Studio Calico

sunday sketch

Hello there! This week's sketch is based on the oh-so-inspiring Miss Susan.

Susan has such talent to make her pictures look so bright and colorful and her sense of design just makes me speechless...anyway, I was very impressed and inspired at the same time by Susan's layout. I thought I would replace some of the photos by tags and just made myself a reason to have fun with my Mister Huey's mists!!!

Some machine stitching around my layout adds some contrast on my layout!

I can't wait to see your take on this week's sketch! Post your layout by Monday, July 25 for your chance to win a SC giftcard!

Insider Tips

July’s main kit, Mind the Gap, comes with a main kit stamp that looks like an open circle border. I think this is my favorite Studio Calico stamp to date, probably because it reminds me of a quilt pattern.

Inspired by this stamp, I recreated this image with paper for one of my layouts, and for an insider tip today, wanted to share this easy process with a quick tutorial for you.

First, start by punching several circles out of double sided patterned paper. I used the Picnic pattern from the Countryside Collection.
After punching your circles, it’s just a matter of folding over a corner at an equal distance on both sides, and layering them together. Remember, the outside circle only needs to be folded once.

After you have created all of your shapes, adhere the back of them on your layout. In the past I have sewed these down, but it makes a fun alternative to the ruffle or floral border, so this time, I let the flaps flip up.

Layer a few rows together, and you can come up with a fun design, this one in honor of Independence Day in the US. I’m out of veneer stars, so went with white cardstock and a Fiskars punch. Kraft cardstock is a standard base, trimmed for a card size of 4.25 x 5.5”. Wouldn’t it be great if I had kraft colored star stickers to use for this card? Maybe I could Huey them. Maybe not?

I hope you’ll give this quick and easy technique a try!

4th anniversary PDFs

We've got yet another anniversary celebration for you - 4 step by step project PDFs featuring our State Fair and Countryside lines. Download them and print them out, and you'll have a little Studio Calico inspiration to take with you wherever you go!

(click here to download the PDF for Waleka's "Happy Shakes" layout)

(click here to download the PDF for Jen's "At the Cabin" layout)

(click here to download the PDF for Tina's "Like Forever" layout)

(click here to download the PDF for April's "Happy Birthday" card)

Vee's Tutorial

Hi this is Vee here with a quick tutorial for you today, using color blocking to design a layout. Color blocking has been a trend in fashion and home decor for years. Color blocking is done by mixing like colors in a single block/strip or matching together like patterns or geometric shapes. It is so much fun and will help you experiment with color in a new way.
Supplies: Cardstock; Embellishments: Countryside Cardstock Tags; Ink: Mister Huey Pickle; Rubons: State Fair butterflies; Stickers: Countryside Die Cut Label, Die Cut Stickers
You can color block a layout by using complementing solid colors or similar geometric patterns, I did both for my layout here. I love shapes as you may know! I used different sized rectangles and similar colors from the Countryside collection using paint and mist to accent those color blocked colors.

I started with a sketch to figure out the placement of the tags for the 11x8.5 layout. I blocked around the photo of my daughter to bring focus to it and make the layout more appealing. It was easier for me to use various sizes of the same shape because it makes it easier to fill white space.



Next I matched up the tags to the sketch, you can always add to a sketch to make it more cohesive. After I like the placement of shapes and glued them down, I added a few extra elements like rubons and stickers to add contrast and interest.

I hope you will try color blocking and share what you create! I can't wait to see you spin on it in the gallery.

Countryside

Hi everyone! It's Kelly here to kick off a very special series of posts this week to share the new Studio Calico products coming out at CHA at the end of the month.  Are you ready to see what we've got in store for you?

The first of two new collections is called Countryside.  Whether you like to frolic in the meadow or just stop and smell the wild flowers, we think you'll find Countryside to be all you'll need to shake cabin fever and inspire a grand new adventure.  We've brough all that we love about the outdoors into a full release of patterned papers, stickers, FabRips, Tags, Notions, Flowers, RubOns, chipboard alphas, wood veneer, as well as five new Mister Huey's Mists to match it all.

Are you ready to take an adventure with Countryside?  Here are the patterned papers for this collection...

County Line:

Picnic:

Mud Pie:

Betsy:

Grove:

Barn Swallow:

Wildflower:

Harvest:

I'm sure you recognize a couple of your favorite patterns from the monthly kits in there, along with some fresh new ones that are sure to become favorites!

We have awesome new stickers that go along with Countryside.  Here are the alphabet sets:


Label stickers:

And a new SC product - die cut label stickers:



We also have new die-cut cardstock tags:


These happen to be my personal favorite products from this release!

And now the new products I'm sure you've all been waiting for - Mister Huey's Color Mists:

There are five new mists that match the Countryside line... Bonny Blue (light blue), Clover (green), Bluegrass (blue-green), Barnwood (grey-brown), and Orchard (orange).  How pretty are these going to look on your pages?

We've got a few more items from Countryside to share, but you'll have to wait for posts later this week.  Stay tuned tomorrow for a look at the other collection, State Fair.  All new products will begin shipping mid to late February.

In the meantime, leave a comment on this post letting us know what you're looking forward to from Countryside.  We'll draw two winners from all of this week's CHA 2011 comments to win an entire Countryside or State Fair collection.  See you tomorrow!