Cafe J

Winners, Coupon, Previews!

I would like to thank all of you for playing along with the Finishing Touches contest the last couple of days! Your comments, both here, by email, and at DST have all been so kind and I have enjoyed reading them so very much! Keep reading to see the winners, a coupon code for everyone, and the full previews of my new products!

News Item #1
There were so many participants that I chose more winners & a little bit bigger prizes than I had originally said! I have used random.org to randomly pick all of the winners of course!

* The following 5 random picks have each won a $5 gift card to Cafe J:

DoodleBop

kyla

mighty-nice

Natalie77

terrista

* and here are the 2 random picks to win all 4 new packs of finishing touches:

clmisener

ehooton

Congratulations to all the winners and thanks again everyone for playing!

News Item #2
Coupon Time!!! Do you all remember Finishing Touches Combo Pack 1 that is already in the store? I have a coupon for you that is good through the weekend to get $3 off your Cafe J purchase if you buy the Finishing Touches Combo Pack 1! Use the coupon code:

FTCombo1
This offer expires Monday; Click the preview to find this product in the store.

News Item #3!
The new products will hit the After Five shelves around midnight CST so here's the full preview of all the new products; everything is linked to my store. Each pack of Finishing Touches is $2.99 and the Finishing Touches Combo Pack #2 is $8.99 and of course, all the new products will be on sale Thursday and Friday as well!

Finishing Touches 5: The Beach - There are 10 sand elements total including 2 full length page borders that are not shown here so all your extractions can walk on the sand! :)

Finishing Touches 6: Grass Stains - Includes 10 grass stain elements for all those park photos!

Finishing Touches 7: Glitters - 10 splashes in 7 colors each........70 total glitters!!

Finishing Touches 8: Splashes - 16 water splash elements including 2 full length page borders!

You can buy all 4 new packs in this combo for a big savings, it's like getting one pack free.

And, I can't leave you without showing a few of the fabulous inspiration pages my tag team girls have come up with! :) Enjoy & have a great day! :)

Contest with Prizes, Sneak Peeks, & a Freebie!

I have a little contest for you today and a sneak peek of my new products for Thursday's Happy Hour! :) And a teeny tiny freebie for you at the end of the post!

I have 4 new editions of Finishing Touches so there is one sneak peek at each pack.

            Sandy Beach                             Water Splashes

      

             Grass Stains                                  Glitters

             

Now here's the contest. Leave a comment in this thread at DST saying which one of the four packs you would like to win the most. Sometime Wednesday, I will choose 1 random poster to win the grand prize of all 4 packs of Finishing Touches & a few more random posters to win their choice of 1 Finishing Touches pack.

And last, I have a very tiny little sampler pack for all of you. It includes 1 water splash, 1 sand sprinkle, 1 grass stain, & a few glitter splats. None of these are the actual products that will be in the store, but they are a sample of each type so you can try them out!

Download your Finishing Touches Sampler here!

There Goes the Neighborhood Collection!

Hi everyone! I'm so excited to share my new "There Goes the Neighborhood" collection with you today! The 4 separate coordinating packs all started with the inspiration below.

The air is fresh, the grass is green, birds are singing, & everything is new. Summer is nearly here, the perfect time for family reunions, both large & small. Hugs are given, games are played, & plates are passed. Adults tell stories of long ago while children create adventures that will eventually become their own stories of long ago. "There Goes the Neighborhood" is about celebrating those moments & telling those stories. Choose from 4 different coordinating "Neighborhood" packs or buy the "Entire Neighborhood" for a fabulous discounted price!

Click here to see all the new products in my store or keep on reading for descriptions, previews, & CT inspiration!

There Goes the Neighborhood: The Full Kit includes 9 solids, 9 patterns, a lowercase alpha, & 70 elements.

There Goes the Neighborhood: Play Pieces includes 51 perfectly shabby cardboard play pieces; 21 ready to go pieces & 30 mix & match pieces.

There Goes the Neighborhood: Cottage Shabby Chic Papers include 9 shabby & crumpled papers that coordinate perfectly with the rest of the Neighborhood collection.

