Let it Snow...

not in real life, just in card speak. I am most definitely not asking for snow!!
This is a card a did more than a week ago. I was playing with different stamps, embossing powders and acetate. Someone gave me a big box of copier transparencies so I have lots to experiment with. The copier quality ones make it so it can withstand the heat gun without warping or melting. I stamped a quarter sized sheet with the Dotted BG stamp and embossed with white EP. I thought it reminded me of snowflakes. I am not sure what possessed me to use pink passion as a main color other than I was looking to use a color that isn't one of my standards. That would make every bold bright color qualify! Adhering acetate is always the problem because you don't want to see any glue or tape show through. In this case I used some large white brads from my stash, they may be American Crafts, but since they aren't in their original packaging I don't know for sure. The penguin is an Elzybells stamp, I just think he is so cute! He is stamped on shimmer white and colored with basic grey, pink passion, ony orange and turquoise. One of the cooler parts of my card, you probably can't even see! In a previous round of acetate embossing I used the bold snowflake jumbo wheel with iridescent ice EP. I had some scraps of it and I used the SU snowflake punch to punch some of the snowflakes out. The punch wasn't an exact match but close enough. I used the punched out snowflakes as an embellishment around the stamped image, using small white brads to attach them. If you click on the photo for a bigger view you may see them. It's a subtle touch but I like it!

We are leaving for PA today for Thanksgiving with family. I am off to pack and bake before we leave. Have a blessed day tomorrow!

Elzybells Meets the Dirty Girls!

So...the present and former Dirty Girls were handed a challenge by Jami...make a card using the Elzybells stamp, Winter Song, include pretty in pink somewhere on your card and absolutely no designer paper!

Here is the gallery with all the cards from those who participated. What a killer assortment of cards!! I always love to see how many varieties can come from the same list of parameters.

In the end, I am not really thrilled with my offering. I am in one of those slumps where I seriously consider selling all my stuff and hanging up my stamping hat. Then I realize, this too shall pass and I will feel more like stamping, hopefully some time soon.

Thanks for stopping by!

Chipboard Galore

I had the vendor sale today. It went fairly well, I made several new contacts and sold several items. No two sales are ever alike. What sells at one may may not sell at another. Today's hot sellers were fridge note pads made from half a junior legal pad and jumbo paperclip bookmarks. I had a few questions about the memo cubes so I want to take a minute to answer those.
**what do I sell them for? I can tell you that I sell them for 6.00 but that doesn't mean that is a price everyone should sell them for. I take into account what my supplies cost me and what I feel is a fair profit margin. That varies on each item. The cubes went up in price this year so I had to raise my price from $5 to $6. Consider though that I live in a more rural community and people aren't willing to pay much sometimes.
**how do I stamp on them? It is a pretty easy item to stamp actually. I buy the cubes precut and glued from StampOnThis.com (see the link in my sidebar). They come with very smooth sides. I know some people buy reams of paper and have a printer cut and glue them to save a bit on price, but I have not had luck with that. Getting the cubes even and smooth is tricky so I go with what I know is good. The only thing you need to be careful of is to hold the cube firmly when you are stamping onto it. You don't want the paper to move. I pinch the top and bottom of the cube with my fingers and stamp away, working around until I have all the sides done. You can stamp on the glue but it can be a bit slick so take extra care of leave it blank.
**do I stamp the bottom and tops as well? I do stamp the tops but not the bottoms, no one will see the bottom.

On to another subject...chipboard. Cosmo Cricket Buck Naked chipboard to be exact. My local stamp store was carrying a set of Cosmo Cricket chipboard ornaments/tags and as a separate purchase, the card stock die cuts to match. I had the best time putting this set together!! It can easily be done while watching TV or chatting with a friend. I did mine on a girls retreat and it didn't require so much mental energy that I couldn't also chat at the same time. I used Scotch Quick Dry adhesive to adhere the die cut paper to the chipboard. Then I used a sanding block to sand all the edges. Since this wonderful Cosmo paper has a more vintage feel, I distressed all the edges with a sponge and Walnut Distress ink. Several of the pieces layered to form even more wonderful ornaments. The stockings for example have pieces that layer for the top, heel and toe areas. The snowman has pieces for the nose and hat. Some of these pieces I incorporated into some projects I did for the 15th. That's all I am going to say about that :). I will show some other ones at another time. What you see in the photo is everything that the package made. These will make cute tags for gifts. I think these could also be done in the car if you have a road trip in your future. To me the best part was the die cut card stock designed to go with the chipboard. It fit the chipboard perfectly so there was no trimming required.
I would make another set just because it was so fun!
Thanks for visiting!

