We’re Going Dotty this week on the Wednesday Challenge, but not in a ‘losing our marbles’ sort of way though, haha.  We are using stamps, stencils, papers,  and/or anything we can think of to add a few dots on our creations and we would love you all to join in!

Once you have made your creation just go ahead and upload it into the linky on the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge blog!  We can’t wait to see what you make!

We are showcasing Art Impressions projects this week. You don’t have to use them to join in but if you have some we would love to see them used.

As always, we’re offering a chance to win a $50 Gift Voucher to Simon Says Stamp! (If you enter in this weeks Wednesday Challenge, you’ll have a chance to win!)

Below are three projects created by the design team, that showcase this weeks theme! You can visit the challenge blog  to get all the details and see the amazing cards and projects that the design team has created this week. If you click on each designers name, you’ll be taken directly to their blog where you’ll get more details about their project! Be sure to give these talented ladies some comments!

Created by our Designer In the Spotlight Susie:

Susie  used:

Created by Gayatri:

Gayatri used:

Created by Heather:

Heather used:

So now it’s your turn. Happy Crafting!

Do you use Instagram?  If so please add  #ssswchallenge to your challenge entry uploads so we can see them on there too!

Blog Candy Alert!! Follow our blog via email and comment on this post for a chance to win a special blog candy!

Hi readers! Happy Tuesday and happy last day of June! We’re officially past the half way mark of 2015! Can you believe it? The very fun and talented Wanda Guess joins us again this month with the Color Pop feature for May: Twisted Citron! Did you miss a past feature? Check out our archives for the combined Cracked Pistachio and Abandoned Coral feature, Mermaid Lagoon, and Fossilized Amber! Coming up next month: Hickory Smoke! Excited for July’s color? Be sure to tune into our blog on FRIDAY to find out what it is!

It’s Wanda here! Happy Summer! I’m here today with the fourth installment in our Color Pop series – featuring the newest Distress Ink Color! I’m excited to share a project using the color for May – Twisted Citron. This is a bright, clear, happy green. Think margarita green, lime-y and fresh! It’s very strong and vibrant, but it’s easy to tone down with other colors, too. Basically, it’s perfect! With this color, a little goes a long way! I love it. Since it’s Summer time I decided to make a beach-themed card and used the Twisted Citron for some gorgeous tropical leaves.

Green is always a good neutral, and this new green was an easy one to match with other colors. I used pretty Abandoned Coral Ink along with some neutral tones of brown and cream to complete my beach look. I love this color combination! Reminds me of Hawaii. My leaves were colored with the ink pad using a sponge dauber. I left some white space in the center of the leaves. If you look closely, you’ll see that I went back and used the Twisted Citron Marker to make a center vein in each leaf for some dimension. I also put just a touch of Vintage Photo ink on some of the edges.

Something really fun that I thought of was to make my own glitter. I was thinking to myself…wouldn’t it be nice to have Twisted Citron glitter?? So I made some! I took a paper plate and sprinkled some clear Rock Candy Distress Glitter on it. I took the Twisted Citron Spray Stain and made a fine mist over the clear glitter. Then I let it dry and stirred it up with a palette knife. Voila! Perfectly matching glitter! Next up I’m going to make some Abandoned Coral glitter…. After it was dry, I used my new green glitter on the tropical leaves.

My leaves, flowers and shells are cut from Ranger Watercolor Paper. I added Clear Rock Candy glitter to all the pieces except the leaves. I also edged everything with Vintage Photo ink and a sponge dauber. For the background I tried another new technique. I wanted to mimic the feeling of sand. I used the Vintage Photo Marker in the Tim Holtz Distress Sprayer took and made spatters on my paper. Then I took the water mister and let some fine mist of clean water fall onto the spatters. Some of the dots softened and some stayed pretty strong. I love this and will definitely use this technique again.

I used a Flashcard and cut out the word Summer. Then I stamped the hashtag #lifeisgood…and assembled all my pieces onto a kraft card base with a small layer of coral paper.

I’ve made another color swatch reference chart for you to see where the new color fits in with your existing Distress Ink colors. This green is in the Yellow Green family more so than the Blue Green family.

Next up is the rich and mysterious Hickory Smoke… Can’t wait to get my hands on this new neutral. See you next month! Have a great day and happy crafting!

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Thanks for reading today, and thanks again to the super talented Wanda for continuing this fun feature for our blog!

Last chance! —>

Hi readers! Happy Monday to you! We’re pleased to welcome Monday DT member Cheiron Brandon as a guest to the blog today! She’s using a new set from The Color of Fun collection to make a bright and cheery canvas : ) Enjoy!

Hi there! It’s Cheiron and I am so glad to be here at the Simon Says Stamp Blog today. I just love the little trees in the Explore Nature Stamp and Die set from the latest Simon Says Stamp release, the Color of Fun. I was playing with some of the new ink colors and stamping the trees and I thought they would be perfect on a mini canvas.

Today I’d like to walk you through the steps I used to create my canvas so you are able to make one of your own. I started with a 4 x 4 mini canvas and gave it a sky and some grass using my Dina Wakley paints in lime and turquoise.

I took a scrap piece of tissue paper and stamped one of the sentiments from the set onto it using Black Archival Ink.

I cut around the sentiment, then adhered it to the canvas using Ranger Matte Medium. BE CAREFUL on this step. I used a small paint brush to apply the medium and smooth my paper down. Make sure you do it gently, so the paper doesn’t tear.

While my sentiment dries, I stamped and die cut some of the adorable trees from the set. I used some of the new ink colors: Jellybean, Melon and Duckling. These new colors are just amazing.

Once you are done stamping and die cutting your trees, decide where you want to place them on the canvas and adhere them with foam tape. After I adhered them, I decided the sides of my canvas looked a bit bare- so I painted on them with the same paint colors I used for the main portion of the canvas. It’s as easy as that. These canvases are so fun to make. You can add as much or as little detail as you like and they are great to add little quotes or inspiration words to. I love the make these and give them as gifts.

Here is the finished mini canvas. I hope enjoyed learning how to make it and I sure hope you will try it out with some of the stamps you have!

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