A Blog Called Wanda

A good deed story and a card...

Hi friends! How are you? I'm hunkered down in my craft studio for the next two days...I gotta get some stuff done! That's okay with me though. Kitty is in here with me and I have some tunes going on my iPad and it's all good. The hubs is relaxing in the family room. A perfect day. I made today's card as a thank you card for a good deed that someone did for me last week. It's a nice story.

I'm sitting at my desk at work last Thursday afternoon and feeling sort of sleepy due to Excel spreadsheet overload...so I got on my iPhone and wrote a facebook post saying "I wish Starbucks delivered." That's it, forgot about it, and kept going. Well...down the hall in another department a sweet co-worker read my post on her phone and wrote me back that she would go and get us Starbucks and deliver it!!! There's a Starbucks about 3 blocks away from our office...and she needed some fresh air... SO how great is that? Technology + facebook + sweet co-worker = Starbucks delivery! What did we ever do before iPhones? Don't answer that...don't speak of it...LOL.

So here's the card I made her to say "thanks a latte" to her for going and bringing me a much needed Venti Soy Caramel Macchiato! Her favorite color is pink...

 

 

This trellis (called Tessatina) die is a brand new die from Memory Box for Spring...I am in love! It looks very nice and crisp against this pink. This quatrefoil pattern is without a doubt my favorite new stamping 'thing' and it's popping up everywhere. Hero Arts has a new stamp (Studio Calico) with this pattern coming out soon. I saw it at CHA. YUM.

 

Here are my supplies...The stamp set is from Amuse Studio and I cannot remember (sorry) where I got this pretty washi tape. I put a touch of Stickles on the little steam clouds. Two Copics is all. R81 was a perfect match for this Bazzill paper.

 

This is what I put on the inside of the card....

 

 

This past week I got five new email subscribers! That puts me at 225 peeps who are kind enough to let me pop them an email when I post something new! This is very very touching to me and I'm really glad you're here sharing with me. Thank you! Have a great day everybody. :-)

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Sunflower Happy Birthday! TESC #152!

WOOO HOOO! It's Friday! Hope it was a great week for all of you and that fun times are ahead for the weekend! I have Monday off for President's Day so it's a three day weekend for me. I have plans for brunch with a gal pal tomorrow and then I need to stamp like a crazy woman to get my projects all done! Thanks for coming by today. It's my day to post for Taylored Expressions so I used the awesome sketch from TESC #152! You still have time to enter your card for the sketch challenge....and you could win a prize! CLICK HERE for details!

I made sort of a shabby-country-chic sort of creation! I used new papers from My Mind's Eye and a Fall stamp set and a pretty shade of golden yellow. I'll put my supply list at the bottom of the post.

 

 

 

 

Here is the sketch image. I flipped it up on it's side since I wanted to use the oval the long way to fit my image better. COOOOOL sketch...it's a keeper!

Here is a photo of my supplies...I used the "Thankful" set - which is traditionally for Fall! You can get more use out of your sets if you try to see them in a different light. The apples could be for a teacher card too and I love the sentiments with that set. I used the Happy Birthday words from the "Embrace Beauty" set because I like that font.  

 

Here is my card before the focal image. I sanded the brown paper and the gold paper to make it softer and more shabby-licious! hee hee.

 

 

 

 

Here is my Copic Palette...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Supplies - all from Taylored Expressions:  

Thankful Stamp Set

Embrace Beauty Stamp Set

Medium scallop die

Copic Markers

MME  - Be Amazing 6x6 paper pad

I hope you have a most fabulous day friends!  

 

Happy Valentine's Day 2012! XOXOXO!

Whew....I have a lot to share today! I had a super fun, busy weekend full of friends and laughter and food and crafting and pictures and oooh boy. I needed to go back to work to rest up! Hahaha. Happy Heart Day to you and your family. It's Valentine's Day! I'm sorry it's here because I feel like I was just getting in my crafty groove with hearts and stuff. I put all the Valentine crafty things away last night...until next year. I have one last card to share with you for the holiday.

As you probably know...I love banners! I'm crazy about 'em actually. Love them on cakes, and cards and hanging up for a party and all that. I even have a Pinterest Board called Banner Madness (click here). I wanted to make a pretty red and cream banner card so I got out some supplies and went to town with it! This card is definitely "more is more!"

 

 

Each little banner is different, but they are all unified by using the same papers, hearts, and butterflies. I adore crisp, bright red with cream.

 

Before I started, I went around the craft room and got out all kinds of yummy things I thought would go together. The pennants were cut from a Papertrey Ink die set and the hearts are also a Papertrey Ink die set. The butterflies were punched from Martha Stewart punches. The beautiful lace ribbon is from my sweet pen pal Holly in The Netherlands! I had to pretty much tear the whole room apart to find those teeny tiny clothespins!!!

 

This is the process of laying everything out first to see what looked best...before gluing it all together. I decided to layer two colors on each pennant.

 

 

Here they are all strung on a pretty piece of lace. I inked the edges of everything with linen distress ink just to make it look more vintage.

 

 

I busted out the sewing machine and made a free form edge around the cream paper. The message was stamped in brown ink.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, somewhere along in the process, Mr. Buddy decided to hop onto my stamping table and have a look...and he liked this one the best! Bad kitty!

 

Friday night my friend CJ met me at Paper Garden to take a class from the fabulous Ms. Julie Ebersole! CJ is an amazing baker/cake decorator. She brought me the most adorable (and delicious) little box of truffles she made! Aren't the pretty? They tasted so goooooooood!

 

 

In class, we made five fun fold cards. I think this idea was my favorite. The card lays flat for mailing but then pops up into a little diorama. SO cute! I will be making some more of these - I have some ideas in my head already. Thanks for a great class Julie!

 

Saturday I spent the day with some of my stamping gal pals....all day....eating yummy food and stamping and laughing and being silly and carefree! Sunday the hubs and I decided to do our Valentine's Day celebrating. It's too hard to go out on a Tuesday night with the crowds and such...so we just did it a little early. First we went for a nice long drive in the car just to relax and snap some pics. Then we went for a tasty dinner at PF Chang's! Had great service and a wonderful time. Made it home in time to watch the Grammys. It was a perfect weekend!

Some of you might know that I LOVE my iPhone. No, I mean like I REALLY love my iPhone! hahaha. I have about 20 photography apps and like to try different things with my phone photos. One of my favorite apps is Instagram. I like the different filters and effects and I like the fact that you can "follow" people's feeds and and share your pix. You can CLICK HERE to see my Instagram stuff. I thought I would share some of my favorite photos from Sunday's drive. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One last picture...our daffodils have started blooming in our front yard! They are so fresh and bright and perfect right when they bloom. Makes me happy!!! Okay, that's enough of my yammering on for one day.

 HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!

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Taylored Expressions February Release week - Key Ingredients Part Two!

More fun today and more projects using the brand new Taylored Expressions Key Ingredients Kit and exclusive Vintage Dreamer stamp set! Here's a photo of the kit in case you missed it on Friday...lots and lots of goodies in there! If you subscribe you get a box full of matching card coordinates every month!

Here is my project for today - again featuring the KI kit, the new stamp set, and the new impression plate! Yeah! I truly love all this new stuff! I used the damask side of the impression plate for the top of my card and then sponged a tiny bit of distress ink to make the detail stand out more. That seam binding ribbon is so yummy....

 

The birdie image was cut from one of the pieces of the patterned papers and then layered over some other matching papers. Taylor really did such an exquisite job matching everything...

 

This is one of the stamp images and I stamped in brown directly onto the patterned paper.

 

 

 

Just so you can have another look...here is the stamp set image and the impression plate image!

 

Thank you for stopping by today! Here are your links for the day:

Key Ingredients Blog: http://www.thekeyingredients-blog.blogspot.com/

Projects for today:

• Melissa Sauls
• Debbie Carriere
• Wanda Guess 

Taylored Expressions February Release week - Key Ingredients!

 

TE February Mid Month Key Ingredients Release!

 

• Key Ingredients Info and Inspiration - From February 10-15  you can learn all about this fantastic kit club and see samples from the Key Ingredients Design Team and the Baker's Dozen! Click here for all the info and start at Taylor's blog each day for all the inspiration.
• February Key Ingredients featuring My Mind's Eye Lost & Found - Rosy begins shipping February 15th. Enroll now!
• Exclusive Vintage Dreamer Stamp Set - find out how you can get your crafty little hands on this stylish new set at 50% off for a limited time!
• Win a Key Ingredients Kit - you can win the March Kit to try out, or have a month added on to your current subscription. See Taylor's blog for all the details and to enter to win! It's easy! 

 

 

The quality and value of the Key Ingredients kits is amazing!  - each month you will get enough coordinating product to make 16 or more cards! They are fun, pretty and easy to use.  I am in love with the Vintage Dreamer Stamp Set and that it is exclusive to KI Subscribers! Enroll in the Key Ingredients Subscription program and take advantage of the opportunity to purchase Vintage Dreamer at 50% off!

Many more details will be posted on Taylor's blog. The Vintage Dreamer Stamp Set will be available to KI Subscribers ONLY. It will be available throughout 2012, but it will be at 50% OFF only through 3/10/12. On 3/11/12 the price will return to regular retail of $21.95. 

Okay, now I am really excited to share my projects with you! This month's kit and stamp set ROCK! It's a different look for us at Taylored Expressions and it's wonderful! kind of shabby chic and vintage! I hope you like it too!  My first card is a criss-cross card. I love this card design and I use it when I really want to show off lots of patterned papers. It's easy to make, but looks impressive when it's done!

 

 

This photo shows the part that you write on that goes inside the folded piece. I lstamped one of the images onto the cream card base in a light distress ink and then scalloped my bottom edge.

 

To make the card base, score an 8.5 x 11 sheet of cardstock in half the short direction and then cut it in half the long direction. Then, on your paper cutter, cut a triangle out of each piece so that they cross when you adhere the two pieces together!

 

Now the fun part! Putting on matching patterned papers. So great to mix and match patterns and this kit is perfect for it. I use the triangles left over from my cardstock to make a template for my layers.

 

 

Here it is all decorated with that beautiful typewriter image and some ribbon and roses... 

 

 

 

Well...after I made that first card, I couldn't stop myself! I had to make more! I used the same soft color palette of peach and mint green and made two more thank you cards for some special ladies. I stamped on watercolor paper which makes it seem even more vintage-y. Look at the bottom of the cards...houndstooth! This was made with the brand new Impression Plate! LOVE it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's the 4-1-1! Please check out the images below of the KI kit, the stamp set and the new impression plate!  Paper, Ribbon, Flowers, pearls...oh my!  

 

 

Here is the Linky List for today...spend some time with us looking at everyone else's great projects! SO much fun because the Baker's Dozen has teamed up with the Key Ingredients Team this week! YAY!  

• Debbie Carriere
• Jessica Diedrich
• Jessie Rone
• Lea Lawson
• Monika Davis
• Charmaine Ikach
• Jami Sibley
• Jen Shults
• Jodi Collins
• Karen Giron
• Melissa Sauls
• Melody Rupple
• Regina Mangum
• Sankari Wegman
• Taylor VanBruggen
• Tori Wild
• Wanda Guess

Be Mine...

Hi friends! I hope you're having a great week so far! I'm popping in today with TWO cards to share! I feel the need to keep making Valentines, but then there's other stuff to post too! This week I found the time to make a card for PTI's Make it Monday and I wanted to get that posted tonight to share with you. Later in the week is some shabby chic goodness from Taylored Expressions!

My first card for tonight is a happy Valentine. I got this idea from some fun stickers I saw at Michael's. They were little birdies holding love notes. I decided to re-create the idea using my big birdie Sizzix die and then I hand made a love letter for him to carry!

