bklynstamper

IHP DT Inspiration Challenge

2012-01-17T06:00:00.000-05:00

This month’s i {heart} papers Design Team Challenge was so much fun! Our challenge-meister, Deb Felts, gave us some gorgeous pictures of living spaces to inspire us in our creations. First I’ll show you the inspiration photo I chose:

I love pink (big shocker, I know), and I just loved the way this bold pink played off the neutrals and the brightness of the sunlit room. I also wanted to pick up the elegant feel of the room. So this is what I came up with for my card:I used stamps from the LilyBee Design set Head Over Heels. It’s such a beautiful, elegant set. The motif is stamped on white cardstock using Desert Sand ink, which is in the Memento Sorbet Scoops Dewdrops assortment that Kate sells in the store. The LOVE is stamped with Memento Rich Cocoa. I punched out some hearts and popped them up with some Sticky Thumb dimensional dots. I backed it with the same pink (Hibiscus) cardstock and mounted the whole thing on a Kraft card.

TIP: to save paper, I punched the hearts out of the pink layer that’s behind the main panel, since I knew it wouldn’t show.

I love how this card came out! I think I need to do more inspiration challenges. I had a hard time choosing which of the beautiful rooms to pick; I can’t wait to see which photos Kate and the rest of the IHP Design Team picked to work with, and what they did with them.

Deb

Tracy

We’d love it if you’d like to play along with this Inspiration Challenge. Just post your project into the gallery at Splitcoast Stampers or Papercraft Planet and use the keyword “ihp0112” so we can find it.

Have a wonderful day!

How did I NOT post these?!!!

2012-01-02T20:09:00.001-05:00

I was looking through my camera, trying to delete stuff and make room for photos of my upcoming trip, when I found pictures of cards that I had somehow never posted! Well, this being a new year and a time for fresh starts, I figured it was as good a time as any to catch up on posting last year’s cards!

Forgive me if I don’t go into detail – some of these were made a LONG time ago! Also, for the same reason, please forgive me if I can’t remember whose work inspired me enough to CASE it, or which sketch challenge, if any, I used at the time.

This one is the most recent of the batch. My niece Hannah turned 18 last month (how did that happen?), and this was her card.

OK, I’m just gonna start putting them up here. If you have any questions about what I used, just leave me a comment and I’ll answer if I can.

There. I think those are all the ones that are worth sharing. I do have my share of duds, you know. And it is quite possible that some cards actually got mailed/given (gasp!) without my having taken a picture of them first.

If you’ve made it this far through the post, please accept my most sincere thanks for sticking with my blog even though I am probably the world’s most recalcitrant (look it up) blog poster. I know I’m bad about it, and obviously all my intentions to be better haven’t done much good. So thanks. Really.

And let me take a moment to wish you the most joyful, healthy, successful (whatever that means to YOU), and fulfilling year yet. I can feel it already – 2012 is gonna be GREAT!

HUGE Sale at IHP!!!

2011-12-20T06:35:00.001-05:00

Beginning today (Dec. 20) IHP is doing an end of year inventory blow out with savings up to 75% off on some products! Hundreds of items on steep markdown including:

Unity Itty Bittys only $3.25
All other Unity sets $5-$7 (that's 75% OFF!!!)
All 6x6 pads only $3.50
All Echo Park and MME 12x12 kits 50% off
All Hero Arts sets (including die and stamp sets) 50% off
Lawn Fawn 50% off
Market Street Stamps 50% off
All My Cute Stamps 50% off
All Technique Tuesday, including Ali Edwards sets, at least 50% off
All Lifestyle Crafts nesting dies only $12
All Spellbinders Nestabilities only $12
3D Embellishments $0.50 - $2
Zva bling only $1

and much, much more! Check the sale page for more amazing deals!

Sale will run while supplies last or until New Year's Eve.

So what are you waiting for? Go shop!

Good stuff!

2011-12-11T17:46:00.001-05:00

It’s been a busy baking weekend. I know lots of my friends were busy baking holiday cookies, but my baking was for other purposes.

This afternoon we threw my daughter-in-law a virtual baby shower. She’s out in Michigan, and the rest of us, well, aren’t. So a few family and friends had gifts shipped to my son’s office so he could sneak them into the house, and we all gathered via Skype and surprised her. Gotta love modern technology! The bulk of us were at my sister’s apartment, so of course there had to be food involved! And of course I had to bake something…

You may know that my son is married to a fabulously talented (and sweet and lovely) children’s book illustrator who goes by the nickname “Chicken Girl.” They’ve been referring to the baby (due anytime in the next few weeks) as Chicken Nugget. Hence:Can you think of a more fitting goodie for this particular baby shower?

And more baking. Tomorrow is my friend/co-worker’s birthday. Something yummy is in order:
Chocolate cupcakes with a mini Reese’s cup baked into the center. Topped with the most incredible vanilla buttercream, which I swirled with some peanut butter. And in order to NOT eat the rest of the candies, I cut them in half and topped the cupcakes with them.

Now I have to mention this buttercream again. I thought I had tasted great buttercream before. Then, a week ago or so, my daughter’s sister-in-law, Morgan, posted a recipe on her blog for what she calls Fantabulous Vanilla Frosting. The blog entry is linked here, and you MUST check it out, as well as the rest of her blog. First of all, she’s insanely talented. But really, you just have to make this frosting. To. Die. For.

OK, gotta go clean up the mess. And mentally prepare myself for Monday. Ugh.

i {heart} papers and Market Street Stamps blog hop!

2011-12-06T06:00:00.002-05:00

Welcome to the i {heart} papers and Market Street Stamps combined teams blog hop! We're so excited to have you join us, and we know you're in for a real treat!

You should have arrived here from Brenda Weaver’s blog. If not, visit Kate's i {heart} papers blog to start from the beginning. You'll go from there to the blogs of our designers and finish up at the Market Street Stamps blog. If you get lost, both company blogs have the complete list of links. And make sure you read this post carefully, because there’s a discount and a GIVEAWAY involved!

about i {heart} papers:

i {heart} papers is proud that we recently celebrated our 3rd anniversary in October. We’ve grown by leaps and bounds and have not strayed from our core principle of stellar customer service with FAST and FREE shipping. You ALWAYS receive free shipping with your $50 US order/$150 CAN order with no gimmicks or restrictions like so many other companies, and orders are almost always shipped within 24 business hours. We’re thrilled to be hopping along with the MSS team today and to be carrying the MSS line of stamps. If you’ve never ordered from us before, please mention that you learned about us on this hop for a free gift with your first order! Please visit us at www.iheartpapers.com, “like” us on Facebook, (where you'll find over 1900 other IHP fans!) and follow us on Twitter (@iheartpapers). If you order by Wednesday midnight EST, all MSS sets are 15% off! Leave comments along the hop to be entered in a drawing to win one free MSS set. The more you comment, the more chances to win! You have until Wednesday at midnight...winners will be announced on the ihp blog on Friday! Enjoy the hop!

about Market Street Stamps:

Market Street Stamps, LLC, was founded in January 2010 by Angelica and Jorge Suarez, a husband and wife team who create unique stamps made from peach-tinted photopolymer, the best available on the market today! Market Street Stamps' goal is to produce durable, high quality designs that you'll turn to again and again! We are thrilled to be hopping with i {heart} papers and their incredibly talented design team today! Be sure to "like" us on Facebook for the latest releases and project ideas from our Design Team!

about my card:
The sentiment is from Essential Holiday Elegance, and I used the Flurries background stamp on both the background panel (in white) and the sentiment layer (in Aqua Mist). I stamped the sentiment layer before I removed it from the die (Nestabilities Labels 8). The background panel is tied with a piece of white herringbone glimmer ribbon and the card is adorned with a snowflake that I die-cut from a sheet of white glitter paper. I used the Dimensional Dots Assortment Pack to hold everything on (LOVE those things!).

From here, you're headed to Deb Felts’ blog. Enjoy the hop!

Remember to order your MSS from ihp before Wednesday to get the 15% discount! Thanks for your comments!

Pa-rum-pa-pum-pum

2011-11-26T20:50:00.001-05:00

This little drummer boy is just too cute!

I wanted to use a modified version of this week’s FTL #168 layout, and thought this little guy would be just the focal point. He’s part of Lawn Fawn’s aptly named Pa-rum-pa-pum-pum set, along with lots of other really cute images that could be used for things other than Christmas cards. I curved the sentiment to match the contour of the circle (love that about clear stamps!). If I were to make it again, I’d move everything down a little in the circle.

The patterned paper is from S.E.I.’s Corinne paper pad, which was not intended for Christmas cards at all, but the colors were so pretty!

I got the stamps, paper, Copic markers and Nestabilities from Kate at i {heart} papers, who is still having her awesome Black Friday Sale. You need to go check it out, because it’s only on until tomorrow!

Black Friday sale valid Wednesday 11/23-Sunday 11/27.
25% off EVERYTHING storewide (in stock items only, not valid on gift certificates) using code (min. order $35): black25dt
10% gift certificate bonus. IHP will add an additional 10% of the value of the gift certificate during this sale.
25% discount does not apply to Gift Certificates. Gift Certificates need to be ordered separately from merchandise.

Happy shopping!

It’s beginning to look a lot like…Thanksgiving!

2011-11-23T16:25:00.001-05:00

Gobble, gobble! Every year in recent memory, I’ve made some kind of table favor for the Thanksgiving table (except for last year, when I made turkey cupcakes for dessert). Usually it was something crafted out of cardstock and filled with some kind of chocolate. This year, since I got a cake pop maker from my son and DIL (♥♥♥) for my birthday, I decided to make special cake pops for the occasion.

These guys (who will be wrapped up in cellophane) will grace each place at the table, and I’m guessing they won’t last until after the meal.

Despite a slight mishap (I dropped a whole tray of finished ones on the floor!), these were a LOT of fun to make! They are not the usual cake pops that are made from mushed up cake and frosting and then formed into balls. These little (chocolate) cakes are baked in balls and then dipped in melted chocolate.

The heads are Sugar Babies candies, the beaks are colored mini chips, and the wattles are little candy hearts. The cake decorating supply store was out of tiny candy eyes, so I had to improvise – these are little white candy confetti circles that I used a black edible marker on. I think they came out cute, if a little deranged-looking!

I had a few left over cake balls, so I decided to make a few sitting turkeys.
They’re just attached to individual candy melt disks with some melted chocolate. The middle one is adorable; the two outer ones look they escaped from the turkey loony bin!

OK, gotta get back to my preparations! Doing a mini-Thanksgiving dinner here tomorrow, and a big one at my dad’s with more of the family on Friday. I will miss having my kids with us this year, but when they’re all grown up, sometimes it just doesn’t work out. Maybe next year we’ll all be together!

Wishing all of my readers a wonderful Thanksgiving, with all the trimmings!

IHP Design Team Challenge: SRM Mini Calendar Stickers

2011-11-15T06:00:00.000-05:00

This month our Design Team Challenge focuses on a particular product, one that I was very excited to see at CHA this summer: the Mini Calendar Stickers by SRM.

I decided to create a piece of wall art with mine. I have a red accent wall in my dining room, so I made it to coordinate with that. Starting with a 12x12 piece of red cardstock as a base, I cut 2.25” squares (the size of each sticker) of white cardstock, onto which I adhered the calendar stickers, and 2.25” squares of different papers from the Black & White Timeless pad by Kaiser Craft. The first square, with the year, was stamped with numbers from the Mint Motif set, I’ve Got Your Number.

Here’s a close-up of one corner:

I found the stickers very easy to work with. They come in two different styles (same size); this is the Decorative Style sheet. I might have to get myself some of the other ones to play with…

To frame it, I found a really reasonable solution at the photo supply store, Adorama. They happen to be a few blocks from my office, but they sell this frame online also, and it’s just over $5. Yes, I said $5! It is a plastic frame (comes in white too, I think) with a glass front. It’s perfect for this, and for displaying treasured scrapbook pages as well.

I can’t wait to see what the rest of the Design Team did with these very cool stickers! Won’t you join me as I hop around?

Thanks for visiting!

Sometimes you just wanna color…

2011-10-23T15:39:00.001-04:00

even (especially?) when you’re supposed to be doing a million other things. I’ve had a couple of the floral images from Paper and Such for a little while now, and I’ve been a little intimidated to color them. Yes, I’ve taken the Copic certification class. Twice. But you really want to do these images justice. Today I just couldn’t wait any more.

The coloring is a little more nuanced in real life than I could capture in the photo, but I think you get the idea. Took me over an hour to color them, and I decided to just trim it down and mount it simply on a light blue card. No other layers or bling. Let the image speak for itself. I’m happy. Way behind on everything else, but happy.

Enjoy your Sunday!

USE those patterned papers!

2011-10-23T08:50:00.001-04:00

We all have them (well, my paper crafting readers, anyway). Those gorgeous sheets of 12x12 paper that we just HAD to have because … well, because they were so gorgeous. We didn’t know exactly what we would do with them, but we just KNEW they would be perfect for … well, something.

I’ve been going through my stash of gorgeous papers and using very simple layouts to make bunches of cards. For example:
This uses a piece of paper from S.E.I. I think it’s from the Juliette collection, but it’s irrelevant -- any piece of beautiful paper with an all-over pattern will do. This one is just full of shimmer and texture, as so many of the S.E.I. papers are. A layout like this will give you 6 cards from 1 12x12 sheet of paper (plus some scraps of coordinating papers for the scalloped trim and punched piece). Add a little bling. Change up the sentiment as needed. Make a set of Thank You cards, or make an assortment. Box them up and give them as a gift.

Here are some more examples (I’ve been a busy girl!):
These use paper from the Basic Grey Porcelain collection. Again, 6 cards out of each sheet. I made 2 each of Thank You, Happy Birthday, and Thinking of You.

Want to get even more out of a sheet?

This layout will give you 9 cards (cut 4x4) out of a 12x12 sheet. Add a 1/4” strip of coordinating cardstock, and stamp a greeting. I think this is also from S.E.I., but I’m not sure. Again, it doesn’t really matter – there are tons of gorgeous papers out there (of course, my favorite source is i {heart} papers).

Insanely simple. It’s all in the paper. You know you have it. USE it!

IHP October DT Challenge – Fireworks!

