The Best and Most Beautiful Things…

Happy Friday, all! I am excited about this weekend – I will be taking a class on the Stampin’ Up! My Digital Studio software. I’m not sure I’ll ever really get into digital stamping, but I do play with it occasionally, and I’m really excited about the prospects of being able to resize some of my favorite SU! stamps.  I will report back next week on how it goes!

Today’s card comes with a story.  I made this card from things in my ‘bits box’ of unfinished card parts.  And I put this big wonky bow on it.  I’m not good with bows.  But I got it a little straighter after I took this picture and it looked pretty good so I put it in the ‘finished’ cards box which was sitting on my dining room table.   But then…

My big cat, whom we call “El Gato Malo” (that is Spanish for “The Bad Cat”) likes to lie on the table while I work so he can supervise.  While my back was turned, he fished this card out of the box and took off with it! I chased him down and retrieved it but the bow was a chewed on mess.   I guess he thought it was pretty wonky as well.  I ended up replacing the ribbon with a similar one and the card was salvaged, and honestly it looked better than the original.  El Gato Malo knew what he was doing, I think.  He’s a good supervisor.

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About this card: The sentiment is from an unknown source and is matted with Stampin’ Up! Brocade Blue cardstock.  The background paper is from K & Company and is also matted with Brocade Blue.  The ribbon is from my scraps bin and the cardbase is an ivory cardstock from Bazzill.

Happy Birthday

Hello again! I have a cute card to share today that I designed for my card class at The Haughton House.  We’ll be making this one in the June class.  It’s very easy but very cute – my favorite kind of card

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About this card:  The bike stamp is a clear stamp from We R Memory Keepers Down the Boardwalk product line.  I stamped in in black ink on Bazzill Kraft cardstock and then again on several pieces of colored cardstock.  I used a 3/4″ circle punch to punch out the colored cardstock wheels and pieced them back onto the kraft with dimensional adhesive.  The sentiment from Hero Arts Year Round Sentiments is stamped beneath.   The designer paper at the top is from the BasicGrey What’s Up series, and the black strip is the reverse side of that paper.

CASE the Catalog!

Hello, friends! As promised here is my weekly project inspired by the current Stampin’ Up! Idea Book & Catalog.  On Sunday when my mom was over for Mother’s Day brunch, I handed her the catalog and told her to pick a card for me to CASE because I was running out of ideas! Of course she found four good ones in the first section that I had passed over!

I really liked the layout of this card on page 34…

My version is pretty dramatically different.  It isn’t a Christmas card, and I had to resize some of the elements to fit my stamp.  But the layout is pretty much the same, as is the layered, punched border and sentiment, and the use of a metal clip for embellishment.

I decided to brush up on my aquabrush skills (hah, see what I did there?) since I am planning to teach my card class how to do basic watercoloring for stamping later this summer.

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About this card:  The sentiment and flowers are both from the Technique Tuesday Greenhouse Society 04-12 stamp set and are stamped in Versafine Onyx Black ink.  The flowers are stamped on watercolor paper and then colored using an aquabrush and Distress Ink in Barn Door and Fired Brick.  I then watercolored the background with Distress Ink Iced Spruce, going darker around the edges for a “glow” effect.  I used a green marker to color the tiny bits of green stem, and a gold gel pen dotted in the center of the flowers.  I matted this panel with Stampin’ Up! Early Espresso cardstock.  The red polka dot designer paper is from my scraps bin, and I cut it with a deckle edge blade along with a strip of more Early Espresso and layered them.  The sentiment is stamped on Bazzill Kraft cardstock and is layered over more red polka dot, both are hand cut into a pennant shape.   The gold metal clip is from Making Memories.   The background paper is from the Bo Bunny Olivia collection.

Mother’s Day

Happy Monday, all! I am postponing this week’s “CASE the Catalog” until tomorrow, because today I really wanted to show off the things I made for Mother’s Day! We had a really lovely brunch together, too, but I didn’t take any pictures of that : ) I should have, my scones came out the size of softballs, lol!

First, a card…  I always make a card for my sister Jennifer since she is a mother.  I got the idea from this card from Jennifer McGuire although I used different stamps and markers.   The picture doesn’t show how shimmery it is in person.

