Inspired Designs

A Trio of Thank You's

I know, I know...I am still piercing on striped dp.  Looks like I am in a bit of rut right now but I do like how this card turned out.

I had initially intended to use kiwi kiss somewhere in my card so that it would qualify for the color challenge, in addition to the sketch challenge, but I ended up using basic black instead and the results are better.  The flowers really pop against that black strip of cardstock.

I stamped three flower images from the Embrace Life set on summer sun cardstock and sponged the centers of the flowers with pumpkin pie ink.  I added some white gel pen accents to the flowers and a pearl center.  The three flowers are adhered to a whisper white and basic black strip of cardstock that has been pierced on each side.  The strip was adhered to a double matted piece of basic black and striped pumpkin pie designer paper.  The pumpkin pie dp has ticket corner punched corners, piercing along the edges and a pearl was added to each corner of the basic black mat.  These mats were popped off the whisper white cardbase.  I stamped the "Thank You" sentiment in the lower corner of the pumpkin pie striped dp mat.   The sentiment was stamped in basic black ink.

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Stamps: Embrace Life, Thank You Kindly

Ink: Basic black, pumpkin pie

CS: Whisper white, basic black, summer sun, pumpkin pie dp

Accessories: Crafter's tool kit, ticket corner punch, pearls, white gel pen, dimensionals, sponge

A Pot of Golden Wishes

I wasn't expecting to get to participate in today's challenge but I managed to squeeze it into my stamping agenda today.

The featured stamper for today's challenge is Jami (sgtStamper).  She has a great gallery with lots of interesting layouts.  I have been trying to get my hostess gift and card done for my groups next month and I used one of Jami's layouts for my card. 

I found these punched St. Paddy day figures on Samantha Parisi's blog and I knew I had to use them in my St. Patrick Day hostess gifts.  I have an idea for the gift basket but was stumped on what to do for the card.  Then I found Jami's cool layout and the rest is history.  I don't own one single St. Patrick's Day themed stamp so I had to use the "wish big" sentiment from the Short & Sweet set and I think it works perfectly with the punchies. 

The leprechaun is pretty self explanatory for punched elements.  Just one thing to note would be the creation of the band and buckle on his hat.  The band is a black window word punched shape.  The buckle is created by punching a 1/4" square in brushed gold cardstock and then punching the window word punch around the square and trimming the two sides to make a buckle. 

The pot of gold is also pretty self explantory but just one comment regarding the lip of the pot and the gold.  The lip was created using the small and large oval punches.  I manipulated a brushed gold scallop circle through the opening and trimmed the edge of the scallop to match the edge of the bottom lip.  I adhered the lip and scalloped gold to a 1 3/4" basic black circle and I added some 1/4" punched gold coins over the scalloped gold.  The two stands on the base of the pot are 1/2" circles.

The two mats are made from old olive and basic black mats.  Each set of mats has a layer of dotted hawaii papaya dp on it and a pierced border.  

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Stamps: Short & Sweet 

Ink: Basic black 

CS: Blush blossom, pumpkin pie, basic black, brushed gold, basic black, old olive, hawaii papaya dp 

Accessories: Crafter's tool kit, circle punches - 1 3/4", 1 1/4" 1/4", 1/2", small and large oval punches, 5 petal punch, word window punch, 1/4" square punch, small tag punch, scallop circle punch, dimensionals, chalks, white gel pen   

Sparkly Season of Friendship

I seem to be stuck on using striped dp, square cards and piercing lately! LOL Today's limited supply challenge was based on using some kind of green colored designer paper in our project.  We were suppose to keep the layers of cardstock to three (I snuck in an extra one!) and to keep our embellishments to two kinds.  I used ribbon and rhinestones. 

I haven't used the Season of Friendship stamp very much and I thought a nice spring themed card would be nice for today's challenge. 

