Mixed Bunch Cased Card

Today I want to show you how you can take a card that someone else has made and make it your own.

We've all been there. You need a card but the inspiration well is dry. Staring at all your beautiful products just seems to make it worse. Where to begin?

This was the situation I faced this past Saturday. My husband had invited the families of our two oldest girls' soccer teams over for an End of Season BBQ (in the pouring rain ... but I digress). He's coached our girls since Marley started playing 3 years ago and this year he is saying good bye to one particular player who he has coached for 2 years - first with Marley's team and then with Paige's team. Her mother has also been an integral part of the team, as Assistant Coach and General All-around Go-to Person, so he asked me to make a Thank You card for her. Two hours before the party started! Now, I am a BIG proponent of the Quick Card but pulling off 3 cards (one for her, one for her daughter and then another for the Team Manager of the other team) in that amount of time while still finishing the prep for the party was a bit much.

My fellow Stampin' Up! Demonstrators to the rescue! We regularly meet and swap cards so I just looked at my Swaps Board, picked one then went hunting for similar products. This one is by Maureen Pollock (I looked to see if she had a site you could check out but can't find one - sorry.)

And this was what I came up with.

I started with a piece of Calypso Coral card stock and layered a piece from the Everyday Enchantment DSP pack from the Sale-a-Bration promotion. (I know that's all over with now but I've still got some and it was really nice stuff so it's just going to creep into the odd project or two!) I embossed an image from Mixed Bunch with White Embossing powder and then used my Blossom punch to create the 3 flowers. The sentiment is from Thank You Kindly and is also embossed in white.

Here's a close up of the embossed flowers. I added a Large Pearl jewel accent to the middle of the middle flower and tied a piece of (now no longer available) Calypso Coral 1/8" Organdy Ribbon around the whole grouping.

Inside I embossed a couple images from Flight of the Butterfly.

Tomorrow I'll show you the one I made for her daughter. It features the stamp set I'll be high lighting in my Birthday Cards for All Ages class on the 13th - more details tomorrow.

Hope you're having a great Tuesday. I've now got to organize a birthday party and find a babysitter for Thursday night! Gack!!

Iron Stamper - 5 Minute Card

Now we've covered the big projects, it's time to turn our attention to the cards I made to fill my little suitcase card keeper. First up is the 5-minute card.

Can I just take a minute to gush about this stamp? It's the Hello, Doily stamp and every time I use it I fall back in love with it. I really hope it doesn't get discontinued at the end of May!!

Anyway, back to the card. I started with a base of Chocolate Chip card stock then added a layer of Blushing Bride card stock that I'd run through my Bog Shot with the Stripes Textured Impressions folder. The doily image was stamped in Blushing Bride onto Whisper White card stock - slightly off the edge. The sentiment is from the Sale-A-Bration Elementary Elegance stamp set (LAST WEEK TO GET FREE PRODUCTS LIKE THIS WITH YOUR PURCHASES!) and is stamped in Chocolate Chip.

Along the bottom of the image I layered a piece of 3/8" Pleated Satin Ribbon in Blushing Bride over a piece of 5/8" Whisper White Organza Ribbon. These are wrapped slightly around the edge of the Blushing Bride layer and then the whole thing is popped up with Dimensionals. 

Just one two last notes: after I took this picture I decided to add a Large Pearl to the centre of the doily image. Also, the inside of the card has a piece of Blushing Bride card stock stamped with an image from Delicate Doilies (also in Blushing Bride - for a barely there subtle look).

Thanks for stopping by! Remember to follow my blog to get all the upcoming posts in this series and if you're interested in my monthly newsletter full of news from Stampin' Up!, my classes and fun tips, please add your email address into the box on my side bar. April's newsletter will contain a valuable coupon that you won't want to miss!!

See  you tomorrow!!

Vintage Birthday Card

Today is my brother's Mother-in-law's birthday. She has felt like another mother to me since Andrew and Jonina started getting serious and our kids refer to her as Amma Lynne, just like her actual grand kids do. So when we were invited over to my brother's to celebrate not only Marley's birthday but Lynne's too, I knew I had to make something special for her. I went into my stash of samples created by the clever ladies in my uplines and here is what I came up with.

I used what has become my go-to DSP when I want a vintage vibe - Everyday Enchantment from the Sale-a-Bration catalogue. I embossed the bottom layer with the Stripes Textured Impressions folder and inked the edges with Soft Suede (LOVE this ink colour! use it on most of my edges). The other pattern is actually the back side of the red patterned paper. I simply inked all the edges and mounted it on Very Vanilla before adhering it with Dimensionals. I cut out the doily with my Paper Doily Sizzlits Die and then brushed it all over with more Soft Suede. 