There Goes the Neighborhood: Showpieces Special Edition is like 4 regular Showpiece packs combined. It is packed full of "There Goes the Neighborhood" goodness with 16 photo masks, 18 text boxes, 36 title pieces & 8 BONUS layered files to easily recreate the looks on the main preview. All pieces are meant to mix & match seamlessly with 100s of possible combination. Expand your options further by using the masks with paper or using the text blocks and titles for a photo mask.

Can't decide what to get? Check out "There Goes the Neighborhood: The ENTIRE Neighborhood"! It includes everything already shown above AND the discounted price saves you $5!

And now, some gorgeous inspiration for you from my amazing CT girls!! Be sure to check out the detailed previews in the store for more inspiration!

by Monika

by Jarmila

by Waleria

by Tina

NSD Blog Party, Showpieces 8, MegaPack, & a FREEBIE!

Celebrate NSD with A5D!

National Scrapbooking Day is here and we are celebrating all weekend long, starting on Friday with a store-wide sale, daily promotions, blog party and fun challenges/contests in the forum.  Don't forget our 5-5-5 collab, Art & Soul, with guest mixologist Kitty Chen, is $5 for five days. 

Don't forget to stop by the following mixologist blogs for NSD goodies.
Crissy
Kristen
Catherine
Janelle
Kimla
Amy
Camila

It's DOLLAR DAY today!

Click HERE to see the 3 Cafe J items that are marked down!

Now onto my new products, I have Showpieces 8 for you!

And here's a page I made using Showpieces 8
and a few finishing touches from packs 2, 3, & 4.
Both papers are from last week's Cafe J freebies!

I have also bundled up Showpieces 1-8 into a mega pack for those who haven't started their Showpiece collection yet! The mega pack is specially prices so it's like you are getting 2 packs free.....with the 40% off sale, it is a ridiculously low price of $10.79 for this weekend also!!!

And here is my contribution to the blog party!
It is a boys vs. girls paper & Showpieces set and includes:

*5 shabby solids in boy and girl colors,

 

*3 patterns - 1 girl, 1 boy, & 1 neutral

(all with word art cutouts at the top & bottom)

 

*2 Showpieces - 1 for the girls & 1 for the boys

(each in layered & individual files)

Download Here!!

 

Winners Announced!

I have already tried to post this THREE times today!!! Each time I post it, the whole thing disappears after 5 minutes, so here's hoping this one stays put!

Thank you once again for joining the Cafe J blog party last week! It was so fun to read all your comments and emails, see your inspiring pages for the challenge and read your Showpieces suggestions!

Several of the contests have drawn to a close and winners have been randomly selected......scroll to the end of today's post for the list!

Before I announce the winners, though, a quick reminder that there are still 3 contests available to enter. Click on each title to go to that day's post for the details.

1. Art Gallery Challenge Contest

2. Showpieces Contest

3. Sport the Blinkie Contest

Newsletter Sign Up Contest Winners:

My newsletter sign up does not require you to type in your name and I didn't want to list the emails of the winners for obvious reasons and yet I want them to be posted, so I've decided to list the first part of each winner's email so I can publicly congratulate them to some small degree! :) All 5 of the winners have already been contacted.

Each of the following has won a $5 Cafe J gift card - Congratulations!

digik

dsen

mctrad

psing

fmlee

Win Your Order Contest Winners

Each of the following has won their order total and just for the readers' interest, the total each has won is between $2 - $25!! So, congratulations to:

Bobbie
Linda
Kim

I will be back later this week to announce winners of the "Art Gallery Challenge" & "Showpieces" Contest! That's it for today & remember to sport your blinkie - you never know when you might get tagged with a Cafe J gift card!

Blog Party Day 5 - Freebie, Coupon, & More!

The week has flown by......it is already the last day of the Cafe J blog party!! Thank you so very much for joining in and even though this is the last party post, the contests are all still going on so here’s the ‘master list’ of contests you can still participate in over the weekend. Most of these take only a minute to play and there are lots of Cafe J gift cards for prizes so click on each contest name to go to that day's post for more details & to join in the fun if you haven’t already!!

