Coffee Loving Papercrafters

We’re so excited to introduce another January Guest Designer, Shanna Slater!

Hello and happy New Year to all my coffee loving crafty friends!  My name is Shanna and I am really excited to be a guest designer this month for the Coffee Loving Cardmaker’s Blog!  (Crafty coffee girl’s dream come true!!)  I feel blessed, honored, and downright giddy to be able to share with all of you!  A little about me…I am a happily married mom of 3 amazing kiddos living in Northern California.  I work full time as a nurse, and love my job!  I have been a scrapbooker/papercrafter for over 20 years, but in the last 5 years or so have began to find a love of cardmaking as well.  My husband likes to say there isn’t a craft I don’t love, which is pretty much true!  I love it all!  It is my therapy, my me time, my fun time, MY time!!

While thinking of what I wanted to create, I reminisced about all of the hops I have participated in.  It dawned on me the perfect stamps to use would be ones I won during the hops!  I love ALL of my coffee stamps equally (don’t want any of them upset at me!) but some see a little more use than others for sure.  I picked this adorable stamp set from Maple & Ink called Espresso Yourself.  I love the artsy feel of the stamps, and the girls are too cute!  I created two 3×3 cards with the girls….I love keeping a few 3×3 cards in my purse to have on hand for a quick note.  People love receiving cards, and sometimes it’s just nice to brighten up someone’s day with one unexpectedly.

For my first card, I stamped the girl on watercolor paper and colored her with my Zig Real Brush pens.  Watercoloring is an absolute favorite go to of mine, I love the texture it adds and let’s be honest…my marker skills are still quite lacking!  While she was drying I decided to ink up a background for her. My card base is made out of bristol paper, which I have the best luck blending on, so I blended directly on my base. I started by using a piece of masking tape to mask off a straight edge and then blended frayed burlap oxide ink for the ground. I used a sunrise for my inspiration for the sky starting with fossilized amber, then a little bit of carved pumpkin, some worn lipstick, and a touch of seedless preserves to top it off.  I blended over a die cut of a cloud that I used to mask the cloud silhouettes.

The card was completed by fussy cutting the girl out and adhering her with some pop dots for dimension. Opening up the card you find a little surprise!  I stamped the coffee ring from the set with frayed burlap oxed ink and then lightly waterbrushed it to soften and color it in.  I colored the cat with my zigs, and fussy cut him out to sit in the middle of the coffee ring.  Who doesn’t love a coffee drinking kitty cat?!?

My second card came together almost accidentally.  I was playing around with my Blendability brush I recently got from Trinity Stamp Company just trying to get used to how it blends….which is fantastic in my opinion!  I used Seedless Preserves oxide ink and then splashed some splatters of it and fossilized amber on top randomly.  I like the interest the splatters add to the background.

I grabbed a sentiment from Hero Arts that was in a previous My Monthly Hero kit and stamped it directly on the background.  The sentiment speaks to me! Just ask my family, LOL.  I trimmed the inked base down a little and mounted it to the 3×3 base with foam tape for a bit of dimension.  I colored and fussy cut the girl out of watercolor paper like her previous counterpart, and mounted her to the card with some pop dots as well.

Thank you so much for having me as a guest here this month, I had a lot of fun designing these cards! If you like what you see, be sure to pop over to my blog Caffeinated Craftiness or follow me on Instagram! Until then, stay crafty and caffeinated friends!