Growing in Unity Blog Hop

Hey there Crafty Friends!!  

We are back with the awesome Blog Hop for The Unity Stamp Company and the Growing in Unity Gals!!!

The GUI Gals have come together to inspire you once again and give you yet another chance to "WIN" some wonderful stamps from the Unity Stamp Company!!!

YAY!!!  That sounds pretty amazing right???

I thought so.

If you have come by my blog first.  Make sure you head back to the beginning @ Rebecca Wong's blog and start there.  Don't miss a blog.  I am sure these wonderful ladies have an amazing project to show you today!!  You don't want to miss it!!!

For today's blog hop, I have once again not done the usual paper crafting with stamps but as I always want to inspire others and push my limits of what you can do with stamps.  I have created a beautiful wood burning picture using Unity stamps.
I used the Kit of the Month
Without Fear.... Without Limits....

Here is my project for you today!!!

I started out by stamping the amazing dream catcher in black ink.

 Then I started tracing the image with my wood burner

Once I was done with the image I continued on to make a whimsical design around it and stamped the sentiment

I put my design in a frame to hang on the wall. Sorry if the photo is a little blurry.  I'm hoping I uploaded the right one as I'm posting from my phone, the image is small.  

I hope I inspired you to try something different with your stamps. 
Thank you for stopping by and now on to your next stop.....

Make sure you stop by each blog and leave a comment.

Next in line is Teri Burson 

Head on over and see what she has created for you.

Here is the line up!!!! 

Rebecca Wong

Karen Nofziger

Amy Martin (that's me)

Teri Burson

Helen Bisesi

Tammy Murphy

Tenia Nelson 

Larissa Pittman 

Unity's Blog

Growing in Unity Day 5 Free Spirit

      Growing in Unity
            Day 5

Today is the last and final day of my week as a Unity Gal!!!  As sad as that is.  I have always loved and enjoyed being apart of the Growing in Unity.  Unity Stamp company is a wonderful family operated company that truely loves their customers and fans as well as want the best possible product for us all. Thank you Unity for letting me be apart of this for yet another year!!! 

Don't forget to leave me a comment here and for the last 4 days as well to be entered in the drawing for a grab bag of Unity stamps. 

For today I went back to paper making and designed a tag using some really neat stamps from Unity. 
               
             

I always cut out my tag in a hard card stock first to make it more durable. I mean we want these things to last, don't we? 

I then found some neat paper from my stash to be my back ground. I started stamping images on different color papers until I found the perfect match. 

Going thru my stash of little peices I found some cute arrows and peices that just seemed to pull it all together. Using Tim Holtz distress stamper and some ink I stamped around the arrow, the free spirit stamp and the banner to add distressing. After playing around for a while I found the places each peice seem to fit just right.

Here's my tag for today....
            

It has that mixed media type feel.

And something we all should live by... A Free Spirit!!! 

Sometimes, we all need to free ourselves from everyday stress and problems we all deal with. Be free for a while and find our peace of mind. 

I hope I was able to inspire at least one person out there this week.  

Please make sure you go back to the other days this week and see my projects.  

Don't forget to comment on each day for more chances.  I will be picking 2 winners by the end of the weekend.  So go on and leave your comments to win a grab bag of Unity Stamps!!! 

That's all for me today.  Be back next week to announce the winners!!! 

Hugs

Amy

Supplies used:

Unity stamps: Brave girl boots- free spirit stamp

& 

Marah Freedom - wings

Maya road: mini banner

Simple stories: wood veneer arrow

Crate paper: arrow sticker

Other from my stash. 

Growing in Unity Day 4 September Girl and a Bottle of wine.

Growing in Unity

Day 4

Wow... Cant believe the week is almost over.  It is going by so fast.  But hey,  Its not over until it's over, Right?

Make sure you have visited

Day 1

Day 2

&

Day 3

Leave a comment on each day here on my blog for your chance to 

WIN!

 Whats up for grabs?  

You ask?

Unity Stamps Of course.

A Grab bag of them too!!!

So make sure you comment for you name to be in it to win it!!!