 

 

 

The sentiment is from Paper Source. I love that font and have it in many sayings!

 

 

Here are my pieces. I cut a small piece of white paper and then scored it with my bone folder to look like an envelope. Then I put a nice red heart on it. I inked around the edges of the blue parts with some light blue chalk ink.

 

 

I had to add some glitter! His eye is a black gem from my stash. the red hearts above are part of a Martha Stewart edger punch.

 

 

 

 

 

My second card for today is a cheery birthday card with a cupcake! This week's Make it Monday Challenge #52 at PTI was to stamp both sides of a die cut and use both sides in your project. There are some really clever people out there - the other entries are awesome! CLICK here to take a peek... And, you still have the rest of the week to get your card in!

 

 

I cut out the die cut shape for the top and bottom of the cupcake and then stamped both sides in pink and brown and attached them. In order for you to see both sides of it, I used a jump ring to attach it to my circle cut out! It kind of swings around in there!

 

 

The impression plate, the polka dot paper and the stamps/sentiment are all from various PTI supplies. I adore this cane impression plate. I used white core paper and then sanded it to make the design stand out more.

 

 

 

Thanks for coming by today! Big hugs from me and Buddy!  

L-O-V-E Foldout card!

Monday? Already? Truly, how is that possible? I guess there's nothing we can do about it, but boy this weekend went by fast! Saturday we hung out with family all day (after getting our taxes done in the morning) and then yesterday was a Super Bowl pizza festivus at our house! I did get in some crafty time to make another Valentine to share on the bloggy blog. I got the idea from this month's issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine. It's a fold-out card - and I don't believe I've ever made one before! 

 

 

Here is the inside of the finished card. By the way, it's hard to take a photo of a fold-out card! LOL. I used some adorable paper from Amuse Studio, sent to me by my friend Teadub!

 

Here is the image from the magazine...and the papers....

 

I printed the template right onto my cardstock and cut it out, instead of making a template first and then tracing. Either way works. Here is the link for the template:  CLICK HERE!

 

 

 

I made a red card base - it's 5x5 inches square - and then lined it with the white paper.

I added some Doodlebug rub-on letters to say I LOVE YOU.....

Here's how I decorated the front of the card - very classic Valentine-y don't ya think? Didn't go too crazy with it. That bright red with white is so crisp and fresh.

 

 

Here's one last view of the inside. You should definitely try this one! It wasn't too hard at all, and you could really have fun with paper choices on this.

As always, thanks for spending a bit of your day with me! Have a great week! More Valentine's to come...my craft room looks like a cupid expolosion right now! XO. 

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A cheery cherry valentine...and a CHA video!

Hello! I'm so excited to actually be home and posting from my computer and hanging out in my craft room tonight! Whew...what a week! It was so great...all of it. I'm still trying to process and remember everything. I had more fun than a girl should be allowed to have at the CHA convention! Thanks for all the nice comments on my posts from my iPhone. It was great to share with you! Now, it's back to reality for me and lots of stamping assignments to get done! Valentine's Day is less than two weeks away! ACK! I need to get busy in that department.

I have a valentine card to share with you, but first, I have a video to share! You know how the DH is really into making videos? Well...I gave him my CHA photos and he made one for me! I hope you will watch it!

 

 

 

What did you think of the video!? TOOOO much fun! I love that he knows how to do that stuff. You might say he's the audio/video department here at A Blog Called Wanda! Okay...now on to my Valentine for the day... One trend I absolutely notice lately is CAS cards. Everyone's going there! I have a new board on my Pinterest just for CAS beauties. Being inspired,  I decided to keep it clean and simple today...and use one of my favorite tools. 

 

 

 

 

I am in love with my Epiphany shape studio tools!! This one is a small heart. At CHA they premiered two new shapes - a flower and a tiny banner! Yipppppeeeee! Those on on my list for sure. Here is my stash of supplies for this project.

 

 

 

This stamp is an old favorite from Hero Arts. I inked up just the stems, and not the cherries. The scale was perfect for those hearts!  

 

I colored the leaves in with my Copics (YG23, YG25 and YG17). The large heart shape is cut from a new die from Memory Box called Cupid Heart. The sentiment is a new one this season from Savvy Stamps. I stamped it on a strip of vellum.

 

 

 

Thank you so much for coming by today! The Taylored Expressions release for February was pushed back a couple of week since Taylor was at CHA. So, be on the lookout for new yummies from Taylor at the end of next week. You will love a new style she's trying out this month.  Have a fantastic weekend!

CHA Goodie Boxes!

Hi peeps! Today I'm posting a super fun project that I've been saving to show you! I'm typing this before leaving for the convention...and when you read this, I will most likely be in my car somewhere on I-5 on the way home from LA. Since I was going to meet the Taylored Expressions Baker's Dozen crew I wanted to make them something special. I made cute goodie boxes to leave at their hotels as a little check-in surprise! I was cooking up this idea for weeks and it was hard to keep a secret.

I used tons of my favorite Taylored Expressions Cuppie stamp sets and lots of sparkly glitter. I hope you enjoy looking at this project. There are lots of pictures in this post!

Here they are all ready to get loaded into the car:  

 

 

 

Here's a close up of my coloring before I put any glittery parts on....

 

I used images and saying from all of these stamp sets. I kept the palette simple - pink, aqua and black. This let me play with a lot of images but still have a clean look.

 

 

 

Look at all those little candies....so cute!

 

Here they are all spark-a-lay!

 

I made little matching notecards to go inside the boxes. To make my mini cards (about 3.5 inch square) I used my Cuttlebug and a large scallop square Nestie. I love making little scallop cards like this. Somehow they seem more fun!?  

 

Here is my little stack of cards ready to go!

 

 

This is what I put inside for the gals....

 

 

Okay, these little cupcakes are the cutest thing ever! I found them at Bed, Bath and Beyond! They are meant to be little single cupcake holders....but I filled them with candy. Then the gals can use them later.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I printed the names out on my computer onto thick cardstock....

 

 

This is the back and side view.... 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for coming by today to check out my project! I hope you do something creative every day! Have a wonderful day....see you soon!

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Sweet Baby!

Hi friends! Happy Friday! Whew...it's been a week, lemme tell ya! I was in LA for two days for work and generally running around like a crazy person. Today is all about preparing for CHA! WAHOOOOOO! The CHA bus (my car) leaves tomorrow and I cannot wait! I am going to finally meet some of the amazing ladies of the Taylored Expressions Baker's Dozen and also hook up with lots of my crafty friends from all over the country. Right now I'm in panic mode...what to pack? How much stuff to bring? What do I wear? Did I remember the gazillion chargers for everything? Do I have a big enough memory card for my camera? Tomorrow morning I'll be on the road and leaving my cares behind and heading towards crafty adventures.

I am going to try to blog post via my iPhone from the convention. I'm not really sure how that's going to go! You can't format pictures or text...and you send your posts via an email! I will try it and I would be grateful if you guys would give me feedback along the way. Also, I'm going to post pictures from the floor onto my 'A Blog Called Wanda' facebook page. So, if you want to "like" me then you can follow along with me that way. This is all new!

I can't believe I'm finally going to a CHA Convention! I want to say a big giant thank you to Taylor for inviting me as her guest. I am truly grateful to be a part of her team.

Okay...I do have a card to share today too! My sweet friend Teadub had a baby two weeks ago! This is her third little bundle of joy and he is super cute! She is such a cool mom - so mellow and patient with her kids. They are a bunch of cuties! So I made her a baby card and got that off in the mail to her last week.

 

 

All the patterned papers are from the My Mind's Eye True Blue paper collection. I love it because it's cute but not cutesy. Nice warm, happy colors, just right for a baby boy! That bear stamp is one of the first stamps I ever bought! The sentiment is from PTI.

 

I layered my strips (1 inch wide) onto another sheet of paper. I love all the patterns together like that.

 

Don't you love orange  and aqua together? I do! I used white core papers so I could sand the edges to make the color a bit softer.

 

Here are my Copic colors - just a few.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please check back in with me over the next few days to see what happens! I hope that you all have a most wonderful weekend! Thank you for stopping by! Big hugs.  

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You & Me

Hi friends! All month, I've wanted to get an entry together for the Hero Arts January Contest! I finally made my card this weekend and got it posted over on the Flickr group! Yay! I love doing this contest and seeing everyone else's entries. The themes this month were either 1) a color challenge or 2) Anything about LOVE! I chose the LOVE category, and used the super cool new cityscape stamp that's been sitting on my desk waiting to get inky! There is still one more day to get your entry in!

 

 

I inked the large cityscape first in light gray ink directly onto the paper. Then, I inked it a second and third time in darker gray ink and cut the buildings out.  

 

Here are the supplies...Isn't that the coolest stamp?

 

The sentiment is also from Hero Arts, but I forgot to take a picture of it! I used a border punch that had tiny hearts in it to get those little red hearts for the card. I popped it on some nice, bright red and then on gray Bazzill paper.

 

 

I think the card ended up having a "Sex and the City" vibe or "When Harry Met Sally" vibe! What do you think? This card would be good for a far away friend or love.

Thank you for stopping by here to spend a part of your day! I appreciate it! Have a great week and I'll see you soon.

Year of the Dragon - Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Happy New Year! It's the Year of the Dragon...and guess what, I'm a Dragon! So...it must be my lucky year! I think that 2012 is going to bring good things. Today is the first day of Chinese New Year. Every year I like to make Chinese New Year cards for my friends. Click here for my 2010 Year of the Tiger card and click here for my 2011 Year of the Rabbit card. Do you know what year you are?  

 

For this year's cards I went back to traditional red, black and gold. It was hard to find a Dragon stamp! The one I used is from Judikins. Here is the finished card:

 

 

 

The gold embossed characters are for double happiness. The dragon was stamped in vivid red ink onto a sheet of vellum and layered over another piece of paper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this photo you can see the white paper underneath the vellum. On that paper, I stamped a large Chinese character background and then some green bamboo. Both of those stamps are from Hero Arts. It was hard to get it to really show in the photo. But, you get the idea!

 

 

Here is the inside of the card. I wanted to carry the bamboo and green over into the inside to bring it all together. This symbol is for good luck.

 

 

Here are my envelopes....

 

 

I am a complete Starbucks groupie! I couldn't believe it when I found these SUPER cool Starbucks cards and sleeves last month! They were gone so fast! I must have timed it just right to get some. I actually collect Starbucks cards....I need to do a post on that one of these days....I have some good ones! And, these are a great addition to the collection.

 

 

The DH ordered me this amazing Starbucks Bearista bear on eBay from Taiwan! I have a Year of the Tiger one too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I took this photo in San Francisco's Chinatown last year,  and I love the color, the movement, and the drama of all those flags and lanterns. It really captures the essence of the place.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today! Gung Hay Fat Choy! Happy New Year everyone! Hope it's a good one, and best wishes for Health, Happiness and Prosperity in the Year of the Dragon!

Wanda!  

Butterflies in red...

Hi there! Happy Saturday! Whatcha doin'? I was supposed to be in class today with the lovely Julie Ebersole at Paper Garden...but she got snowed in in Seattle and never made it here! SO sorry she wasn't able to come this weekend! We will catch her soon though.

We finally got our rain here in Sac-town and I am enjoying a day inside in the craft studio finishing up some projects and reflecting on a roller coaster week. When I say roller coaster, I mean there were ups, and downs, and all arounds, this week. I know that a change is coming in my life. I can feel it coming, and I can feel the commotion and energy that comes before the calm of decisions made. I don't mind it actually.

This week brought me back in touch with people that I care about that I hadn't talked to in years. The week taught me that if you extend your hand and relax, people will be there for you. I loved that part of this week. Anyhoo, I think I'm rambling at this point, and I do have a card to share! I hope you are enjoying a very nice weekend.

