TriFold Thanks

Hi all,  Hope this posts finds you enjoying the close of Summer and embracing  a new school year. Our daughter has returned to college and our son is beginning his second week in the 7th grade. Fun and exciting times for everyone!  At Stamp to Cope, we are wrapping up our Summer activities and preparing for Fall workshops and Breast Cancer Awareness events. 

As the school year begins, so do many clubs and organizations that took a break so families could go on vacation or focus on warm weather activities. Sending reminders and/or invitations to participants can be a great way to get the momentum going again. A favorite type of card is one that can be duplicated in bulk for just such an occasion.  However, designing something that is relatively easy to duplicate but still provide a WOW factor can be a challenge. So imagine my joy and surprise when a large box was delivered to my front door as I was pondering designs for a set of invitations I was asked to create. One of the participants from my stamping Learnshop in July sent a huge stack of trifold/precut card stock bases for our creative use. Thank you Maureen!!!!  This first project used distress stain rubbed directly onto the stamp for multiple colors of the flower and computer generated text for the invitation specifics. A ribbon was fastened to the back so it could be tied completely around the folded end product.  Of course, I couldn't stop there, I ended up creating about 10 different cards to put in our display at the Art Gallery.

Since masculine cards seem to be such a challenge for most of us, I wanted to share this next picture to show how I used the same card base but put a rustic spin.  

The card base was distress inked in brown and the use of sticky back canvas for the stamped clock faces added depth and texture. On the inside, I stamped the sentiment in brown ink and then put a mask over it before I stamped the click. I used Copic markers on the clock for a little pop of color. Coloring on canvas can be trick because of the texture and the bleeding of the inks. Do some testing on a scrap piece of canvas to determine what color medium you like best.

Thanks for reading and have a great week! 

Jeannette

Learnshop Success

Wow, it is August already and boy have my postings gotten away from me with all the activities and travel on my schedule. But, I am back now with plenty of exciting things to share....

During the first part of the month, my family and I took a little road trip to Charleston, SC. As many of you know, my husband is in the recovery stages of throat (head and neck) cancer so we did not want to go too far or take things too fast.  Charleston seemed to have something for all of us with Low Country Furniture for  my husband, Patriots Point for my son, and palmetto trees, salt water, and sand for me (Ft. Sumpter was an added bonus). We all came home relaxed and creatively inspired. 

 Upon our return we immediately jumped into the 2012 Berea Festival Learnshops where I conduct 3 Art of Stamping workshops (beginning, intermediate, and advanced).  These workshops currently serve as our annual fundraising event with 100% of the fees collected for my workshops being donated to Stamp to Cope.  What a great time everyone had with plenty of projects created.  The card picture above uses one of the background pieces we made with the shaving cream technique and working with stamps and inks that play well with water/water color paper.  For more photos of the workshops, check out the Berea Tourism facebook page or directly at these links for beginner and advanced. The picture coverage was great..Thanks Mike! If you were unable to join us this year, be sure to mark your calendars for the 2013 event scheduled for the second and third week of July.

I left the final workshop and headed directly to the airport for a flight to Chicago for my university's graduation ceremony. Watching our students walk across the stage is always the highlight of my teaching year. On this visit I received two surprises...1. I received an honor award and was inducted into the Delta Delta chapter of Epsilon Pi Tau for my work in instructional design and use of instructional technology. 2. I served as a faculty representative welcoming alumni, graduating honor students, and student families at Harry Carey's in Chicago, IL the night before graduation. This event gave me an opportunity to spend some time with very excited students and our gracious commencement speaker, Ben Stein.  

Now that I am back home, it is time to try and catch up...when do the children go back to school? :)

Blessings and have a super day!  Jeannette