Featuring Kelly Purkey Shop │ January 2018 Shop Release

I don't normally post on Sundays but I wanted to make sure to get this blog post up right away because I'm afraid that this months Kelly Purkey Shop release will sell out quickly. The kits and stamp sets are so good this month and the extra stamp sets are really speaking to people from what I've seen online. Let's get right to it.

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The First Project I made was completely inspired by the My Universe kit. I LOVED the sentiments and the planet and moon stamps so much. It also helps that my daughter is completely obsessed with anything that has a galaxy print on it. I have seen so many cool galaxy backgrounds and paintings out there I decided I wanted to try my hand at making one too. I am not a painter by any means so this was a huge stretch for me but I love how it turned out. It took a few days to work on because the tutorial I followed suggested adding layers of watercolors and drying in between each layer. It was so much fun layering paint and watching it deepen and gain more depth. My painted background easily had 10 layers of watercolor, I would just layer, let it dry and add in some more. I used my favorite Peerless Watercolor papers and a few colors from an old Studio Calico set.

Here you can see it closer and you can also see the stamping I added onto a vellum tag using the stamp set in the My Universe kit. I love those stamps. I added in a few of the tiny stars right on top of my background too just to add in more accents.

I had initially thought I would just use a full size photo on half the page but when I was done painting I didn't want to loose a whole side. I ended up erasing the background of my photo and fussy cutting around the edge so the photo was more prominent but still layered. Its like shes floating int the galaxy and I love how it turned out.

Here is a glimpse of what layer one on my paper looked like so you can see how it started.

And this is the final layer, probably layer ten, I lost count. This was prior to adding in the white and silver star splatters that really made it come alive.

My second project is a special one. I really loved the sentiments behind Kelly's We Go High stamp set and I loved the colors of the papers in Tina's Forever Travelers Notebook kit. There are so many important movements happening now and I may not always talk about things like that here but I do feel them deeply. I wanted to use the stamps so badly but I didn't really have an empowering personal story to tell but while I was thinking about all of the powerful women out there that have spoken to me or taught me things just by being who they are I decided to celebrate them. I realized when I was making my list that there were quite a few women personalities and characters that I watched growing up that really spoke to me. These women all had strong convictions and stood up for themselves and that really made a difference on me when I was young.

When I was planning out this layout I thought I was going to cut the photos into circles but then I saw the postage stamp set that was in the Forever Travelers Notebook kit I switched things up. I printed all of the photos in black and white and sized them so that they would fit inside the postage edge stamp and leave a little extra. I then attached them to real envelopes and added in the postmark stamps, varying them up on each image. I then tore them out like you would a real stamp you wanted to save. I was going for irregular and authentic here.

I layered them out on the page in order of how they came into my life and what ended up was perfect pairs that also paired really well with some of the sentiments in the stamp set. I really love when things just align like that in the universe.

I used one of the cards in the My Universe kit to add my stamping and added an extra line with my typewriter. I layered some of the stickers from the Forever Travelers Notebook kit and called it done. I really do love this spread.

I hope this release speaks to you as much as it spoke to me. I love when I'm so utterly inspired to make something, its such an awesome feeling.

Take care,