Introducing The Heart Desires Store & Design Team!

Hello everyone!  It is spring and there is so much to celebrate!

Welcome to a doubly special event!

Today we celebrate not only the Spring Coffee Lovers Hop, but also the opening of my friend Tonya’s store, The Heart Desires and our design team reveal!

I am so excited for Tonya as she embarks on this journey and I hope you will share in the excitement as well by hopping along with the design team and then hopping over to her store to find some sweet products for your planners and paper-crafting!  Tonya will be curating high-quality products that she recommends in a boutique-style shop.  For our hop, we are featuring some of her current products and/or Hero Arts company products.

For all you coffee lovers, she has some fabulous finds for your next coffee inspired project–stamps, stencils, inks, and great embellishments!  Here are few of my favorites.  Click any image My links aren’t working, so click here to be taken to Tonya’s shop to purchase:

One of my favorite stencils in my collection! The Crafters Workshop

 

These are new to me and I love them!  A good coffee embellishment can be hard to find!

 

Cup O’Joe Brown Ombre? Yes, please!!

 

 

I love Simple Stories for my scrapbooking; their word/phrase stickers are seriously the best, and you get so many for the price!

 

Can’t go wrong with Kelly Purkey for on-trend and witty fun supplies.

This is my favorite watercolor and layering paper.  The texture and bright white are just perfect.  I have featured it below in my second card.

 

 

 

Hero Arts Neon Inks are my favorite for delightful, rich, retro neon.  A child of the 80’s, how could I not love them?

Today, I am featuring couple cards to celebrate Tonya’s store opening and the Spring Coffee Lovers Hop!

First up, my tropical twist on the coffee plant!

 

So here is a lovely picture of a coffee plant. In my modern twist, neon colors and bold black take center stage.  The flower and berry stem is from Julie Ebersole’s Wild Garden set.

The leafy stem has been cut from one of the most beautiful coffee bags I have ever seen (the coffee was pretty fine, too!).  I love single origin coffees and exploring small roasters.  We are pretty lucky here in the PNW to have some amazing roasters–Heart, Coava, Courier, Case Study, Seattle Coffee Works, Elm Roasters, and Slate to name a few.  In Seattle, we are also finally catching up with other progressive cities and our coffee shops are offering some wonderful roasters from all over the US.  Here is a photo of the actual bag:

Isn’t that lovely?  I have cut out the entire bag and have a few other up-cycled projects in the works!

 

 

 

 

 

TECHNIQUE:
For the flower, I embossed a Hero Arts background stamp onto cardstock with clear Versafine embossing ink and covered it with clear embossing powder.

Then I sponged Hero Arts Neon pink ink over the embossing.  You can see some of the sheen of the clear embossing on top of the flower.

The sentiment is from an older Kelly Purkey collection.  She has partnered with Hero Arts and has some fantastic product for planners, scrapbooking, and card making which Tonya is featuring in her store.  Below are a few of the featured Hero Arts products (the whimsical leaf is actually from Penny Black, but I’ve had it so long, I thought it was a Hero Arts die!  Hence, its appearance alongside the other products!)

You can view more of my coffee-inspired projects here!

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Next Up: Terrarium Love

Hero Arts offers up the best of the papercrafting trends like succulents and pineapples as of late!  My next card features HA succulent garden stamps, their terrarium die cut from Jen Hadfield gold paper and birch wood paper, Distress Ink watercoloring on Ranger watercolor paper, Studio Calico sentiment, and all digital papers from The Lilypad and The Digital Press.

The inside washi is from Stampin’ Up, which Tonya also sells! I love the play of coral against the blues and ripe green.

Okay, now it’s time for you to hop along to the rest of the design team’s pages for some more inspiration!

THE HEART DESIRES Design Team

Amy Tsuruta 

Kathryn Lorenzini  (You are here!)

Katie Brooks

Kimberly Wiener

Lenae Daly

Toni M Maddox

Tonya Jastad  Owner

GIVEAWAY!

But before you go, don’t forget to leave a comment because we will be randomly selecting a winner of a $10 gift certificate to The Heart Desires store.

The giveaway will run through Sunday night, 3/27, 11:59 pm pacific time for anyone who comments on this blog post. Winners will be announced on Monday night by 7pm Pacific time!

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Holiday Gift Bags

Make-It Monday # 142 Decorated Kraft Bags

Happy December, all! I am excited to share the kraft gift bags I made for the Papertrey Ink challenge this week.  This was a really inspiring challenge as the possibilities are endless and playing around with ideas on little kraft bags is a great way to experiment, since the bags are so inexpensive.  Once I got started, I could barely stop!

I am going to start with my favorites and explain my process, as I discovered a really cool technique somewhat by accident!

First up, Twinkle.

As you can see, I used the light bulbs from Papertrey Ink’s Come All Ye Faithful additions set.  I just love these and want to use them all the time!  Labor intensive, but worth it!

So I first sponged Unicorn White ink onto the Crafter’s Workshop birch trees stencil.  Then heat set.  Next I stamped all the lights, and heat set again.  Then I had a bright idea 🙂 I had earlier experimented with stamping Versamark Dazzle directly on my embossing, covered with clear embossing powder and heat set.  You can see these cards here.  I wanted to create a sparkly winter forest, so I covered the bag with Versamark Dazzle in Champagne; then added Ranger Sticky embossing powder, heat set and sprinkled with white glitter.  Ta-da!