I love using the negative space when cutting with dies. This is the new Darla Butterfly Die from Memory Box. It's the perfect shape and size in my opinion. I cut the butterflies out of watercolor paper! I hadn't done that before. I happened to have this scrap on my work table. I LOVE it now. The card is so sturdy and thick and rich because of the texture and weight of the paper.

 

 

The front (white) panel was mounted on foam tape over the pretty patterned paper. I distressed the corners and speckled some ink on the front also.

I think this layout would work with just about any color combination. You could use pinks for a Spring feeling or some pretty green...you might be seeing me make this card again! I added some red blings at the end for a bit o' sparkle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay, so next week is going to be CA-RAZY! I'm going to CHA! WAHOOOOOO! I've figured out how to blog from my iPhone and so I might be doing some blogging straight from the convention floor if I see some stuff that I can't wait to share. I'm really over the moon excited to go and have some fun with my crafty compadres. That doesn't start until next Saturday...but I am already there in my mind! Bye for now.

The Sky's the Limit!

Greetings! How are you this week? I'm doing just fine and eagerly awaiting some days of solid rain here in Sac-town! It hasn't rained here since November and the air is super dry and everything is brown and icky. I love the rain and the fresh air it brings with it. It's been far too long around here. This weekend Julie Ebersole is coming to teach at my friend Stephanie's stamp store and it's sure to be a good time! I will take a class and have some din din with the wonderful HRR. Cannot wait! I'll post pix from class on Sunday or Monday. Next week I'm off to my very first CHA Convention in Anaheim. Whew! LOTS of fun things going on for a January! I'll be so happy to share all of my adventures with you.

Today's card was made for a card swap with my dear Stampin' Up group that I've been meeting with for years. I don't know why I never got around to posting this one. I love the whole hot air balloon craze in stamping and this set is so sweet. These were fun to make!

 

 

My little gingham hill was just cut free form with a pair of scissors. The stamps are super easy to layer and mix and match.

 

 

The supplies.....

 

 

The assembly line in progress....

 

 

These are my go-to inks. You can always find them on sale at Joann's too! Even better!

 

 

 

My journey this year I think is going to be about control vs. surrender... I am working so hard on believing in the good things that can happen if you relax and let go instead of trying to hold on so tightly for control. It keeps coming up in conversation and in those 'a-ha' moments a lot. I'm really trying. So... this saying is fitting for me. The sky's the limit if you believe and allow things to happen! Hugs from me to you. Have a wonderful day everyone.

Poppin' up to say hello!

Hi friends! Today is my day to post on behalf of Taylored Expressions and the Baker's Dozen Design Team! I'm sharing one of my favorite sets from TE today - Kitschy Kitchen! It's one of the very first stamp sets I ever bought from Taylor and I love it. Hope you will too. Have a great week! Thank you for coming by today!

Here is my finished card! Is that sentiment just the ca-yutest thing ever?

 

 

I used Karen's awesome sketch this week from Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge! Why don't you enter too? Click on over to Karen's blog and check it out.

Here is a side view action shot! LOL! I cut out a few extra toast pieces and put them on foam tape to give it some fun and pop!

 

Here is my Copic palette - some "retro" olive greens and tans...nice and simple...

 

Here are the supplies I used. Everything is available from the TE Store!

 

 

I'm so glad you popped in! Har har har. I'm cracking myself up! Have a fabbie day!  

 

Home is where the heart is!

Hi! Me again...back with another card creation for the weekend. I've been in the craft room all day and now I'm watching the red carpet for the Golden Globe Awards. I definitely like the red carpet better than the actual show! I love looking at all the gowns and jewels and I like listening to the banter between everyone. It's been a mellow day around our house. The hubs is watching football...and Buddy is...what else...sleeping! I hope you've had a great weekend.

Today I'm sharing a card I made for a friend who moved into her new home this weekend! I'm so happy for her and hope that she has many good times in her new place! She likes antiques and pretty things, so I made her a shabby chic creation using one of my favorite stamp sets from PTI - Love Lives Here - and the matching dies. Hope you likey!

 

 

 

I had so much fun cutting out these tiny houses and picking out the different papers! I put some pretty pink pearls in the middle of the hears.  

 

 

Here's my supply list... The beautiful pink roses and pearls came from my sweet pen pal Holly in The Netherlands! Like I said, I adore that stamp set. I picked out some 6x6 paper pads and used some of each.

 

 

 

 

Here is the card and envelope. I also stamped the inside...but I forgot to take a picture of it!

 

 

Thanks for spending a part of your day with me! Have a good week ahead!  

Rock Star Birthday!

Hi everybody! It's FRIDAY night! Whew. To quote my friend Kat...Lordy Be! We made it. This week was rough. I think everyone is finally back to work and possibly grumpy about it and work was just busy. But, now, it's the weekend. I stopped by The Paper Garden on my way home and saw the girls and got some stamping therapy and some laughs...and now I'm home in my sweats blogging and then getting ready to kick Mr. Buddy out of my seat on the couch.

Today is my brother-in-law's birthday and this week I made him a cool, kinda grungy, rock-star birthday card. Rock on Steve! Happy Birthday! I tried a fun new technique and I took lots of photos to share it with you. I will certainly be doing this again. I was going for an overall Ed Hardy kind of vibe because that's exactly what he likes!

 

 

 

LOVE this color palette. Nice darker aqua with grey undertones and a bright olivey green. It's difficult to photograph the shiny window plastic...makes quite the glare!

 

 

I used watercolor paper, my distress inks, my perfect pearls and a big clear stamping block.

 

 

First off, I smeared some ink pads directly onto the clear block. I've seen people do this with reinkers usually, but I don't have any...so I just used the pad.

 

 

Next up, I spritzed the clear block with water and smeared it around with my finger.

 

 

Then....I smashed it right onto the watercolor paper. Since the paper has a texture, the ink pools in different spots and I think it looks neat. I left it on there for a few seconds to let all the ink soak in.

 

Here's what I ended up with! You can see the brown, green and blue all ran together. I love the way the edge came out! No two of these will turn out the same. One tip - I liked it MUCH better after it dried. So, if you do this and don't like it right away, wait a few minutes.

 

I got out a sheet of Judikins window plastic and stamped some cool images with my trusty black Staz-on ink pad.

 

 

While my Stayz-on was drying I spritzed some pewter Perfect Pearls onto my main color block.  

 

 

I stamped the "Happy Birthday" words directly onto the watercolor paper so it would be a layer underneath the other images. Lastly I added some teal blings to the whole thing. I adhered the window plastic to the card using matte black brads.

 

 

What do you think? Will you try this? I like it very much and I can think of a bunch of other color schemes and images to use with it. I think it would be a nice clean and simple card to just do a color block and a pretty sentiment and leave it at that. Hmmmmm...not enough time and too many ideas!

I hope you all have a very fabulous weekend! Thanks for coming by! Mwah.

Taylored Expressions Calendar Challenge - January!

Hi! Today I'm sharing something kind of fun - and this is my first time making something like this! It's a cool new calendar product from Taylored Expressions and I am having such a good time making my pages for it. The Baker's Dozen Design Team will be sharing calendar goodies and ideas with you throughout the entire year, so be sure to check out everyone else's projects too. 

Refer over to Taylor's blog to get all the info to play along with us each month. There will be a linky at the bottom of Taylor's post and it will remain open all year, so you have the option to go back and catch up if you start playing late. For everyone who plays in 10 or more of these monthly calendar challenges in 2012, there will be a random draw for a TE prize pack valued at over $150!!! Click here to go to the TE Calendar Department and see all the goodies.

I chose to make the "Frame Your Imagination" calendar and use Cuppie as my theme! The stand for the calendar comes in raw wood and then you can paint it whatever color you choose. I painted mine kind of an antique white and then speckled some brown onto it to give it some character.

CLICK here for the calendar stand...CLICK here for the page protectors and CLICK here for the page inserts. I like this a lot because the finished pages are 6x6 and that gives a lot of room to stamp!

Here's my page for January:

 

 

Isn't that a neat stand? I like that it's big enough to stand out and be a desk decoration.  

 

Here are all the stamp sets I used! I used Cuppie of course, and then the sentiment from a Moka set, and the snowflake from another set...oh yeah...and then some banners...I like to mix and match my stamp sets so that each project comes out unique.

 

I added a pretty blue scallop border at the bottom of my page. Can you see the light blue snowflakes?  

 

 

 

 

I always use my trusty Copics to color my TE images!

 

 

 

Hope your week has been a great one! Thanks for coming by A Blog Called Wanda today! Take care! 

Now before you get started on your calendar project, you'll want to take a look at the fabulous calendar inspiration from the other Baker's Dozen gals:

• Charmaine Ikach
• Jodi Collins
• Melissa Sauls
• Sankari Wegman
• Taylor VanBruggen
   

Penny Black Valentines!

Hello! Are you ready for some Valentine's Day cards? Hearts? Red? Well...then you're in the right place on this day! I am the guest designer over at the Penny Black blog today sharing some Valentine's goodness. I was super excited when Jenyfur asked if I wanted to play with some new images. Everything they do just rocks in my opinion. She asked me to keep it simple and elegant...not tons of layers and patterned papers...so that's just what I did!  Please click HERE to go directly to the PB blog. Have a wonderful day everyone!

I think this first one is my favorite of the bunch. Isn't that heart just a gorgeous image? When you do this watercolor technique you never know what you're going to end up with. You put the ink on and stamp and see what develops. I think in this case, the colors blended together very nicely. I added a strip of vellum and one of my favorite PB sentiments.

 

 

 

 

This second one is also made with the watercolor brushstrokes technique. This time in a more masculine color scheme. I shaded with a light tan color against the really vivid red. I added distress ink around the edges of the paper to make it look aged and worn.

 

 

 

These images are from one of the new clear stamp sets and I like the way they are drawn. That little envelope is the cutest thing. I know I will end up using that stamp a lot.

 

 

 

The image here is one big giant background stamp! I stamped the whole stamp in white ink and then went back over just the one heart with red ink. Kept it simple...

 

 

Have you started working on Valentine's cards yet? I am excited about all the new stamps to play with and hope to have mine done early this year! Have a wonderful week.

Spring Birthday Card!

Hi everybody! Hope you are enjoying a nice Sunday! I'm in the crafty cave cooking up all kinds of things to share this week! You are probably able to tell that I am all about Spring right now. I'm ready for bright, happy colors and sunshine in my craft projects. It's been very dry here and windy and yesterday it was warm too. Very odd weather. I would like a spring shower....that would be nice. Anyhoo...I'm off track now. OH! Before I forget...I set up "A Blog Called Wanda" Facebook page this week. I would be very happy if you would "like" it. The link is in the blog left side bar.

Today's card is a cheery Spring birthday card made with what has to be one of my favorite paper collections of all time... October Afternoon Sidewalks. I could make 500 projects with this paper. The palette is wonderful and it works for so many types of cards. Do you have a very favorite paper right now? Share with us so we can check out your fav!

 

You know this paper just screams out to be matched with gingham right? The flower was cut with PTI flower dies. The center is a pin that matches the paper collection. Don't you love how it is perfectly matched to the paper? Um, I'm not OCD or anything....

I decided to pop some bright red to pick up that color. I used my Martha Stewart butterfly punches. I cut a window out of a Nestabilities die and put the text paper behind it.

I matched the green with Stampin' Up Kiwi Kiss paper, and popped my top layer up on some foam tape for more dimension.

I crumpled the flower in the palm of my hand to make it not so hard and straight. This way it has a gentle curve to it, like a real flower might.

