I think I have what’s going around. Not feeling too hot but I have to go to work because this week is just training, training, conference. I hope I don’t loose my voice until Thursday afternoon at least or hope that I never get to that point. I hate to cancel any of my training sessions (I don’t have one job but 15% of the time I do software training — this week it’s Word and Excel 2007) and Thursday I’m presenting at a conference.

So before I feel any worst, I did this card last night and also the video. This is the SCS sketch challenge 163 from last week. Thought I’d try it out. It’s a square card. Mine isn’t 100% square but square enough. I used my new Just Celebrate set with the Christmas paper… oh what is it… anyway… here it is. I love the stripe ribbons. I wish Stampin Up had more colors!

The video is a simple one. If you’ve watched me expand and contract the last few weeks you probably figured this technique out. If not, here it is. The other way of doing it is by using Stroke in the Blending tool. I like the first method but I think it’s a preference thing. Try both out and see what you think is best for you. In this video I also introduced you to Smart Objects. There’s a part two to the Smart Objects… coming soon. I’ll talk about some of the things I know about it and I’ll compare it to a folder. Smart Objects is in CS2 for sure but not sure about the previous versions of Photoshop. If you don’t have this feature, I’d Rasterize the text or flatten the “books” layers first then do the rest of the steps of either using Stroke or the Extract.

Enjoy! I did a page with this technique but I’ll show you later since I need it for my Virtual Scrapbooking Night at SCS February 23 and March 1-2. I am one of the host, yeah!!! The theme… well… just got there and check it out {::SMILES}. Putri is my SCS username — actually it’s my username is all the forums and galleries. I’ll share the story next time. I’d love it if you play along with me. Any media is welcome.