I inked the tree with close to cocoa ink and stamped it on the left side of a top note diecut.  I trimmed the right side of this diecut and then stamped the leaves on the limbs in kiwi kiss ink.  I pulled pink pirouette and regal rose ink off the edges of the diecut with a sponge.

I stamped and cut out flowers in pink pirouette and regal rose ink.  I adhered them to the tree limbs and added tiny clear rhinestones to each flower center.  I punched the left side of the diecut with the horizontal punch and threaded a length of regal rose 5/8" grosgrain ribbon through it.  I tied the ends together with white embroidery thread.   

The corners of the kiwi kiss striped dp layer were ticket corner punched and a pierced border was added to the edges.  This mat was layered on a large ticket corner punched whisper white mat and popped off the regal rose cardbase with dimensionals.  I added a large clear rhinestone in each corner of the cardbase.  The sentiment "The season of friendship lasts forever" was stamped in the lower left corner of the kiwi kiss dp mat in basic black ink.

Thanks for checking out my blog and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

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Stamps : Season of Friendship

Ink: Basic black, kiwi kiss, regal rose, pink pirouette, close to cocoa

CS: Whisper white, regal rose, kiwi kiss dp

Accessories: Big shot, top note die, clear rhinestones, regal rose 5/8" grosgrain ribbon, horizontal slot punch, ticket corner punch, crafter's tool kit, dimensionals, embroidery floss, sponge

So Hoppy For You!

Today's SCS challenge required us to use stripes in our project.  I have been wanting to make a punched frog since I saw it on Heather Summer's blog and this challenge gave me the perfect opportunity to do just that!

Initially I was going to make the water using striped dp but then I decided maybe a striped sky would be better.  I picked striped baja breeze dp for my sky background.  I added a pierced border to the dp. 

The wavy water scene was created with pacific point cardstock and a slit punch.  The frog was fashioned from various SU! punches and is positioned on a nestabilities diecut oval shape.  I used my scissors to cut a v-shape out of the oval lilypad to mimic the shape of a real one.

I stamped the "so hoppy for you!" sentiment in black ink on scrap whisper white cardstock and used an oval punch to punch the sentiment out.  I layered it on a larger pacific point oval and adhered it in the upper left corner of the cardfront. 

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Stamps:  Hoppy for You

Ink: Basic black pad and marker

CS: Whisper white, pacific point, old olive, kiwi kiss, basic black, baja breeze dp

Accessories: Crafter's tool kit, large and small oval punches, nestabilities, big shot, dimensionals, three flower punch, circle punches - 1 3/8", 1 3/4", 1", 3/4", 1/2", wide oval punch, slit punch 

  

More Rosey Kiwi Tulips

I think I have taken a billion photos of this card but I can't seem to capture a crisp, clean image of the sweet birdie and his basket of tulips.  

Today's color challenge was to use more mustard, rose red and kiwi kiss in our projects.  I don't think I have ever used this color combo before but I don't mind the look of it.  I thought the basket, tulips and bird image from the A Flower For All Seasons set would work well for this combo. 

I used the aquapainter to watercolor my images and added some darker more mustard areas on basket with a more mustard marker.  I decided to make a scallop edge medallion to frame the sweet image.  I layered larger mats of more mustard striped dp, whisper white and kiwi kiss cardstock behind the scallop edge medallion.  I added some piercing to the larger mats and whisper white taffeta ribbon for embellishments.  The medallion and the larger mats are popped off their bases with dimensionals.

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Stamps: A Flower For All Seasons

Ink: Basic black, more mustard, rose red, kiwi kiss, marker - more mustard

CS: Whisper white, rose red, kiwi kiss, more mustard, more mustard dp

Accessories: Whisper white taffeta ribbon, scallop edge punch, crafter's tool kit, dimensionals, aquapainter

Sweet Easter Chickie Round Top Box

When I saw today's challenge I knew I wanted to make an Easter themed round top box.  I adore the sweet chick from the A Good Egg set so I ended up using it and a paper pieced egg to create a focal point for the box. 

