Hello Fans!! DeeDee here, this time with swap partner Clearsnap!! Take the feel of mother’s day and combine it with the feeling of being a still new mama and you sort of come to my piece for today.

It feels very feminine . My form is up on a pedestal and held very high.. regal like.  She’s bold, beautiful and colorful but very strong.

I always find that the saying “If ain’t broke don’t fix it” is seriously appropriate, and I don’t know how you cover your chipboard with paper.. but here’s how I’ve always done mine:

I grabbed my Basically Bare Dress From and the glitz designs paper I wanted to use.. made sure both the chipboard and the paper were “Wrong side” up.. and traced the piece onto the paper. I didn’t mind about being exactly perfect, as long as I was drawing a little bit big instead of small! Then I cut out the paper and rubbed my chipboard down with a nice clear wet glue. Adhere paper and allow to dry! … now here’s the really good part..

I sand the edges with a green washing pad!! They’re rough enough to be similar to sand paper, but aren’t too rough as to tear the paper. My favorite crafty tip!!

Here are some close ups of the project:

I used the Basically Bare Wings in stiff felt, the yellow is a Clearsnap Cat’s Eye ink pad in Sunflower, and the glitter is Clearsnap Fool’s Gold.
The base of my sculpture is from the Basically Bare Gears set, and is piled with wooden spools, baker’s twine, vintage buttons, tulle and a rose made out of Glitz Designs paper.
The apron for my dress from is actually from the Basically Bare Small Pennants embellishment set. It’s covered in Glitz Designs paper with the same method shown above.. look at that sanded edge!!

Thanks so much for stopping by. -DeeDee

Be sure to check out what’s going on over at the Clearsnap blog as well!

Good morning, everyone!  Are you enjoying the blog hop with Clearsnap?  I hope so!  Be sure to check them out on their blog to enter a drawing for some great stuff!

My project for today uses some of the super fun Smooch inks and glitter.

The quote on this canvas is part of a line from a Sandman comic (which I love.  Love.  As in, the day this post goes up I am getting it tattooed upon me).  It is from the book Fables And Reflections, in the story Fear of Falling.  The full quote is this:

“Sometimes you wake up.  Sometimes the fall kills you.  And sometimes, when you fall, you fly.”

I started out by coating the canvas with gesso, and using a little Punchinella from Gauche Alchemy as a mask to add some texture.

Once the gesso was dry, I sprayed it lightly with some water and dabbed some Azure Smooch ink randomly on the canvas.  Then, before the ink or water dried, I drug a sponge brush through it to make the sky background.

I colored some clear Punchinella with more Azure ink and put it on top of the small heart.  Both hearts were then covered with clear UTEE.  And, because I love sparkle but hate getting glitter all over the place, I added glitter to the UTEE and used it to coat the wings.  I also mixed some gold glitter into a fresh batch of UTEE and dropped it onto a non-stick craft sheet to make the little sun drops that surround the sun shape.

 The clouds are edged with Azure Smooch ink, and the sun is edged with Sweet Melon Smooch ink.  I also went over the words on the canvas with Azure Smooch for a little more depth and shine.

That’s all there is to it!  Thanks so much for looking and joining in on the hop!

x Beth

Be sure to check out what’s going on at the Clearsnap blog as well!

Basically Bare embellies used:
Celestial Shapes, Bare Basics Hearts, Bare Basics Wings

Clearsnap products used:
Smooch (Azure, Sweet Melon), Glitter (Fool’s Gold, Sapphire)

Hi everyone!

So happy to be part of this Clear Snap swap! I must say that I truly love their color box brush pads and the smooches are so much fun to work with, and that is exactly what I used to make this fun and lovely card! Take  a look:

I used the wonderful Color Box Pigment Brush Pads to add lots of color to this card, the stamp is a combination of both Mango Tango and Sunflower, two colors that simply go perfectly together!!! Love the look it gives the stamp.