2011-10-18T06:01:00.000-04:00

This month our Design Team was treated to a wonderful new product from Tsukineko called Fireworks! It’s a water-based, acid-free and non-toxic shimmer spray that coordinates with the Memento ink pad colors. We’re all using them in our projects today.

I wanted to keep the thoughts of Katie Renz and her valiant battle on the front burner (honestly, it’s nearly impossible to get out of my mind), so I used another one of the digital images that is being sold to raise money for her family. This one is the mermaid that was designed by Marianne Walker. I thought that the Pear Tart Fireworks would be perfect for an underwater kind of background.

I printed the image and sentiment out, and sprayed it with the Fireworks. I did it inside a carton to contain any spray mess from getting all over the place. I printed the image a second time and colored it with my Copic markers, and fussy-cut it to adhere on top of the sprayed image. Unfortunately, I couldn’t, no matter how I tried, get a picture to show how beautifully shimmery this stuff is! You’ll have to use your imagination a bit. Oh, and I also used some Stickles (Icicle) to add some sparkle to the mermaid’s tail and the little stars in the sentiment.

Before I added the Stickles, I cut the piece out with Nestabilities, embossing it with that fabulous new No More Shims Embossing Mat. I glued a layer of green cardstock onto a white card base, and covered it with a piece of printed vellum I had in my stash that was perfect for the watery scene. The image was then popped up on some Dimensional Dots. Once it was all put together, I put the whole thing back in the carton and gave it another shot with the Fireworks to give it just a little bit of subtle shimmer.

Kate will be giving away some Fireworks to a random commenter ON TODAY’S DT POSTS so the more you hop and comment, the more chances you have to win! Winner will be announced on Friday so you have until Thursday 9PM EST to leave those comments!

Here’s the roll call:

Carolyn (you are here)

Deb

Kate

Have a shimmery day!

Swimming for Katie – A Blog Hop & Fundraiser

2011-10-10T00:01:00.000-04:00

From October 10-12 some of the best stampers are joining together to support and encourage our friend and fellow stamper, Katie Renz, who is currently battling inoperable gastric cancer. If you're not familiar with her story, Katie’s cancer started just before Christmas last year. This young, beautiful, healthy, vibrant mother of 3 with her infectious smile was suddenly diagnosed with an inoperable cancer, virtually overnight. A few tummy aches and then stage 4 gastric cancer. Her first post about it is here. The idea of “Swimming for Katie” came from her recent post here.

All of the patterned papers here are from the Sweet Owl pad. I pieced the character from one of them and colored the tentacles with a Copic marker and then went over them with a Spica pen to give it a little shimmer. There are some little glitter dots of Stickles on the crown and at the tope of the wand. I cut strips of some of the papers and diagonally covered the card front. The waves are cut with a scalloped Nestabilities die.

This exclusive stamp used in my sample, designed by Becky Oehlers is available as a clear stamp, as well as a digis or a dig and SVG cut file. 100% of the profits go to Katie's fund to help her and her young family. Her husband Kevin and her three young children need our help and support. In addition to the Keep Swimming Octopus, Marianne Walker and True =D Doodle Designs both also donated digis that are for sale. Direct donations are also being accepted. Information central is HERE. This is a permanent page that will stay active at i {heart} papers with current information and the full 3 day blog hop listing, as well as the donation button.

Here are all the items available for sale.


Keep Swimming Octopus Peachy Clear stamp $5.50 with free shipping	Keep Swimming Octopus DIGIstamp $3.00 with instant download

Keep Swimming Octopus DIGIstamp with SVG cut file $3.50 with instant download	Keep Swimming Ribbon Fish DIGIstamp and DIGIpapers $5.00 with instant download

Keep Swimming Mermaid DIGIstamp $3.50 with instant download

I hope you will join me in supporting Katie through a purchase or donation. The following is a list of everyone who has projects posted today. I hope you will be inspired by them and moved to purchase or donate. If you would like to send Katie a card, her mailing address is:

Katie Renz
PO Box 5913
Bellingham, WA 98227-5913

Thank you!

Now go check out all of the other stellar stampers who are participating in today’s round of this amazing collaborative effort:

AJ Otto
Beate
Carolyn Mustopa (you are here!)
Dawn Burnworth
Deb Felts
Gretchen Belknap
Heather Jensen
Jen del Muro
Julie Ranae
Kate - i {heart} papers
Kendra Wietstock
Lisa Johnson
Loretta Lock
Lori Tecler
Lynn Mercurio
Marianne Walker
Michele Gross
Stacy aka Twinshappy
Tracy Schultz
Debbie Olson
Cindy Lawrence
Cindy Haffner
Julie Koerber
Christine Okken
Tammy Hershberger
Danielle Kennedy
Barbara Anders
Makiko Jones
Ashley N Newell
Shannan Teubner
Taylor Usry
Jen Tapler
Jenn Balcer
Jenny Chesnick
Jess Larsen
Jessica Knutsen
Jimmi Mayo
Joan Bardee
Joan Ervin
Julia Aston
Julie Day
Julie Ebersole

IHP Logo Color Challenge

2011-10-05T06:00:00.000-04:00

As part of the IHP Birthday Bash, we’re having a color challenge using the colors of the IHP logo. And such pretty colors they are! We would love it if you would join us in making a project of your own (upload to your blog and link to the Mr. Linky on today’s posting of the IHP blog, upload to the IHP Facebook page or an online gallery with the keyword IHPBB2011). Deadline to enter is Saturday 12pm EST.

Here’s my card. This shows how you can use stamps and paper intended for Christmas on a birthday card:
That cute little smiley package is from the Lawn Fawn set called Pa-rum-pa-pa-pum, and the paper is from the Basic Grey pad Eskimo Kisses. The packages are colored with Copic markers to match the paper and IHP logo (BG01, RV23, G82). I glittered up the packages with some Icicle Stickles and popped the piece up on the patterned paper-covered card base with some of those super-sticky Dimensional Dots. The greeting is from an old Hero Arts greeting set. A very simple but adorable birthday card, and a great way to get extra mileage out of your holiday stuff!

Check out what the rest of the Design Team did, and don’t forget to play along for your chance to win a prize in the random drawing!

And remember, in celebration of IHP’s 3rd Birthday, use the code 3bday for 20% off everything in the store through 10/7/11. No exceptions or exclusions! And as always, free shipping with your $50US/$150CAN order.

Happy day!

In honor of WCMD

2011-10-01T18:30:00.001-04:00

Here are a couple of cards I made for World Card Making Day using goodies that I got from i {heart} papers.

A little back-story about my card making: Long before she started i {heart} papers, Kate was my first real introduction to card making, waaaay back when I contacted her to hold a SU workshop for me. She quickly thereafter became my upline, and now, all these many years later, she is one of my dearest friends and I hold her singly responsible for all the money I’ve spent on papercrafting stuff, as well as for all of the many wonderful friends I’ve made through the craft. She runs a rockin’ good business, and I’m so proud to be even a marginal part of it.

Anyhoo. This first card uses the stamp set Chubby Chums, and paper from the Sweet Owl paper pad. That pad is so full of gorgeous papers with all kinds of glittery and shiny goodness. Love it! As you can see, I did some fussy cutting on this one. After I stamped the image on the patterned paper and colored it with a few Copic markers, I cut out the eyeballs separately and attached them. I popped the image up on a Fleur de Lis Pendant piece. There’s a strip of Fuchsia Faux Suede ribbon behind it.

The next card is great for using up scraps of paper. These papers are all from the Fine & Dandy True Blue pad by My Mind’s Eye, which I don’t see in stock at the moment, but any coordinating papers would do as well. I cut the edges with the Long Classic Rectangles Nestabilities to get the small scalloped shape I wanted. Some punched stars highlight the stars in one of the papers, and they’re blinged up with clear Kaiser Craft rhinestones.

We’ll see if I can get any more card making done today. Stay tuned!

Happy World Card Making Day – IHP Style!

2011-10-01T10:38:00.001-04:00

There really is a day just for us – and it’s not just National, it’s for the whole WORLD!

And how awesome is it that this month Kate is also celebrating the 3rd birthday of i{heart}papers, and there’s a whole WEEK of festivities planned. How can you join the celebration?

October 1 - World Card Making Day! Make a card and upload it to the IHP Facebook wall and show off some products you've gotten from IHP. All entries will be eligible for a Facebook exclusive giveaway! Use code WCMD2011 for 20% off everything in the store. No exceptions or exclusions! And as always, free shipping with your $50US/$150CAN order.

October 2 & 3 - Facebook giveaways. Send your crafty friends to like IHP and have them tell Kate you sent them!

October 4 - secret Facebook happening (won't be announced until that day) with THREE gift certificates being given away.

October 5 - IHP Logo Color Challenge. We would love if you would join us in making a project of your own (upload to your blog and link to the Mr. Linky on the IHP blog, upload to our Facebook page or an online gallery with the keyword IHPBB2011). Deadline to enter is Saturday 12pm EST.

October 6 - more Facebook giveaways! Send your crafty friends to like IHP and have them tell Kate you sent them!

October 7 - Facebook giveaways and Operation Julie's Smile blog hop. Hop along for your chance to win a $20 IHP gift certificate or one of the other amazing prizes donated for Julie's fundraiser.

ALL orders placed during the Bash (Oct 1-7) will be entered for your chance to win the grand prize $50 gift certificate drawing on Monday.

Refer a friend who orders at least $25 and have them mention you in their order comments and you each receive an extra entry!

Winners will be announced on Monday, October 10 (evening)

What a way to celebrate!

IHP DT Challenge: Something New

2011-09-20T06:00:00.000-04:00

The theme for this month’s i {heart} papers Design Team challenge was pretty loose: all we had to do was use some of NEW stuff that Kate’s been getting in from the Summer CHA buying spree. Not difficult at all, if you ask me!

There are soooo many gorgeous new paper pads that the challenge for me was deciding which to use. I wanted something that would work for a masculine gift, since I’ve been doing so much girlie stuff lately. The colors in the Breeze pad from My Mind’s Eye were so deliciously different from what I’ve been using lately that I couldn’t resist playing with them. And I took full advantage of the fact that in these collections, all the papers are meant to work together. So I used as many as I could at one time in this patchwork-style treat can (paint can from my stash) and matching birthday card.

For the oval panels, I used some of the new Lifestyle Crafts (Quickutz) dies – the Nesting Oval and Nesting Lacy Oval ones. And to give it a more masculine look, I cut the lacy oval shapes from self-adhesive Corkstock. It cuts like a dream and is perfect for something like this!

Oh, here’s a hint when you’re adhering paper to curved surfaces like this paint can: roll the piece of paper over the edge of a table to give it a bit of curve before you stick it on. It makes things much easier! I used my favorite decoupage medium for this job – Royalcoat satin finish.

The image and text for both of these are from an adorable oldie but goodie set that Kate still has in stock – Changito Baker. I just used some scotch tape to omit wording from the stamp when I did the card. Cute Changito is colored with Copic markers.

Make sure you check out the New Items page at IHP. And if you already have some new stuff and want to play along with us, just upload it to the SCS or PCP gallery with the keyword ihp0911.

Now go see what the rest of the fabulous design team did with the new stuff:

Happy hopping!

Crochet Madness!!!

2011-09-17T13:23:00.001-04:00

There probably isn’t a craft I haven’t dabbled in at some point in my life, or at least tried my hand at. Some stuck; some lasted a month or two and faded away. I started crocheting when I was very young, and have picked it up now and again through the years. Recently I was tempted to play with yarn again. Take a look at what I’ve made over the last few weeks and see if you can figure out why…

A snuggly little pink bunting, and

a little sweater set with not one, but two hats. I couldn’t make up my mind.

Yup! My son and daughter-in-law are gonna make me a grandma, and it’s a little girl!!! I’m so excited I could explode! Baby isn’t due the beginning of January, though, so we’ve got a while.

In the meantime, once these were done I started looking at what else I could crochet, and found this entire world of something they call Amigurumi, which is basically little crocheted animals and things. I decided to start with this little Chinese rabbit called Tuzki. He has pipe cleaners in the arms and legs, so he’s sort of posable.

I’ve got lots more patterns downloaded – this is gonna be fun!

Anyhow, lots to get done this weekend that does not involve a crochet hook, so let me get moving!

Have a great weekend.

Not yet, but I’m ready!

2011-09-11T23:32:00.001-04:00

No, it’s not fall yet, but there’s a definite hint of what’s to come in the air. I have a love-hate relationship with fall. On one hand, the temperatures are milder, there’s a clean crispness in the air, and my birthday falls smack in the middle of it. On the other hand, it means winter is coming; that alone is enough to make me dread the fall.

Anyhow, while I’ve been taking the last couple of weeks away from card making and revisiting my old hobby of crocheting, summer has definitely slipped away (if not officially, then at least atmospherically). It made me want to revisit my favorite autumnal paper pad that I got from i {heart} papers from last year – SEI’s Moonrise. And the gorgeous embellishments (which Kate still has a couple of in stock) that coordinated with the papers just begged to be used with this week’s Clean & Simple FTL #157 layout.

While I was digging through my older stuff, I found this Stampendous set called Happy Everything, which is really a little gem (and which Kate also still has in stock). A little snippet of brown satin ribbon finishes it off.

Will I send this card to someone this fall? I’d like to think so, but my track record thus far is not good when it comes to actually putting cards in the mail. Anybody else out there have that problem?

Happy everything,

Feel Better, Cupcake!

2011-08-28T23:42:00.001-04:00

When I saw the sketch for the FTL155 Challenge this week, it reminded me of a made-up bed for some reason. Tonight I sat down to play, and this is what I came up with:

I’ve been loving the Miss Nelly paper by Kaiser Craft (I’ve used it a lot lately – I’ll show you later), and this Doctor’s Orders stamp by Taylored Expressions was perfect for paper-piecing with it.

A few Copic markers, a little ribbon, and it was done!

Here’s the sketch with the link if you’re interested:

Off to bed now – it’s been a crazy weekend, following a crazy week, and I think tomorrow’s gonna be a little crazy too!

Big girls don’t cry

2011-08-21T10:18:00.001-04:00

That’s a lie. Sometimes they do – like when their big girl moves out of state with her husband to start a new phase of their lives together.

