Best Guy T-Shirt - Stampin' Up! Custom Tee

 Today's card is a fun guy card for that special man in your life.  I designed this one for my monthly class last week and I wanted to show off a few retiring items one last time but also show the new Hexagons Dynamic Textured embossing folder from the Occasions catalog.  I was late getting in the game on this one but it's a very cool embossing folder and is perfect for guy cards!

 

  The card base is Delightful Dijon a retiring In Color.  This was definitely not my favorite In Color but I love it pair up with the grays.  I think it works perfectly in this masculine design.  Along the one edge, we stamped some of the small splatters from Gorgeous Grunge which is retiring.  

  We embossed the Basic Gray panel with the Hexagons Dynamic embossing folder.  Make sure to spritz your cardstock lightly with water prior to running it through the Big Shot.  The water helps soften the paper fibers and allows the impression to really be well defined.  

  The narrow Smoky Slate strip is stamped with the little arrow stamp from the Custom Tee stamp set.  This set and the matching framelits aren't carrying over to the new catalog so if you really like all the possibilities this set offers don't miss out.  We attached the stamped strip to the embossed panel and then added some staples to the top and bottom for a fun, masculine detail that isn't ribbon!  Do the staples before adhering the larger panel to the card front so you don't have the backs of the staples showing through on the inside of the card.  I would also suggest using Fast Fuse or Tear Tape to adhere the embossed panel to the front.  You need something a bit stronger than snail to keep the panel from curling and popping up.

  The t-shirt was made by first using markers to color the sentiment from Suite Sentiments and then stamping it on Whisper White cardstock.  Then the shirt was stamped in Basic Gray around the sentiment.  Much easier than trying to line up the large sentiment just right inside the shirt.  You can use the framelits to cut the shirt out or just hand cut it (we hand cut it in class).  Mount the shirt on the card front with dimensionals.

  I don't have a photo but on the inside of the card we stamped more of the splatters and then added another stamped t-shirt and customized the inside greeting with the Thoughtful Banners set.  I had some samples; Happy Father's Day, You're Amazing, Happy Birthday, and Thank You. 

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: Custom Tee (retiring), Suite Sentiments (retiring), Gorgeous Grunge (retiring)

Ink: Delightful Dijon (retiring), Basic Gray, Smoky Slate  Markers: Smoky Slate, Basic Gray, Delightful Dijon (retiring)

Paper: Delightful Dijon, Smoky Slate, Basic Gray, Whisper White

Accessories: Hexagons Dynamic Impressions embossing folder, staples, dimensionals

  

Watercolored Little Piggy - Stampin' Up! This Little Piggy

  Today is another preview of a new set that will be in the Stampin' Up! 2017-2018 Annual Catalog.  This Little Piggy was an all attendee giveaway at the recent Stampin' Up! On Stage demonstrator event.  You've probably seen a bunch of samples already with this set but it's really cute.  The pigs have such happy little faces.

  I used this set to make a few quick thank yous to send out to a few long distance customers who had placed orders with me.  Isn't nice to get fun mail?  I try to send out a lot of cards and I do ok with birthday and thank yous but I need to do better with "just because" cards too.  It's nice to get a card for absolutely no reason than someone was thinking about you.

 

  I was pretty proud of myself when I put this card design together as I didn't need to cut into any large pieces of cardstock.  All the layers were pulled from my scrap bags and just trimmed a little to size.  I feel even more accomplished when I can use scraps and end up with a cute card!

  The card base is the Kraft cardstock that is retiring.  I really liked using this cardstock for boxes, pouches and giftcard holders since it came in 12x12 sheets.  This is one product I know I'll miss.  But I had some card base sized pieces that were perfect for this design.  I stamped the little cloud with white craft ink right onto the base.

  The piggy is stamped in Stazon onto watercolor paper and then I watercolored him/her? with the new Powder Pink In Color and the darker shade is Blushing Bride.  The aquapainter made it really easy to get the color where I wanted it.  The pinks blended quite well and I'm happy with the result as I'm not much of a watercolorer.  The sky is brushed with Soft Sky ink and the ground/grass is Old Olive.