I also used a Basically Bare Fanciful Frame and the lovely Smooch in Sweet Melon, this color went perfect with Mango Tango, so I used it to edge the frame and also add some small dots. The Smooch bottle comes with a fine tip applicator which makes it super easy to add these fine details.

Finally the bird, I am super in love with how it turned out!!! This lovely bird from Basically Bare’s Stack-A-Bellies collection was the perfect addition, so much went into getting this final color, I first inked it with the Colorbox Mango Tango, dried it, went over it with some Colorbox in Sunflower, and some Smooch in Sweet Melon, dried it again, and added some Diamond Dust to finish it off, isn’t it just amazing?

Thank You for stopping by today! Hope you enjoyed and have a great day!

Love, Frank

Be sure to check out what Clearsnap has going on over at their blog, too!

Basically Bare Products Used:

Fanciful Frames ES006VR

Stack-a-Bellies Birds SB004VR

Clearsnap Products Used:

Colorbox Pigment Brush Pad Mango Tango

Colorbox Pigment Brush Sunflower

Smooch in Sweet Melon

Jamie here with you today and I’m kicking off a five day stretch of a Basically Bare and Clearsnap collaboration!

I started this layout by distressing the edges of the patterned paper, then lightly inking them with a French Blue and Aquamarie Cat’s Eye Chalk Ink Pad.

The background color was created using a mixture of Pool Smooch Ink mixed with an equal part of  Liquitex Glazing Medium.  I then used a dry brush technique and just randomly painted the patterned paper.  Then I used the same dry brush technique and painted on a bit of Taffy Smooch Ink.

On to one of my fave embellies, the dress form!  I heat embossed the entire dress form with Metallic Copper WOW powder.  I then edged the dress form with Bubblegum WOW embossing powder and also  heat embossed the wings with the same color.  Once the wings were cool, I then ran them through my Cuttlebug for a bit of added texture.

In the bottom corner of the dress form, I used the Glue Gloss on a script stamp and then covered the stamped image with glitter.

And for the last bit of embellishment, I used Snickerdoodle Smooch Ink (again mixed with glazing medium) and painted all of the pennants. Once they were dry, (which took about 24 hours because of the glazing medium) I used a simple back-stitch to adhere them to the layout.

One last little trick I’ll share – I used an Ice Blue Cat’s Eye Chalk Ink Pad to add a slight highlight around the edges of the pictures.

 Be sure to check out what Clearsnap has going on over on their blog as well!

Basically Bare items used:

*Basically Embellies Chipboard Dress Form

*Basically Embellies Large Canvas Pennants

*Basically Embellies Chipboard Wings

*Basically Embellies Felt Blossom

Clearsnap items used:

*Smooch Ink in Snickerdoodle, Pool, Azure, and Taffy

*Fluid Chalk Cat’s Eye Ink Pad in Ice Blue, French Blue, and Aquamarine

*Glue Gloss

*Glitter in Sapphire

*Colorbox Pigment Brush Pad in Mango Tango

Hello everyone! It’s Emily here with a little something different to share today! Being on the “Book Bunch” team, I normally make mini albums, but I wanted to switch things up a bit!

I’m a collector of all things that can be alter. I must admit, I tend to “stock up” on the alterable wood crafts when I visit the craft store. I have loads of photo frames waiting to be altered. I had one left of this little hanging flower frame. I thought it would be a perfect gift for my 4 year old daughter. She loves when I make her things to match her room.

Of coarse, my frame wouldn’t be complete without a little touch of Basically Bare products! I one of my personal faves, the Canvas Chipboard and Felt Pieces – Blossoms and Leaves. I misted them each with some Tattered Angels  Glimmer Mist and then doodled with my Zig fabricolor pens.

I also did the same with the Canvas and Felt Pieces – Hearts. I added some little letter stickers to the heart to spell out my daughter’s name. Sometimes things seem to mean a little more when they are personalized, right?

That’s my quick and easy little project for today! I hope I was able to inspire you to try one for yourself! Beware, altering is addicting!

