so much to share......

front of tote

Back of tote

I found this amazing template site.....Creations by AR. I was so happy to find this site. I purchased the Haute tote and went to town creating it. I knew EXACTLY what I was going to do with it the second I saw it. These are my teacher gifts this year. I am putting thank you notes inside them. I will do another with a different theme...cause quite frankly this one took some serious amounts of time!

Ok, where to start.....The bag is super easy to put together. It takes no time at all. Decorating it...well that took me well over 3 days. I made the tote and connected the body so that I could ink it in landscape form. I tore small pieces of paper and started inking in layers for the sand. I used 4 different shades of Distress inks on the sand. I did the same thing for the ocean but I cut wavy templates and then blended them in as best I could so that it looked like real ocean waves. I used a white gel pen from Inkessentials to create the wave effect and the ocean spray on the beach. These two shots show good views of the sand and water layering. The sky was originally stamped with the HA Clouds stamp but I wasnt' happy with it so I inked over it with chalk ink. You can see hints of clouds through it IRL.

this is the back side of the tote.

After I finished inking it all the fun really began (ok, so the inking was really really fun and my fingers are still severely ink stained...but that's the fun in stamping! Every time i look at my inky fingers I smile! :) )

I used the Hero Arts Snow layering paper for all my cuts. I then inked them to be the colors I wanted. Except for the sailboat. I used the Hero Arts Silhouette sailboat shape and cut it once in white and once in red. It was too fine of detail to try and color. I didn't want to tear it and the Copics weren't giving me the red I wanted. The Hero Arts Silhouette toy boat is inked with distress inks. I just cut it out of the white paper and inked it. I'm sorry for the bad picture above. It was late and I didn't realize it until they were on the computer already!

All the shapes on the card were cut with my Silhouette SD....except for the sun. I tried every sun I own. ...which is all of them and I just couldn't get a good cut that was so small so I punched a circle out of dotted paper and put some stickles on it.

I inked all the seashells and then some of them I sprayed with a white/gold perfect pearls and others I used glossy accents on. I used glossy accents on the water of the pail on the backside of the tote too. It looks like real water in real life.

The Palm tree was cut twice, once in green and once in brown, those too were inked with Distress inks then then I used Stickles on top of them.

The Beach chair is a Silhouette shape. I used the HeroArts Dots and Flowers stamp on orange cardstock with orange distress ink then ran it through the Silhouette for the chairs background on the tote. On the card I used orange dotted paper that was going to be the inside of the tote until I found tan dotted paper...and I forgot to take a picture of the inside...sorry. It' has a little pocket stitched inside it too.

The flip flops & bucket of drinks are a Studio G stamp colored with Prismacolors and cut out. I used the Hero Arts sandpiper to accent the sides a bit, the clouds are also Hero Arts Silhouette shapes.

The card....ok that is a spinoff of the beach tote. I wanted them to be very similar but not as time consuming. I again inked but I cheated and tore kraft cardstock for the sand then inked it. For the water I inked that but i didn't use strips of torn paper for it. I just inked it and blended it and then I sprayed it with blue perfect pearls. I love how it looks like the water is glistening. I did the same thing for the sailboat as the tote. Palm tree was cut out of just green, inked and then glittered both top and trunk with Stickles. I cut out "Mahalo" and colored it with 2 shades of Copic Markers. Again the flip flops, bucket and this time beach ball are all Studio G.

I think I covered it all....WHEW!

If I missed anything or you have any questions...please don't hestitate to ask












Products used:

Ink: Tim Holtz Distress inks
Cardstock: Bazzill, Hero Arts
Patterned Paper: Bo Bunny, Scenic Route
Stickles, Perfect Pearls
Stamps: Hero Arts S5213 Dtos and Flowers, S5215 Clouds
Studio G

Silhouette shapes:
HA Shapes used:
Sailboat_C00340_23067
Palm_tree_C00377_23067
Toy_boat_C00348_23067
Mahalo_C00341_23067
Sand_piper_C00320_23067
Scallop_shell_C00314-23067
Clouds_C00031-23067
HA Stamp: Clouds, S5215

Other Silhouette shapes:
sandcastle_C00325_20508
4_beach_sand_pail_collection_C00701_19210
Sea_shell_2_C00415_17986
Sand_dollar_0416
Shell_0417
shell_0419
beach_chairs_C00322_20508