UYS Challenge Going Strong

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I guess pink erasers will work just fine for conditioning clear and rubber stamps! Thanks to everyone who took time to answer that question.

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As I went through my SU Flowers stamp box for the Use-Your-Stamps Challenge, I found Summer Silhouettes, a gift from a kind reader a few years ago. I'll show the cards I made with it over the next few days.

To be honest, I'm not a fan of cling rubber stamps and have sold or given away most of the ones I own. This set, however, is an absolute keeper. The stamps are beautiful, and they are also easy to make pretty cards with. I don't think I've made a bad card with this set...a sign of intelligent design. And not my intelligence, mind you. Whoever made this set knew what s/he was doing!

So first up is a card using the leaves and flower blossoms in the set. I inked and spritzed these using Hero Arts inks and Glimmer Mist. I'm finding that the Hero Arts inks turn into distress inks when spritzed with water or Glimmer Mist. They turn very blotchy, and some of the colors are unattractive.

Lime Green and Pale Tomato, however, work nicely!

The sentiment is from an old, discontinued Hero Arts clear set...one whose name is lost to time (at least in my craft room). But it's a useful set, and I plan on sending this to a good friend whom I've neglected lately.

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Finally, I want to offer up thanks to Audrie Magno Gordon and Ardyth Percy-Robb. Though they don't know it, they helped me find my stamping joy again, and I am grateful.

So very grateful.



Supplies
stamps: SU, Hero Arts
ink: Hero Arts lime green and pale tomato; VersaMagic gingerbread
paper: white 120# cover
accessories: dimensionals, Glimmer Mist (the Dazzling Diamonds color, I think)

A Reader Question AND More UYS Challenge Cards AND a New Challenge Blog

Reader Sue asked if a pink eraser will work for conditioning stamps, or if one must use a white eraser. I honestly don't know the answer, although I dislike pink erasers as ordinary erasers (they tend to be rough on paper and smear rather than remove pencil lead). I only buy white erasers for my own use. Have any of you used pink erasers to condition stamps, and if so, did it work? Sue (and probably a few others) would like to know!

Now, for a couple of Use-Your-Stamps Challenge cards. It took two cards to use all four of the stamps in the StampinUp Garden Silhouettes set.

This blossom branch is so pretty but really needs to be used horizontally. I paired it with a sentiment from Gina K's Hello Sunshine set and added some touches of Sakura Stardust sparkle to the centers of the flowers.

Here, I used the three other stamps in the same random way as on yesterday's card, but on a portrait-oriented base rather than landscape. The sentiment, from Hero Arts Year Round Sentiments, looks like it's being pushed up by the flowers, and the three rhinestones serve to unite the flowers and the sentiment.

Also, that the rhinestones appear on the single Tidal Pool stem rather than scattered over the other flowers helps reinforce the sentiment of being special.

On a completely different note, I encourage you to check out Virginia Lu's new challenge blog: Virginia's View Challenge. Her challenge right now is Watercoloring, which is broader than Karen's OLS challenge but still related!

Supplies
stamps: SU Garden Silhouettes, GinaK and Hero Arts sentiments
ink: Hero Arts, Memento Luxe tuxedo black
paper: Papertrey white
accessories: Sakura Stardust pen, rhinestones

UYS Challenge Revisited: A Progress Check

A while back, I began the Use-Your-Stamps Challenge, but during the holidays and their aftermath of using so many new purchases, I've not made much progress in using my stamp stash. So the other day, I pulled down my SU Flower stamp box and quickly used all the stamps therein.

One whole set (Stem Silhouettes) on a single card!

These pretty colors are courtesy of my new Hero Arts inks. It's a happy, sunny card made on a cold, snowy, icy, dreary day.

Using orange Stickles, I've discovered, is very uplifting on such days.

How are you progressing in your own version of the UYS Challenge?