My baby girl Laila and her husband Roy are moving down to the Virginia Beach area tomorrow so Roy can start his new job as a doctor (I’m so proud of him) at a hospital down there. Don’t they look wonderful and happy?
Roy’s family invited us out to a barbeque in Long Island yesterday to say farewell them. His mom Dottie cooked up a storm – incredibly delicious food that I ate waaay too much of!

I, of course, had to make a cake. It’s what I do.
That is a LOT of buttercream. Underneath it all is a dark chocolate cake filled with alternating layers of chocolate ganache and kirsch-soaked fresh cherries. I must say that it was very yummy, and very rich.

Roy’s sister Morgan made some beautiful (and very delicious) cupcakes. I confess that I was so full that I only tasted the little ones on the right – yummy little high-hats topped with marshmallow creme under chocolate coating. Well done, Morgan!

Anyhow, as I write this they are probably tossing things willy-nilly into cartons at the last minute before the truck comes at noon to pack up their lives and head down to VA first thing in the morning. And I’m sitting here with tears running down my face because I just realized that I never got a picture of us together yesterday. I know they’ll be back for visits, and I’ll go down there to visit, and it’s not forever, and all that stuff that people say, but still…

IHP DT August Challenge: Beat the Heat!

2011-08-16T06:00:00.000-04:00

In many parts of the country, or the western hemisphere for that matter, August is the hottest, stickiest month of the year. This year in particular, we’ve had an especially brutal summer. So our challenge this month was to create a card/project using COOL colors and/or few layers.

I went for the cool colors, but actually ended up with a little more layering than I usually do. Overall, I think I ended up with a pretty cool card!
To begin with, I chose my patterned paper from the Basic Grey 6x6 pad Eskimo Kisses (it doesn’t get much cooler than that!). The branch and bird cage are from the Ashley’s Blooms set by My Cute Stamps. I stamped the cage and the sentiment (from an old Hero Arts set in my stash) in Memento London Fog to keep the cool feeling going. I outlined the branch with my Copic Marker BG11 to give the impression of the sky without coloring the whole thing, and to set off the white of the blossoms. The white lacy strip is some Basic Grey self-adhesive paper ribbon, also from my stash. The bird cage is popped up on Sticky Thumbs dimensional dots for some added depth.

The layout of the card was taken from this week’s Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge 130, although I did kinda flip it around a little bit to suit the stamps.

If you’d like to play along with our challenge, we’d love to see what you do! Just upload your creation to the SCS or PCP gallery with the keyword “ihp0811” so we can find it.

Now go hop around and see what Kate and the rest of the IHP Design Team came up with for this chilly challenge:

Stay cool!

I love pink

2011-08-12T21:46:00.001-04:00

Really, I do.

Stamps: Little Loveosaurus (MFT)
Ink: Memento Black, Copic R81 (for airbrushing)
Paper: A Fair Day (S.E.I.)
Other: Big Scalloped Ovals Nestabilities, Sweet Blush satin ribbon (PTI), self-adhesive pearls (airbrushed R81), Shabby Pink Smooch (TE)

Unity Hop-Along

2011-08-11T00:01:00.000-04:00

Hi! Today the IHP DT is Hip Hopping along with the Unity Design Team. So be sure to check all their blogs for fabulous projects showcasing Unity! In celebration of this little hop, ALL full-sized Unity kits at IHP are $12 or less! But, there is VERY limited inventory and these past kits will not be restocked, so don’t wait or you might miss your chance to get them at this fabulous price.

Here’s my card:
It uses the Unity Itty Bitty set By a Thread, and paper from the Stella Rose Hazel 6x6 pad. I used one of the Copic markers that I colored one of the thread spools with to dye the white ribbon the same color, and added a little faux stitching with a white opaque pen. The patterned paper and the focal circle are cut with Nestabilities.

I don’t usually do any “dressing up” on the inside, but this time I did.
Go check out what the rest of the IHP DT did with their Unity stamps:

Kate
Tracy
Kendra
Lori
Deb
Lynn
Gretchen
Loretta

Happy hopping, and happy SHOPPING!

Two days in a row!

2011-08-06T11:54:00.001-04:00

Here’s another card I made recently with some goodies I got at CHA a couple of weeks ago. It has sort of a rustic feel to it, which is pretty much outside my comfort zone.

The nice people at the Scor-Pal booth were kind enough to give me a Scor-Bug tool when I mentioned that I’d been wanting to try one. That was the launching point for this card, which uses a kraft panel edged with the little bugger.

At the Simple Stories booth, they had some samples of paper from the Days of Summer collection out for the taking. It was a piece that had circles of different patterns from the collection, so I punched some butterflies out of a few of them, and a circle out of another. I trimmed it with some adhesive paper lace from Basic Grey, and stamped it with one of my favorite stamps from Papertrey’s Signature Greetings set. The butterflies are blinged up a bit with rhinestones. Had to add some bling somewhere!

It’s a beautiful day, and I’m gonna head out for a long walk, ‘cause I think it’s supposed to rain later.

Let’s play catch-up

2011-08-05T20:17:00.001-04:00

I’ve been stamping a lot, but not blogging a lot. Need to do something about that, since I do enjoy sharing my creations (even if the inspiration for them is often liberally borrowed from others). No excuse except for laziness, I suppose, and the fact that I don’t feel very chatty. So I decided that the answer, at least for the time being, is to set out to just post pictures of the stuff, and not put pressure on myself to be witty or verbose, and just see what develops.

There were a lot of friends’ birthdays in July and I realized I never posted pictures of the cards. Sadly, not all of these friends actually got cards. Blame it on Facebook.

So let’s start the game of catch-up with a couple of the cards that actually got made and mailed.

This was for my wonderful friend Kate (owner of i {heart} papers). Paper is from the For the Record collection kit, stamps are Technique Tuesday’s Stamping in Circles, and I used one of the Spellbinders fancy tags set for the scrolled medallion piece. I loved how it coordinated so well with the paper and stamp design! I colored in the white space on the circle thingie with a Copic marker to make it match the paper better. What I forgot is that Kate is not fond of red. Sorry!

Next up was my friend Jackie’s birthday. Jackie loves purple. This I remember because I do too. I used a stamp from the Stained Glass set by Flourishes, and paper from the Memory Box Enchanted 6x6 pack. I had fun with my Copic markers with this one. I even remembered to take a picture of which ones I used. Hmm, I see that I missed a couple. Sorry!

OK, I think I’ve used up my word quota for this post. Hopefully there will be more later. Words, I mean. And posts.

Later,

July IHP DT Challenge: Charity Logo Inspiration

2011-07-26T06:00:00.000-04:00

For this month’s IHP Design Team Challenge, we were asked to use the logo of a favorite charity as inspiration for our card or project. I doubt there’s anyone reading this whose lives have not been touched in some way by breast cancer, and my family is no exception. I used the logo of Susan G. Komen for the Cure® as inspiration for this cute little phone message pad.

I love their whimsical use of the ribbon image to represent a person running, since the fundraiser they’re famous for is the Mother’s Day Race for the Cure. I used the whimsical-looking telephone from the Just My Type stamp set by Lawn Fawn, stamping it in Memento Tuxedo Black and coloring it with Copic markers for the main image, and stamping it repeatedly in light pink as a background as well as on the bottom corner of each page of the note pad. I used a piece of yummy Light Fuschia Faux Suede ribbon around the bottom of the top panel to visually balance it and give it a little texture. It’s all mounted on a layer of light pink over a base cover of PTI Raspberry Fizz cardstock.

If you’d like to know more about Susan G. Komen for the Cure®, simply click on the logo above. If you’d like to show us how a favorite charity logo has inspired you, we’d love to see your work. Just post it to the SCS or PCP gallery using the keyword ihp0711 so we can find it.

Now go check out what Kate and the rest of the IHP Design Team did with this challenge:

Thanks for stopping by!

Baby’s Birthday Weekend

2011-07-10T21:39:00.001-04:00

OK, she’s not a baby. But she’ll always be MY baby, no matter how many times she celebrates birthdays! This year my youngest, Annisa, set a goal to move into her own apartment (and out of the one she shared with her sister) by her birthday, and she did it! She found a gorgeous studio apartment in Manhattan, and christened it with a double-header birthday celebration – one for friends and one for family – since it isn’t quite big enough to handle everyone at once. This called for two cakes. And one card. Very clever of me: offer to make cakes for both parties and you get to go to both of them!

Here’s Cake #1:
I tried to tie the colors in with her apartment (the sofa is orange, the rug is black and grey, table is white, chairs are black). This was a 9” chocolate cake filled with chocolate ganache, raspberry jam and fresh raspberries. Covered in orange and black fondant. Very yummy.

Cake #2 was a 6” carrot cake with cream cheese frosting:
Very yummy as well. I ate altogether too much cake this weekend. And drank too much wine. I think I’m gonna skip my weigh-in tomorrow.

And here’s the birthday card:

Because she is my beautiful, ever-evolving butterfly. Wish BIG, my sweet baby! And fly high. Love you, Annisa!

(isn’t she gorgeous?!!)

New Improved Storage!

2011-07-04T19:23:00.001-04:00

I had a very full weekend! Took a little road trip with my sister down to New Hope, PA to see my brother play with an awesome Steely Dan tribute band, and to celebrate his birthday. And on the way back, we stopped at Ikea. I’ve been keeping all of my PTI stamp sets in CD boxes on a shelf in my craft closet, but somehow the ones I use most end up sitting on the desk, cluttering it up. I had some space on the wall in front of me, and I found these fabulous wall-hung CD racks at Ikea that would let me store all of my MANY PTI sets right in my face!

And see – I even have room for more! Each unit is about 34” long and holds 76 CD cases. It’s called Lerberg, and it was ridiculously cheap – like less than $6, I think! And they can be hung horizontally or vertically, whichever suits your space better.

If you’re wondering what is right below the racks, it’s a magnetic strip that I hung there so I could keep inspiration/reference things handy, like the printed out sketch challenges every week. There are little magnet circles holding the papers up.

To put it all in perspective, here’s what’s above my desk:
On the left is the ribbon rack that my Dad made me last year. The lower shelves are great for keeping my ink pads and Bow Easy handy, as well as my stash of buttons. Martha punches sit nicely on top of the unit, and a flex-neck lamp is clamped onto it. There’s another lamp you can see on the desktop at left. Can never have too much lighting, especially with these aging eyes!

Sitting underneath the ribbon unit are the plastic boxes with X-dividers that hold all my Copic markers.

It’s great to have everything at my fingertips. Now I just need to spend some time playing with it all!

Holy Macarons!

2011-07-01T22:58:00.001-04:00

These little Parisian nuggets of decadence, made of ground almonds, egg whites and sugar, are all the rage in NYC now. I’ve heard nothing but how difficult they are to make, so of course I had to give it a try. And because it is the way I am, I researched the topic to death! Read every blog, every recipe, every tip sheet that I could lay my hands on that had anything to do with macarons over the last week.

Tonight, after aging my egg whites for 48 hours, I screwed up my courage and gave it a go. After lots of measuring, weighing, sifting and beating, the results are better than I expected for my first time. Slightly browned (they aren’t supposed to be), and slightly chewier than I think they should be, they are nonetheless BEAUTIFUL to me. Look at those dainty little frilly feet! They are filled with seedless raspberry jam. And for all that work, I only got ONE DOZEN out of it.

They’re supposed to get better, taste and texturewise, after aging a day or two.

Somehow I don’t think I’m gonna find out.

IHP Design Team Challenge – and a SALE!

2011-06-21T06:01:00.000-04:00

This month, the i {heart} papers Design Team was challenged to create something based on “Sensational Summer.” Being that summer actually begins today, I think it’s quite appropriate!

Using some bright, summer-y papers (Echo Park’s Summer Days) and one of my favorite Chicken Girl Design stamp sets (Hugs from a Bug), this is what I came up with:

I paper-pieced the smiling sun in the corner using an old OCL set (Sunshine Cheer) and highlighted it with some yellow Stickles. The grass that the cute ant is walking on is covered with Flower Soft. The layout was based on this week’s Mojo Monday Sketch Challenge (which kinda gives away the fact that I waited until the last minute to do this!).

Before I send you over to see what the rest of the design team came up with to celebrate summer, let me tell you about the spectacular Pre-CHA Clearance Sale that Kate is having starting TODAY!

Even though new items are still arriving in the store (new Unity, OCL and Echo Park, to name a few), CHA is only a few weeks away! Starting today, IHP is having a HUGE Pre-CHA Clearance sale to help make room for new things that will be purchased at the show. Some highlights of the big sale:

All Unity $12 or less, including store kits and co-brands
Unity Itty Bittys $3.25
OCL (except the latest releases) are all $11 or less
All open stock 12x12 only 25¢ per sheet
Flower Soft only $4.50!
Stampavie only $6!

But there is much, much more, so be sure to check out the sale page for all the details! And, as always, free US shipping with your $50 order!

Now go check out what these very talented ladies came up with for this challenge:

And then GO SHOPPING!!!! Happy Summer, everybody!

It’s been too long

2011-06-05T18:08:00.001-04:00

I’ve been a bad, bad blogger. No good excuses – just caught up in baking stuff and family stuff, so my downtime was really crash time. But I’m jumping back in with this little number. I think it says it all…

I used this week’s sketch challenge from The Sweet Stop (SSS111). When my mojo is stalled, sketch challenges usually get me started again. The typewriter stamp is from Just my Type from Lawn Fawn, but the message stamped on the paper is from the Talking in Circles set from Technique Tuesday. I love being able to mix and match my stamp sets! The patterned papers, the border and letter stickers are from the fabulous For the Record 12x12 Collection Kit. Of course all of these, as well as the Copic markers I used to color the typewriter and Nestabilities I used to cut it out, are available from i {heart} papers.

I have more to catch you all up on (those of you who are still following me after my abysmal posting track record), but that will have to wait a bit. For now, I’ll just say that I’m glad to be (hopefully) back in the swing of things, and I truly appreciate (more than I can say) those of you who are actually reading this.

Later,

IHP DT Challenge – Color Blocking

2011-05-17T06:00:00.000-04:00

This month our fearless i {heart} papers design team challenge coordinator, Deb, challenged us to use the Color Blocking technique for our card or project. I know there are many variations of this, and some are more clean and simple than what I ended up doing. Anyway…

I’ve been wanting to make a Gratitude Journal for a long time. I bought the blank lined book ages ago, and decided that this challenge was the perfect opportunity to actually do it. So I grabbed a piece of graph paper and started sketching out block designs until I came up with one I was happy with.

