fresh & fun

I recently stopped by Stamp Happens and found ordered some Bo Bunny Paper. Oh my….I want it all! It came yesterday and I had to use a sheet right away for today’s sketch sample.

My card base is a 5 1/2″ x 8 1/2″ piece of Chocolate Chip cardstock folded in half. It was sponged with Walnut Stain Distress ink. And yes…that one of my new favorite dark browns. I love Distress inks. They stay we a bit longer. That makes them PERFECT for sponging…and you know I like sponging! LOL

Anyway…. The edges of a 3 3/4″ x 5″ piece of Bo Bunny paper were sanded, distressed and sponged with Old Paper Distress ink before it was stitched to a 3 15/16″ x 5 3/16″ piece of Red Ridinghood  cardstock that had been sponged with Fired Brick. The edges had been distressed as well.

I cut five 7/8″ squares of Riding Hood Red cardstock squares, sponged them with Fired Brick ink and stamped Verve’s Frosty Flakes in the same color randomly all over. The squares were taped to a 1 1/4″ x 5″ strip of Whisper White cardstock that had been punched with Stampin’ Up!’s Eyelet Border punch and sponged with Old paper Distress ink. To add a little a bit more brown to that part, I stitched a straight edge in brown thread.

The sentiment is also from Verve’s Frosty Flakes. It was stamped in Walnut Stain ink on Whisper White cardstock. It was cut out with Nestabilities Double Ended Tags and sponged with Old Paper ink. I created another Snowflake Medallion with Create a flake one Spellbinder dies, adhered it to one side of the label and a bit of chocolate Taffeta ribbon on the other end.

To finish the card off I added a few Rhinestones from Basic Grey in the center of the snowflakes.

Have a wonderful day! Hugs and smiles

Rick’s boss’s wife was sick. I wanted to give her some German chocolate…German chocolate makes everything better.

So I bought another candle holder and filled it in different kind of German chocolates. I love that I can some German chocolates in the commisary. To dress it up I added Olive Silk Ribbon from May Arts and a layered tag.

For the tag I cut three different size leaves out of a Manila file folder with the Maple Leaf dies from Spellbinders. Those are only available until the end of the month. I am glad I got them. They look so pretty. For the biggest leaf, I folded some of the manila folder in half and cut the leaf so it wasn’t cut at the stem and create a card. Each leaf was sponged with Fired Brick, Scattered Straw and a touch of Peeled Paint Distress ink. I stamped Floral Edge over the leaf in Scattered Straw. The sentiment is from Verve’s stamp set Wishing You in Walnut Stain ink. For a finishing touch I added Crackle Accent over the leaves.

The inside was sponged the same way. The rest of the sentiment was stamped inside.  And here is the finished candle holder. I know it’s not the best shot. I tried to shoot it out of my front door.

And yes, I know….Ghiradelli isn’t German chocolate….but I thought it would fit good with the colors of the other chocolates I chose.

Have a great day! Hugs and smiles

Sorry my sample for the challenge is a bit late. I didn’t get work on it until 8:30 a.m. (EST) in the morning and I am not the fastest stamper. I did know I wanted to use My Mind’s Eye “The Merry Days of Christmas” Paper to tie this card in with today’s Holiday blitz Tutorial sample. I will post that a little bit later.

I started with stamping the tree from Verve’s Christmas in the Air once on White cardstock, then two times each on two different greens from the My Mind’s Eye paper pack. I cut the white tree out completely. The green tree tops were cut out one a bit shorter then the next. They were layered on my white tree. The edges were sponged with Walnut Stain Distress ink.

The blue layer underneath was cut with Label 8 Nestabilities dies from The Merry Days of Christmas paper. The edges were slightly sponged with Walnut Stain ink. Chocolate chip cardstock was cut with the next size up label 8 die and sponged with Walnut stain ink. I punched a whole with the Crop-a-dile and tied white Taffeta Ribbon through it. The blue layer was adhered to the chocolate cardstock with dimensionals, the tree with dimensionals on the blue layer. Tiny Twinkles on the lower right corner finish off the main image.

The card base is a 4 1/4″ x 11″ piece of Core’dinations cardstock folded in half.  My patterned paper pieces measure 1 1/2″ square, 1 1/2″ x 2 1/4″, 1 1/2″ x 3 1/2″ and 2 1/2″ x 3 1/4″. They were layered on a sponged 3 15/16″ x 5 3/16″ piece of Chocolate chip cardstock. The edges were stitched by machine.

