Stampin’ Blends with Mug on the Shelf

Stampin' Blends and Mug on the Shelf sounds like a great holiday combination.  When Elf on the Shelf came along my kids were already beyond Santa.  I love seeing all the creative pictures of how and where my friends “find” their elves each day during this holiday season.  If you enjoy coloring as part of your paper crafting repertoire, you should consider giving Stampin’ Blends a try.

If you have followed me for a while you know that coloring is not my strong paper crafting skills.  I find that with Stampin’ Blends even I can get a well shadowed image while enjoying coloring.  Here’s my method:

1. Color the area with the light color using the brush tip of the marker
2. Color the outline (and anywhere else there is stamped image) using the fine tip of the dark marker
3. Add a layer of light over the whole image to blend the dark and the light

For these images, I was able to accomplish this for each mug and the shelf with one pass.  If the image were larger, I would have used the same technique, but only on a small portion of the image.  Once I completed steps 1 – 3 in an area of a larger stamped image I would have repeated the steps in another area of the stamped image.  I promise to demonstrate this in a video soonJ

Another tip when making this card – stamp the images bottom to top.  I started with the phrase at the bottom of the white layer.  Then I stamped the shelf.  Finally, I added the mugs and their toppings using the Masking Technique.