The paper pieced egg and the broken egg on the bottom of the chick are from retired SU! dp - petals and paisley.  It feels good to use some of my stashed dp - I tend to buy it and not use it too often.  The band across the center of the egg is tempting turquoise and pretty in pink cardstock with white gel pen dot accents.

The little chick image was stamped in basic black ink of scrap whisper white cardstock and then again on the small tempting turquoise circle.  I watercolored the image with so saffron and pumpkin pie ink.  I cut the image out and popped it up on dimensionals over the other stamped image.

The small tempting turquoise circle is layered on a larger so saffron circle and a pretty in pink scalloped circle.  I added white gel pen dot accents to each scallop and then adhered these matted layers to the rounded top of the box.

The layered sentiment was created with a wide pretty in pink oval, a large tempting turquoise oval and smaller stamped whisper white oval.  I added white gel pen accents to the wide oval and attached a so saffron punched flower with the pretty in pink center in the upper left corner of the matted ovals.  The "happy easter" sentiment was attached to the front of my box, overtop of some wonderful PTI lemon tart dotted ribbon.  I added some irridescent filament and glittery eggs to the basket.

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Stamps: A Good Egg

Ink: Basic black, so saffron, pumpkin pie, regal rose

CS: Whisper white, pretty in pink, so saffron, tempting turquoise, petals and paisley dp

Accessories: Small, large and wide oval punches, three flowers punch, 1/4" circle punch, dimensionals, sticky strip, nestabilities, big shot, white gel pen, PTI - lemon tart dotted ribbon

Certainly Perfect Plum Lilies

Today's SCS featured stamper is Julie (juliemlacey).  She has such a great style and I have always admired her cards.  I picked this card of Julie's to CASE and modify.

I changed the color combo, eliminated the brads and dp.  I added stamped and punched lilies elements instead of using dp has a focal point. I also changed the ribbon, the sentiment and the layering of the sentiment.

The base of my card was a whisper white card.  I adhered mats of certainly celery, perfect plum and pale plum onto the base.  The idea folded scallop square punched lilies came from Stacey King.  She has an amazing talent for adding folded elements to her cards. 

Each lily is made from a punched pale plum scallop square.  I sponged the center of each square with perfect plum ink and folded the square to form a lily shape.  I adhered a folded 1/2 of a 3/4" circle to the base of each flower.  These were attached onto cut stems and grass sections.  I layered the stems and grass over certainly celery stamped grass from the Inspired by Nature set on a whisper white mat.  I sponged certainly celery ink over the lower portion of the stamped and cut grass images and then tied a length of whisper white organza ribbon around the mat.   These smaller mats were popped off the larger mats with dimensionals.

The layered stamped sentiment was created by stamping the "for you" sentiment from the All Holidays set in perfect plum ink on scrap whisper white cardstock.  I used the small oval punch to punch the sentiment out and I pulled certainly celery ink off the edges.  I adhered this small oval to a large perfect plum oval and used dimensionals to pop it off the lower left corner of the small stamped mats.

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Stamps: Inspired by Nature, All Holidays

Ink: Certainly celery, perfect plum

CS:  Whisper white, certainly celery, perfect plum, pale plum

Accessories: Scallop square punch, small and large oval punch, sponge, whisper white organza ribbon, dimensionals, sticky strip, 3/4" circle punch

Lucky Leprechaun Cuppie

I have been working on getting my calendar cuppies done and my March cuppie certainly fits the bill for today's SCS limited supplies challenge.  We had to stretch ourselves and use or do two things out of the norm for your project.

My two "out of the norm" practices for this calendar piece include having no layers and using copic markers.  I find it difficult to make no layer cards and I rarely use my copic markers to color my images in.  I also used stickles for the coins in the pot of gold and that is something else I don't utilize very often. 

