Circle Circus?!

I had almost forgotten I owned this stamp set!  It is one of the few wood mounted stamp sets I have left.  I keep those in a drawer and always forget what I have in there. It's one of my favorites for making my own dsp so that is what I decided to do today for the challenges at The Paper Players and colourQ.

I loved these colors but I don't have the retired ones so I substituted in Pool Party and Pacific Point.  Circle Circus is such a great set because there is no way to mess up with it!

This card was so simple and I love the way it turned out!  I simply stamped the Circle Circle images all over the Whisper White cardstock and then used a circle punch to punch out the window for the sentiment. I cheated for the sentiment and stamped it on a scrap of Pool Party and then adhered it with Dimensionals. I knew there was no way I would get it lined up perfectly by just stamping it on the card base!  The Pacific Point panel is embossed with the Honeycomb Embossing Folder and then I used a Window Frames Framelit to punch out a frame for the sentiment window.  So simple!

 

Stamp Sets: Circle Circus, Word Play

Cardstock: Pool Party, Pacific Point, Whisper White

Ink: Pool Party, Pacific Point, Midnight Muse, Summer Starfruit

Tools: Circle Punch, Honeycomb Embossing Folder, Window Frames Framelits

Accessories: Rhinestone, Dimensionals



ATSM Stamps!

It's time for another challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More! and the theme this week is stamps.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  You just have to use stamps on your project.  They can be rubber stamps, clear stamps, digis...it doesn't matter as long as you use stamps!  Doesn't get much easier than that now, does it? :)

This week our fantastic sponsor and Guest Designer is JOANNA MUNSTER FROM INSPIRED BY STAMPING

Joanna is offering this prize to the winner of this challenge -

$20 GIFT VOUCHER

I chose the colors from Create with Connie and Mary for my card this week.  I thought they were so bright and cheery, which I could really use this time of year!

I knew I wanted to use Everything Eleanor because I am in love with those flourishes. After I stamped them and then stamped the doilies I thought it would look great embossed so I chose the Elegant Lines Embossing Folder.  It really coordinated nicely!  The circle behind the sentiment is pierced for some more added texture.  And of course the Seam Binding ribbon is ruffled. I love all of the texture on this card!  It looks detailed but it was actually quite simple. My favorite type of stress-free card. :)

Make sure you check out the other stamp creations at ATSM and link yours up for a chance to win too! Can't wait to see what you all come up with!

ATCAS Masculine

It's time for another challenge at Addicted to CAS and this week's challenge is sponsored by

  Andrea over at Annabelle Stamps!!

Andrea has offered a $10 discount voucher at her store!!

 

The code word this week is one that I struggle with!

Masculine cards are so hard for me!  I guess I am just a frilly girl at heart and I like to use flowers, doilies and soft, feminine colors. lol I used some challenges at clean&simple and The Play Date to help me out a little bit.

 

If you are ever stuck with a card, it really does help to pick out some challenges to work from. Even if you are too late to enter the challenge or have no plans on entering the challenge, it really does help to have somewhere to start!  As soon as I saw this sketch I immediately knew I wanted to put a clock there where that circle image is.  And the little gears were perfect for underneath the sentiment strip.  I finished my card off with a little spritzing.

 

Stamp Sets: Clockworks, Daring Adventure, Delightful Dozen

Cardstock: So Saffron, Whisper White

Ink: Basic Gray, Not Quite Navy, So Saffron

Tools: Corner Rounder, Color Spritzer

Accessories: Dimensionals

The return to stress-free stamping

I realized today that I have so much more fun stamping when I make it stress-free!  By that I mean, not so many supplies, not so many layers. Just a clean and simple card.  That's really what I need to get back to if I am going to keep my promise of blogging at least 4 cards a week!  I had a lot of fun making this quick and simple card using the challenges at colourQ and retro sketches.

I really love those colors and at first thought I would make a masculine card but then decided I wanted to use one of my new stamp sets from the Spring Catalog instead, Oh, Hello.  I love the big sentiments in this set.

Hard to tell from my poor editing, but the upper left hand corner is spritzed with Crumb Cake ink. It looked a little bit too clean after I had it all stamped. :) The sentiment is stamped one time at full strength and twice after being stamped off. I did use the Stamp-a-ma-jig, although it doesn't really look like it on the left!  Oops!  I made sure the little banner in the corner hangs over the edge of the card just enough that it still fits in a standard-sized envelope.  Gotta pay attention to those little details! ;)

 

Stamp Set: Oh, Hello

Cardstock: Always Artichoke, Crumb Cake, Whisper White

Ink: Always Artichoke, Cherry Cobbler, Crumb Cake, Pool Party

Tools: Stamp-a-ma-jig, Color Spritzer



Getting back in the Game

I've starting posting a little bit more frequently and feel like I'm back in the game a little bit. Just a little though. I know I am still missing out on some great challenges!  Today I chose the challenges from Dynamic Duos and Mojo Monday.



