Bandana Birthday

My monthly techniques group meets this week and I decided to pull out an older technique to show them. 

Birthday card featuring the Bandana Technique with the Flowering Flourishes stamp set (126367) and sentiment from Perfectly Penned (122892).

The Bandana Technique has been around a while, but I haven't done it with this group yet, so I thought it was about time!  I designed this card with a decidedly country flavour.

This technique works best with flourish or paisley stamp images.  I opted to use the Flowering Flourishes set which, I have to say, works pretty well! Here is a quick rundown of the products I used:

• I stamped the largest image from Flowering Flourishes on Real Red card stock using black Staz On ink.  
• I added the white highlights to the stamped images using my White Stampin' Chalk Marker (132133)...sooo much easier to use than a white gel pen!  That one's a keeper!!
• I sponged the edges of the bandana layer with Real Red ink.
• The denim-looking background is just a piece of Midnight Muse Core'dinations card stock.  I lightly sanded the entire surface of the textured side...instant denim!
• I added a bit of burlap trim and little button brads from the Vintage Trinkets (118764)
• I also added little knots of twine to the sentiment label.

Sometimes its fun to pull out older technique and try them in a fresh new way.  Its also TONS of fun to try brand new techniques and have we got a great one over at The Technique Twist tomorrow!  Stay tuned...

Step it Up!

Today I want to show you how easy it is to take an inpiration design and step it up to make it your own.  First I want to show you a card I CASE'd that was originally designed by Tammy Fite:

Masculine birthday card featuring the Collage Curios stamp set with sentiment from Perfectly Penned

This is an exact copy of Tammy's card.  Now here is my stepped up version...

Stepped up version:  changed to landscape orientation, embossed background, added more ribbon and crushed Soda Pop Top

Whaddya think?  Cool, eh?  I love the addition of the crushed Soda Pop Top with the stamped images in the middle.  It just  take the design to a whole new level!  I challenge you to try stepping up a design that inspires you...you'll be amazed at what you come up with!
This card is one of the samples that will be available for my Spring Fling card buffet coming up this weekend!  For more information click HERE. There are still seats available for both the Friday evening  and Sunday afternoon time slots.  Call or email today to reserve your spot!

Heartfelt Thanks

Today I want to show you the card I designed to thank the parents and volunteers who helped my colleague at school and I stage our last-minute concert last Friday.  Those of you who have children in school in Ontario know that things are a bit of a mess right now so we were forced to move the date of our Christmas concert up almost a week.  The show was wonderful and we have many parents to thank for their help behind the scenes.  Here is the card we'll send to each one:

Thank you card featuring the Festival of Prints DSP and sentiment from Perfectly Penned

 Because we have almost as many men as women helping us out I wanted the cards to have a masculine flavour.  I chose to use the woodgrain TIEF with the Core'dinations card stock in Early Espresso.  I die cut a heart from the music notes pattern in the Natural Compositions in honour of my students who performed beautifully on Friday evening.  The sentiment is die cut using the Apothecary Accents Framelits and adhered with dimensionals.  A simple card to express so much gratitude!

Monday Morning Blues

I really dislike Mondays.  Especially after a busy weekend where I feel like I had no down time.  Ah well, the show must go on, as they say, and so must the school year, so off to work I go.  Before I do, I want to share a project with you that was inspired by one of the Make-n-Takes at Hamilton Regionals last month.  I blogged about it here, so you can see the original version of this project.  Here is another take on it that we did as one of the Make-n-Takes at my team meeting this month.

Vellum Note Card Pouch...love that stitched satin ribbon that is FREE right now with a $50 order!

Note cards and envelopes featuring the Everything Eleanor and Perfectly Penned stamp sets.

Isn't that a great little gift set?  I loved the vellum pouch idea from Regionals and also the single layer, stamps-and-ink-only design.  I really wanted to replicate that to show you that you don't need a ton of supplies to make something beautiful.  I used the Note Cards and Envelopes, stamped with three different colours of ink: Sahara Sand, Pool Party and Midnight Muse and used an image set and a sentiment set.  The possibilities for this project are just about endless!  The best part is that because you get 20 note cards and envelopes in a package you could make up five sets like this for just $7.50.  Talk about an economical gift idea!  I can tell you Max's teachers are going to be getting some of these little beauties come Christmas this year!
Have a great Monday and a good week everyone!

Fall Collage

Sometimes I love challenging myself to create cards that keep to the basics of stamp, ink and paper.  Today's project is the result of one of  my attempts at keeping it simple (ish):

Simple card featuring the French Foliage  and Perfectly Penned stamp sets.