Then I broke out my Echo Park “For The Record” 12x12 Collection Kit and started cutting. The rose, letters and words I added are all from the kit as well. The stamped words on the yellow block at the lower right are from the OCL set Big Thanks – I just selectively inked and stamped (with my favorite Palette Noir ink) the words I wanted, omitting the ones I didn’t. It’s a great way to get added value from the stamps you have.

The blocks were first arranged and glued down to a black cardstock piece cut to the size I needed to cover the ugly print that was already stuck on the front of the book. After it was all decorated to my liking, I used my i {stick} papers redline tape to adhere it to the book.

All in all, I’m pleased with how it came out. Thanks, Deb, for forcing my hand on this. Oooh – that can be my first entry for my gratitude journal! And of course, I’m grateful for all of you who are actually taking the time to look at this :-)

Now go check out what the rest of the IHP design team did with this challenge:

Kate
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy

And if you’d like to play along and show us your Color Blocking designs, just load them into the SCS or PCP gallery with the keyword ihp0511 so we can find it.

Special Announcement from i {heart} papers

2011-05-06T07:13:00.016-04:00

I just wanted you to know that there were some yummy new additions to the store this week, so be sure to check the new section in the store. And, LUCKY YOU…tomorrow is National Scrapbooking Day so IHP has a 10% off coupon for you when you spend $40 or more, valid starting today through Sunday. Use code NSD2011DT. Plus, all single digistamps are only $1. And all orders of $100 or more will get a free extra gift from Kate as a thank you. It might be a paper sampler or a stamp or something else! It’ll be a surprise!

So what are you waiting for? Go shopping!

I {heart} baking

2011-04-30T21:48:00.001-04:00

This is what I’ve been up to for the last couple of days. My grandpuppy, Sugar, turned 1 year old (in people years) yesterday, and my daughter invited some of Sugar’s doggie friends over today to celebrate. Of course, I had to bake some treats for the doggies, so I whipped up a batch of these yummies. All kinds of good stuff in there – banana, apple sauce, carrots, whole wheat flour, spelt flour and oats. Honestly, there’s nothing in there that I wouldn’t eat. But I didn’t try them. The dogs loved them, though.I packaged them up like this:

And we must have some goodies for the people, right? What could be better than some pupcakes? Got the idea from the Martha Stewart website. Very time consuming, but sooo cute! And very yummy. The ears and eyes are made of chocolate, and the noses are Raisinettes.

And because this past Monday was my son-in-law’s birthday, I baked a little something just for him – a Beer Batter Bread with Gruyere and Rosemary. It smelled divine when I baked it this morning, and I’m sure it will taste just as good. I got the recipe from the Bake at 350 blog, here. Super simple. Here it is in all its glory:

I just love the way my house smells when I bake. I do NOT like the way my kitchen looks afterward. I need somebody to stand next to me and clean up as I go. Any volunteers?

Papertrey April Blog Hop Challenge

2011-04-25T10:13:00.001-04:00

This month, the PTI Blog Hop Challenge is to make a masculine card. It just so happens that today is my son-in-law’s birthday (Happy Birthday, Roy!), and the card I made for him uses PTI’s Enjoy the Ride stamp set and die. Unfortunately I did not get it into the mail, so I’ll have to hand-deliver it to my daughter later today.

You may recognize the car from the nifty tutorial I did HERE about how to accurately die-cut images with solid dies (like PTI’s) – after they are stamped. If you have the same trouble I do with lining up the stamp with the die cut, this tutorial is for you!

I used BG Max & Whiskers paper for this card, since I was going for a dog theme here, and the colors were nice and masculine. The doggy in the car is my grandpuppy, Sugar, wishing her daddy a happy birthday. That stamp is from a little BG clear stamp set. I stamped her first on the white circle, then adhered the car (with the window trimmed out with a craft knife) on top of her. The sky and road are masked and airbrushed with Copic markers.

Enjoy the hop!

Tutorial: Die-cutting stamped images

2011-04-23T11:16:00.001-04:00

Anyone who has used Nestabilities or other open-format dies to cut their stamped images knows that it’s pretty easy to align the die around the image. But what about the solid dies that are available now? I don’t know about you, but even with clear stamps, I have a hard time stamping the image correctly on the die-cut shape – it’s always just a little wonky, even if I’m standing right above it to line it up.

So I came up with an easy way to stamp first, then cut perfectly – every time. Now, I don’t know if anyone else has come up with this idea already, but it’s new to me, so I wanted to share it with you. Here we go…

First, take a piece of cardstock and die-cut the shape. You are creating a mask. I’ve used PTI’s Enjoy the Ride die (and stamp) for this.

Now stamp your image.

Start creating your die-cutting “sandwich”. I’m using my Big Shot. Lay the stamped image (face up) on your cutting mat and align the mask over the image exactly the way you want it. You can use a little tape to hold it down if you want. (I could have aligned this a little better…)

Now take your die (cutting side down) and place it into the mask – you’ll feel when it’s sitting properly in there. Take a little tape and hold it down to make sure it doesn’t shift.

Cover it with your top plate and run it through your die-cutting machine. That’s it -- a perfectly aligned image!

And you can keep your mask to use over and over again. I like to cut one in a light color and one in a dark color, depending on what I’m stamping on. And I store them right behind the dies in my binder so they’re always there when I need them. I store my dies – all of them – in a photo album binder loaded with different size pocket pages. Each pocket has either a square of black cardstock with some magnetic strips attached, or a square of of magnetic sheeting (I think they sell them as vent covers). In the back of the album, I have a couple of sheets of 8x11 magnetic sheeting, hole punched for the binder, for my border dies. Here’s a pic of one page:

Hope this has been useful and takes some stress out of your crafting time!

IHP April DT Challenge: Exclusively Yours

2011-04-19T06:00:00.000-04:00

This month the i {heart} papers design team is spotlighting some of the stamp sets that are available exclusively through i {heart} papers. I decided to use one of my favorite Chicken Girl Design sets, Birthday Wishes.

Now as we all know, nothing says “party” quite like a pink elephant. So I paired the image with some pretty pink papers from the Little Girl Collection Kit by Echo Park. The balloon is paper-pieced and popped up on a foam dimensional. I used this week’s inspiring Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge #113 for my layout.

Supplies from i {heart} papers:
Stamps: Birthday Wishes (Chicken Girl Design)
Ink: Memento black, Copic markers R81, R83, YG02, C2
Paper: Little Girl Collection Kit (Echo Park), Copic Blending Cardstock
Other: Adhesive Dimensional Dots (Zva), Nestabilities – small circles

Do you have any of the exclusive IHP sets from Mint Motif, The Petal Press, or Chicken Girl Design? Would you like to share your work with us? Post it to the gallery at PaperCraft Planet or Splitcoast Stampers and use the tag ihp0411 so we can find it.

Now go check out what the rest of the IHP Design Team has this month:

Kate
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy

Happy stamping!

A complete departure

2011-03-21T00:10:00.001-04:00

from my usual style. I was inspired by Julie Lacey’s take on this week’s Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge. I needed to make a birthday card for my awesome boss (OK, I had plenty on hand to choose from – I just wanted an excuse to play), and I wanted to use more of the yummy papers from the Echo Park Be Mine Collection, because she is totally into the whole black/white/grey thing.

A little bit of Raspberry Fizz (Papertrey) made the card pop. You will notice that I actually used my sewing machine. Yup, I sewed on paper! Of course it helped that the machine was already loaded with black thread (I hate changing thread). Peeking out from under the ribbon is some of the BG adhesive paper lace, and the swirls are pieces cut from some Zva Jet Crystal Flourishes.

The center piece is cut with Labels 13 Nestabilities, and stamped with PTI’s Damask Designs.

So even though this is the complete opposite of my usual clean & simple style, I rather like the way it came out. Don’t get too used to all this fussiness from me, though!

Yummy

2011-03-20T18:10:00.001-04:00

Just a quick share. I spent the afternoon making these for my boss’s birthday tomorrow. She’s a terrific boss, and a really awesome woman. And she LOVES m&m’s.

These are triple chocolate cupcakes with buttercream frosting. They were fun to decorate, and yes, I did sit and sort the whole bag of m&m’s out by color.

And yes, I did lick the bowl(s).

IHP March DT Challenge: What’s New?

2011-03-15T06:00:00.000-04:00

This month the i {heart} papers Design Team was given a bit of free reign – we could make whatever we wanted, but it had to use some of the NEW stuff that Kate ordered from CHA.

Since Easter is right around the corner, I decided to use some of the spring-like and delicious paper from the Stella and Rose Hazel pad by My Mind’s Eye to make an Easter basket and some eggs. I just LOVE these colors and prints! (Yes, I know there are a few of you out there asking what a nice Jewish girl is doing making an Easter basket ☺)

I found some styrofoam eggs when I was cleaning up my craft closet (you wouldn’t believe some of the stuff I had hiding in there!), so I took a few and covered them with punched out flowers, using some glass head pins that I picked up in the sewing notions section at Wal-mart a long time ago.

The basket is made with an 8x8 square of kraft cardstock, scored 2-5/8” inches from each side. This post on Splitcoast Stampers has a link to the directions. The strip left from trimming an 8-1/2x11 sheet was enough to make the handle. I applied squares of various papers from the Hazel pad before I assembled the basket. Here’s a closer look at just the eggs:
How have you been using the new goodies introduced at CHA? Would you like to join our challenge? Just post your project to the SCS or PCP gallery and use the keyword ihp0311 so we can find it.

Now go take a look at what Kate and the other very talented ladies who comprise the IHP Design Team made with their new stuff:

Kate
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy

And be sure to stop by i {heart} papers to see the new and wonderful goodies that are coming in almost every day! Kate’s legendary outstanding customer service, and free shipping on orders of $50 US and up, just can’t be beat!

IHP & OCL Partner Challenge Day

2011-03-04T03:00:00.000-05:00

Today I’m happy to join my fellow i {heart} papers design team members in partnering with the Our Craft Lounge Challenge #55. The challenge is to pick a card made with an OCL set (there are soooo many awesome ones to choose from!) and do our own version using a different OCL set.

Above is my card, and if you click here you’ll see the card that the very talented Denise Marzec made, and which I used as my inspiration. While Denise used Pat the Good Dog for her card, I used Tweet Trees for mine. She had some adorable die-cut clouds floating over her image panel, and I decided to pop up the body of the bird over my image. The oval image panel and scalloped mat are cut with Large Oval Nestabilities, and the scalloped border is cut with the Jumbo Scalloped Petite Borderabilities. My patterned paper is from the October Afternoon Seaside collection. And these are the Copic markers that I used to color the image:

We’d love to see your take on this challenge too! Here are the details:
Play along and you might even win one of OCL’s monthly prizes! Details are on their blog.

Go take a look at the cards that the rest of the IHP Design Team came up with for this challenge:
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Lori
Lynn
Tracy
Kate

Happy stamping!

A couple of sweet cards

2011-02-21T21:26:00.001-05:00

I got to spend some time at my new craftin’ desk this weekend (more on that soon) and whipped up a couple of sweet and simple cards using the Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge 105.

Amazingly, I didn’t use any stamps on these – just the Echo Park Little Girl Collection Kit that I recently got from Kate at i {heart} papers, some ribbon, and some cardstock. I love collection kits – lots of papers that coordinate, and all kinds of stickers and stuff to go with them. Gotta love these cupcakes, too – totally guilt-free and calorie-free!

I have a couple of other things I worked on this weekend – some I can’t share for a little bit yet. I’ll be back in a couple of days to show you more.

IHP DT Challenge: Inspired by a Story

2011-02-15T06:00:00.000-05:00

This month Deb, our design team challenge coordinator, assigned us the task of making a card or project that was inspired by a story. My card is inspired by the Jules Verne story “Around the World in 80 Days,” which was first published in 1873. It was made into an Academy Award winning movie with David Niven in 1956, and again in 2004 with Jackie Chan. As far as I’m concerned, the second one didn’t count. It was also adapted many times and many ways for stage, screen and TV. But anyway…The story is about an English man, Phileas Fogg, and his French valet, who set out to circumvent the globe in 80 days on a bet, using whatever means of transportation is available. In the original book there was no hot air balloon involved, but the 1956 movie added that element and all adaptations after that kept it in.

I used the Unity stamp set Itty Bitty Adventurous for this, along with paper from Kaiser Craft’s Up, Up and Away pad. Both are currently available at i {heart} papers (of course), although in very limited quantity. It was stamped with Palette Cocoa ink and colored with Copic markers (BG11, YR20, YR24) to coordinate with the background paper. The aqua dewdrops are from my stash.

Now go take a look at what the rest of the design team came up with:

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

We’d love to see what YOU can make that’s inspired by a story. If you make something, please post it in the PCP or SCS gallery with the keyword “ihp0211” so we can find it.

Wishing you your own great adventure,

Happy Valentine’s Day!

2011-02-13T23:43:00.001-05:00

Just a quick post with a couple of cards that went out in the mail. Hopefully I timed it right and they get where they’re going on time. With all the mess of reorganizing my craft space the last couple of weeks, I didn’t get as many cards made as I would have liked.

This card was inspired by one in a PaperCrafts magazine a while back. Can’t put my hands on it right now to give proper credit. The brown layer is run through the Big Shot with an embossing folder and then lightly and carefully stamped with PTI Background Basics:Text Styles. A white eraser took care of the boo-boos that inevitably occurred.

This one was inspired by what must have been a recent sketch challenge. Again, I wish I could put my finger on which one, but I can’t at the moment. It’s hard to see, but the pink strips were first stamped with an old SU heart vine background stamp, then run through the Big Shot with the Swiss Dots embossing folder. I stamped a piece of darker pink CS with the reverse dots stamp from the Mint Motif set Very Square using Palette Claret ink before I punched it out with a large heart punch. I find that Claret is actually a better match for the PTI Raspberry Fizz CS than their own ink. The words along the bottom, stamped in Palette Charcoal, are from the PTI set Sweet Love.

Hope your day is filled with love.

