Friend's Birthday and Cloud Tutorial...

Good evening!

I have one more Zoo Animal card to share with you tonight. Remember to take advantage of Gina's Lucky Seven stamp sale before Monday night at midnight - that's when all the stamp sets go back to their regular prices!

My card today is based on my StampTV sketch for this week - as you can tell, it's one of my favorite layouts and seems to fit so many images that I own! I used some retired Stampin Up patterned papers - I love these colors and patterns together!

I colored everything in with Copics and added some Diamond stickles to the elephant and Cinnamon stickles to the giraffe - because what's a card without some sparkle?! lol! The 'friend' sentiment is from Rectangle Greetings - I love how these block stamps in this stamp set fit Marvy's yellow scallop rectangle punch.

Here's the inside of the card...

The star in the Zoo Animal stamp set fits the green Marvy star punch pretty well, doesn't it? The sentiments on the inside of the card are from Gina's Simple Pleasures and Rectangle Greetings.

Cathy and Donna are also sharing some projects they've made with a couple of the Lucky Seven Stamp sets tonight too - so be sure to check out their blogs tonight!

I have been asked to share how I make my puffy clouds on my cards - like on the one I'm sharing tonight, so I thought I'd take a few photos to show you just how quick and easy they are to make.

First, these are the materials I use for the clouds...

You can use any chalks - I just like using Pebbles shimmer chalks because as you well know by now - I LOVE sparkle! I have also found that I can color right over my Copic coloring and the chalks don't seem to alter my colors very much. You can use a white eraser to erase some of the chalk too.

I used a scallop circle punchout for the cloud shape on this card - but you can also use a scallop oval punch like I did on this card HERE. The technique is exactly the same. The alligator clip and pom-pom puffs are included in the chalk kit.

Starting at the bottom corner of your paper, lay your scallop shape down and shade around it with chalks. **Remember to stamp and color your images FIRST and do the clouds last... at least if you're working with Copics because you don't want to stain your copic marker nibs. The clouds are usually the LAST thing I add to my scene - unless of course I'm adding stickles... **

This is how it will look with the template pulled away - notice the hard lines of the scallops. Don't worry about the harsh lines - we'll soften them a little later.

Next, move your scallop die to one side and apply chalk all around the shape like shown. You will need to dab the pom-pom into the chalk several times to get enough color to go around the die cut shape.

Continue to move the shape - working from BOTTOM to the sides upward, picking up chalk as needed to get the shading you want. Fill the entire sky with clouds.

See all the puffy clouds? The chalk lines are harsh and definite right now, aren't they? It doesn't look very realistic yet, so we're going to soften the lines. This is the biggest reason why I like to make clouds with chalks - they are very forgiving and can be softened really easily.

Take the alligator clip with the pom-pom and gently rub right over the scalloped lines - it will soften those harsh lines right up! Don't pick up more chalk on the applicator - just use what is left on the pom-pom. Now, let's take it one step further..

To finish the clouds off, rub the alligator clip with the pom-pom over the entire sky very softly - this adds just a touch of blue chalk to the white clouds and makes them more realistic.

Let me know if this was helpful to you - I hope it showed just how easy they are to make!

Thanks for checking in with me tonight!
Jessica