oh, just post already!

This is a card I did a while back for my friend Lorraine - she loaned me something, so of course I had to make her a thank you card! Thanks, Dude! :)




Stamps: Year After Year, Sincere Salutations
Ink: Basic Brown, Chocolate Chip classic pads, Versamark
Paper: Chocolate Chip, Close to Cocoa, Pumpkin Pie card stock; Watercolor paper, Prints Designer Series Papers (So Saffron)
Accessories: Watercolor Wonder Crayons (Ruby Red, Pumpkin Pie, So Saffron), Corner Rounder punch, clear embossing powder, sponges

where has the time gone?

How is it that a month always seems to pass between my posts? I really am stamping, I'm even sometimes taking pictures of my creations, I just seem to fail to write them up for some reason.
:P

Well, here's something:



Thank YOU for being patient! :)

Stamps: All About U
Ink: More Mustard, Not Quite Navy
Paper: Close to Cocoa, More Mustard, Not Quite Navy, Confetti White card stock
Accessories: Dimensionals, Spiral punch, Chocolate Chip 5/8" grosgrain ribbon

I love that spiral punch! It's great as used here, to make it almost look like you've torn a bit of paper out of a notebook to add the greeting, but did you know that you can also make custom covers for most spiral-bound notebooks? Of course it's great for Stampin' Up!'s Art Journal, but I've experimented with other notebooks and so far, they've all fit fine. It's a excellent way to make a custom notebook/journal, and you can change the look on a whim! Switch them out depending on the season, or to show off an interesting color combination.

a new twist on the corner rounder punch

This card shows a different way to use the corner rounder punch. If you're really careful, you can remove the guide that lines up the corner, and use the punch along one side to make a nice scalloped border:


It's also a rare day for me - a card made with background paper! I love this stuff, I buy a fair amount of it, but for some reason I'm just scared to use it. I've seen so many great cards using our Designer Papers that I just HAD to do something myself, and this is the result.

Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley, Wonderful Words
Ink: Old Olive Classic Stampin' Pad; Taken With Teal, Certainly Celery, So Saffron Stampin' Write Markers.
Paper: Certainly Celery, So Saffron, Whisper White, Taken With Teal card stock; Petals & Paisley Double-Sided Designer Paper
Accessories: Hodgepodge Hardware - Aged Copper, Certainly Celery 1/4" grosgrain ribbon, Corner Rounder punch, Crafter's Tool Kit

Thanks for looking!

using other ideas

This card is a demonstration of how you can get an idea for a card from a scrapbook page (or the other way around, of course).

First, open up your Fall & Winter 2007 Collection to page 125. If you don't have one, call me first and I'll get one to you, and then go to my web site and click the link for "Online Catalog" and use that for now. See the scrapbook page, with the adorable baby? Now, look at this card:




You should be able to see the similarities there - I lifted the colors and layout almost directly from the scrapbook page, but I used what I had on hand to make my own creation. I've still got the Old Olive base, but instead of the background paper on the left, I used Sahara Sand stamped with Very Vanilla craft ink to make my own background. The brown strip is the same deal - rather than the Close to Cocoa designer series paper, I used a 1" strip of Cocoa card stock and stamped polka dots in Vanilla, then the flower motif in Chocolate Chip classic ink. Rather than the photo as the main piece in the middle, I took the square stamp from the Baroque Motifs set and stamped that in Close to Cocoa on Sahara Sand card stock (this mimics the sepia toned photo), and layered it on Always Artichoke card stock. The small elements framing the center piece are simply that same square, stamped in Artichoke ink onto Old Olive card stock, and trimmed down with our fantastic Paper Snips.


Supplies:

Stamps: Baroque Motifs, Itty Bitty Backgrounds
Ink: Close to Cocoa, Always Artichoke classic pads; Very Vanilla craft pad
Paper: Old Olive, Close to Cocoa, Sahara Sand, Very Vanilla Always Artichoke card stock
Accessories: Stampin' Dimensionals

Cherish

New card with Baroque Motifs:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, Purely Pomegranate, Versamark
Paper: Purely Pomegranate, Elegant Eggplant, So Saffron
Accessories: Tag Punch, Paper Snips, Gold embossing powder, Elegant Eggplant and More Mustard ribbon, Double Circle punch, Stampin' Dimensionals

Now this is a card that I really love! When I saw the new Purely Pomegranate color for this year, I fell head over heels with it and I want to use it all of the time.