The sentiment is also from the new set Christmas is in the Air. It was stamped on the bottom right with Walnut Stain Distress ink.

 I will be back a bit later with today’s tutorial sample. Hugs and smiles

Our annually Tutorial Holiday Blitz week is going on at SCS right now. I already missed alerting you about the first two wonderful tutorials, a scrapbook wallet tutorial written by Makeesha Byl and a Matchbook Candy holder by Theresa Momber. I am sorry about that. I was crazy busy packing up sold Stampin’ Up! products and shipping them out. Thank you all for helping me make room in my craft room for new stamps from other companies!

Today’s tutorial is written by Libby Hickson and is for a Snowglobe card. She had posted one last winter and I had asked her right there and then if she would write this for us for this year’s Holiday Blitz. How fun to see one of those on the back of the Winter Mini catalog from Stampin’ Up! earlier this year.

My card is pretty simple. The cute little polar bear and the background are from Flower Soft. Flower Soft has some cute new products coming out. Make sure you come back tomorrow to learn more about them. The sentiment is from Verve. I received it as a thank you with an order last fall. Julee is so sweet to always include a little thank you stamp with each order. It was stamped with Tuxedo Black ink on Gina K’s Pure Luxury Cardstock. It was punched out with the large oval punch from Stampin’ Up! and layered on a Black Scallop Oval Punch-out.

The patterned paper is My Mind’s Eye Merry Days of Christmas. I tied 1″ celery Satin ribbon around the snow globe bottom. I can’t help by make more of those adorable snowflakes, Sherry Cheever showed us how to make. I made a smaller version that I sponged with Faded Jeans Distress ink and sprinkled with Shard Vintage Glass Glitter. The button is from Basic Grey and was tied on with waxed linen.

I hope you have time to check out the new tutorials, let the authors know how wonderful their projects are and try them out.

Have a wonderful day! Hugs and smiles

Yesterday was the birthday of an acquaintance of mine. She is the Mom of Lucas and Rebecca’s friends and I see her almost every day. I drive the kids to school, she picks them up. So when her daughter told me in the morning that it was her Mom’s birthday and that she likes Twix, I knew I had to create something. I bought a candle holder and filled it up with Snack size Twix.

I tied red May Arts Silk ribbon around the candle holder and cut cardstock with Nestabilities Label 1 to create a tag. The image is from this month KOM stamp set from Unity. It was stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black ink on Gina K.’s Pure Luxury Cardstock, cut out with Label 1 Nestabilities and was colored with Copic Markers (YR21, YR23, YR24, R14, R24, R29).  I tried to get close to the Twix colors with my copic marker choices.

After I adhered it to the tag base, I added Stardust Stickles over the Dragonflies and Crystal Effect over the rest of the colored part. Tiny Twinkles were adhered all around the image with Quickie Glue.

For the inside of the tag I stamped the image again on a Label 1 cutout, this time with Adirondack Butterscotch Dye ink. The sentiment is from Verve’s Circular Sayings and was stamped in Tuxedo Black ink.

I hope you have a happy and safe Halloween! Hugs and smiles!

For yesterday’s Product Focus, I thought it would be perfect to create an updated tutorial for the Shaker card. It was one of my first tutorials and needed a new look. Why didn’t anyone tell me that flash photography and tutorials don’t mix well, especially when using Acetate. LOL

We had a lot of questions about the Spellbinder image in the SCS gallery with the Pumpkin frame. I thought it would be great to use that in the tutorial to show how it’s done.

I cut my Pumpkin Frame with Pumpkin Nestabilities out of Dusty Durango textured cardstock. I also cut a Pumpkin out of Acetate and Grandma’s kitchen patterned paper. My shaker was filled with Crafty Sparkles - Chunky Crystal.

My card base is Chocolate Chip cardstock cut with the Clear Scallop Square Big Shot die from Stampin’ Up! I love to use that die to create card bases. What’s not to love about a square scallop card, right? LOL

A 3 3/4″ square of Whisper White cardstock was layered with a 3 9/16″ square of All Fall Fancy Pants Patterned Paper. The Patterned Paper was stamped with a the leaf swirl stamp from Simple Blessings in Vintage Photo Distress ink and sewn to the White layer. The horizontal strip measures 1 5/8″ x 3 1/2″ and from the Grandma’s Kitchen paper collection. It was stamped with Unity’s Giving it all meaning in Vintage Photo. The edges were distressed and sponged. I used a triple stitch to sew the strip to the square layeres and tied 5/8″ wide Organdy ribbon around it. The bow as topped off with a Recollections Brad (Michaels).