I think this is my favorite cuppie calendar month so far, but I have 10 more to do so that could easily change! LOL  I got the idea for the colorful, sparkly rainbow from Laurie Schmidlin's (Lauraly on SCS) cute March calendar.

 

I am sorry that I haven't been around too much this week.  We celebrated teacher's appreciation week at school which took at tremendous amount of prep work but it went off without a hitch.  Tomorrow is the twin's Valentine's party so we have been busy finishing our Valentine's gifts and cards and I made the sweetest lovebug cake for them to share with their friends.  On top of all of this I had two technique group nights so needless to say I am going to get some much needed sleep and rest over the weekend.

Speaking of sleep, it is way past my bedtime and I should get to bed.  I might have to sub tomorrow. 

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Stamps: A Year of Sweets

Ink: Palette noir

CS: Calendar insert by Taylored Expression

Accessories: Copic markers, crystal effects, dazzling diamonds, stickles, rhinestones

Cute Cuppie Calendar

I was so excited to get my Taylored Expressions order in the mail!  It arrived just in time for Teacher's Appreciation week.  I made a cuppie calendar for myself and the twin's teacher. 

I can't belive how absolutley adorable these cute cuppie images are.  I painted the wooden calendar frame with white acrylic paint and hung the 6x6 page protectors on the rings. I may still add some embellies to the frame, maybe something that I could changed up with the seasons.

You should definitely check out Taylor's calendar products on her site.  She also offers such a great selection of cute cuppie stamps that she designs and great embellishment and tool products. 

The first month I tackled was January.  I know that the month has already passed but I will definitely be keeping these calendar pages or perhaps reusing the images, so I had to make the January page.

I colored the sweet cuppie image with copic markers and added some rosey cheeks accents.  I adhered a purple rhinestone to the cuppies head that matched the scarf. 

I added dazzling diamonds to the blue on the snowflakes and the snow by applying crystal effects to the area first and then adhering dazzling diamonds over top.  I also used the crystal effects to attach blue Taylor's Tiny Twinkles to each point on the snowflakes.  The rhinestones, tiny twinkles and dazzling diamonds really add some sparkle to this wintery scene.

The A Year of Sweets I February image features two cuppies in love with the sweetest cuppie cupid in the background.

I used copic markers to color the cuppie images.  I added some glittery red stickles accents to the cherries on all the cuppies heads.  Dazzling diamond accents were added to the wings of the cupid cuppie with the help of crystal effects.  

If you look at the smaller image of the whole calendar set-up at the beginning of this post you will see that I also added a sweet red rhinestone on the 14th to denote Valentine's Day.

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Stamps: A Year of Sweet's I - Taylored Expressions

Ink: Palette Noir - PTI

CS: Calendar inserts - Taylored Expressions

Accessories: Copic markers, crystal effects, dazzling diamonds, rhinestones, Taylored Expressions - wooden calendar stand, Taylor's tiny twinkles, 6x6 page protectors

Flower Fusion Friend

Today's featured stamper is Karen Dunbrook (k dunbrook) and her gallery is full of wonderful, inspiring cards.  I decided to CASE and modify this card by Karen.

I kept the layout the same but I changed the colors and the designer paper.  I added some whisper white taffeta ribbon  and used the ticket corner punch instead of the corner rounder. 

I used layered felt flowers with rhinestone centers instead of stamped flowers with brad centers.  I eliminated the stitched elements and add some piercing around the perimeter of the dp mat.  I added rhinestones to the corners of the chocolate chip base.  I also changed the sentiment I used on my card.

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Stamps: All Holidays

Ink: Chocolate chip

CS: Chocolate chip, pink pirouette, whisper white, pink pirouette dp

Accessories: Big shot, nestabilities, flower fusion too, rhinestones, ticket corner punch, whisper white taffeta ribbon, crafter's tool kit, dimensionals, sticky strip