Thanks to everyone for following along on the Thomas Kinkade blog hop this week.  We’re glad you stopped in to visit and post your comments!

Random drawings were done for 2 gift certificates to the CHF store out of everyone who participated in the hop and left comments, and the winners are:

Tanja for the $20 gift certificate

and

Aimee for the $10 gift certificate

Congrats, and enjoy your shopping!

Liz will email you the gift certificates.

The Gift Certificates will be valid for 6 months from date of issue. PLEASE NOTE that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your Gift Certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

There is one more prize which is the Design Team Special Prize for creations uploaded to the Kinkade Summer Fling Gallery during the week.  Everyone wow-ed us with fantastic projects and it was so hard to pick just one, but the prize for this week goes to Stamp Queen.

This Barn Dominoes project is really a masterpiece.  We loved that she used Sunset at Riverbend Farm for a decor item and featured the image in this cutout style.  Just look at all of the texture and her beautiful coloring!  Stamp Queen, email liz@cornishheritagefarms.com to claim the stamp set of your choice up to a value of $16.99.

A few more Kinkade gallery standouts include this one from Lisa S:

The full frame image of It Doesn’t Get Much Better and her expert coloring is really all you need here.

And StamperSuzz made a Christmas card featuring Silent Night all in gold:

This is just so festive with the collage embossed background, the bookpage, and all of the embellishments!

Thanks so much to everyone who played along with the blog hop and special gallery submissions.  We love your enthusiasm!

Now on to next week, we’re spotlighting All Things Considered.  These sets go on sale starting tonight (6/18), and please join us again next week for another blog hop and special gallery challenge.

Happy stamping,

Laura

It’s hard to believe that it has been three years since Cornish Heritage Farms released the first Thomas Kinkade image.  I still remember when I first saw these gorgeous works of art popping up in the Splitcoast Stampers gallery.  I was in awe of the stampers who had created them.  It wasn’t long before I had to own one of my own.  When I finally bought my first stamp I was afraid to use it.  I didn’t think it was possible that I would be able to create the beautiful cards that I saw in the gallery.  And to be honest…when I look back at those first attempts at coloring these images I’m a little embarrassed.  But now…after little baby steps and with lots of practice.  Coloring Thomas Kinkade images and creating projects with them is one of my favorite things to do!

Are you still intimidated by these detailed images?  Well, hopefully after today’s tutorial you will be ready to give it a try!  My goal today is to show you several different ways to create beautiful cards with the Thomas Kinkade images and to show you some of the great resources available to you.  I am going to start you with an easy monochromatic Thomas Kinkade Card and step you up to a completely colored card.  I thought we would work with Wedding Cards today since it is that season.

This first card is a simple momochromatic card which requires no coloring to look fabulous.

For these cards I used:
-A Thomas Kinkade Stamp (I used The Forest Chapel)
-Misc. Scrapblocks or backgrounders
-Versafine Ink by Tsukineko
-A Brayer
-CHF Simply Smooth White paper
-Colored Cardstock of your choice
-border punches
-Embelishments such as brads, dew drops, ribbon, or lace.

To get the best results I use CHF Simply Smooth paper and a brayer to help  get a nice even layer of ink on the stamp.  You can find a great comparison of different paper’s and inks here.

Then for a nice even image I find that laying the paper on the stamp and then lightly rubbing across the paper works great.

As you can see, with no coloring, this image looks great and can be turned into a card with a few simple steps.

The next card I made is another “no color card”.  I used Versafine Deep Lagoon ink and the Scored Panel Technique for this one.  This time before stamping your image, simply score your paper panel at 1″ intervals in both directions.

Then follow the inking and stamping steps above and you’ll end up with this.

Trim around the image and create your card.  It’s a quick and easy way to end up with a “WOW” card.

When you are ready to add color, start simply.  For the next card I stamped the image in Memento Tuxedo Black ink.  Then I only used the lighest copic markers to color it.  The great thing about the Thomas Kinkade images is that the fabulous detail of the picture will show through your coloring and naturally add shading if you keep the coloring light.  For this card I used G20 for all the green, R81 for the pink, YR02 for the orange, Y11 for the yellow, C1 for the church, BV00 for the purple, and B00 for the blue.  This Technique would work great with chalk or colored pencils too.  Just remember to go light!

The next step up up from this simple one layer coloring is to add definition by adding a second layer of color.  Start small at first.  Making a card using the Spotlight Technique will allow you to detail color just a small part of the image.  It’s a lot less intimidating to start this way.  Lisa did a tutorial a while back on the Spotlight Technique that you can check out here.  Here is my spotlight card.

