Inspire Me Monday: You Spin Me Around!

Howdy Power Poppy Peeps!  It’s time another Inspire Me Monday! I’m your hostess Allison Cope and today we’re going to talk about creating a fun spinner card using digital stamps.

As most of you know, there is nothing I like better than to create cards that have interactive elements to them. So today, I’m going to share with you all how to create a card using a digital image as your focal interactive element.

Grab a cup of something icy and join me in my craft room…

Click here to see it in HD.

Thanks for joining me at my crafty desk.  Here’s a little replay of all three of our spinner cards featured today…

First off, the card we created together, it features the digital stamp “Sunflower Power”.

Here’s a close up of our sunflower.

Copics: Flower: Y32, YR21, YR12, YR15, Y08, E70, E71, E74, E77  Leaves: YG93, YG95, YG97

Here’s our Santa Snowglobe featuring the digital image “Snowglobe Greetings” and some fun clear stamps too; holly from Heaven & Nature Sing.

Here’s a gander at all that sparkle…

And finally, our extremely simple spinner card featuring the clear stamp set, Pure Prairie Spirit.

And here’s a quick glance showcasing those iridescent Fine Tech Metallic paints…

Thank you so much for joining me today.  I hope you enjoyed my tutorial.  I’d love to know if you’d give making a spinner card a go in the comments!  Have a week everyone!

~ Allison Cope ~


Plaid Sunfflower
Stamps: Power Poppy (Sunflower Power)
Cardstock: Copic X-Press It, Strathmore (Bristol Smooth Watercolor), Recollections (110# White)
Dies:  My Favorite Things (Stitched Circles), Lawn Fawn (Stitched Rectangles)
Ink: Copic Markers, Ranger Distress (Tumbled Glass, Peacock Feathers, Blueprint Sketch, Black Soot)
Patterned Paper:  My Favorite Things (Farm Fresh Gingham 6x6)
Ribbon: Basic Narrows (White)
Twine: Darice (Hemp)
Thread:  Other.

Metallic Pool Bouquet
Stamps: Power Poppy (Pure Prairie Spirit)
Cardstock: Copic X-Press It, Stampin’ Up! (Pool Party)
Dies:  Catherine Pooler Designs (Circles
Ink: Catherine Pooler Designs (Mint to Be), Fine Tec Metallic Watercolors (Blue-Green, Silver Pearl, Fine Gold, Shining Pink, Green Pearl)
Embossing Powder:  Zing (Powder), Stampendous! (Detail White)
Thread:  Gutermann.
 
Santa Snow Globe
Stamps: Power Poppy (Snowglobe Greetings, Heaven & Nature Sing)
Cardstock: Copic X-Press It, Stampin’ Up! (Crumb Cake, Cherry Cobbler)
Dies:  My Favorite Things (Stitched Mini Scalloped Oval Stax
Ink: Memento (Rich Cocoa), Copic Markers, Primsacolor Premier Colored Pencils (White), Zig (Wink of Stella – Clear) 
Misc.:  Silver Thread.

News from the Good Vibe Tribe!

Hello all and Happy Friday folks! Are you ready for another heavy helping of inspiration here on the Power Poppy Blog? Because, my friends, I am ready to dish it up! There was so much inspiration out there this week that I was actually giddy as I made the rounds! And.... I cannot wait to share. So, let's jump right in and get to all this excitement!

GOOD VIBE No. 1

This first little burst of creativity comes from coloring phenom Elizabeth Zaffarano, one of Power Poppy's newest Instant Gardners! Did you catch that fun news, along with a brand new digital stamp delight? If you did miss it -- don't have FOMO (fear of missing out), click HERE and read all about this fun-filled news! Then, hop, skip and jump HERE over to Elizabeth's place on the web to see how she created this gilded look above using Power Poppy's Vibrant Thanks stamp set that she said replicates the look of Italian Damascene jewelry using Mica-based paints! So fun and sparkly!

