Sunday with my Copics

Happy Tuesday!! I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!! I thought I'd pop in today and share the cards we made over the weekend in my Copic classes. I taught 2 Beginner Copic classes at Papertrix on Sunday and had a wonderful time!! I want to say a BIG thank you to everyone who came and took the class - I hope you all went away with a bit more knowledge about Copics and had a great time as well! ;) I got to meet some fellow SCS'ers too - so that made these classes all that more special. We made 3 cards again in each class - this first card features "Get Well Riley" from Hanna Stamps. Besides Copic knowledge - I try to incorporate some fun ideas into the cards for the class as well - so since I had bought a bunch of those little plastic mazes in bulk - I decided to share with my students and make this fun get well card. The paper on this one is from the DCWV Grade School stack.

This next one we did features one of the KETTO's by Stamping Bella - yes - Cindy carries the KETTO's in her store - how fun is that!? I'm telling ya - if you live close to Nashville, IN - RUN over there and get yours today - they are flying out of the store!! ;) This one is "Ginger Ketto" - I paired her with some paper from the DCWV Far East stack and a Hero Arts sentiment (Arigato means "thank you" in Japanese). We accented the card with some donut Schmintz from Stamping Bella - Cindy has started carrying these in the store as well and they are so much fun - the little Hero Arts gemstones fit perfectly in the middle of these! I think everyone had fun using the Ketto images as well.

The last one we did was a little circle card - this card features one of the new Shirley's 2 Girls sets that Papertrix is now carrying - this image and sentiment is from the "What's New?" set. (And BTW - I am totally in LOVE with them - I have an Airedale Terrier and this dog looks EXACTLY like my Bailey!!). We used paper from the DCWV Pets stack and a little bone clip with some ribbon tied to it. These Shirley's 2 Girls images are fun to teach Copics with because of the little backgrounds they have incorporated on them - it's a great image to really talk about shading and adding those background shadows to make our dog pop out of the background.

So I hope my gals (and guy) on Sunday enjoyed the class and were pleased with what they went home with - I think I'm getting better at creating card designs that are feasible for all levels of cardmakers and that we can get colored and assembled within the class time we have. And as long as they leave knowing better how to use their markers - well - that makes my day because that means I'm doing something right - LOL!! Thanks so much for stopping by!!

Copic Class Saturday

Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend!! I wanted to post this evening and show you the cards we made in my Copic class today at Papertrix. I had another wonderful class today and I think everyone enjoyed themselves! Thanks to everyone who attended today!! We made 3 fun cards today along with learning the basics of Copic coloring and shading/blending. This first card uses the new Christmas Owls set by Hero Arts. We even pulled out the Cuttlebug to emboss the panels on our cards.

This next card uses the ADORABLE Teddy Bear from the Hanna Stamps "Vintage Toys" set - this is a GREAT image to practice Copic coloring on - lots of space on his adorable little body to color and shade! The background paper is from the Graphic 45 Playful Past line and we used the Martha Stewart Lace Doily punch for the decorative edges at the top of the card.

This last card uses the MFT "Going Places" set - this map is SO much fun to color and shade and the dresses on the MFT and Hanna images are perfect for practicing Copic coloring on. The background paper on this one is by My Mind's Eye. I tried to use nice clean layouts for our cards - I like the gals to leave with some card design and embellishment ideas as well as Copic knowledge.

Thanks again to the wonderful ladies to who attended my class today and an EXTRA BIG "thank you" to Cindy and Wayne - who own the BEST stamp store in Indiana - you guys are awesome and I love teaching at your store - thanks for a wonderful opportunity!

I hope you will all be stopping by my blog on Monday - the Hanna Stamps November release sneak peeks start on the design team blogs on Monday and I am busting at the seams to show them to you - you are gonna LOVE LOVE LOVE them and I get to introduce you to my new favorite Hanna on Monday too - hee hee....oh - and I got a little treat in the mail today that is gonna make for some extra fun on my blog next week ;) - have a wonderful weekend and I will see you bright and early on Monday!!

More "Ghoul" Power & Copic Class News!

