Old-Fashioned Girls (Digital Two for Tuesday)

Did you ever make a card (or in this case, several cards) that you just couldn't wait to share? Well, I made these last night and couldn't wait to show them to you this morning.

I follow the Digital Two for Tuesday blog, and I love collecting the images she gives out each week. However, I'm not very good about actually making anything with them - except for that one time when I guest designed for her. :)

But when I saw these girls, I knew I had to make something with them. I hope this encourages her to keep offering the images! People really do end up using them, even if it takes awhile.



Supplies: stamps (Digital Two for Tuesday, Stamp Happens); paper (K & Co, unknown, Making Memories, The Paper Company); ink (Versamark with chalks, BIC markers); MS PATP Eyelet Lace; Nestabilities Labels 8; dimensionals.

I already had the base of this first one made, but it just wasn't coming together like I wanted it to. Originally, I had intended it to be a quilt card. But since this scrap was bigger (4x6"), I tried to fit it onto a 5x7" card and it just wasn't thrilling me. So I set it aside ... and then realized it was perfect for this image.

So I used the paper as a coloring guide for my image. I discovered that it's best to go with light colors for these images since they're vintagey. In case you'd like to know which specific BIC colors I used, here you go: Peach Parfait (skin), Tiki Hut Tan (hair and shoes), Summer Melon (dark clothing accents), and Yellow Blaze (main clothing color).

Before I forget, let me mention that I almost always print my digital images using only my black ink cartridge (it's cheaper). As a result, I had to pull these images into my photo editing program and choose "Fade Correction" to make them dark enough. I also chose to "Remove Digital Noise", and it smoothed out the stray dots on the faces and such. If you use a color cartridge in combination with your black cartridge, they may print for you just fine as they are.



Here's a close-up of the main image to show you a really cool technique I learned from Lindsay Weirich. (Sorry, I've searched and searched and still can't find her exact posting, but I'll try to explain it.)

After I had colored the girl, the white background looked pretty stark next to my warm yellows. So I used a trick I learned from Lindsay. I'm not sure if this will work with dye-based markers, but feel free to chime in if you do know!

Anyway, I colored my image with my (permanent) BIC markers. Then I inked up this stamp with Versamark and stamped it right over top. I chose yellow chalk and rubbed only where I wanted the background image to show (i.e. not on top of the girl). I went back over it lightly with some orange chalk to make it a "warmer" color. The really neat thing is that the Versamark doesn't show on my main image. Isn't that cool? I doubt it would work on colored paper (since it would probably also watermark on my image), but it works great on white! Besides, we mostly color images on white, right?

Okay, so let's go on to the second adorable little girl ...



Supplies: stamps (Digital Two for Tuesday, Inkadinkado sentiment); paper (Making Memories?, The Paper Company); ink (SU! Bliss Blue, BIC markers); Nestabilities Scallop Circles Large; MS PATP Iron Gate Fence border punch; paper doily; white pearl dimensional paint.

I used the patterned paper as a guide to coloring this girl, too. I used: Peach Parfait (skin), Tiki Hut Tan (hair and shoes), Oceanview Blue (clothing), and Lemon Bliss (clothing).

After she was colored, I cut her out and mounted her onto the doily-and-scallop-circle base, slightly off-center so I could stamp the sentiment right beside her.

I really like how this one turned out!

And then I have one more ...



Supplies: stamps (Digital Two for Tuesday, Inkadinkado sentiment, Studio G leaves); paper (Making Memories, The Paper Company); ink (SU! Bliss Blue, BIC markers); Nestabilties Labels 8; MS doily lace punch; paper doily; pearl dimensional paint.

As I was laying this one out, I remembered a sketch challenge I had seen just this week (and really liked), so I'm entering this one in the 2 Sketches 4 You Laura's Sketch 50 Challenge. I'm sure there's an abbreviation I'm supposed to use, but I couldn't find it anywhere. Sorry! :)

I used the same Versamark and chalk technique on the background of this image. The leaf stamp worked pretty good with my decorative paper, so I was pleased!

I hope you enjoy these cards as much as I do, and I hope you go check out the Digital Two for Tuesday blog. She is so generous and has some really nice stuff on there!