The sentiment was a multi-step process. First I stamped the curly frame image from Elementary Elegance Stamp set with Early Espresso ink. I then stamped over the image (as closely as I could) with some Versamark ink and heat embossed it with clear embossing powder. (I was rushed taking the pictures so it doesn't really show up. Bummer! Trust me when I say that the gloss is there - it's subtle but it adds quite a bit to the over all look of the card.) Then I nestled the Happy Birthday sentiment into the same frame image stamp and stamped the whole thing with Baja Breeze. This allowed me to cut out the inner frame and mount it with Dimensionals onto my embossed image. 

A little bit of the Pleated Satin Ribbon in Baja Breeze finished it off.

Thanks for checking out my little card. I'd like to take a moment to remind you that you have a little over a month left to earn free products like the DSP and stamp set I used on this card. Sale-a-Bration ends March 31st so place your orders now. Any orders of $60 qualify you to one free item. To check out the available products please follow this link.

Valentine's Day Treats

Some eye candy for you and some real candy for my girls! Check it out ...

So the little buckets were purchased at Dollarama and then I filled them with candy hearts.

To get the hearts to stand up in the tins I attached a clothes pin to the bottom and hid it among the candies.

Here's how I made the Valentines: using the Hearts Framelits Dies, I cut out a piece of Melon Mambo card stock with the largest size heart and started layering. First is a piece of Very Vanilla Card stock (which I inked around the edges with Melon Mambo ink) then a Dollar Store doily spritzed with Smooch Spritz in Blushing Bride. On top of that I put a piece of Everyday Enchantment DSP (once again, inked around the edge) and finally a monogram.

The monogram was made with the Alphabet Soup On Board letters that I inked in Melon Mambo then covered in Dazzling Details. (Note to self - 3 hours is not quite enough drying time!)

For the back I stamped some images and sentiments from P.S. I Love You onto another Very Vanilla heart inked around the edges with Melon Mambo ink. To get the different colours on the strawberry I used my Stampin' Write Markers in Riding Hood Red, Chocolate Chip and Garden Green. It's very easy to use these markers on Stampin' Up stamps to create custom coloured stamped images. Just colour the stamp, huff on it to re-moisten the ink and stamp as normal. Voila! Custom coloured images!

And the husband wasn't left out of the hand made card parade. He received this lovely card that I made at an Upline meeting a couple weeks ago. Thanks to Kristina for the cute make-and-takes!!

This card also uses the P.S. I Love You stamp set and what I really love (and a great reason to go to my meetings so I can learn tricks like this to teach my customers!) is the one heart we covered in Cherry Cobbler Dazzling Details. A simple thing but what an impact!

A few last pictures showing the fun my girls had making Valentine's for their class mates. I offered this as a class but had no takers so my girls got to go nuts!

Even little Christine got in on the action!

These are the ones I made for their teachers. The biggest heart is cut from a piece of Beau Chateau DSP.

Here are Christine's finished ones. In all honesty, I think she had more fun handing them out to her little friends than she had making them!

Okay, that's all I've got for you today. I hope your Valentine's Day was a love filled as mine was!

Project 12 My Way

Hello fellow crafters!
I've got another layout to share with you today as well as a card.

For the past 2 years I have played along with Davinie Fiero and Scrapbook and Cards Today in their Project 12 Challenge. The idea was that each month we were given a Becky Fleck Pagemaps sketch to play with and we created a month-in-review type page. I loved getting a new sketch each month and loved seeing how all the different participants interpreted them. This year they have changed the format. There are no new sketches (although we are welcome to mine their archives and re-use a sketch from the past 2 years) and instead of making it strictly about the entire month we can pick any topic, week, day, whatever to scrap. They have (and I think this will be a monthly thing) given us a colour scheme as an added challenge. I'm not thrilled about the changes but have decided that since my favourite part of the whole thing was documenting each month in one layout, that's what I'm going to take from it and continue doing.

So ... I decided to use a new sketch and used PageMaps' January 2012's double page layout sketch.

And this is what I came up with.

As you can see I used the sketch as a jumping off point but my pictures seemed to want to be arranged in a slightly different way. So I went with it!

Here are some close ups.

The left side - I used Crumb Cake smooth card stock as my base and layered two pieces from the Everyday Enchantment line in the background. 

The right side - I moved the title and journalling block to this side - again, it just seemed to want to be there!

I had a lot to say so I decided to type it up. I printed it onto Very Vanilla card stock and cut out the individual paragraphs for a more casual look.