January IHP Design Team Challenge

2011-01-18T06:00:00.000-05:00

This month’s i {heart} papers design team challenge was an inspiration challenge based on a lovely European candy store called, well, The Candy Store, in Ottawa, Canada. In keeping with the European-ness of it, and the candy-ness of course, I decided to alter a candy box I received as a gift. I wanted a way to package some sugar-free Dove chocolates, and this was the perfect size. The box was originally filled with the most incredible chocolates from Japan. Really, truly scrumptious. Interestingly, they were brought directly from Japan to me by the girlfriend of a dentist – hmmmm, do you think there’s a little collusion going on there?

The box was black to begin with, and I simply cut a sheet of paper from the delicious Echo Park Be Mine Collection Pack to cover the top, the inside, and all of the sides, leaving a bit of the black as a border. Both the circle pattern and the pink text pattern are 2 sides of the same 12x12 sheet. The Eiffel Tower label and the 2 little pink hearts are part of the collection pack – it has 2 sheets of stickers in it. I finished it off with a double bow made from some fuchsia silk ribbon in my stash (with the fabulous Bow Easy).

The inside of the box is decorated as well, with another one of those little pink heart stickers for an added pop of color. You can’t see it because of the chocolates, but the bottom is covered with the pink text paper too. Oh, and I’m afraid that by the time you see this, some of those candies might have mysteriously disappeared…

Now go take a look at what the rest of the design team came up with:

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

I’m guessing there will be some sweet treats to feast your eyes upon. If you’re inspired to participate and share your creation, please post it to the SCS gallery or PaperCraft planet gallery with the key word ‘ihp0111’ so we can all find it.

Have a delicious day!

Puppy Love

2011-01-08T22:21:00.001-05:00

I think I’m gonna send this card to my daughter and son-in-law for Valentine’s Day from their puppy, Sugar. (I’ll have to move quickly to delete it from Facebook when it automatically loads there so she doesn’t see it beforehand ---shhhhh.)

I used Pat the Good Dog, a cutie OCL set that I just got from i {heart} papers, and I used the OCL Color Challenge of red, black and kraft, too. I made my own patterned paper with the border stamp in the set, and colored it, and the dog, with my Copic markers. Everything is stamped with Memento Cocoa ink.

The XOXOXO in the bone is from an old Hero Arts set, but any number of sentiments would fit in there. I used my Bow Easy to make a double bow from some black & white gingham ribbon in my stash.

I’ve got some more Valentines done too – but I’ll save them for another day.

Inspired by…

2011-01-07T21:45:00.001-05:00

This week’s Moxie Fab Tuesday Trigger was right up my alley, and I knew as soon as I had a chance I was gonna use this gorgeous cake as the inspiration for a card.

Look at this cake:
I decided that it would be really cool if I used my new Cricut Cake to make a card based on this inspiration. I love the fact that my two passions have collided on so many levels. I have used many paper crafting tools in cake decorating, and now I can use my Cricut Cake to cut paper for a card! I used the Elegant Cakes cartridge and some SU Shimmery White cardstock. Here’s the results:

It was impossible to get a really good shot of this card. You can’t see the shimmer of the paper; it’s really beautiful in person. And of course I had to add some butterflies (Martha punch) and some pearls to finish it off.

I love how it came out! I’m sure you’ll be seeing more Cricut creations in the near future.

Happy New Year!

2011-01-01T14:28:00.001-05:00

I thought I’d start the year off by pulling out one of my favorite OCL sets and wishing you all good fortune in 2011.

I’ve got much to be thankful for in the past year, and I can’t wait to see what this year brings! Good fortune, both financially and otherwise, would be nice. And the return of my mojo would be nice, too.

This card uses the sketch from the January SFYTT Sketch Challenge. I’m so glad Jen decided to switch to a monthly challenge instead of giving it up. Her sketches are the best, and they never fail to inspire me.

After I colored the designs on the tablecloth, I went over them with some Spica glitter pens to match the sparkle of the striped paper. And I wrote in the 2011 by hand in the crystal ball.

What I used:
Stamps: Crystal Clear(OCL)
Paper: Happy Day (s.e.i.), Black, Copic Blending Cardstock
Ink: Memento Black, Copic markers, Spica pens

Wishing you all the best in the new year.

Hi, my name is Piper, and I’ll be your date tonight (aka IHP December DT Challenge)

2010-12-21T06:00:00.000-05:00

This month’s IHP Design Team challenge was to make something inspired by fancy fashion. I found a vintage glittery white dress online and decided to dress up a champagne bottle for a festive occasion. You can see the dress below.

I created a simple pattern first with plain paper, so as not to waste my precious supplies. Once I knew what my goal was, it only took about 15 minutes to get it done. But oh, the days I spent trying to get to that point! As Kate, says, that’s why they call it a challenge!

The glittery white paper is from the Petaloo glitter pad. Kate has a few different assortments in the store. I punched 6 holes down the sides of the “bodice” and ran some white Glimmer Ribbon through it, looping it over the neck of the bottle and tying it in the back. Then I took a piece of burgundy crepe ribbon and wrapped it around from the front to the back and then to the front again, tying it there. Did that make sense? I actually fed the ribbon first through a couple of the holes on the sides to keep it in place, then did the wrapping and tying. Clear as mud, right?

Anyhow, hope you feel a little inspired yourself! Wouldn’t this be a great way to present a bottle of bubbly this New Year’s Eve? If you want to post your own version of a fashion inspired project, make sure you use the keyword “ihp1210” in the SCS or PCP gallery so we can find it.

Now go take a look at what the rest of the design team came up with:

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

Have a sparkly day!

For the love of a dog…

2010-12-19T19:24:00.001-05:00

This is how I spent my afternoon today. I’m home with a miserable cold, and had to stop to sit down several times throughout the process, but it’s the holidays, and some things just need to be done. There’s no shortage of puppy treats and gifts available online, but there’s nothing like something from Grandma’s kitchen, right?

So while everybody else was home baking holiday cookies, I made doggy biscuit treats for my grandpuppy, Sugar. And a few for my brother’s dog, Rusty, too. I am THAT crazy lady who went and bought the cookie cutters in 2 sizes!

In case anyone is interested, the recipe was from the King Arthur's Flour blog. Very easy, and you probably have all (or most) of the stuff in your kitchen already. I actually had to go out and buy a new jar of peanut butter because it’s been so long since I’ve used the real stuff that it had gone rancid in the cabinet!

Counting down… Is anybody less ready than I am?

Look who’s hiding in my refrigerator…

2010-11-26T06:47:00.000-05:00

Are these not the cutest little turkey cupcakes you have ever seen? I’ve been working on them since Wednesday, and they’re all tucked away now, chillin’ and waiting for their trip to the Philadelphia area to meet the family today. Too bad their lifespan will be only slightly longer than their poultry counterpart. Gobble gobble! They even look a little apprehensive, don’t they?

A few details for those who are curious: I got the idea here. I used Trader Joe’s Yellow Cake Mix for the cupcakes (first time – I’ll let you know…), and for the frosting, I made a Bittersweet Chocolate Swiss Meringue Buttercream. Let me tell you folks, this stuff should be against the law. Never have I tasted anything so sinfully silky and deliciously decadent. Trouble with a capital “T”.

The tail feathers and beaks are made of fondant. Hopefully, the food coloring will have worn off my hands by the time you read this. I cheated and bought the eyes already made at NY Cake and Baking Supply, which is conveniently (and dangerously) located about a block and a half from my office.

Have a wonderful day. Catch up with you soon!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2010-11-25T20:30:00.001-05:00

Today, and every day, I am most grateful for my amazing, wonderful, loving family. I completely lucked out in that department. Every single one of them, whether related by birth or by marriage, is a true joy.

The favor boxes above will be on our family Thanksgiving table tomorrow. Yes, I said tomorrow. Our family has decided that when we can, we’ll celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas on the “off” days. No matter where we celebrate, there’s a great deal of traveling involved for most people, and celebrating on an alternate day makes that a lot easier. It also lets those with spouses celebrate with both families.

Here’s a close-up of the box. The image is made with the Happy Harvest set by The Petal Press, available exclusively from i {heart} papers. I drew the stem on the pumpkin, since technically I stamped it upside down. It’s colored with Copic markers, and a drop of Glossy Accents is added to each of the acorns. The greeting is from the same set, and it’s embossed with gold EP. I punched the whole thing out with a big oval punch, but you could easily use Nestabilities. I then ran a gold metallic marker around the edge to finish it off. The box itself is made with the Sizzix matchbox die from SU!. I don’t know how I ever lived without it! Most of them are filled with Hershey’s Nuggets (a few, like mine, are filled with Weight Watchers candies).

I sincerely want to thank those of you who actually follow my blog. I know there are a few of you out there, and I do appreciate it. I also know that I’m not as diligent as I’d like to be in posting. I hope you’ll stick with me anyway as I try to get better at that.

And make sure you take some time to check out Kate’s enormous Black Friday Sale at i {heart} papers. From Black Friday through Sunday (midnight EST) use the code black25dt for 25% off any order $25 or more. This is the biggest discount IHP has ever offered so take advantage of it while you can!

Then, in celebration of Cyber Monday, after the 25% off coupon has expired, there will be over 600 items on steep, steep discount - some up to 50% off! So shop early with your 25% off coupon to get what you really NEED to get and then come back on Monday to see all the fantastic savings that are left!

(The nitty gritty details - coupon does not apply to any previous orders or any items that are out of stock. Sale items are first come, first served and no rainchecks apply. And, no credits will be issued if you purchase something with the 25% off coupon and then it goes on sale at a later date. Sorry!)

Lights all Aglow – IHP DT Challenge

2010-11-16T06:00:00.000-05:00

Glowing lights are something that all of the upcoming holidays have in common, whether you’re celebrating Christmas, Chanukah or Kwanza, so that’s the theme our Challenge-meister Deb gave us for our challenge this month.

I decided to create a trio of luminaria to meet this challenge. They are all made of heavyweight clear vellum, cut to 3” x 10-1/4” and scored at 2-1/5”, 5”, 7-1/2” and 10”. They’re all trimmed with strips of paper from the Cosmo Cricket Mitten Weather 6x6 pad. But the vellum is decorated using a different technique for each one.

Photographing these was quite a challenge; I wanted to show you how they look when they’re lit from within, so the papers are kind of dark. I used little battery powered fake votives instead of real flame – a lot safer that way, and they even flicker! There are actually 2 little lights inside each of these to provide more dramatic light. I found a 6-pack of them at Walgreen’s for $5.

The first one is pierced using an Ornare template, and decorated with a few Zva red rhinestones to accent the design.

The second one is stamped with Iris Palette ink and one of Kimberly Crawford’s Very Square stamps. Look how nicely the pattern compliments the paper!

For this last one, I ran the vellum through my Big Shot with the Vine embossing folder, although any embossing folder would be beautiful. Here’s a hint, though. Score and pre-fold your vellum before you emboss it. Depending on the vellum you’re using, it may crack if you try to fold it after it’s embossed. Ask me how I know…

If you’d like to make your own, please leave me a link – I’d love to see! Now go check out the rest of the design team’s blogs to see what they came up with for this glowing challenge.

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

Have a great day!

Moonrise Birthday

2010-11-09T21:30:00.001-05:00

I wanted to share a card I made with a snippet of the gorgeous paper from S.E.I.’s Moonrise collection. I made this for my wonderful daughter – it’s classic and beautiful, with just the right amount of dazzle, just like her. Love you, Laila!

The layout and the idea for the debossed rose in the corner are from one of the recent PaperCrafts magazines (always full of inspiration), but I can’t remember offhand which one. The crochet trim is from my stash – it used to be white, but I dyed some of it in coffee a while back so I’d have ecru.

Between the vintage elegance of the lace, the modern lines and glimmer of the foil in the delicious paper, and the texture from the debossing (SU! embossing folder), it really does have a very clean and simple complexity to it (how’s that for an oxymoron?).

I’ll keep this short and sweet – and hopefully be back later in the week with more cards I made with this yummy paper.

Library (Birthday) Card

2010-11-03T20:28:00.001-04:00

Today is my dear friend Oliver’s birthday. I met Oliver years ago when working in a college library. He was a librarian who has long since retired, and I have long since left the library. And it has been a long time since I’ve seen him. But he loves getting my birthday cards, so it’s a good thing I made this long before I got so lazy about crafting and posting!

I had a heck of a time getting the colors right in this picture. The red is not quite as bright as it looks, and the foam letters (Thickers) are black, not bluish. The dots on the side of the pocket are from the Thickers package also. Here’s a shot with the library card out.

I used stamps from several different sets. The Celebrate stamp is from a Cornish Heritage Farms birthday set; the others are from various PTI sets. The card itself was a free download from Heather Nichols. Unfortunately I can’t find the post she attached it to. The houndstooth paper is from the Pink Paislee Bayberry Cottage pad. That and the red herringbone ribbon stapled onto the card are available at i {heart} papers.

I know I’ve been a really bad blogger. No excuses here. I’ll try to be better. Really.

IHP Birthday Bash – Day 2

2010-10-20T03:00:00.000-04:00

Hello and welcome to Day 2 of the i {heart} papers 2nd Birthday Bash! If you missed yesterday’s post, be sure to scroll down to participate in the scavenger hunt/blog hop to earn your 20% off coupon in Kate’s store (and see some really amazing projects from 25 incredible designers!)

Today’s challenge is a sketch challenge from Kate. Here’s my take on the sketch. I used paper from the DeLovely 6x6 pad, and the OCL set Sunshine Cheer. I masked the cloud so the sun would be peeking out from behind it, and airbrushed the oval while it was still in the Nestabilities die with a light blue Copic marker (sorry, I put it away before noting which one it was!) The little bling-y flowers are from the Hero Arts Sparkle Gems Small Blossoms, but there was no orange in the set, so I colored a couple of the yellow ones with an orange Copic marker. Luscious orange silk ribbon accents the middle of the card.

We’d love to have you play along for a chance to win a prize – it’s a super-easy and versatile sketch. Be sure to post your direct link on Kate’s post, either as a comment or in Mr. Linky, and tag your uploads with IHPBB10S.

Tomorrow Deb will be hosting another challenge for you.
Winners for each day will be randomly drawn from the day's challenge entries, and everyone who plays along, either with the challenges and/or the scavenger hunt will be eligible for the grand prize drawing that will close the festivities on Friday.

