More Browns Technique Cards

This card started as a panel made at Lynette's house on Oct. 23rd using Natasha Foote's YouTube tutorial,  Browns Only Technique, Video #1237 from Sept. 24, 2025. The embossing of the hill and trees was demonstrated by Natasha at about the 10:15 minute mark in her video tutorial.

I tried the technique, first wiping the bottom of the panel with an anti-static powder bag. I tore a piece of paper to make the mask for the hill.  I applied Versafine embossing ink to the paper below the hill mask with a makeup sponge. Then I stamped the trees with embossing ink. Finally I added the gold embossing powder and heat set it all.

I liked how the gold embossing looked, but the paper I used was thin and there was warping from when I did the browns technique. I tried to "get rid" of some of that warped paper by cutting my panel with a Hero Arts Oval nesting infinity die. I cut a black "frame" with the next size larger oval die. I did not get my panel centered perfectly, however! 

The photo above shows  the way the "swiping" of the 3 colors looks, working from the bottom of the page toward the top: Gina K's dark chocolate, warm cocoa and soft stone at the top. 

Below are three cards and another sample showing the swiping of the inks at the beginning. Below each card I list the ink colors I used for the sky. Info about the stamps is at the end.

Ink blending: distress tumbled glass for the lake and streams. The sky, bottom up: distress fossilized amber, Gina K sweet mango, blue denim.

Ink blending: distress tumbled glass for the lake and streams. The sky, bottom up: Gina K wild dandelion, sweet mango, bubblegum pink, blue denim.

Ink blending: Gina K peach bellini, lovely lavender, wild lilac.

Above you can I tried swiping greens for the land. Used Gina K's asparagus, then jelly bean and soft stone at the top. I liked using the Fabiano Smooth Bristol paper 103 lb. (280 gsm). It worked much better than my regular inexpensive cardstock. It held up to water without much warping to much. 

The stamps for the outline mountain and a solid, filled in mountain are from Momenta, a small set that Lynette gave me. 

The tree stamps are from Gina K's Natural Silhouettes & You Warm My Heart, Stampscapes:  Tree Duo 085A and Inkadinkado-2 pine trees 96683 K, 

The birds are from Gina K's Fearless Flyers and Stampscapes-Gulls 302A.

The ground cover filler in the green card is from Stampscapes: Bush, 191A.

You can always click on an image to get a larger version.

Thank you for visiting! 

Wishing you Peace and all good!

Stampfest at Lynette's March 11, 2025

Lynette, Don and I spent the day together at her place on Tuesday. We had a great day visiting, enjoying a delicious lunch at Naf Naf's and at the end of the day, enjoying some wine, cheese and crackers and chips and salsa! 

Lynette and I always have a great time stamping together! Tuesday was no different! Above you see three of the four card designs we made.

This card was made by Lynette a long time ago. It's such a pretty card that we decided to try and make one like it. The green ring was made from the outer petals of Stampin' Up's Summer Sunflower stamp. The butterfly and script stamps were part of Stampin' Up!'s Botanicals.

We decided to use the flower from Stampin' Up!'s Botanicals. For the flourishes we use a clear Rhonna Farrer? stamp from Lynette's stash. Used a clear circle stamp with lines made by Kelly Panacci called Memo.

We cut a circle mask from thinner paper with a circle punch. Stamped the Summer Sunflower stamp with distress peeled paint over the circle mask to create border of  "leaves". Then stamped Kelly Panacci's circle lined stamp in the center with distress peeled paint ink. Using what was left after punching the circle, we masked the green leaves area and stamped the Botanicals script in distress candied apple. 

Stamped the flower from Botanicals in distress candied apple. Stamped the butterfly from SU's Botanicals with candied apple on separate cardstock to be applied with foam tape after all was done. Used blending brushes to add candied apple and peeled paint to the background. Used foam tape apply our butterflies.

These cards were made with Lynette's My Meadow stamp set by Stampin' Up. Lynette found a similar My Meadow card on from Pinterest. (We were unable to find the source of the Pin.) We used watercolor paper and Gina K's inks, starting with moonlit fog for the gazebo, warm cocoa for the tree trunks. We used an aqua painter/water brush to blend the ink right after stamping to give a watercolor effect. We learned this from Jackie Bolhuis' YouTube 

https://klompenstampers.com/stampin-up-card-ideas-feel-like-an-artist/

which you will see more in the next card. 

We used GK sea glass for the pond (I think), moonlit fog for the bridge, jelly bean green for the leaves and grassy meadow. Not sure which green for the flower leaves. The flowers were stamped in cherry red, wild dandelion, sweet mango and wild lilac. The stones by the pond were stamped in soft stone. We used colored pencils to add a little extra color and for a little shading too.

After beginning and finding that the brown tree trunks bled into the green leaves, I started to use a heat tool to dry my work with the aqua brush before stamping the next item in this fun scene.

The two cards above are made with Stampin' Up's Snow Front, a scene type of stamp set. We used the Jackie Bolhuis technique from her YouTube linked above. I added one of Lynette's sentiment stamps for the thinking of you card I want to send.