I really liked this color combination and I had to use the dessert option since I now have this wonderful Clouds Embossing Folder!

That little booger of a boot took me forever to get right!  I tried coloring it with markers, watercolor crayons and aqua painters and none of those looked very good!  So I ended up stamping it on Tempting Turquoise AND Whisper White cardstock. Then I cut out the clouds from the WW and glued them onto the TT. That was a lot of fussy cutting but it looks sooooo much better than the coloring!  After all that work, I made the rest of my card fairly simple, for my sake and the sake of the card. lol

Stamp Sets: Bootiful Occasions, Rain or Shine
Cardstock: Basic Black, Tempting Turquoise, Whisper White
Ink: Black StazOn
Tools: 2 1/2" Circle Punch, Wide Oval Punch, Clouds Embossing Folder
Accessories: Black Dotted Scallop Ribbon, Dimensionals, Rhinestone Basic Jewels

ATSM Vintage

It's time for another challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More! and the theme this week is vintage.

This week our fantastic sponsor and Guest Designer is JOANNA MUNSTER FROM INSPIRED BY STAMPING

Joanna is offering this prize to the winner of this challenge -

$20 GIFT VOUCHER

I was actually way ahead of the ballgame on this one because I accidentally did my card for January 19th instead of February 19th.  Oops! Vintage is not really my thing, so I chose a stamp set that I thought would work well with vintage.

When I think of vintage I always think distressing so I did a lot of that on the DSP by sanding it, wetting it, sponging it with ink and crumpling it. The back DSP is also embossed with the Chevron Embossing Folder, my favorite masculine folder. 

Make sure you check out the other vintage creations at ATSM and link yours up for a chance to win too!  Can't wait to see what your interpretation of vintage is.

Sale-a-Bration Time!

This is one of my favorite times of the Stampin' Up! year!  For every $50 you spend, you get to pick a free item out of the SAB brochure. There are even more rewards for spending $150 and for having a workshop, so it is a great time to spend. There is also an amazing special for signing up to be a demonstrator during this time, so contact me if you would like more information!

The challenge over at SUO Challenges was perfect for me...Create something using an item out of the SAB brochure. I happen to have a few...or more. lol  I had an idea in my head that used a lot of embossing folders, which was perfect for the challenge at Black Tie Fridays!  I forgot to link up my card there last week so I made sure to get this one done early. :)

I just love this DSP from the SAB brochure. It is so bright and cheery. And of course I had to use the coordinating buttons and ribbon!  I threw in the embossing folder and new stamp set too!  This has to be one of my favorite SAB brochures ever. I love everything...except the one with the telephone booth. That one is not quite my style. :) I'm glad they have something for everyone though!

It sure would have been nice to have that little butterfly punch for my card but that got pushed back to my next order that is going in this week. You can't have everything all at once!  Well, at least I can't!  Maybe if I was still teaching but now that I am a stay-at-home-mom/baby sitter I am not bringing in that much dough! It all works out though because if I was still teaching I wouldn't have as much time to play with all those goodies so I am happy with what I can afford!

 

Stamp Set: Bloomin' Marvelous

Cardstock: Whisper White

Ink: Island Indigo, Pool Party, Summer Starfruit, Tangerine Tango

Tools: 1" and 1 1/4" Square Punches, Chevron EF, Perfect Polka Dots EF, Vine Street EF

Accessories: Sycamore Street DSP, ribbon and button pack, Large Rhinestones, Dimensionals



 

A Confession

Yes, I have a confession. An addiction, really. I am addicted to Words with Friends on Facebook and it has taken time away from my crafting. You might be laughing but it is true! I used to post every single day, sometimes two and three times a day. Now I am lucky to get the cards done for the design teams I am on!  I am really going to cut back on my game time and try to focus on my cards and scrapbooking. My goal is to make at least 4 projects a week for right now and hopefully add to that in the future. We shall see how that goes. :)  I decided to ease my way back in with a simple card for CASology, The Friday Mashup and CAS(E) this Sketch. 

The challenge at the Friday Mashup was to use markers in some way and texture.  I, of course, pulled out my favorite marker tool, the Color Spritzer!

I love the dotted clouds on this embossing folder!  I spritzed a background with Marina Mist and then ran a second sheet of Whisper White through so I could cut out some white clouds and pop them up on dimensionals.  