Pretty basic, huh?  I deviated from my usual fall colour choices and incorporated some equally fall'ish but less used colours:  Always Artichoke, Bravo Burgundy, More Mustard, Soft Suede and Cajun Craze.  I have to say that I think this was the first time in over a year that my Bravo Burgundy ink pad has seen the light of day!  Anyhow, I die cut one of the labels from the Apothecary Accents set from a post-it note and used it as a mask in the centre of the card to leave a space for my sentiment and then I went to town stamping the images from the French Foliage set and then sponging using Crumb Cake and Soft Suede inks.  When I removed the mask I stamped the sentiment in Soft Suede in the centre of the label shape.  I could have left it at that  but I just had to add a little something  else and cross-stiched the little "X"'s at the points of the label.  Just a little something extra by way of subtle embellishment.  I layered the panel on a piece of Bravo Burgundy card stock and then mounted it on a Very Vanilla card base.  Super simple and easy to do!

Autumn Birthday

This week my monthly techniques group meets.  Today I want to show you one of the projects we'll be doing.  Have a look:

Fall Birthday card featuring the French Foliage stamp set with sentiment from Perfectly Penned.

Inside view with sentiment from Bring on the Cake.

I so love Fall colours!  This design was inspired by a bunch of negatives I had leftover from my cutting leaves using my new Autumn Accents die.  I thought it might be cool to use the negative shapes as stencils to sponge a background and so I went to work. I used my sponge daubers to apply ink inside the stencil.  For the maple leaf I used More Mustard, Cajun Craze and Cherry Cobbler.  For the oak leaf I used More Mustard and Soft Suede.  For those of you wondering how I did the layer behind the sentiment label, check out my Tutorials page for a quick how-to.  This card came together easily and I really like the result!  I hope my class participants do too!

Just a quick reminder to enter my giveaway for a free month's subscription to Craft Project Central by leaving a comment on any post dated August 5th - 12th.  The winner will be announced on the 13th...it could be you!

So Many Reasons to Smile

Reason #1...we have a winner!  The winner of the free month's subscription to Craft Project Central is

Sandy U!!

Congratulations, Sandy...I'll be in touch about how you can access your free subscription...enjoy!

Reason to smile #2:  You can purchase the beautiful, limited edition Reason to Smile stamp set for just $5 when you place a $60 order this month.  How sweet is that?  To show you just how gorgeous the images in this set are, I'm going to be featuring several projects using that set over the coming week.  I hope you enjoy them!  Here's the first...a really quick and easy card:

Simple Thank you card featuring the Reason to Smile stamp set with sentiment from Perfectly Penned.

Pretty simple and straightforward, eh?  Gerber daisies are one of my favourite flowers, so it was only natural that I fall in love with this stamp set.    This card literally took me less than 10 minutes to make...gotta love quick and easy designs for when you need a card in a hurry.  Speaking of which, I have some work to do today design the projects for my upcoming events this week.  I hope today holds some stamping time for you too!  Enjoy!!

More Fabric Fun

Today's post is based on a layout shown by Shelley Gardiner (Stampin' Up's co-founder and CEO) during one of her presentations at last year's convention.  Shelley's version used Spice Cake fabric and was fall-themed but I decided to give this birthday card more of a spring-feel.  See what you think...

Birthday card featuring Twitterpated designer fabric and the Perfectly Penned stamp set.

Inside view with sentiment from the Blessings from Heaven set.

Whaddya think?  I designed this card for my team meeting last month.  If you'll recall we were looking at ways to incorporate fabric into our projects and this one is a REALLY way easy to add a pop of colour and texture.  Here is what I did:
Starting with a piece of confetti white cardstock I spritzed it with blushing bride Smooch (from the Occasions Mini).  This is by far my favourite Smooch colour yet!  So quick and easy to use and such a great effect!  Setting that aside to dry, I stamped the sentiment in island indigo on a piece of scrap confetti white cardstock and then tore it out, attempting the keep the image relatively centred.  I then sponged the torn edges using both blushing bride and island indigo ink.  Going back to my spritzed cardstock, I distressed the edges using the tool from my cutter kit.  I then cut a 3" square of Big Shot Multi-Purpose adhesive sheet.  That stuff is the BEST adhesive for adhering fabric to your projects.  Easy to use and in-expensive too!  I adhered one side of the double-sided sheet to the centre of the card and then peeled off the backing to reveal the very sticky adhesive.  I then tore strips of Twitterpated fabric and layered them over the adhesive, again attempting to centre them somewhat.  I layered the stamped sentiment overtop using Tombow multi-purpose liquid glue.  The last touch was one of the big designer buttons I picked up from the Clearance Rack and threaded with a bit of island indigo ruffled ribbon. 
On the inside of the card I wanted to incorporate the fabric somehow and so I tied a narrow strip into a knot and added it as a detail in the upper left corner.  The sentiment, one of my favourites, is from the Blessings from Heaven set in the main catalogue and is stamped in island indigo on confetti white cardstock.
Another quick and easy card using our fabulous fabric...have you ordered yours yet?

