Christmas Cards in August

Hello everyone,

This passed weekend I finally got around to playing with some of my new faerie stamps! I put business on hold and my step mother came over for a "create date". I so needed a day of laughing and creating!

I decided to use Ornament Faerie to create a Christmas card and started with embossing her in black on some iridescent white paper that I have - unfortunately, I don't remember what kind of paper it is. I'll keep my eye open because Tombow markers blend beautifully on it and the iridescence shines through whatever colour you apply! I added colour to the edges and blended in with water. I then added Glossy accents to the holly wings to add some texture.

  

From there I chose papers that I felt matched well and outlined the borders with Stickles, glitter glue. I also added some Christmas ribbon that I had behind the image to break up the rectangle frames a bit. A technique that Shirley Deatcher does really well!

  

I used a pair of my Fiskars scissors to cut the bottom edge off the front of the card leaving it a bit shorter than the back cover. I then added a band of gold to the inside so that when the card is closed it shines behind the cut edge. When the card is open it adds a little bit of interest to the inside of the card. I saw my step mother do this - she is a very artistic person who has taught me much along the way - and loved the look of it. I think it ties the front of the card in with the inside to create a unified piece. 

There you have it! She ended up way more traditional looking than I had first thought but I like the end result :)

It was funny timing... Shirley wrote me that night as well to show me a piece that she had made with Ornament Faerie. I guess we were both creating at the same time! I'm posting a photo of her creation. She blogged about it earlier today as well. Shirley's Blog

Thanks for stopping by for a look at what I'm up to :)
Ryn 
All of my stamp designs are available here:

www.designsbyryn.com

A sneak preview of my new Faerie Stamps!

Hello everyone,

I guess this is my very first blog post! To be honest, I've been a little bit afraid to commit to blogging on a regular basis. There are always so many things to do with running this business that I keep finding excuses not to take the plunge. The release of a new set of stamp designs seems to be a good place to start. Deep breath... Here I go!

I've seen so many blogs - many of them maintained by my customers - that are beautiful and very polished looking! If any of you have advice for me along the way I would love to hear what you have to say :)

I hope you enjoy this sneak peak! These stamps should be available on my website Designs by Ryn in a bit more than a week from now.

 I'm quite pleased with the texture in Dragonfly Faerie's wings. To me, it looks as if the light is catching them and they are shining.

 Harp Faerie uses the same technique in the wings as Dragonfly Faerie. It worked too well to only use once! I also added little tufts on the wings and a feather - Why not? Faeries don't live within our world's set of rules. I can't wait to make something with this for my musician friends.

 Dancing Faeries was inspired by traditional dance forms in which individuals link arms and celebrate together. I had lots of fun giving them different hair styles. As they are Autumn faeries I made their wings of leaves.

 In Ornament Faerie I was originally going to have her holding a garland of holly leaves and berries to match the wings. No matter what I did I couldn't get the scale to look right so I went through some old sketches and found this ornament that I had planned to use another year. Voila! It worked! She's on her way to decorate a Christmas tree.

 Hugging Faerie just makes me smile and feel warm :) I think this stamp will go wonderfully with some of my snowflake designs from previous years. I imagine them sitting in the snow maybe with a sentiment like, "Sending hugs your way".

 Acorn Faerie is a set of 3 individual stamps. The idea behind this was to have the acorn and oak leaf separate from the main stamp so that they could be used as embellishments. This faerie has just finished removing the top of the acorn to be used as a beret like hat and is giving the nut to her little chipmunk friend.

Dancing Faerie Set is also a set of 3 individual stamps. They are detached copies of the  faeries in the stamp Dancing Faeries. This is for those of you that want the flexibility of placing the faeries where you would like them to be. They go together in different configurations or can stand alone in a scene.

I hope you like the new designs! I look forward to hearing what you think :)
Bye for now,
Ryn