Thank you so much for coming by to see me today! This week has some fun things in store. I am guest designer over at Penny Black (yay!) on Tuesday and I will post my cards here too. They are all new Valentine images. Thursday I will be back with a calendar project that we are all working on for Taylored Expressions. I'm making a whole calendar using Cuppie images! Have a fabulous day!

You're my type of friend!

Hi peeps! Happy Friday! I hope you had a great week and that you're looking forward to a fun weekend! I'm super psyched that I get to have lunch tomorrow with one of my besties and get all caught up with her. Yay! I don't get to see nearly enough of Ms. Patty!  It was a crazy week here at the bloggy blog with the new Taylored Expressions release! I hope you found something you liked. That is such a fun whirlwind.

Today I'm sharing a card set that I entered in the Hero Arts December contest. One of the challenges was to make a set of cards....with no specific theme required. I went through my stash and found that cool typewriter set and decided to use that. I made a set of cards and each would be just a nice little note to pop in the mail to a friend. I have had these tins around the crafty cave forever...and figured it's time to use 'em up.

Here's my tin with the cards inside. I adore this paper collection from Basic Grey! I used only papers from that collection - Picadilly! I used corduroy distress ink for my type and typewriter and a light aqua for the lines on the paper.

 

Here are my cards. Each one is just slightly different. Aren't those sayings cute?

 

My supply list:  

 

 

I felt the need to add a few butterflies into the mix!

 

 

 

YOU are definitely my type of friend! Thanks for coming by today and have a great weekend! See you soon!  

Taylored Expressions January Release Day!

 

 

Happy Release Day! Now the store is open and you can shop for all the fun new stamps, dies and papers we've been featuring all week. Have a great time looking around! I hope you find something you love. My one last card to share for Release week is another valentine. This image just reminds me of those cute valentine's we used to send when we were kids. I think it would also be a nice baby shower image.

 

The ribbon and the heart pin are from the Project Pantry Kit for this month. This is just the prettiest shade of pink ever! I combined it with the We R Memory Keepers "Love Struck" collection of papers.

 

 

Would you be mine?? Hee hee. This stamp is a single, from the Whimsical Wishes collection drawn by Nancy McKinney. Like the Scotties from yesterday, it's part of the Animals in Love A la Cartes: Dachshunds in Love, Giraffes in Love, Pandas in Love, are continuing the Animals in Love A la Carte series (see also Animal Love Sentiments). Last year TE introduced Animals in Love A la Cartes with the Elephants, Fish, Flamingos, Owls, Scotties, Snakes, Turtles, and Whales along with the full size set Animal Love Sentiments.
Special on these - Buy one of the three new Animals in Love and select any one of the eight 2011 Animals in Love for Free!! (yes, I said free!)

TE Release Day!

• All of the new products are now available for purchase! Check out the Fresh Out of the Oven Department to see everything in one place!
• More projects from the Baker's Dozen to inspire you. Just follow the link list below.
• Did you win one of the Mystery Baker's Dozen Blog Giveaways? Find the list of winners on Taylor's Blog.
• Buy one Animals in Love A la Carte and get one free/Select calendar products 50% off/Layered Doily Dies Special - get all the details on our January Release Specials by clicking here.

 

Ready to take one last hop around this week? Here's the list for today. Thank you for coming by!  

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

Taylored Expressions January Sneak Peeks - Day 3!

 

 

Today I have TWO projects to share using two great TE Valentines images/sets! Yay! Today I went with the traditional bright red for Valentines. This color of red paper that comes in the Project Pantry this month is luscious. The first project is a tin with mini cards inside. I meant for this to be a nice gift for a friend...and then she can give the notes to her family as a surprise. I used the Totally Tags Valentine set...but it doesn't have to just be for tags!  

 

I decorated a tin using the Project Pantry Kit for this month, some pretty twine and this gorgeous new Doily Die from Taylor! That flower was in my stash and I have no idea where that's from (sorry!) You can see two the the new Doily dies in the picture below. There is a third, larger one, too. The little hearts are the centers of the Jumbo Heart Border Die (see the end of the post).

 

 

  

 

 

The stamp set is from the Embracing Grace collection by Emily Burger. It's called Totally Tags Valentine – and it's a new set of tags to coordinate with the Totally Tags Taylored Dies…great for all sorts of cards and treats for Valentine’s Day and beyond! It is a Full-sized set that includes 9 large tag images.

The Layering Doily Dies will be sold separately and there will be a special discounted price to purchase all 3 together!!    

 

  

 

Okay....so that's not it for today!!! I'm also sharing a doggie Valentine using Scotties in Love!! SOOOO fun! These little doggies are so cute! This is one of the Animals In Love from last year...but you can still get it!

 

This Die is TO DIE FOR! Get it? No seriously....one of my favorite products EVER from Taylor! It's new this month and you will love it. I'll be using it on everything! The hearts that come out of the center are the perfect size for the top of the dog house!  

 

 

I used papers from the My Minds Eye "Love Me" Collection again for this card. Kept the colors simple and clean. Just red, off white, and charcoal grey. I love this paper!

 

 

The Scotties in Love stamp is from the Whimsical Wishes collection by Nancy McKinney, and is part of the Animals in Love A la Carte: Dachshunds in Love, Giraffes in Love, Pandas in Lovecontinuing the Animals in Love A la Carte series (see also Animal Love Sentiments). Last year TE introduced Animals in Love A la Cartes with the Elephants, Fish, Flamingos, Owls, Scotties, Snakes, Turtles, and Whales along with the full size set Animal Love Sentiments. Our customers loved these, so we've added 3 more this year. Fun for Valentines as well as showing your love year-round. 

Special on these - Buy one of the 3 new Animals in Love and select any one of the 8 2011 Animals in Love for Free!

 

 

 January Release At a Glance

• We have sneak peeks to share Monday through Wednesday. All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday, January 5th at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.
• Join us as a fan on Facebook for an early peek at the stamp sets, as well as a SPECIAL Facebook GIVEAWAY, on Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST.
• Mystery Baker's Dozen Blog Giveaway: Each day, one lucky blog commenter will be chosen by random draw to win a $10 TE Gift Certificate. Winners will be chosen from a different Baker's Dozen blog each day and will be announced on Taylor's blog on Release Day! Be sure to hop around to see all the sneak peeks and leave comments on each and every blog for more chances to win. Limit one comment per blog per day, please. Comments close Wednesday 1/4 at 7pm PST for the drawings.

Here's our hop list for today! LOTS of projects going on everywhere today. Go see what the rest of the Baker's Dozen has for you!  

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

Taylored Expressions January Sneak Peeks - Day 2!

 

 

Hi! Welcome back for Day 2 of TE Sneak Peeks! Today's card is made with the new {adorable} Buddy Bear stamp set! He's super cute and make such a fun valentine card. He would also be a great image for baby cards! I used the brand new Project Pantry Kit papers for this card too. 

 

 

 
This is such a great sentiment stamp and comes with Buddy Bear. I love using kraft/brown with this bright clear red.

 

Here's my Copic Palette....

 

I used some sweet tiny scallops of kraft to match the cuteness factor of the image. I left my coloring kind of simple and primary since that, to me, fits the style of the card.

The stamp set is from the Apple Doodle Ink line drawn by Doug Applegate. He's called Buddy Bear –  and he can be a Polar Bear, a Brown Bear, a Teddy Bear? You decide! Any which way, he'll capture your heart! This is a Petite set with 8 images/sentiments.  

We're offering our Project Pantry Basic Recipe Kit along with additional Spice It Up Ingredients that you can pick and choose from to build the kit just the way you want it! I used the papers from the Kit on today's card and some of the ribbon on my card for Thursday. Here's the deets:

Valentine Basic Recipe Project Pantry Kit includes:
20 sheets of double sided patterned paper (American Crafts 'With Love' Collection)
12 sheets of 8.5 x 11 solid cardstock
6 yards of ribbon (2 yards each of 3 different styles)
*Plus lots of optional Spice It Up Ingredients to add in to create a truly personalized kit. 

January Release At a Glance

• We have sneak peeks to share Monday through Wednesday. All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday, January 5th at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.
• Join us as a fan on Facebook for an early peek at the stamp sets, as well as a SPECIAL Facebook GIVEAWAY, on Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST.
• Mystery Baker's Dozen Blog Giveaway: Each day, one lucky blog commenter will be chosen by random draw to win a $10 TE Gift Certificate. Winners will be chosen from a different Baker's Dozen blog each day and will be announced on Taylor's blog on Release Day! Be sure to hop around to see all the sneak peeks and leave comments on each and every blog for more chances to win. Limit one comment per blog per day, please. Comments close Wednesday 1/4 at 7pm PST for the drawings.

Here's the link list for today...have fun and hop around! 

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild 

Taylored Expressions January Sneak Peeks - Day 1!

 

Hi everyone! This month, for Taylored Expressions, we're working on all things that have to do with LOVE! Cool new stamps to make projects for Valentines and Spring time events. Hope you will have fun with us all week sharing our projects. Here's my first one for the week:

 

A pretty new set with matching dies that's really versatile...Rosy Posey! I used an acetate card base and some pretty papers from the Project Pantry Kit and the My Mind's Eye "Love Me" collection for 2011. This is a really cool technique that I haven't done in a long time. Those flowers are such a pretty focal image I wanted to show them off.

 

Here's my Copic Palette for this project....

 

 

 

The stamp set is from the Whimsical Wishes line by Nancy McKinney. It's called Rosy Posey – and it's a beautiful set of whimsical roses! This set coordinates with the Rose Wreath, the brand new Rosy Posey Taylored Die set, Mini Leaves Die set, and Leafy Branch die. Anyone who loves roses will go crazy for this set! It's a full size set that has 19 images/sentiments. I could really see this one for Mother's Day cards or Wedding cards too.  

The TE stamps are made of high quality red rubber and come on a full color panel and store perfectly in our Mini Binder Boxes (4 sets to a box). The full size set panels are 5.75" x 8.5" like this set. Taylor's sets are an outstanding value.

Here's a sneak peek at the matching dies:  

 

 

January Release At a Glance

• We have sneak peeks to share Monday through Wednesday. All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday, January 5th at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.
• Join us as a fan on Facebook for an early peek at the stamp sets, as well as a SPECIAL Facebook GIVEAWAY, on Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST.
• Mystery Baker's Dozen Blog Giveaway: Each day, one lucky blog commenter will be chosen by random draw to win a $10 TE Gift Certificate. Winners will be chosen from a different Baker's Dozen blog each day and will be announced on Taylor's blog on Release Day! Be sure to hop around to see all the sneak peeks and leave comments on each and every blog for more chances to win. Limit one comment per blog per day, please. Comments close Wednesday 1/4 at 7pm PST for the drawings.

Click on the links to check out everyone else's cards and projects for Day 1 of Sneak Peeks. Have a wonderful day! Thanks for coming by.  

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

Crazy for Quatrefoil???

Hi everyone! How are you? Are you all ready for New Year's Eve? I think we are boring this year and staying home and warm and toasty by the fire with some movies! I don't think we're going out. Sometimes we go to our waterfront and watch the fireworks at midnight and enjoy the festivities and sometimes we go out to dinner. This year I think we'll be lucky to actually make it to midnight! I'd love to know what you're doing! I'm happy it's Friday (I was the ONLY person at my office this week!) and happy to be sitting here sharing a project.

Before I get started too far...there are still some Grab Boxes left! (see the post below this one). I'll be packing them up this weekend and shipping them on Tuesday. Get 'em while they're hot!

I like to make calendars for my gal pals each year - for them to put in their work cubicles or on the fridge. I use the clear plastic 4x6 frames with the magnets on the back. I look for them on sale at Michael's. I keep the design simple so that it will fit inside the frame and look good all year. I think I've been doing this 8-9 years now! This year I went quazy for quatrefoil and used it for my calendars and cards! I am IN LOVE with this design element. It seems to be everywhere (as you'll see later in my post). It's classy and feminine and retro all at the same time. What could be better than that?

