Paper Players Challenge #6

I am so happy to have finally completed a card for the Paper Players Challenge over at Always Playing with Paper. This colour combo really said 'flowers' to me. And so I pulled out my new Level 1 hostess set 'Because I Care'. I stamped 2 images and carefully cut out parts of it and popped them up on glue dots to add dimension. This is kind of a simple 3D Tole, or paper tole. Many people ask me how I get my scallop trim edge and corner punches to line up so easily, and so I have made a little tutorial on my technique. Click here for the tutorial.

Now back to my card. The image was stamped in Basic Grey on Very Vanilla. Then I coloured in the blossoms with an Aquapainter and Rose Red ink and the leaves with Certainly Celery and an Aquapainter. Then I mounted it on a frame of Rose Red cardstock (again click here for a tutorial) Then the whole thing was mounted on a piece of textured Very Vanilla cardstock. I have included the untouched photo below to show the detail from the Vintage Wallpaper textured impression folder for the Big Shot which made this texture. Next I added a Certainly Celery ribbon (retired). The sentiment was stamped in Rose Red and mounted on a piece of Basic Grey cardstock. Finally, the whole thing was mounted on Certainly Celery cardstock.

The Fun Stuff
1. Paper – Very Vanilla, Basic Grey, Rose Red, Certainly Celery
2. Ink – Basic Grey, Rose Red, Certainly Celery
3. Stamps – Because I Care
4. Accessories – Vintage Wallpaper Textured Impressions folder, Scallop Trim border and corner punches. Modern Label and Word Window punches, Aquapainter, Stampin’ Dimensionals, Mini Glue Dots, ¾ inch Certainly Celery ribbon (retired)

Border and Corner Punch Tutorial

Many of you have commented on how pefectly lined up my borders are when I use the border and matching corner punches together. Below is a tutorial on my technique. I'm sure there are many ways to do this, but this system works best for me. I'm not one for measuring and fussy details so this way may not be perfect, but it usually works out for me.

First you need to punch one of the corners of your paper. The corners line up in the punches perfectly. You just need to fiddle a bit to get the corners to line up with the paper exacly. But if you push the paper against the bottom of the punch it will fit nicely into the paper guides.

Next use the border punch to make both sides away from the corner. I like to line up the last punch with one of the punches in the next. For me this works perfectly when lining up the next punch, but what this means is that the last scallop is punched through twice - once with each step. You can also use the picture guides in the punch itself, but these never work for me.

Next, lay down the piece of cardstock that you plan to mount in the 'frame' you are making. Make sure the corners aren't too far apart or too close together for your image. In the photo below, I made the frame a bit too small, but then I trimmed the paper with the image (very vanilla cardstock) once the frame was completed.

The next step is the trickiest. When you figure out where you want to put your corner (by using the 'guestimate' technique in the previous step) then you can punch your corner. YES - you can use these new corner punches where there IS NOT a corner. Amazing right? All you do is make sure you are NOT using the paper guides on the bottom of the punch. Instead, I turn the punch over and line up the previous scallop (like I do on the sides as mentioned above). Then I line up one side with the edge of the paper. You can see this if you turn the punch upside down. Then I punch it. The image below shows the two corners that are punched before they are cut.

As you can see in the photo above, it's pretty obvious where the edge of the paper should be to punch the rest of the border. I lay it down on my paper cutter and line the straight side that has been punched out with the blade on my paper cutter and cut.

Do this for both corners

next punch your edges up to the final corner as below

Then punch the last corner are you are done!!!!! After you make the frame you can trim up your image (like I mentioned above) and mount it on the frame like below

Almost Artisan 10

This card was inspired by the colours in the Sweet Pea DSP pack. I cut and layered and trimmed and used punches etc. Here's what I used to make the card.

Stamps: Wings of Friendship, Fine Flourish
Ink: So Saffron Classic Stampin’ Pad, Chocolate Chip Classic Stampin’ Pad
Paper: Taken With Teal Cardstock, Whisper White Cardstock, Rose Red Cardstock, Sweet Pea Designer Series Paper
Accessories: Chocolate Chip 5/8” Satin Ribbon, Wide Oval Punch, Big Shot, Finial Press Textured Impressions Embossing Folder, Lots of Tags Sizzlits, Corner Rounder Punch, Scallop Trim Border Punch, Black String from Pirate Party Kit to tie bow, Filigree Brads, Rhinestone Brads
Adhesives: SNAIL, Sticky Strip, Stampin’ Dimensionals

Stampin' Celebration Challenge #10

When I saw this inspiration photo I knew that I had to pull out my Circle Circus stamp set. This card s for the latest inspiration challenge over at Stampin' Celebration. I was excited to pull out my new Daffodil Delight ink and paper. I just love how this colour combo pops on the page. I dug out a retired sale-a-bration set for the sentiment.

