Think, think, think.....

I love this tree image.

It's from Lovely As a Tree, a very versatile stamp set, great for seasonal, and masculine cards!

Why do I love this particular tree? It reminds of of the Party Tree in the Shire, from the Lord of the Rings, or it could be a giant tree from the Thousand Acre Woods....both are my favourite fictional places.









Hmmm..... if only I could figure out how to add streamers to the tree. Then I could make a Tolkien-esque card.....

Or maybe I can add a Winnie the Pooh sticker....and Tigger too!


Think, think, think.....

Blooming Beautiful

I've been busy lately but have made plenty of cards this past month.

I thought I'd post the Mother's Day card I made.... I used a sponge and regular ink pad to create the background. To help the sponge pick up more colour, you can always spray a little bit of water onto the sponge, or use a re-inker. I also used chalk pastels to watercolour the flower image.

I like using the scalloped circle punch. It's great for spotlighting an image!!

Something simple

I'm a big fan of simple layouts. Did I say that already??

Maybe it comes from the yearbook editor days, but when there are too many elements on a page, it just looks way too cluttered for me. A simple and clean design is what I always try to go for.

Of course, that means my layouts probably aren't very original, but hey, I never said I was a designer! Just a monkey-crafter! :P

Anyway, here is a card with a simple layout, which can be adapted for virtually any kind of card you want.

For this, I used the versamark watermark pad to add some very faint texture to the background on the white cardstock. You can barely see it, but it's there.

The watermark shows up more in this picture than it does in real life though, because of the light. It's almost like my own designer paper, home made. :) So far I've found that the watermark can be better seen on coloured cardstock, and it is barely noticable on the white, but I haven't used it that much. I'll keep trying new things with it though as I like the effect very much!

As for the images, I love this stamp set. It's aptly named "If the halo fits" from the 2008 Spring-Summer collection of Stampin' Up! So far I've used the angel image for a birthday card, and a get well card, and this one is a thank you card. So versatile! :)

(I'm going to have to figure out how to edit picture sizes.....)

Fancy Birthday

One of my sisters celebrated a birthday in March and I'm quite proud of the card I made for her. I based it on another card that I had made last year but with a slightly different layout.

For this one, I used an image from "Summer By the Sea" from the Spring-Summer 2008 Catalogue from Stampin' Up! As you can see, since this is a later card, my watercolouring has improved!! (but not by much hehe).

The greeting is from "A Little Birthday Cheer" and the definition of "wish" on the envelope is from "Define Your Life".

I used a glue pen to write "Birthday Girl" and

tapped glitter all over it for the final touch. I really like this card. Its simple, but very pretty!

Not all my cards turn out this way though. Sometimes it takes me FOREVER to get a card right. *sigh*

But this one's just perfect! :D

Lining things up.....

I know...the watercolouring could use some help, and I could have used more adhesive.

Watercolouring was the first technique I learned in a card class, and I love the technique. (I'm still trying to perfect it though.) So of course, this was one of the first stamp sets I ordered and of course....this also ended up being one of the first cards I made.

The image is from "Seaside Sketches", from Stampin' Up!'s 2006-2007 Catalogue. I only watercoloured the background and the jeans to add focus on the father-son duo.

The circle window was created using the 1-3/8" and 1-1/4" circle punches from Stampin' Up!

The circle looks in at the greeting (also from "Seaside Sketches" set) which reads "The best things in life are not free, but priceless." The text inside doesn't exactly line up perfectly, and if I were to make this card again, I'd definitely try to line it up better. But that is a minor minor detail.

I think this would be a great Father's Day card!

Intro to Monkey Crafts....

Yes yes, monkey-crafts, my crafting blog.

I'll be putting up cards and maybe other things, that I've made. :) But....I've only made cards and bookmarks so far.

So yes, here's what you'll see....99% of images will be from Stampin' Up! Supplies I use will be about 50% to 100%. Why? Cuz I'm a Stampin' Up! Independent Demonstrator! :) (Plus I like their stuff.)

Why am I posting my cards? Not sure....partly because I like to make cards but have very few people to give them to, or I just can't part with it! Since I'm taking pictures of my cards anyway (so that I remember what they look like when I do give them away), I might as well share some of them.....

Not all of them will be "monkey originals" but they will be all "monkey-made"!