  I added a narrow strip of Old Olive along one side and then added a small Powder Pink flag with a bit of burlap ribbon and a baker's twine bow.

  If you're interested in getting your hands on new Stampin' Up! products before the catalog goes live then you can join my team as a demonstrator and participate in the catalog preorder which starts tomorrow!  If you want to learn more about the opportunity please get in touch and I can tell you all about it!

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: This Little Piggy*

Ink: Stazon, Powder Pink*, Blushing Bride, Soft Sky, Old Olive, White craft

Paper: Kraft (retiring), Old Olive, Watercolor paper, Powder Pink*

Accessories: burlap ribbon, bakers twine

*Items available with the release of the Stampin' Up! 2017-2018 Annual catalog

Colorful Seasons Branch - Stampin' Up! Colorful Seasons - Fab Friday 111

  It seems that the week of my monthly stamp class I can't get my act together enough to prepare for class, have the class and then also blog.  I guess there is just too much going on during that week and something has to give!

  But I've been a having fun with some new stamping supplies that I was able to purchase from the soon to be released 2017-2018 Annual Stampin' Up! catalog!  As an added bonus for attending the On Stage event in Richmond all attendees were able to order some of the products which are in the new catalog!  How fun...except that the ordering window is very short so it's a bit hard to decide what you might want and really, I wanted almost all of the products!! But I decided on a few that I knew I could have some fun with until I could order everything!

  I used a new set, Colorful Seasons, for my Fab Friday challenge card today!  Here's the sketch we're working with this time around....so much you can do with this one!

 I thought the fun branch and flower combo would be perfect for those long skinny panels.  The Colorful Seasons set has a coordinating thinlet set, Seasonal Layers, so it's a breeze to cut out the branch and flowers (and lots of other shapes too)!

  This card is loaded with new items!  The card base is the new In Color Berry Burst.  I think it's kind of in between Melon Mambo and Rich Razzleberry.  The DSP is from a new pack that is called Wood Textures and is a 6x6 stack with 48 sheets and 12 double designs!  I chose one of the lighter patterns with the roughed up painted wood look.  It's a great background for the bright flowers and leaves.

  The thinlet set comes with a large scalloped edge die so I cut a little short piece to mount my branch on.  The branch is cut with Early Espresso cardstock and then I stamped (and stamped off) 2 of the flowers and cut them out as well.  I used 2 other flower shapes to cut out Lemon Lime Twist (another new In Color!!) flowers which I layered behind the Berry Burst ones to stand in for leaves.  I added the blossoms to the branch with a few popped up on dimensionals.

  I used a thank you greeting from another new set, Daisy Delight, and embossed it in white onto a vellum flag.  I added some linen thread and 2 more flowers around the greeting.  The 2 flowers help conceal the adhesive holding down the vellum.

  As the final touch, I added small rhinestones to the centers of the flowers.

  I'm really looking forward to stamping many more cards with this set.  I see it being a wonderful seasonal go to stamp set for all occasions.  

  Head on over to see what the rest of the Fab Friday Design Team has done with this fun sketch!

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: Colorful Seasons*, Daisy Delight*

Ink: Berry Burst*, Versamark

Paper: Berry Burst*, Lemon Lime Twist*, Wood Textures DSP stack*, vellum, Early Espresso, Whisper White

Accessories: Seasonal Layers Thinlets*, white embossing powder, linen thread, rhinestones

*these products will be available in the upcoming 2017-2018 Stampin' Up! annual catalog

Bright Butterfly - Stampin' Up! Watercolor Wings

  Better late than never today!  Here is a nice Easter card a little bit late!  And with just a quick change of sentiment it can be for a birthday or thinking of you card.  And I know you all have those kind of sentiments in your stamp set stash!

  I help out with the 2 year old Sunday school class at my church and the main teacher is a super awesome lady who is still rocking it at 89.  Yes, at 89 she still teaches Sunday School...the 2 year olds no less!  #lifegoals  Every year she hosts an Easter party (and Christmas party) for our class at her house and I make the invitations because well, I make cards and it's fun to do invitations for this occasion.  This is the design for this year's party.

