Warm Winter Wishes times 2

Today's post will be a little longer than usual. I made two variations of this wonderful little snowman from Heartfelt Designs: Snowmen melt your Heart. This is from the same set as the snowman on the card posted October 4th. These little guys are just too cute. I made 12 of each of these two designs as part of my collection of cards for this year's mailing. I actually have all the cards made now and have 'only' to sign them all and address the envelopes. I just have to figure out how to do mailing labels from my contact list. Note to self - enlist daughter's help on that one.!            

The card design is on a blue bayou card base that was run through the Big Shot with the Northern Flurries folder from SU. The designer paper is from My Mind's Eye and is layered on some naturals ivory c/s. Then a knot of crumb cake seam binding was tied around the panel before attaching it to the base. I stamped the snowman on naturals ivory c/s with Memories black ink, dried it, and coloured it in with markers (basic gray, going gray, not quite navy, baja breeze, and pumpkin). Then I cut around him, leaving a border and mounted him with dimensionals. Inside is a strip of the designer paper and a piece of naturals ivory for the greeting. The words inside and out are stamped with blue bayou ink.

On the second style, I used a similar colour scheme of blue bayou but with white this time. I created my own designer background paper on white c/s, using HFD's Snowy Swirl in bayou ink and a snowflake from SU's Warm Winter Wishes in soft sky ink. For the greeting b/g, I used only the snowflake and stamped the words in bayou. I used the same colour scheme for Mr. Snowman, then fussy cut him (did I mention 12 times?) and added him to his base (again, only snowflakes here to keep the attention on him). Lots of dimensionals were used in the making of this card. A piece of island indigo ruffled ribbon from SU was attached to the panel behind the snowman.

Inside, another panel of  my designer paper, and an oval with a large snowflake in sky ink and the sentiment (HFD) in  bayou ink. All the ovals were cut with the classic oval dies from Spellbinders.

That is about it . I am not sure which one I like better and I hate to pick favourites; I would not want to hurt one of these little guy's feelings. . I would be thrilled if you left a comment and let me know which one you prefer.

Okay, time for breakfast and then, if I hurry with my chores for the day, maybe I can find time for more stamping. Love getting my fingers inky!

Stamping 411 Sketch Challenge

Hello fellow stampers. sorry to have been AWOL for so long. I have been rushing around, trying to squeeze in lots of last minute visits, appointments, packing, and cleaning before leaving for the south in 3 days. If you think there has been a long stretch of silence from me this past little while, wait until the next month is over. I am going to try to post once a week but I make no promises. Because this is still quite new to me, I will be playing it by ear.That said, here is a card I found some time for today. I just treated myself to the Layered Poinsettia die from Spellbinders, and just had to take some time to give it a try. I decided I would use the layout from Stamping 411, (here and on the right) as a starting point. As you can see, I moved things around a bit to allow for the size of the poinsettia.  I used ruby red and old olive c/s. After the petals and leaves were cut, I left the paper in the die and sponged ink (real red and handsome hunter) over the back to create the veins. Then I sponged more ink on the edges of all the pieces to make them stand out a bit. A beautiful gold pearl brad was added to the center. I put the whole thing together with glue dots. The designer papers are older retired SU papers. The card base is ivory, with hunter and red mats and the gold ribbon is from Michaels.
Oh yes, the words are from a retired SU set (name) and I stamped them in hunter ink. I really like this set of dies and I think I will be getting my money's worth from it.
 

Ooooh, Shiny

My husband accuses me of being a bit of a magpie when it comes to bling. Well, here is some subtle sparkle for the holiday season. After all, Christmas is the best time for sparkle.

This card is a CASE of one by Lee Conrey. I love her work which is typically very CAS (clean and simple) although I would be more inclined to use the word elegant instead of simple.

Although I did not get as far along on my goal for yesterday as I wanted, I did get my sample made and everything cut and ready to assemble for another 16 cards. And most of the household chores done as well, but that is so mundane. I need to hire a housekeeper so that I can stamp uninterrupted!!

The white card base is 5 3/4" square. A cherry cobble red mat is topped by SUs fabulous silver glimmer paper. I really like this stuff - it is a bit lighter weight and more flexible than any other glimmer paper I have come across. I wish they made it in more than just 2 colours. BecauseI hate to waste any of this beautiful paper, I cut 1/2" strips to create the mat. A penny saved and all that.

The piece of c/s for the top layer was scored on all four sides at 3/8" in. Then I stamped the holly sprig (from SU's Bells and Boughs stamp set)  as well as the greeting (also SU - Season's Greetings) in silver encore ink and embossed it all with silver EP. Coloured in the berries with a marker, added some silver cord and rhinestones, and assembled everything. Inside, I used two small strips of glimmer paper, stamped the holly with silver lightly so as to not detract from the words, and added the sentiment with cherry ink.