Newsletter Signup Contest

What: Sign up for the Cafe J newsletter in the right hand sidebar.
Deadline: Sunday, April 19
Prizes: Several Random Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards
Winners Announced: Monday, April 20

Art Gallery Challenge Contest
What: Create a page using Cafe J Art Gallery Collection freebies or other products from the Art Gallery Collection by Cafe J.
Deadline: Monday, April 20
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards.
Winners Announced: Sometime Next Week

Win Your Order Contest
What: Place an order of any amount at Cafe J Wednesday, April 15 - Friday, April 17.
Deadline: End of the Day, Friday, April 17
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards worth their Winning Order Total.
Winners Announced: Monday, April 20

Showpieces Contest
What: Share Ideas for upcoming Showpieces.
Deadline: Tuesday, April 21
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards
Winners Announced: Sometime Next Week

Now, let’s get on with Day 5!!!!

Sport your Blinkie Contest!
This one is easy! All you have to do is grab my blinkie from the left sidebar of my blog & add it to your signature at any or all of your favorite forums. My tag team & I will be browsing through the forums/galleries over the next week and we will pick random Cafe J gift card winners when we see you wearing the Cafe J tag team.

Friday/Saturday/Sunday Coupon
Yep, that’s right! This coupon code is good through the entire weekend!! Use code GETMORE to receive $4 off on your purchase of $10 or more!

Friday's Tips/Tricks-Shadowing Acrylic Elements
Today, I would like to share with you one of my own signature methods of shadowing acrylic elements. This method is particularly useful when you want to give an element a little extra depth & lift.

I have 2 main actions that I use as the base for my signature shadows-one for smaller objects and one for larger objects. You can download them here if you would like to use them for this tutorial, but I don’t know if they will work in PSE, sorry!

There are 10 main steps listed below and it may seem like a lot to do, but once you have done this several times, it goes really quickly, especially if you use the action.

1. Place the acrylic element on your page; for today’s tutorial, I am using an acrylic heart that is about 4 x 4 inches on my page; you may download it here if you like.

(If you have installed my action, select your acrylic element in the layers palette, choose the small objects action, press play and then skip down to #6.)

2.  (If you have installed my action, select your acrylic element in the layers palette, choose the small objects action, press play and then skip down to #6.) With your acrylic element selected, choose layer/duplicate. A new window will open up, name it ‘shadow’ so you don’t get confused later.

 3. With the shadow layer selected, choose image/adjustments/hue & saturation. A new window will open up.....use these settings
hue 0
sat 0
lightness -78
& click ok.

 

4. The shadow layer should still be selected. Choose filter/blur/gaussian blur and in the window that pops up, set the blur at  3.4 px & click ok.

  5. Select your shadow layer again and at the top of the layers palette, adjust the opacity to 70%

6. (If you used the shadow action, you can start here again) Drag the shadow layer just below the acrylic element in the layers palette.

7. Select your shadow layer in the layers palette and using the arrow keys on your keyboard, click the down arrow twice and then the right arrow twice.

8. At this point, you have an option to make the shadow more prominent. The easiest way to do this is to select the shadow and hover your curser at the bottom right hand corner of the box around the shadow on your page. Click and hold on the little double arrow (noted by the 'x' on the screenshot below) and rotate it a little to the right. If your element will be layered on top of a lot of different pieces, you may want to rotate it even more, then double click to set the shadow layer again.

{Right now, the shadow is in the right place, but the acrylic element looks cloudy and gray. We will take care of that next.}

9. Click on the thumbnail picture of your acrylic element in the layers palette. The acrylic element on your page should look like there are little ants marching around it.

Select your shadow layer in the layers palette and click delete. This will delete the part of the shadow directly underneath your acrylic element which will restore the acrylic element's clarity and color. You may need to click delete several times in order to accomplish this.

Click Select/deselect to make the marching ants go away.