The details
1. Paper – Daffodil Delight, Basic Black, Whisper White
2. Accessories – Basic Black Satin Ribbon, Stamp-a-ma-jig,
3. Stamps – Circle Circus, Congrats (retired)

Latest Blog Award

One of the things that I love about bloggerland out there is the friends that you can make online. Occasionally someone sends me a blog award and I have to say that I am usually too busy to organize myself to pass it on.


BUT...


Today I was thrilled to receive one from Tamie over at Paper Infusions and More. She has presented me with this Cherry On Top Award. Thanks Tamie. Please take time to check out her blog. She has a weekly colour challenge for you to enter. And as I am on summer holidays I have the time to post this one up. I also organized myself to post up the other awards I have received over the past year. This one I am actually going to pass on - hooray!!! Isn't it the cutest?? I love the little cupcakes.


The rules for this award are:
1. Thank the person who gave this award to you.
2. Copy the award and put it on your blog.
3. List three things which you love about yourself.
4. Post a picture you love.
5. Tag five people you wish to pass this award on to.



So without sounding too narcissistic here are 3 things I love about myself.


1. I love being artistic. I studied classical piano for 10 years when I was younger, I taught myself to play the guitar, I taught music to primary children for the first half of my teaching career, I love to paint with watercolour and sew. And a few years ago I discovered that my true artistic passion is papercrafting.


2. I love my family. I have a wonderful husband and 2 adorable children. They are all the most important things in my life. I learn new things from my children daily. They are both bright sparks.


3. I love being a teacher. I have been teaching primary children for 18 years. Right now I teach Grade 2. I have taught in New Zealand on a job exchange. I have friends who are teachers all over the world. I love that teachers are usually passionate about their jobs. It takes a certain kind of person to be a teacher and I love people like that.


Now for the picture. It's so hard when I have so many pictures of my children and family that I love. This picture is of my daughter when she was 11 months old. I love how expressive she is. Even though she couldn't talk when I took this picture, you can tell how excited she is. To this day she LOVES swings.

Five people to tag - again this is a toughie as I have so many wonderful blogging friends.

1. Angela - my upline and good friend. I would not even have this blog if she had not encouraged me to follow her into the blogosphere. Click here for her blog.
2. LeAnne - I find so much inspiration from her blog. She is one of the people behind the long running Color Throwdown challenge blog. Check out her fabulous creations on her blog here.
3. Kari - a friend and crafter I met online. Kari is extremely talented and has been sought out to join the design teams she is on. Click here for her fabulous blog.
4. Beverly - I met her through her entries to Stampin' Royalty. She always has such nice things to comment. Check out her great blog here.
5. Lesley - a fellow Canadian teacher from British Columbia as well. She always leaves me such nice comments on my blog. Check out her wonderful challenge blog called Always Playing with Paper.

Thanks again Tamie for the award. I swear I'm going to get organized enough to enter your challenges as I LOVE colour challenges.

Colour Q Challenge #40

I am so happy that I have finally had time to sit down and enter a few challenges. It's been a while for me. This card is for the latest challenge over at Colour Q. I used my Beautiful Wings Embosslit die to make all the butterflies in the challenge colours. Then I ran the white background through the big shot with the Square Lattice Textured Impressions Folder. I used the Scallop Trim border punch to add some detail. I find these little butterflies difficult to attach, but a tiny dot of Crystal Effects glue for a quick fix.
The details
1. Paper – Melon Mambo, Cameo Coral, Bermuda Bay, Barely Banana, Whisper White
2. Accessories – Beautiful Wings Embosslit, Square Lattice Textured Impressions Folder, Scallop Trim Border Punch.

Practical Scrappers Sketch

I used My Digital Studio to create this page. These photos are from my nephew's 1st birthday and my Brother's 40th birthday party. Last year, my nephew was born on my brother's 39th birthday. One of the games my sister-in-law organized for all the toddlers was a pin the nose on the clown game. All the kids got these clown noses. I couldn't resist making this page. The kids were having so much fun.

So Simple, Yet So Effective

This card was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo easy to make. I stamped the background tone-on-tone, and then stamped the sentiment in a coordinating colour and punched it out and mounted it on a die cut in the matching ink. I added a tiny pearl to the sentiment for a little extra detail.

Paper - Bashful Blue, Pacific Point, Whisper White
Ink - Bashful Blue, Pacific Point
Stamps - Elements of Style, Ovals All
Punches - Large Oval and Scallop Oval
Accessories - Pearls and Stampin' Dimensionals.