GOOD VIBE No. 2

Folks, there's been a Bloomie sighting! This one happened at the charming little stamp shop Impressive Ideas located in the heart of Norcross, Georgia. Our own "Inky Peach," Katie Sims stopped by to show off her coloring prowess and helped overload these happy stampers with a giant dose of Power Poppy goodness! I can only venture a guess here, but I am sure they were taken with Katie's charm and her incredible coloring skills!

GOOD VIBE No. 3

Christina Hor reeled me in with this fun "Fly Guy" creation she fashioned for her husband as a way to celebrate their 11th anniversary! Check out how she created her own sentiment to go along with this beautifully colored up image! If you want to check out her creation in its full glory, click HERE! On that post, Christina was even gracious enough to share her digi sentiment as a freebie to use to create your own Fly Guy cards! What's even more fun is the fact that this card was her way of saying, "Hey hubs, let's go fishing on our anniversary!" Too cute, right?

GOOD VIBE No. 4

Enna (@ritzyhag on IG)  crafted not one, but TWO stellar holiday cards draped with a monochromatic flair! I know that when autumn hits and card makers start dreaming about their holiday creations, they want/need/crave ideas! We thought Enna's idea for mass producing creations with Power Poppy's Botanical Tree was truly "share worthy!"

GOOD VIBE No. 5 

Okay, this last vibe is just one that melts my heart and makes it bubble up with joy. Why? I remember when Marcy started this amazing company three years ago and mentioned how she wanted to personalize each and every delivery. She grabbed her string, her decorative papers and a slew of washi tape and sounded just so excited to be able to connect with her customers. I, being the somewhat jaded person that I am, thought, 'Well, I wonder how long this could possibly last?' I thought she might just get too busy trying to get orders out the door. Amazingly, it's lasted three years and still brings as much joy today as it did three years ago. What's fun is seeing just how much customers love this extra touch when they post their happy mail on social media. One more reason why I love, love, love my friend Marcella! ;-)

Now it’s time for the all-star line up, the Bloomies are back...

Want to see what the Bloomies beautifully crafted... just for you? Well, stop by, say "hi" and see for yourself!

Allison Cope

Christine Okken

Stacy Morgan

Tosha Leyendekker

Have a fabulously colorful weekend, and we’ll see you back here in a few days! You won’t want to miss awesome Ally Cope’s newest Inspire Me Monday tutorial coming your way to kick start your week!

~Julie

Merriest Berries Digi is HERE. A new designer is TOO!

Howdy do, friends! We’re taking a break from our regular Tuesday’s Hues to Use inspiration (you can always check the archives if you’re in need of a fresh color palette or to upload your card).

Today we’re letting the Instant Gardener design team loose with our brand new digital stamp set, Merriest Berries. You may have gotten a glimpse of it when Kathy Racoosin of the Daily Marker posted her take on the opening day of the Daily Marker 30 Day Coloring Challenge (woo hoo!), or maybe you saw my version during this weekend’s blog hop and giveaway ... but folks, YOU AIN’T SEEN NOTHIN’ YET!

But before we share the list of inspiring designers participating in today’s celebration of Merriest Berries, I have some HUGE NEWS! We have a new member of our Instant Gardener digital team to introduce. This is a woman whose work struck me the first time I saw it over three years ago — and she has continued to captivate me with every papercrafting project she digs her glitter-speckled fingers into. Let’s give a joyous welcome to our newest Instant Gardener, Elizabeth Zaffarano.

You can see Elizabeth’s work on her colorful Instagram feed @saffronkingfisher, where she shares process shots that are as beautiful as the finished product, explains her thinking behind her design direction, mulls over color combinations, and shares the pretty objects and influences that inspire her always outside-the-box ideas. Elizabeth is reviving her blog, where you can see lots of her past projects: https://saffronkingfisher.wordpress.com

Elizabeth says:

Hi there! I’m so delighted to be joining Power Poppy as an Instant Gardener! Power Poppy’s very first release of Azaleas and Springtime Love got me hooked on coloring, and I haven’t stopped since! I mostly color with Copics, but dabble in colored pencils and watercolors too.  And I love to transform my coloring into cards, boxes, envelopes - the sky’s the limit! 