Hope you all have been having a wonderful week!! So I REALLY wanted to do a card for today's sketch challenge over on SCS - it's such a cool sketch - I had it all planned out - my image colored and everything - well - I went to cut my image out with one of my circle nestibilities and the edge of it slipped and caught the tip of my thumb and sliced it open!!! OUCH!!! (A little back story - according to my dear hubby - I am COMPLETELY and udderly accident prone - seriously - you should have seen his face when I came home with the Bind It All - hee hee...he knew I would lose a finger in that - and have almost had it happen twice. I have to promise him when I go to crops that I must come home with all appendages in tact - LOL!!!) So anywho - I cut my finger on my nestie and it bled terribly - ALL over my image and the cardstock I was using for the card and all over my Cuttlebug plates as well too - ick. So that's the story why I don't have a sketch challenge card for you today - trust me - you didn't want to see the carnage - hee hee...I promise I'll be more careful for tomorrow. It's also why I am sharing this little cutie card with you today - it's a card I made over the weekend for Papertrix. Cindy carries the Imaginesce Hallowhimsy line down at her store - so you can get this adorable little stamp and matching paper there. I wanted to spruce her up a bit since she doesn't really need to be colored in - I added a couple of Hero Arts rhinestone stickers to her eyes and a little knot of ribbon to her head - isn't she a cutie?? Speaking of Papertrix - I have some wonderful COPIC CLASS NEWS:

My beginner class on November 1st from 12-3 is full - HOWEVER - since I'll be down there already - Cindy and I have decided to add ANOTHER Beginner Copic class from 3-6 on November 1st - so if you are interested in taking my class - please contact Cindy at Papertrix - the number is on my sidebar. We always have LOTS of fun and I promise I don't bite - well - as long as you behave yourself - BWA HA HA!!! Totally kidding - hee hee...

Another Great Class!

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!! So are you all ready for Monday morning?? No? Me neither - LOL!!! I just got back from a wonderful day in Nashville, IN - I got to spend all day in a stamp store - sounds pretty fun, huh? I taught my second Copic class at Papertrix today and it went really well!! I had a wonderful and fun group of ladies today - they were very eager to learn about Copics and were all very sweet! We made 3 cards again today - I chose to make different cards for this class - I want to keep my class fresh! Here are the cards we made...

The image on this card is from the Hero Arts clear Cupcake set - I love this set and this is a great image to color in with Copics - that nice big wrapper is great for learning to shade and we also talked about how to use that wonderful Cool Shadow Copic shade to make our frosting appear white. The patterned paper on this card is from the DCWV Pocketful of Posies stack. The gals especially loved those rhinestone "sprinkles" - a perfect final touch!
We had SO much fun with this card - check out Tractor Riley in his corn field - LOL!! The corn is from the Garden Hanna set and so are the little vegetables that I stamped on the 3 yellow strips - I wish I could take credit for being the first to pair this Riley with the corn from the Garden Hanna set - but I can't - a very talented gal over on SCS whom I know as "Emptynextstamper" made a card where she had put Riley in front of the corn for one of our Friday Hanna Stamps challenges and that card has always stuck with me - so thanks to her for the super idea!! I did this card in John Deer colors which everyone got a kick out of and it was just a fun image to color - gotta love Riley!! ;)

This last card we did was with an image from the "Rain or Shine" set from My Favorite Things set - this is a great image for learning to color and shade with Copics too - just look at that nice big raincoat of hers!

Overall - we had a really great class - I do want to send a big "Thank You" to all the ladies who came out and took my class today - I had such a wonderful time with them! I have my next class scheduled for those who may be interested - it will be Saturday, November 1st from 12:00 - 3:00 PM - if you are in the area - Fall is an absolutely breath-taking time in Brown County - I would love to see you there!! Thanks so much for stopping by!!

What a fun day at Papertrix!

Happy Sunday everyone!! Hope everyone has had a wonderful weekend! I had such a fun day today at Papertrix teaching my very first Copic class - wow - can I just say that I am going to love teaching? I had a great class today - 6 very wonderful ladies came to take my class and we had such a great time! I do hope I didn't overwhelm them with too much Copic information today - it was a Beginner Copic class - I taught them basic coloring and then a couple of beginner blending techiniques. We talked about the Copic Color System and what all those letters and numbers on the markers mean. I taught them a little about the colorless blender and then about what inks and papers to use. They left the class with 3 finished cards - I did all the paper cutting and stamping of the images in their card kits - so we could really focus on coloring the images well and then putting them on the cards was just the icing on the cake! Here are the cards we made in class today...I used the "But I Need It" Hanna stamps set for this card - this was a great image to learn how to do even coloring and then a little shading as well - there is so much area on her dress to color in. We were also able to talk about things like coloring lips, skin, cheeks, eyes, etc. with this image. We did some paper piecing on a couple of her bags (which they LOVED) using paper from the Die Cuts with a View Glitter stack. The sentiment on this card is from the "Things Hanna Would Say" set.We used Hula Sophie G for this next card - I taught them lots of cool techniques with this image. We did basic marker to marker on paper blending - but we did some tip to tip blending work on the flowers in her lei. We did a little work with the colorless blender as well on the sand and I taught them how to do the blades of grass using the Super Brush tip of the marker. The paper on this card is from the My Mind's Eye Magnolia stack and the sentiment is from the Hanna Stamps "Just What I Meant to Say" set.This third card went over really well. I used the biggest scalloped circle nesibilitie to create the acutal card and then just did a lot of layering with the circle nestibilities. I used a bird from the Penny Black "Fresh New Day" clear stamp set for the main image and the sentiment is from the "Things Hanna Would Say" set. I did more marker to marker on paper blending with this one and we did some halo work around the bird with the colorless blender. I also showed them how to alter objects with the Copics - the little dew drops in the center of the flower were clear and we used a dark purple Copic to color them to match the paper - this was another very popular trick!

