Sixth Street Sundries

Emily Midgett

domed arches stencils

Ducky Hugs with New Simon Says Stamp!

This post was sponsored by Simon Says Stamp. Thanks, Simon!

Hi friends! I have been super busy the last couple of weeks getting my mom to various medical appointments and celebrating my little boys’ fifth birthday (my goodness, how time has flown!), but I’ve taken some time to slow down and do some creating with the new Simon Says Stamp Rain or Shine release! The utterly precious little ducky in the new Darling Duckling die set immediately spoke to me; my theme for the baby shower for my older set of twins was based on the book “Make Way for Ducklings,” a favorite of mine as a child and a good representation of my own journey through motherhood with a gaggle of duckling-kiddos trailing behind me! I pulled out some white cardstock, botanical dies, and my OLO markers and got to work creating this sweet card. Let’s get started with the details!

*I have gathered links to all of the products used at the bottom of the post for your convenience, using affiliate links. Thank you for shopping with my links! I truly appreciate your support for my work!*

To begin, I die cut the pieces of the new Darling Duckling, Pretty Poppies, and Windswept Leaves dies from plain white cardstock. I then used vibrant OLO Markers to add lots of vibrant yellow and green to the ducky and foliage, as well as creating some almost-white poppies with a super pale yellow marker and using the Zero marker to soften the edges of the yellow so that they faded into white along the edges of the petals. Customizing solid white die cuts with alcohol markers is one of my favorite ways to make simple die cut shapes super special and bold!

To ground my die cut images, I decided to do some simple stenciling. After placing a white A2 card front on a Simon Says Stamp Craft Tacky Mat, I centered one of the Nested Domed Arches Stencils on the card front, then used blending brushes to lightly blend Pawsitively Saturated Ink in shades of Cadette and Butter at the top and bottom of the arch to insinuate a sunrise towards the bottom and blue sky above. The background doesn’t need to be super involved; the suggestion of colors is enough for your brain to fill in the blanks!

After I had finished creating the background, I used liquid and foam adhesive to adhere the flowers, foliage, and sweet little ducky on the blended area. I tucked the foliage around the flowers and added a bloom and leaves around ducky to complete the visual cascade, finally adding a greeting from Bold Smiles that I’d stamped with Cadette ink over which I added a layer of Iridescent Blue embossing powder, creating a subtle and beautiful shimmer. Finally, I added a few Butter Pawsitively Dazzling Gems for added sparkle!

Well, that’s all for my project today! I love the fresh springtime colors. We’ve had a cold snap after some endlessly rainy weather, but I’m hopeful that we will have warm temps by Easter so that the flowers can bloom and have a nice day outside. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!

Snowy Deer with Simon Says Stamp + Colored Pencils!

This post was sponsored by Simon Says Stamp. Thanks, Simon!

Hi friends! Today, I have a super sweet and feminine project to share with you using the beautiful new Holiday Cheer stamp set from the November 2024 Card Kit of the Month, which is sadly sold out as a kit, but the great thing about Simon Says Stamp kits is that you can almost always purchase the kit items individually! The kits are just a really excellent value, full of coordinating products that work beautifully together and separately, so it’s totally worth it to become a Subscriber. (Click HERE to read all of the details on how you can save money with a monthly subscription!) However, the precious Christmas Cheer stamp set is still available (and with coordinating dies as a set!) and I’ve used it to create this delicate and feminine holiday card. Let’s get started with the details on my project!

To begin, I stamped the deer, the holly sprigs, and the sweet bow images from the Christmas Cheer stamp set onto some pale gray cardstock using Simon Says Stamp White Pigment ink. I like to use white pigment ink when working with colored pencils on colored cardstock, as the white pigment ink lines seem to be absorbed into the colored pencil coloring beautifully so that the images pop from the colorful background! I used my favorite Caran D’Ache colored pencils to color the images in soft shades of warm gray, sweet carnation pink, and some vibrant green for the holly leaves. After I had finished coloring the main parts of the images, I used a white gel pen and a black pigment pen to add details to the deer’s eyes, nose, and spots. Mixing the mediums helps to make the deer look super polished and professional, as I can never get the tips of my colored pencils *quite* sharp enough to get perfect coverage on those teeny areas!

After I had finished the pencil coloring, I placed one of the stencils from the Domed Arches Stencils & Masks set onto the center of an A2 panel of the same light gray cardstock that I used for the images, then used a blending tool to blend Simon Says Stamp White Pigment ink on only the curved part of the stencil opening. It reminds me of a snow globe! After I had blended the snowy images, I used a white gel pen to add some tiny dots and snowflakes on just the blended area, enhancing the snow globe feel and creating an area upon which I could ground my little deer. I also used the White Pigment Ink to stamp a greeting from the Christmas Cheer set as well as the banner, adding some white embossing powder to make the sentiment look extra crisp. I used a pair of scissors to fussy cut all of the images, then adhered them to the card front with some foam adhesive squares, which helps the tone-on-tone images pop out from the background a bit!

After I had adhered the images, I decided to trim a thin strip off of the bottom of the A2 gray panel so that I could tie in some more of the color palette from the pencil colored images. I added a very thin strip of white glitter cardstock peeking out from the bottom of the gray card front, then backed it with a slightly thicker strip of pink cardstock to tie in the pink in the color palette. I also used a Quickie glue pen on the holly leaves to add some Simon Says Stamp Unicorn Dust fine glitter, adding just a tiny bit of sparkle to the card, which I think makes it extra festive and fun!

Well, that’s all for my project today. Don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the Simon Says Stamp DieCember 2024 blog party! It’s not a traditional blog hop, but there will be an absolute wealth of inspiration using the fabulous new release, as well as fun giveaways and promotions to celebrate DieCember! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!