Focus on Faith with Sara Furr: Mercy Sparrows

 Blessings dear friends, and welcome to my second edition of Focus on Faith for the month of July.

 I have to tell you that I am totally in love with the new "Mercy Set"! These birds and florals are just so beautiful!

I started with a piece of Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock cut to 4 1/4 x 5 1/2. I stamped my image using Versafine black ink,  and then watercolored my birds and florals using dye ink  markers.  

After my watercolor was all dry I went back in with colored pencils to add shading and fine detail to each of my little birds.

**Make sure that your colored pencils have a very sharp point and they will add in beautiful sharp details to each of your images to give them ton of depth.

I added a blue wash in the background for my sky.

After my images were all dry , I decided to tear my focal piece down into a single strip that I would put in the center. I sat that aside to work on my background. I cut a piece of pattern paper to be 4 x 5 1/2" and adhered that to my card base. I then created another panel that is 3 3/4 x 5 1/2", and I embossed that with a floral embossing folder. I then added some blue ink to the raised embossing with a blending brush and then rubbed a Silver pigment ink lightly over the top of that. I distressed the edges of the cardstock with the edge of a scissors. I then cut several sprigs of detailed leaves, and ink blended blue ink at the base of each leaf,  and added them to the back of my focal strip with the birds.  Before adding the focal piece to my card base,  I added a strip of crocheted lace in the background, then adhered my focal piece down with foam tape. I tied a gingham bow and added that to the left side of my card with a large glue dot. To add a couple finishing touches,  I added some pink pearls to the centers of my flowers, and some silver pearls on my berries and in the background.

For my inside I used a piece of Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock cut to 4 x 5 1/4" and stamped the sentiment "His eye is on the sparrow" and "Hallelujiah", both from the Frameworks Sentiments set, in Black Versafine Ink using my stamping tool to make sure I got the placement just right. 

The phrase "His eye is on the sparrow" means that God is intimately aware of and deeply cares for every single detail of your life. It is a message of comfort, meant to reassure you that you are immensely valuable to God and that He is always watching over you.

I also stamped one of the single birds from the Mercy Set, and the sentiment "His mercies are new every morning ", in Black Versafine Ink.  I again layed down a base of watercolor and added in fine details with colored pencils.

That finishes up my card for today. I love how it turned out, and I hope that you like it too. Thank you so much for joining me today!  I hope that you got inspired,  and if you haven't already,  I hope that you can get this set!  It is definitely a favorite of mine,  as I really love birds. 

God bless you,  and keep watch over you!

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick 

Other products used:

Die cutting machine 

Paper cutter

Embossing folder

MISTI stamping tool

Versafine ink in Black 

Silver pigment ink pad

Dye ink markers

Colored pencils

Scissors

Watercolor brush

Glue dots

Foam tape

Gingham ribbon

Pattern paper

Blue Cardstock

Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock 

Pink and Silver pearls

Crochet Lace

Focus on Faith with Sara Furr: New Mercy Set

 Blessings, my dear friends, and welcome to the first edition of my "Focus on Faith" for the month of July!



This week I have two creations to share with you using the brand new, and very lovely, "Mercy set", along with some new die sets.

My first creation is a simple, yet elegant, watercolor. 

I die cut a piece of Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock using a label from the new #6233 die set to create a focal piece to stamp my bird and sentiment. **professional tip- be sure to use an embossing mat to dry emboss the die cut after cutting to give a clean, crisp and embossed edge to your die cut. 

I used Black Versafine ink to do my stamping in my MISTI stamping tool. I then watercolored my image with dye ink markers, adding in light washes of color to each section and going back in with a full strength ink to add in depth and shading.

 Once my image was colored, I added a light wash of blue in the background for a tiny bit of sky and let that dry. I then went back with a damp brush and pulled some the green color from my leaves out into the background . I then added a bit more green in splotches for more background interest.

Simple, easy, and oh so lovely! Don't you think? I just love this sweet image!

 

I created 2 mats of a light and dark peach colored cardstock. I embossed the darker peach with an embossing folder to add texture and interest to the panel. I distressed the edges of both panels with the edge of a scissors and adhered them together. I wrapped, and adhered a piece of pretty white lace towards the bottom of my panel, and then popped up my focal piece with foam tape and mounted it to the right center of my embossed background panel. 