My snowflakes (kind of fun that we actually had snow so I could use them!) were made with the Snowflake #2 die for the Big Shot (the large snowflake) and the snowflake punch. To attach them to the page and to add some sparkle I used the flower Brads. And speaking of sparkle, I also gave the snowflakes a liberal spraying of Vanilla Shimmer Smooch Spritz. The shine is subtle but it's there!

Here is the smaller snowflake with the smaller size of flower brad.

For my title I used the Alphabet Soup On Board letters. They are raw chipboard so I coated them with two coats of Very Vanilla Craft Ink and a liberal coating of Vanilla Shimmer Smooch Spritz. 

Here is another of the snowflakes and you can also see that I popped up my title letters with Dimensionals for even more texture. I think the snowflake is curling up so much because it was slightly wet when I attached it to the page. I'm sure it will lay flat once it's in a page protector!

Everything I've highlighted is available for order through me or through my on-line store (just follow the links). The Everyday Enchantment DSP is only available as a Sale-A-Bration purchase through me. The best way to get it is to host a workshop and for every purchase of $60 you get to choose one free item from the Sale-a-Bration list. 

Here is another project I did using this DSP.

I made these cards for an upline group meeting last week. We have card swaps so in return for making these, I got some really cute cards for my display board. 

To make this card I took a piece of the Everyday Enchantment DSP, cut it to size then ran it through my Big Shot using the Framelits Dies Hearts Collection. Behind the heart cut out I mounted both a smaller heart and a doily made using the Paper Doily Sizzlit Die which I had lightly sprayed with Log Cabin Smooch Spritz.

The bit along the bottom was created by rolling one of our Stampin' Wheels along a piece of Very Vanilla card stock with the Decor standard wheel in Calypso Coral ink. I then tied a piece of Calypso Coral 1/8" Organdy ribbon around it and through a Designer Series button from the Neutrals collection.

Hope you like these projects. If you are interested in making something similar please use the link at the side to email me. Space is still available in the Mommy and Me Valentines class so sign up now!

Thanks and Happy Crafting!

Big Blue Eyes

I've got another layout of one of my beautiful daughters to share with you today. I've mixed several paper lines - just proves how versatile Stampin' Up! products are!!

This is Paige and the final of the portrait shots that we had taken this past December that I plan to scrap. 

I'm planning to enter this layout into Elle's Studio Thursday sketch challenge so here is the sketch we were given.

For my layout I started with a piece of 12x12 card stock in Bashful Blue. I inked the edges with Concord Crush and then layered  a piece of Sweet Shop DSP on top. The photo and journaling block (just a piece of Whisper White card stock) were mounted on Concord Crush card stock and then I added strips of papers from Cheerful Treat and Flirtatious DSP. 

One of the papers in the Flirtatious Specialty DSP is these awesome laser cut doilies so for the title I cut out three of them, layered them over some more Cheerful Treat paper and a piece of 1/2" Stitched-Poly Ribbon in Concord Crush and adhered my letters on top. The word BIG is from the Word Play stamp set and originally said 'Wish Big' but I only needed the second word so just cut off the top of the stamped image.

I treated my letters in the same way as this layout. These are from the Alphabet Soup On Board set. First I inked them up with Bashful Blue, then I coated them in Crystal Effects and finally, to accent the word 'blue', I added a bit of Dazzling Details while the Crystal Effects was still wet. NOTE: I would do a second coat of ink before adding the other products next time. I'm not super happy that the letters look more grey than blue. But ... it is what it is.

For this embellishment I cut out another of the laser cut doilies and added a plastic flower (from my Twelve embellishment tin so not Stampin' Up!) and a Glimmer Brad. I also added a couple other brads from the Sweet Shop Jelly Bean and Everyday Enchantment collections. The Everyday Enchantment Ribbon and Brad pack is exclusive to the Sale-A-Bration catalogue so I can't provide you a link but to view the catalogue please click here.

Here are more of the brads I used on this layout - more than I normally use, to be honest! The green one is another from the Sweet Shop Jelly Bean brad collection and the lighter purple one is from the IN COLOR Printed Designer brads.

New products to showcase

I've been playing a bit (lot) lately in my craft room (hole) and wanted to share some of the items that I've cranked out. First up are some Valentine's Day cards using new products from the Occasions Mini and the Sale-a-Bration catalogue.

I will be sending these to 4 of my fellow ScrapHappy members for our Valentine's Day Card Swap.

They were fun and fairly easy to do so I am thinking I may have to offer a class!

