"Dreams" tag for music prompt on #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
This weeks prompt at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge is music.  This can be  interpreted any way we like, I have been using songs as inspiration.  I knew I would be fired up by this prompt, I have a hundred tags in my head that I would like to make!  This tag was inspired by Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams".

I started off this tag with some embossing.  I thought these bubble-like images would give the background a dreamy quality. I used a kaleidoscope  embossing powder that was glittery  with various sparkles of colour.  This would act as a resist to the ink that I add.

I did several backgrounds at the same time.  I smooshed distress ink onto my craft mat and spritzed with water.  I also added some Heidi Swapp ColorShine gold spray into the mix.  I dragged and pounced my tags through the inky goodness, drying in between layers.  I repeated the process until I was happy with the result.

As you can see here, the embossed areas resisted the ink.

I used a Spellbinders die to cut out the dream catcher from some blue foil board.  I love to use gold and silver foil board, but there is also red, blue and green in the package that I don't use as often, so I was happy to find a use for the blue.  I really liked the look.  I don't know why, but I think of blue when I think of dreaming.  I have heard that we don't actually dream in colour.  I don't know if that is true or not, my dreams seem to be colourful!

This is a "Kelly Creates" stamp set that I got from Michaels.  I love these sets and they are only $5 each! Even less if you have a coupon.  I usually find Michaels a little pricey, but was really happy with this purchase.   They all have about 18 - 20 words.  I thought this was a great deal.  Maybe I will do another post to showcase these stamps.  Anyways, Dreams was one of the words on this set.  I heat-embossed it with Rangers gold embossing powder on vellum.  I wrapped the vellum around the tag.  I did this so that it would mute the background enough for the word to stand out, but still visible behind the vellum.

Then I added a blue foil mat and my usual black mat to finish off the tag.

I hope you have enjoyed my process for making this tag.  Thanks so much for letting me share it with you.  Have an awesome day everyone!

Kim xo

Playing with distress inks and Color Shineto make some pretty backgrounds #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I had some fun the other evening creating some backgrounds for some more tags.  I love playing around with different techniques which is why I always seem to be creating backgrounds for future art projects.  It's just fun!  This time I pulled out my original distress inks.  I squished them down on my craft mat, spritzed them with water and pressed and swiped my tags through the inky goodness.  I dried each layer and then dunked it again, adding more ink or water as necessary.  I like a little shimmer and  thought I'd pull out some Heidi Swapp Color Shine gold spray to mix in with my distress inks and I love the marbling effect it created.

This one actually has no distress ink in it, it is Gold and turquoise Color Shine spray, but done the same way.  I sprayed it onto the mat and added water and smooshed the tag into it!

I heat embossed a couple of tags to create a resist before inking them up for a different effect.

 I splattered the gold onto this tag

I just love how the gold marbled through the distress ink!

I will be using these backgrounds to create some more tags for The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  It's all about the process and having fun!  This isn't a new technique for me, although it is the first time I thought to add the color shine.  But every time you do it, you get totally unique results.  So every project that you use them for will be unique, even if you finish them all off the same way.  I hope you have enjoyed having a look at my ink play, and I encourage you to give it a try, if you haven't before, and try it again, if you have!  You will be seeing some of these backgrounds very shortly on some new tags.

Thanks so much for stopping by!
Kim  xo

Happily Ever After

Hello my friends!  Just a short post today to share a card I made.  My friend Bonnie is heading west today to attend her nephews wedding.  She asked me to make a card for her.  I made it at our art club and I didn't really have a nice surface to showcase the card as the tables are all covered in (you guessed it!) paint.  I don't even mind that as a background for some projects, but it definately didn't suit this card.  So I put down a sheet of paper, which being so light, didn't highlight the card as well as I would have liked, but that is what I had available.  So, apologies over, I hope you can see the card well enough.  I was quite happy how it turned out.  

I used Recollections shimmer card, a Local King Rubber Stamps background, which I heat embossed in gold.  I used my Tim Holtz scribbly die to cut the hearts (I just love that die!) out of gold card.  I heat embossed the sentiment on velum.  I llayered onto gold card and then on to a card base I made with the same shimmer stock as the front panel.  I didn't take a picture of the inside, but I added a velum pocket to hold a gift certificate or money.

Hope you enjoyed my card today, and thank you for stopping by!

Tag 6-8 "Hello Sunshine| #onelittletag

Hello my friends!  Welcome to my blog.
My tag today is based on the challenge to "step out of my comfort zone".  I have always loved the "mixed media girls" and have wanted to try creating some of my own.  But, as I mentioned n my last post, because of my vision limitations. drawing and colouring are difficult.  So, outside of one other attempt quite a while ago, I haven't tried my hand at it.  I thought this would be a good opportunity.
I drew a face, labouring with my magnifier and armed with an eraser.  II liked the face I created (although my daughter informed my that I need to fix the eyebrows.  But I am sharing, warts and all!)
I made some copies so I could use it again.  I coloured her face using Spectrum Noir markers and a white gel pen.  After  I finished colouring her, somehow I ended up with a mark on her cheek.  I attempted to lift it out, and did lighten it.  So we won't call it a wart, we will call it a beauty mark!