The final step up is to color an entire Thomas Kinkade image.   It took me a lot of practice to learn to color the Thomas Kinkade images like this.  But when you are ready to tackle it, Sherrie did a great tutorial on coloring with copics here. And Keri showed us how to watercolor Kinkade images here.  And I did a quick lesson with pencil last year on my blog.

I hope that seeing these different ways to create with the Thomas Kinkade images inspires you to give it a try.  There are even more great hints and tutorials in the Thomas Kinkade, “How to Guide”.  It’s on my table all the time and gives me a lot of inspiration with these fabulous images.  If you create something new this week, I hope you will share it with us in the Spring Fling Gallery!  Still have questions?  Ask away in the comment section and I’ll do by best to answer it!

And….don’t forget, the Thomas Kinkade images are 25% off for one more day!  Sale ends Thursday June 17th, 2010 & is for online orders only.

-Kristine

Wasn’t last week’s kick-off of the 12 Weeks of Summer fun?! There is no time to rest though, week #2 is here and we are focusing on the wonderful Thomas Kinkade line.

Once again, two gift certificates will be awarded to 2 lucky winners who successfully follow the blog hop and comment as they go in the time allotted. It is not a race! The Thomas Kinkade hop starts here today, comments must be made before midnight EST on Thursday, 6/17/10. Winners will be announced on Friday. 1st Prize is a $20 CHF gift certificate, 2nd Prize is a $10 CHF gift certificate which will be emailed to the winning participants. The gift certificates will be valid for 6 months from the date of issue. Please note that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your gift certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

If you upload a qualifying card using a Thomas Kinkade stamp to the special gallery by Thursday at midnight (6/17/10) you will be eligible for the Design Teams Favorite Prize which will be a rubber stamp/stamp set of your choice up to the value of $16.99.

There are so many fabulous Kinkade images available at CHF. For this week I chose to work with the The Old Fishin’ Hole image. My oldest son is a bit of a nut when it comes to fishing so I had him in mind while creating.

If you intimidated to color these detailed images, don’t worry, they look great simply stamped. I used a navy ink on this card and layered it over a cream background. A bit of Antique Linen Distress ink along the edges was all it needed. The sentiment I used is from the Thomas Kinkade Expressions set in the Mona Lisa Line.

If you do like to color, then you will find lots of coloring therapy in the Kinkade images. I spotted this beauty in the gallery, it was created by SueDrees.

Didn’t she do an amazing job of coloring? Perfect for the upcoming 4th of July holiday.

The entire Thomas Kinkade line is on sale this week (ending at midnight Thursday 6/17/10)….25% off!

Enough carrying on, are you ready to hop? Here is the line up (starting at 10am EST)…

Joanne Allison

Tracy Harp

Kristine Reynolds

Jennifer Roach

Remember, leaving a comment at each stop gives you more chances to win the prizes! If you happen to get lost, come back here to find your way.

We can’t wait to see your entries in this weeks Kinkade gallery!

Happy Hopping,

Tracy

A HUGE thank you to all of you that followed along on the blog hop as our design team featured projects using their favorite Backgrounder stamps. We really appreciate your comments and enjoyed reading each and every one!

And now..without further adieu… the winner of the 1st prize, a $20 Cornish Heritage Farms Gift Certificate is:

Tracy J! A big congrats and thank you to Tracy.

The winner of the 2nd prize, a $10 Cornish Heritage Farms Gift Certificate is:

Sheila D! Thank you for playing with us, Sheila.

Liz will be emailing your gift certificates to you.

The Gift Certificates will be valid for 6 months from date of issue. PLEASE NOTE that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your Gift Certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

Before you go, I do have one more prize to announce. We asked you to upload your creations showcasing Backgrounders to the Special Gallery for a chance to be awarded the Design Teams Special Prize. Now I can tell all of you who participated what I hard time it was for us to choose just one!

The winner of the Design Teams Favorite Prize which will be a rubber stamp/stamp set of your choice up to the value of $16.99 is:

Stampin AK’s clever use of the Woodgrain Backgrounder paired with this stamp from the Saturday Evening Post line makes it a very fitting and unique card for Father’s Day. Stampin AK, please email your selection and information to liz@cornishheritagefarms.com so she can get your prize out to you!

More examples from the gallery I want to share with you…

Leahlovesstamps Pretty Damask card features the Double Damask stamp for the background. She used the Spanish Script Backgrounder to stamp her flowers as a focal point.