I paired the crisp white quatrefoil overlay with some bright spring green Stardream paper. YUM! Isn't that super cool? Sorry, I'm getting carried away.

 

Here are the cards that went with the calendars! I found a matching stamp - it's from Savvy Stamps. LOVE that too! It's hard to see the banner of very light pink to accent the sentiment. I chose this kind of old fashioned floral paper because the whole look was starting to give me a 50's Palm Beach/Lily Pulitzer vibe....

 

Here's the supplies...That's my current iPhone cover! EEEEEEEK!

 

 

I'm pretty sure I have some sort of Cuttlebug injury after cutting all these out!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have a wonderful, fun, fabulous weekend!

The first {heart} card of the season!

Hi everyone! How was your Christmas? I hope you had a lovely day and that Santa was good to you! I hope you were surrounded by friends and family and that the true meaning of the season touched you in some way. The DH and I had a very nice, mellow weekend. On Christmas Eve we went to one of the "mega" churches near our house for a wonderful service full of BIG music and a performance by "The Silhouettes" from America's Got Talent! Do you remember them? They were my favorite act from this year. They are the group that performs behind a big curtain and they make shapes out of their bodies. It was really wonderful. There were lots of people at church and everyone was in a good mood. Hubs and I didn't do presents this year, but I did get a new Bearista Bear and a couple of gift cards for Christmas...thanks honey! We spent the day relaxing and it was wonderful.

Also, on Saturday, I was so happy to get a big box of Memory Box and Poppystamps goodies from the new collection. Dave has outdone himself again! I don't know how he does it, seriously. The new collection is called Love and Kindness (sigh) and has all kinds of neat new dies and stamps for Spring and Valentine's Day. I had to get my hands on them stat! Here's my first card with the new stuff!

 

 

 

Three new butterfly dies...are you kidding me??? YAY! I layered two here for more depth and interest. I used a color palette of pink and grey, which is always a favorite. I think this could be a Valentine card or even a wedding card.

  

The detail on these new dies is amazing...I used a dark charcoal grey bazzill paper for my keys.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What are you up to in your craft room right now? I'm working on starting Valentine's projects and also making some calendars...oh...and I gotta start on New Years cards too! I hope that you have a wonderful week! Thanks for coming by here today!  

Happy Christmas Eve to you and yours...many blessings!

Happy Christmas Eve! I hope that you have some great plans with those you love for today. Hard to believe it's time for Christmas. What a perfect time to be thankful and count our blessings and praise the Lord. We have some fun plans for the evening and I can't wait. One of my favorite acts from America's Got Talent last Summer was the Silhouettes. I was rooting for them the entire time. What a cool concept. Did you see them? Well....tonight we are going to see The Silhouettes perform at one of the local churches here in my town! I can't wait! I think it will be a magical evening. I will have to tell you about it next week. The hubs and I will grab an early dinner and then go to church. Awesome!

Merry Christmas from my craft room to yours....

 

I made some simple Christmas Thank You cards to send to my kind and generous friends who sent me Christmas presents. Figured today would be a good day to share them. 

 

 

 

A pretty simple layout, with just a few supplies. You can see the inspiration card I cut out of the Papercrafts magazine. I went through my stash and got out all my different Thank You stamps.

 

 

 

 Each card is just a litle bit different, but all have the same layout. The finished card is a 4 inch square.

 

 

MERRY MERRY MERRY CHRISTMAS EVE!
 

Country Snowmen!

Hi everyone! What's going on?! I hope you had a wonderful weekend. Are you ready for that one last week leading up to Christmas? I'm trying my best to finish up all the last minute wrapping, cooking, baking, cardmaking, blogging and shopping today so that I can actually take a breath and enjoy the season a little bit. Sometimes I feel like I just go through life so fast that I miss it! So, I'm going to try really hard to relax next week, and take a look around.

Yesterday we went to my youngest brother's house and visited with my two brothers, their wives, and their FIVE sons under FIVE years old! They are so fun! I have to tell you that I was pretty tired when we went home though! I wish I had 10% of that energy!  It was so nice to see everyone and talk and hang out. It did my heart good.

Before I dive into my share for today I just wanted to express my thanks for all the kind, sweet, wonderful comments everyone left for me on Friday and Saturday about my guest designer spot on the Penny Black blog! That was such a fun experience and I read and appreciated each nice note. Thank you!

Today I'm sharing some fun country snowmen cards I made - inspired by a photo I saw on Pinterest. I saved it to my Christmas board a while ago, and then decided to make them! HERE is the INSPIRATION, from Anna Wight.  I love her work. She made pins and magnets out of her snowmen, but I made cards. Are you hooked on Pinterest yet? Oy. So many wonderful ideas.

I made six cards in all... They all have the same layout, but I used different colors and different ribbons and backgrounds to make each one unique. I had fun picking out little accents to put on their scarves.

 

 

It is too hard to pick a favorite...

 

I started with circles punched out with my Marvy Uchida punches. I made two different sizes. Then I added some distress ink around the circles. The first step in rustic....

 

 

 

Next, I got out my blo-pen and used black ink to add splotches and spatters to my circles...

 

I didn't want them all the same, or all too perfect, so for their carrot noses, I freehand cut triangles from a sheet of Bazzill paper.  

 

Some coal for their eyes and mouths...in the form of enamel accents!

 

I added some pink chalk to give them rosy cheeks...

 

Here they are, with their scarves on! I wrapped ribbon around a piece of foam tape to give them "necks" for the scarves.  They're starting to come together now... 

The background papers were all stamped using antique linen ink on cream cardstock. They're all from Hero Arts. Music notes, text, and plaid. I couldn't just pick one so I made some of each. I also distressed the edges of the paper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aren't they so fun and country shabby-chic? I just had such a great time with this project. Hope you enjoyed it too!  

Have a FABULOUS week!

I'm the guest designer for Penny Black today!

AAAAHHHHHHHHH! I'm so totally excited to share happy news today and show you what I've been up to! I'm the guest designer on the Penny Black Blog today! OMG. I can't stand it! I got an email from Jenyfur a couple of months ago asking me if I would like to be a guest designer...and I had to think about it for exactly three seconds before I said yes! Most of my very first stamps were Penny Black stamps - 18 years ago! I have loved their company ever since. I am so flattered and feel very lucky to be a part of the fun today. I made five cards in all...so there are a lot of pictures to share today! Maybe you will pop over to the PB BLOG and check it out?!

The first card is made using one of my favorite techniques - Watercolor with Brushstrokes stamps. You color directly onto the stamp with your Marvy Markers, mist with water, and then stamp on watercolor paper. I think I must have taught this class a hundred times at my local stamp store. I have all my brushstrokes stamps still. This is a classic, timeless technique that never disappoints. The stamp is just gorgeous, don'tcha think?

 

 

 

 

 

 

This second card is my vintage-y take on Penny Black. I added lots of crunchy snow to the finished product and used very traditional colors and and distressed edges.

 

 

 

 

 

Now, if you're making Penny Black cards...you know you have to include some hedgies! This card is fun and playful. Love this image. I colored it with my Copics and then added glossy accents to the lights to make them shiny.

 

 

 

And, here's Mimi! I went with a super bright and funky color scheme for this one! Gave her some rosy cheeks and a pretty pink hat! How can you not smile at that stamp?

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, this happy snowman makes his appearance on an easel card! I really like using light blue with bright red and it really works for snow people. The icy blue makes it feel cold and the red is just so happy. I colored him with my Copics and then smothered him in ultra fine glitter to make him shimmery.  

 

I love this stamp! ACK! I {heart} Christmas!

 

 

If you made it this far...thank you! Hahaha. I know it's a lot of cards for one day! I had the very best time making them all! I hope you have a fabbie day and a great weekend! See you soon!

Happy Holidays Vintage goodness!

I have been really wanting to share this card with you! I had so much fun making this card! So many details, and layers and color. I adore the new Echo Park paper collection that I used. I bought it in 6x6 and in 12x12! LOVE. Seriously. I'm all about Vintage Christmas-y stuff. The paper was one inspiration and the other inspiration was that I wanted to make a big, juicy, silvery rosette! :-) The finished card is a 5x7!

 

 

 

 

Here's a snap of that paper goodness! The top sheet is stickers. Yummmmm.

 

I started my rosette with some Doodlebug sugar coated cardstock in silver and I cut a 12x1.5 inch strip.

 

I scored the paper strip at each 1/4 inch and then folded it accordian style...

 

After I made the rosette, I layered an olive green circle, then a Martha Stewart Doily and then a red circle. Whew. Finally, I put on some pretty K&Company layered stickers on the top. I love how all these different things came together. Later I added a pretty snowflake from last year's Imaginisce collection.

 

 

 

For the sentiment, I cut out this saying from one of the paper sheets. I layered a pretty, wide piece of antique looking lace ribbon. Here you can see that little snowflake.

 

I think this card is like an inch thick! hahaha. It went in a box, so it's okay! Can you imagine trying to cram it into an envelope!? I hope you had fun sharing my process.

Thank you for stopping by my blog to see me! Are you all done with your Holiday projects? I think I am getting to the point where I might be ready for Valentine's Day already! Hahahaha. I feel like I have been making Christmas cards for months!

Please be sure to check in with me on Friday. I have some SUPER exciting stuff to share with you. I am going to be a guest designer for one of my favorite stamp companies...and had to keep a secret so long!

Happy Birthday to the hubs!

Hi! Today is the hubs' birthday and I thought I would share his birthday card and also share our outing to San Francisco yesterday to celebrate his birthday! My husband was born in San Francisco and he is a HUGE 49er football fan. Right now he's in the family room watching the game.  It is so hard to make him cards. But, I got an idea...this is his 49th birthday....so I made him a 49er card! Yeah! He totally flipped out and loved it. That made me really happy. I hope you get a kick out of it too.

 

 

I printed the SF logo off the computer on high print quality on good cardstock and then cut it out. I wrote the sentiment on the computer as well. The rest was inspired by the team colors of red, gold and white.

 

 

 

 

 

I can't remember where these chip board numbers are from...maybe Basic Grey? I painted them with gold craft paint before adding the glitter. I have found that if you don't put something (color) down first then the glitter looks dull. I LOVE making glittery numbers!

 

The stripe accent is based on the team's uniform pants. They have a stripe just like this down each leg. I cut the sentiment into a banner - cuz it just looked sporty!

 

 

Finished off the whole thing with some stars punched out of gold paper...

 

 

 

We got up yesterday morning, stopped at Starbucks, and headed into the city. From our house, we can be in downtown San Francisco in about 90 minutes. Oddly, there was no traffic yesterday! We stopped off on Treasure Island to snap some pics. It was sort of foggy and hazy, so the photo isn't really clear. I never get tired of this view.

 

 

 

First stop...Union Square...for shopping and people watching...and, boy, was there good people watching yesterday!

 

Tiffany's...Ah... I still have the first thing I ever bought there...my first pair of real pearl stud earrings. I think I've had them 25 years and I still wear them all the time. So many memories from shopping downtown.

 

All of a sudden, we heard all these police sirens and bullhorns. Weird, right? Well, turns out the police were clearing the street for the "Occupy San Francisco" protestors to come through.

 

 

On the top floor of Macy's is a Cheesecake Factory restaurant that has outdoor seating. It's really the best view of Union Square, and we like to go hang out there and have a meal when we are shopping. Here's the view from our table down onto the square, with the tree and the ice rink. It was a gorgeous evening!