The Pumpkin Frame was sponged with Really Rust and Chocolate chip ink. I small bow was made out of SU Mistletoe ribbon with the help of my BowEasy. The sentiment is from Verve’s Hello Pumpkin set. It was stamped in Vintage Photo on White Cardstock, cut out with the small oval punch and sponged with Old Paper Distress ink. One of the leaves from Simple Blessings was stamped over it in second generation Old Paper ink for added texture.

Here is a video for the visual learner:

When I saw last week’s color challenge I thought I could use the color combo for recreating another old tutorial of mine: Serigraph. It’s fun to revisit these old tutorials and try to come up with a new sample.

The card base is a 4 1/2″ x 9″ piece of cardstock from Core’dinations Chocolate Box Collection folded in half. The background was created with Distress ink Colors: Old Paper, Worn Lipstick and Fired Brick. The stamps used were Verve’s Happiness Found and Harvest Blessings.

The background base is a 3 13/16″ square of Whisper White cardstock. It was layered on a 4″ Whisper White square and was stitched to it. The strip on the side was cut and embossed with Spellbinders Harvest Border out of the same Core’dination cardstock as the base. It was sanded and taped to the side. 1″ Wide Organdy Ribbon was taped around it. The bow was made with Bow-Easy.

For the sentiment I cut Whisper White cardstock with Spellbinders Label 4. It was sponged first with Old Paper, then with a hint of Worn Lipstick. Leaves were stamped over it in Old Paper and second generation Worn Lipstick before the sentiment was stamped in Vintage Photo. The leave is a punchout from the Harvest Border Borderabilities.

The inside of the card is rather simple. I love that the Core’dination cardstock from the Chocolate Box collection has a different core then it’s front. Here it’s a soft red that went perfectly with my leave colors. The leave on top is stamped in Worn Lipstick and is from the stamp set Harvest Blessings. The two leaves on the bottom are punchouts from the Harvest Border.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a wonderful day!

Here is a video for the visual learner:

Remember this card?

The card has a decorated inside with a detachable bookmark. I couldn’t show it back then because we hadn’t run the product review on the Xyron Creatopia yet. So here is the inside of the card.

And here is the bookmark part:

You can find a step by step tutorial written by Mary Brown for this card style on Splitcoast. Here is a video for the visual learner:

For WCMD Verve challenged us to pick colors from a flag and create a card with that. Of course I had to pick Germany (Black, Red and Gold/Yellow). I knew I had a video for the Watercolor Wash Tutorial coming up, so I thought I try using it for my sample.

I cut out Watercolor paper with Spellbinder Label Four Nestabilities and stamped the flower silhouette from Verve’s Because of you in Black Craft ink. I embossed it twice with Clear Embossing powder. I guess I should have used the Embossing buddy, because you can see the stray powder. Although I think it gives it a nice look. I went over the image with  7Gypsies ColorWash Scarlet and Ochre to create the background. The watercolor paper was layered on a bigger black label.

The card base is a 5″ x 10″ piece of Scarlet Core’dination cardstock folded in half. The Whisper White cardstock layer was cut with Stampin’ Up!’s Clear Scallop Square Die.  The 3 5/8″ Fancy Pants All Fall Patterned Paper was stitched to a 1/4″ bigger piece of Basic Black cardstock. Gorgeous Burgundy Silk May Arts Ribbon was died around the lower part of those layers before the main image was adhered.

The sentiment is also from Because of you. It was stamped in Tuxedo Black Memento ink and cut out with Spellbinder Tag Nestabilities. I left the tag on and airbrushed the center with Copic Markers. A Prima Flower with a 5/16″ black brad in it’s center finishes off the card front.

Here is a video for the visual learner:

My Bermuda Bay card base measures 4 1/4″ x 8 1/2″ . It was dry embossed and cut with the Xyron Creatopia.  A piece of Thoroughly Modern designer paper was taped to the top and sanded. White May Arts Satin Ribbon was tied around it.

The image is from Verve’s stamp set Abundant Blessings. It was stamped with Melon Mambo ink, cut out with Circle Nestabilities and first layered on a slightly bigger Chocolate chip circle, then on a Whisper White Scallop Circle. Another piece of Thoroughly Modern Designer Paper was taped to the inside of the card front.

To see the Creatopia cutting and dry embossing, check this video:

I shot this video before receiving a second wheel guide from Xyron. The second wheel guide  helps cutting paper straighter.