Jane Luxem’s Peacock in Teal is simply stunning! The design team loved it! I love the Peacock Scene Backgrounder stamp and Jane made it look gorgeous in teal ink.

There are lots of other smashing designs using Backgrounder stamps in the gallery so be sure to stop by and check them out.

Next week, we are doing it all again! Ink up your Thomas Kinkade stamps and show us your best creations! There is a special gallery where you can post your design to be chosen by our design team for a special prize.

The design team will be blog hopping again so make plans to follow along, make comments and win prizes! It all starts HERE on Monday.

Thomas Kinkade stamps go on sale tonight (Friday June 11th, 2010)!

Have a great weekend,

Melony

Since we are focusing on Backgrounders this week for our Summer Fling, I decided to create a tutorial that would give you a way to use several backgrounders at once. By creating a “quilt” on a card, there are infinite possibilities of colors and stamps that you can use. This will be a great way to show off all the CHF backgrounders that you have in your collection.

Let’s start by gathering up our supplies:

CHF backgrounders:
Fine Gingham
Pretty Pattern
Dots and Circles

Classic Essential Expressions (Mona Lisa Moments) from CHF (not pictured)

Simply Smooth White cardstock from CHF

colored cardstock (Bazzill Smoothies Ocean Breeze – not pictured)

square punch (I used a 1″ punch from EK Success)

Rectangle and Scallop Rectangle dies (Spellbinders)

Ink pads in various colors
(I used Adirondack dye inkpads in Aqua, Juniper, Salmon, and Espresso.)

Adhesive

optional:
pearls
oval and scallop oval dies (for sentiment)

Step 1:
Stamp your backgrounders onto Simply Smooth White cardstock and let them dry completely.

Step 2:
Punch out 3 to 5 squares from your stamped backgrounds. The total number depends on how big you want to make your quilt. Mine is 3×4 but you can experiment and make yours larger or smaller.

Step 3:
Adhere your squares in a pleasing pattern to another sheet of Simply Smooth White cardstock. Don’t start at the edge – leave a 1/2″ border (approximate).

Step 4:
Arrange your rectangle die shape over your quilt and cut it out.

Step 5:
Arrange your card as desired. I added a scalloped rectangle mat behind my quilt and added some pearls in the center.

See how easy it is to create your own quilted card? You can use so many different backgrounders and colors that no two cards would be alike. You could do a square card with 4×4 squares, or you could create a long rectangle card with 3 by 6 squares. Have fun and experiment with this quilted card tutorial.

Did you know that ALL of the backgrounders are on sale?? But the sale ends tomorrow at midnight (Thursday, June 10), so hurry up and get the ones on your wish list today.

By the way, you can use this tutorial to create your own card and upload it to the special Backgrounders gallery in the Summer Fling section for a chance to win a free backgrounder! You also still have time to go through the blog hop and leave comments for a chance to win gift certificates to the CHF store. Click here for information on the blog hop. Good luck!

The first blog hop of our 12 Weeks of Summer Fling is here! This week we are all about Backgrounders!

Two Gift Certificates will be awarded to 2 lucky winners who successfully follow the blog hop & comment as they go in the time allotted. This is not a race. The Hop starts here today, comments must be made before midnight EST on Thursday, 6/10/10. Winners will be announced on  Friday. 1st prize is a $20 CHF Gift Certificate, 2nd Prize is a $10 Gift Certificate which will be emailed to the winning participants. The Gift Certificates will be valid for 6 months from date of issue. PLEASE NOTE that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your Gift Certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

If you upload a qualifying card using a CHF Backgrounder to the special gallery by Thursday at midnight (6/10/10) you will be eligible for the Design Team’s Favorite prize which will be a rubber stamp/stamp set of your choice up to the value of $16.99

Did you know there are 59 backgrounders currently available in the store? All along the hop today you will see new samples created by our design team. Here is one I made using the Weave Backgrounder.

I love how this stamp creates a subtle look of texture. I used it twice, once for the background panels and a second time on the main image where I kissed a Kim Hughes stamp to the backgrounder.

How about an oldie from the gallery? This sample by Julie Campbell uses 2 backgrounders, Lined Paper and Polka Dot. I thought this was a great sample to show as we come to the end of the school year in our area.

All Backgrounders are 25% off until Thursday at midnight!

Here is the line up for this weeks hop (starts at 10am EST)

Joanne Allison

Tracy Harp

Melony Bradley

Holly Brown

Laura O’Donnell

Jean Franks Beck

Lisa Silver

Remember that leaving a comment at each stop gives you more chances to win the prizes! If you happen to get lost along the way, come back here to find your way.