I live in San Diego, California with my husband, where he graciously shares the dining room table with all of my paper crafting endeavors.  

Yay, welcome, Elizabeth, we have LOVED (and been in awe of) your Inspire Me Monday guest posts, and now we get to have you around the Power Poppy scene a lot more often.... everybody wins!

So let’s go see what our designers have come up with using Merriest Berries... and I’m going to warn you, each one is as unique as can be. You will not see the same color scheme used twice!! These ladies are POWER PLAYERS, I tell you!! I marvel at their creativity and I know that their hard work and practice coloring and working with patterns and layouts through the years has paid off - and it can for YOU, TOO! Take some inspiration today and keep on honing your skills, my dears, because you too can get to this level.

Sharing cards today, we have:

Broni Holcombe

Nancy Sheads

Rhea Wiegand

Jessie Banks

Jennifer Dove

Elizabeth Zaffarano
Barbara Walker

Enjoy all of the eye candy, and don’t forget that this set comes with THREE versions of the berries and ribbons, along with sentiments. This is an image you’ll really enjoy coloring, and as our designers show us, it’s easy never to make the same card twice!

In case you’re wondering... we will be releasing NEW clear stamps for Fall and Holiday in October — STAY TUNED FOR DEETS!

Inspire Me Monday: Digital Sentiment Manipulation

Hello folks — If you are looking for our Daily Marker 30 Day Coloring Challenge + Giveaway post, please CLICK HERE.

Be sure to come back and read this OUTSTANDING tutorial on digital image and sentiment manipulation by the Bloom Brigade’s Tosha Leyendekker.... FILLED with information and step-by-step screen shots! xoxox, ~marcella

Hello creative peeps!!  Welcome to this week's Power Poppy Inspire Me Monday!!!  Tosh here, and I'm going to share with you how I manipulate digital sentiments, using Photoshop, to fit with the layouts I design with Power Poppy's incredible digital images.  For my first card, I used the new digital set Cherries and Berries.  

This is a long post, so I hope you bear with me.  I have a second card to share at the end too, in which I used a VERY NEW digital image called Merriest of Berries, along with the sentiment from Power Poppy's Hollyberries Digital set.

So, lets get right to it.  I Loved Marcella's new cherry clusters and thought it would be fun to combine both sentiments that come with the digital set Cherries and Berries.  So here's how I got started:

First, open all the images you want to use for your project.  I chose the cherries, and the two sentiments.  I then click on the middle yellow dot at the top left of the image, to bring them to the bottom of my screen and get them out of the way, leaving only the cherries on the board.

See that little pink eraser on the left?  Right click on the image and then click on the Magic Eraser Tool at the bottom of the pop-up screen.  Now, lets have some fun erasing!!  Just click on all the white space around your cherries that you want to be erased.  You'll need to click on the small areas too.  That way the only part that shows up when you create your design is the image itself.  No background noise.  Do this with each of your sentiments also.

Now, you're going to want to create the base for your image.  Start by clicking on File at the top, then "New", then "Blank File".

I want my card front to be a vertical rectangle so I'm making my base rectangular.  I chose 5" for my width, and 7" for my height.  My next card is square, so I just made the dimensions 5"x 5".  It's easier when getting ready to print it out.

I brought my image into the my blank base by clicking on the cherries at the bottom of the screen and dragging them into the frame.  Now, you can rotate, enlarge or shrink them by first clicking on the square arrows on the upper left hand side.  I've darkened the area by clicking on it and you can see a solid arrow pointing to it.

See the boxes around the image?  By hovering over one of them with your mouse, you can rotate it any direction.  You can also shrink or enlarge it.  I like to only use the corner boxes to shrink or enlarge because it doesn't distort the image.  Just hover over it until the arrows show, click and drag larger or smaller until you get the size you want.  I kept the cherries in their original size and just rotated and each time I wanted to add a cluster, I clicked on the cherries at the bottom of my screen and drug them up into the frame, and, once again, rotated them until I got the look I wanted.