 

This is a snow princess from the Christmas department at Macy's. This just really caught my eye. I still can't decide if it's beautiful or sort of creepy!!! What do you think?

 

I liked this little guy...so happy and retro just smiling away...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not sure what was up with the harlequin elephants!

 

 

Mark took this shot with the fish-eye lens on his camera! 

 

 

This shot came from my iPhone at dinner...not the best photo quality, but it captured the moment! Cheers! And...Merry Christmas!

This one is also from my iPhone - with the instagram app. I LOVE that app! You can make your photos look old, or black and white, all kinds of stuff. I really love how this picture came out with the vintage feeling.  

 

One last stop on the way home - back at the same spot on Treasure Island to capture the city with her Christmas lights on! So breathtaking. This picture is better if you click on it and make it bigger.  

 

Okay, friends, let the frenzy continue! Have a wonderful week! 
  

Winter House

Greetings and Salutations and Happy Friday! Christmas crunch time is here people!!! AAAAHHHHH! We have a fun weekend planned for the DH's birthday. We are going to San Francisco for the day on Saturday to take pictures and shop and dine...awesome! Sunday is his actual birthday and he requested that I make "big breakfast" for him and then he wants to watch football all day. Done!  So, we'll be taking a momentary respite from Christmas to celebrate a birthday! I hope you have all kinds of fun stuff planned for your weekend.

Today I'm sharing a card made with one of my very favorite stamp sets from Taylored Expressions...A Day in Paradise!  Now, you might be scratching your head and saying...that's a beach set! Well, it is, but I made it into a Christmas card. I love the house image from the set, and made it into a snowy scene.

 

I used my Copics to color the house green and red and also I used yellow to make a warm glow coming from inside. Yes, that's my favorite Picket Fence Die too!  

I found these cute, tiny Christmas lights at Michael's and tied them on the card with some red Doodle Twine. That delicious paper is the MME Lost and Found Christmas Collection. I didn't even have to stamp a sentiment, because the words were already on the paper!

 

 My Copic Marker choices for this project....

 

My supplies and the stamp set...I always try to look at my stamps in a different way! With this set, I was also thinking you could use the Chairs and put some snow, or a cute wreath on them and make them a winter card too.  

 

Thanks for checking in with me today! 

Have a fantastic weekend!

 

Girly, you rock!

Hi everybody! I have a fun card to share with you today...not Christmas related...no snow here today! Hahaha! Has anyone else noticed my obsession with glitter snow and snowflakes this year? It seems I can't stop myself!

Today I have a funky and fun thank you card I wanted to post. Some of my best gal pals at work gave me iTunes gift cards for my birthday last month. (Awesome!) When I sat down to make their thank you cards...inspiration struck me! I have these CUTE stamps from Amuse...one is an iPod and the other is a rocker girl! I chose some bright fun colors and a card was born.

 

 

The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink...and it's perfect! Aren't those iPods crazy cute??

 

Here is my Copic palette. I matched the markers to my ink pads. No real shading going on here...the image is so small it just wouldn't show up and I like the very graphic nature of the solid color anyway. Sort of has an 80's feel to me.

 

Here are the stamps and my ink pads....

 

I mounted the center image up on some foam tape and kept it clean and simple...

 

Here's the matching envelope! Hugs and thanks go out to Theresa and Lisa! Thanks for the iTunes cards! I went ahead and bought the full HD version of Angry Birds...dangerous! hee hee.

Have a wonderful day bloggy friends!

Inspiration comes from the strangest places!

Hi friends! How's it going? I spent most of the day yesterday trying to get my Christmas cards all organized and then I started the addressing process...and I do mean process! Whew. What a task...it's a task done with love though. Are you done? Have you started? I always say every year "I'm going to start really early this year" but I never do! Why is that? Oh well...It always gets done somehow right? I have a busy and fun week ahead. Looking forward to seeing some co-workers I don't see all the time, and also to seeing some friends and stamping mid-week. Yay!

The card I'm sharing today was inspired by an Ann Taylor advertisement in a magazine! Just goes to show you that inspiration can come from anywhere. It was this gorgeous, wintery scene, and I loved it. I'm not sure I 100% love my card, but I do like the conept. I wish I had a better pine/bough punch. Anyone know of a good one? 

 

 

 

Here is the ad that I cut out of the magazine...Isn't it gorgeous? It's just green, white and gold...and tons of fluffy snow! I chose some burnished gold paper and a nice forest green paper for contrast. I ended up using glitter paper for the ornaments. I improvised my pine boughs with a fern punch!

 

I cut out two shades of green for my branches and layered the punches starting from the left corner. I used cream paper as my base.

 

I drew in the ornament hangers with a ruler. I can't draw a straight line by hand! The sentiment is stamped in a rich brown distress ink.

 

Now...for the snow! I put two layers on. I let the first layer dry and then went back over it a second time with more glue and more glitter.

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a snap I took of the lovely ladies of Paper Garden Boutique! I had the best time with them on Saturday and wanted to take a Christmas photo for them. Just an FYI for the local folks...Stephanie is moving the store in January - over to Pavillions Shopping Center! Aren't they pretty? So much fun, too.

Have a great week!

Shabby Tea Room Challenge Week #90 - Silver Skates!

Hi everybody! I'm sitting here in the craft room, kicking off the first weekend of December madness! My to do list for the weekend is actually a grid chart with columns for what has to get done each day! OMG. We just got home from the grocery store and I'm doing laundry and it's 9:00...and I forgot to eat dinner. Sheesh...It's the holidays! I made this card on Monday and I have been dying to share it with you! I was surfing around on blogs Monday morning and checked in on my sweet friend Audrey who made this amazing creation for her guest designer spot for Shabby Tea Room. I zipped over to Shabby Tea Room and saw the inspiration image... Well...the paper and glitter started flying! You know how sometimes you just can't stop yourself? This was one of those times!

 

 

The inspiration image is so pretty, don't you think? I love the icy coolness of it and all the texture. It's amazing how much texture there can be with white and cream. I love this! I never would have combined white and cream together! It's beautiful.

These ice skates are a personal favorite stamp set of mine from Papertrey Ink! I added some pretty grey socks and some little silver bells... Then I coated the skates in prisma glitter and the blades with Silver Stickles. In this photo you can see the cream/white combo pretty good.  

 

Another favorite winter stamp...from Amuse! I stamped the snowflakes in grey ink on white paper for the background. In the foreground, I used shimmery Versamark (Champagne) on cream paper!

 

The frame was cut using my Cuttlebug and a large Nestability. I punched the big snowflake out of Doodlebug Sugar Cardstock (LOVE) and the ribbon is from Paper Source. I decided to use gray as my accent color, because I thought it was pretty with the silver.

 

The sentiment is from Denami, and was stamped in the same gray ink.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I was all done with my card, I had the piece of paper left over from my big snowflake punch...so I put it on a piece of cream paper and made a matching gift tag. I don't want to waste one scrap of that yummy paper!

Thank you so much for coming by to see me today! I hope that you have all kinds of fun things planned for the weekend! I'll see you soon!

Taylored Expressions December Release Day!

TE Release Day!

• All of the new products are now available for purchase! Check out the Fresh Out of the Oven Department to see everything in one place!
• More projects from the Baker's Dozen to inspire you. Just follow the link list at the bottom of my post below.
• PETITE-A-PALOOZA SPECIAL: Purchase any 6 Petite Stamp Sets (new or old) through Friday December 9th and receive a Petite Storage Case absolutely FREE!

 

I am so excited to introduce the new Fly Your Flag sets today! There are three different flag stamps with matching dies. I'm using Fly Your Flag 3 which has 7 stamp images and one die. It's from the *te* Collection by Taylor Van Bruggen herself! You are going to love these - so versatile!  They are a unique take on pennants! Fold them together and string along a piece of baker’s twine or on a toothpick or decorative pin, cut in half and create a banner…lots of ways to fly your flag! Coordinates with the previously released You’re My Type Upper and Lower alpha sets.

Here is my first card for today using Fly Your Flag 3 (with die) and more goodies from the October Afternoon Card kit....

 

 

How cute are these flags?? ACK! The die cuts a double flag...you just fold it over and adhere them together! LOVE. I put my flags onto some long pearl pins. The dashed line is one stamp, and the sentiment is another stamp. You can see in the background the adorable TE Clouds Impression Plate. Love that too! This card kit has to be my all time favorite from Taylor.  

I made some pretty scallops on my card using the TE Medium Scallop die. Then I cut out pieces of the blue patterned paper to make some accents on my flag and the bottom of my card. I think this would be the nicest card to send to a girlfriend!  

 

 

 

The second card I have to share today is made with the brand new Snowflake Wreath - which is a set of 7 for $7.95 - and it's perfect throughout the Winter months as well as another great option for Christmas cards and decorations! 

I made a smaller card with this set - maybe for a gift enclosure card or a tag. My finished card is 3x3 square and I used a CAS layout. The wreath is one stamp and then there is a matching snowflake (which I used to make background paper) and then the nice sentiment. I like just the small pops of red for winter... 

 

 

 

This stamp set would be great for the December month of your calendar - if you're making one and following along with all of our new calendar projects!  

Well....I guess that's it for Release Week! I have so enjoyed sharing with you this week, as I know everyone else has. After you pop over to the TE Store, won't you go check out the rest of the Baker's Dozen projects for today? We also have Jami and Nancy joining us for Release day! I am so loving the concept this month of all these great small sets!  

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Nancy McKinney

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

***Guest Designer LORI CRAIG! Yeah!

Taylored Expressions December Sneak Peeks - Day 2!

 December Release at a Glance:

• It's Petite-a-Palooza as we introduce A DOZEN new Petite stamp sets, plus one new A la Carte, from every stamp collection available at Taylored Expressions.
• Yesterday was Calendar Day as we showcased FOUR new TE calendar products - all perfect for gift giving!
• Today is Card Kit Day as we introduce FOUR new Taylored Card Kits available just in time for the holidays!
• All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday, December 1st at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.

• Join us as a fan on Facebook for an early peek at the stamp sets, as well as a SPECIAL Facebook GIVEAWAY, on Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST.

 

Today I'm excited to share with you the super cute new stamp set called Polar Pete! He is from the Apple Doodle Ink by Doug Applegate Collection and is a set of 5 for $7.95. This little guy will warm your heart. I love what some of the other Baker's Dozen team members did with him too...he's just not for Winter!  I'm also using the October Afternoon Sidewalks Card Kit for my project for today. Here's the 4-1-1 on the card kits:

Taylored Card Kits

Each kit includes: 10 solid colored cardstock card bases,10 neutral cardstock image panels, envelopes, patterned paper, ribbon, KaiserCraft rhinestones or pearls - all packaged in a Petite Storage Case. Kits are $14.95 each. There are 4 new kits to choose from!!

 

 

He comes with different sentiments...but this one was my favorite! I punched out a red heart to add some more emphasis to the saying. This cute sparkly ribbon is included in the card kit, as are all the papers you see here.

 

Here is my Copic color palette for this card.... 

 

Isn't he adorable? I love it!

 

Taylor is introducing Petite Storage Cases - that will hold 6 Petite sets! This size works along side your regular Mini Binder Boxes and how cool is it that you get one free with each card kit?? 

The card kits also made great Gift Ideas - one of the new card kits would make a great holiday gift for either a seasoned stamper or someone just getting started. An even better gift would be the combination of one of the card kits with any of the new Petite stamp sets. Or a Petite set would be a great little stocking stuffer.

Check out what the rest of the Baker's Dozen has in store for you today! 

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

***Guest Designer LORI CRAIG! Yeah! 

Taylored Expressions December Sneak Peeks - Day 1!