Hi everyone, it’s Erin posting again today.  :)

Who likes vintage?   Of course I do, but with a modern twist!  Sewing manikins are still hot in the crafting world and so I thought I’d create a canvas with one using one of the Basically Embellies Dress Forms.

I stared off by painting a 5″ x 7″ canvas using some of my favorite paints and stencils.

Then I pulled out three of the canvas leaves, and one of the small chipboard flowers from the Basically Embellies Bare Basics Blossoms & Leaves, and one of the bodices from the Dress Form set and painted them up.  While they were drying I covered the skirt of  the dress form with the chevron zig-zag paper.  I then adhered the dress form onto the canvas with matte regular gel medium…it’s nice and thick so I can “slope” the edges around the chipboard since it dries clear, and then paint over it.

Then I just adhered the “leaves” onto the skirt with some more gel medium and added a few embellishments too.

I was careful to only adhere the tops of the leaves onto the canvas so that the bottoms could have some dimension.

And then I just finished it off by stamping on a scripture verse and adding some finishing touches.

Hey papercraftin peeps! Sarah here with a fun little layout to share! I couldn’t wait to make something with the Basically Bare felt clouds, they are sooo cute! I thought they would be perfect paired up with a brand new gorgeous little baby! Aren’t new babies so precious? Especially when they’re sleeping haha! This little guy is a new addition to my family, and I was lucky enough to catch one of those adorable newborn smirks with my camera, I was so excited!

Look at that face! Ugh! So adorable! Now, I know this is a SUPER simple layout (gasp!), but I just really wanted to keep the focus on the photo and the “starry sky.” I jazzed up the clouds a little with some Stickles and doily remnants, and I wanted to hang some Basically Bare stars but I couldn’t do that without prettying them up first with my white Zig Painty FX pen and glitter of course!

Those paint markers from Kurtake work awesome on the chipboard shapes, they turned out pretty cute! What do you think he’s dreaming about?

Some people say that when babies smile it’s just gas, but I don’t believe that for a second I think he was actually happy that he finally got to meet his Aunty RahRah… Thanks for hangin out and have an amazing day!

Love, Sarah

Hi Everyone, Kristin here to share another fun layout!

Today I’d like to share a couple of quick tips for dressing up your embellishments to use on a layout (or any other project you see fit).

When creating layouts, I tend to stick to a graphic style — lots of lines, geometric shapes, patterns, etc — so its very important for me to create a little bit of interest with my embellishments.

I wanted to create a neutral layout where my embellishments were the elements that popped off the page. These sheets of patterned paper from The Paper Loft were perfect to start my background. In keeping with the graphic theme of the layout, I added some stamping, washi tape, and a Paper Loft quote along the right hand side, repeating the linear pattern.

On to the embellishments:

The first embellishment we’re going to take a look at today are the awesome felt clouds from the Celestial Shapes Set. I love the soft and fluffy look that the clouds have right out of the package, but I knew I needed to add a little bit of color to make them pop off my page. I didn’t want anything that was going to take away that soft and fluffy texture, so I pulled out my chalk ink. I started adding color to the clouds directly from the ink pad, dabbing around the outside and then working my way inside to build up color.

This is a really easy way to add color to your felt shapes without losing the soft and fluffy texture of the felt itself.

The second embellishment we are going to look at is this little heart and star cluster down at the bottom of the layout.

I started off by painting a chipboard heart from the Hearts Collection with a pink Zig FX Painty marker, but the color and the texture of the heart was a little too harsh against the rest of the softened look. I decided to mute the heart just a bit by adding a sheet of vellum to the top. The sheerness of the vellum allowed the pink to come through, but in a much softer way. I cut the vellum to be just smaller than the heart itself, giving it a nice bordered look.

And from this angle, we can get a better look at the star (Celestial Collection) in the cluster. I also painted the chipboard star with a Zig FX Painty Marker, before embossing it with some dark grey embossing powder. Adding that small detail really helped to make the star an integral part of the embellishment cluster, without just looking like it was stuck on top of the heart.