For this one I started with some Very Vanilla card stock (cut and folded to make a 5.25" x 5.25" card) which I inked around the edges with Poppy Parade. The patterned papers are a DSP from the upcoming Sale-a-Bration and called Everyday Enchantment. I used the new Framelits Dies Hearts Collection to cut out my hearts and edged the largest one with the 3/8" Pleated Satin Ribbon in Pear Pizzazz. The stamped image in the centre is from Take it to Heart as well as the banner image. I used stamps from I {Heart} Hearts and Itty Bitty Bits to decorate the banner.

I played with the colour scheme on this one but the general design is identical. The ribbon I used here is Victoria 5/8" Crochet Trim which is normally vanilla but I ran it over some Poppy Parade ink as that matched the paper better. Love how the look is completely changed! 

Note: make sure the ribbon has extra drying time before you start manipulating it or you will be left with red fingers!! :)

And since I had all the papers out and was in a crafty mood I created this.

This is my most favourite layout to date! It was pretty involved but I am so in love with the results I think it's going to get framed!

I started with the HUGE rosette. I'd started making one weeks ago when my friend Sandra came over to play with all our new products. Once I saw just how big the rosette was going to be I put it aside until I could figure out how to use it. 

Well, inspiration hit yesterday! 

This is a new die for the Big Shot called Designer Rosette. Here I used the die 4 times and glued the 4 rosette quarters together to form this giant one. Then I went hunting for some paper to set it off and found myself drawn back to the Everyday Enchantment that I'd already been using. 

I had cut out this scalloped heart earlier using the Heart Framelits and tried layering a doily I'd also cut out earlier using the new Paper Doily Sizzlits Die. I liked the look and when I added a the stamped image on top I was in love. I stamped the image in Basic Grey to match the framing of my black and white photo.

This picture was one taken in December when our family went for formal portraits. I mounted it first on Sahara Sand and then on Basic Grey card stock. Then I wrapped it with some Calypso Coral 1/8" Organdy Ribbon from the Sale-a-Bration catalogue. I affixed the bow with a matching Printed Designer Brad - the brad and the ribbon are being sold in a combo pack and they match the Everyday Enchanment DSP. Yummy! Finally I punched out a butterfly, added the date and tucked it under the bow (see below). 

A close up of the bow/brad/tag combination.

And last, but certainly not least, the title. I took some of the On Board Alphabet Soup letters, covered them with Calypso Coral ink and then put a layer of Crystal Effects over top. Love them!!

Here's a shot showing the dimensionality of the layout. The letters look precarious but they are glued down pretty well!

Oh, and the spray you see was achieved using the Color spritzer Tool and my Basic Grey Stampin' Write Marker. Now that I've finally figured out how to use it properly, it's become a bit of a go-to tool. I love the fine mist it creates. Perfect for a slight antiqued look.

Well, there you have it. Thanks for stopping by.

Occasions Mini Birthday cards

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Hope you had a wonderful Holiday Season with your family and friends.

A few days ago, my Upline Sandra came over with her kids for a play date. Really, WE wanted to play! We'd both received our pre-order shipments from the Occaions Mini and Sale-a-bration catties and wanted to try out some of the new items. So we made sure the kids were fully engrossed in Lego or Wii and we got busy!

I have 2 aunts with birthdays coming up so I made a couple birthday cards.

This was the first one I made. I used Very Vanilla Card stock for the base and stamped it in Lucky Limeade with the butterfly image from the Sale-a-bration stamp set Elementary Elegance. The circle is punched out of Blushing Bride card stock with my 2 1/2" circle punch. Then the flower .. ah, the flower ... There is a new stamp set with matching punch in the Occasions mini that I LOVE! It's called Mixed Bunch and the punch is called Blossom. I stamped the top image and then both punched and fussy-cut it out and mounted it on top of another punched out flower from the Twitterpated DSP (see below for a close up of the flower). I held everything together with a brad from the Sale-a-bration Everyday Enchantment Ribbon & Brad pack. 

The ribbon along the bottom of the card is the new 3/8" Pleated Satin Ribbon in Blushing Bride and the Happy Birthday tag is cut out using the new Framelits Dies - Labels Collection.

I liked the design so much I did it again.

This time the background stamp I used is from the Mixed Bunch stamp set and I used Basic Grey ink and Baja Breeze card stock and pleated ribbon.

Hope my aunties like these cards! I also made a set of birthday cards for one of my aunts but I'll show you that in a few days (just in case she checks!)

Thanks for stopping by. The Occasions Mini catalogue goes live tomorrow so check my website for ordering information. Sale-a-bration starts on Januray 24th. For every $60 you spend on Stampin' Up! merchandise, you get a free item from the list.  If you are in need of some staples this would be a good time to stock up! You still have a few days to order Clearance Rack Blitz items - they go away after January 5th so act fast! These deals are A-MAZ-ING!!!

Have a good evening - see you soon!