Teenage birthday card

I needed a birthday card for a girl who's turning 17 and loves horses. Wanted to the rescue! This layout is one of my favorites! It was the July WICKED sketch by Joanne Travis. It is awesome for using a square of DSP without having the DSP take over the whole card. This DSP is from Razzleberry Lemonade. The colors are Pumpkin Pie and Crushed Curry, and that helped set the color palette for the card. I started with a piece of Shimmery White so there would be just a hint of glitz on there. First, I stamped the horse in Soft Suede. I started at the right and then stamped multiple times, moving slightly to the left each time, to show the horse's movement. The sun is a 3/4" circle. I punched it from a Post-It note and used the hole to make the sun by sponging So Saffron (More Mustard would be a good choice too). Then I masked the sun with the punched piece and sponged Crushed Curry and Pumpkin Pie on the top half. The bottom half is sponged with Dusty Durango. (TIP: I use a sponge, but I swirl rather than stipple or pounce to get a softer look.) I added Soft Suede mats to the focal image as well as the Dusty Durango piece that the DSP is on; the Dusty Durango layer is stamped with Sanded in the same color. I distressed the edges of the DSP and sponged on Soft Suede. The card base is Crushed Curry stamped with Sanded in the same color. Soft Suede ribbon is the finishing touch.
Happy stamping!

More Holiday Mini stuff!

Here's a super quick card I made using 2 new Holiday Mini items. The balloon's basket is from a great new stamp set called Sweet Centers. Each of the stamps is made to go with a 1 3/4" circle: balloon, center of a flower, center of a heart, Christmas ornament or center of a Halloween image. I mixed it up a little by using a new punch from the Holiday Mini for the balloon. The punch is actually a Christmas ornament! (Look at it upside down, and you'll see it!) I love it with the balloon stamp for something different than the circle. I added the swirl from Priceless on the cardbase to simulate the wind (like I did on my kite card a few weeks ago).
Happy stamping!

A pirate's card for me

For this week's workshop wow challenge, I decided to do a sketch challenge. This sketch is based on the card on page 13 of the catalog. I used the new Night and Day DSP from the Holiday Mini; isn't it gorgeous? The stamped image is from my favorite new set, Beware Pirates. It's hard to tell in the photo, but the cardbase and stamped image are on Shimmery White cardstock.
Happy stamping!

Something new!

I know this isn't stamp related, but I am so excited that I have to share! I got a new car on Saturday!! Whoohoo! It's a Chevy Aveo. I traded in my wonderful Bravada because of Cash for Clunkers. The only reason I really have this car is because of my mom. She contributed a down payment so I could afford the monthly payments. Thanks, Mama! This is the first brand-new car I have ever owned!
Life has been really hectic, so I haven't stamped for a while. But I promise I will be stamping tonight, and later this week I will have BRAND NEW SNEAK PEEK items to show you from the upcoming Holiday Mini. You're going to love it!
Happy stamping!

Spotlight on spotlighting

Here is one more card I made for VSN. The challenge was to use a flower and a circle on your card. I love the spotlighting technique, so I decided to do that. I actually cheated a bit; I already had this card made except for the stamped panel and the ribbon. I had made another card where the focal image was so horrible that I couldn't bring myself to show it or send it to anyone. So I pulled that panel off, added the ribbon and stamped the flowers. I debated about where to put the spotlight. For balance, I would have liked it on the left, but I decided that the color needed to be on the right. I think it would have looked good the other way too.
Supplies (all SU): Stamps: Flores Suaves, Sanded; Paper: Confetti White, Crushed Curry, Melon Mambo, Rich Razzleberry textured, Razzleberry Lemonade DSP; Ink: Crushed Curry, Melon Mambo, Basic Gray; Accessories: aquapainter, 1 1/4 & 1 3/8 circle punches, Crushed Curry dotted grosgrain ribbon
Happy stamping!

Beware Pirates!

Last weekend, SCS had Virtual Stamp Night. During VSN, they present a challenge every hour. This month, the theme was food. I made this card for a challenge where you had to follow a recipe. The recipe I chose was for a Blue Bikini martini. The colors were Tempting Turquoise, Brilliant Blue and Cameo Coral. The accessories I chose (from a list) were acetate and brads. The garnish was rhinestones (in my brads).
I started by cutting a piece of window sheet and a piece of Tempting Turquoise cardstock down to the size of my stamp block. I stamped the ship onto the window sheet with White StazOn. To make my water scene, I punched a 3/4" circle into a Post-It and used that to sponge Cameo Coral craft ink for the sun. Then I heatset that to get the true ink color. Next I sponged Brilliant Blue ink all along the bottom and just around the other edges. I used Ice Circle rhinestone brads to attach the window sheet to the backdrop. The card base is Cameo Coral with Sanded stamped in Cameo Coral ink. I stamped the sentiment in turquoise ink and punched it out with the modern label punch. I backed that up with a designer label in Brilliant Blue.
Happy stamping!

Same Sketch Different Card

First of all, sorry that the photo is slightly blurry! Hope you had a great weekend! Mine was sticky and soggy, but I'm hopeful that this week will be better.
On Saturday, my friend Karen came over to stamp. She wanted me to show her how to make some of my projects using items that she has on hand. She really loved a card that we made during SAB, and she wanted to do that same card again. We grabbed the new In Colors and her Thoughts and Prayers stamp set. I showed her how to make her own patterned paper using one of the stamps. I think the card turned out great! The color combo (Crushed Curry, Bermuda Bay, Old Olive) is so pretty and works so well with the stamps we used.
Happy stamping!