10. There are several different ways to adjust the lightness/darkness of your shadow. You can play around with the opacity level in the layers palette to lighten or darken. You can also duplicate the shadow layer if you like. And anytime you want to make an acrylic element a little whiter and more prominent, you can duplicate the acrylic layer.

Last, because I am a bit of a geek I like to click on the box next to the shadow layer in the layer palette so I can see what it looked like before, this gives you the WOW factor! hahaha and makes you feel very accomplished! Here are the before and after pictures!

Friday’s Freebie
I made an acrylic button alphabet for you today so you can practice those acrylic shadowing techniques! It includes a full lowercase, uppercase, and some symbols.

Thank you again so very much for joining me for the Cafe J blog party! I realize that you have many valuable things to do with your time and I feel honored that you have chosen to hang out here for a few minutes each day! I will be posting winners over the course of next week, so I will see you Monday!!!

Download Friday’s Freebie here!

Blog Party Day 4 - Freebie, Coupon, & More!

Wow! It’s Blog Party Day 4 already!!! If you are just joining us, be sure to check out the previous blog posts for contest information and freebies! For your convenience, here is a list of the contests that are still going on and a few basics about each one. Click the contest title to visit that day’s blog post for the full details.

Newsletter Signup Contest
What: Sign up for the Cafe J newsletter in the right hand sidebar.
Deadline: Sunday, April 19
Prizes: Several Random Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards
Winners Announced: Monday, April 20

Art Gallery Challenge Contest
What: Create a page using Cafe J Art Gallery Collection freebies or other products from the Art Gallery Collection by Cafe J.
Deadline: Monday, April 20
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards.
Winners Announced: Sometime Next Week

Win Your Order Contest
What: Place an order of any amount at Cafe J Wednesday, April 15 - Friday, April 17.
Deadline: End of the Day, Friday, April 17
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards worth their Winning Order Total.
Winners Announced: Monday, April 20

Showpieces Contest-Details in Today’s Post Below!
What: Share Ideas for upcoming Showpieces.
Deadline: Tuesday, April 21
Prizes: Several Winners will Receive Cafe J Gift Cards
Winners Announced: Sometime Next Week

And now, on with Day 4!!!

Showpieces Contest
I have received many emails for requests of specific Showpieces so here’s your chance to chime in!  What themes or specific titles or quotes would you like to see? Any other ideas? Post them all here in the Comment section for today’s post and I will choose a few random winners to receive Cafe J Gift Cards!!! The deadline to leave comments is Tuesday, April 21 and the winners will be announced sometime next week.

Thursday’s Coupon
Use code GETMORE to receive $4 off on your purchase of $10 or more! This coupon is good from now all the way through Sunday!

Thursday’s Tips & Tricks
Just a quick Public Service Announcement for you today: Journaling is IMPORTANT!!! Yes, that is as much a reminder to me as it is to you! It’s so easy to forget about journaling when we are focused on the beauty and creativity of our pages, but you will definitely want to have journaling to read when you are 80 and can’t remember the exact details of that special day, event, or person. Here are a few quick ideas to jumpstart your journaling.

1. If you are not sure where to start, use the interview method. Ask your children, husband, best friend or dog to answer a few questions about their favorite things and don’t settle for a one word answer. Once you have finished your interviews, make a page for each person and include the journaling in ‘interview style’.

2. If you can’t think of a creative way to word your journaling, then think of a creative way to show your journaling. For example, “We went to the beach Saturday and had so much fun” looks a lot better when you use the text as a frame or page border or even the shape of a flower than if you were to just write a plain straight line sentence.

3. Add interest to your journaling by using a plain font for most of your journaling and a fancy font just for the key words. You could also achieve the same effect by keeping all the journaling plain, but changing the color or size of the key words.

4. Change the style of your journaling...reminisce about a favorite event by telling it storybook style, complete with “Once Upon a Time” and “Happily Ever After”.

5. Don’t feel that you have to use full sentences all the time in your journaling. Try adding phrases or family quotes or silly rules either in list form or scattered in a whimsical way around your page.

6. Use a fun “Mad Libs” type of style.....I have included a journal block using this method in today’s freebie to show you how!