Supplies
stamps: SU Stem Silhouettes, Papertrey Signature Greetings
ink: Hero Arts yellows and oranges, Memento brown
paper: Papertrey white
accessories: Stickles

OLS#3--Just Add Water

Here are three cards for One-Layer Simplicity #3--Just Add Water. The challenge is to use water to make a background or spritzed on a stamp to create a watercolor effect.

I sort of improvised by inking up my acrylic blocks with Kaleidacolor Spectrum Inks, spritzing them with Glimmer Mist, and then stamping to create a slightly shimmery background.

The blue spectrum pad made a lovely background for this little snowman and snowflakes from Hero Arts Screen Shot set.

 
You can see a bit of the shimmer in the close-up, plus I used a little Stickles on the flakes.

These dark colors seemed suitable for a Halloween card, especially when I found this fun spider  from Technique Tuesday in my stash. And then I found googly eyes. How fun!

And finally, these luscious shades of green made me think of trees, so I pulled out Papertrey's Through the Trees set.

What a fun and easy way to make interesting backgrounds! Watery techniques really do yield some very interesting--sometimes unpredictable--results. I'm going to continue to play with water throughout the month, so look for more OLS entries from me in the future.

Click on over to the OLS#3 Challenge and play along!

Conditioning Clear Stamps

Long-time stampers already know that clear stamps often need to be conditioned...and sometimes rubber stamps do, too. After not buying many stamps for a few years, I'd sort of forgotten about it, so here's a reminder to condition your new stamps so they take ink well.

For newcomers, this might just change your life.

First, here's what can happen when you DON'T condition a stamp:

Unconditioned Hero Arts banner stamp using Hero Arts butter bar ink

Now, if you're aiming for a "distressed" look, this is fine. But I'm not generally a distressing stamper. I want clean images. After I stamped this blotchy aberration, I reached for this:

White Eraser

After firmly scrubbing the whole image with the white eraser, I cleaned the stamp well, inked it up again, and this is what happened:

Soooo much better.

Why do stamps need to be conditioned? Well, residue from the manufacturing process can cause blotchiness on both clear and rubber stamps...especially large-area solid stamps. This film is easily removed with mild abrasion, and once it's gone, it's gone.

Any time you have a problem with blotchiness, grab that essential stamping tool--the standard white eraser--and get to scrubbing. Totally worth the effort.

Supplies
stamps: Hero Arts
ink: Memento
paper: white 110# cover
accessories: orange Stickles

CAS News!

Here are the headlines this weekend in CAS news....

1. The newest One-Layer Simplicity Challenge is running like a mountain stream!!! Karen Dunbrook's fabulous challenge this month is called OLS#3: Just Add Water. Either spritz your inky stamp with water or make a background with water to blend your inks! The challenge will be open until March 24, and then on the 28th, the design team members will spotlight their favorite details from among all the entries. So get to spritzing!

2. If you're interested in learning more about design from three rock stars of clean-and-simple cards, a class over at Online Card Classes is just for you! Taught by Julie Ebersole, Kristina Werner, and Jennifer McGuire, this class is the third in the CAS series and focuses on one-layer cards. You do not need to have taken the first two classes to take this class!!!! While I've never taken a class from this site, all three of those teachers are awesome and so I have no worries encouraging those of you who want to learn more about one-layer design to take it. Class starts on March 10, so don't wait!

OLS Details

No card from me tonight, but click over to the One-Layer Simplicity Challenge to see the "Details" post for OLS#2-Can You Repeat That?

The Details posts on the OLS blog will be posted after the challenge closes on the 24th of the month. Some members of the design team will highlight several cards each and tell you what details in that card make it stand out. These posts are an excellent way to be inspired!

For February, Heather, Karen, Ardyth, and I each spotlighted three cards, so you have twelve awesome cards to check out in one post!

Go! Soak up the inspiration!

And many, many thanks to all who are participating in our OLS challenge. There are so many amazing cards that we all had a REALLY hard time picking just three each. To see ALL 104 OLS#2 cards, go HERE.

And on March 1st, Karen's challenge will be posted. Hmmm. What will she come up with?!?!