Well Worn Birthday

Well Worn Birthday

Today is my husband's birthday and I have been contemplating the card that I want to create for him.  For me, a male card is sooooo hard.  It is a challenge to think outside of the female/flower/froufrou box.  I will come up with a unique card to show you tomorrow, but for now here is one that I have on my card buffet.    I have to thank Dawn Olchefske for this idea.  Don't you just love how easy it is and what a great way to use up dsp scraps.  If you cut your dsp for card fronts, first cut the 12x12 into three 4x12 strips.  Then with each of these cut into 4x5 1/4 and you will get six card fronts out of one sheet of dsp!  Then the bonus is that you will also have three pieces of 4x1 1/2 strips and those I used for this card, punching out the circles with the 1 1/4" circle punch.  You could make a card for children or adults with this theme. 

I am making many cards for our soldiers by donating cards to Operation Write Home.  Our local ladies will be having a card making day for Operation Write Home on Thursday, April 12th from 10 to 4pm at the Sallie Logan Library in Murphysboro, IL.  Please come and join us, but if you can't we can always use donations of paper, envelopes(A2 size) or money for postage.  Email me with questions or donations.  Last year our small group sent 552 cards and this year we plan to beat that number.

Recipe:

Stamp:  Teeny Tiny Wishes

Ink:  Early Espresso

Paper:  Well Worn DSP, Early Espresso and Naturals Ivory Card Stock

Accessories:  1 1/4" circle punch, Modern Label and Word Window Punches

Lego Birthday - rs#3

Lego Birthday

Well, I finally am posting on my blog, don't faint.  First my mojo left the building, then I visited my darling daughter and her husband and menagerie.  Then my father fell and I went to help the parental units.  So, I'm home and mojo has returned.  YEA!!!!

One of the demonstrators that I received blog posts from introduced retro sketches to me and I decided to try out their fun challenge for the Lego Birthday card above, I decided to flip the sketch on it's side.   And here is retrosketches#3:

Just a reminder that there is less than two weeks left of sale-a-bration!  If you go to the bar on the right you can click and see the great items that are available for free for purchasing $50 in product.  You can go shopping on my website by clicking on the Shop Now button on the right also.  The Lego Birthday card will be added to my Card Buffet.  I will be posting more of those cards in the next few days.  Have a great day, it is sunny here and 78 degrees!

Recipe:

Stamps:  Occasions Alphabet

Ink:  Pacific Point, Real Red and Crumb Cake

Paper:  Big Top Birthday DSP, Pacific Point, Real Red, Whisper White and Daffodil Delight Card Stock

Accessories:  Corner Rounder, 1/2" Circle Scallop Edge Border and Owl Punches, Uniball White Pen, Brights Brads and Retired Stampin' Up! Ribbon

Merry Monday Challenge #1

The Mocha Morning Sounding Joy

I know, I'm crazy, but I ran into a brand new challenge over at Always Playing With Paper and could not pass it by.  Leslie is a wonderful talented lady and I have been following her blog for a long time.  Good time to get a start on next year's Christmas cards and I will have this one available to make in my card buffet.  So, here is the Challenge Sketch:

Recipe:

Stamps:  The Sounding Joy and Season of Joy

Ink:  Versamark

Paper: Basic Black, Early Espresso and Gold cardstock, Paper Vellum and Mocha Morning DSP

Accessories:  Big Shot, Oval Scallop Frame, Scallop Oval Punch, Scallop Edge Border, Black and Gold Emboss Powder, Embossing Buddy

Christmas Cards - Card Buffet

Wednesday, December 7th is the last Card Buffet of the year.  Below are the cards I have added to the buffet for Wednesday night:

Besides the pictured cards above, I have 30 other cards to choose from.  If you would like to come, give me a call and join us.  New stampers welcome.

I'm here for you Sunflower!

CR84FN I'm here for You Sunflower

My card that I created today for my upcoming Card Buffet on August 29th is made with my new favorite stamp, Sunflower, which is a background stamp.  I made this card for two different challenges.  First for So Shelli, Shelli Gardner is a co-founder and CEO of Stampin' Up! and her challenge was Thinking of You Creative Challenge. 
Then the second challenge was for CR84FN Color Challenge :

Recipe:

Stamps:  Sunflower, En Francais, Petite Pairs, Tagtastic(Hostess)

Ink:

So Saffron, More Mustard, Crumb Cake, Daffodil Delight

Paper:

So Saffron and Very Vanilla Card stock 

Accessories,

Dimensionals, Curly Label Punch, Stamping Sponges

VC Rocks! Blog Hop - Punches Galore

Welcome to the last VC Rocks! Hop of the summer.  Those of you who follow me know it has been a really long time since I posted.  I spent more than a week helping my daughter and her husband move, then picked up a virus that has kept me in bed for almost two weeks!  So I haven't had much energy to stamp lately, but picked two cards from our card buffet that I hadn't  blogged about yet that use punches.