Getting Ready...

for a craft sale. Restarting a business after a move is difficult and my SU business is no different. I was contacted in September by someone in my new area who is doing a vendor sale/craft show and fundraiser. I don't exactly have the time to prepare for such an event but I felt not participating wasn't an option. I need to get my name and face out there and meet some new people. I need it for my business but I also need it for myself! I am digging out as many things as I can find from previous sales and craft shows and supplementing with a few items that are quick to prepare and also good sellers. Memo cubes are one of my favorite items to give as gifts. I prefer practical gifts and memo cubes fit that bill. I order mine from StampOnThis.com, you can find a link in my sidebar. She is fantastic to deal with, provides great items, fast shipping and great customer service. I also purchased the cello bags from there to package the cubes in. They are a tad long so after tying it with ribbon I cut part of the bag off. Here is a sampling of my cubes. I used various SU stamp sets: Snowburst, Baroque Motifs, and Priceless. I also prefer to make and sell items that I know I can give away in case I don't sell out. Memo cubes make great gifts for teachers, co-workers or when you just need a little something.

Because I am busy prepping for the sale, I am not stamping much for fun this week. I hope to be back in the swing of things next week.

Snowman Shaker

I worked all afternoon yesterday on Dirty Dozen projects. I can't wait to share them because I have had the best time on these projects!! Once I get on a roll however, it is hard to pull myself away to do anything else.


Here is another piece from my wheeled OSW I did a few days ago. The emboss resist shows up a little better on this one.
I bought the stamp set, Wishing You Cheer, because I thought the stamps were perfectly sized for slide ornaments and shakers. It finally saw ink. I created the shaker by first punching 2 1" squares into a piece of basic grey card stock, slightly overlapping them to create a rectangle. Then I punched it out with the Marvy Giga scalloped rectangle. I attached a piece of acetate behind the window, put down a edge of Scotch foam tape, added some clear beads and then my stamped image. Don't shakers make you happy??? Again, the sky blue and basic grey needed a punch of color so I added a panel of real red to this one. I used white grosgrain ribbon with a scrap of red I had for the bow.

Today hubby and I both have the day off so who knows what we'll do. It is so nice to have time together just us.

Jumbo Snow Wheel

Last night I made a one sheet wonder of sorts with the jumbo wheel, Snow. I wheeled a sheet of glossy white card stock with basic grey ink. I had in mind to use grey and sky blue. It is a bit hard to see but I embossed 2 different snowflakes over the words using clear EP for a resist technique. I used my brayer with the rubber attachment to cover the sheet in sky blue ink. Once it dried I wiped it with a cloth to remove the ink from the embossing. I cut several pieces to use as a bottom panel, layering it with basic grey. It needed some color so for each card I added one accent color. The mug is a Whipper Snapper stamp, I love it's size. One mug is done with wild wasabi and sky blue and the other with purely pomegranate and sky blue. I used Stardust Stickles on the steam for added fun. The snowman is from the SU hostess set Perfect Presentation. I used the Stickles on the falling snow to add sparkle on that card. The sentiment is from PaperTrey's Holiday Wishes set.

If you click on the photo you can get a closer look at all the details. I loved doing the OSW with the wheel and resist embossing. This is a great way to get a set of cards done for a gift.

Enjoy your day!

Sidekick Trio

I have piles of card stock pieces laying around from various classes and SAS. I wish I had the discipline to finish up the cards after the class but I don't. I usually am tired of it by then so I set the pieces aside until I have energy to go back to them. If I ever get organized better I could plan one of those left over classes I read about. Instead, I used some of the pieces to make up a series of 3 cards using the hostess set, Sidekick sayings.
They are pretty straight forward. I used Cuttlebug folders on two of them.