It's hard to tell in the photo, but for the motif on the tag, I stamped in pomegranate on saffron cardstock, and trimmed that out around the dots. Then I stamped the motif again in eggplant on eggplant and trimmed that out closer to the main part of the image. This way, you get a border around it in a totally different corner. I love the look of torn paper, and it's fun to use it as if you're revealing a little secret on the layer beneath, like the "cherish" that's on the lower right corner. And of course, ribbon is one of my favorite accessories to just add a little extra something to almost any card.

Colors from Stampin' Up!'s Rich Regal color family are a natural for a vintage set like this, and the eggplant and pomegranate might be my favorite color combination. At least for this week, until I see something different.

Next up will be an example of how to adapt an idea from a scrapbook page into a card. Stay tuned!

Thinking of You

Today I have 2 cards that are almost the same, just slightly tweaked colors and accessories. I hesitated to put these up, because to be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I like them. Maybe you won't either, or maybe you will. In any case, at least I'm stamping, and maybe I can learn from mistakes. Feel free to tell me what you think about them, what you do and don't like, what I might tweak to make 'em better.

Card #1:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs (love this new stamp set), Sincere Salutations
Ink: Handsome Hunter classic pad, Very Vanilla craft pad
Paper: Handsome Hunter, Blush Blossom, Elegant Eggplant card stock
Accessories: embossing powder, paper snips, dimensionals

Technique: embossing. I just inked up the stamp with vanilla ink, poured embossing powder over it, ran heat tool over that to melt the EP, let it cool (important step - stamping injuries can be surprisingly painful!), then trimmed the edges with the paper snips. Those little scissors are great, because you can trim so closely to edges and they're super-sharp and cut all the way to the tips.


Card #2:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs, Sincere Salutations
Ink: Handsome Hunter, Sage Shadow, Perfect Plum classic pads
Paper: Handsome Hunter, Blush Blossom, Perfect Plum, Sage Shadow card stock
Accessories: Metal Edged Tags - square, Crystal Effects, paper snips, dimensionals


No interesting technique on this one, but I did remove the paper from the middle of the Metal-Edged tag, then cut a square of Blush Blossom cardstock and mounted it underneath the tag with a little Crystal Effects (this stuff is so versatile). The trick to getting the paper out of the tag is to cut a big X through the middle of it. Once you pull out the first triangle, the rest are easier to remove, and then you can customize the paper. It's an easy way to give something a little extra highlight on your work, but without letting the background show through - if I'd just taken out the paper and not replaced it, you'd see the background on the main layer. Plus, the edge of the tag by itself would be harder to mount, because how do you attach such a thin piece of metal to the paper so it's popped up, but without your adhesive showing?

Actually, there is a little trick to these cards - on most of my cards, the largest layer is actually the card "base" where I'd eventually write something. If this were a "normal" card, that would be the Handsome Hunter layer, but to write on that, you HAVE to have a gel pen or something similar, or else you won't be able to read the words. For this card, I cut a piece of Handsome Hunter into a 5.5" x 4.25" rectangle - a quarter sheet of cardstock. Then I cut the Blush Blossom cardstock so that it was 5.25" x 8", folded it in half, then mounted that on the Handsome Hunter. Now when you go to open the card, you're not opening a Handsome Hunter card, you're opening a Blush Blossom one, and you can use almost any pen to write on that!

Polka Dots & Paisley

I made this card a couple of months ago, but apparently never posted it. Whoops!




Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley
Ink: Pretty In Pink, Certainly Celery, Regal Rose
Paper: Pretty In Pink, Certainly Celery, Whisper White
Accessories: Hodgepodge Hardware - Aged Copper, Certainly Celery ribbon, Mini Glue Dots, Stampin' Dimensionals


I love to add ribbon to cards, and the Mini Glue Dots are a great way to add a little bit of it anywhere. Just tie a simple knot in the ribbon, press it to the glue dot, then stick it on the card wherever you like. This accessory really helps odd-shaped or textured pieces like a ribbon stay on a card, and ribbon is an easy and inexpensive choice for jazzing up your work.

Happy Birthday!