As a final touch of softness and interest, I added a pretty seam binding bow with a corduroy button off to the left of my focal piece.

And that finishes my first card.

My second card uses the mirror image of the bird branch, but this time I stamped with Black Momento ink onto a scrap of the Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock, and then colored it with alcohol markers, and then fussy cut out of my sweet bird so I could pop him up on top of a nest of thread. I stamped my sentiment in Sepia Versafine Ink onto a white paper doily, and then popped up my birdie to the right hand side on his little nest of peachy pink thread With tiny foam squares. I added tiny pink pearls to the centers of my open flowers.

I added 2 mats of dsp that had the peach and pink tones of my flowers that I had colored, and distressed the tap, and bottom edges with a scissors. I then added some pink zig zag stitching to the right hand side with my sewing machine. I wrapped some crinkle seam binding ribbon, that I hand dyed with Distress reinker in Tattered Rose, around my dsp panels, and tied a simple bow.

 I then added that whole panel to a mat of peachy pink cardstock, and then to my whitecard base. I die cut a decorative bookmark from the new #6230 die set with the same peachy pink cardstock and cut off the decorative edge to use behind my doily. I adhered that with my tape runner, and then added a circle of white fun foam behind my doily to pop up that layer. 

As a final touch I added a decorative cream colored button to the center of my bow with the same pink thread I used for the nest behind my bird.

And that finishes my second card. 

I can't tell you how much I love this new "Mercy set"! It is so lovely, and has the best "Mercy" sentiments. It is a "must have" if you like birds. I hope you liked my two projects, and got inspired to create something soft, beautiful, and faith inspired using this lovely new set. Have a blessed week, and I will see you again on the 21st of July.

God bless you all,

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick

 

Other products used:

Die cutting machine 

Paper cutter

Embossing folder

MISTI stamping tool

Versafine ink in Black and Sepia

Dye ink markers

Alcohol ink markers

Scissors

Watercolor brush

Glue dots

Foam tape

Seam binding ribbon

Buttons

Thread

Sewing machine

Dsp

Cardstock

Doily

Lace

Pink pearls 

Focus on Faith: Seek Wisdom Wreath by Sara Furr

 Blessings my dear friends, and welcome to my second edition of "Focus on Faith" for the month of June. 

As many of you know, June is usually a time of graduation for children from high school, so I thought I would try to create a faith inspired card that could be used as a graduation card, so I dug out the two new "Wisdom" stamp sets. I didn't really have any idea of what I wanted to do, so I just pulled out the stamp set and decided to play around.

I started by creating a 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" square out of Canson XL Bristol smooth cardstock. I placed the square into my MISTI stamping tool, and took out the florals from the "Wisdom set 1". I positioned them on my card stock in the top center, and decided I would try to create a wreath.  I inked them up with black Versafine ink and stamped them down. I then turned my cardstock 1/4 turn, and inked, and stamped them again. I did this 2 more times until I had created a circle wreath. I then positioned the owl from the same set, and the "SEEK wisdom" sentiment from the "Wisdom Set 2", in the center of my wreath. I inked them in the black Versafine ink and stamped them. I wanted the owl to be holding a "diploma", so I inked up just the very top of the large scroll from the "Wisdom set 1" with a very light gray dye ink marker. I stamped it so that the owl appeared to be sitting on or holding the scroll. 

 At this point, I still had no idea what I was going to use as my coloring medium. I had originally planned to watercolor it, but thought I would try a little experiment!  So,  I waited till the Verksafine ink was completely dry, and did a test sample to see if I could actually use my alcohol inks to color them. Now, they say that you can only use Memento black ink as your base medium for alcohol markers, but I found that the Versafine ink was fine, as long as it was completely dry. I just made sure to not touch the lines too much with my alcohol markers!  So, I went about coloring the florals with three shades of purple alcohol ink markers; a light, a medium, and a dark. I colored the whole flower in the lightest color of purple, then I added in the medium purple up to about the middle of the flower. Then, I went back in and added lines of the darkest purple with a light flicking motion. Lastly, I  went back in with the lightest purple to blend out all three. I proceeded to color the green leaves with two shades of green alcohol ink markers. I colored each leaf base in the light green, and then added in a dark green just in the center base of the leaf.  