The leaves on the first one are stamped and cut out of river rock as well as put on dimensionals. The brads are American Crafts and the ivory color is a good match to the river rock.

The second card has a scallop edge made with the corner rounder punch. The center of the flower is a gold Liquid Pearl.

The third one has tiny gems as ornaments and is very sparkly IRL.

Thanks for visiting!

Mix, Mingle & Be Merry!

Last night's SAS was so fun! It is so good to be with friends who I don't get to see much anymore.

Here is another of one of the cards we did. Every year this stamp makes it into at least one SAS design. How can you resist these cute guys?? There are snowflakes in white craft ink on the bashful blue panel. Part of the fun is coloring in all the details. Everyone puts their own touch on their card. No two are usually alike. The tag stamp is from the hostess set Perfect Presentation.

Thanks for stopping by!

S'more Man

This S'more man idea is so cute but I can not take credit for it. I have seen it in several places, especially on SCS, so I have no idea where it all started. We are making this version at tonight's SAS. The blue bayou base is embossed with the Cuttlebug snowflake folder and adds so much to a simple idea. It uses a slew of punches...1 1/4", 1 3/8" squares, word window, corner rounder and large oval. The face and hands are stamps from the Cold Play set. To give him that toasty look, I sponged creamy caramel around the edges. The marshmallows are up on dimensionals. This card makes me smile! And hungry, LOL!!

Keepin' it short today!
Blessings on your day!

Class Samples

These are the class samples for tonight. Since all of the ladies who come are new stampers things need to be more on the simple side. The trick is to make them simple without looking simple. Tonight we are learning some basic water coloring techniques and using Liquid Applique. The center sample is a 2 year planner that we are covering. I loved the look of not quite navy stamped onto sage shadow with the large swirl in Baroque Motifs.

TIP: It is so easy to forget that you can stamp without using a neutral card stock. Try different inks on different card stocks. The Baroque Motifs set is especially great for this.

I found the 2 year planners at the Dollar Tree. You can find planners for a dollar in lots of places these days but I prefer the ones from the Dollar Tree. Why?? For the last 3 years they have carried ones made by the Day Spring company and I find the quality of them higher than others. Some of you may recognize the Day Spring name because they make cards that often sell in Christian book stores. These come with scriptures at the top of every page so for my church ladies it makes a great choice.

I am on a mission today for one of my Dirty Dozen projects, I hope it works like I vision it in my mind!!

Have a great day!

It's Monday!

Life is good! Here are a few reasons why...

Today is sunny and high of 76 degrees--remarkable for Upstate New York in the middle of October.

The Red Sox are going to the World Series, Yeah Baby!!

I have the day off!

Look at what I got yesterday. Pastor Bill's wife and I were both given a bouquet of roses in church for Pastor Appreciation month. That was a first for me. What a special thought and gesture!

I also have a card to post. On Thursday I have a Christmas Stamp a Stack. This is one of the designs that was REJECTED! It would require me cutting 120 circles with my Creative Memories circle cutter and after coming to my senses I thought better of that idea. Plus I am not sure I am won over by the design, it's a bit dark. But I thought I would post it anyway.

Have a great day!

Snappy Pumpkins

You probably thought I wasn't going to post anything today, didn't you?? My day started off running so I am just now getting around to stamping and posting. First thing this morning, I tried out yet another new hairdresser. This is another one of those pains about moving. I met this lady at one of my stamping classes I started at church. She is very nice and I think will work with me on getting my hair back to how it was. It is amazing how two haircuts can get your hair so off track! Then Greg and I were off to talk kitchens with a guy who came last week to measure our space. It's exciting and depressing all at once! Exciting because it will look so great and meet our needs so much better. Depressing, because even though it is a reasonable amount for what we are getting, we have no idea how to pay for it. God will make a way.

I bought this cute Whipper Snapper stamp at my favorite new stamp store and finally inked it up today. I love the happy faces on these pumpkins. I stamped it onto watercolor paper and colored it in with a combination of watercolor crayons and ink. It is another fun image to watercolor. It doesn't leave much room for much else on the card so I layered it with chocolate chip and stamped the really rust card base with one of the leaves from the Fall Whimsy set. I added some of the new satin trimmed ribbon from Amuse and finished it off with a copper leaf brad.
Greg's folks are coming for a visit tomorrow so I am not sure what the day holds.
Have a great night!