Stampin Royalty Challenge #27

It's Wednesday so that means another great challenge over at Stampin' Royalty. Please hop over to Jody's blog to see what great project she has come up with.
This week it's a sketch challenge brought to you by yours truly. Although I made the sketch with flowers, once I actually sat down to make the card, I decided to get rid of the flowers all together and use the images from Sentimental Journey and Artistic Etchings. The centre square was stamped tone on tone with the En Francais background stamp. The colours I used are Perfect Plum, Pink Pirouette, Rose Red, Soft Suede, and Whisper White. The scallop rectangle was punched out with the Scallop Square Clear Bigz die for the Big Shot.

Practical Scrappers - Cartoon/ Animation Challenge

This week the challenge over at Practical Scrappers is to use Cartoons or Animation in your sample. I dug out these glittery Mickey Mouse stickers. I pulled the colours for the card out of the stickers themselves. The new colour Daffodil Delight worked perfectly with the yellow, Real Red and Basic Black were the other colours used. The sentiment came from MDS (my digital studio) and it's from the Once Upon A Time stamp set. I tried something new for the background. First I ran the Daffoldil Delight paper through the Big Shot with the New Lattice Textured Impressions Folder. Next I used a brayer and ran it over Summer Sun ink and then lightly ran it over the cardstock. This contrasting colour really highlights the texture on the card. I added a black satin ribbon from the current catalogue.

Seeing Doubles Yet Again.

This card was originally made for the Seeing Doubles challenge over at Stampin' Royalty last week. I had the clever idea to use multiple double images for the challenge. But when it was all done, I liked the other card I made better - so I used it as my challenge sample. This one uses the same Level 2 Hostess stamp set Cute By The Inch. I inked them up with my Concord Crush marker and carefully cut them out. Then I mounted them on Pale Plum cardstock and cut them out again,. Next I mounted them on dimensionals on Early Espresso cardstock. The card base is Wild Wasabi and I used Versamark and Baroque Motifs to stamp the background image.

Almost Artisan 8

Here's another page I submitted for the Artisan Award contest. I love this photo of my hubby and my daughter. It was taken a few years ago at the family cabin. They both look so peaceful in this picture. I used the Sunny Day simply scrappin kit.

Ink: Taken With Teal, So Saffron,
Paper: Sweet Pea Designer Series Paper,
Cardstock: Taken With Teal, Whisper White, So Saffron
Ribbon: Whisper White Organza, Whisper White 5/8” Satin
Accessories: Pretties Kit, Aqua Painter, Cutter Kit, Big Shot, Top Note Bigz Die, Finial Press Textured Impressions Embossing Folder
Adhesives: SNAIL, Sticky Strip, Pop Up Glue Dots, Crystal Effects,
Journaling and Title created with My Digital Studio

Graduation Card 1

I found this fabulous graduation paper over at Lindsay's Stamp Stuff. I made 4 cards in total and I'll post them up over the next few weeks. I made the grad cap using punches and some freehand cutting. Click here for a little tutorial. The paper was mounted on Soft Suede and Old Olive cardstock which coordinated very nicely with the colours in the paper.

Graduation Cap Tutorial

Here's a tutorial on how to make this cute little Graduation cap. First I cut a strip of black cardstock that was 1 inch wide. Then I cut on an angle twice to form a diamond shape. Next I took a 1 1/4 inch circle punch to make a circle and then cut it in half. Both shapes are shown below.

Next I took the 3/4 inch circle punch and punched out to half circles from the larger half circle as in the picture below.

Now for the tassle. First I took some yellow grosgrain and unravelled it. (I used some retired Crushed Curry polka dot grosgrain in my example). I unravelled it about an inch.

Next I started to wrap the long string that was unravelled, back around the remaining ribbon like so.

Then I stopped and cut the ribbon down to a thin strip like in the photo below.

Then I continued to wrap the long string around over until it looked tight and clean and smooth. Then I added a drop of crystal effects glue and wrapped it two more times. Then I trimmed the long string so that the tassle looked like the one below.

I layered the two pieces of black cardstock like in the photo below. Then I used my paper piercer to punch a hold in the centre and then threaded the tassel through it.

Finally I put a brad through the hole and trimmed off the extra yellow string from the back.

The brad will hold the tassel in place so make sure the tassel is where you want it to stay when you fold the brad tabs down.

Almost Artisan 7

This card was originally inspired by a card made by my upline Angela. You can find the link to her blog on my sidebar. Then I changed the colours radically and changed it to a 3 x 6 card. I used the Sweet Pea DSP as the colour inspiration this card. I used Taken with Teal for the trees. I had to use my Stamp-a-ma-jig . I stamped each image twice - once on the base cardstock and then again and I carefully cut out the 'leaves' portion and popped them up on dimensionals. For the centre tree I used markers to colour in each of the leaves for a more individualized look.