The second item to share with you is the card I made for my mom.  I turned again to the Stampin’ Up! Sew Suite set because it just makes me think of her! I received this great patterned paper in a swap awhile back and have been saving it to use on a card for mom.  For this one I did a sort of collage style with all the stamping paper pieced.  These stamps are great for that technique.

And finally a Pinterest inspired bit of artwork as a little gift for Mom, a framed button heart.  The frame was unfinished so I covered it in some pretty paper and then created the heart out of buttons.  Please note that every single button is threaded with linen thread.  Y’all know how I feel about naked buttons!

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About Jennifer’s card:  I stamped the Stampin’ Up! large background stamp Linograph in Versamark on white cardstock and heat embossed it with Ranger white embossing powder.  I colored the paper with a variety of SU! Markers, then sprayed on water mixed with Perfect Pearls powder in Pearl until the colors muddied.   Once dry I matted with SU! Basic Black cardstock.  The sentiment was printed on my PC then hand cut into a pennant shape.  The small hearts are more SU! Basic Black cut on my Big Shot with the Sizzix Fashionable Hearts embosslit die then mounted on dimensional adhesive.

About Mom’s card:  I stamped the Stampin’ Up! Sew Suite stamps onto various scraps of designer paper using Versafine Onyx Black ink then fussy cut them out.  I added buttons from my stash to the button card and wrapped SU! Linen thread around the thread spool.  Some are accented with a little silver gel pen, and I put a silver brad in the sewing machine for a knob. I stamped the sentiment from SU! Something to Celebrate on a scrap that I curled with my fingers and mounted to the sewing machine to mimic fabric.  I used my Big Shot to cut a large circle using the Spellbinders Eyelet die, and mounted my stamped items onto it then adhered that to my card with dimensional adhesive.  The background paper is from a swap and is matted with SU! Basic Black.  I tied on some SU! seam binding in Cherry Cobbler. 

About Mom’s gift:  The unfinished frame came from Michael’s.  I covered it in a paper from American Crafts and used the reverse solid side of that same paper as the background for the heart.  To make the heart I hand drew a large heart on a piece of ivory cardstock and cut it out, then adhered it inside the frame.  I threaded lots of buttons from my stash with SU! Linen thread, then carefully glued them on to cover the ivory heart.  I added a few on top of the first layer to fill in any gaps.

Happy Birthday

In my next class at the Haughton House (May 24) we’ll be learning to dry emboss and die cut using the Cuttlebug.  Dry embossing is one of my favorite techniques to add texture and interest to a card so I’m excited to share it with my class.

This birthday card uses a Cuttlebug Fleur de Lis folder which was inked first to create a faux letterpress look.   We’ll be making this card in our class!

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About this card:  The sentiment from Hero Arts Year Round Sentiments was stamped in Distress Ink Tea Dye on Worldwin cardstock in Sand.  I sponged a little more Tea Dye light around the edges before matting in navy blue cardstock (also Worldwin).  It is adhered with pop dots.   The jute twine I used here is from Reasonable Ribbon, I think.   The back panel is more Worldwin Sand cardstock dry embossed with the Cuttlebug Fleur de Lis folder which had been inked first with Distress Ink Tea Dye.  I added dots of copper Liquid Pearls to the intersected lines created by the dry embossing.  After trimming  I sponged a little bit of Distress Ink Vintage photo around the edges, then matted with more navy blue cardstock and mounted on an ivory card base.

You’re Invited

Every year for Mother’s Day I do a nice brunch for my mom and my sister, and I like to send them a fancy invitation to make it extra special.

This year I wanted the invitations to look like silverware folded in a napkin with a pretty napkin ring.

The silver band slides off and the “napkin” opens to reveal the sentiment.  I printed the brunch date and time details on my PC and adhered them to the back of the card so the inside and front stay clean and simple.

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About this card:  The silver metallic cardstock is from Worldwin and is dry embossed with a Cuttlebug embossing folder.  The cardbase is a modified gatefold, I intentionally overlapped the edges to give it more of a napkin look.  The silverware from Stampin’ Up! Compliments to the Chef is stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with Ranger silver detail embossing powder, then colored lightly with a metallic silver colored pencil.  The sentiment also from Compliments to the Chef is stamped and embossed in silver, and matted with more silver metallic cardstock.