Additionally, ALL orders placed during the Bash (Oct 19-21) will receive a free goodie bag of surprise merchandise. The more you spend, the bigger your goodie bag!

Also, there will be random drawings for additional prizes from our Paper Craft Planet group members, our mailing list (sign up on the right side of the store’s homepage) and our fans on Facebook. If you are on all three, then you’ve got triple the chances to win!

I do hope you’ll play along. Deadline to enter is Friday morning 3AM EST.

Happy Birthday, IHP!!!

2010-10-19T03:00:00.000-04:00

Hello and welcome to the i {heart} papers 2^nd Birthday Bash blog hop and scavenger hunt! You should have arrived here from Kate’ blog. If you're jumping into the middle (or if you're lost!) be sure to start at Kate's. You don't want to miss a thing!

Today we’re celebrating two great years of IHP and are delighted to have some fabulous guest designers playing along with our talented design team members to bring some birthday paper-crafting inspiration your way! Our design team and guests are revealing their creations for this month's design team challenge--to design the "Perfect Pair"--a birthday card and coordinating gift, tag or other presentation item.

We would love if you would join us in making a Perfect Pair of your own (upload to your blog or an online gallery with the keyword IHPBB10). Be sure to post your link on Kate’s blog so we can see your project and enter your name in our challenge prize drawings.

In addition to today's design team challenge, we've got some fun celebrating in store for tomorrow and Thursday! Don't worry - you won't have to hop every day! Kate will be hosting a sketch challenge tomorrow on her blog, and Deb has another challenge for you on Thursday. Winners for each day will be randomly drawn from each day's entries, and everyone who plays along, either with the challenges and/or the scavenger hunt (more on that below) will be eligible for the grand prize drawing that will close the festivities on Friday.

Submitting your challenge projects is not the only way to win! Tucked into the text of today's blog posts we've provided clues to an easy scavenger hunt (most have to do with our favorite products and tools or hobbies and interests we have) that we invite you to play as you hop. When you find the answer, click the link to visit the store and collect "evidence" that is listed on that particular product’s page and email your complete list, in blog hop order, to Kate when you're finished. You can take your time and stretch the hop over the three days of our Birthday Bash celebration...it's not a race, but like any other sale, the earlier you shop, the better the selection! Deadline to submit your scavenger hunt entry is Friday morning, 3AM EST.

By participating in the scavenger hunt you'll receive an exclusive, one time use 20% off coupon code to use when you shop at i {heart} papers. (This will be emailed to you after the Bash when entries are checked.) You will also be entered for your chance to win the grand prize $50 gift certificate drawing on Friday.

ALL orders placed during the Bash (Oct 19-21) will receive a free goodie bag of surprise merchandise. The more you spend, the bigger your goodie bag!

Also, there will be random drawings for additional prizes from our PaperCraft Planet group members, our mailing list (sign up on the right side of the homepage) and our fans on Facebook. If you are on all three, then you’ve got triple the chances to win!

For my Perfect Pair project, I made a birthday card and matching wine bottle tag. Every birthday should be celebrated with a nice bottle of wine, yes?

The card uses this week’s sketch challenge from Paper Craft Planet. You can’t tell from the photo, but I punched a circle out of an acetate sheet to put on the crystal ball. It’s adhered with Glossy Accents. Oh, and before I covered it, I added some glitz to the presents with Spica glitter pens!
The wine bottle tag is very simple. The same punch I used for the sentiment on the card and for the acetate ball covering was used to punch a hole to slip over the wine bottle.
For these projects I used:
Stamps: OCL Crystal Clear, CGD Birthday Wishes (for the presents)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers, PTI Fresh Snow
Paper: SEI Happy Days, PTI Hawaiian Shores, Melon Berry & True Black
Other: Oval Nestabilities, Bright Green Silk Ribbon, SU circle and scalloped punches, ZVA ADHESIVE DIMENSIONAL SQUARES (HINT, HINT!)

Your next stop on the hop is Cathleen! There's a list of all of the participating designers on Kate's blog just in case you get lost along the way. Happy hopping, and good luck with the scavenger hunt!

Birthday Bunny

2010-10-16T09:00:00.001-04:00

I am such a bad blogger! I don’t know what’s been happening to my time, but I certainly haven’t been using it very efficiently. I can’t keep up with all the blogs I follow any more than I can keep up with my own. Shame on me!

Anyhow, I have a backlog of cards to share, and I’ll start with this one. I used Jen’s SFYTT from last week. I love her sketches – they’re always so inspiring.

The image is from The Cat’s Pajamas set Forget About the Cake and is colored with Copic markers, and the patterned paper is from the Kaiser Craft Hippy Girl collection pad. The greeting is from PTI’s Around & About Sentiments set. I think I used SU! Kiwi Kiss cardstock for the base.

I’ll keep this short and sweet – lots to do today. Enjoy the weekend!

And now for something completely different…

2010-10-02T18:45:00.001-04:00

A huge departure from my usual style in every way! Subdued colors are not the way I roll, but sometimes you have to shake things up. In a subdued sort of way.

There’s no bling on this. At all. The borders that appear to be black are actually chocolate brown. The image, from OCL’s Vintage Traveler set, is stamped in Memento Rich Cocoa on cream cardstock, then sponged lightly with Chamomile ink to “vintage” it up a bit. The delicately delicious paper is from the Gossamer collection by Memory Box.

The one thing that is consistently “me” in this card is that I used another sketch challenge. This time the SCS #300 sketch. I can’t believe they’ve done 300 of them! The format of the sketch and the Eifel Tower just seemed meant for each other. Especially when the sketch is turned on its side.

Well, it’s been a prolific stamping day for me. I think I may be done for today. But maybe not. We’ll see…

Happy WCMD (Part 2)

2010-10-02T16:40:00.001-04:00

Yup, I managed to make another card to share. Sorry, but I’m not sharing the fugly ones.

This is for the SCS Pink Holidays challenge for the month of October. It’s part of their Hope You Can Cling To card drive to benefit the MD Anderson Cancer Center.

I used Papertrey’s Merry & Bright Additions. I stamped the tree with a glue pad and covered it with some pretty fuchsia glitter from my stash. The base of the tree was stamped with Memento London Fog. The part that took the longest was finding the right paper to go with it. I ended up finding it, of all places, in my Basic Grey Lemonade pad. I couldn’t find just the right color ribbon, so I took some light pink taffeta ribbon and colored it with Copic marker RV17. The old (retired?) SU! Purely Pomegranate was a good match to mat the image. Super simple, but cute! And it uses this week’s sketch challenge (yes, I loves me some sketch challenge) from Mercy.

I don’t think I’m done yet, so I may be back again for a record-breaking third post today!

Happy World Card Making Day!

2010-10-02T13:17:00.001-04:00

Yes, my non-stamping Facebook friends who are seeing this, there really IS a World Card Making Day -- and I’m gonna celebrate it to the max!

My first card today is in honor of my friend Lisette, who spent the afternoon here with me yesterday and almost died when she saw this “smooches” stamp – one of her favorite words. So here you go, Lisette – it’s yours next time you come over. :-)

Oh, and it uses this week’s Sketch For You To Try – thanks for another great sketch, Jen!

What I used:
Stamps: Love is Sweet (Taylored Expressions)
Ink: Memento black, Copic Markers (R83, R85, YG93, YG95, E42, E43, W1)
Paper: PTI White, Hey Birdie (Kaiser Craft)
Other: Nestabilities (Labels 13 & Big Scalloped Petite), Light Fuchsia Faux Suede Ribbon, Stickles

Stay tuned – there will be more!

IHP DT Challenge: Treats & Tablescapes

2010-09-21T03:01:00.001-04:00

This month the i {heart} papers design team was challenged to create a project that could be used as a treat or as part of a table setting.
I had been wanting to do something with the clever new Chicken Girl Design Witch Eye Brew image from the September release, so that was my starting point. I needed some kind of candy that resembled eyes, so I went to the drugstore to poke around; I thought for sure one of the candy manufacturers would have some kind of candy eyeballs out for Halloween. Well, maybe they do, but not at my drugstore. But I did see the starlight mints, and my mind started spinning -- they looked like bloodshot eyes!
A couple of punched circles glued onto the wrappers, and they sure were! Now, what to package them in? Something clear so they would show through…
Out came my pillow box die, and I started looking for some heavy acetate sheets. I didn’t have any that I thought would be heavy enough, but I did have some of the acetate card boxes that Kate is now selling in the store. Perfect! I got 2 pillow boxes out of 1 card box. A strip of i {stick} papers holds the box together – the ends are just folded in.
I printed the image out on some Copic Blending Cardstock, sized to fit a 2” wide piece, so I got 4 across the page. Isn’t it cool how you can do that with digital images? It’s colored, of course, with Copic markers. I used more i {stick} papers to hold the image onto the box.
How spooky-cute is that?!!! And really quick and easy!
Go see what the rest of the design team came up with:
Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate
Have yourself a madly creative day!

Playing Along with OCL

2010-09-10T07:14:00.000-04:00

With my newly rediscovered mojo calling to me, I decided to play along with the OCL (Our Craft Lounge) design team for their weekly sketch challenge. I just got this new set and couldn’t wait to use it.

Something just called out to me when I saw this fortune teller chick. I had to have this set, Crystal Clear, and apparently lots of others did too, since Kate seems to have run out of it. However, if you go to her site and request it, she’ll re-order it. Here’s the inside of the card:

I pulled my colors from the oh-so-delicious Olivia 6x6 pad from Basic Grey, which as of this moment Kate does have in stock! The base of the card is PTI Ripe Avocado, with a layer of Melon Berry. The ribbon is black Glimmer Ribbon which Kate also has in stock. You can’t tell from my crummy picture, but there’s lots of sparkle in it! She also carries the Nestabilities that I used to cut the image out. Isn’t cool how I made it look like the fortune teller was inside another crystal ball?

OK, gotta go try and clean up my stampin’ space a little so I can keep the groove going!

I found it!!!

2010-09-09T19:12:00.001-04:00

My mojo, that is. As I suspected, it was buried beneath the layers of stamping detritus that was heaped on my table. Once I had a (relatively) clean space in which to create, it was easy to fall back into the swing of things. Perhaps this will teach me to straighten up after myself. OK, who are we kidding?

Anyhow, I’ve been quite prolific over the last couple of days, but I’ll start out by showing you this simple card. It was inspired by something I saw in one of the Paper Crafts magazines, but I have since forgotten which one.

Please forgive the crappy photo. I have the hardest time getting aqua colors right on the computer, and no amount of image editing seemed to do the trick.

I used paper from S.E.I.’s Happy Days 6x6 pad for instant impact. This paper is soooo pretty – you can’t see all the shiny, glittery accents on it here, so you’ll just have to trust me. The strip with the little white stars is also from that pack, and I ran over the edges with a glitter pen to mimic the glitter in the larger piece. Kate at i {heart} papers has the pad with some custom-made matching buttons.

The greeting stamp is from Papertrey Ink’s Enjoy the Ride set, which you’ll see more of in the coming days. The double punched borders are made with one of the SU! border punches. The cardstock used is PTI Dark Chocolate and Vintage Cream.

I will be back tomorrow with more stampin’ goodness!

Still here…

2010-09-05T11:47:00.001-04:00

My mojo has gone mysteriously missing – I think it’s buried under the mess on my table. I haven’t been able to sit down and create lately – with one exception. This is a card I made for my very wonderful stepmother for her birthday this past week. It uses the special PTI set, Four of a Kind, that was given out at the CHA Supershow in Chicago (with purchase, of course!).

I used the rock’n’roll technique on the larger flowers, inking them first in Summer Sunrise, then rolling the edges in Pure Poppy. The flower centers are embellished with Sage Ultra Fine Flower Soft. The background panel (Ripe Avocado) is embossed with Diamonds and Dots folder; I think it looks a little like a trellis for the flowers. Both the Flower Soft and folder are available from Kate at i {heart} papers.

The greeting and punched oval are from my Stampin’ Up! stash.

One of the many things I’m hoping to accomplish this long weekend is clearing off my table. If I find my mojo under that mess, you can expect to see more posts in the near future!

Happy Labor Day, my friends! Have some fun!

Couch Day?

2010-08-18T19:02:00.001-04:00

While I still had my Wisteria paper out from my previous projects (see this post), I figured I’d use it to make a card for the FTL103 sketch.

I’m not quite sure what a couch day is – probably different things to different people. But to me it spoke to the comfort of having a friend over, sitting and chatting on my sofa (are you reading this, Lisette?), which I haven’t had for a while since my sofa has been covered with stuff for what seems like forever. See, my crafting has taken over my entire living/dining room. No longer is my (used-to-be) dining room table the only place I craft; the coffee table is my secondary spot, where my Big Shot now sits, surrounded by more stuff. Gotta do something about that so I can have friends over again!

Anyhow, I was so happy with the way this came out that I made another one, exactly the same but with different paper for a different feel. This one uses paper from the BG Nook and Pantry pad.
I used Papertrey’s On My Couch set for both, and added a little shading (hard to see here) with my Copic markers.

There’s nothing good on TV tonight, so maybe I’ll do a little straightening up. Maybe.

IHP August DT Challenge – Get Organized!

2010-08-17T03:01:00.000-04:00

This month the i {heart} papers Design Team was challenged to create or alter something organizational. As crafters, we all have lots of I know my table (where normal people would eat, but I craft) is overrun with it. However, my bedroom is also full of stuff. My desk (with my computer) is in there, and my bedside table is always overflowing with books and, well, stuff!

Long ago, in a galaxy far away – oh, wait – different story. Anyway, several years ago I bought a wooden desk organizer at Ikea and have had it on my desk holding various forms of, ummm, stuff. It was a nice, finished wood piece, but I always meant to decorate it. Never did. You know how that goes. Well, now was my chance! I looked through my 12x12 paper collections (this thing is big!) and found the BG Wisteria Collection Pack that I had bought when it first came out. The colors spoke to me. And I realized that they spoke to me because they were the SAME COLORS as my bedroom! And this is what that desk organizer looks like now:

Forgive the creative Photoshop treatment. The sucker was too big to really fit in my light tent.