  The card base is Whisper White thick and then a slightly smaller layer embossed with the Elegant Dots embossing folder.

  The sentiment is from the long retired Well Scripted set and is stamped with Smoky Slate and cut with the oval layering framelits.  A Stitched Shapes oval backs the sentiment panel.

 The butterfly is a 3 step process for the wings starting with the lightest color So Saffron, then Peekabook Peach stamped off once.  Then full strength Peekaboo Peach stamped along the wing edges.  After cuting out the wings with the Butterflies framelits then I stamped the body in Smoky Slate.  It's easier to line up the body in the white space after die cutting.  If you stamp the body first and then cut you might not have it lined up well and your butterfly could have its head chopped off.

  I added a bit of Peekaboo Peach ruched ribbon behind the ovals and then popped the butterfly with dimensionals.

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: Watercolor Wings, Well Scripted (retired)

Ink: So Saffron, Peekaboo Peach, Smoky Slate

Paper: Whisper White thick, Whisper White, Smoky Slate

Accessories: Butterflies framelits, Stitched Shapes Framelits, Layering Ovals framelits, Elegant Dots e.f., ruched ribbon, dimensionals

  

Simple Blossom Sympathy - Stampin' Up! You've Got This

 While I only purchase and stamp with Stampin' Up! products I do enjoy seeing what other companies are designing from time to time.  And if I want to,  I can usually recreate a design using my Stampin' Up! supplies.  Pinterest is a great place to just browse designs without having to slog through 20 different company websites.  I pinned this card quite a while ago.  I think the simplicity of the large white flower really drew my attention.  So when I needed a sympathy card recently, I pulled up my "ideas" board and looked around and decided to use one of my Stampin' Up! sets to make a similar card.

 

  The card starts with a Basic Black card base, then a layer of Sahara Sand.  On the Sahara Sand layer I stamped the big peony (??) blossom from You've Got This in black twice.

  Then I stamped the flower again on Whisper White and fussy cut it out.  I also stamped some of the leaves twice so I could layer them behind after they were colored.

  The flower is colored in with clear Wink of Stella (which you can't see at all in the photo) and the center is colored with the Daffodil Delight colored pencil.  The leavs are lightly colored with the Old Olive colored pencil and then the some highlights added with the Old Olive marker.

  The flower and one set of leaves are popped on a dimensional over the top of the background flowers.  The sentiment is stamped in black.

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: You've Got This, Thoughts and Prayers

Ink: Basic Black  Colored Pencils: Daffodil Delight, Old Olive  Marker: Old Olive

Paper: Basic Black, Sahara Sand, Whisper White

Accessories: Clear Wink of Stella, dimensionals

Stamped Off Flowers Birthday - Stampin' Up! Avant Garden

 After today's card I think I am all caught up with sharing class projects.  Even though you can no longer get Avant Garden through Stampin' Up! if you've missed out on this great Sale-a-Bration set you can probably find it somewhere.  But this technique would work well with other solid image flower stamps.

  We stamped the flower panel with Island Indigo and alternated around the side with full strength ink and stamped off ink (just ink up your stamp, then stamp it onto scrap paper before stamping on your cardstock) to give a nice little layered look with some depth.  When I was explaining this project to my stampers I told them that this is a technique that has been around forever but we might forget about it because there are so many new tools and fancy dies that are available these days.  Stamping off is also a great way for new stampers to make their inks work a bit more because you can get a light and a dark version of the same color...you don't always have to have every single color right away.  

  After stamping the flowers the leaves are stamped in Mint Macaron (retiring In Color) and repeated the stamping off.  Next the centers of the flowers are stamped in Smoky Slate.

  The sentiment is also stamped in Smoky Slate and a sprinkling of adhesive rhinestones brings attention to that corner.  Some Vanilla and silver ribbon was wrapped around the flower panel.

  The other items that is a subtle details but brings a lot to the card is the embossing with the Elegant Dots embossing folder (retiring).  Several of my stampers fell in love with this one and had to order it.  And I'm so glad they did as it's now on the retiring list.  I just checked and it seems that it's still available so if you have this on your wish list don't wait!

