18, 2016 10 Comments
Time to get another week started off the way we mean to go on – with lots of colour! It’s me -Elaineabella – here to share some more colouring tips with you for Marker Geek Monday. This week I’m answering some requests that came via Instagram, to see some colouring with the Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers. Connect with us folks, we’re listening!
If you also enjoy colouring with alcohol based markers like Copics and you missed last week’s post take a look when you’re done here, especially if you find images like Tiny Townie Bree loves Buttercream a little daunting with those big lacy ruffled skirts : Marker Geek Monday: Copic Colouring a Ruffled Skirt with Step by Step and Colouring Video. Although that post was created using Copic Markers, I would actually approach the colouring in a similar way using other supplies like the Zig Clean Color Pens, so it is worth checking it out whatever your preferred medium.
Over on the Stamping Bella Instagram feed, mperezdetagle asked if any of us have coloured Stamping Bella images with Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers. I know that our current special guest Sandy Allnock has coloured some of the stamps in the past (see her awesome Nacho blog post with video), but I’m not sure I’ve seen any of our character stamps coloured with them and I certainly hadn’t attempted them personally. I had a quick play with mine and Thinkingofyouabella and this was the result:
Not too bad! I actually like her a lot more now than I did straight after colouring her, which is often the case with colouring.
TOP TIP: if you’re not loving your work, walk away for a while and return to it with fresh eyes. So often our opinions of our work can be tainted by the disappointment we feel when things aren’t going exactly as we envisaged, or the frustration of having to deal with technical issues in the process.
A few people, including our wonderful BOSSABELLA Emily requested that I do a post/video using the markers. I was a little hesitant, as while I am not new to the markers, I also don’t feel that I’ve practiced enough in this particular area with them. Then I thought it might still be fun to let you see how I approached colouring with them, and give you a little peek at the process. Hopefully this post will help you feel inspired to experiment yourself, whether with these particular pens or whatever you may have!
These markers are a completely different beast to my usual alcohol based markers (Copics, Touch Twin, ProMarkers etc). They are filled with a water-based dye ink. Unlike most watercolour markers however, they have a proper bristle tip. One very appealing advantage of the proper synthetic bristle tip is that it enables you to achieve beautiful fine details, which you will see if you take a look at Thinkingofyouabella‘s hair. The bristles give a flexibility that allows you to create lines that go from thick to thin quite naturally and fluidly. I absolutely loved colouring the hair with these pens using the direct to paper marker blending technique.
The Zig Clean Color Real Brush pens are available in sets ranging from small 6 marker packs to the large 80 pen set. They are also available as open stock, so you could start out with a smaller set to try them out and supplement with individual pens later on, or just buy individual pens from the outset. When I purchased mine last year I bought the 60 set and have since added a few pens here and there by buying them individually. Shop around – prices seem to vary and you can get some good deals online.
The fact that the pens are available individually is great, because these are not refillable. I’ve had mine for around a year now, but have not done a huge amount of colouring with them so can’t really comment on how long they last.
Mostly I’ve used my Zig Clean Color Real Brush Pens to colour in my adult colouring books. I tend to use them without water as most colouring books don’t stand up well to wet media, and so I used the same technique on the image above and on my second attempt which I also filmed for you (watch my video below). I lay down the darker colour and then blend it out with a lighter shade. This technique seems to work much better on a smooth paper as opposed to a rough watercolour paper. I used Strathmore Bristol Board here, and found it worked really nicely. The image I posted on Instagram and the image I coloured in today’s post are my first attempts at colouring skin tones with the markers.
One of my favourite things about these pens is that they are great to travel with. I store mine in a large cosmetic pouch, along with colour swatches for reference and a water brush.
As the ink in these pens is a water-based dye you will want to use an ink pad for stamping that plays nicely with water-based media. My personal preference is for Ranger Archival Ink Jet Black, but Versafine Onyx Black also works perfectly. These inks of course, do not work well with Copic Markers!
TOP TIP: If you’re stamping on a rough surfaced watercolour paper you may wish to use a stamp positioner like the MISTI stamping tool to allow you to easily re-stamp if your impression doesn’t come out perfect first time.
Here’s the video showing how I coloured my stamped image. Watch below or in HD over on YouTube (while you’re there make sure to subscribe and check out my Stamping Bella playlist).
If you’re using the pens with water, they behave quite differently to the technique I’ve shown here. Keep reading as you will find I’ve got some inspiration and information to share for this technique too!
