Saturday, August 28, 2010

Vintage Christmas, take two

It's time again for the weekly challenge from Our Creative Corner. Wendy gave us a great color challenge: Cherry Cobbler, Early Espresso, Old Olive, So Saffron and Very Vanilla. Remember this card? the one where I said I messed up the challenge? I was intending the card to be for this challenge, but I didn't use the right colors - oops! This time I'm back with a card that follows the challenge - but I stuck with the vintage Christmas idea for this card and used the same watercoloring technique.

I pulled out the Bells & Boughs stamp set again, but this time I used one of the images for my watercoloring with markers. I wanted the style to be more elegant on this card, so I chose the gorgeous Cherry Cobbler paper from Deck the Halls (in the holiday mini), along with a panel of saffron DP and an olive dot print from Jolly Holiday (also in the holiday mini). I dirtied up the edges with espresso ink again, and on the saffron paper I even covered the whole panel since it looked a little too bright and clean, LOL! I added a sentiment from Teeny Tiny Wishes accented with the modern label punch and two olive brads. A bow made of Cherry Cobbler seam binding (again, holiday mini) provides an elegant embellishment. Tip of the day: The seam binding is very lightweight, which makes it gorgeous but also a little fragile, so handle it carefully. The color and texture are so pretty, it's worth it!

I hope you enjoyed my second vintage Christmas card - now go take a peek at the other creations from the OCC team and then play along with us! Have a great weekend!

Saturday, August 21, 2010

In My Thoughts

This week at Our Creative Corner we have a sketch challenge for you. We know how you all love them! Just click the link to the OCC blog to see the sketch and play along with us.

For my take on the sketch, I pulled out the Friends Never Fade stamp set and the matching Greenhouse Gala designer paper. The flower was colored with Baja Breeze, Chocolate Chip and Pear Pizazz markers, then punched with the 1 3/4" circle punch. I used a Chocolate Chip scalloped circle for the layer behind it, and then to add a bit more color I inserted a Pear Pizazz circle cut with the Circle Scissors Plus. The sentiment is from the new set called Word Play. I used chocolate chip 1 1/4" striped ribbon and knotted a bit of Pear Pizazz ribbon around it. Under the sentiment panel is Very Vanilla card stock embossed with the finial press folder. The base layer is just Pear Pizazz and Chocolate Chip card stock with two vanilla brads.

Have fun with the sketch - we sure did, and we hope you'll join us in the challenge this week!

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Divine Diva Inspiration Challenge #34

This week's challenge is a Lindt chocolate magazine ad I'd saved a long time ago and forgotten about. How could I ever forget anything that had to do with chocolate? I loved it when I first saw it, and I still love it now, so here it is for your stamping inspiration.

ETA: I can't believe I forgot to upload the photo of my card! So embarrassing... I'm traveling and had a bunch of cards to do before I left, and I guess the day I made this one I was in too much of a hurry. I won't be able to get the photo up until I get home, but I hope that won't stop anyone from playing the challenge!

If you know me and my cards you probably aren't surprised at what jumped out at me - the buttons. (Well, right after the chocolate, anyway.) Aren't they super cute? And I love the colors, too, which I interpreted as Pumpkin Pie, Tempting Turquoise, Old Olive, Cherry Cobbler, Very Vanilla, and Early Espresso. The photo didn't lead me in a particular direction for stamps, so I decided to use something that would let me feature the buttons. I haven't used the Season of Friendship set in a long time - I thought it would look cute with buttons instead of leaves. I picked out a variety of buttons in my color scheme - some are retired, and some aren't, LOL. I tied all of the buttons with linen thread and attached them to my tree with glue dots. Behind the tree I put strips of designer paper - the cherry striped paper is current but the others are retired. The last touch was a sentiment from Heard from the Heart - and isn't it cool that the word "heart" fits right inside the little heart punch?

Be sure to check out the cards made by all the Divine Divas for this challenge!

Anne

Chris

Donna

Julie

Kerri

Hope you are inspired to come and play along. Just leave a comment here with a link to your card. We can't wait to see what you create! The keyword for uploading on online forums will be DDIC34. Have fun and look for the next challenge on September 2!