I used a napkin background, did some paint splattering and cut around some of the images (also out of my comfort zone!).  I ended up mounting another napkin to some card in order to cut out one of the images to put behind her.

I figured out how I wanted to position her and cut around one of the flowers to put her behind it and to give my tag more dimension.

I stamped my sentiment (which I had received as a free gift with a Quick Cards magazine) with Versmaark ink and heat embossed it with black embossing powder on vellum

Finally, I mounted the tag onto a black background.

I hope you like my mixed media girl and I think I will be doing more of them!  Thanks for stopping by!

Tag 3-14 #onelittletag

Tag 3-14

I heat embossed a few of this image, so I thought I would do another tag with a distress ink background, masking an area for a sun and sponging over torn paper to add some landscape. I did a card similar to this before and liked the effect. I could have spent more time on the background but it's getting late!

Tag 3-13 #onelittletag

Tag 3-13

  I I first painted the tag with gold acrylic paint, then I stenciled over it using coarse molding paste that I added red paint to.  I had this stencil in mind for this stamp, but I didn't want to cover up the black and gold that I did on my last tag. .  I heat embossed my image (which I love) onto vellum and coloured from the back with Spectrum Noir alcohol markers.  I adhered the vellum to my stenciled background, added a ribbon and mounted to black card

Tag 3-4 "Relax" #onelittletag

Tag 3-4 "Relax" #onelittletag

I was running a little short on time tonight, so I used this tag that I started the other night. I embossed in black as a resist and wet the background and dropped watercolour into it. The birds on the wires were from ny stash, as was the word. I did some sponging with distress inks, punched the corners and assembled my tag.

momentwithmimi.blogspot.com

Another Month Finished #onelittletag

Another month of tags finished.  I can't believe that I have kept up!  I haven't done a tag every single day (although most days!)  and I often play catch up, but it is definitely keeping me in the creative frame of mind.  That is the whole point.  I have gotten things out from the back of the shelves and given them a little love, have done some experimenting and all-in-all, have been having a good time.

My own personal goal was to do at least seven cards or tags a week.  Not necessarily one a day, and not even necessarily seven different ones, just seven.  This challenge ( One Little Tag Craft Challenge on FB, for anyone new to my blog) has really kept me on track.  Actually, including the bonus tags and the duplicates, I have created 69 tags so far this year!  Wow!

So I would like to thank those of you who have been following along, and invite those of you who have recently viewed my blog to join me on my little tag journey of creativity.  AND my journey into blogging, something I have never done before (being as technically challenged as I am, lol)

Thank you and hope to see you here again soon!  If you like what I have been doing, please share! And if you enjoy making tags or looking at tags, you should check out and join One Little Tag Craft Challenge on FB hosted by Jenny Barnett Rohrs of CraftTestDummies.  It is a great group of talented and supportive and super nice people, and you are welcome to join at any time through the year.  I am enjoying it so much!

Tag 2-28 Christmas Wishes ‪#‎onelittletag

Tag 2-28 Christmas Wishes ‪#‎onelittletag‬
Still have all my Christmas stuff out, so the last couple of tags for February will be added to my Christmas collection. This was another quick one. I used some Recollections holiday shimmer card from a couple of years ago for my background. The deer, cut from black glitter paper were from my stash. The sentiment was foiled on white card and punched out. I added a snowflake punched from glitter paper with a black rhinestone and a few little sparkly embellishments. I punched the corners, mounted to gold foil paper and mounted to black card.

Tag 2-25 Season's Greetings #onelittletag

Tag 2-25 Season's Greetings ‪#‎onelittletag‬
Tag 25, Christmas time! What a great challenge week to make a Christmas tag. I used some Christmas pattered paper from my stash. I had a whole sheet, but I don't know which pad it was from. I stamped a gold flourish on the paper. I die cut my deer from chipboard and covered it with gold UTEE, and a final coat of Ranger fine gold embossing powder and stamped some music notes into it. I die cut my poinsettias from vellum and g...littered the edges with TH glitter, I foiled my tag with the sentiment, although it's hard to tell in the photo, I used a TH brad in the centre of the flower. I punched the pine branches from green foil card with my new TH punch and I also punched the snowflakes from glitter paper. Added some final bling with some red rhinestones. Punched the corners, mounted to some patterned paper and the to black card. Lots of shiny on this one!

Tag 2-24 Let it Go #onelittletag

Tag 2-24 Let it Go ‪#‎onelittletag‬
My slump didn't last long, once I had everything out. I attempted this tag a few different ways and this is the way I liked the best.   I used my laser printer to copy my stamped image .  I used my laminator and deco foil to foil the balloons and my sentiment. (there is a tutorial on my 3rd post called "Try Something New" that will show how I do this) Then I used distress ink to colour around the balloons to create the idea of a sky. I also used distress ink to sponge in some colour on the balloons. I used a glue pen to add some random dots and foiled those (I'm trying to use my foil in a few different ways). I used my gold ink to finish the edges and mounted to a black tag. I have to say, foiling really picks up all the details that embossing just can't quite achieve.

