Crafty Weekend

I was lucky enough to go to my upline Kay's retreat this past weekend.  This was the first time I've been able to go.  It was so much fun!  She spoiled us with lots of treats.  We had make and takes, lots of food and a Christmas pajama party Saturday night.

My goal was to get swaps done for On Stage in November.  I didn't get all of them done but I did get some completed. Here are some of the cards I made:

This stamp is from the Every Good Wish set. I love the 

watercolor look. I got 25 made for swaps!

I don't have this bundle yet but got to use Kay's. It's

a beautiful set - I've ordered it now! I only had enough paper

 to make about 12 of these for swaps. 

This card was made with the Snowflake Sentiments

bundle.  Another beautiful set!  I've seen so many

gorgeous examples on Pinterest with it.

I used several different sets on this card.

The sentiment is from the Snowflake Sentiments set,

the mittens are from the Smitten Mittens set and I used

the Winter Wonder embossing folder for the background.

I'm sure you can't see it in the photo, but I added Wink of
Stella to the embossed snowflake.

This is the Hearts Come Home bundle. More

Wink of Stella on the snowdrifts. I added

silver foil paper behind the windows.

I decided this was a little to time

intensive for swaps.

This is using a special stamp set - Merry Patterns.

You can get this stamp set free with a $300 party

or order.  Stay tuned for more info on another

way you can get one.

I wanted to make some swaps for On Stage

that weren't Christmas. This is using the

Oh So Eclectic bundle. I'm not sure this

is my final version. I'd like to try one using

embossing paste in the background instead of the

die cut out.

So that's most of what I made at the retreat.  Next time I'll have my cards planned out better so I can make sure I have everything I need.  But it was a lot of fun to play with stamps and dies that I didn't own!

Embossing Fun

Last night I had an embossing class.  We made cards using both types of embossing.  We had so much fun!  I forgot to take pictures at class but here are the projects we made:

For this card I used the Woodland Textures embossing folder - still one of my favorites.

I adhered it to the crumb cake piece before embossing so it would all match perfectly.

Then I added leaves using the Colorful Seasons bundle. I love those intricate die cuts.

Did\ you notice the little piece of fluff above the leaves? That is the copper ribbon all

 stretched out. f you pull it apart you end up with this really fun netting.

This card uses the Cheers to the Year stamp set. I embossed the circles on the 

background in gold and silver. I added a strip of the gorgeous Year of Cheer specialty 

designer series paper.  All of it has metallic foil - just beautiful!  The piece behind the 

sentiment is one of the foil snowflakes from the holiday catalog. I just punched the 

middle of it out with a 2" circle punch.  I'll  save the outside of it to use as a wreath on 

another card.

The card on the left is the card we made in class. It was made with the emboss resist

technique.  I stamped the snowflakes from the Colorful Seasons set in Versamark

on Shimmery White paper and them embossed them with clear embossing powder.
Then I took my aqua painter and Dapper Denim and applied a wash of color all over

 the card. The embossed areas resist the ink.  After that, I took my aqua painter and 

splattered drops of water on the card and blotted them with a towel. The water 

caused the ink to lift leaving little spots with less color.

The card on the right I sponged with Soft Sky, Marina Mist & Pacific Point. 

Sponging makes the colors a little softer.

Hope you enjoyed this peek at the fun class we had last night. Hope to see you at a class soon!

Not so scary cat punch

One of my favorite new bundles in the Holiday catalog is Spooky Cat.

Here are a few spooky projects I made with it:

But then I decided to make some not so spooky cards for my friend Elizabeth:

This card uses some of the Delightful Daisy Designer Series Paper.  

The sentiment is from the Wood Words set.

I used the Lovely Inside & Out bundle on this card.

Looks like I'm partial to black cats! The Happy Celebrations stamp set

& Celebrations Duo embossing folder work great together on this card.

The Painted Autumn Designer Series Paper doesn't have to 

be just for fall projects.

This would be a good card to send to

someone who recently lost their fur baby.

I had so much fun playing with this punch.  It's not just for spooky Halloween cats!

Mini pizza box fun!

I spent some time over this long weekend playing with new products.  I had more fun creating with the new pizza boxes!  They are food safe so perfect to give as a gift with a cookie or some candy inside.  Another great gift idea is to fill them with 3 x 3 cards - we now carry envelopes for those.  Those 3 x 3 cards would be perfect to use on gifts. I'm planning a class for this in October - watch my weekly email for details.   Here's what I created with them:

I sponged this pizza box with Pumpkin Pie ink.