Small detail work can really make your entire project come together.  Adding a little color, some sheer vellum, or embossing are only a few of the ways that you can quickly dress up bare embellishments.

Thank you so much for letting me share this layout with you, I’ll leave you with a closeup of the journaling.

Thanks again for stopping by!

– Kristin

Hello everyone!  Miae here with a layout that will hopefully get your creative muscles flexing!

I wanted to explore the grungy, mixed media side of Basically Bare so I pulled out my Gears Set 2 , Up Up and Away and my Hearts Set 2 and got to work.

The background started off as plain white cardstock which I covered with strips of Japanese handmade origami paper and washi tape!

I love getting to play with all my different mediums so altering each Basically Bare item was loads of fun!  I wanted my “hot air balloon” to be the focal embellishment so I put several different layers on it. I started by covering the gear portion with sewing pattern paper. Next I brushed on gesso. Then I took my brayers and applied two different metallic paints to cover the whole gear. After that I stamped a Tim Holtz Alterations stamp on it.  So that was my base. To that I stuck washi tape from Gauche Alchemy in a chevron pattern, used a circle mask and Deco Art Snow Writer to create the raised circles, and added hearts!  The basket was covered in Snow Writer and colored with Tattered Angels Glimmer Glaze and Chalkboard mist. Here’s a close up:

I loved working with the acrylic gears. The larger one I stamped with a word stamp and outlined with my trusty Zig Painty pen. The smaller gear I partially covered in Snow Writer and dripped yellow india ink over it.  The smaller chipboard gear I covered with foil tape and put some sand paper to it. The hearts got painted and stitched, sprayed and safety pinned.

All in all I had such a fun time getting my hands messy on this project!  And that’s my post for today!

Hey there it’s Tanisha, a member of the Book Bunch, here with a really fun mini album that I created to house photos of my 2 rambunctious little boys!

I had the pleasure of working with Dude, a really cool collection from The Paper Loft.   This line has my boys written all over it with it’s clever phrases, distressing, and awesome colors!

I used the Simply Shapely Mixed Media Album, which is just perfect for larger photos and for experimenting with different techniques.  I covered the front cover with patterned paper cut just a tad smaller than the album.  I love to leave some of the natural elements showing when working with these types of album as I think it adds character.

I added a couple of Gears from set 2 to the cover.  I dry embossed both gears and then heat embossed the chipboard gear with WOW embossing powder in Metallic Copper, to give it a rustic look.

Whenever I work with cardboard, I just can’t help myself, I MUST peel pack some of the top layer to reveal the beautiful corrugated layer.  It adds so much texture and acts as a mini canvas.  I used dark brown ink here.

I inked a chipboard button, tied it with jute and layered it on the acrylic gear.

So many ideas come to mind when I look at the felt tag.  I chose to slightly alter it by lightly rubbing with ink and adhering Large Pennants that I covered with patterned paper.  I added my sons’ initials to finish off the look.

I altered the color of this felt button by spritzing it with Lime Glimmer Mist.

I have found the using a hot glue gun on the canvas and felt pages are the best way to adhere elements.

This filmstrip is from the Paparazzi Set.  I added color to it by heat embossing with WOW embossing powder in Ebony.  It really adds a nice glossy finish to the piece.

I used gear masks from Tim Holtz, a few Basically Bare gears, and denim glimmer mist to create the background on the canvas page.

I repeated the same technique on the back, but used Lime glimmer mist.

I used copper embossing powders on the gears (Gears Set 1) to give them a rusty look and then adhered to the acrylic page with brads.  I embossed both sides since I attached them to a clear page.  Yes, the gears actually work, making this a fun interactive page.

Here you can see the back of the gear–I fussy cut elements from patterned paper and adhered them over the center to hide the brad prongs.

Thanks so much for taking a peek at my project today!!

Be sure to visit the Paper Loft and see all their great lines!

Tanisha