I used the same process to do the foiling on this tag, I just used a coloured card instead of white.  No distress ink on this one.

This tag was pretty much a fail, but I thought I'd share it anyways to show the difference between the foiling and the heat embossing, which I used here.

Thanks for dropping in!





Shiny is the name of the game #onelittletag

Tag 2-23

This weeks challenge is to basically use shiny and glittery and shimmery.  Which is fun for me!  Where so I begin?

No word today, just a random little piece of abstract art. I finally hit a bit of a slump. I couldn't think of anything to do for my tag. I wasn't too concerned, we've done over 50 tags, it was bound to happen. Actually, I think we should all give ourselves a pat on the back. Whether it's a tag a day, every few days, every week or whenever you can manage, we are all still here being creative. Anyways, as you may know, I love shiny, so not a good time for a slump. So I got one of my distress backgrounds that I had stencilled gold paint on as a start. I had die cut some of those scribbly Tim Holtz circles out of foil card, so I wanted to use them. I got out my deco-foil, but I wanted to try using it a different way, so I layed ddown some tape runner and foiled it. I love the distressed look it created. I finished the edges with some gold embossing powder and assembled my tag. I kinda like how it turned out.

Thanks for stopping by!

Tag 2-19 All the Stars in the Sky #onelittletag

Tag 2-19

Last one tonight, I promise! I am playing catch up. I have been pretty busy  and tomorrow is another busy day. Going to a painting workshop.  Looking forward to it and I should be getting my supplies ready, but I really wanted to get some tags posted before I'm too far behind. I'm a little disappointed with this tag. I like it, but the embossing didn't really come out well and a few things I was trying didn't quite work. But I have had the idea for this tag a while and I will try it again. My 3's are my distress ink background (twisted citron, wilted violet and peacock feathers) and I embossed 3 stamps.

Thanks again for popping by!

January Tags #onelittletag

I am a little late in posting this, but here is a photo of all my January tags, less one that I gave to a lovely lady that bought one of my paintings. My Nature tag. After speaking with her, it just seemed to really suit her so I thought it would be a nice thank you.

I can't believe we are at 42 tags and I am actually keeping up!  Thanks for letting me share with you.



Tag 2-1 - Explore

Tag 2-1 - This tag was a foiling experiment. I used one of my colorburst backgrounds. I splattered with some gold and white distress paint. I stamped my quote (Tim Holtz) with Versamark ink and embossed with Ranger sticky embossing powder. I foiled it and ran it through my laminator. It didn't work perfectly, but I think I will try it again.



Tag 31 - Art Washes Away... #onelittletag

Tag 31 - I used one of my prepared backgrounds that I had inked with distress inks, stencils and marked with distress paints. This is a Deep Red stamp I've had for ages and never used

Tag 28 - Let it Go

Tag 28 - I am slightly behind, I've had a few busy days (but artful days!) I must admit, I did not put a lot of time into this tag (which I have to remind myself, is perfectly okay). I did stick to this weeks challenge. Laurie shared that great gellatos video, which reminded me I had those sample swatches, so I used the black velvet one for my background.

 When I did tag 23, I first started off brayering my ink, which didn't give me the effect I wanted, but I saved the paper and so I punched my flower and petals out of that. I used a quote from my stash and I did some edging with some distress ink and i edged the tag with my gelatos

Hope you enjoyed.  See you soon with tag 29!

Tag 27 - Creativity #onelittletag

Tag 27 - this tag was made from the beautiful kleenex box I found yesterday, but didn't use.

 I also used the quote that I was going to use yesterday, but that just didn't work on my tag.The bytterfly was one I had in my stash, already coloured, and the lattice (Tin Holtz) is also something from my stash. Some metallic thread that was attached to something else and I reclaimed. I tried to use some distress ink and I did use my PITT pen. Something to keep in mind, some kleenex boxes have great designs on them, but they also have a varnish that will resist ink. So if you want to use one, you might want to base your design around that.



Tag 26 - Found Objects #onelittletag

So Jenny added a new challenge this week, to The One Little Tag Craft Challenge. She challenged us to use some found objects in our tags, to recycle and up cycle. So I dug around for a few things I could use to meet the challenge.

I had a few things out and I wasn't exactly sure how this tag was going to go, so I let it evolve. I trimmed my tag out of the card backer of a stencil I had , my image is actually from a card I had printed a few years ago of a mixed media painting I did, the brad I used came from a second hand store. I gessoed the tag and then painted with distress and adriondack paints, then used a Tim Holtz stencil with Broken China DP, added some markings with gold and white DP.

 I did some edging with the gold and assembled the tag, mounting to black card. I will use some of the other bits that I had out on other tags this week. I love the design on the Kleenex box...