I'm loving this new cat punch!

The boxes look great left white. I created a belly band for this one.

It slips off easily so the box can be opened.

There are so many possibilities for these pizza boxes!  I'm sure I'll be creating more fun projects soon!

Fun with Embossing Paste

I am officially an empty nester now.  We moved my youngest son to college 2 weeks ago. It's been very quiet around the house!  But on the bright side, I had time on Saturday to just sit & create.  It had been awhile since I took time to do that - it was so fun & relaxing.  I decided to play with my embossing paste.  I'd made 1 or 2 cards with it before.  This time I decided to try some new techniques.

Here's a photo of the tools I used:

Aren't those masks fun?!  I decided I wanted to make something with each one.

Here's the background I made using the clouds mask:

This was made using the embossing paste just as it comes out of the jar. I used a die cut oval in the middle to keep the clouds just on the outside. I knew I wanted to use the flying pig from the This Little Piggy set.  Here's the card I ended up with:

I stamped a few clouds in Soft Sky to go with my flying pig. The pig stamp has a saying at the bottom of it that I didn't want on this card.  So I put a piece of scotch tape over the saying when I inked up the stamp.  Just be sure you remove the tape before stamping on your paper! 

This background was also made with the embossing paste as it came out of the jar. But this time I put it on one of the gorgeous wood Designer Series papers:

I didn't want to cover up much of this beautiful design. So I used the cat punch from the new Holiday Catalog (available Sept 1st). I punched it out of Shimmery White card stock and colored it with an aqua painter to look like a Siamese - simple but elegant:

Then I decided to try coloring the embossing paste. I took a little bit and put it on my Silicone sheet and added a drop of Pumpkin Pie reinker:

I made this background and one that covered the whole piece of card stock.  This is the card I created with the piece that was fully covered:

This uses some new dies from the 2017 Holiday Catalog.  I just love this pumpkin die!

I've been wanting to try this next technique with the embossing paste.  For this one I used the brick mask.  Right after applying the embossing paste (after removing the mask), I sprinkled copper embossing powder on it.  I set it aside & let it dry for a little bit before heating it.  I didn't get a picture of the background by itself but this is the card I created:

I think this is my favorite!  I also used one of my favorite new sets - Painted Harvest.

I had so much fun spending the afternoon playing!  I need to make sure I do that more often.  I just got another fun bundle today from the Holiday Catalog.  I'll have more to share with you next week!

This Little Piggy

Just a quick post to share one of my favorite stamp sets from the new catalog.  We got to see this set in action at On Stage in April.  While everyone else was picturing cute, pink pigs - all we could see were red Razorbacks!

So of course we had to make some in card class last week.  These are the 2 cards we made:

The pigs were stamped with Archival Black on Shimmery White card stock.  Then we used an Aqua Painter to color them. You can find lots of cute examples with this set on Pinterest. Let me know if you'd like to add these cute hogs to your stampin' stash!

Climbing Orchids

My parents have grown orchids since before I was born  So when I saw the Climbing Orchids stamp set in the new catalog, I knew I would have to get it. The orchids in this stamp set are Phalaenopsis or 'moth orchids'.  They are probably the most popular orchid sold, you can usually find them at your local grocery store.  Most orchids are epiphytes.  This means they don't grow in soil, but get their nutrients from water and air. In tropical areas, you will find orchids growing outside on trees. Ok, that's enough orchid facts for today. 😊   How about seeing some cards made with this gorgeous set?

This card is quick and easy. I stamped the orchids 

in Powder Pink and the Sheet Music in Early

Espresso.  I also used the new Ruffled textured 

embossing folder.

For this card I used the coordinating

framelit to cut out the orchids and buds. 

I stamped the orchids in Rose Red on 

So Saffron card stock. I used the Petal 

Burst embossing folder for the background.

I got this idea from Robin Messenheimer. 

This one is stepped up a little more. I used the

coordinating framelits to cut out pieces of the

orchids and then assembled them on the card. 

They were stamped in Peekaboo Peach and I

used Chocolate Chip for the sentiment & branches.

The background paper is from the Wood Textures

Designer Series Paper Stack. 

I had so much fun creating with this bundle.  I can't wait to send one of these cards to my parents - I know they will love it!