Another card I can send for regular postage rates - this one is a mailer. All supplies, with the exception of the Heartfelt Creations inside sentiment, are SU although the cord is retired.

When it Rains...

The season is really changing quickly here. Last evening it rained, and then the rain turned into something a lot thicker than rain. Fortunately, it did not last long and there is no sign of that incident here this morning.

Also yesterday, my computer was off line for hours. I think I went into withdrawal. So today, again, I have two cards to show.

 These are both from my Christmas workshop. The first is adapted from a card I made last fall in Glendale at a Stampscapes class held by Ken Pesho. You can view his card here. When you get to the Stampscapes  Gallery page, select Ken Pesho VIII from the menu on the left. First, die cut the ornament from white c/s with Spellbinders Heirloom Ornaments (this is the largest die in the set). I used the Stampscapes Comet stamp but changed the scene up with SU's Scenic Season. I masked the words on this and should have masked the small bird as well. It looks as if it is about to be blown to smithereens, as my Mom would have put it. I used markers to add two colours of blue to the comet before stamping. Then I added the scene  with Memories black, and after everything dried, sponged on the same two colours of blue. The mat was created by running a small metal washer with a pencil in the hole around the edge of the ornament on the back of the silver c/s. This works so well when you need a mat for just about anything.

 The navy background c/s was embossed with the Cuttlebug snowflake folder in two passes. The pine boughs are from a Marianne die, the sentiment is stamped on a #4 SB label with navy ink and a border is added just inside the edge of the label with a silver pen. The sentiment here if from the SU set, Beautiful Season. The border on the front and inside were punched from the silver c/s with a MS Garden Trellis punch. Finally a knot of silver ribbon is attached to the top of the ornament with a glue dot.
I can't tell you where the silver c/s came from as it has been in my stash forever. The rest of the c/s, the inks (except the black) and the stamps (except the comet) are all SU.

 Card number two used the gold version of the unknown-origin c/s from above. I die cut the mat from Spellbinders Grand Labels 4. The card base here is ivory.

I stamped the Heartfelt Creations stamp, Large Joy with Poinsettias, in gold encore ink and embossed with gold EP. After colouring with twinkling H2O's ,
I laid the die over the image and lightly traced the inside of the die. Then, using my blade, I cut around the areas that I thought would overhang the edge of the die. With the die placed on the image the way you want to cut it, gently lift the trimmed edges over the to of the die before running the whole piece through the machine. You end up with some areas overhanging the die cut piece. Clear as mud? I hope this photo helps.

As you can see, (at least I hop you can see it), you don't cut away the remaining c/s when you trim around the areas you want to lift.

I made about 10 of these in a row, and once you get the hang of it, it goes quite quickly.

For the inside (sorry about the fuzzy photo - it is too early in the morning for me) I used another Heartfelt stamp from the Holly Border set, with the same embossing and twinkling H2O treatment. Then I stamped the Heartfelt sentiment in gold with no embossing. The bow on the front is gold organdy ribbon from Michaels and is attached with a glue dot.

Today, I hope to get the last of my personal Christmas cards made and the address labels printed. Then I can pack it all away until I get back from the south in December. That will be a great load lifted off my mind.

Oh, and look, the sun is shining so I might try to get out and appreciate one of the last days of Alberta autumn.

Digi Cards

Good morning everyone. I hope my Canadian friends all had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend. I definitely did. My Son and his family were here from Calgary for the weekend, and although I had to share them a bit with my DDL's family, it was still the best. Even my grandson, who is now 17 and very busy with work and soccer in his free time, was here.

This past week, I had the unhappy need to create some more sympathy cards, as two of my friends lost their mother in the same week. I thought today would be a good day to would share with you my fall back sympathy cards.

They are created using Stampin'Up!'s My Digital Studio. And they are so lovely, I am left wondering why I do not use it more often for other types of cards.

They are both made using the Summertime Splendour background and the Thoughts and Prayers stamp set. For the inside, I used the same b/g but a smaller canvas, then set the opacity to 50% before adding the sentiment.

I printed the first card on white c/s and the second on vanilla. I am luckily able to use c/s on my HP printer and I arrange the layout so that I can get front and inside on one sheet of c/s.

Finally, I attach every thing to a card base (Concorde Crush and Chocolate Chip) and add ribbon (white and vanilla) and they are done.