December Release at a Glance:

• It's Petite-a-Palooza as we introduce A DOZEN new Petite stamp sets, plus one new A la Carte, from every stamp collection available at Taylored Expressions.
• Tuesday (today!) is Calendar Day as we showcase FOUR new TE calendar products - all perfect for gift giving!
• Wednesday is Card Kit Day as we introduce FOUR new Taylored Card Kits available just in time for the holidays!
• All of the new products will be available for purchase on Thursday, December 1st at 8 am PST. You'll find it all in the Fresh out of the Oven Department at the Taylored Expressions Store.

• Join us as a fan on Facebook for an early peek at the stamp sets, as well as a SPECIAL Facebook GIVEAWAY, on Wednesday night beginning at approximately 6 pm PST.

 

Taylor is introducing lots of new calendar products this month - to get us all ready for the new year! I like to make calendars to send to my girlfriends as kind of a Happy New Year present. We have lots of things to choose from. For my project, I'm using the Mini Tear off Calendar plus the Desk Acrylic Base. You can create one year-round art piece or a different insert for every month of the year. Taylored Expressions has created our own exclusive mini tear off calendar (2.25" x 3") that can be adhered to either acrylic base choice (sold separately) as well as being used on card and scrapbooking projects. The possibilities are endless. The Mini Tear Off Calendars are 30 cents each or 10 for $2.50 and the Desk Acrylic Base is $2.25 each.

I am celebrating the new year with my calendar project and I'm using the brand new Happy New Year A la Carte stamp, which is a single image for $5.95. It's from the  *te* by Taylor Van Bruggen Collection. It's hard to find a good New Year's Stamp - and I am loving this one!

 

 

This side view shows you how the calendar sits on a desk. I mounted my tear off calendar onto a piece of black cardstock and mounted it to the front - so that will stay there the whole year. Then, I can just create a new insert for each month!  

 

To me New Year's always seems kind of fancy and elegant...so I stayed with a black and gold color scheme. I colored in the image with my Copic markers. The martini glass for the "A" is just too great! I stamped and cut out two more and mounted them to my project. Lots of sparkly gold glitter, too! The background paper is from the MME Lost and Found 2 Collection.

 

 

Since it's day one of Sneak Peeks I always like to make a reminder of some things I love about Taylored Expressions stamps! They are made of very high quality rubber mounted onto foam. They adhere to all your clear blocks. Petite sets are on a 3" x 5" base and are $7.95 each - which is a great deal!

Petite-a-Palooza is the perfect time to take the plunge and try some TE stamps if you haven't yet. We have something for everyone. And if you're already a TE fan, you'll love all the fun choices this month! 

Please take some time to go hop around and see all the other great calendar ideas for today!  

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

***Guest Designer LORI CRAIG! Yeah! 

Winter Mittens...and warmest wishes!

Helllllllo! Have you emerged from your Thanksgiving food coma yet? Have you recovered from Black Friday shopping yet? At our house, today is a catch up day and get-some-work-done day! Thursday was full of food and family and yesterday we shopped til we dropped, as is our tradition. But, today, someone's got to do the chores and it looks like it's us. The DH is outside planting tulip and daffodil bulbs in anticipation of Springtime and I'm cleaning all the sheets/towels, etc and trying to regain some control in the crafty cave. Buddy, of course, is snoozing away on the couch. Isn't it nice to be a cat? Hahaha. Anyhoo, hope you've been having a lovely holiday weekend!

I have a quick and easy card to share today. I had these cute mitten cut-outs from Paper Source in my stash and decided to finally use them! I combined them with some pretty felt snowflakes from Stampin' Up and some white felt, and voila...some more Christmas cards are done!

 

 

The background is a snowflake Cuttlebug folder and then I distressed it with some Antique Linen ink. The red paper is white-core so I sanded just the edges to soften the look. I love aqua with red for Winter, don't you?

 

These gorgeous glass buttons are from Webster's Pages and the color was a perfect match!

 

 

Warmest Winter Wishes from me to you today! I hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend. Please come back next week - Taylored Expressions sneak peeks start for December! It's gonna be great...

Pastel Winter Fun!

Hello! How are you? How has your week been going so far? Is all your shopping done for Thanksgiving!? I hope all is well at your house! The DH is feeling so much better but I'm not sure if he will be able to eat everything on the Thanksgiving plate...but I know he's gonna make a good effort! We love Thanksgiving at our house. Can't wait!

I have a bunch o' cards to share tonight. I was totally inspired by the December Hero Arts Contest! The themes this month were 1) tags, or 2) Bling, or 3) A very pretty pastel color palette. Well...you guys know me by now, so you know I combined all three themes into my entries! Hahaha. I went to Paper Garden and got the most beautiful shades of Stardream papers and came home...and let it all fly! Snowflakes and punches and glitter, oh my! I had a fun time with this one!

 

 

I made three cards with this look...combining all the colors in the challenge palette. White snowflakes stamped onto the Stardream paper is so pretty!

 

This tag stamp is part of a cling set from Basic Grey+Hero Arts!

 

 

 

Pretty Martha Stewart Punch snowflakes...

 

Trying to decide which colors to put where...

 

I think the pink card is my favorite. I am LOVING pink for Christmas this year!

 

 

 

Next I got out my fun mitten punch and put some snowflakes on them! I added some silver Stickles for more pop! I just bought that giant snowflake punch!!!

 

 

 

This would be a great card to mass-produce for Christmas cards...which reminds me...I need to get busy with that! hahaha.

 

One last one...I really just couldn't stop myself with that paper!!!

 

I snapped this quick pic to show the holiday crafty mess I have going on here in the stamping room! It's overflowing everywhere...even on the floor! Yikes! Also, you will note one giant kitty cat planted right in front of the space heater! That's how he rolls....

Thank you for coming by today! In case I don't see ya before...Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! I am very thankful for your kindness and warmth!

 

Some Poppystamps fun!

Hi! How are you doing? I hope you had a great weekend!  I'm just winding down the weekend in my crafty space and thought I would post a card I made with the super-duper cute new Poppystamps for Winter 2011! I hope you have been over to check out all the new stuff! Dave did an amazing job with new stamps and gorgeous new dies...It's all just so adorable and fun. I've been making some cards to post over there in the coming few weeks and I really just wanted to show you this one!

All the stamps, paper, and dies are from Memory Box and Poppystamps...

That tree die is the cutest thing ever! The trees are actually in a straight line...so I cut out little snippets of the die into pieces and then glued them onto the back of my snowy hill to match the curve. The stamp is crazy cute and has a matching die! (woot woot!) I colored the image with my Copic Markers and added little pops of glitter. The patterned papers are from Memory Box.

All the details for the products can be found by clicking HERE.

I joined the Memory Box/Poppystamps Creative Team back in October and I must say it has been such a great experience so far. There are so many fun things to come....lemme tell ya....we're already working on Valentines! I would be so grateful if you would show your support by liking Poppystamps on Facebook and/or following Poppystamps on Twitter. That way you will get all the news first! Here is the direct link to the Poppystamps Blog and here is the direct link to the Poppystamps Storefront.

Thank you so much for coming by today! Happy Thanksgiving Week! The Holidaze have officially started! Hugs.

TESC #150! Winter Birdies...

Hello! Happy Friday friends! The hubs and I are off to my college football game tomorrow. Hopefully we aren't going to get killed too badly. The other team is ranked #8 in the country, and they're favored by 20 points! OUCH. Oh well...we will have a good time anyway. I haven't missed a Big Game in 30 years and I'm not going to miss this one! GO Bears!

Today's card is my contribution to Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge #150! WOW - 150 sketches? Right on Taylor! Jami designed the great sketch for this one, and so I had to join in. There's still time....click on over (here) to see the rules and enter your own card!

The Sketch image:

 

In the side view you can see all the pretty snow on the branch! The paper is MME Lost and Found 2 Breeze Collection.  The dies for the branch and the birds are the Birds and Branch Dies  and I use those all the time! The background is the SUPER pretty Musical Swirls Impression Plate.The Banner was stamped with the Banner Holidays set and I also used the Banner Day 1 set! The scallop border is the Small Scallop Die!  Everything is available at the Taylored Expressions store!

 

Here I go again with the Perfect Pearls Mist! (I blame Richele for this!) I embossed my image with the Swirls side of the Impression plate on cream cardstock. Then I generously misted it with the Pearl sheen. I adore this effect!  

 

Look...it's snowing! In order to get the depth on the glitter snow, I used white enamel accents instead of plain clear glue.  

 

 

 

 

Thanks for coming by and spending part of your day here with me! Have a super weekend! See you soon. 

 

Thanksgiving Pretties!

Greetings! One week from tomorrow is Thanksgiving! Holy guacamole where did this year go? Christmas will be here asap!  Yesterday I holed up in the crafty cave and made our Thanksgiving cards for 2011. I have made this a tradition for at least 10 years now...pretty cards for family. I love doing this. I love the colors of Fall, the leaves and, most of all, the meaning of Thanksgiving. It's a perfect holiday in my book. I was inspired this year by an unlikely source - some floral paper! I don't know why, but the colors just said Thanksgiving to me. It's a bit non-traditional, but I like it anyway! I distressed and inked, and sewed...oh my!

Here's the final creation:  

 

 

 

It took me FOREVER to figure out how to get my machine to zig zag! ACK. It was worth it though! I love the look of this. You should see all the scraps I shredded before making the good ones!

 

The leaves were punched out of a rust colored (white core) paper and then sanded to show some texture. Then I sprayed them with Perfect Pearls Heirloom Gold Mist. YUM! I tried to get it kind of splotchy on purpose. Aren't they so pretty?

 

For the words, I stamped them in brown ink on cream paper and cut them into banners. Then I crumpled them with my hands and inked them with Antique Linen distress ink so they would look aged.

 

I did the same technique on the yellow leaves as I did on the bigger leaves. In this picture you can really see the pearl mist. I also turned the corners of the leaves up.

 

I inked and distressed the background layer and mounted it to a kraft card base.

 

Here's my little stack of pretties...all ready to be finished. This was a multi-step process and I always do all the steps for every card...assembly line style...

 

Here is the inside: I combined two clear stamp sentiments onto one clear block. Then I added another leaf in a butterscotch color.

 

I had to show you the back too! Hello Kitty Pilgrim! Are you freaking' kidding me??? LOVE her!

 

 

I hope you are having fun preparing for a big feast and getting excited about welcoming friends and family. And I am wishing you a Happy Thanksgiving a little early, for I am thankful for you my bloggy friends! Have a great day today!

Acorns and Leaves...

Hi bloggy friends! This past few days I have noticed the beautiful Fall leaves here in Northern California. Our neighborhood is full of trees, big giant trees. In fact, we have two 80 foot maples in our backyard (but that part isn't so much fun). We finally had a cold snap and all the color is blooming. I love it! There is this one red tree in particular that is in our neighbor's front yard...I can look right at it out the kitchen window. Wonderful. Today, I decided to make the first Thanksgiving card today to share. I guess I'd better pick up the pace, since Thanksgiving is next week! Ack!

Thank you to everyone who has sent the nicest notes and wishes and prayers for the hubs' surgery last Friday. The surgery went well. We had to wait around until 5:30 pm until he finally went in. The doctor said that his tonsils (both together) were the size of a tennis ball (!!!) and were the biggest he'd ever seen. Oy. No wonder he's been so sick. Anyway...enough graphic details. Yesterday I think was his worst day and today he seems to be feeling much better. SO thankful for that! Anyhoo, just wanted to say how wonderful it has been to receive your encouragement.

The main focal stamp is from Waltzingmouse...love this set...it's called Peace and Plenty. I colored the image with my Copics and kept the layout clean and simple.

 

Here's my color choices...The other two greens are YG63 and YG67.  