There are times when you may want one image in front of the other, and it may automatically go behind.  That's easy to fix.  Just right-click on the image you want to manipulate and click "bring forward" or "send back".

Here's a look at my final cherry arrangement.  Once I was happy with how they were arranged, I moved on to the sentiments.  Now we're finally getting to what this tutorial is really about.  

I started by bringing up the first sentiment to the main screen by "double-clicking" the one I want.  I then made 4 duplicates by clicking on File at the top left, and then duplicate.  You're going to need 4 duplicates because you are going to be doing a lot of erasing.

Back to our eraser.  Right-Click on it and click on "eraser tool" at the top of the "drop-down" menu.  Next you will want to decide the size of your eraser.  We want to cover fairly large areas at a time, so I would suggest making the eraser a bit larger.  But small enough to fit in the tight areas.  If you are uncomfortable using a larger eraser in the smaller areas, you can always resize your eraser at any time.  Look at the top left of the screen.  See the brush stroke? Just go to the right of that and choose the size of the stroke you want.  Mine was set at 99 because I was erasing the entire bottom portion of the image, leaving only the word "You".

Then, using the highlighted crop tool on the left, crop your sentiment as close to the edge as possible.  It just makes it easier to lay out.

Do this with each panel of your sentiment.  Leaving only one section, or word, on each one.  I separated "You", "really are the", "sweetest" and "thing" so I needed 4 duplicates.  I then went on to do the same to the other sentiment.

It looks like this before you crop them.  Once again, I click on all the yellow dots, and take them off of my main screen so I just have my cherry base up.  Click and drag up each part of your sentiment one at a time. 

Now I can play around with each section of sentiment...enlarging, shrinking, rotating...whatever you want to do to fit your layout.  (use the square arrows, at the top left of the vertical strip, again) I enlarged the word "you", and shrunk some others.  I also rotated the word "with".  Just have some fun.

Once I get my sentiment layout the way I want it, I save it and insert it into a new Word document.  I can resize the entire panel there the way I want it.

That's finally it for the tutorial portion.  Here is a look at the final result once again.  I loved the look of the black/white with the bold red cherries standing out on their own, so I decided not to color the leaves or any of the sentiment.  Marcy does such an incredible job with her designs, that they are gorgeous even without coloring!

And here's a look at a card I made with the sentiment overlaid over the entire image.

I did everything the same as above, only I lightened the image first.

Click on "Enhance" at the top, scroll down to"Adjust Color", then to "Color Variations".  I made sure the "Midtone" button was highlighted on the left, and just clicked "lighter" about 6 times.  I then created a New Blank File, and drug the image up into it.  You can then lighten or darken it even more by clicking on "Adjust Color", then "Adjust Hue/Saturation.  Slide the "lightness" bar according to how saturated you want the image.

Erase the sentiment the same way you did before, and just lay it over the image any way you feel fits.

Here's a close-up:

Whew, that's it.  I hope I've explained it all clear enough, and that you get an opportunity to try manipulating some digital sentiments of your own.  Thanks for sticking with me!

  Happy Stamping!

Daily Marker Coloring Challenge, Blog Hop, and GIVEAWAY!

Hello, hello my dear friends! I’m a bit late in joining along in Day 2 of the Daily Marker’s NEW 30-Day Coloring Challenge... so let’s just call this: Day 2/3. :) I want to join the chorus of voices encouraging EVERYONE to try to make time to color this month, even if for just a few minutes. That dearest of dearhearts, Kathy Racoosin of The Daily Marker started this marvelously uplifting event, which has no structure, rules, or fuss — the only point is to give yourself the gift of time to do this thing that you so enjoy.



I have to say, spending a few hours coloring in the garden this morning is surely just what the doctor ordered for us, as we await news on our little puppy Tibbs, who had to spend the night at the animal hospital yesterday. It seems he swallowed something he wasn't supposed to — at least that’s what they are examining as I type this. Last night we got to spend a bit of time with the pup, and he was definitely feeling cheerier after some fluids and antibiotics. We knew when he wanted to chomp on our cheeks that our little puppy was making a turn-around.

