Happy News!

Don't you just love happy news? A little while back I found out that I won Stampin Up's July Art Contest in the Flutter by Butterfly category! I was so excited. :-) Not only did I get to choose any 3 stamp sets from the catalog, my project is published in Stampin Success--the monthly magazine for demonstrators. Since the magazine went online today, I thought I would share my project with you!

I actually made this project quite some time ago--shortly after I made this butterfly bag. As you can see the bag grew a little bit. :-) I wanted to create a bag that was made entirely of Top Note Die cuts, and this is what I came up with. All of the brown you see on the bag (handles, inside, butterfly) all use the faux suede technique. There is also a pocket on the inside.

Note: I'm creating a tutorial for the bag that will be posted soon.

Ink: Chocolate Chip marker (for stitching detail)

Paper: Chocolate Chip, Pink Pirouette, Bella Birds DP, White Vellum paper

Accessories: Chocolate Chip corduroy buttons, Pretties Kit, dimensionals, Big Shot, Beautiful Butterflies die, Top Note die, thread

Making a Comeback. . . .

Hello again! Well, we finally made it to Texas. :-) We've been here for about a week and a half now, and our house is mostly unpacked. Unfortunately my stamps are all still in their boxes, but hopefully not for too much longer!

Anyway, I thought I would try to start posting again. . . . I did manage to snap a few pictures of some projects before I left LA, so I have a few things to show you until I actually get stamping again. This project shows off several new products found in the Occasions Mini Catalog.

First, don't you just love this little matchbox? It is the new Matchbox Bigx Die for the Big Shot that you can find on page 16 of the Occasions Mini Catalog. I love being able to roll my paper through the Big Shot and having it come out the other end all cut, scored, and ready to fold. :-)

The bottom of the box uses Baja Breeze textured paper, and for the top I used the new Medium Window Sheets (ie acetate) from the Mini Catalog. The ribbon is the new 5/8" Satin Ribbon,and the tag is stamped with the new Matchbox Messages stamp set that coordinates with the Matchbox Die. Oh, and the chocolates were wrapped with the new Walk in the Park Designer Series Paper.

Below you can see the what the boxes look like 'closed', as well as a Kiwi Kiss version of the matchbox.

Stamps: Matchbox Messages
Ink: Baja Breeze, Kiwi Kiss, Pretty in Pink marker
Paper: Baja Breeze Textured Paper, Kiwi Kiss Textured Paper, Medium Window Sheets, Whisper White, Walk in the Park DSP
Accessories: 5/8" White Satin Ribbon, linen thread, 1" circle punch, 1 1/4" circle punch, 1/16" circle punch, Nuggets chocolates, dimensionals

Suede Ovals

Today I have a quick card to show you using some of the new product from the Occasions Mini Catalog. I'm very excited about the new Mini Catalog as there are a lot of fun new products! Even better, during the month of April, if you purchase $40 of merchandise from the Mini Catalog, you can choose one of the 'Under $10' items from the catalog for free! See the flyer HERE.

I started this card by stamping with Basic Gray ink using the new set Oval All. After punching out with the Large Oval Punch, I used a Cameo Coral marker to color the butterfly and then added Crystal Effects and Dazzling Diamonds Glitter. I used the new Scallop Oval Punch to layer the Cameo Coral scalloped oval. The oval is popped up on dimensionals.

The Baja Breeze layer shows the Faux Suede technique. The faux suede technique is actually pretty easy to do . . . . I'll explain it quickly and hope that it makes sense! Take the strip of paper (here the Baja Breeze) and a bone folder. Use the bone folder to pull it along the paper as if you were curling ribbon. "Curl" the paper every which way. The idea is that you are breaking down the fibers in the paper. Then go to a corner of the paper and carefully peel the paper apart into two halves lengthwise--as if you are peeling a sticker from the backing. So the faux suede part is actually just the inside of the paper. You'll have to try it to see how simple it really is. :-) It is nice because it adds a soft feel to the project.

To finish the card I used the Mat Pack to add the row of paper piercing. Finished card size is 4 1/4" by 4 1/4".

Have a great weekend!

Stamps: Oval All

Ink: Basic Gray, Cameo Coral marker

Paper: Basic Gray, Cameo Coral, Baja Breeze, Whisper White

Accessories: Scallop Oval Punch, Large Oval Punch, Mat Pack, Paper Piercer, Bone Folder, Crystal Effects, Dazzling Diamonds, dimensionals

Textured Congrats

Today I have another simple Sale-A-Bration project to show. This card uses a stamp from the set Congrats--which is one of the sets you can earn for free during Sale-A-Bration. This is also a project we made last week at Technique Club.