Friend-Ship

Some days are great stamping days, the ideas flow and it all seems to come so much easier. I wish I knew the formula for recreating those days!

I pulled out the hostess level 1 scrap kit, Creative License, and started my design process from there. I used the textured card stock from the kit and drew the colors from the paper. I was in the mood to watercolor so Boatloads of Love seemed a good fit. I stamped on watercolor paper and used the same ink colors as are in the paper: blue bayou, soft sky, pumpkin pie and wild wasabi. I think that makes 3 days in a row with my not-so-favorite wasabi! I first wet the paper and then added ink, that way it spread more easily. After it had dried I added the darker tones with more ink and a drier brush. The life rings are colored with a white gel pen to make them stick out more and the anchor is colored with a silver pen. I also stamped the clouds a second time, cut them out and mounted them onto dimensionals. I did the scalloped edge using the corner punch and added orange grosgrain ribbon for interest. This image is so fun to color and I like that the colors in the paper made my choices straight forward.

Some of you may remember several months ago that I put out a request for donations of stamps for my friend Karen to take to Romania. She and her family are there serving as missionaries for one year. They also have one of our former youth group teens, Melanie, along to help with the kids and do her own mission work. I thought you may want to take a peek at their blog and read about their time in Romania. I find it so fascinating and encouraging! Here is the link for the Hopkins Family.

Blessings on your day!

What's Kickin'?

So Bronc Buster has sat unused for weeks on my shelf. It lends itself to more masculine cards, another struggle for me. My jumbo eyelets sat unused as well. I felt a challenge coming on!!


Keep it simple is my theme for this card, don't ruin it with ribbon or other girly embellishments, LOL! For some of us a card that seems so simple can actually be very difficult. Somehow it seems so unimpressive after you work on layers, techniques, embellishments, ect.

One thing that really helps a simple card is designer paper, it adds so much for so little effort. Here I used the Apple Cider paper from the mini catalog. It dictated the color choice making that process easy as well. I have always liked really rust even though it doesn't get a lot of play time. The main image is stamped in chocolate chip on river rock...now there is a color I am lovin' and using a ton!! The spice on the card comes from the jumbo eyelet and brads. Men like hardware and these jumbo eyelets fit that bill.

Thanks for stopping in!

Yummy Winter Wishes

I loved the tins that Paper Trey debuted last month and just had to order my share. We actually made this at host club last night. I can imagine using them to package homemade fudge and caramels at Christmas time. More yummers!!

Wild Wasabi is not my favorite color, I am trying to use it more so maybe I will like it more. I like it here paired with soft sky, it looks fresh with the silver tin. I wheeled half of my labels with the snowflake wheel/soft sky and the other half I carefully stamped with the winter wishes stamp from Labelicious using wild wasabi. The fit is so close it almost demands a Stamp a ma Jig but I managed to do without. For the belt I got out my much neglected crimper. I cut a strip of wild wasabi 1 1/2" by 11", crimped it and attached it with sticky strip. It is not attached to the tin so it can be easily removed without breaking the belt. I punched out the label with the designer label punch and adhered a small half pearl from the Pretties kit to the center. A small glue dot fits perfectly behind the half pearl! I also used the scallop punch with soft sky and white grosgrain ribbon.

I can see teacher and co-worker gifts in my future!

Blessings on your day, thanks for visiting my little corner of cyberworld.

Acetate Card

Sorry I fell off the blog planet for awhile!! I made an intentional decision to concentrate on some other things that needed to get done but I still felt guilty leaving you hanging!!
Today I am once again off the Rochester for the day. My host club meeting is tonight and I am excited. I have a full day planned and stamping with the girls is icing on the cake.
I have had an acetate card on my list for a long time and finally got around to making one.
I used the new set, Snow Burst, on the acetate using white Stazon ink. It creates such a fun look, like you are looking out a window. There are 2 panels/layers of card stock on this card. The sentiment from Season of Joy is stamped on white and layered onto soft sky before I adhered it to the front of the card. I cut the blue bayou layer a half inch bigger to give it a thicker frame and adhered that to the inside front cover. The back has a layer of white card stock on the inside and then a frame of purely pomegranate on the back. When the card is closed you also see the pomegranate frame through the front. The "o" in joy is stamped in pomegranate and popped onto a dimensional. The pomegranate stitched ribbon finishes it off.
What an unusual card to get in the mail, I think it would really make someones day! And for people like me who don't know what to write in a card, the limited writing space is perfect!