We used Lynette's old wood mounted Stampin' Up! Tulip set for these four card panels using Gina K's cherry red and bubblegum pink inks for the flowers. For the more solid leaves we used Gina K's jelly bean green. For the accent lines stamp on the leaves, we used fresh asparagus ink. 

We really enjoyed "going back in time" using the old wood mounted stamps! Always enjoyed Stampin' Up's definitely decorative two step stamps. This one was surprisingly easy to match up. 

Thank you for visiting!

Wishing you peace and all good!

Stampfest with Lynette October 16, 2019

Lynette and I had a great time stamping last Wednesday. We started by looking at ideas Lynette had pinned on Pinterest. The mountain scene card was not one of her pins. We were in search of Heather Telford's Lilac card and ran across her Lake Wanaka mountain scene card! It looked so dreamy and beautiful we wanted to play with that idea.

We used a pencil to draw the basic lines of the mountains. Then we decided to use inks and a water brush to "paint" them. We smooshed distress inks onto an acrylic block and picked up the color with a water brush. We used the distress ink colors Heather listed: faded jeans, stormy sky, weathered wood, frayed burlap, rusty hinge wild honey, tea dye, vintage photo, early espresso and forest moss.

Lynette used markers to color a tree from a Stampin' Up set called Artistically Asian.

I tried to paint in the tree and shrubs. I found the distress forest moss to be too dark, so I used peeled paint on the shrubs.

For our flower card we used a stamp set called Blossoms Abound from Stampin' Up.

Lynette found a Pinterest Pin showing a Lilac card made by Heather Telford. However the link went to a page that had many cards made by various people. Not helpful when looking for details about a specific card. After some web searching, we found the actual blog post for Heather Telford's Lilac card. Since we did not have the ink colors that matched Heather's beautiful lilacs, we substituted Stampin' Up's lavender lace and distress wilted violet for the 2 step flower stamps in the Blossoms Abound stamp set. We used Stampin' Up mellow moss and  old olive for the leaves.

We had fun trying to make a wreath card after seeing Karen Day's card here.
We made many samples and ended up using a 1-1/2 inch circle mask in the center. However we did not like the very defined circle look. So, we started with the mask but then removed it to get some stamped images into the circle area.

We used leaves stamps from Altenew's Wildflower Garden,  Judith stamps, Stampin' Up Yay You and an old foam SU set from 1996 that had a pumpkin in it.
Ink colors:
SU old olive, mellow moss, and close to cocoa
distress crushed olive, aged mahogany, fossilized amber,

Thanks for visiting!
Hope you make today a special one!

Drawing a Little Beach Scene

I really like the Waterfront cards Lynette and I made at our Waterfront stampfest in June. Since I don't have the Waterfront set (by Stampin' Up!) I decided to try to sketch the scene. Used watercolor pencils by Stampin' Up, a set of 24. My dear neighbor Mary very generously gave this set to me. I really like the variety of colors.

In this card, I was hesitant to use an aqua painter after drawing it. I was afraid of messing up the drawing. But you can see another card below where I decided to give that a try.

I do not have a waves embossing folder like Lynette's so I used my "We are memory Keepers" TIDE folder. Also added crochet thread from my stash.

This card will be an anniversary card. It kind of reminds me of Hawaii. As you can see, it's pretty much the same as the card above. However, this time I used an aqua painter/water brush on the watercolor pencil drawing. The color became darker and more vibrant. I like it better this way. What do you think?

Used Hero Arts Stamp & Cut - Ribbon Messages for the sentiment in Versafine Black Onyx ink.

Used watercolor paper scraps from my stash.

Thank you for visiting! Wishing you a day filled with special JOY!

Mountain and Ocean Direct to Paper Technique

While surfing Pinterest I ran across a fun and easy direct to paper tutorial by Michelle Zindorf.

Since I didn't have all the inkpads Michelle used, I improvised.

On my first card, I used Stampin' UP's so saffron.

Then I sponged some distress spun sugar on top of that for my sky.

Also used spun sugar on my paper ribbon.

Used distress stormy sky and salty ocean for the mountain

broken china for the bottom of the page.

Added distress mowed lawn at the bottom on top of the broken china, 

then a little distress black soot on top of everything at the very bottom.

I stamped the SU Nature Walk  and clear Dimensions Happy Birthday

in Versafine black onyx ink.

This card for my son-in-law was made pretty much the same as above.

I switched to distress scattered straw for my sky.

A friend suggested I make the Nature Walk stamped image less bold

so I used an old Versafine inkpad that was dry. 

Otherwise I would have just stamped off once before applying.

I like how this looks. What do you think?

I changed the colors a little on my third card, continuing with the scattered straw for the sky.

Used distress peacock feathers for the mountain

tumbled glass for the ocean

rusty hinge instead of the green at the bottom

and vintage photo instead of black soot at the bottom edges.

The Stampscapes frond #3 was stamped multiple times with pine needles, 

stamping off a few times to vary the intensity of color.

Thanks so much for visiting!