I started by inking the 'congratulations' stamp with Kiwi Kiss ink, and then before I stamped I took my Basic Black marker and colored the dots along the bottom. Then I stamped on Whisper White card stock. I used my new texturz plates for the Big Shot to get the dry embossed texture on the Kiwi Kiss layer. Very fun! I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot more projects with the texturz plates. :-)

Finished card size is 3" by 6".

Stamps: Congrats

Ink: Kiwi Kiss, Basic Black marker

Paper: Kiwi Kiss, Basic Black, Whisper White

Accessories: 1/4" Basic Black grosgrain ribbon, Stampin Up Background texturz plates (diamonds), Big Shot

Breezy Polka Dots

Do you like free stamps? :-) The stamp set (Polka Dot Punches) featured in the card above is one of the products you can earn for FREE during Stampin Up's Sale-A-Bration promotion. The promotion is already underway, but you still have until the end of March to take advantage. You can earn a free Sale-A-Bration product with each $50 purchase! Click HERE to see the brochure.

This is a card that we made at a workshop last night. I saw THIS adorable card by Kylie over on Splitcoaststampers and knew that I wanted to do my own version.

I stamped the flower image on Cameo Coral and then again on Kiwi Kiss card stock and punched both out with the 5-petal Flower Punch. The Kiwi Kiss flower I cut into pieces so that it could become the leaves. The Chocolate Chip brad is one of the new 5/16" jumbo brads. The edge of the Cameo Coral layer was distressed using the Cutter Kit. The flower and the Cameo Coral layer are up on dimensionals.

Stamps: Polka Dot Punches, Thank You Kindly

Ink: Chocolate Chip

Paper: Baja Breeze, Cameo Coral, Kiwi Kiss, Very Vanilla

Accessories: 5/16" Chocolate Chip Jumbo Brad, 5-Petal Flower Punch, 1/8" circle punch, Cutter Kit, dimensionals

New Catalog!

The new Spring-Summer 2009 Idea Book and Catalog is here! Lot of gorgeous new stamp sets, accessories, and tools! To see the new catalog online, click HERE, or to browse the new products, click HERE.

One of the new sets from the catalog is called Sweet Stems. I've already had a chance to play with this set, and I'm loving it! This card is what I made for my floor swaps at Leadership. I'll admit that I was in a little of a rush to get all my swaps done beforeI left (you can't imagine me procrastinating can you!!), so to speed up the process I actually took an old idea of mine and just changed it up a bit.

So HERE is a card I made over two years ago (my very first card I posted on Splitcoaststampers!), and then below is the 'updated' version. Hopefully I've improved a bit in my stamping over the years! At the very least I've learned to love dimensionals. ;-)

Note: The black for the flowers and the word are embossed to give the card an extra little 'bling'. A little trick I learned a while ago, is to use Black Craft ink and then emboss with clear embossing powder (EP)--MUCH easier to use than black EP! Stray specks of clear EP just don't show as much as stray specks of black EP.

Stamps: Sweet Stems, Wonderful Favorites

Ink: Basic Black Craft, Rose Red Kiwi Kiss

Paper: Rose Red, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White

Accessories: Clear EP, Blender Pens, 1/4" Whisper White grosgrain ribbon, dimensionals, cutter kit, heat tool, embossing buddy

I also thought I would show another fun picture. One of the reasons I've been so quiet lately is that I was very fortunate to attend Stampin Up's Leadership Conference in Orlando, Florida earlier this month. It was a wonderful experience! Among the many highlights was being able to meet Shelli (CEO and co-founder of Stampin Up). Shelli was truly one of the kindest, most sincere, down-to-earth people I think I've ever meet. Also very photogenic! It was truely a pleasure to meet her!

Happy Halloween Frankie!

I just love all of the Frankenstein cards that everyone has been making! I saw and adorable one by Karen over at Karen's Korner, and then saw some more over at Splitcoaststampers that used the Top Note Die and the Big Shot. So, I of course had to make one too. :-)

I took a couple pictures of the Big Shot as I was making the card. The first one shows how you layer the Cutting Pad, then the Die, and then the paper. On top you put another Cutting Pad and then you are ready to roll it through the Big Shot.

For this project, I wanted the Frankie face (Kiwi Kiss paper) to be the card base as well. So, I cut and scored my card stock and put the folded edge just below the top part of the die so that the edge wouldn't cut. (Can you see that in the picture? If not, click on the picture to see a larger version.) The last picture shows the base after it goes through the Big Shot and before I added the face.