NOTE: I’m not too happy with the way the blush colour on the cheeks dried. When the colour settled into the paper it actually lightened significantly, giving the cheeks more of a bleached out appearance. This fits with the way you can use the lighter marker to blend out the darker colours, it just didn’t occur to me while colouring that this would be the case. As you can see in the video, while wet the colour appeared much darker. Next time I will try a darker shade of pink for the cheeks and see how that works out.
I thought I’d add a handy colour map for the image, as I usually do with my Copic Marker posts. I’ve also included one for the first image I coloured as seen on Instagram.
Remember that if you purchase Stamping Bella stamps you can obtain free Copic Colour Maps for the versions shown on the product packaging – go HERE to find out how to do that. Between those and the bonus colour maps often featured here on the blog, you can build up a great library of colour combinations to try out with your own Copic collection.
Over on my own blog – Marker Geek – I’ve got another video for you featuring Thinkingofyouabella and the Zig Clean Color pens. There’s a difference though – over there I’ve used a different technique by adding water and using them as watercolours. Click through to my blog to read the post and watch the video: Colouring with Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers ft. Stamping Bella. I could only have been further outside my comfort zone if I were using actual watercolour paints! You know what though? I had a lot of fun, and it gave my brain a little workout.
TOP TIP: Step outside your comfort zone from time to time. You may surprise yourself, and you will definitely learn more than you will by always playing it safe. Make the time, take a chance and reap the creative rewards!
If you try out the techniques shown in this post with your Stamping Bella stamps, be sure to share! We would love to see the results and hear how you feel about them. Show off your creations in the comments below and even better, share your own favourite tips with us. Let’s talk colour!
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 COLOURING!
MWAH
Elaineabella
July 15, 2016 7 Comments
I hope you’re having a great week and I so hope you are loving all of our posts… I think they are so amazing ifidosaysomyself LOL
We are all in Montreal again.. we helped settle my father into the rehabilitation facility for his hip AGAIN.. and therapy has begun AGAIN.. it seems like he is recovering at a more rapid pace this time but his mindset is still quite negative so it is VERY tough.. but we are plowing through it hoping things will get better. Meanwhile we are enjoying the city .. actually showing the kidlets where we are from.. from our old houses where we lived to restaurants we went to as kids to McGill University where I graduated from.. going for walks and of course ending almost every night with this.. please note MAJOR DIET STARTS in AUGUST LOL.
Ryan discovered this ice cream place called “LA DIPERIE”… omg the concept of this place is that you order vanilla soft serve, then they have 30 hot dips to dip the vanilla into… dips like coffee crisp.. dulce de leche.. oreo cookie, banana, … AND THEN.. wait for it… wait for it… they dip THAT into any TOPPING you want.. like oreos.. coffee crisp.. hazelnuts.. fleur de sel.. lavender.. smarties.. you name it.. is that INSANE OR WHAT?
Here’s Tyler with his OREO dip and OREO TOPPING
Here’s Jayden with her COOKIE DOUGH dip and OREO TOPPING. I CANNOT EVEN…
we also tried to teach the kids about the Montreal “joie de vivre”.. just the feeling I used to have growing up… We randomly walked into this restaurant and found Ryan’s oldest friend and his family.. we pulled tables together, drinks flowing.. laughing.. reminiscing.. it was just the therapy and nostalgia I needed.. We then went to St. Viateur bagel at 11:30 PM.. a Montreal institution.. and couldn’t help MAWING (it’s my word for shoving down my throat) the FRESH HOT WOOD BURNING OVEN BAGELS …. sooooo good. If you ever have a chance to visit Montreal you HAVE to go to St. Viateur. Promise? k
Now on to our regular show 🙂
Today’s Bellarific Friday theme is CHRISTMAS in July
AliceWERTZabella used PENGUIDEER
Carlabella used UPTOWN GIRL QUINN
Danabella used PETUNIA loves CHRISTMAS
FAYE-WJ-ABELLA used Uptown girl EVE under the MISTLETOE
Kerribella used THE CHOIR
Sandiebella used UPTOWN GIRL EVE under the MISTLETOE
Shelabella used MAGGIE with PENGUIN AND Edna Blows a kiss SIGN BASE
and Stephabella used UPTOWN GIRL EVE under the MISTLETOE
How’s that for some Christmas Cheer? LOVE.
Check out our INLINKZ contributors at the bottom of THIS post
and now for our emailed sistahood contributions!
here’s Gail’s card closed
and then when you open it she used MERRY EVERYTHING!
Heather used SANTA EXPRESS
Lynda used SINGIN so BEAUTIFUL
Amazingness!!
Now for next week’s theme?
a MOJOBELLA sketch!
use any CURRENT Stamping Bella image following this sketch and send it ovah!