Overall - the class went really well today and Cindy and I are already making plans for the next class. I am going to check my oldest son's school schedule - but the current plan is that I will be teaching another Beginner Copic class in August and then we think we may add an Advanced Class in September - so as soon as I have info on my upcoming classes at the store - I will be sure to post them on here. Thanks so much for stopping by and be sure to check back tomorrow - it's that time again - sneak peeks for the August Hanna Stamps releases start tomorrow - which will be released this coming Friday - August 1st. And let me tell you - you are going to LOVE these new releases - they are fabulous!!!

I'm Copic Certified!

Greetings from CHA!! OMG - what an experience this is - I am having an absolute blast up here in good ol' Chicago! My CHA experience started yesterday with my Copic Certification course - and WOW - it was truly one of the most fun and informative classes I have ever set thru. The fabulous and insanely talented Marianne from Copic taught the class and I have to say BIG BIG BIG thanks to her for sharing her knowledge and love of these markers with us - not only is she extremely knowledgeable about Copics - but she is an absolute riot - so BIG thanks to her for a wonderful experience! The class was technique driven - we learned so many different blending techniques and you truly begin to see just how much you can do with Copics. I thought it may be fun to share some of the images that I colored in the class yesterday so you can see the techniques we learned about. This first image is a Whipper Snapper stamp I colored in class - this is some shading done with marker to marker on paper - Marianne taught us the key to nice even color is to really saturate the paper with the marker by coloring in small circles and keeping your edges wet - this will give that nice even color. To do the shading - go back in with a color 2-3 shades darker and put in your shadows - then go back in with your original base color and blend two shades together. The halo around my little Boo Boo bear was me playing with the Colorless Blender...

Here's a Penny Black image I did with the same marker to marker blending technique - and notice the little bit of sparkle on the flower leaf and stem - that was done with a Copic Spica glitter pen - OMG - LOVE these!!!

One of my favorite blending techniques we learned in class was this feathering technique - I LOVE this technique - it's done with 2 different colors - you start each color on opposite ends and then feather them together - I am describing it terribly - so I will show you some images I did using this technique and if you want more info - Marianne has a entire post about it on her blog (http://www.ilikemarkers.blogspot.com/) - here's another Penny Black - I did some feathering on the belly (pink into green) and then I did some feathering on the flower (yellow into pink)...

Here's an unfinished Hanna I wanted to share with you - I apologize I didn't finish coloring her in - but I wanted to show you the feathering I did with the orange and yellow on her towel - check it out - doesn't it look like flames??

Oh - and did I mention the goodie bag?? Copics galore!! Here's a pic of the goodies I got at the class - this is very exciting to me because there are some different Copics that I hadn't tried before - the wide marker is just too fun, LOVE the Spica Glitter pen - and they even gave us a couple of multiliner pens - I am VERY excited to have the black multiliner pen!


We also learned how to use the airbrush system (so now I can go home and really get the full potential out of mine). One of the most interesting parts of the class was learning about the colorless blender and all the fun things you can do with the colorless blender solution - Marianne does some very neat special effects with this stuff - she showed us a pic of a pair of burlap pants she had colored on one of her Manga characters that literally looked like real burlap - she had done it with a piece of burlap and the blender solution. We also did some altering on items like dew drops, flowers, etc. - basically just really emphasizing the fact that the ink in Copics is an alcohol ink and you can do all the same things you can with other alcohol ink. Overall - I would give the class 2 very enthousiatic thumbs up (I think that's from a movie - just can't think which one - LOL) - anywho - it's an AMAZING class - well worth the money and the trip up - I can't wait to get home and try out all these fun techniques!!