The face was mostly just made with punches. The mouth is free handed, and the highlight on the eyes were added with a white gel pen. Feeling ready for Halloween now? :-)

Stamps: All Holidays (to stamp 'Happy Halloween' inside)

Ink: Kiwi Kiss (to sponge around edges)

Paper: Kiwi Kiss, Lovely Lilac, Whisper White, Basic Black

Accessories: 1" Circle Punch, 1/2" Circle Punch, Round Tab Punch, Big Shot, Top Note Bigz Die, sponge, White Gel Pen, Basic Black marker

Scary Pillows!

I can't believe Halloween is almost here! I've been having fun playing with my new Halloween set from the Holiday Mini Catalog--Eat, Drink & Be Scary. I loved the samples shown in the Mini Catalog with this set, so I used those to inspire me and went from there. You can see what I came up with. These are two of the projects that we will be making this month at the non-profit class that I teach at my church.

For the top pillow box, I used markers to color directly on the stamp, stamped, then punched out with the Wide Oval Punch. I cut the black layer with the Coluzzle Cutting System. Oh, and since I wanted to give the pumpkin a little more dimension--but I didn't want to actually cut it out :-)--I used the 3/4" circle punch. It was pretty close to the right size--close enough anyway! Also, for the ribbon I put it through the hole on the first side, knotted, pulled it around to the other side of the box, through the hole, knotted again, and then trimmed.

Last time I posted some pillow box projects, I had people ask a couple questions . . . I did use the Premium Crease Pad to cut out the pillow boxes. Also, these are smaller than you may guess. If you leave them flat, you can just barely slide a gift card inside. So that gives you a rough idea of how big they are. Perfect for a little treat, rolled up money, etc. Such fun little boxes!

Stamps: Eat, Drink & Be Scary

Ink: Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie marker, Basic Black marker, Kiwi Kiss marker

Paper: Kraft, Tangerine Tango, YoYo Yellow, Lovely Lilac, Whisper White, Kiwi Kiss, Basic Black

Accessories: Big Shot, Pillow Box Die, Wide Oval Punch, 3/4" Circle Punch, Coluzzle Cutting System, Crop-A-Dile, Star Punch, Pumpkin Pie ribbon, Basic Black Ribbon, Dimensionals

Breezey Bows

It's been a little while since I've stamped anything new since I've been busy with classes and commission work, so I thought I'd do a color challenge to get myself back into it! I went over to Splitcoaststampers, and saw that the color challenge for today is Really Rust, Chocolate Chip and Baja Breeze. Great combination!

So, this is what I came up with. It ended up being a super simple card to make! I used the dotted circle stamp from Think Happy Thoughts to stamp on Very Vanilla card stock in the 3 colors for the challenge. I tore the top edge and then grabbed my 5/8" Chocolate Chip grosgrain ribbon. I wanted to do something a little unique since the rest of the card was pretty simple, so I also grabbed one of the wide clips from the Clips Assortment. I've already used a lot of the other two styles of clips (wire clip and small library clip) from the assortment, so I have a small supply of these wide clips laying around waiting to be used. I'm not sure that they were meant to be used as a bow holder, but it works, right? :-)

Anyway the 'bow' is simple and the pictures below show how I did it. I used a 7" piece of ribbon to create the bow part--just fold it back on itself twice, lay it on top of the other piece of ribbon (6") and clip them both together! How simple!

Stamps: Think Happy Thoughts

Ink: Really Rust, Chocolate Chip, Baja Breeze

Paper: Baja Breeze, Very Vanilla

Accessories: 5/8" Chocolate Chip grosgrain ribbon, Wide Clip (Clips Assortment)

A Tangerine Kiss

This is one of the cards that we made last week for my Technique Club class. The technique that we were learning is called ‘kissing’. This is a very simple technique that has a lot of possibilities. For this card, start by inking up the Paisley Background stamp. Here I used one of the gorgeous new In Colors, Tangerine Tango. Then take the solid petal from the Pick a Petal stamp set and ‘kiss’ the stamps together. Just pretend like you are using the Paisley background stamp as your stamp pad. Then stamp on your paper. Now wash the stamp and repeat to finish the other petals for the flower.

The edges of the Whisper White panels were sponged with Chocolate Chip ink and then distressed using the Cutter Kit. The sentiment came from the set Celebrate Everything. The clear button was attached with a mini glue dot.

The idea for this card came from a swap I received at convention from Jennifer Warner. I added the kissing technique, sponging and distressing, and changed from Pretty in pink to Tangerine Tango. Thanks for the inspiration Jennifer!

Stamps: Pick a Petal, Celebrate Everything, Paisley Background
Ink: Tangerine Tango, Chocolate Chip
Paper: Tangerine Tango, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White
Accessories: Clear Button, 1/4" Chocolate Chip grosgrain ribbon, Round Tab Punch, Cutter Kit
Techniques: Kissing