7. Last but not least, always date the photos on your pages with the date they were taken....you will be glad you did!

Thursday’s Freebie
Today’s freebie started out as a template. Then I kept adding more extras to the template and decided to save them all separately as well. Then I decided that I better make a few more papers too, so it ended up as a mini-mini kit! There are 4 papers and 8 elements included as well as the psd layered template  which contains shadows in separate layers for your convenience.

Download today’s freebie here and come back tomorrow for the LAST DAY of the Cafe J blog party!

Blog Party Day 3 - Freebie, Coupon, & More!

***UPDATED TO ADD***

So sorry everyone, but I made a mistake with Sandra's wonderful freebie and included the preview only and not the actual template!! YIKES!! So, if you downloaded the freebie anytime between last night (April 14) when I first posted until 9:30 CST April 15, you have the incorrect file and will need to download again! Again, I'm so sorry for the inconvenience! 

________________________________________________________

The last 2 days have been so fun! I love seeing all of you here at the party and participating in the contests! If you are just joining us now, be sure to check out the blog posts from Monday and Tuesday for freebies, contest info, and more!

{BTW-I am posting this post before it's actually Wednesday, Day 3, so I will leave the Day 2 coupon code active until tomorrow morning and you can decide which coupon you would rather use until then! :)}

Wednesday's Contest:Win Your Order!

All you have to do is place an order at Cafe J Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday this week. I will choose a few random winners from all the orders placed those 3 days to receive a gift card of the same amount their order equaled! In other words, if your order is picked randomly and your Cafe J order total was $2.99, I will email you a Cafe J gift card for $2.99; if your Cafe J order was $39.99, I will email you a Cafe J gift card for $39.99! Winners will be announced next week!

Wednesday's Featured Product: Art Gallery Papers

I really love the look of painted papers-they are solids and yet they are almost patterns as well. They have a handcrafted & textured look that I really enjoy working with & I have created each pack with it's own signature style. There are 6 Art Gallery Collection paper packs so far, but my favorites are the "Moody Papers". They have a really deep and textured look that make them perfect to use as the main background or as part of a layered background.

Wednesday's Coupon

Use code PAPERS to receive an extra 15% off any Cafe J paper packs today! Combine this coupon with the store sale for a great deal! This coupon is good for today only!

Wednesday's Tips/Tricks

Layered backgrounds are a really great trend right now. They add so much texture and depth, but unless you shadow them well, they can look flat and uninteresting. There are a lot of different methods to use for creating shadows, but I would like to share with you today 1 method that I turn to time and time again for this type of realistic shadowing.

1. Position your background papers the way you want them to appear in your final result. You may choose to center the smaller paper exactly, leave it off center, or tilt it.

2. Create an empty layer directly below the paper you are shadowing.

3. Use the soft round brush at a size of 200-300 and set the brush blending mode to multiply.
 

4. Following the edges of the paper, draw the shadow in, making sure that you position your eraser along the inside of the paper as shown by the red circle below. Because you are using such a soft and large brush, this will soften up the shadow and leave you with less to erase later.

5. Instead of trying to follow the edges exactly, try to follow a curvier line so that the shadow will look realistic as if some parts of the paper are lifted higher than others. When you are finished with this step, your shadow will NOT look the way you want it to look! :) It will most likely appear too dark, too large, and too fakey. Don't worry though, the next step will fix that.

6. Adjust the shadow layer opacity using the slider bar until it starts to look like a real shadow.
 

7. If there are any shadow parts that look out of place, erase them by just barely brushing them away around the outside edges of the pieces you want to erase. (use the soft round brush set at about 200-300) Experiment with this method until you find your perfect signature style. You can use this little trick on any element you want to have an uneven and realistic shadow. Here is my final result:

Wednesday's Freebie

Sandra aka FrkEdwards aka Fruitloop Sally is one of my fabulous tag team members, but she is so much more! She is a DAM contributer and a fabulous designer and a smilie extraordinaire as well! Visit her store at Pickleberry Pop here, her store at Inspiration Lane here, and Fruit Asylum (her blog) here! (I also happened to notice she has a freebie on her blog today!)