This features the new "Year After Year" stamp set - I love sets like this that contain multiple images where you can swap them out with the same template if you need a quick card. Here's an example:




Stamps: Year After Year, It's Your Birthday, Itty Bitty Backgrounds
Ink: Basic Black classic pad; Real Red, Brilliant Blue, Glorious Green, Yoyo Yellow, Only Orange markers
Paper: Basic Black, Whisper White, Yoyo Yellow
Acessories: Circle Rhinestone Brads - Fire; square punch, Dimensionals

Fairly easy card, and really, if you just change the greeting and the image used, you've got a whole new card. That set has 8 to choose from - the gift above, a mortarboard (grads), flowers (friendly pick-me-up, just a note, etc.), a tree (holidays), a cake (birthday or wedding), heart (lovelovelove, Valentine), elephant (welcome new baby, kid's birthday), and pumpkin (fall, Halloween). The tree would be great with lots of rhinestone brads on there - I love this new accessory!

All About U - blue

Hey look - two cards with the same set, but I actually changed the layout!




Stamps: All About U
Ink: Taken With Teal**, Brilliant Blue classic pads; White craft pad
Paper: So Saffron, Taken With Teal, Brilliant Blue, Whisper White
Accessories: Dimensionals, Tag Corner Punch, Horizontal Slot Punch, sponges

** The U is stamped in Taken With Teal, and that pad had suffered the same fate as the Orchid Opulence pad. The color used to be almost a dead ringer for Not Quite Navy, before I "updated" the color with a reinker. It's much more teal now.

All About U - orchid

The scoop with this card is that I almost never used my Orchid Opulence ink pad. Why? Because the color was off. Way off. Almost neon off.

This sort of shows it:




Look really closely at the "U" image. I actually stamped that in Orchid Opulence, which is also the color of the base of the card. They don't look anything alike, do they? Admittedly, there's not much of the original image left, as I've used Crystal Effects all over that U, which changed the color a bit, but look around the edges. You'll see what I mean. It should match the "love" that's in the tag (I used a marker for that stamp), but it's pretty easy to tell that they're not even close.

At any rate, I got a reinker, and inked the heck out of that pad, and now it's much closer to the card stock and I'm a happier stamper. I will definitely be using this ink color more often now.

Stamps: All About U
Ink: Orchid Opulence
Paper: Orchid Opulence, Pixie Pink, Whisper White
Accessories: Metal Edge Tags (gold) - sadly discontinued now.

Heartfelt Thanks - eggplant

Essentially the same card as the last one, only with Elegant Eggplant as the color I started with (hey, did anyone notice that I made a card WITHOUT PURPLE?).

Stamps: Heartfelt Thanks
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, Summer Sun, Always Artichoke, Mellow Moss
Paper: Always Artichoke, Elegant Eggplant, Very Vanilla
Accessories: Dimensionals.

You knew I couldn't make a card without Dimensionals, at least.

Heartfelt Thanks - teal

I've been using this set so much, in no small part because it's one of the very few I have that isn't retired. *sigh*



Stamps: Heartfelt Thanks
Ink: Taken With Teal, Cameo Coral, Ruby Red, Certainly Celery
Paper: Taken With Teal, Cameo Coral, Whisper White
Accessories: metallic gold cord, gold organdy ribbon, Hodgepodge Hardware - aged copper, sponges

Heartfelt Thanks

This ties in with my other obsession of late, knitting. The owner of Mosaic Yarn Shop in Blacksburg, VA, came up with the idea of knitting blankets for the victims of the recent shootings at Virginia Tech. I knitted some squares for it, collected a few from some other knitters, and sent them along. Of course I had to send a thank you card to her for collecting the squares and organizing everything. This is the card I made:



Details:
stamps: Heartfelt Thanks
ink: Pumpkin Pie, Bravo Burgundy, Old Olive, Mellow Moss
paper: Pumpkin Pie, Bravo Burgundy, Old Olive, Very Vanilla
accessories: neutral buttons (color applied from ink pad, and distressed with a sanding block), linen thread, natural hemp (colored with burgundy pad)

no really

I'm going to post something here soon. I've actually made some cards, I just need to document them. I'll get to it soon, I promise.

For, you know, the 2 or 3 people reading this. Heh.