Your next stop on the tour is Joanne.

Happy Hopping,

-Tracy

What’s the 12 Weeks of Summer Fling? Each week will feature one of the rubber stamp lines at CHF with a blog hop and special gallery showing new samples using stamps from that line. The featured line will also be on sale for the week so definitely the time to add to your collection:) Two Gift Certificates will be awarded to 2 lucky winners who successfully follow the blog hop & comment as they go in the time allotted. This is not a race. All Blog Hops will start from the CHF Be Creative Blog on a Monday, comments must be made before midnight EST on the Thursday of that week & winners will be announced on the Friday. 1st prize is a $20 CHF Gift Certificate, 2nd Prize is a $10 Gift Certificate which will be emailed to the winning participants. The Gift Certificates will be valid for 6 months from date of issue. PLEASE NOTE that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your Gift Certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

If you upload a qualifying card (using the featured week’s stamp line) to the CHF special gallery for that week you will be eligible for the Design Team’s Favorite prize which will be a rubber stamp/stamp set of your choice up to the value of $16.99. The deadline for uploading cards for the prize will also be Thursdays at midnight. Looking forward to having you play along with us for the summer.

The Design Team has been working hard to bring you a fun-filled summer! In addition to the blog hops one of the team members will post a tutorial here on this blog each week, again featuring the line of the week in the tutorial. Blog hops, prizes, free stamps, discounts, tutorials…can you stand it??

It all kicks off right here on Monday!

–Tracy

Welcome to June friends!  With a new month comes a new Stamp of the Month and this one is so adorable. It reminds me of a children’s story illustration. It’s called “To  Town, Mrs. Chicken“.

Jean created a sample that totally captures this image! She combined it with the ATC set “Fall Harvest“. The gingham ribbon, the yellow flower….mmm, so much to love!

I love how Jean simply stamped the image in red ink but it would also look great colored!

All month long this stamp will be sold at a special price. It is available unmounted ($5.99) or wood mounted ($8.99). Stop by the store to pick yours up soon!

On Friday we will be making a special announcement. We have something fun up our sleeves and it just might involve prizes .

Thanks for stopping by.

–Tracy

Congratulations to :

Ellen Crawley who wrote: I have not tried anything like this yet, but it looks great!

Ellen, please e-mail liz@cornishheritagefarms.com to claim your stamp.

Enjoy!

Here in the US we are headed into a long holiday weekend. I can’t believe summer is just around the corner! There is a wedding on the farm this weekend so no new releases were planned for today. That gives me a chance to share something different with you today. What is it you ask? A treasure trove. I was “digging” around the CHF forums recently and discovered treasures beyond measure.

Most weeks one of the DT members shares a tutorial with you here on this blog. Did you know that each week Lisa Silver also posts tutorials over in the forums? Well she does. These tutorials and techniques get filed under various categories for us to enjoy anytime. There are several years worth of ideas, some of them by our favorite CHF alums.

I recently had gall bladder surgery and was limited to light duty. While “resting”, I spent an entire morning pouring over the treasures in the technique forum. It was like visiting an old friend in many cases. I was reminded of things I had not done in a long while. But I also discovered some new ideas to try. I chose 2 different tutorials to share with you today to give you an idea of what you’ll find when you go digging for yourself.

I tried my hand at Vintage Photo Tinting which can be found under Coloring Techniques. Lisa Strahl shared this back in 2007 and it uses Distress Inks that are still so very popular today. I used the Thomas Kinkade Graceland stamp for my sample. The only difference in my sample is that I used black Stazon since I did not have the grey. This was so fun!

I am a big fan of 3-d projects and found lots of them sprinkled around the different categories of the technique forum. When I happened upon the Postcard Holder that Lisa Silver did last August, I knew I wanted to make one. Lisa includes clear instructions as well as photos for the visual people like myself. The holder is darling! Instead of filling mine with post cards I made 4 small cards (3 1/2″ by 5″).

There was enough room for the cards and envelopes. Won’t this make a fabulous gift for someone?

Whether you are new to stamping or a seasoned veteran, I bet you will find a gem or two to try. If you are new then you should spend some time in the Classic Techniques and Stamping Projects sections where you’ll learn embossing ideas, spotlighting, custom embellishments, bookmarks and more.  You’ll find a special section all about holiday projects…ornaments, gift card holders, coasters and such. How about Altered Projects that involve recycled items, mason jars or polymer clay?

Are you itching to go dig up some treasures of your own? Maybe you’ll have time this holiday weekend to get inky.  If you try something new please come back and let us know.

Be Creative today!

–Tracy