Ink: Bermuda Bay, Chocolate Chip, Pretty In Pink, Old Olive
Stamps: Trendy Trees, Tiny Tags
Paper: Whisper White Cardstock, Sweet Pea Designer Series Paper,
Accessories: Medium Tag Punch, Jumbo Eyelets, Stamp-a-ma-jig, Masterpiece Ribbon Originals, Linen Thread.
Adhesives: SNAIL, Sticky Strip, Stampin’ Dimensionals

Stampin Royalty Challenge #26

Today I'm sharing with you a card made for the current challenge over at Stampin' Royalty. This week's challenge is called 'Seeing Doubles'. The design team has done a fabulous job this week. Hop on over to Jody's blog to see what she has come up with.
I love, love LOVE the colours on this card. Purple and green - remember? What's special about this card is that the purple on the images is one of the new In Colours - Concord Crush. Now I don't have any cardstock or ribbon from the new catty yet, so I substituted with Elegant Eggplant (another fabulous purple). The patterened paper is from the new catty (Greenhouse Gala) and it's in another new In Colour - Pear Pizzaz. I can't wait for the new ink pads and paper to be available so that I can stamp without using my markers.
So now about Seeing Doubles. What I did was stamp one image twice - from the upcoming new Level 2 hostess set Cute By The Inch. I used my new Stampin' Write markers to use Concord Crush ink. Then I mounted both images on Elegant Eggplant squares and trimmed them down. Look below for more detail. The ribbons were layered ricrack over 1/4 inch grosgrain. Both are in Elegant Eggplant. And I doubled them up for a double look at doubled up ribbon. The base of the card is Wild Wasabi. I am thrilled to see this retired In Colour returning to the permanent line up. I have been rationing my stash of it from a few years past. So I hope to see you all over at Stampin' Royalty.

Practical Scrappers - Border Punch Challenge

This card is for the current challenge over at Practical Scrappers. This week the challenge is to use border punches or decorative edged scissors. I saw a layout in CK magazine which inspired this card. In the magazine the page was done in Kraft coloured paper and the entire 12x12 page was covered in border punch outs of the same colour. For my card I chose Bashful Blue as my background. What I did was punch the edges first and then trim down the strips to a narrow size. The stamp is from the Oval All set and I used my SU punches to cut out the sentiment. Pacific Point is the blue of the scallop oval. A few buttons and brads and ribbons later and we have the completed card.

What a Great Gift Idea!

This fabulous idea was shown to us at my recent upline meeting. It's super easy to make. First you need to go to the hardware store and buy metal flashing. You can ask an employee for help to find it if you need to. If you buy a large roll of it, you need to cut it into 12 inch sections. This is easily done with an old pair of scissors. Next you need the petal die for the big shot. Run it through. Then you carfully push out the sections that are a bit stuck. You need to be careful or you can slice your finger - just ask me how I know this :) . Once all the pieces are out, though you can handle them easily without injury. So first you use your fingers to roll up the petals and curve them back. You don't need the smallest flower. Then you layer them together and adhere them together with glue dots. Put a votive candle in the middle to complete it. The large glue dots work best. A hot glue gun does not work too well on metal and they fall apart easily - again, ask me how I know this. :)

Tragedy

So yesterday I had an absolute tragedy happen to me.
I went into the bathroom last night to "brush my teeth" and I brought my new catalogue with me to peruse while I "did my business". I put it on the counter to find my toothbrush, but...

need I say more???? I know a picture says a thousand words.

It fell in the (thankfully clean) toilet.

When I heard the splash I turned and grabbed it and wiped it down and pulled out my hairdryer and set to work. It is now dry and not stuck together, but as you can see in the photo above, it's a bit ugly. I mean, it's (almost) as important as the Bible in our house. How can I hold on to something so yucky and grimy.

But ... Ta DA.. My fabulous upline Angela came to my rescue and provided me with a spankin' shiny brand new one.

I am so blessed. I am going through my new catty again with a box of post-it's to plan my order for July 1st once again. HOORAY (thanks Ange!)

Almost Artisan 6

Here's another card I made for the Artisan Award competition. I was inspired by another card I had seen that didn't use Stampin' Up! stamps. I used my paper piercing tool to made a border around the top note die cut and the wide oval punch die cut.

Stamps: Well Scripted, Season Of Friendship
Ink: Soft Suede Classic Stampin’ Pad
Paper: So Saffron, Soft Suede, Not Quite Navy, Tempting Turquoise, Whisper White
Accessories: Wide Oval Punch, Big Shot, Lots of Tags Sizzlits, Top Note Die, Masterpiece Ribbon Originals, Scallop Edge Punch, Earth Elements Brads, Paper Piercing Tool and Mat Pack, Fresh Favorites I Coloured Buttons
Adhesives: SNAIL, Sticky Strip, Stampin’ Dimensionals