I only covered the 4 outer sides. It seemed a waste of time, energy and paper to try to line the insides, which wouldn’t be seen much anyway. The two sides have the same large-scale print, and the back has a different coordinating paper from the collection. You’ll have to trust me on that. I used Royal Coat clear decoupage finish to adhere the paper to the box. I like it much better than Mod Podge. I had to patch the paper on the front and back, because the thing is about 13” wide. That’s kinda why I used the striped paper on the front – makes it harder to see the seam.

But I couldn’t just stop there. I also have a (huge and growing) collection of Crystal Light containers of all shapes and sizes that I’ve been saving for some kind of organizational purpose. Or something. They begged to be covered with more of this yummy paper. Et voilá! (or is it voilà? – I’m accent-challenged)

These are 2 containers, the newer oval kind, covered and attached to each other with i {heart} papers’ very own i {stick} papers redline tape. Worked like a charm! I trimmed the shorter one in the front a bit so I could grab my reading glasses out of it more easily. When you’re “of a certain age,” you find yourself with multiple pairs of these drugstore beauties strategically placed (lost) all over your house. At least I’ll be able to find one pair!

You’ll see that not only did I make use of many of the papers in the collection, but I also used some of the adhesive embellishments (um, stickers) from the pack; the plaque and letters on the box are from the collection. So is the circle border piece on the larger cup. The cute little bee on the shorter cup has some Stardust Stickles on its wings.

I had a lot of fun with this! Hope it gives you some ideas. Oh, and Kate still has (as of the moment of this writing) 2 of the Wisteria Collection Packs in the store. Just sayin’.

Now go check out what the rest of the Design Team did with this challenge:

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy
Kate

Enjoy!

did somebody say…

2010-08-11T18:49:00.001-04:00

You know how sometimes you can look at a sketch for inspiration and nothing comes to you? And then you look at the same sketch and POW!, it just jumps right out at you. That’s how it was with the FTL102 sketch on the clean&simple stamping blog. I looked at it all week, and then tonight it just hit me. So here it is:

Now look at the sketch and tell me how I, the queen of martinis, missed that until today:

I wish I could remember where I got this stamp. I went through a phase where I bought every martini-related stamp I could get my hands on. This is unmounted rubber, so I have no idea who makes it. The olives are just made with punches.

Anyhow, I suddenly have the urge for a drink. See ya!

Purple Fuzzy Monster

2010-08-01T23:18:00.001-04:00

I had such a great time in Chicago this past week at CHA. Sure, it’s fun seeing all the new lines and products coming out (and getting free samples), but for me the best part is seeing all the old and new friends that I’ve made through this wonderful world of paper crafting. I wish we didn’t have to wait for these events to get together!

Anyway, while walking the show floor with the i {heart} papers gang, Jannie Ho (creator of Chicken Girl Design stamps) and I stopped at the Our Craft Lounge booth where she was introduced to Sparkly Fluff. I got a sudden inspiration to use one of her monster images with some Sparkly Fluff, and it was the first thing I stamped when I got home. I present to you the Purple Fuzzy Monster. How cute is that?!!!

Here’s a closeup of the monster:

The image is from one of her first sets, Silly Monsters, which is available (and on sale!) in clear stamps, since it was before her line went digital. I colored it with Copic markers before applying the Sparkly Fluff, and added large drops of Glossy Accents to the eyes. I used black cardstock as a base and to mat all the layers. The patterned papers are from S.E.I.’s Black Orchid and Bridgeport lines. I used the Splitcoast Stampers Sketch Challenge #291 for the layout.

I have a vague memory from early childhood of being afraid of a Fuzzy Monster. Or maybe it was my brother. It was many, many moons ago, and you know how memories get warped over time. Anyhow, I don’t think anyone could have nightmares from this cute fella!

Sweet dreams!

IHP July Design Team Challenge

2010-07-20T03:00:00.000-04:00

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?

2010-07-18T17:11:00.001-04:00

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!!!

2010-07-16T07:16:00.000-04:00

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…

2010-07-02T07:10:00.001-04:00

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!

Papertrey June Blog Hop Challenge

2010-06-25T18:43:00.001-04:00

This month's blog hop is all about color, so our challenge is to create a project using our favorite Papertrey color combination. Now, I didn’t realize that this was a favorite combination of mine until I noticed that I had used it in no less than THREE cards recently. And lucky you, you get to see all three of them.

Let’s start with this one. It uses the set Heart Prints. Very simple and classic. I like it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t what Papercrafts magazine was looking for in the last publication call. I still like it.

Next up, another pub rejection. You’ll notice a theme here with 1/4” strips. Everyone who makes layered cards has 1/4” strips laying around. You know you do. Here’s a really cool way to use them. These are some extra butterflies I had left from making this card.

The third card is one I made a little while ago. I don’t think I posted it yet. Signature Greetings again, and Delightful Dahlia. That’s some black Sparkly Fluff in the center of the flower.

Hope you enjoyed the cards and can get some inspiration from my color combination.

Blast From the Past Blog Hop

2010-06-22T11:00:00.000-04:00

I’m excited to be participating in Taylored Expressions’ Blast From the Past customer bog hop. I realized that I haven’t given my TE stamps enough love lately, so this was a great opportunity to play with them. Here’s my card, using the set Doctor’s Orders.

I used papers from the Cosmo Cricket Early Bird collection for the background and the paper-pieced bedspread. The colors kinda fit the optional color inspiration that was included with the blog hop rules:

I didn’t want to add another layer behind the focal image since the background was so busy already, but it needed some definition so I just ran a red Copic marker around the edges of the ovals. And of course I had to add a little bling in the form of red rhinestones.

Here are the entries from the Taylored Expressions Blast from the Past blog hop! Stay tuned for details on how you can sign up for the customer blog hop next month!

1.	Taylor VanBruggen	19.	Alison Anderson	37.	Libby Hickson
2.	Monika Davis	20.	Jessica Willison	38.	Rebecca Ednie
3.	Jen Tapler	21.	JoAnn Valderama	39.	Peggy McCurry
4.	Tracy Clemente	22.	Cassie Trask	40.	Tonya Woodruff-Everett
5.	Carolina Buchting	23.	Margaret de Witt	41.	Barbara Anders
6.	Jackie Pedro	24.	Karen Motz	42.	Jami Sibley
7.	Corinne Reyes Mercado	25.	Candace Mitchell	43.	Pattie Goldman
8.	Margie Cortina	26.	Shelly Cameron	44.	Angela Bear
9.	Bonnie Ratzloff	27.	Charmaine Ikach	45.	Carole Chesser
10.	Tangii Crain	28.	Karen Giron	46.	Ayana Posadas
11.	Jodi Collins	29.	Laurie Schmidlin	47.	Lisa Smeaton
12.	Stacey Schafer	30.	Tammy Hershberger	48.	Colleen Begley
13.	Kerry Johnson	31.	Lorie Ames	49.	Lori Tecler
14.	Tanis Palmer	32.	Ann Kranitz	50.	Rosie Hughes
15.	Kelli Hull	33.	Carolyn Mustopa	51.	Sankari Wegman
16.	Nancy McKinney	34.	Melissa Cooper	52.	Meri McLaughlin
17.	Lisa Hjulberg	35.	Laura Jean Nygaard	53.	Melissa Sauls
18.	Stephanie Kraft	36.	Patti Gingrich

(Collection closed)

Link tool by inlinkz.com

For an Inspiring Graduate

2010-06-20T00:10:00.000-04:00

I may have mentioned that I work at a college. I come in contact with all kinds of students on a daily basis, but I have had the privilege of becoming friendly with one who really stands out. Lorinda is no spring chicken; I know she has a grown son. She has battled almost every kind of challenge, health and otherwise, that you can think of, including two bouts with cancer. Yet she has the most positive, infectiously joyous attitude of anyone I have ever met. She’s an inspiration to everyone she meets. She is my biggest cheerleader in my weight loss journey, swearing she sees changes that even I can’t see.

And she is graduating today – magna cum laude.

This card is simple, but it says everything it needs to say, and it sparkles – just like she does.

The cap is from the set For the Graduate, and the sentiment from Signature Greetings, both by Papertrey Ink. The trailing rhinestones are a piece of a Zva Creative flourish from i {heart} papers. There’s another rhinestone in the center of the cap. I cut the panel a little smaller than the card front and scored it 1/4” on all sides with my Scor-it board.

I’m so proud of her huge accomplishment – even prouder that she’s going on for her Master’s degree in the fall. I wish her all the happiness in the world. But I’m really gonna miss her…

IHP June DT Challenge: Getting “Krafty”

2010-06-15T03:00:00.000-04:00

[BE SURE TO READ ALL THE WAY THROUGH TO SEE SOME EXCITING NEWS!]

The challenge this month was to use one of the Kraft patterned papers that Kate has in the store. There are plenty of them, and I decided to use the Life Stories Collection 2 Pack by My Mind’s Eye. Pretty roses, huh?

Well, you might have noticed that I don’t use Kraft very often. And oh brother (sister), did I ever struggle with this challenge! I played around with an idea I had for 2 weeks and couldn’t make it work. Finally, I had to just toss it and start over again. I used the FTL#94 from Clean & Simple Stamping for my layout.

The focal piece is actually the back of one of the tags that comes with the collection. I messed up the front. Yeah, this was THAT kind of card. I stamped the rose leaves from the Hero Arts set Leaf Prints on the tag, and also on a scrap piece of Kraft paper, with Ripe Avocado ink. I cut the leaves out of the scrap piece and glued them onto the tag. The rose is from an ooooold package of Martha Stewart stickers that have been sitting in my stash for about a century. It was pink, and I airbrushed it burgundy with one of my Copic markers.

I took a length of red crepe ribbon and sprayed it with a brownish Copic marker to bring it a little closer to the color in the paper. Then I ruffled it behind the circle and sprayed some of the same brownish color around the edge to “dirty it up” a little. I don’t know why. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

The greeting is from the Mint Motif set Very Square Sentiments, available only from i {heart} papers.

And speaking of stamps available exclusively from i {heart} papers (here comes the big news), tomorrow begins sneak peeks of the latest Petal Press set called Summer Garden. The Petal Press is BACK (after a brief hiatus) and this new set is the perfect summer set! It’s sweet and elegant and even coordinates with some elements from Happy Harvest!

With the new release comes some new DT faces. They will all have sneak peek samples tomorrow and there will be blog candy up for grabs, so be sure to stop by and comment on all of their blogs for your multiple chances to win, both tomorrow and on release day, June 23.

Please join me in welcoming (or welcoming back) the team. I hope you stop by tomorrow to see their amazing creations! (Note: Tracy will have projects posted all week long leading up to the release.)

The Petal Press Design Team:
Amy
Cathleen
Gretchen
Heidi
Julie
Krysten
Natalie
Tiffany
Tracy – designer
Kate

Now go check out the rest of the “regular” IHP Design Team and see how much better they met this challenge than I did:

Cathleen
Deb
Gretchen
Kendra
Loretta
Lori
Lynn
Megan
Tracy (yes, she’s a busy girl!)
Kate

If you read this far, you deserve a prize. Unfortunately, I don’t have one. But if you read this far, you also know how and where you can try for one. :-)

CASEing Cathleen (yet again)

2010-05-31T16:56:00.001-04:00

When I feel like creating but feel low on creativity, I head to the many blogs I follow for inspiration. So today I went to my Google Reader -- a blessing for simplifying my life, as I follow over 250 blogs at this moment -- and selected just the entries that I had “starred” to find something to CASE. Lo and behold, I found (not a surprise) this card by my wonderful and amazingly talented friend Cathleen. She is so often a source of inspiration to me that I should know to just go straight to her blog!

I loved the simplicity and serenity of her card, and of course the butterflies. And I remembered that I had in my stash, from many years ago, a little pack of Japanese washi papers that would work beautifully with this idea. You can’t really tell from the photo, but the centers of the flowers are metallic gold. It’s just gorgeous, and I only had one 6x6 piece of it.

Allow me, if you will, to share a few tips I used when making this card.

1) When the paper you’re using is expensive and in short supply, use this trick: cut your layers first, then punch or die-cut your shapes from the part that will be hidden behind another layer. That’s what I did with the butterflies and the large panel.

2) This washi paper is very porous, and its surface does not take well to tape-runner adhesives. Remember the mulberry paper that was so popular several years ago? Like that. So I used Mono Multi liquid adhesive. Worked like a charm.

3) I didn’t want to worry about my greeting having to span different thicknesses of layers that would have been caused by layering the large panel over the smaller one. I trimmed the small layer along the left edge so it could just butt up against the large layer. Voila! – one level surface.

What I used:
Stamps: greeting from Delightful Dahlia (PTI)
Ink: Memento black
Paper: Japanese washi paper, PTI white, black, and Spring Moss
Other: butterfly embossing Sizzlet (SU!), self-adhesive pearl lines (Zva Creative)

Hope all of you here in the U.S. enjoyed your 3-day weekend! Back to the grind tomorrow…

Happy Birthday, Sis!

2010-05-30T20:20:00.001-04:00

Today is my “baby” sister’s birthday, and what a beautiful day it was! The weather here in the northeast is just gorgeous – a little on the hot side, but not oppressively so.

We celebrated with a scrumptious buffet brunch at this awesome place in Westchester called Kittle House, courtesy of my dad and stepmom.

And because no occasion is complete without cake, I made some cupcakes. These are chocolate cupcakes, topped with a double dip of chocolate ganache and little fondant rosebuds. But the surprise is that there’s a mini Reese’s peanut butter cup in the center of the cupcake! Yup, I baked ‘em right in. I put them in the freezer first, and then pressed them gently into the top of the batter before sticking the pan in the oven. The part of the candy that didn’t get completely swallowed up by the batter is nicely hidden by the topping. What a happy little experiment that was! Although I confess that I haven’t tried one yet. I hope the cake isn’t too dry – I never used this particular recipe before.

Oh, if you’re wondering about the card, I used PTI’s Lily of the Valley set, copying Nichole’s idea of stamping on kraft and filling in with white craft ink. I found that using q-tips like she did didnt’ give me enough control, though. I had a few Fantastix laying around since forever, and that worked much better for me. The leaves are colored with Copic Markers YG95 and YG97. The butterflies (of course there had to be butterflies!) are punched out of one of the patterns in Pink Paislee’s Bayberry Cottage pad. It was a little too bright for the background, so I toned it down with a W3 Copic. Tiny rhinestones adorn them. Of course.