Dawn Griffith's window card

Have you ever visited Dawn Griffith's blog? She is awesome! She is very creative and posts great videos of her projects. Last week, I saw this beautiful window card that she made for her convention swap, and I asked her if I could use it for this week's workshop wow. She was kind enough to say yes! It is so cool-looking and so easy to make! Let me know if you want me to do a photo tutorial; if a few people ask, I'll do one. I know some have trouble watching videos online.
Supplies (all SU): Stamps: Eastern Blooms, Heard from the Heart; Paper: Confetti White, Razzleberry Lemonade DSP; Ink: Melon Mambo, Rich Razzleberry; Accessories: window sheets, 2 way glue pen, Dazzling Diamonds, Crushed Curry dotted grosgrain ribbon
Happy stamping!

WICKED kite

This month's WICKED challenge for demonstrators on SCS has a summertheme. Sharonstamps gave us 3 great challenges, one of which was to create a kite card. Here are her directions for making the kite: To make a kite, cut a 3 1/2" square. Place one corner in the channel of your paper trimmer, and the adjacent corner at 1"... cut! Flip it over, repeat.. you have a great kite! I wanted a slightly smaller kite, so my Pumpkin Pie piece started as a 3" square. The whisper white piece was 2 3/4" square. I will also admit that the first piece I cut ended up a parallelogram; not sure how to work that into a card!
I kept the rest of the card simple. I used the big swirl from Priceless to imitate the wind blowing, and the tail of the kite is Crushed Curry ribbon with Pumpin Pie pieces tied on.
Happy stamping!

Stampin' Success sketch

One of the benefits of being a SU demonstrator is that we get a great magazine, Stampin' Success, every month. This was the sketch from the most recent magazine. I changed the size of the circles; they used 1/2" circles, but I wanted to use the heart from Love You Much which is 3/4". Since I have Bermuda Bay ink now (Hooray!), I wanted to use that color for sure. The color combo is Bermuda Bay, Old Olive, and Summer Sun. A little border or ribbon would be a great additional touch to step the card up.
Happy stamping!

Thursday's workshop

Thursday night, I had a workshop at Louise's house. I don't have a large client base, just one group I work with. We are all good friends, so the workshops are lots of fun! We made the paper bag purse and the 3-D card with the horse from Wanted. Both items were a big hit! Here are the purses we made. They all use the Razzleberry Lemonade DSP.

Every time I'm at Louise's house, her cat gets in my purse! (I believe this is Baxter.)

Sorry for the erratic posting this week. Sometimes life gets in the way of stamping and blogging (and reading blogs--I have over 200 posts to read in Google Reader!). I'm planning to get in some good stamping time today and get my blog posts done and scheduled so they will post on time.

Happy stamping!

Evolution of a card

Hi all! Sorry for the late post. It's been a heck of a week, and I'm still recovering from my computer problems last week. (I had to get a new hard drive and motherboard, so I lost all of the stuff on my old one. I still have recovery hopes though.)
I just did a swap for non-convention goers. SU has their convention now, and some of us who can't go (sniff, sniff!) participated in a swap.
The photo above is my final product, but it didn't start out that way! Here's what happened:
Here was my first one. I started out with a sketch. I think it was a weekend sketch challenge by Lori Craig. It had 3 circles down the side, but I could only fit 2. I knew I wanted to use Rich Razzleberry and Melon Mambo and then added Old Olive. I thought this was OK, but the Old Olive crimped strip seemed to be too much. I decided to change it to Chocolate Chip instead.

This was my second version. I liked the chocolate chip textured strip much better, but the card still needed a few more touches.
In my final card, I colored the flower centers chocolate chip and embossed them with Irridescent Ice embossing powder. The sentiment was stamped in 2 different colors to add more visual interest.
Special touches I used: The Old Olive layer in the flower was punched with the scallop circle punch, adhered to a strip of paper and punched again with the same punch to create the pointy edges. The flower was inked in Melon Mambo, and the Rich Razzleberry was added around the edges with sponge dauber. The Old Olive layer behind the sentiment was made with the modern label punch; I cut it in half and adhered it behind the sentiment (punched out with the same punch).
Happy stamping!

Beate's weekend sketch and some more DSP

Beate had a sketch posted that I thought would be perfect for using more of my new Razzleberry Lemonade DSP. What is it about using new stuff that is so appealing?
I think I ended up using a 2 1/2 X 3 1/2 piece of DSP. I adhered it to a piece of Rich Razzleberry textured cardstock and added a scallop border to mimic the Razzleberry scallop in the DSP. I used Pumpkin Pie for the card base and stamped a circle from Circle Circus so that there would be some stamping somewhere on the card!
I colored the flower using ink and an aquapainter. I was not very happy with it because the Melon Mambo ink spread much further down on the petals than I wanted. Next time, I'll put the lightest color on the outside edge and work my way in. For the center of the flower, I used a brad from the Hodgepodge Hardware inside a jumbo grommet. I put the brad inside the grommet then pressed the grommet prongs in around the back of the brad to keep the grommet in place.
For the 2 strips in the sketch, I used Crushed Curry grosgrain ribbon and a strip of Melon Mambo textured cardstock. The ribbon is 1/2" so I cut the strip 3/8".
Supplies (all SU): Stamps: Circle Circus; Paper: Pumpkin Pie, Rich Razzleberry textured, Melon Mambo textured, Razzleberry Lemonade DSP; Ink: Crushed Curry, Melon Mambo, Pumpkin Pie; Accessories: scallop border punch, Chit Chat rubons, Pretties kit, aquapainter, Styled Silver HPH, jumbo grommets, Crushed Curry grosgrain ribbon
Happy stamping!