Today is the opening of the Dirty Dozen gallery. Most of the stamping I did these last few weeks was for the gallery. The theme is Autumn Splendor and there are indeed many splendid ideas inside the gallery!! I hope you like!

Blessings on your day! I will be back tomorrow for sure, the post is ready to go even!

Simple Jacked Up!

So, yesterdays post was a simple masked/reverse masked card. Today's card is that idea stepped up a bit.



I did the same thing with my template but this time the oval uses groovy guava and purely pomegranate on the inside and river rock on the outside. Again I used very vanilla as my base card stock. I stamped the large butterfly from the Garden Whimsey set in black. I stamped it a second time in groovy guava and rolled the edges in pomegranate onto a scrap. I cut the wings only from the second one and mounted them over the black butterfly with dimensionals. The swirl trail and small flowers are from the Priceless stamp set. This detail is lost in the photo but I used a black glaze pen to go over the dots on the butterfly wings, his body and the swirl trail. In person the glaze pen ink dries slightly raised so it shines ever so slightly and feels embossed when you run your fingers over it. Such a small touch adds so much! This time I layered with black card stock and then onto pomegranate. Four black brads anchor the corners. I decided against a sentiment for now.



Maybe tomorrow I will move on from this template, maybe not!!

Simple Sunday

Sunday often feels like the end of the week for us. Because church takes up a large part of our day, Sunday afternoons are usually reserved for down time. Hubby spent his down time on the sofa watching football and I went to create.

I had a template on my counter that we used at Thursday's stamp a stack. It called my name so I picked it up. What resulted was this simple card that looks like it took more than it did. Perfect for a Sunday!

Originally we used the oval hole so I started with that, sponging some more mustard ink over the entire space. Then I sponged some pumpkin pie ink around the outer edge and finally, I sponged some really rust along the edges. I dragged my sponge from the template onto my paper which gave it a dark halo look on the outer edge. Then I took the oval part out of the trash since I originally hadn't seen a use for it, LOL!! I covered up my work with the oval and sponged mellow moss and always artichoke ink in an outward motion all around the oval. It really gives the illusion of layers and depth. I stamped one of the stamps and one of the sentiments from Garden Silhouette using basic brown ink. I added a little life to the image with some fruit punch Stickles. The image is done on very vanilla and matted with really rust and kraft card stock. I don't think it even needs ribbon! Although I didn't time myself this card can easily be done in under 10 minutes.

Tip: create templates from acetate (transparencies). Then they will be reusable, washable and best of all clear. The fact that they are clear makes it easier to center onto your project. Templates can be created in many different ways, this one I made using a Creative Memories oval cutter. You can use punches, trace objects, computer generate something and more.

Enjoy your day and thanks for visiting!

Holy Family

Here is one of the cards we are doing tonight at the SAS. The main image is embossed with gold EP and colored with watercolor crayons onto shimmer paper. Coloring with the crayons is much easier and quicker than using ink and for this card I like the more subtle colors it gives. The mellow moss card base is stamped with the Tres Chic background. There is a strip of gold card stock under the burgundy ribbon to accent the gold EP.

Today is my loooong day/night. I am looking forward to seeing my stamping friends again.

Blessings on your day!

Snow Time...

Not really, we have been having a fantastic stretch of weather this last week, but the snow is coming I'm sure.

It's not too soon to think ahead for Christmas cards though. I love this little stamp set, the images are so cute! I used soft sky to form the base of the pocket card. The bottom panel is blue bayou that is wheeled in white craft ink with the new Snow jumbo wheel. I used real red as an accent color and it really makes the card pop. The top tab is stapled in place. The insert and the snowman have soft sky snowflakes (say that 3x's fast!) on them. For the closure I punched 2 holes and tied it off with white grosgrain ribbon.

It's a happy card I think!

Off to work this morning, so I am keeping it short.