IHP July Design Team Challenge

It’s time again for the i {heart} papers Design Team Challenge. This month we were challenged to use some of the 12x12 papers that Kate has in stock (which are ALL on sale, by the way). I decided to use some of the Jillibean Soup paper called White Macaroni.

I used Kimberly Crawford’s new sets, Cake Shoppe and Cake Shoppe, Too, and paper-pieced the cake out of the paper. I also covered my white card base with it. I used some lace trim from my stash which, sadly, Kate has no more of, to decorate the cake. Then I realized that I could make this card fit the Curtain Call Color Challenge by adding some greens! I decided not to add a greeting to the card so that it could be used for either a birthday or a wedding.

Go check out what the rest of the design team did with Kate’s 12x12 papers, and get inspired to go shopping and take advantage of the deeply reduced prices!

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

Have a great day!

How is it possible?

Last week my youngest child turned 30. I think it was more traumatic for me than it was for her! She flew off to South Beach to celebrate with friends, while I sat here and pondered how this could possibly be. 30 used to be old —when I was a teenager we believed that we could not trust anyone over 30. But it doesn’t seem old any more! Like anything else in life, it’s all relative. I certainly don’t feel old enough to have 3 children over 30. I think I’ll just wait here and let them catch up to me!

Anyhow, this is the card I made for my amazing daughter, Annisa. It’s as sparkly and classy as she is.

It was hard to get a good picture of all the sparkle on this card. The ribbon is shimmery, the cocktail is made out of rhinestones, and the chipboard numbers (found them in my stash) are colored with a Copic marker and coated in glitter.

What I used:
Stamps: PTI Star Prints
Ink: Memento black
Paper: GCD Floral Garden
Other: Zva bling, Lime Glimmer Ribbon, Scalloped Oval Nestabilities, SU! border punch

Not to go all mushy on you all, but feel truly blessed to have such phenomenal children and often wonder how I got so lucky! Life is good.

Happy Birthday Kate!!!

You might (or might not) have noticed that I haven’t been posting much lately. Weird thing – I don’t know if it’s the oppressive heat and humidity we’ve been having, or just my own kind of malaise, but I’ve been in a real creative slump for the last few weeks. Somehow, though, I managed to dredge up enough inspiration to make my wonderful friend Kate (of i {heart} papers fame) a birthday card.

I really wanted to use some of this bold, beautiful paper from my stash. It’s from the s.e.i. Black Orchid collection, but I see that Kate only has a few sheets of a different pattern from the collection left in the store. PTI’s Hawaiian Shores paper is a good match for the turquoise, and I’m pretty sure that if I had any of their Chartreuse paper it would have been good. But I don’t. So I took a piece of shimmery white cardstock that was laying nearby and colored it with my YG23 Copic marker and declared it a match. The greeting is also stamped on that shimmery cardstock.

I’m really behind on birthday cards. I owe a lot of people cards, but especially my brother. Every year I make a special card for him with a guitar theme because, well, he’s a gifted musician who plays the electric guitar, and I can’t think of anything that symbolizes him better. And now it just doesn’t seem right to send him a birthday card that’s not a guitar. But this year I sat for literally hours trying to come up with something and ended up with NOTHING. I feel awful about it. Why do we put this kind of pressure on ourselves? Am I the only one who does this? I’m quite sure he’d be happy with anything I sent. I’m still trying to come up with something to send him belatedly.

Oh, I did make one other birthday card for someone special. I made it before the slump hit, but didn’t post it yet. Stay tuned.

Why don’t you hop over to Kate’s blog and wish her a happy birthday!

A handy tip for using digital stamps…

This sweet and simple card using one of the adorable Chicken Girl Design images was another one that Paper Crafts did not pick up in the last pub call, so I can share it with you now.

One of the things I love about digital stamps is that you can manipulate them. You can make them bigger or smaller, and you can also move things around if you want to. The sentiment in this digi-stamp is actually below the image. I moved it to the side with a sweet little trick that doesn’t require any fancy image editing software. In a MS Word document, I placed the stamp on the page twice. On one, I used the Crop tool to eliminate the words, and on the other I cropped out the image. Then I just moved the words next to the remaining image.

I colored it with Copic markers picked to coordinate with the lovely DeLovely paper.

SALE ALERT!!!  SALE ALERT!!!  SALE ALERT!!!
This image, as well as all of the other Chicken Girl Design stamps are available exclusively at i {heart} papers, and you should head over there NOW because Kate has put almost 800 items on sale. Seriously, I’m talking about some DEEP discounts, including almost all of the stamps and 12”x12” papers!!! If you’re looking for bargains, head over there while the gettin’s good.

Hope you all enjoy the long weekend coming up!