Today I am sharing with you a project that I have been wanting to do for a while.

Who likes wine????

Yeah, me too.  But what to do with all those bottles.  I cant throw them away.  Well, not all of them anyway.

So today I am showing you a project 

from one of my saved wine bottles.

It is Pretty!!!

And September Girl Had to make an appearance since it is September!

It all started with a bottle of wine, Once I drank it, that is.

the label was the first to go and you know that sticky stuff the label leaves?

yeah, that has to go too.

After I cleaned the bottle up a bit, I took it outside and spray painted it white.

This took quite a few times to make sure it was all covered and layered well.

After that dried, I began experimenting. 

I knew September Girl was the stamp.

But how was I going to make it stamp on a glass surface? 

was the question.

and I can say, it took about 10 times to get a perfect image using reg black ink. 

(the bottle being glass makes for a slippery surface, the stamp would slip and smear the ink.  Plus you have the roundness of the bottle too that doesn't work with you, by the way.)

So after the ink dried,  I wasn't happy with it. The lines became so thin, it was hard to see and even worse to try to capture with a camera.  We live, we learn, Right???

(please note: I am not telling you this is impossible or that it is a hard project, Because really this was not hard to create at all.

I just want to make sure if any of you try this, there will be things you will run into.  But don't let that discourage you from trying or continuing on with the project.

Some of our best projects come from our worse mistakes.

And for those that may have tried this.  It was new to me.  So if you have any suggestions, or idea's you found out while creating a decoration piece from a bottle, Please feel free to comment away.

We learn from each other!!

That is what a community is about.)

So, out came the paint..... 

You know that made me happy right.

Nothing like getting paint all over.

My favorite!!! 

Another 10 or so attempts and I finally managed to stick with the little imperfections.

I used a gel pen to highlight her hair and a few other spots too.

I did think to color the image, but I thought it looked better on the bottle just how she was.

I used some twine to wrap around the bottom and the top of the bottle to add a fall like look.

and one last stamp, the feather.

I think it was a good choice.

So now I have such a pretty September/fall piece to show off to my friends and family.

Hope you liked my project today and that I inspired you in some way!!

Thanks so much for visiting.

tomorrow is the last day.  So make sure you come back and comment and see and be inspired to make new things with stamps.

HUGS

Amy

Supplies used: 

Wine bottle - from my stash of drinking wine. :)

Unity Stamp: September Girl by Angie Blom

             Feather - Nov. 2014 Smak kit

White spray paint

Darice - Jute Twine

Gel pens and brown paint from my stash.

Growing in Unity Day 3 Grateful Butterfly Canvas

Growing in Unity

Day 3

Hey there crafty friends, I hope you have enjoyed my blog posts so far.  Today is a special day because my project will be up on the Unity blog today. Well and its my Birthday today too...But head over and check it out over there too.

Make sure you leave a comment here before you go.....

you do want a chance to

WIN

Right?

Then make sure you check out and comment on every post here on my blog this week.

Go back to 

Day 1

Day 2

Up for grabs is 

A grab bag of stamps from Unity!!!!!

I say that is a pretty cool prize to win just for commenting.

Without further delay, here is my project for today.

It is probably my favorite this week.

I love butterflies and I love working on canvas.

I think the colors help too.

What do you think?

I had so much fun making this project,  not only because of the butterflies, which I do love Unity's selection of.

But because it is more of a mixed media type piece.

One of my passions.

to get those fingers messy in paint and create.

It really is so much fun and also relaxing.

Who knew getting messy could turn out this cool....

Usually I use gesso as a base on all my canvas work, but this time I planned to cover the canvas in Tissue paper by Hazel and Ruby.

I love this paper, and use it on so many different things.

Of course, I use modge podge to glue it down.  

make sure you wait for it to dry fully because Tissue paper will rip if you are not careful.

but once dried... It is as tough as nails..... well almost. 

The next step was to add a little dimension with modeling paste and stencils.

 make sure after this step you allow it to dry as well. 

or it can turn into a mess. 