So, my coloring queens, let’s get to the fun ....we debuted a new digital stamp set called Merriest Berries that was drawn expressly with Kathy in mind, as she LOVES a good cluster of holly. I upped the ante a little bit, adding mistletoe to the holly, and I sure hope you got to see what Kathy came up with for the beautiful KICK-OFF post for the 30-Day Coloring Challenge... here’s a peek!

Isn’t that OVER THE TOP AWESOME??!! Look at how Kathy treated the bow with those wonderful stripes, enhanced the white stitching with incredible shading and allowed those Merriest Berries to bubble over with holiday fun. I was so tickled to see what Kathy made with this set — THANK YOU SWEET KATHY! I’m doubly stoked to see what YOU will do with it, hopefully inspired by all of the coloring challenge beauty that will surround us all month long. See below for how you might win this set, along with a gift code to shop at Power Poppy!

I was hoping to be able to join in on the blog hop yesterday with so many other fabulously NEAT companies, but I got sidetracked with things around here, and just this morning spent some beautiful time in the garden painting this new image...

The digital version of Merriest Berries comes with three different options for the cluster of berries and ribbon. Kathy Racoosin chose the “bow” version for her creation, and I decided to go with the “candy cane”. There is one more version with just dovetailed ribbons, as well as a sentiment with “Merriest Wishes”!

I’m still not quite ready for traditional Christmas colors, so I decided to color my berries and ribbons in  a palette inspired by my garden Zinnias! Pink and Orange do not fail you, my friends!! They offer such a zingy, zesty happiness, and that is definitely something I wanted to bring into my world today. So... 

I printed my image at 35% opacity so that the outlines were very light. But then I went back in with my gouache paint and spent lots of time darkening and gradually deepening the shadows to really help those berries and leaves pop.

Here’s a detail of the berries, you can see how each holly berry is multiple shades of yellow, orange, pink, and red, and the white area is a spot that I did not paint at all, but left blank. If you do not trust yourself to leave an area blank while you're painting, a trick I learned back in art school was to dab rubber cement with a fine brush in the areas you want left white (essentially, masking them off). Finish your shading with watercolors and gouache, and then roll off the rubber cement — it works like a charm — if you can still find rubber cement. hehehe — do they even still make it?)

Anyway, painting this lively cluster really lifted my spirits. I decided to give it a handpainted gingham background in citrus yellow, and handlettered a sentiment to send my Merriest Wishes to all of YOU today!

Daily Marker Blog Hop list  

If you encounter a broken link, please refer to the full list to get you to the next blog.

The Daily Marker

Mama Elephant (Road Trip 9.9)

Stamping Bella (Road Trip 9.23&24)

Gina K Designs (Road Trip 10.6&7)

Waffle Flower (Road Trip 11.1)

Jenn Shurkus (Road Trip 11.11&12)

Neat & Tangled  (Road Trip 11.18) 

Concord & 9th (Road Trip TBA)

Power Poppy (Road Trip March, 2018) YOU ARE HERE!

Lawn Fawn (Road Trip TBA) 

WPlus9 (Road Trip TBA) 

Debby Hughes (Road Trip completed) 

Jennifer McGuire (My favorite OnLine Card Class is OCC partner)

Kristina Werner (My favorite OnLine Card Class is OCC partner)

Heather Ruwe (My favorite OnLine Card Class is OCC partner)

POWER POPPY GIVEAWAY

I’m giving away the Merriest Berries Digital Stamp Set — PLUS a $30 shopping code to Power Poppy! Please leave a comment below by Sunday, September 10, at midnight, and I will pick a winner and announce it here on my blog on Monday, September 11th. The full list of ALL winners from the individual blogs will be announced HERE at the Daily Marker on Tuesday, September 12th. (check each blog for the specifics of their giveaway).

Thank you so much for coming by today, and pardon for the delay in my post. Enjoy your Labor Day weekend, and I so hope you’ll take time to color in the challenge. All you have to do is color, but if you want to REALLY have fun, you’ll want to share your card on social media and hashtag: #thedailymarker30day

September Power & Spark Challenge: Get Krafty!