Another class preview

Yesterday I showed you one of the cards for my September class featuring the Vintage Vogue stamp set.  Today I have another for the same class that uses the Very Vintage wheel as well.  It also uses my new favourite DSP:  Mocha Morning!

Sneak peek at September's monthly class projects using Vintage Vogue and Perfectly Penned stamp set and Very Vintage wheel.

This card comes together far more quickly than the one I showed you yesterday!  It really is quite simple, but that gorgeous Mocha Morning paper makes it so elegant!  I honestly see A LOT of that paper in my stamping future!  I also love the WOW that the lace border punch offers...so pretty when punched from brushed gold cardstock and threaded with black satin ribbon!  Ok...that's all the hints I'm going to give!  If you want to know more, come on out on September 13th and make this and two other cards with me!

September Monthly Class Sneak Peek!

Believe it or not, I am already into planning my classes and events for September!  I know it seems early, but my monthly card class happens on the second Tuesday of every month and with school starting, I know the first week is going to be nutty!  So, since my featured stamp set next month will be Vintage Vogue, I started playing with ideas to use that set.  It is one that I've had for a while but haven't inked up in quite some time.  So, here is the first card I came up with.  It is based on the sketch from the Paper Players this week...see what you think!

For PP57:  September's Monthly Card Class Preview using Vintage Vogue and Perfectly Penned stamp sets and Beau Chateau DSP

So, whaddya think?  I really didn't set out to make a shabby-chic card, but that's kinda how it turned out!  There is a lot of fussy cutting in this one, so my class attendees will need their favourite pair of paper snips.  Don't you just LOVE the Beau Chateau DSP pack?!?  It is so pretty and feminine I can't get enough of that paper!  Good thing I can stock up with the BOGO (or rather BTGO) event this month!  I'm not going to give the deets for making this one...you'll just have to come and take my class on September 13th!  Its posted on my website events page HERE...you can even RSVP right from that page!  I hope you can join us...did I mention you also have the option to purchase the Vintage Vogue set at a discount if you attend this class?  That's right...every month I feature a different set and offer it for purchase at a discount for all class attendees.  Plus, if your order is $40 or more you get to take the class FOR FREE!!  See, now there's even MORE reason to join us!  Click on over to my Stampin' Up website and RSVP today!

Forever Young

Last night I sat down to make a birthday card for a colleague and friend who is turning 40 in a couple of weeks.  I wanted to use the Timeless Portrait DSP from the new catty.  I just love the rich colours and bold patterns in that paper!  I also wanted to create something for this week's challenge at Friday Mashup because I haven't played along in a while and I miss it!  The challenge is to create a birthday card using the following colours:  cherry cobbler, not quite navy, always artichoke and sahara sand.  Well, the birthday card part wasn't a problem, but because I was using the DSP, I had to substitue some colours:  not quite navy became island indigo, always artichoke became river rock and sahara sand became very vanilla.  I also added black to make everything pop.  So, here is my card...

Birthday card for FM16 using the Forever Young, Word Play and Perfectly Penned stamp sets and featuring Timeless Portrait DSP.

This is an easel card that folds flat and fits in a standard envelope!

The Forever Young set is another one that I knew I just HAD to have when I first saw the new catty.  I love that image of the tree with the swing.  So calm and peaceful...I remember being that little girl, swinging away without a card in the world...Sorry!  I got a little nostalgic there for a second!  That's what I'm hoping happens when my friend opens this card on her 40th birthday:  a little nostalgia and happy memories.  I'm not going to go into detail about how to create this card (it took a while!), but I will list all the  new products I used:
Timeless Portrait DSP, lace ribbon  border punch, stripes embossing folder, island indigo in-colour cardstock, Forever Young and Perfectly Penned stamp sets.  Whew...that's a lot of new product on one card!  Can you tell I'm loving all the new goodies???
On a completely different note, don't forget to take my survey (link is at the top of the left-hand column on this page) for a chance to win a $40 gift certificate.  The survey closes this Sunday, so don't miss out!