 

Here's a little secret... I only had one sheet of that burnt orange paper but I needed a circle layer for my image. I cut my background layer...and then cut my circle out of the center of it. Shhhh. No one will ever know!

 

I've seen this technique on a few blogs lately and I love it! Score your paper each half inch and you have a pretty quilted pattern!

 

The sentiment stamp is from Inkadinkadoo... I added some blings at the very last minute! I couldn't help myself. 

 

 

This makes me happy and thankful! This is a picture of my crazy cute nephews in their front yard! OMG this is the perfect Fall photo in my book. I even have it as my phone screen saver right now! How can you not smile??  {photo credit}

 

And, it's been a while since I let you know how Mr. Buddy is doing... As I mentioned earlier, we've had a cold snap.... Oh, did someone else want some heat too? I didn't realize! Hahaha.

I hope you have a wonderful week!  

Happy Day! A birthday creation!

First and foremost...Happy Veterans Day to all of you veterans, families and friends! At our house we are both children of military fathers and we are grateful for the service of our heroes yesterday and today.

SO...turns out I had time to get a blog post done before leaving for the hospital today. The hubs' surgery check in time is 3pm so we had time to sleep in and take it easy a bit before leaving the house. He's really nervous and I'm trying to be the cheery one. Even though it's an 'easy' surgery it's still scary. I'll fill you in later on how it went.

Yesterday was my uncle's birthday and so I thought today I would share his birthday card. I know he already got it, so it's safe now! I wanted to make him a really cool card, and I think I may have gone overboard with the layers...let me know what you think! I just kept adding stuff... More is more, right? I was inspired by the awesome color palette of the Happy Day paper collection from Simple Stories.

 

This paper pack comes with these tiny calendars and I cut the hat out of one of the papers. I made my own flags by cutting strips of paper and wrapping them around pearl pins. (Secret? I colored the tops of the pins with a Copic marker!)

 

I distressed all the edges and used a cool bracket edger punch. I love Copper brads for masculine projects. My uncle is a photography lover (that's where I got it from) so I added a tad of Tim Holtz filmstrip tape just for him!

 

 

This is another one of those projects with no stamping! The letters for his name are rub-ons from my stash. Everything else is paper piecing. Happy Birthday Uncle Steve! Have a great day everyone and thanks for coming by.

Show and Tell from this weekend!

Hi friends! How are ya? Hope you're having a great week and doing some fun stuff mixed in with the day to day stuff of life! I have been dying to share with you what I did this weekend. Tonight I finally had time to take photos of my projects and sit down and write a post about it.

My friend Richele and I met many years ago when we both taught classes at one of our local stamp stores. She is super sweet and SUPER talented! Mad talent! Her style is Tim Holtz/Ranger/Grunge with the most attentive eye for detail and a splash of femininity too. (Her blog here) She works closely with Tim Holtz and does design for Ranger, among other crafty things.  Well...Saturday afternoon I called her up to say hi and she says "I'm teaching classes all day tomorrow at Scrapbook Territory, why don't you come with me?" I had to think about it because I had about a bazillion things I was supposed to get done. Luckily, my gut told me to call her back and say "yeah!" and that's just what I did! Lucky me! That was definitely the right decision.

She taught a melt-art class in the morning and a Grunge Christmas class in the afternoon...it was a crafty marathon...all day! Met some really nice people and made the neatest projects. I'm inspired in a whole different way after letting go and being messy! hahaha. Okay...enough blabbing...here's the goods...First up, our lovely teacher, Richele.

 

 

Here's Nikki and Marsha concentrating on their UTEE melting pots. From the looks of all those cords, I'm glad we didn't blow a fuse!

 

We did some mold and pour molds and made faux resin flowers out of the melted UTEE. I have never done this technique before and I really liked it. I always thought it was complicated or difficult...but it isn't. I may invest in a melting pot at some point!

 

Here's Richele pouring the UTEE into some fun foam shapes over dictionary pages to make embellies for cards. What a cool idea!  

 

 

 

One of the other things she showed us was to take paper flowers and leaves and run them through the melted clear UTEE until it's coated. It dries fast, and dries into this amazing glass like finish. LOVE this! I'm also picturing putting some chunky glitter on them before they dry???

 

 

 

 

 

For one of our projects we took one of our flowers and some leaves and used them to make a piece of jewelry. I decided to make mine a pin. Isn't it pretty!? I'm so excited to wear it on my favorite denim jacket! I wear pins a lot so this is great!

 

See the close up of the "dew" on the leaves? That's actually dry! We sprayed them with Perfect Pearls mist. OOOOOOH LA LA! This is hecka fun!  

 

 

 

Here are my faux resin flowers!  

 

Got me some o' this on Sunday too!

 

Now all that stuff we made in the morning class was more than enough fun for one day...but NOPE...there's more! Here are the projects we made in the afternoon Ranger Grunge Christmas class!  These cards have a real retro vibe that I like a lot. Very classy.

 

 

 

With this project I became infatuated with Perfect Pearls Spray in Heirloom Gold....wowza!

 

This ornament is a die cut on a piece of grungeboard and then crackled, and painted and sprayed and on an on. All these layers really make a wonderful outcome.

 

Richele gave us lots of goodies and stickers and Stickles and we went to town making ATC's. Here are my two favorites. Lots of distress ink and embossing. MMMMMMMM. I think I will probably end up gluing these onto card fronts for some Christmas cards.

 

 

 

 

On a totally different topic...when I went to leave the house Sunday morning the hubs pointed out that the normally blue hydrangeas in the front yard were doing some weird stuff now that it's November! Check out the color on this one!

Thanks for letting me share my good time and my projects! This week is going to take a serious turn on Friday so I need some good vibes and prayers coming our way. My dear hubs is having a Tonsillectomy. He's been sick and generally not feeling well for a long time and we're hoping that getting his tonsils removed will start him down the path of feeling like his old self again. Not sure when I'll get a post up next - so check back in with me. HUGS!

SSSC #142 - Thank you card!

Holy cow! What a weekend I had! Too much fun and not enough rest...and it's Monday night already. Wow. I ended up doing all kinds of fun crafty stuff this weekend, and all of it was unplanned. Life presented me with some fun opportunities and I took 'em! I went to some classes, met a new friend, spent time with old friends. Yowza...still processing all of it. I will tell you more, but I need to take pictures of some stuff first - to share with you. I hope that you had a fabbie weekend too!

Today's card is my entry for Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge #142. I L-O-V-E the sketch this week and had to play along. You have until Saturday to enter ... join me? Skip on over to Karen's to check it out.

 

 

 

 

Here's the cool sketch image: I know this one is a keeper!

 

Here are my supplies: The awesome brand new sets from Taylored Expressions are "Love Grows Here" and "Sunflower Wreath." I also used the new mini leaf dies and my favorite medium scallop die - all From Taylored Expressions too! LOVE the Away We Go collection from My Minds Eye - in the 6x6 pack! With all of that I had the makings for a nice Fall Thank You note!

 

Here is my Copic color palette. I love that teensiest pop of aqua in with all those Fall colors. Yummmmy for sure. The warm gray was used to color the fence in the image.

 

When I color, I keep my color chart and my patterned paper handy so I can match colors. I am kind of (kind of?) OCD when it comes to color matching! This is a great way to pull your project together...  

The mini leaf dies make excellent accents for projects. Here I used some twine and a button to make my own embellishment. Isn't that little owl the cutest thing? The sentiment is from the Sunflower Wreath set and I used my stamp-a-majig to line it up under the tree image. I adore this new tree stamp set...didn't get enough last week and had to use it again right away!

 

 

 

 

Thank you, bloggy friends, for coming on by today!

Have a good one and I'll see you soon!  

Howdy!

Hi everyone! Greetings and salutations on this fine November day! Happy weekend to you all! Well, it's been a busy week here on the blog, what with all of the Taylored Expressions release week festivities and all that good stuff. BUT...we missed a very important day...my birthday! Hahaha. My bday was on Thursday. I'm a gal who loves a birthday, lemme tell ya. I love to get cards in the mail, to go out to dinner with my friends and to generally be spoiled by the hubs. Always have, and always will, love a birthday! In honor of this momentous occasion I have a birthday card to share with you. I also have some snaps to share of our fun-filled day spent in San Francisco.

First off, here's a card inspired by, and made with, the uber cute new Sidewalks Collection from October Afternoon. Do you not love that company? I love the retro colors they use and the happy prints. I made two cards using the same papers, actually. I'll post the other one a different time.

 

 

The pretty red doily is made from the big die from PTI! Nice! I cut out a pretty yellow border to offset the word paper.  

Added a nice big shabby chic rose to the whole thing and then used the stickers that came with the paper collection. No stamping involved! The Happy Birthday wording is a rub on!

 

 

If you're still with me...I have some photos to share too. I didn't really know what I wanted to do on my birthday. The hubs and I both took the day off from work and late Wednesday I decided it would be fun just to go hang out in San Francisco for the day, taking pictures, and shopping, and eating...you know - the good stuff in life. It ended up raining for much of the day, but we got some cool shots before the rain started.

FIrst we stopped off on Treasure Island, which is in the middle of the bay. Best view of the city and the bridges! The clouds were starting to roll in...the sign of things to come.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We went to this bakery I love called Miette. I have their cookbook and love it so much. They make yummy cupcakes and macarons.

 

 

 

 

For lunch we had a salami sandwich and cupcakes. Yum, no?

 

 

 

 

We hit up a couple of favorite art stores - Flax and Blick Art. Blick has the GIANT 'tower o' Copics' that I so would love to bring home with me. Unfortunately it would not fit in my purse! Every color in every shape... When I win lotto that baby is mine! Flax has the amazing paper room! Rows and rows of shelves with handmade papers from around the world. You look in a big catalog at the swatches and then go and find the corresponding cabinet. WOW. Been going here for years - it makes me want to be creative.

 

I had some fun with my iPhone photo apps - Instagram and Hipstamatic. I like to experiment with the images. Sometimes they come out neat, and sometimes not. I'm posting a few of those too.

 

 

 

Mark bought me an amazing leopard print cover for my iPad at the Tory Burch boutique. SCORE! It seems classy and cool at the same time. Rawr. LOVE. Thanks honey!

We did not buy these...but, man, aren't they pretty?

Thank you so much for coming by the blog today! I hope your weekend is just fantastic! See you soon!

Taylored Expressions November Release Day!

TE November Release Day!

• All of the new products are now available for purchase! Check out the Fresh Out of the Oven Department to see everything in one place!
• More projects from the Baker's Dozen to inspire you. Just follow the link list below.
• Did you win one of the Mystery Baker's Dozen Blog Giveaways? Find the list of winners on Taylor's Blog.

Wow! Here we are at release day already?! Oh...and it's also my Birthday! WOOT! I have another card to share today using the very pretty Thankful Stamp Set. I just really love this one. I know I will use it for years to come as part of my Fall stamping projects.  I also used the mini leaf die again...I cannot get enough of it!

This time I featured the Cornucopia image and one of the sentiments. I think this would make a very nice Thanksgiving card or a hostess card - if you're going over to someone's house...  

This is a fun image to color, and you can see I busted out all my Copics! I stamped my image in brown ink on cream paper to make it warm.

Here is my colored image before I added clear glaze to parts of it.  

 

 

Thank you so much for coming by this week to join us for the TE November Release festivities! I hope you've had a good time and that you enjoyed everything we had for you. Now...get shopping! It's time! Have a great day!

Charmaine Ikach

Danielle Lounds

Jami Sibley

Jen Shults

Jodi Collins

Karen Giron

Melissa Sauls

Melody Rupple

Regina Mangum

Sankari Wegman

Taylor VanBruggen

Tori Wild

Wanda Guess

***Guest Designer LORI CRAIG! Yeah!