Hi all and happiest of Fridays to you! Goodness -- are you ready already for a brand new challenge designed to bring a little design power thanks to a creative spark? We sure are and today, the ever-so-talented Christine Okken is challenging us to....

HOW TO PLAY: Dig deep into that paper stash and pull out your kraft colored cardstock! That's all you need to succeed in this fun-filled challenge! Here's what Ms. Christine has to say about this month's Power & Spark challenge...

“With summer winding down in the Northern Hemisphere, let’s get warm and cozy by creating with Kraft card stock as our stamping/colouring layer!”

Well, I personally can't wait! I've already printed off some fun new digis on kraft cardstock just to get ready! Hopefully, I'll be able to share my endeavors next week on my blog! Until then, if you need some creative inspiration, Christine has a heavy dose of that for you! 

It looks like Christine sure had fun with Power Poppy's stamp set In Praise of Sunflowers, don't you think? Not only did she color this up in breathtaking fashion, check out the texture she added thanks to a wood-grain embossing folder! If you'd like the specific deets on how she created this beauty, be sure to stay tuned for our Bloomie link list later in this post! 

Meantime, we can't wait to see you get those fingers inky as you join us in this month's Cozy Krafty Coloring Challenge! If you are our lucky winner in our random drawing, you'll win a....

$50 SHOPPING SPREE AT THE POWER POPPY SHOP! 

THE OFFICIAL RULES:

• Use Power Poppy stamps if you have them. If not, it is a great way to win some! 
• Link your creation below using our Linky (please use the exact URL from your post instead of a generic blog address.)
• Please mention Power Poppy in YOUR blog or gallery post with a link back to THIS challenge!
• The winner will receive a $50 SHOPPING SPREE TO THE POWER POPPY SHOP! 
• Enter as many cards as you’d like, as long as they fit the theme of the challenge!
• Deadline to enter is September 30th @ 8:00 PM EST. At that point, we’ll draw the winner randomly and make the announcement right here on the first Friday in October.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

So, drum roll please, time now to draw that winning name from our August Power & Spark Mix & Match Challenge! If you didn't traipse through the link list to check out all the entries. WOW! You need to-- just click HERE to see for yourself! There was some intense talent this past month! 

Moving on, we have a winning name to draw from our July Power & Spark Challenge! After random.org put all of the names in the virtual hat, the number drawn was...

That means our lucky winner was....

JANE CRISCI!!!

I think the Power Poppy Power Puppy Mr. Tibbs pulled some strings with random.org to get this number to pop up -- just so he could get some extra play. As you might remember, we featured Jane's artistry last week on our Good Vibe 5! Well, here's an instant replay for you, thanks to Jane's good fortune! ;-) Jane, can you leave a note in the comment section to let us know how if you drew that Corgi or if he was a digital stamp as well? Inquiring minds (mainly mine) would love to know! Just for the record, Jane also used Power Poppys Easy Breezy Coneflowers digital stamp set! 

CONGRATS JANE! You've won a $50 Shopping Spree! Contact us at bloom@powerpoppy.com and we'll send you your shopping code!

With all of that color bursting forth today, time now to turn things over to some of the most talented card designers in all of blog land!

Stop by, say “hi” and see what these fine ladies have been up to this week!

Cindy Lawrence

Christine Okken

Julie Koerber

And, be sure to stop back by on Monday when one of my favorite people on the planet joins us to host Inspire Me Monday! The fabulous Tosha Leyendekker will be in the house sharing some tips and tricks to get the most out of your digital sentiments! Woo Hoo! Can't wait! 

Speaking of can't wait, did you hear the news that Power Poppy will have a special reveal TOMORROW for the kick off of the next 30-Day Coloring Challenge with Kathy Racoosin? Yep, we sure will and man, oh man, it's a trio of beautiful designs that I know you will want to snatch up after you see what Kathy does! 

Until then, live life in full bloom! 

~Julie

An InLinkz Link-up