March Guest Designer - Julia Stainton!

Hi I’m Julia Stainton andI’m thrilled to be guest designing for Neat & Tangled for the month of March! I love creating and always have a project (or ten) on the go. Designing is a big part of my life and I’ve been a freelance designer since 2007. My family and I live in Ontario, Canada in a big old farmhouse that we are always renovating. You can find my work at Belle Papier {pretty paper}.

The Crafting is my Jam stamp set immediately caught my eye in the Neat & Tangled Shop. It’s so me! And seriously, if you’re hear reading a crafting blog, well, I’m pretty sure it’s you too! Scissors and brushes and buttons and sequins…oh my! It’s an amazing mix of my two crafty loves, paper crafting and stitching. 

Lately I’ve been absolutely addicted to 1. Creating Shaker Cards and 2. Watercoloring. It was an easy deduction to put them both today with this sweet stamp set and see what happened.

To start off with the project, I first stamped images from the Crafting is my Jam set randomly over some watercolor paper in Black Archival Ink. When watercoloring, you need a waterproof ink so test yours on a scrap before starting to add pigment. Another tip is to be sure you use watercolor paper and not just regular card stock. It really DOES make a difference. Once the images were all stamped I added in color using some of my favorite watercolors. Once the color was all in, I flicked the brush with wet pigment over the surface for a fun flecked look.

Creating a shaker card is so much fun and the fabulous sequins in the Neat & Tangled Shop are perfect for them. You’ll need two layers, a sheet of acetate/clear plastic, sequins, a die and some dimensional foam adhesive strips. Create a window in the card front by die cutting a circle from the watercolored panel. Adhere a piece of acetate to the back of this layer to form the window panel. Cut another layer of watercolor paper the same size as the front window panel and stamp the sentiment in the center of it so that it shows through the window. Apply foam adhesive to the back of the window panel around the edges of the paper. With a large layer like this I like to surround the circle perimeter with more strips of foam so that it doesn’t sag and so that I don’t need as many sequins. I chose the Sunset Shimmer Sequin Mix for a warm fun look. Fill the window section with a sprinkle of sequins, remove adhesive backing from foam tape and carefully place stamped layer onto the window layer. You will then have an enclosed shaker space. Finish off your card with embellishments and a card base and it’s complete!

What a beautiful card!  We're so excited to have Julia this month and we can't wait to see the rest of her projects!  

Have a wonderful weekend and meet us back here bright and early Monday morning for the first day of Release Week!