Plaid Technique Balloon Card

I am a big fan of Tim Holtz (as I am sure many of you are too!).  One of Tim 's techniques is creating beautiful plaids on glossy cardstock with alcohol inks and a blending tool.  (If you want to see the step by step, please go to Tim's blog and search for "plaid".  You should get several results.  The one where he describes the technique originally was during one of his Christmas Tags.)

I started by creating a plaid on a white glossy piece of cardstock. I stamped the balloon image with Archival black Ink (Ranger).  I heat set it and then cut it out.

I used a light blue (kind of a worn blue actually) and embossed it.  Then I added some color to the edges.

This side view really shows the colors of the plaid nicely.

Close Up!

Here you can really see the plaid.

I hope that you try out a little plaid yourself!

Lis

Washi Tape with Bouquet

Today's card:

1. Card base was ivory cardstock with the front covered in mirrorcard.
2. Mat size is 3 3/4 inches x 5 inches (I wanted to see more of a border around this mat.)
3. I covered the mat with washi tape in colors of pinks and purples and one blue.
4.  I attached the mat with two-sided tape after trimming the edges.
5. I added the blue flowers first and attached them with glue dots, leaving the stems free.
6. Then I added the ribbon bow with a glue dot over the stems.
7. I trimmed the stems.
8. I set the ribbon with glue dots.
9. Lastly I added some other small paper flowers to fill in the space.

(I have to say that I am very happy with the way my pictures turned out today!  I wish they were all this good.)

Close Up!

The bouquet...

A bow using wired organza...

The strips of washi tape...

A side view of the ruffles off the bow...

QUESTION:

Would you prefer this format rather than the other one?  With this format I will give directions/instructions/the steps I used to create my cards.  What do you think?  Please leave a comment or click/vote below by clicking in one of the little boxes.

Thanks! Lis (and come back soon!)