The effect reminds me of sugar-coated gumdrops and I was thrilled.  I will be using this technique on cards and tags this season for sure!  I finished it off with a sentiment stamped in blue Brilliance Ink from Amuse Studio’s Hello December set, which I will feature in my next post!

Next up, Candy Jar!

Here I have used Papertrey Ink’s fabulous Tag Sale #8 die as the focal point.  Inside, I have placed my little mason jar from Poppystamps, and filled it with candies from Lawn Fawn’s Sweet Christmas set.  The bag’s background was stamped with the Versamark Dazzle and then covered with Bridal embossing powder, which I love and have had forever, from Personal Stamp Exchange.

For all the candies, I masked and stamped each one with Tuxedo Black ink so they would overlap.  Then I colored with Copics.  I heat set and then covered with Versamark Dazzle and clear embossing powder and heat set for a glossy sheen which you can see in the first  and last photo.  Pretty sweet, don’t you think?

Bag #3: Delicate Doily Snowflake

This bag was stenciled with Crafter’s Workshop doily in Unicorn White and covered with bridal embossing powder.  The little button says “sweet” and I thought it was a perfect embellishment for the tag.  I love Papertrey Ink’s font for the “joy” sentiment, which is from the Mega Mixed Messages set.  The green ribbon is covered with doily images that reflect the bag, and instead of using traditional red and white, I opted for juicy, bright pastels.  It doesn’t quite represent here, but I used Brilliance Ink in red-gold, which is very iridescent and matches the pink sparkly ribbon.

Bag #4: More Joy

I embossed a few of my kraft bags which really added to the basic brown bag.  After embossing, I again covered with Versamark Dazzle, then covered with bridal embossing powder for this shimmery, iridescent quality.

I used Papertrey Ink’s Boutique Borders die and their Joy sentiment again.  I hand cut some flags from my snowy-white sparkle paper and adhered with silver sparkle brads.

Bag #5: Rustic Winter Wreath

I just LOVE this delicate wreath stamp from Memory Box.  It is so versatile and can be used for any season.  For this bag, I again embossed it with Tim Holtz’s wood-grain embossing folder.  Then I stamped the image with Unicorn White, and embossed with detail white powder from Stampendous.  Here you can see the embossing folder detail and glossing effect of the wreath.

Instead of using Papertrey Ink’s Fillable Frames #4 die as a label, I folded it and used as a closure!  Way to re-purpose!  I love seeing products in a new light.

The sentiment is from Waltzingmouse Stamps Halloween Party set.

Whew!  Are you ready for just 2 more?  Okay, here they are!

Bag #6: Fa-La-La-La-La!

Here I featured Papertrey Ink’s Come All Ye Faithful Additions Set and keeping with the musical theme, added some die-cut  silver bells from Memory Box.

Bag #7: Sweet Swag!

Last, but not, least (though it is my least favorite of the bunch), is my sweet swag bag, featuring Paper Trey Ink’s Come All Ye Faithful Additions sentiment.  I used the Memento Brilliance inks for iridescent shine. Ribbons are from American Crafts.  The circle tag can hold a sentiment or someone’s name.

So I am more than half-way there for 12 days of Christmas treats!

Thanks so much for stopping by–I hope my creations sweetened your day!  Comment or email if you would like to know more about my techniques.  I love hearing from you and connecting!

Now I think it’s time for a few sweets myself–Almond Roca, anyone?  While you are indulging, head over to Nichole’s blog for some serious eye-candy!

Witch in the Foggy Woods

Simon Says Stamp Challenge: Halloween Pt. Deux

Well, at the risk of sounding like a Luddite, I think I just figured out how to best upload my photos from my camera so that they are large and visible!  I am sure there has to be an easier way than my convoluted process, but with this post, I think I have figured an improvement for now!  (Where is Santa and that digital camera?)

So this past week in Seattle we were surrounded by a thick fog rolling off the Sound, perfect for these darkening days of autumn.  Through a complete accident of experimentation, I was able to capture the kind of foggy, gauzy moonlight that sifts through a thick forest on an October evening when the moon is full.  Using my Crafter’s Workshop birch stencil and some Unicorn White with a foam applicator, I brushed the ink on Amuse Studio’s Slate paper.  Because I have made a window with American Crafts Crate Paper Photo Overlays, the effect has been muted, but I love that I was finally able to find a use for these overlays.
The sequins and stars are from American Crafts as well.

Waltzingmouse Stamps has provided this haunting, finger-wagging witch & the sentiment is another fabulous Memory Box creation.  I love how Memento’s Tuxedo black ink represents on this slate paper!

All dies are from Spellbinders.

I will leave you with a fine poem befitting the week and my little corner of the world!

Fog, by Carl Sandburg

The fog comes

on little cat feet.

It sits looking

over harbor and city

on silent haunches

and then moves on.

May something wooly and wonderful embrace you this week!

Head over to Simon Says Stamp for some inspiration!