Saturday, August 14, 2010

School Days

This week's challenge at Our Creative Corner is to make something with a school theme. I knew right away what I wanted to do for the challenge - I loved the pencil holder that is on p. 93 of the catalog so I created my own. We don't go back to school here in Massachusetts for another month, but this little project got me in the mood a bit early!

First I covered a toilet paper tissue roll with a 4.5" x 5.5" panel of paper from the Play Date collection. (We use Costco toilet paper because it's one of the few [only?] brands that didn't shrink their rolls to 4" - so you should measure your roll before you cut your paper.) Tip of the day: I recommend using Mod Podge to adhere the paper for a smooth application. For the base I used retired chipboard and adhered the TP roll with the Tombow multipurpose glue. The catalog version wasn't decorated, but I thought adding some extra touches would be cute. On an olive grosgrain ribbon I tied a tag made using the First Day stamp set. I used the "first day of school" stamp and a Chocolate Chip marker to create my "school days" words - it's not perfect but for now it's close enough!

For the owls I used - what else? - the new owl punch. Now, if you're like me and when you first saw this punch you said, "I can live without that," trust me, you're wrong. These owls are so stinking cute. Plus I've been seeing all kinds of fabulous punch art with this punch so you're going to want to have it ASAP! My owls were made with more Play Date paper, plus Chocolate Chip, Crumb Cake and white card stock. I just stuck them to the pencils with glue dots. Tip of the day #2: I used strips of my card stock and DP for punching - that way I don't waste a bunch while I'm punching out all these little bits and pieces.

Be sure you go check out all the rest of the school-themed projects by the OCC gals. I know they will all be fabulous!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Tax-free weekend in Massachusetts

This weekend Massachusetts is having a sales tax holiday - so purchases from Stampin' Up! made on Saturday and Sunday will not be charged sales tax! Woohoo! With that in mind, I'd like to offer any Massachusetts customers a special offer for this weekend only. With a $50 order you will get a free catalog, plus I'll extend my standard club special to everyone: for every $50 you spend you get a free marker (or any product of equivalent value).

You can place your order directly through my SU site or you can contact me to put the order in for you. The only catch is that I'll be traveling and not here to receive any orders that I put in, so I'll need to have all orders shipped directly to the customer. If you want to have an impromptu catalog party, it's a great time to do so - workshop orders of $350 or more will get an extra $25 in hostess benefits. I can get a catalog to you before I leave if you let me know right away.

This offer goes for anyone who orders this weekend, so you're welcome to share this with others (Massachusetts customers only, sorry). If you place your order online I'll give you a voucher for the free marker(s) or a Paypal refund, whichever you prefer. You just need to get your order in before the sales tax holiday is over (Sunday night).

Happy tax-free shopping!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

My excitement for the week

I have to do a little toot-tooting my own horn with some fun news. I got a very surprising email yesterday - I had entered this card from my July club in Shelli Gardner's blog contest, which was to use new products, and I can't believe it - Shelli chose me as one of the winners! You should be sure to go to Shelli's blog here and check out the rest of the winning projects - they are all amazing. I'm honored to be in such terrific stamping company! Thanks to all of you who read my blog and comment and support me in so many ways - I couldn't do it without you!

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Vintage Christmas oops!

I was working on a challenge card tonight and I had the challenge completely wrong in my head... I guess I will be making one extra card this week! But I do like how my oops card came out so I'm going to go ahead and post it. And coincidentally, it also works for the color challenge from the Paper Players - lucky for me I messed up, LOL!

I hadn't played yet with the new stamp set called Greeting Card Kids. They are such adorable images and great for watercoloring, which I hadn't done in a while. I've been seeing that other stampers do their watercoloring with markers and I had never tried it that way, so I played around with it on this card. I think I'll be trying it more because it was really fun! I used Cherry Cobbler, Old Olive, Early Espresso, and Crumb Cake markers with my Aqua Painter. The pink trim on her hat and coat was also an oops - I didn't mean for the red to bleed into it, but once that happened I went with it and I actually think it looks sweet.