At this point,  I decided that my wreath needed some filler so I added in the little berry sprigs from the "Wisdom set 1", here and there, randomly around my wreath with the black Versafine ink. I colored the berries with a very dark purple alcohol marker.  

My wreath still wasn't quite full enough, so I inked up just the very top of the leafy vine stamp from the same set with a dark green dye ink marker, and stamped it in three sets in each little section so I had a dark, medium, and light variation of color. I continued stamping this way all the way around the entire wreath inking the vine, and then stamping off three individual times to give me a nice full wreath.  I then decided to add some of those vines coming off from behind, and to the side of my owl and the scroll in the center of the wreath.  To blend things out a bit, and give a sort of watercolor look, I used two very light shades of green alcohol ink markers, and blended around the inside and outer edges of the florals.  I then took two shades of a very light greenish blue alcohol ink marker, and did the same around the very edges of the outside of the wreath where the vines are, to create a sort of watercolory sky.

I then worked on coloring my owl with alcohol markers in shades of tan, and brown, and bright green for his eyes. I felt that the owl and the flowers both needed a lot more detail, so I broke out my Polychromos colored pencils,  and I decided to add in all my details on my owl and in my florals and leaves.  For the flowers, I used a very sharp purple pencil to very gently draw in the leaf veins, and then I took a black pencil and darkened along the edges of each petal, and the very middle of the flower, leaving the centers of the flowers white. This added a lot of depth and shading to give my florals a lot more dimension.

I added gentle lines horizontally across my owl's chest and wings so that it resembled layers of feathers. While I had the pencils out,  I decided to add a couple more details in the center of my wreath where the vines are sprouting from behind the scroll, and I did more blending with the light green alcohol markers, and then added in more details with a light and darker green pencil. I then decided to take those two green pencils and add in more details on my leaves. I left the vine leaves alone.  I did not add any details to them at all. I very lightly colored the scroll with a soft tan to give it a vintage scroll look.  

When I was happy with my focal piece, I distressed the edges of it with the edge of a scissors.  I created a white mat for behind my focal piece, and distressed the edges of that as well. I then added foam tape behind that whole focal piece.

 I then created another white mat for my 6x6 card base that I embossed with a dotted circle motif embossing folder. This embossed detail helped bring my whole card together by adding more texture, and repeating the circle motif as from my wreath. I adhered that whole piece to my card base with my focal piece popped up in the center.  

To create the inside of my card, I cut two mats of a light and very dark purple for my center focal piece. I used another 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" square made from Canson XL Bristol smooth cardstock and placed it into my MISTI. I chose two sentiments, the jewels, and the two floral pieces , and positioned them in my MISTI to create a cross in the center of my focal piece. I only colored the florals. I followed the exact same coloring as previously described on the front.

 I thank you so much for joining me today! I hope that you liked my project, and got inspired to create some Faith inspiring artwork.

God bless you all my crafty friends,

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick

Art Impressions products 

6203- Wisdom set 1

6204- Wisdom set 2

Other products:

Canson XL Bristol Smooth cardstock

Versafine Black ink pad

Alcohol ink markers

Faber-Castell Polychromos colored pencils and a pencil sharpener

Green dye ink marker

Sand color dye ink marker

Scissors

Embossing folder

Die cutting machine

Paper cutter

MISTI stamping tool

Focus on Faith: Covered Bridge by Sara Furr

 Blessings my dear friends, and welcome to my first "Focus on Faith" for the month of June.

Not too far from me are 2 covered bridges situated in some beautiful scenery in "God's Country". The beauty of them always brings me peace and the nostalgia of times long ago, so I wanted to recreate one of those local spots. 

I used this wonderful stamp set called "He Leads Me", along with a couple foliage stamp sets to create my watercolor scene. I really had fun practicing my watercolor. I have created a mini picture tutorial for you to follow my steps......

I started with an A2 panel of watercolor cardstock and taped it to my board with post-it tape about 1/4" all the way around. I then stamped in my covered bridge with a layer of blue and brown marker. Then the fence and trees with just brown. I just stamped the tree from the set 3x up the left side to create a "Big" tree.

I then pulled color from the lines to create depth and shadow. To soften the tree limbs so they weren't so heavy i added some water to soften and then blotted up the ink before stamping in the green foliage.