Sandra has created a fabulous template for this week's blog party!! Here is her page that inspired it, I love it's unique composition and style! She used Cafe J cardstock papers, some Cafe J elements, and the other elements are by the fabulous Kristen Rice! (K Studio)

and you can download your fabulous Fruitloop Sally freebie here! See you tomorrow!

Blog Party Day 2 - Freebie, Coupon, & More!

Thanks for joining the party! If you missed yesterday's post, click here for the freebie download, the newsletter signup contest and more! Also, I'm leaving the Day 1 coupon code active until I get up in the morning so if you are awake and shopping, you can choose between yesterday's coupon and today's coupon!

I am also super excited to let you know that After Five Designs and Shabby Pickle Designs are both having a storewide 35% off sale from now through Thursday this week! Everything in both stores is 35% off except the very newest items which are 20% off. Combine this with the coupon code of the day for an extra great deal!

So....let's get on with Day 2!

Art Gallery Challenge/Contest

I have a fun and easy challenge for today's contest.....I have been talking about how fast and easy it is to make your own 'Art Gallery' page so here is your chance to try it out for yourself. Here are the rules:

1. Create a page using 1 Art Gallery Collection paper (or more), 1 Showpiece (or more), and 1 Finishing Touch (or more).  You may definitely use yesterday and today's freebies for this, so no purchase is necessary to participate! :) If you do use products you have bought at Cafe J, make sure they have "Art Gallery Collection" as part of the title. The exception to this is alphas, you may use those from any designer you wish and of course, you do not have to use any alphas at all if you do not want to.

2. Post your page in your favorite gallery.

3. Leave a comment on today's post with your name and a link to your Art Gallery page! (Feel free to let me know how long it took you to finish your page if you are so inspired as well!)

That's all there is to it! The deadline for this challenge is 10:00 pm CST on Monday, April 20. I will announce the gift card winners Tuesday or Wednesday....there will be at least 2 winners, maybe more depending on how many participants there are!

Here's my page for the challenge although I actually did it last week. It took me less than half an hour to put together, which is amazing for me! I usually take hours or days!

A few tips to get you started:

1-Don't overthink your page. It is meant to be fast and easy so don't be surprised when it is! Also, if you are like me, you will have to resist the urge to keep adding more to your page!

2-Feel free to mix and match any of the photo masks together for your own unique look.

3-Try making your own Finishing Touch by recoloring a few Showpieces photo masks and layering them under your photo for a splash of color.

4-If you are having a hard time matching up your photo colors with the papers and elements you have, turn them to black and white photos and then turn up the contrast a little bit to really make them pop!

Tuesday Coupon

Use coupon code ONEDOLLAR at checkout to receive $1 off any order today. There is no minimum $ amount required and this coupon is for today only.

Tuesday's Featured Product: Showpieces

My Showpieces were actually the first product in my Art Gallery Collection. I was searching for the perfect word art and a photo mask for a page I was doing and I thought, "Boy it would be nice if a designer would combine these 2 products so I didn't have to look through all my supplies for the perfect one of each." My next thought was "Hey, I'm a designer, why don't I combine these 2 products so the perfect combination is always at the ready!" and that is how the Showpieces came to be!

Each pack of Showpieces includes 4 photo masks (in 2 variations each - plain and paint stroke textured), 4 titles, and 4 text blocks. You can mix and match these or use just the masks or the word art independently from each other. I also include 4 *bonus* psd files so you can easily recreate the 4 looks that are on each main preview.

There are 7 sets of Showpieces available at Cafe J right now, with plenty more to come, but my personal favorites are these 2 packs:

Showpieces 7

Showpieces 3

Tuesday's Tips/Tricks

Most of today's tips for working with the Showpieces are so basic that it's easy not to think of them! Yes, the Showpieces do work great just slapped down on the middle of your page, but there are also so many different and creative ways to use them. Here's a few easy ones to try:

1. Rotate the photo masks and the word art whichever way you like. Try them sideways, upside down, or going off the edge of the page.