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: Avant Garden

Ink: Island Indigo, Mint Macaron (retiring), Smoky Slate

Paper: Very Vanilla, Island Indigo

Accessories: Elegant Dots e.f. (retiring), rhinestones, Vanilla silver stripped ribbon, dimensionals

Bright Flowers Mother's Day - Stampin' Up! Flower Patch

  With all the attention I've been giving to Father's Day lately I don't want anyone to think that I've forgotten about Mother's Day.  We made this card at my March class and my stampers had the choice of the sentiment they wanted to use.  The Thoughtful Banners set is so versatile for changing sentiments to fit whatever occasion you have.  And a nice flower card is always handy to have tucked in the card box.

  Now when I designed this card using the Flower Patch stamp set I didn't know that it would be retiring.  I'm glad I got a few cards made with it but as I usually feel when a stamp set retires that I didn't use it nearly as much as I could have.  All the cards that could have been....lol!  

  For this card I used a bright, bold color combination.  Not all moms out there are into frills, pastels and lace so it's nice to have some colors that might reflect more of their personality.  The card base is Tempting Turquoise.  The flowers are stamped in Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight and Tempting Turquoise.  The flower center of the Daffodil Delight flower is stamped in Tempting Turquoise.

  The coordinating Flower Fair framelits (also retiring) were used to cut out the flowers.  They are arranged around the sentiment panel which is a Whisper White square cut with the Stitched Shapes framelits backed with a Basic Black panel.  A trick to making sure that you have enough room on your sentiment panel for the phrase is to start with the bottom words first and then work your way up.    Then you can make sure your flowers don't cover anything up and there is room for all you want to say.

  Using the Brights collection of enamel shapes my stampers could choose any of the colors/shapes that they wanted to add a bit of detail to the smallest flower center.

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

Stamps: Flower Patch (retiring), Thoughtful Banners

Ink: Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight, Tempting Turquoise, black

Paper: Tempting Turquoise, Basic Black, Whisper White

Accessories: Flower Fair framelits, Stitched Shapes framelits, enamel shapes, dimensionals

  

Spring Birthday Rose - Stampin' Up! Rose Wonder

 It's back to the grind today after spring break and Easter.  I think waking up at 6:15 was a bit shocking to the boys this morning but they rallied and we even got out of the house in a reasonable amount of time!  Small victories right?

  I still have lots of cards to share even though I wasn't home last week to stamp.  Today's card is one that we made at my March stamp club.  We did a bit of embossing, a bit of water spritzing and a bit of watercoloring to make this beauty.

 The card base is Cucumber Crush a soon to be retired In Color.  Hopefully you all have placed you orders for inks, papers and embellishments in the retiring colors.  They aren't lasting long and some items have already sold out.  Cucumber Crush is a nice fresh green for spring.

  Next the sentiment is stamped in black onto a Whisper White panel and a bit of white organza ribbon (also retiring) goes across the side.  This is a great design to just switch out the sentiment for a thank you, or thinking of you or we even did some Easter greetings in class.

  To make the rose we stamped it in Versamark onto Shimmery White card stock and embossed it with white embossing powder.  Next, we spritzed the image with water so that we had little pools of water in each of the petals and leaves.  Then we took an Aquapainter and reinkers and dabbed, swirled and painted our colors on the image.  There is no wrong way to apply the ink for this card.  From the center out, we used Peekaboo Peach, Flirty Flamingo and Watermelon Wonder (also retiring).  The Cucumber Crush ink was used on the leaves.  Using the heat gun again, dry the image and then cut it out.  The rose image comes with another little leaf attached but we cut that one off and just used the bigger leaf but cut it off and repositioned it.  The rose is popped up with dimensionals.

  Just like I told my stampers....way easier than it first looks!

  Thanks for looking!  Did you stamp today?

  Stamps: Rose Wonder

  Ink: Versamark, Cucumber Crush, Peekaboo Peach, Flirty Flamingo, Watermelon Wonder

  Paper: Cucumber Crush, Whisper White, Shimmer White

  Accessories: organza ribbon, white embossing powder, dimensionals