I then grabbed some paint and went at it.  Brushing here and there to make a beautiful back ground.  

I also took two Unity butterfly stamps and stamped in different colors on the back ground. 

I had some cute felt that was perfect for this, but it was white.  So I again had to add some color to make it pop out and join in with the other colors.  

I cut a piece of  card board box up and pulled the flat layer off so i had the bumpy side.  Splashed a few paint drops and let it dry.

Then dug thru my stash and found some great things to add layers with and make it look fun.

I took a piece of thick white card, I had laying around and stamped the beautiful butterfly on it.  I also embossed it to brighten the butterfly up.

I decided to only color in the heart on the butterfly to make it stand out more. 

So.... Do you like it as much as I do??? 

Leave me a comment and tell me what you think.

by commenting you will be entered to win a grab bag of stamps from Unity!!!!  

So don't forget to do that before you leave. 

Thanks for visiting today.

HUGS

Amy

Supplies used:

Unity Stamps - Butterfly- Nov 2014 Smak kit and 

               Butterfly- You give me Butterflies by Joslyn Nielson

Ranger Dylusional Stencil- Dotted flower

Hazel & Ruby Tissue paper- Ephemera collage

DecoArt Media - Modeling paste

Simple Stories - Grateful Wood veneer

Creative Embellishments- Octagon shape, Diamond shape, Butterfly

Queen & Co - felt fusion

Studio Calico - wood veneer (frames)

Growing in Unity Day 2 Christmas Reindeer

Growing in Unity

Day 2

Hey crafty friends,  I'm back again for day 2 of GUI!!!

I hope you stopped by my blog yesterday for Day 1.

If not head back over and check out my Halloween night canvas and don't forget to leave a comment for your chance to WIN a grab bag of stamps from Unity!!!

For today's project I took a leap into the future a wee bit for Christmas.  Although, those that usually make Christmas card to send out start earlier  than you might think. I however don't usually get to make Christmas cards very often.

And if you ask my family, we are pretty horrible about sending cards out on time anyway. We always have blamed our grandma for that.  She accepts the blame too.  With great pleasure. 

Now onto my card I made today. I haven't had the chance to use these cute lil' reindeer yet so I decided a Christmas card would be perfect.  

Here is my card......

And a couple up close photos...

To see the details.

I decided because I wanted all the reindeer on the card, to make it a longer card, which is good because I can always put a letter in it as well when mailing it off. 

I used Bo- Bunny's Elf magic collection as my main back ground.

After stamping the stamps on brown paper, which seemed appropriate for the reindeer, I cut around them leaving a lil' bit of space to outline them.

It gave it a cute look.  I used color pencils, markers and Gel Pens to color in the parts I wanted to highlight.

I then took other paper from Bo Bunny and outlined behind the image to make it stand out a touch.  Using 3D dots, I attached the Reindeer to their designated place on my card.  I added a few red snowflakes that seemed to add a perfect touch.

Of course I had to add a sentiment, so I chose "Let it snow".

Here is another picture for you to see the 3D effect. 

Thats is it for today. 

Supplies used:   

Unity Stamps - Reindeer by Lisa Arana

Bo Bunny's Elf Magic collection

Bo Bunny's Silver & Gold Collection

Core'dinations pastel card-stock

Spectrum Noir - Marine - Color pencils

Markers and Gel pens

3D Dots

red snowflakes from my stash

I hope i have inspired you today and you enjoyed my project. 

Don't forget to leave a comment 

for your chance to 

WIN a grab bag of stamps from Unity!!! 

And for more chances, comment each day of the week, here on my blog.  And Head over to the Unity website and check out all of their amazing stamps.  You will be glad you did. 

If you want to follow me, that would be nice too.  I have more in store for the up coming months, you don't want to miss it.

HUGS

Amy

Growing in Unity Day 1 2016 Halloween inspired

Growing in Unity
Day 1
Halloween inspired....

Hey crafty friends.... It's that time again... Another great year as a GIU Girl.  

I always have loved being able to be apart of Growing in Unity.  Unity Stamp Company is a great company and has amazing stamps... Have you seen the selection?  So many beautiful stamps to create with.

Here's how it works.... I post a project that was inspired by using Unity stamps every day this week.  You get to visit with me every day here on my blog and if you leave a comment every day, I will enter you into a giveaway at the end of the week to win some Unity stamps of your own.  Sounds like a good deal to me.  There will be 2 winners.

As you can see if you view past blog posts, I haven't posted in a while.  I guess I needed a much needed break from blogging for a while and what a great way to starting blogging again.  So lets get on to it..

My first project this week was inspired by Halloween, its coming up so quickly.  I started out with a black canvas. This is my first time using them, as I always just used white ones.  I wanted to use some of Unity's stamps that I have either not used yet or that I found more challenging on canvas.
Here is what I came up with....

Unity stamps I chose for this project were from the November 2014 smak kit.
The moon, flying birds and the tree branch.

I wanted the image to look dark and more Halloween night looking.

I used different color ink pads from Archival and Colorbox along with Tim Holtz distress stamper and my hands to blend the colors in the sky.  I used Faber-Castell PITT artist pen for the water.
I added the tree limb because every time I take a picture one always seems to get in the way.  But also to reflect it off the water as well.  I think it came out pretty well.  This project was also to show everyone that Stamps are not just for paper... They can be used in so many creative ways.  You just have to open your mind and think outside the box.  I hope you liked my project today and I do have some pretty neat projects in store for you this week.

And dont forget the leave me a comment.  I like hearing what you think as well as Hey... There is a chance to win some amazing Unity stamps.  (Grab bag of 25 stamps). There will be 2 winners.

Thanks for visiting.
Hugs
Amy

Tracy and Andy's Dare to Create Challenge

Hey there my crafty friends!!! 

Today I am sharing with you a project I created for

Tracy and Andy's Dare To Create Challenge.

The challenge is on their FB pages and all the info you need is on Tracy blog here.

As you all know I love both of these artist work and mixed media.

I stepped out of my comfort zone just a little by adding a little brighter colors but I am really happy with the results.

I used Deco Art paint, which is a rule in this Challenge. (And I hate to be honest here when I say, I dont have too many Deco Art paints.  How embarrassing that is.  I do need to get more because I love the things I create with them.)

And my favorite Stampedous Stamping block for the additional lightening or crackle look. 

Here is my painting on canvas.

I do have another project in the works for the same challenge.. Only to enter on Andy Skinner's side of t he challenge. 

I hope you all head over by following the links and join in too.

Let me know what you think.

I always love hearing from all my friends new and old.

Dont be shy and leave me a comment below.


thanks for visiting today.
I will be sharing my other project hopefully soon.

Hugs
Amy



New Graphic 45 and color me stamps At Blitsy

Have you heard??? 

The new Graphic 45 and Color Me stamps are at blitsy!!! 

We all know blitsy has awesome deals.

So head over and check them out here.

I am an affiliate for Blitsy now.  So if you follow my links to all the Great sales, coupon and anything I share, I will make a commission off of what you buy and if you join. So if you want to shop an amazing store and help me too.  Use my links.  And always as all of us crafter do get inspire by their videos and buy your supplies where the prices are low and the sales are awesome.

Thanks for stopping by.  

More posts with coupons and sales to come.  Keep your eyes appealed. 

If you don't wanna miss a sale, like Blitsy Facebook page or friend me on Google +, follow my blog or friend me on Facebook. 

Happy crafting!!! 

Hugs

Amy

Blitsy Affiliate

Hey There crafty friends

I am so excited to announce that I am now an Affliate for Blitsy

Blisty BRAND NEW Shaker Cards

Blitsy has so many great prices on our our so loved Crafting supplies.

I will be sharing with you from time to time coupons and links.

http://www.shareasale.com/r.cfm?B=667750&U=1272873&M=55703&urllink=

Head on over and check out Blitsy Today.  Follow the link above.

Great Prices and Great Deals always. 

Thanks for visiting today.  

I will be posting more shortly.

Hugs

Amy