2. Shrink the entire showpiece down tiny or enlarge just the mask to full page size and use with your favorite paper instead of a photo to make a unique background.

3. Repeat the word art text blocks to make an entire column or row across your page for a linear look.

4. Change the color of the word art or blend it into your background using one of the blending modes. Or for an instant aged look, use a soft eraser set on 50% to partially erase bits and pieces of the word art.

5. Remember that none of the Showpiece parts need to be shadowed. You may add a small shadow to the title word if you wish, but if you use a shadow on the text block it will end up looking blurry & it won't blend in nicely with the background.

6. Try using the paint stroke texture of the photo mask for a different look. Sandra has created a really beautiful page using this method. She used the paint stroke version of the photo mask and blended her photo using one of the many blending modes available in the layers palette for a really fun and edgy look. The way that the paint strokes show through the photo really give it that 'painted on' look.

These are only a few of the many tips/tricks I could give you for using these, but here are a few pages from my fabulous tag team girls for more inspiration! Each page is using 100% Art Gallery Collection products!

by Sara

by Melanie

by Monika

by Jarmila

Tuesday's Freebie

I decided that I wanted everyone to be able to participate in the Art Gallery challenge, so today's freebie is another Art Gallery Collection sampler pack so you will each have plenty of supplies to choose from without having to break the bank. The Sampler Pack 2 includes 4 Art Gallery Collection papers, 2 layered and shadowed Finishing Touches, and 2 Showpieces with separate pieces and bonus psd files. The Finishing Touch with the frame is included in 2 versions-one with no glitter in the frame area so you can use it with a photo and one with glitter in the frame area in case you want to use it just like it is.

Thanks for joining me & I'll see you back here tomorrow!

Download Art Gallery Collection Sample Pack 2 Here!

Blog Party Day 1 - Freebie, Coupon, & More!

Thanks for joining me on Day 1 of my blog party!!! You can look forward to games, prizes, coupons, and freebies all week along with a few tips and tricks to make your pages look their best!! :) Each day I will feature a Cafe J product and show a tip or trick on how to use it successfully. I will also post a coupon code that will be good for that day only! Now, let's get to it!

Newletter Sign Up Contest

This is an easy one! All you have to do is sign up for the Cafe J newsletter sometime this week. I will choose a few random newsletter subscribers to receive a Cafe J gift card! The newsletter sign up is on the right hand sidebar of the blog. And of course, as a newsletter subscriber, you will receive product sneak peeks & exclusive coupons that you won't find anywhere else. Winners will be announced next Monday, April 20th.

Monday's Featured Product: Finishing Touches 1

OK, I know that I'm the one who designed them, so maybe it's not polite to say, but I just LOVE these! You can choose to add just 1 or 2 little splashes to your page or you can fill your page with water using one of the page bottoms. You can even add the wave that's included and position your favorite extraction on it to make it look like the perfect surfer guy or gal.

 

Monday's Tip/Trick

Here are a few tips/tricks to try when you are using the water splashes.

1.If you are using a light colored background & the water splash does not show up as much as you want it to, try duplicating it once or twice until it shows up the amount you would like.

2.When I was testing these, I came to the realization that for the most part, these look best unshadowed. I will have a quick tutorial later this week on my signature method of shadowing acrylic and water elements also.

3. You can also use these water splashes as ice elements. All you have to do is double click on the water splash layer in the layer palette. This will bring up a pop up window with layer options. Click on "Color Overlay", change the color to white, the blending mode to overlay and adjust the opacity until your element has just the look you want.

Monday Coupon

Use code GETMORE to receive $4 off on your purchase of $10 or more! This coupon is good for today only!

Monday Freebie

Today I have for you a sample pack of the Art Gallery Collection! It includes 4 papers, 2 water splash Finishing touches, 2 glittery Finishing Touches, and 1 Showpiece with 2 color choices for title/text block & the bonus psd file. If you are not familiar with my Art Gallery Collection, click here for the explanation of how these products can save you time!

Thanks for stopping by the party today and be sure to come back tomorrow for more fun! 

Download the Art Gallery Collection Sampler here!