 

Stamp Set: Rain or Shine

Cardstock: Chocolate Chip, Real Red, Whisper White

Ink: Chocolate Chip, Marina Mist, Real Red

Tools: Clouds Embossing Folder, Color Spritzer

Accessories: Dimensionals

ATSM Bingo Challenge!

It's time for another challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More!  This is one of my favorite challenges, a bingo challenge!

 

This week we are sponsored by

Clear Dollar Stamps

There is an amazing range of goodies over here! The wonderful Cassie is offering the winner of our challenge an amazing $15 gift voucher!!!

 

I decided to go straight down the middle and use red, free, and pearls. I chose ribbon for my free space. I actually started by making a digital card and then used that to design a similar card with cardstock and all the fun goodies!  I love the ease of MDS2+ but I still love having all of my 3D embellishments too.  Here is the digital card that I designed:

I liked the look of the black card base with the red splatters on my computer, but that was going to be hard to do with my "real" supplies, so I opted for a white card base spritzed with black and red ink.

I think that MDS2+ is going to be great for me to design cards while I am away from home!  While I don't have everything that is in the program, I found that it is fairly simple to substitute items, like I did with the die shape, card base and sentiment.

Stamp Sets: Hearts a Flutter, Seasonal Sayings
Cardstock: Whisper White
Ink: Basic Black, Black StazOn, Real Red
Tools: Oval Accents Bigz Clear Die, Color Spritzer
Accessories: Brights DSP Stack, Pearls, White Taffeta Ribbon

ATCAS Candy!

It was my week to choose the code word at Addicted to Clean and Simple and here is what I chose:

I did not realize this, but not all countries use the word candy!  I am so sheltered. :)  So, if you don't have candy in your country you can use any sweet, chocolate, lollie, treat, whatever you want to call it! :) 

We have an awesome sponsor again for this challenge. Please let me introduce you to

Beverley from Uniko Studio

Beverley has been kind enough to offer a fabulous prize - digis from her store!

You can find her awesome selection

 

I decided to use the color combination from colourQ on my card. I just love it when Blogger decides it doesn't want me to resize my objects! Not really! lol

 

 

Funny that I chose candy as my code word because I don't really have any candy stamps.  Sweets for the Sweet is pretty much my only one, but I already used that one on a challenge here so I wanted to do something different.  I decided to make a little jar full of candy conversation hearts. I hate those things but they make a cute little decoration on a card! :)

 

I love using the jar from Perfectly Preserved with our vellum cardstock.  I found the best way to adhere the hearts (or whatever you are putting in your jar) is to cover the front of them with our Sticky Sheets and stick them right to the back of the jar. This way you can tell exactly where to put them and make sure they are inside the lines of the jar.  I used the Diagonal Plate for the Simply Scored to do my background and sponged it with Pink Pirouette ink. I always seem to use my embossing folders and forget about Simply Scored! 

 

Stamp Sets: Perfectly Preserved, Tiny Tags

Cardstock: Pink Pirouette, Whisper White, Vellum

Ink: Cherry Cobbler, Melon Mambo, Pink Pirouette, Tangerine Tango

Tools: Cannery Set Framelits, Heart Punch (retired), Simply Scored and Diagonal Plate, sponges

Accessories: Cherry Cobbler Baker's Twine, Dimensionals

 

ATC&S Make Your Mark

It's time for another Make Your Mark marker challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More!  The challenge is to use markers on your project, in any way you want to.  I combined this challenge with the sketch at Fab Friday and the theme challenge at Black Tie Fridays.

 

I used the markers three different ways on my card.  I first used the Color Spritzer to spritz the card base with Island Indigo ink.  For the large snowflakes, I first inked them with Bashful Blue ink and then used my Island Indigo marker to add a second color directly to the stamp.  I used the same technique on the smaller snowflakes, except I first inked them with Island Indigo ink and then colored on the stamp with my Basic Black marker for the two-tone effect.  For the sentiment, I used markers to color each letter individually.  I am not much on fussy coloring of detailed images, so these techniques for markers work great for me!

I used another one of my favorite techniques for adding glitter to the whole image panel. After I die cut and stamped the image, I covered it with a Sticky Sheet then poured Dazzling Diamonds over it. This is a great way to add some bling to a large amount of space. Here is an up close picture where you can see the two-tone stamping, spritzing and glitter a little bit better:

 

Stamp Sets: Seasonal Sayings, Snowflake Soiree

Cardstock: Bashful Blue, Whisper White

Ink: Bashful Blue, Basic Black, Island Indigo

Tools: Labels Collection Framelits, Color Spritzer

Accessories: Festival Prints DSP Stack, Dazzling Details, Rhinestone Basic Jewels, Sticky Sheet, Dimensionals

 



Attempting Digital Scrapbooking

While, I love to make scrapbook pages, I am SOOOO bad about getting pictures printed and put on the pages. :( I have monthly scrapbooking classes at my house and have literally hundreds of scrapbook pages lying around, mostly without pictures!  So now that I have started to play with MDS2+ a little bit, I thought this would be a great chance for me to the scrapping done with the pictures, all in one!  Here is my very first page that I attempted:

I love this picture of us with Easton. He has that ornery look on his face that he has most of the time. :) Medallion was my favorite stamp ever and I was so sad to see it retire. I was so happy to see that it is included in MDS so it can live on in my work!   And isn't that sentiment beautiful?!  It is from a digital set called Fantabulous You.