Hmmm. I think I have enough WW points left for a cupcake. Happy Birthday, sweet sister! This year has GOT to be better than the last!

Color Throwdown #94

2010-05-26T03:46:00.000-04:00

Today’s Color Throwdown Challenge is being sponsored by Kate at i {heart} papers, so I’m using a Chicken Girl Designs digital image that is available exclusively through IHP.

These were a lot of colors to play with, but I think I made it work.

This adorable giraffe image is from the April digital release, and it’s colored with Copic markers (E25, E42, YR18, Y23, YG95, BG10) and cut out with oval Nestabilities. The sentiment is from the CGD photopolymer set Into the Forest. The patterned paper is from PTI Polka Dot Parade pad, and it has 3 of the colors in the challenge. I feel like I should have added something to the yellow panel, but nothing I could think of was working. Oh well.

The other thing that’s bother me is that I used a sketch challenge for this too, and I can’t remember for the life of me which one it was. The ONE time I just follow from my iPod Touch and don’t print it out, I completely lose the reference! The actual sketch used a circle instead of an oval, but otherwise I stayed true to the sketch. If anyone recognizes it, please let me know so I can give credit where it’s due.

Feel free to play along!

Happy Birthday, Daddy-o!

2010-05-24T22:17:00.001-04:00

Today is my sweet Daddy-o’s birthday. He truly appreciates the cards I make. He’s an engineer, so he looks really closely at them to try to figure out how I did everything, and then when he sees me he asks for details! So every card I make for him, I try to make a little better than the last. Oh, the pressure!!!

Anyhow, making masculine cards is always incredibly difficult for me, so gender-neutral is usually about the best I can do. I was itching to use my new Up, Up and Away set from PTI, and this was the perfect occasion. I LOVED the way Maile Belles used the negative space for the clouds, so I took her idea and raised it by one layer. I wanted to use felt for the top layer of clouds, but I didn’t have any – I did, however, have some white fun foam. I absolutely love how it this card came out!

Sorry if the photo looks a little washed out. I had to take the picture quickly and get it into the mail! I hope he got it today.

I paper-pieced the balloons, and punched the border, from papers in the s.e.i. Jocelyn pad. The greeting is from the PTI set Signature Greetings.

Hope YOUR day is fabulous!

Many Thanks

2010-05-20T11:57:00.001-04:00

When I got my box of goodies from Kate at i {heart} papers this week, one of the things I couldn’t wait to play with was the new Cosmo Cricket DeLovely papers. The bright, summery colors and clean designs were just what I needed.

I’ve noticed crafters using their Cricut cutters to cut out words for their cards and scrapbook pages. While this is very cool, I do not own a Cricut, and probably never will. (I know, shocker – a toy I don’t have and don’t think I even need.) But I seemed to remember that one of the alphabet sets (I think it’s called Olivia) that I bought for my Cuttlebug way back when I first got it, had a few words in it. So I dug it out and sure enough, there was “thanks”. Perfect! I would make a set of bright and cheery thank you cards with my new papers. The nice thing about using the die-cut words is that they have enough substance to stand out on even the brightest, busiest papers, as you can see here.

Since I could get 2 cards out of each 6x6 sheet of paper, I made a set of 6. I changed up the layouts a bit for the different papers. Just because I could. Here are pictures of the individual cards, in case you want to see better:

Of course, I had to add some butterflies. I’m hopelessly addicted to butterflies these days! And of course the butterflies needed some bling. I had some Hero Arts rhinestones that came with 4 colors in the pack. I used the fuchsia ones on the bottom card, but for the others I used my black Copic marker to color some clear ones. I love being able to do that – have perfectly matching accents in seconds!

The stamped greetings all come from the OCL set Big Thanks. And the strips are not ribbon – just 1/4” strips of cardstock.

OK, I have the day off again today, so I’m gonna try and take a little walk on this gorgeous day, and maybe make something to show you tomorrow. Have a wonderful day, and thanks for stopping by!

Shabby Chic Baby Girl

2010-05-19T00:10:00.001-04:00

I would tend to describe my papercrafting style as clean & simple, so shabby chic is not something I’ve ever felt comfortable with. Which is why the Shabby Chic CAS Challenge on Splitcoast Stampers kind of scared me. But I had this beautiful Memory Box Gossamer paper from i {heart} papers, and it seemed like a great way to use it. I also took the opportunity to use the Paper Crafts Go-To Sketch Challenge #3 to make this card. Nothing like compound challenges to get the mojo going!

I must say, I kinda like the way it came out. But don’t expect to see a lot of sponging or {shudder} distressing from me!

What I used:
Stamps: Baby Button Bits (PTI)
Ink: Creamy Caramel, Memento Rich Cocoa
Paper: Memory Box Gossamer, PTI White and Sweet Blush
Other: Vintage Buttons (PTI), 1” circle punch

IHP May Challenge: CASEing Kimberly

2010-05-18T03:01:00.000-04:00

As you may be aware, the uber-talented Kimberly Crawford just came out with her own line of photopolymer stamps called Mint Motif, available exclusively through i {heart} papers. To pay homage to this exciting and remarkable achievement, the IHP Design Team was challenged to select one of the many awesome cards on her blog and use it as inspiration for our own.

Now, what I realized when I sat down to tackle this is that the real challenge was picking just one! It soon became clear that a huge percentage of the cards I have been inspired by, whether in blogs or in magazines, have been created by Kimberly. Since I don’t have her new stamps yet (waiting not-so-patiently for mine to come in the mail) I finally settled on this one, from back in March. I loved how she combined the two patterned papers (I do love my patterned papers!), and I love having a way to showcase a special embellishment.

For my card, I used papers from the BG Green at Heart 6x6 pad, and one of the pretty ivory tulle butterflies from IHP. I used a Copic marker (V04) to color it to match the paper. I airbrushed the sentiment panel with YG21 and YG23 while it was still in the rectangle Nestabilities to pick up the greens in the paper as well.

Please go check out the rest of the design team to see what inspiration they’ve gleaned from Kimberly’s creativity.

If you’d like to play along and CASE one of Kimberly’s cards too, please let us know. If you post it to one of the online galleries, you can use the keyword ihp0510 so we can find it.

What I used:
Stamps: All Occasions Messages (Hero Arts)
Ink: Plum Pudding (PTI), Copic markers V04, YG21, YG23
Paper: PTI White, BG Green at Heart
Other: Rectangle & Labels Two Nestabilities, tulle butterfly, linen thread

Yay, Cathleen!

2010-05-16T14:37:00.001-04:00

My friend and fellow IHP Design Team member, Cathleen Torina, is this week’s Featured Stamper over at Splitcoast Stampers. I’m over-the-moon thrilled for her, and she SO deserves it!

The deal is that you pick one of the many amazing cards in her gallery and find one to do over your own way. I think you’re supposed to use a different image, but since I have the image she used on this card, and I’ve had a hard time using it, I figured I’d use her same basic layout (‘cause I loved it so much!) and just change the colors up. I also didn’t use quite as many layers or details as she did.

What I used:
Stamps: Thank You (cling - Hero Arts)
Ink: Memento Black, Copic markers RV06, YG25
Paper: White, 2008 Bitty Dot Basics (PTI)
Other: Buttons and ribbon from PTI, Big Scalloped Petite Borderabilties

I hope you’ll go over and take a look at all of Cathleen’s gorgeous work – she’ll inspire you the way she does me!

Fairy Door

2010-05-15T20:31:00.001-04:00

Up until last weekend, I had barely heard of Fairy Doors and certainly had never seen one. But I was in Ann Arbor last weekend visiting my son and daughter-in-law for Mother’s Day, and as we were walking along S. Main Street my DIL pulled us aside to show us this magical sight:

Teeny-tiny. I don’t think it was more than a foot high! And absolutely perfect in every way.

I believe in fairies.

Bring on the Cake

2010-05-10T03:02:00.000-04:00

Today i {heart} papers is releasing a new batch of Chicken Girl goodness! The May release of the Chicken Girl Designs digital stamps has such fun images that I couldn’t resist pitching in to help introduce them.

This is the Kitty Cake image, one of four being released today. The words are from the Hero Arts set Essential Messages. I just cut them apart and matted them for emphasis. The patterned paper is from the Basic Grey Kioshi 6x6 pad. I ruffled some white silk ribbon behind the focal image using i {stick} papers redline tape. As you can see, I didn’t do a perfect job of it, but I’m learning to forgive myself.

OK, here’s the full May CGD release. Tell me, how can you possibly resist these?!!

Go check out what the Chicken Girl Design Team did with them:

Christy
Loretta
Lori
Tammy
Carlie
Michele
Laura
Kate

And I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the other i {heart} papers design team members have something to show you too.

Now isn’t this a great way to start off the week?

Mint Motif at IHP

2010-05-07T06:26:00.001-04:00

Today is a very special day at i {heart} papers! Yes, of course it’s Friday, but today also begins the sneak peeks for IHP’s newest exclusive stamp line, Mint Motif, designed by Kimberly Crawford. Over the coming week you will see peeks of the two coordinating sets, Very Square and Very Square Sentiments, which will be fully released on the 14th. I’m so excited for Kim, and I can’t wait to get my hands on my own set!

So do you want to see the peeks? Go check out Mint Motif’s fabulous design team:

Kimberly Crawford – designer
Charlene Austin
Latisha Yoast
Geny Cassady
Kazan Clark
Julie Overby
Kate – owner

Have a great weekend!

Happy Anniversary, Laila & Roy!

2010-05-02T14:25:00.001-04:00

Today is my daughter and son-in-law’s second wedding anniversary. Wow, time has gone by so fast! And it’s so wonderful to see how happy they are. My kids have excellent taste in spouses!

Since I am on a butterfly kick these days, I couldn’t resist picking up these gorgeous Martha Stewart stickers when I was wandering around my local paper crafting store last week. And then when I found an amazing pad of K and Co. specialty papers (Que Sera Sera) that went perfectly with them, I had to have that too. It’s very dangerous to wander around that store! I’m gonna have to find someplace else to aim for on my lunchtime walks.

I used one of the sketches from the Verve sketch challenges last month, so it’s only fitting that I used a sentiment from their Anniversary Birds set.

Hope you’re all enjoying your weekend! Wish it could last a little longer…

“New Life” Cake

2010-05-01T19:10:00.003-04:00

I know that most of you who visit my blog come expecting to see cards, but once in a while, for special occasions, I take off my paper crafting hat and put on my cake decorating hat.

Now, I am not a professional baker by any means, but I was honored to be asked by my sister to make a cake for the very special party she threw this afternoon celebrating her triumph over a serious health challenge. Throughout this one-year journey she has shown such strength and courage, and she asked for a cake that symbolized rebirth and renewal. After a great deal of thought, butterflies seemed like the perfect choice.
For those of you interested in the details, the tiers are 12” and 9”. The top tier is butter cake filled with chocolate hazelnut buttercream, and the bottom layer is chocolate cake filled with chocolate ganache, raspberry filling, and fresh raspberries. It’s covered in buttercream flavored fondant. The butterflies are completely edible – edible ink printed on edible wafer paper. I glazed them with a thin coating of piping gel and cut them out, bending them in the center, before they dried completely. They’re attached to the cake with little dabs of piping gel.

By the way, it was an AWESOME party, with a live band, and my super-talented brother jammed with them at the end. And I danced. A lot. And drank a lot of wine. I think I need a hot shower and a nap. OK, maybe a nap first.

Life is good.

April PTI Blog Hop – Tissue Paper

2010-04-25T17:08:00.000-04:00

This month’s theme for the PTI Blog Hop was to use tissue paper. Well, PTI stamp sets come wrapped in tissue paper, and I just so happened to have the paper from my latest order handy. I knew I wanted to make a flower from it, and I wanted to use some the new Dotty Biscotti paper. I almost never use Kraft cardstock, and I think I bought that paper to force myself to use it more.

I folded a piece of the tissue paper up to get a bunch of layers (10-12) and ran it through my Big Shot with the larger PTI Dahlia die. Then I took my Copic airbrush and RV25 marker and tinted the pieces, concentrating on the outer edges and leaving the centers lighter. I poked a hole in the center and held them together with a rhinestone brad, and then scrunched and fluffed them up a layer at a time, from the top downward. Here’s a closeup:

Of course I had to add some more bling to complement the flower center, so I punched out a few butterflies with a Martha punch and added some rhinestones to them.

The layout was inspired by one of the sketches in the new PaperCrafts Go-to Sketches magazine (p.144), but specifically by Kimberly Crawford’s card on p. 145. What a treasure that issue is—so full of inspiration!

What I used: (All PTI unless otherwise noted)
Stamps: Signature Greetings
Ink: True Black
Paper: Kraft, Raspberry Fizz, Dotty Biscotti
Other: Rhinestone brad (SU!), clear rhinestones (Hero Arts), butterfly punch (Martha Stewart)

The Hop starts at 8:00 tonight, and I can’t wait to hop around and see what all the other fabulous stampers did with this month’s challenge!

Wedding Invites

2010-04-24T12:36:00.001-04:00

I just finished up an order of wedding invitations for a super-sweet couple whose guest list kept growing and growing! We started out at 150 and ended up at 190. That’s 190 invitations, folks — not guests. So yeah, I’ve been busy! I do love working with couples on their invitations, though. There’s something really special about making their vision come to life and having a small part in such a special occasion.

Anyhow, here’s the outside. I used Vertico pocket folds from cardsandpockets.com in Champagne. This is the equivalent of Stardream Opal, if you’re familiar with that. The monogram seal was done with circle punches. TIP: I printed the monograms in the cutting borders of the invitation panels to cut down on waste.

This is the invitation opened up. All printing was done on 80# Creamery Felt cardstock, so it has a lovely texture that contrasts nicely with the smooth shimmer of the pocket fold.

The flourish is stamped with Papertrey’s Fancy Flourishes stamps in Brilliance Platinum Planet, which is a shimmery pigment ink that matches the outside of the invitation perfectly. Here’s a close-up:

In case anyone is wondering, I do my invitation layouts with Adobe InDesign. If you have any other questions, please feel free to leave a comment and I’ll do my best to answer.

I hope Christine and William don’t end up spending this whole beautiful day inside addressing and stuffing envelopes. Tomorrow it’s gonna rain!