I then stamped in the small grass from the Foliage set around the fence posts and trailing the fence leading to the bridge. I stamped the little bushes from the WC Mini Foliage in a bit darker green up along the bank in front of the bridge, and I stamped the bushy tree limb from the same set in a brighter green for the trees' leaves, stamping several generations for each of the stamps, and then blended them out with a damp brush. I added in more shades of green to extend my grassy areas. I also added in some darker shadows on the roadway for the fence posts with more brown. I then added some pretty blue for the creek water under the bridge and then watered it down a bit more to blend in my sky. I let that all dry and then went back in to add some pretty flowers with a purplish blue color using the "lavender" stamp from the Mini Flower set, again stamping several generations onto the edges of the roadway. 

I also added the tiny leaf branch from that set to add some foliage around my fence posts out front and I used it to create some big bushes on either side of the bridge.

I blended those out just a bit with a damp brush and let it dry before stamping in the tiny purple dots, also from the same set.

I then stamped the flower bunches repeatedly over in the right hand corner to give some interest in that corner, and draw your eye around the whole scene. I added  some more blue into my sky for more depth, and lastly I stamped my sentiment with Black Archival ink.

And finally, the reveal! I carefully removed the post-it tape from the edges and admired the beauty of the scene!😊

I honestly wasn't fond of the brown on the "Big tree" on the left side, so after distressing the edges of my cardstock with scissors I added it to a soft purple mat and added a pretty bow to strategically "hide" my tree trunk! Hehe😁 It worked perfectly and it added a lovely touch of softness. Besides, it wouldn't be a "Sara" card without a pretty bow on it, right?! Haha

Behind the purple layer is an embossed layer of black that has little flowers on it, but its hard to see the detail in the photo. But trust me, you can see it in real life really well!

So, with all the layers, my card wound up measuring 5 1/2x6 3/4".

I hope you like my creation and are inspired to create some "God's Country" of your own!

I absolutely love living in the country where there is so much beauty and scope for the imagination! I always feel so much closer to God here!

I hope you have a great week my friends and I will see you again soon!

Blessings to you all, 

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick

Art Impressions products used:

5129- He Leads Me set

5372- WC Mini Foliage 

5009- WC Mini Flower set

4051- Foliage set

Other products:

Watercolor cardstock

Watercolor brush

Archival Black ink pad

Dye ink markers

Chiffon ribbon

Embossing folder

Die cutting machine

Scissors for distressing 

Paper cutter

Misti stamping tool

Stamping blocks

Adhesive

Foam adhesive 

Focus on Faith: Joy & Blessings with Sara Furr

Blessings my dear friends. Today,  I have two projects to share with you for my Focus on Faith, and both creations have the theme of Joy. Joy in the Lord, Joy comes in the morning, and Joy in all our blessings. 

My first creation is an A2 card that is bright, sunny, and full of gorgeous colors adorning my stained glass window, along with touches of gold.

 I stamped my focal image from the "Stained Glass Window" set with Encore Gold Ink (pigment) onto Canson Bristol Smooth cardstock and then heat embossed the image with Gold embossing powder. I colored the stained glass window with alcohol markers and then fussy cut out the window and applied foam tape behind.

 I created a card base from a golden yellow cardstock and cut a layer of a soft yellow and embossed it with an embossing folder from my stash and distressed the edges with the edge of a pair of scissors. I added a white doily to the right edge and cut off the excess. Then,  I added a strip of lace, and I adhered a strip of pale yellow cardstock just over the edge of the lace that looks like little sunshines. I then wrapped a piece of cream colored chiffon ribbon around the top of that strip and tied a bow off to the left side.

 I added that embossed panel with foam tape. I made a nest of gold metallic thread and adhered that to the back of my Stained glass window and adhered it to the doily. Finally, I added 3 Gold pearls to the top left corner of the embossed panel.

For the inside, I stamped the sentiments "Hallelujiah" and "Joy comes in the morning" with Encore Gold Ink and again heat embossed it in Gold embossing powder. When it was all cooled, I used a blending brush to add some yellow behind the sentiment to look like the sun in the sky.

This is an excellent reminder that we should arise with the sun every morning and thank God for the gift of life, and the beauty of the Earth, and the day before us. Every day is gift, one we are not guaranteed!!!

 

My second creation is a 6x6 card that I designed to coordinate with my first card.