To finish the rest of my card, I added a panel of dot paper from the Jolly Holiday pack, a sentiment from the Bells & Boughs set that appears in the holiday mini, some crochet trim, and a bow. I made the bow from the same crochet trim and the Cherry Cobbler seam binding available in the upcoming mini, then added one of the gorgeous antique brads in the center. The punch I used for the label behind the sentiment is also new in the holiday mini. It's called the decorative label punch and it's fabulous. I wanted to make the shape a little bigger so I punched an extra label, trimmed off the short ends, and added them to the top and bottom of the sentiment shape. For more vintage goodness I also sponged all the edges with Early Espresso ink.

That's it from me... I spent most of the evening working on this card, so I guess I won't be getting to the correct challenge tonight! Tomorrow is another day, right?

Saturday, August 7, 2010

For the Birds

This week begins a new month of challenges over at Our Creative Corner, and our hostess with the mostest this month is the fabulous Wendy Janson. Wendy's first challenge is to use embossing of any kind - you know it, you love it... so come play along!

I used a little dry embossing on my card. This was one of the cards we made at club this month. I wanted to use the new Aviary set - isn't it cute? I ended up combining two other cards into my CASEd creation - I took some ideas from this card by Lynn Put and others from the cute sample card on p. 192 of the catalog. For my colors I pulled out the new Color Coach. I knew I wanted to use Marina Mist, so I flipped through looking at all the combos they showed that used it and chose this one with Cherry Cobbler and River Rock. I didn't realize until I was all finished that I used two of those colors in my OCC card last week - but they're great colors so enjoy them again this week! I used naturals white for my stamped panel.

This card has a fair amount of cutting, but the rest of the card came together quickly. I used a River Rock card base and a 4" square of River Rock DP. The scallop border is a sneak peek of a new Big Shot die in the holiday mini - it's called Tasteful Trim and it works really well with the new (gasp!) fabric that will debut in the mini catalog, but it's super cute for cards, too, of course! I used the square lattice embossing folder on the blue scallop. To accessorize the card I added Floral Fusion flowers in Cherry Cobbler with a (retired) button in the center, plus a couple branches punched with the bird punch. Oh, and the sentiment is from Just Believe.

I know the rest of the OCC team will have gorgeous embossing to show you so please go visit the blog to see all the wonderful creations there!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Divine Diva Inspiration Challenge #33

For this week's challenge I chose these fun tequila bottles I found on Lovely Package. Those bright colors just jumped off the screen and grabbed me!


I picked a color combo that may make you all think I've lost my mind, but I really like it: Concord Crush, Melon Mambo, Daffodil Delight and Pear Pizazz. It works with these fun papers from Greenhouse Gala and the big flower from Punched Posies. My layout is the Mojo Monday sketch - now there's a challenge I haven't played in ages. I embossed the pink with the Vintage Wallpaper folder, added Concord Crush ribbon and daffodil buttons, scalloped the bottom of the daffodil paper with a Martha Stewart punch, and applied a retired rub-on sentiment.

Be sure to check out the cards made by all the Divine Divas for this challenge!

Anne

Chris

Donna

Julie

Kerri

Hope you are inspired to come and play along. Just leave a comment here with a link to your card. We can't wait to see what you create! The keyword for uploading on online forums will be DDIC33. Have fun and look for the next challenge on August 19!

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Eat Cake!

I have an ongoing project: use up my huge stash of supplies to stock my Etsy shop with more goodies. I'm trying to work on birthday cards to make up some sets, and for that I'm using all kinds of bits and pieces that never made it onto finished cards. This card turned out pretty cute so I thought I'd share.

The starting point for this card was the background - retired paper from Urban Oasis that I'd put onto black card stock. The cake was inspired by one made by Mary Fish - it's done with the Playful Pieces hostess set in Crumb Cake and black. Instead of using a single sentiment, I stamped the birthday image from Everything Nice two times and used it as a graphic contrast to the cake image.

I like this so much I might make more in other colors - I never thought this was a card I'd end up posting on my blog! Thanks so much for visiting today!