Kraft and Kreme MDS

Yes, I am hooked on MDS now!  It is so much fun to play around with while I am sitting here in the evenings watching tv with the family.  I also like that I can play with some different stamp sets for a change!  Today I made a card for the Less is More challenge to use the colors kraft and kreme.

I used Crumb Cake and Very Vanilla for my card. It was hard for me to figure out exactly how to do a clean and simple card with MDS because I am just getting starting and everything I am doing is pretty simple! :)  I tried to accomplish the "less is more" concept by keeping my image and sentiment in the corner so I still have that "white space" in the upper and left quadrants.  I added a little bit of stitching around the outside because I don't sew so this was a great way to add some stitching to my card.

My first MDS project!

Okay, do not judge me too harshly! This is my very first project using MDS2+ so this card is very basic. :)  I can already tell that I will be spending many hours playing with and watching videos to figure out some of the more advanced techniques. There are a lot of elements included in it. I was very impressed! 

For this card I used a simple sketch from retro sketches and the color combination from Dynamic Duos. 

 

I had a lot of fun playing with the elements. I do not usually decorate the inside of a card too much when I am making a traditional card, but it was so easy to do with my digital card because I didn't feel like I was "wasting" my supplies. :)  Here is the front and the inside.

 

Very simple, but I am sure I will get better the more I play around with it and watch some videos!  I never thought I would get into digital at all, so this is at least a start!



February Creative Crew Challenges

It's time for the February Creative Crew Challenges over at Splitcoaststampers.  You can check out all of the wonderful creations the design team came up with here and make sure to play along and upload your creations too!  Here are the projects I came up with:

 

 

This card is for the February Creative Crew challenge to make a project with doilies. I used a doily stamp and I thought the DSP also looked like doilies!

 

 

 

Stamps: Delicate Doilies, Teeny Tiny Wishes

Paper: Crumb Cake, Raspberry Ripple, Very Vanilla

Ink: Crumb Cake, Primrose Petals, Raspberry Ripple

Accessories: Scallop Circle Punch, Bitty Banners Framelits, Primrose Petals Stitched Satin Ribbon, Print Poetry DSP Stack, Sponges

This card is for the February Creative Crew color focus using Raspberry Ripple, Primrose Petals, Pretty in Pink, Very Vanilla, & Sahara Sand. It's a lot of colors to get into one card but perfect for a valentine's day card! I guess this one could also be for the Love challenge!

Stamps: Daydream Medallions, You Are Loved

Paper: Sahara Sand, Very Vanilla

Ink: Raspberry Ripple, Primrose Petals, Pretty in Pink, Sahara Sand

Accessories: Floral Frames Framelits, Decorative Label Punch, Rhinestone Basic Jewels, Lacy Brocade Embossing Folder, Raspberry Ripple Stitched Satin Ribbon, Natural Cotton Ribbon, Sponges For this month's Creative Crew scrapbook challenge we were asked to create a scrapbook page using this sketch.       I rotated the sketch because I wanted to have banners at the top and bottom. I am in love with banners and am so glad we now have framelits for them! Stamps: Hearts a Flutter, Bring on the Cake Paper: Baja Breeze, Daffodil Delight, Tangerine Tango, Whisper White Ink: Baja Breeze, Black StazOn, Melon Mambo Accessories: Rhinestone Basic Jewels, Baker's Twine, Hearts a Flutter Framelits, Window Frames Framelits, Perfect Polka Dots Embossing Folder This card is for the February Creative Crew Love challenge. I've seen and made lots of cards with hearts for Valentine's Day so I decided to use flowers instead. Stamps: For the Birds Paper: Melon Mambo, Old Olive, Tangerine Tango, Whisper White Ink: Baja Breeze, Daffodil Delight, Melon Mambo, Tangerine Tango, Black StazOn Accessories: Honeycomb Embossing Folder, Labels Collection Framelits, Scallop Circle Punch, Bird Punch, Floral District DSP, Woodgrain Embossing Folder, Watercolor Crayons, Aqua Painter