Bye Bye Google Reader! a quick way to save your feed: bloglovin'

So, Google Reader will be gone on Monday, July 1st.  It's not nice to say, but I won't really miss it all that much. While I do appreciate the work that went into it, I found it sort of difficult to navigate...

My new fave?

Bloglovin' seems to be the Belle of the blog-reader ball, since it's easy to use & visually appealing:
 You can have updates delivered via email in a tidy digest format so your inbox is not overrun:

> To join bloglovin' click here and then hit the join bloglovin' button and continue...

> Quick & easy transfer of your google reader, here.

Want to Follow my blog with Bloglovin ?

After you've signed up, simply click here:

 

 ...........................................................................................................................................

 

& here's some more info that you might find useful (for Readers & Bloggers)...

 > Find some popular posts for DIY & Craft here.

> There's a free iphone app, 

for bloglovin' here:

> And more info on using Bloglovin' here.

Bloglovin' is surprisingly thoughtful towards bloggers - allowing readers to comment

 directly from the feeds while still giving page hits to blogs! This article shares the details.

> Info on how to add your blog to bloglovin' (or "claim it") here.

> But there's also a good video here for how to claim your blog, 

by Megan at " I teach, what's your super power?":

> Want to add a "follow me" widget to your blog? They are here.

Thank You for enduring the housekeeping!
Here's hoping that your blog surfing is a blast, ox


P.S. Special thanks to Lobster, the gorgeous free font (I used it here in the header thingamajiggies) It makes the most lovely cut files!

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a Rainbow Colour-Blocked card - A Day for Daisies magazine article. :)

When the lovely Tammy, of A Day for Daisies fame, asked me to 

make a card that would be included in her feature article for  

Complete Cardmaking Magazine I jumped  for joy! Then I made this...

Here's a little peek at the article:

It was such a thrill to hold a real magazine in my hands, for a change! :)

The cards that the team at A Day for Daisies made for the article are so gorgeous!

-1-

The image is called "I Love my Two Girls"
I printed it at 70% for this card:

This sweet little portrait digi reminded me of my best friend Kim & her twins girls. (They're a bunch of gorgeous, angelic people just like these gals).

The image was heat embossed by printing on Paris Bleedproof paper for Pens (Borden & Riley) and then quickly covering with fine/detail clear embossing powder & melting it with a heat gun. You can read more about heat-embossing digital images, here.

I scratched lines for the hair into the cardstock in with a paper piercer (to add texture).

It's coloured with these copic markers... skin: shaded with E00 Skin white &  C1 cool gray no.1. blush on cheeks: E50 pinkish white hair: W1 Warm Gray No.1; W3 Warm Gray No.3; touches of Y02 Canary Yellow (on a clear blender pen); YG91 Putty; W7 Warm Gray No.7; E44 Clay; E49 Dark Bark; 100 Black background: BG10 Cool Shadow.

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The embossed background was made using white cardstock embossed with Sizzix Tropical Paisley folder that was slathered in Gesso. Here's how:

 

Step 1) Pressure emboss a piece of cardstock in an embossing folder.

Step 2) Apply gesso or paint to an old plastic gift card.



Step 3) Swipe the paint on the cardstock, over the raised areas of the embossing.



Step 4) Allow it to dry to the touch (don't worry about buckling). Tip: You can speed up drying time with a blow dryer (the kind you use for your hair) but heat guns may cause paint to bubble. :-)


Step 5) You can straighten it out easily: Once it's dry to the touch, set your painted embossed piece under something flat & heavy (like a stack of books).

I like to use my embossing machine. With a plate under it. It has just the right weight and is always within reach.

You can also ink your piece & sand it for more texture, if you like:

(Here's a tutorial from a few years ago)

-3-

Here's a close-up photo of the textured paper:

 It was made by punching out tiny flowers from Fiskar's 'Scalloped Daisy' 

border punch then  piercing a hole in the middle of each:

 

And gluing them on paper...