I try to have several made up in advance so that I can reach for one when I need it.  They are so quick and easy to do, it only takes me about 10 min each and  less if I am making  a whole batch.

Recently, I downloaded a digital stamp from another company and I am interested to give it a try with the MDS. Hopefully, I will have something to show you in the next few weeks.




That's it for today. See you tomorrow.

What do you mean it`s Friday...

Where has the week gone. Between construction at our house, prepping for the next class, getting ready for my family this weekend (it is Thanksgiving here in Canada) and my book club meeting here last night, for which I had to get the book finished, the last few days have flown by.

So again, I will post two cards today in an effort to `catch up`.

This is a card that I made a couple of months ago for a male birthday. I mixed together some copper coloured cosmo fine glitter with some aged mahogany distress embossing powder. Then I stamped the medallion on naturals ivory card stock with chocolate craft ink, applied the mixture and heat embossed it. I trimmed around the image, adhered it to a circle of choc.chip card stock, and distressed the edge of the circle. The rust card base is stamped in choc.chip ink with the sanded background stamp. A piece of chocolate ribbon with an ivory brad  was glued to the card front, then the circle element was attached. Finally, I stamped the sentiment in rust on naturals ivory card stock, punched it out with the oval scallop punch, layered it on a chocolate oval, added brown brads (I had to trim the brad `legs` so that they would not stick out) and used a piece of sticky strip to attach it all to the card.

Except for the Ranger embossing powder, all products used were SU.

This card is one of the six I designed for my classes.

The 5`x7`base is white card stock. I began by stamping several times on the glossy white card stock with the Snowy Swirl stamp from Heartfelt. I used versamark, then heat embossed with white EP. I also did a 1 inch strip for the inside of the card and stamped the sentiment on a small rectangle . After the embossing cooled, I sponged teal and cool caribbean inks all over these 3 pieces.

On a rectangle of plain white cs, I stamped the Sleigh Ride image in Memories Black ink, and added a bit of colour with caribbean and going gray markers. I trimmed this to fit behind the Decorative Window Scene (Heartfelt) which was die cut from teal cs. I glued these together and attached them to the background with dimensionals. The teal mat for the sentiment was  punched with the Scallop Trim Corner Punch at both ends. More dimensionals used here.

The inside strip was matted in teal and the words were stamped with teal ink.

Except where noted, all products used are SU.

Well, that is it for this week. I am off to have lunch with my good friend, Ellen, at Lazia, then back home to get ready for the holiday weekend. I am looking forward to a relaxing time visiting with my family. I hope you all have a great weekend too, and if you are Canadian, Happy Thanksgiving.

Time Keeps On Slippin`...

Yesterday was one of those days.I just had time in the early hours to get a card made, but then the day got crazy and I never got back to the computer to post. I had three friends stop by at different times to work on stamping projects and suddenly the day was gone.

So today I will post two projects.

The first is another of the cards from my Christmas work shop. I just love this little guy from Heartfelt Designs. He and his buddy have put in a lot of time on my workstation this fall. You will meet the other snowman at a later date.

I stamped him on white with Memories black ink, coloured him with SU markers, and cut around him leaving a border. Then I stamped a small area of his hat to include the holly, coloured it, fussy cut it and mounted it on him with a dimensonal.  I stamped the holly from a coordinating HFD stamp, coloured and cut it out too. The sentiment was stamped and die cut using the a nestie petite oval, then the holly was attached with a glue dot. The designer paper is Recollections from Michaels and the card base is cherry cobbler.

You can find directions on how to cut and fold this center step card here at Splitcoast Stampers, a favorite resource of mine.




Stamps: SU-Snowflakes, HFD-Snowmen Melt your Heart , Elegant Holly Swirls, and Warmest Greetings (inside).









Project number two is the card I got made yesterday morning. It is a Z-fold and the finished size is 5x7.

I stamped and embossed the doily and the border lace in white. The doily is so intricate and pops off the darker paper so boldly, you have to do a double take to realize it is not a real one.

This is pretty straight forward. I free cut around the doily, then laid it onto the lighter blue paper and created my own mat.It was just too flimsy without some kind of backing.

I have not put any sentiment or verse on this one yet; I think I will leave that until I actually use the card.


Stamps: SU-Hello Doily, HFD-Shabby Chic Lace            .

Papers: SU cs-Pool Party and Island Indigo, K&Co dsp -
K Ology Addison Blue Garden Swirls.

Ribbons are both SU.


Sorry the smaller shot is a little contrasty. It is so very dull and dreary here this morning, I had to use my flash. I normally count on natural lighting.

Well, things to do, so that is it until tomorrow. Thanks for looking.