I stamped the Daffodils from the "Tulip Floral set" with black Memento ink onto a circle die cut, and I colored the image with alcohol markers. I added foam tape behind it and adhered it to my white doily and added more foam tape behind that.

 I added that to my card base and distressed layers, including a layer of beautiful dsp from the "Easter S2 Paper pack" following the same steps as above in my first card. I cut the "Joy" die cut once from Gold mirror cardstock, and once from yellow fun foam and adhered them together with liquid glue and popped it up off to the left hand side of my focal image. 

For the inside, I created some more layers and stamped the sentiment " May each day bloom with joy and blessings" with black Versafine ink.

I pray that you find joy in Christ, and in each and every single day he has given us to enjoy. Never take these beautiful moments for granted! Life is beautiful, and we have so many things to be thankful to God for.

I hope my projects have inspired you to create something "Joy" and "Faith" filled.

Many blessings to you all,

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick 

Art Impressions products used:

5897-Stained Glass Window set

5417- Frameworks Sentiments 

5986- Jesus & Joy Dies

6061-Tulip Floral set

5892- Easter S2 Paper Pack

Other supplies:

Paper cutter

Scissors for distressing edges of cardstock and cutting out window image

MISTI stamping tool

Alcohol markers

Embossing folder

Die cutting machine

Doilies 

Circle die

Gold pearls

Gold metallic thread

Chiffon Ribbon

Blending brush

Encore Gold Ink

Gold embossing powder

Heat tool 

Adhesive 

Canson Bristol Smooth cardstock

Black Memento Ink

Black Versafine Ink

Focus on Faith Bright Butterflies! by Sara Furr

 Blessings, my dear AI friends!

Welcome to the first edition of "Focus on Faith", for the month of May. 

Today, I have a bright and colorful creation using an alcohol ink background that I created like 2 years ago and never used, so I pulled it out and decided to have a play with it.

 I can't tell you what exact colors I used here, because it was so long ago, but I can tell you that I used Tim Holtz Alcohol inks in a Blue, yellow, and blue, and blending solution on Yupo paper. You just apply some blending solution to the Yupo paper here and there,  and then add drops of alcohol ink here and there,  and let it spread on its own, or you can use a blower tool to push the ink around,  or just keep turning your cardstock side to side to keep the ink moving until it dries. So much fun!

Once my alcohol ink blending was all dried, I applied alcohol lift ink through a stencil, and then wiped off the ink with a paper towel, and it lifts off the alcohol ink and leaves behind the stenciled image.

 I took that background, and I strategically placed the butterflies from the "Butterfly set" on the lighter areas of my background and then stamped out the butterflies and greeting with black Archival ink. I thought these butterflies were perfect for this because they are bold images.

I distressed the edges of the Yupo paper and then I die cut the pretty eyelet border rectangle from the Decorative Journal Page 1 die set and I cut it in half and used it on either side of my stamped panel to add a decorative border. I added some sequins to the panel and added foam tape to the back. I created a 6x6 card base from black cardstock and a matting frame also. I used the black to mat my piece of neutral dsp from the Father's Day Paper pack, and distressed the edges of both and adhered them together and popped them up on my card base with foam tape. To create my decorative strip, I used a piece of white scalloped edge lace and machine stitched a strip of the mint green stripe dsp, also from the Father's Day Paper pack to it, and adhered it to my matted dsp and then popped up my focal panel over top.

Have you ever played with alcohol inks? They are so much fun to play with, and they create something totally unique! If you don't have alcohol inks, you could try something similar with watercolors or dye inks on watercolor paper. You would just have to use bright or strong colors as your base, and make sure it is completely dry before trying to lift the ink through a stencil with a damp paper towel.

Please let me know if you like this technique. Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope you got inspired to have a play with your alcohol inks or if you don't, to try them.

Many blessings my dears, 

Sara Furr- The Crafty Farm Chick

These are all the supplies I used: Links to Ai products are below.

Art Impressions products:

#5200- Butterfly Set

#6072- Father's Day Paper pack

#5768- Decorative Journal Page 1 Die

4774-Stamp positioner

Archival black ink

Other products used:

-Alcohol inks in pink, blue, and yellow.

-blending solution 

-air blower

-Yupo paper

-stencil

-alcohol lift ink

-Paper towel

-scissors to Distress cardstock edges

-white scalloped lace

-sewing machine

-sequins

-die cutting machine

-foam tape, adhesive