You could do this with any punched shape, really.  It's a bit time consuming, but it's quite easy and in the end you have something that's a little out of the ordinary. And I'm probably stating the obvious here, but you can save time by only adding flowers to the areas that show on your card.

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You can download all of the rainbow digital elements for this card, here (or individually below)

The 3D flowers were paper pieced by filling with digital paper colours and fussy cutting. The flower stamens were made by stitching on white thread & silver seed beads:

Tammy gave her permission for me to share the rainbow-filled flowers as a free image 

in case anyone would like to do their own paper piecing: 

-5-

To make two-layered flowers, you could try this in Photoshop:

1) Open the "I love my two girls" image.

2) Open the rainbow flowers & copy them.

3) Paste the flowers & arrange them over the image.

4) Print the image & an extra set of flowers to layer.

Don't have Photoshop? 

You could simply print & cut them and stick them on the image.

Need a quick card?

You could just lay the rainbow flowers over the image & print
if you need a quick card & don't want to be fussy cutting.

-6-

Here's the rainbow frame, in case you'd like to use it:

To make the frame, I just made a grid in Photoshop & then filled

 each square with some of my patterned papers (at a really small scale):

And here is the blank Overlay version, in case you'd like to 

make your own custom frame or square quilt paper:



or you can find the blank overlay here on flickr.

New to making papers?

You might want to check out this tutorial for filling with pattern in Photoshop
or this one using Gimp (which is a free program).


And here's the inside of the card:



Just some tiny graph paper in light turquoise,
with a simple little strip of rainbow and a row of more punched flowers.

Here's the strip, in case you might like to use it:

. 

 

How to save these single papers directly from my blog:

PC users in Firefox/Chrome: right click on the image & choose "save link as"

PC users in Explorer: right click on the image & choose "save target as".

Mac users: Visit flickr, here, click on the paper you want, then right click and 

select 'all sizes' & click on "download the original size of this photo" 

If something isn't working for you, or you would
like some tips on printing, please just let me know
  melstampz@gmail.com

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The design team at A Day for Daisies share some stunning work on the Blog. 

And they have challenges often - with free images. Here's a look at the latest release:

 It's a set of interactive paper doll images that dance & move!

Hope you're enjoying your day, ox





P.S. You might like to know that all of the images in the 'I Love...' collection come on a free CD with the magazine. It's such a great bargain. (You can also find them individually here and as a collection here.)

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Mustache paper & overlay set (free)

Wow, You Guys! Thank you times a million for your kindness about my video.
 You are always so amazingly supportive! (Gets me all teary eyed). :o)
I promise to try to make more videos. Thinking of trying out the Hubby's iphone...

There was no resisting last-minute Mustache papers & overlays
for Father's Day. They're available
in zip files for quick downloads (but also still on flickr)...

You can download all the papers & the overlay in 2 zip files here:

  1 - Mustaches - on white (overlay & colours 1-25)

2 - Mustaches - on white (colours 26-51)

Or you can find the whole 12.5 inch square set on flickr, here.

And just the overlay, to make your own custom papers, here.





You can download all the papers & the overlay in 2 zip files here:

 

1 - Mustaches - solid (overlay & colours 1-25)

2 - Mustaches - solid (colours 26-51)
 


Or you can find the whole 12.5 inch square set on flickr, here.

And just the overlay, to make your own custom papers, here.

In case you want to just download one single paper
and try it, here are my very faves:

.

How to save these single papers directly from my blog:

PC users in Firefox/Chrome: right click on the image & choose "save link as"

PC users in Explorer: right click on the image & choose "save target as".

Mac users: Visit flickr, here, click on the paper you want, then right click and select all sizes & click on "download the original size of this photo"
 

If something isn't working for you, or you would
like some tips on printing, please just let me know
  melstampz@gmail.com

 Hope you can have some fun with these,

P.S. I got the original free mustache shapes from digitalscrapbooking.net, but their site is down for maintenance.

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