Rosette Christmas

The first card pictured I have been so inspired by every one on the web making rosettes.  They are so fun and easy to make especially now that Stampin' Up! has introduced the "Simply Scored" Scoring tool starting September 1st.  It also has a very unique feature added to it and that is place markers.  You just place them on the lines you want to score, no more remembering every time!

The top layer was punched out with the 2 1/2 Circle punch, then it was layered onto the scalloped circle that is on the new Perfect Pennants Bigz L Die in the new catalog.

This next card I fell in love with - purses out of the Cupcake Builder punch - just so cute!  This card could be used for a Thank You, Get Well, Thinking of You... the possibilities are endless.  First you cut out three of the bottoms of the cupcake and turn them upside down.  Then punch three 1/2 circles from the 3/4" Circle Punch, this makes the flap of the purse(On our circle punches at the half-way point, the punch dips down).  Then reinsert the circle punch into the former punched area and punch a slice for the handles.  I attached a pearl and after gluing the entire purse together, used dimensionals to prop it up on the card.  Too cute and so easy to make.

The Perfect Little Purse Card

The Love of Stamping

Stamper Shirley

00 VC Rocks Blog Home
01 Carey R Pedstamper Stamping Tree House
02 Linda R Pretty Inky Papercrafts
03 Sharon F Created By You
04 Patrice H My Little Patch of Dirt
05 Angela W Life with a Wiener Dog
06 Karen G Krafting with Karen
07 Kim A Stamping Fun with Kim
08 Janice H Stamping With Janice
09 Nichole S Scrappy Stamps & Ink
10 Jane H Stamp With Jane
11 Nancy K Scrapbook Kits and More
12 Elizabeth K Elizabeth's Stamp Room
13 Elaine W I Reckon I'll Stamp
14 Carolyn S InkingTheNightAway
15 Kris S Maddiebug Designs
16 Heidi S Cheekie's Ink Pad
17 Holly & The Dog InkPaperStamps
18 Shari D Shari's Stamp Pad
19 Stace C Stampin Stace
20 Diane   Stampin Ldyglfr62
21 Kym Artful Imagination
22 Barb F The Love of Stamping
23 YOU ARE HERE:  Debbie M Clever and Cute
24 Shirley N  Stamper Shirley
25 Ellen K Blinkin', Thinkin' & Inkin'
26 Loni H Loni's Life

Blossom Party & Faux Cloisonne

I have been designing cards for my upcoming card buffet and wanted to share one with you.  My daughter, Luella, was with me for five days and we always have a great time together designing cards and making 3D projects.  I love this retired DSP and wanted a flower to show it off so it reminded me of the Blossom Party die, it is really sad that I have had this die for over a year and never used it. :(  But the great part of having a card buffet is that I am getting all of my DSP out and my dies and having a great time creating!

Blossom Party

Isn't it just too cute?  The next card we learned how to do Faux Cloisonne in our Technique class Thursday night and I have decided to add it also to the card buffet since I love how the butterflies turned out.  Do you have a lot of glossy catalogs or old Stampin' Up! Catalogs hanging around?  When I started cleaning out my stamp room last week, I couldn't believe how many I had still, but we put them to good use with this Technique.  First the cards:

Faux Cloisonne with Flores Suaves

Isn't the butterfly so lifelike?  It is from the Flores Suaves (Soft Flowers) stamp set.  First we found a picture in the colors we wanted to use for the butterfly, then rubbed over the image with the Embossing Buddy then stamped the image using Versamark, sprinkled on black Emboss Powder (you could also use gold or silver) then heated it with a Heat Tool.  Cut them out by hand and the paper ends up feeling like plastic and really takes a bend well.  This technique works well with open stamps (not a solid image) like this butterfly or a flower.  Check out my next post that qualifies for two challenges.

Card Buffet

I am so sad to be leaving my favorite Designer Series Papers behind and some of my favorite stamp sets, but so excited that the new catalog goes live tomorrow!  The last two months I have started having card buffets.  We are having so much fun at these classes.  I have been using retiring paper and falling in love with them and today is the last day to order them.  I found my mojo yesterday and I have been designing cards like crazy.  Here are the cards for our next buffet: