Authentique

Technique Tuesday | It’s Your Day

March 14, 2013 by Nancy Nally Leave a Comment

Designer Yana Smakula brings us the next project for our Technique Tuesday feature week that concludes today! It features a new set called “Wildflowers“ that is perfect for creating layered images or cards! (Yana also created a “Thinking of You” card earlier in the week using a sentiment from this set.)

Chalkboard effects are currently very trendy in paper crafting. For this card, Yana created a chalkboard effect by stamping a shadow stamping technique using white ink on black cardstock. A little ink distressing of the sentiment block with the white ink completes the faux chalkboard effect.

Yana also used another technique – she took two small stamps, the “hello” text and the butterfly, and stamped them repeatedly to create a design block that carries much more weight in the design than those two tiny elements would without the repetition.

Supplies | Stamp: Technique Tuesday (Wildflowers).Cardstock: Dovecraft (Premium White). Patterned Paper: Authentique. Ink: ClearSnap (Color Box Pigment – Frost White 15080, ColorBox Cat’s Eye Chalk: Queue – Primary Elements 71704). Floss: We R Memory Keepers (Sew Easy Floss – Pink). Adhesive: Dovecraft Foam Dots. Button: Dovecraft. Pencil: Marco. Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper (Corner Rounder).

Designer: Yana Smakula

Yana Smakula is a newlywed from Ukraine (which is in southeastern Europe) with no kids but two black cats. She loves to travel across the world and meet new people, discover new cultures and just explore. So far together with her new husband she’s been to a few places in Europe (Poland, Check Republic and UK), Africa (Egypt, Tunisia and Israel), Asia (China and Sri Lanka) and USA. Their next dream destination is Madagascar, because they hear the nature there is simply breathtaking! Yana fell in love with the U.S. while living here (in Las Vegas, NV) as a high school foreign exchange student when she was a teen. She enjoys scrapbooking, mostly about her travels. Her other passion is cardmaking – she enjoys trying new products and techniques, experimenting and creating in different styles. She’s also very much into stamping (although she didn’t realize it until she took a close look at her cards and noticed almost all of them use stamps!). To learn more about Yana, visit her website.

Filed Under: Card Annex, Play Tagged With: Authentique, Clearsnap, Colorbox, Dovecraft, Technique Tuesday, Technique Tuesday feature, We R Memory Keepers, Yana Smakula

Have A Great Day

February 5, 2013 by Nancy Nally 1 Comment

Think a simple black stamped image is boring? Designer Sharon Callis proves that it doesn’t have to be! It’s all about the background here when Sharon stamped her Mini stamp on a funky yellow pattern from Authentique’s Blissful collection. The pattern and bold color, contrasted with the black graphic, bring a fun retro vibe to this greeting!

With its gray and yellow color scheme, and the car graphic, this card would be great to send to a man – but is still fine for a woman with retro taste, too. The sentiment can be adapted with a note inside when sending it to fit a special day like a birthday, as well as just being for everyday. It’s always a great idea to have some flexible, general purpose cards like this tucked away in your card stash so you are never left without a card for an occasion.

Supplies | Patterned Paper: Authentique Paper 6×6 pad (Blissful). Stamp: docrafts (Nostalgia Classic Cars by John Byars). Ink: Tsukineko StazOn (Jet Black). Ribbon: unknown. Adhesive: Xyron (Mega Runner).

Designer: Sharon Callis

Sharon Callis lives in Ireland and has been a crafter for over twenty years. In 2011, Sharon was named ‘Cardmaker of the Year’ by Cardmaking and Papercraft/ Quick Cards made Easy’ Magazines in the UK. Sharon’s work has been featured in publications such as Creative Cardmaking, Papercraft Essential, Create and Craft TV, Cardmaking and Papercraft as well as on various craft companies Facebook pages and blogs. She currently designs for Xyron, gel-a-tins and Little Yellow Bicycle. In addition to her passion for papercrafts, Sharon also likes to do a wide variety of crafts: knit, sew, cross stitch, machine embroider, plastic canvas, costume design, woodcraft, dollshouse miniatures, sketching, home decor, model making and baking. To learn more about her,visit her blog.

Filed Under: Card Annex, Play Tagged With: Authentique, docrafts, Sharon Callis, Tsukineko, Xyron

Vintage Girl: Be Mine

January 2, 2013 by Nancy Nally 1 Comment

Coordinated embellishments and paper from Authentique’s “Lovely” collection emphasize the vintage style of the image on this card by designer Susie Moore.

The adorable little girl with the Valentines is a digital image that has been colored with Copic markers – except for her dress. The dress is paper pieced with the same red dot paper used for the background of the card, to create an image that is perfectly coordinated with the other elements from the Lovely collection. This look is easy to achieve with a digital or stamped image – simply print/stamp the image again on the patterned paper and cut it out!

Supplies | Papers: Authentique (Lovely). Cardstock: PaperTrey Ink. Embellishment: Authentique (Lovely Bundle Pack). Dies: Spellbinders (Oval, mat). Markers: Copic. Image: Digi Darla (Cutie Pie).

Designer: Susie Moore

Susie Cannon Moore is married to her soulmate Randall, and between them they have five grown children – four boys and one girl – and five wonderful grandchildren. They live in a small country town called Maypearl, Texas. Susie has been paper crafting all her life, but started scrapbooking seriously in 1998. She has been published in Paper Crafts and Just Steampunk, and also have been on HGTVʼ’s Crafterʼ’s Coast to Coast. Susie loves to scrapbook her family, and do mini books (mostly as gifts). Card making is also a passion she has embraced for years. As a computer nerd, she especially enjoys using digis. In May of 2011, Susie, who has been a dieaholic from the early Sizzix days, started a website devoted to crafting with dies. You can visit her website at The Dies Have It.

Filed Under: Card Annex, Play Tagged With: Authentique, Copic, Digi Darla, Papertrey Ink, Spellbinders, Susie Moore

Strong Girl: You Can Do It!

January 2, 2013 by Nancy Nally 1 Comment

Ombre is hot! We’re used to seeing ombre in a watercolor style, but our designer for the day, Susie Moore, reinterpreted it and created an ombre look here with patterned paper. The lightest area of the ombre gradation leads the eye perfectly to focus on the focal point image.

Small details can really help tell a story on a card. On this one, the pearls set a feminine tone but are contrasted by the more masculine twine – echoing the same visual contrast in the focal image. The twine also adds a thematic touch, appearing reminiscent of shoelaces and football pad ties.

Supplies | Patterned Papers: Authentique (Uncommon). Cardstock: PaperTrey Ink. Dies: Spellbinders (Oval and mat). Markers: Copic. Digital Stamp: Designed2Delight (Little Quarterback Girl). Twine & Pearls: Unknown.

Designer: Susie Moore