Happy Birthday

I have a cute birthday card to share today that is loosely based on an OWH sketch, #105.   This card will go in my Operation Write Home box – which is getting kinda full, so I need to pack it up and ship it out soon!

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About this card: The sentiment from Stampin’ Up! Elementary Elegance stamp set was stamped in SU! Chocolate Chip ink on a scrap of ivory cardstock.  I punched it into a circle and layered it over a punched scallop circle of SU! Cameo Coral cardstock.  I used a Viva Decor pearl pen to add pearls to the scallops and then adhered this piece with dimensional adhesives. The vertical background strip is designer paper from Making Memories hand cut into a pennant shape then layered over strips of SU! Cameo Coral that were border punched with the scallop trim punch.  The polka dot background is more Making Memories paper and the mat is SU! Brocade Blue cardstock. 

CASE the Catalog Monday!

Happy Monday, all! I have a ”just because” card to share today that is inspired by a project in the current Stampin’ Up! Idea Book and Catalog.   I also want to remind you that May 28th will be my last card in this CASE the Catalog series – the new SU! catalog comes out on June 1st and since I am ready to move on to a different project, that seems a good time to end this one.

I was inspired this week by a Christmas card found on page 36 of the catalog.

I liked the layering of the elements and the layout… but I changed the stamps and of course the color palette.  And since my sentiment was “Cherish” I decided to put a little punched heart instead of a rhinestone embellishment in the center of the medallion.

I had a really hard time photographing this card, too.  I wanted to show the metallic gleam of the copper embossing, but it was hard to do that without washing out the ivory and pink.  In person the pink is a bit stronger and the horizontal strip is dry embossed with tiny little hearts that don’t show up in the photo.

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About this card:  The sentiment is from the Stampin’ Up! set Baroque Motifs and is stamped in SU! Chocolate Chip ink on a scrap of ivory cardstock.  The Medallion stamp from SU! was stamped twice – once on the SU! Chocolate Chip card base and again on ivory cardstock – in Versamark and heat embossed with copper detail embossing powder.  I cut out the central circle of the ivory piece and layered it with dimensional adhesives over my ivory sentiment panel and the embossed card base.  The horizontal strip is SU! Blush Blossom cardstock, which is dry embossed with the SU! Adorning Accents embossing folder and then die cut with the SU! Adorning Accents Edgelits die.  I diecut a second strip from more Chocolate Chip cardstock to layer beneath.  The small punched heart is also Blush Blossom cardstock and is on dimensional adhesive. 

In My Thoughts

Hello, friends! Got another card made for the OWH “Be a Rebel” Virtual Cardmaking Party! Yvonne’s challenge for us was to use bright colors on a card.

I went to Pinterest again for my inspiration, and here’s what  I ended up with…

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About this card:  The sentiment stamp was borrowed from a friend (no idea who makes it, sorry) and is stamped in Stampin’ Up! Chocolate Chip ink.  The leaves are from the We R Memory Keepers stamp set “Botanicals” and are stamped in Close To My Heart Key Lime ink.  The horizontal strips are random designer paper scraps.  The button is a paper button made with the Sizzix “Sweet Buttons” Embosslits die and more scrap designer paper.  The linen thread is from SU! and the card base is SU! Chocolate Chip cardstock.  I used a We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper to round the top two corners of my Hammermill white cardstock panel.

I Miss You

Back this morning with another card for the ongoing OWH “Be a Rebel” Virtual Cardmaking Party!  This morning’s challenge from Beth is to use a die cut on a card.

I was in a clean and simple mood this morning and I wanted to CASE a card I saw on Pinterest, so I came up with this…

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About this card: The leaves are a Sizzix die – I cut my white cardstock twice and glued them together for strength before putting it on pop dots.  The black polka dot paper is a random scrap.  The sentiment is from Close To My Heart (A1045) and is stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with Ranger gold detail embossing powder.  The white cardstock is all Hammermill.  The narrow black ribbon was a gift from a friend.