A Blog Called Wanda

Queen And Company Happy Harvest Shaker Card Kit - Fall Greetings!

Happy Weekend Crafty People! Happy Saturday! I have Thanksgiving on my mind, and making the last few projects for Fall. It's been busy in the studio and there's a mix of Christmas stamps and Fall stamps pretty much scattered everywhere! Just a couple of weeks now until Turkey Day and I can't wait. I am debating putting up some Christmas decorations but, nah... Not quite yet. I love the warm tones so I'm not ready! What are you up to this weekend? 

Today's project is a card I made with the brand new, beautiful, latest shaker card kit from Queen and Company. This one is called Happy Harvest and it's right up my alley! It has a pretty fall color paper pad, a wonderful stamp set (maybe my favorite one yet from Queen and Co), dies, and everything you need to make cool shaker cards. I looooove these kits - I know you're used to me saying it. SUCH a good value for the money. CHECK IT OUT here. The kit is on sale right now too! Woot!

My card started with an A2 card base in cream cardstock. I layered a bit of woodgrain cardstock from my stash. Then all the other papers are from the kit. Pretty stripes and polka dots... I used a bunch of the papers. 

 

I made the cute little acorn shaker using the included paper pad and the included gems and pearls in warm tones. I wrapped a bit of twine around the card and paper layers. I used one of the shaker elements dies (the oak leaf) and die cut leaves to put behind the acorn. It's so cute! I stamped the sentiment using brown ink, and again on cream cardstock.

 

 

 

I'm so glad I got this kit - because I know I will use these sentiments on lots of things. The font combinations are wonderful! 

 

 

That's it for today! Happy Harvest! CLICK HERE to check out the kit - or click on the photo below. I hope you have an outstanding weekend! I will see you soon my friends! XOXO

QUEEN & COMPANY HAPPY HARVEST KIT!

 

Reverse Confetti New Release Blog Hop! November 2018!

Hi my crafty friends! How's your week going? I hope it's been an awesome one! I'm so happy it's November and Fall activities are happening. The nights are cool now and life is good! Today we're blog hopping to launch the brand new November product release from Reverse Confetti! Woot! Pretty, fun, and fabulous new stamps, dies and paper launch TODAY! Yes! There's a lot of winter crafting stuff and COFFEEEE! Yes, brand new coffee stamps and dies. I always love a coffee themed craft project. I know you're going to love this release. CLICK HERE TO SHOP WHAT'S NEW at Reverse Confetti! The full blog hop list and the shopping links are at the bottom of my post. Hope you enjoy this fun and inspirational hop! You should have arrived here from the wonderful blog of Amy Rohl! 

I made two cards to share today - used my Copic Markers and some fun ink blending techniques too. I'm really into ink blending backgrounds lately! So much fun to customize your own background paper colors for cards. Let's get started! 

First up is a BRIGHT coffee card! (Get out your sunglasses!) I used the brand new "Drink More Coffee" stamps and dies for this one. I looooove the sentiments in this stamp set. I chose to use the Sun's Up Mug's Up sentiment and that is what inspired my bright yellow background. This is an A2 sized card with a white card base. 

 

I started by making this fun background. The background die is one of my favorite products from Reverse Confetti. I used it quite often. It's the Stitched Rays cover. I used two shades of yellow Distress Inks and went over it with looooots of color. I dried all that ink with my heat gun and then splattered clean water on it and Copic Opaque White splatters. I set that aside to make the rest of the card. 

 

I stamped and die cut the cup, saucer and spoon and colored them all with Copic Markers. I also die cut the coffee die and splattered it with white paint. I die cut a white circle and stamped the sun rays in yellow behind where I wanted to put the coffee cup. Then I layered the coffee cup and saucer onto the white circle. 

 

The sentiment was white heat embossed onto a strip of vellum - I did this to let the yellow show through, but also to tone it down just a little bit. I love sentiments on vellum! 

 

 

 

Next up is an adorable little bunny and his birdie friend sledding by to say hello! I used the brand new "Snow Buddies" stamps and dies for this card. I started with an A2 card base in white and then layered dark aqua and kraft. The snow mound was made by die cutting a circle die from white paper and trimming it to fit over the kraft layer. Easy peasy! I stamped the snow flakes in white ink onto the kraft. 

 

 

Sweetest sentiment! I stamped and die cut out the snow bunny and his sled and colored them with Copic Markers. I added bits of Diamond Stickles too! 

 

Everything is layered onto the card using foam tape. I used another new set called "Snowflake Magic" to create the small let it snow sentiment. 

 

 

Thank you SO very much for joining me today on my stop on this fun and fabulous blog hop! Hip Hooray for the brand new Reverse Confetti November Release! The entire release is available for shopping now! What is on your wish list? Hope you find something to tickle your creative fancy. Enjoy the hop! Next up is the awesome Heather Hoffman! Full blog hop list below! XOXO

 

BLOG HOP LIST FOR TODAY!

Reverse Confetti Blog
Amy Kolling
Melissa Phillips
Amy Sheffer
Lydia Fiedler
Tricia Barber
Kelly Lunceford
Lisa Henke
Leanne West 
Amy Rohl
Wanda Guess
Heather Hoffman
Therese Calvird
Amy Tsuruta
Kathy Schweinfurth
Michelle Short
Audrey Tokach
Melissa Bickford 
Jeanne Jachna
Olga Moss
Ali Farmer
Deanne Kuntz

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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Jingle All the Way! Honey Bee Stamps Deerly Loved Release!

Greetings and happy Monday! Let's kick this week off right with a happy, cheerful snowman! Did you have a good weekend? It was my birthday this weekend and I had a very nice weekend indeed. Friday we went shopping and walking all day, outside at this pretty mall and I got some new presents... And spent way too much money at Sephora! Yikes. I love that place! Then we had a day of rest and watched movies... Sunday I worked all day at the Voting Center and that was great too. Lots happening. Oh, and did I mention it was 85 degrees??? So, I am totally in the mood for a snowman! I need fog and rain, and I need to wear a sweater. Dang!! This is very unusual weather indeed. I'm trying to get my Christmas spirit going! 

Honey Bee Stamps launched a new release last week called Deerly Loved, and it has the cutest and best new stamps, dies and stencils for Winter Holidays! CHECK IT OUT here! I fell in love with the Jingle all the way sentiment set and knew that's what I wanted to use first. Paired with an adorable snowman and you have today's card! This card makes me smile. 

I started with a white A2 card base from Neenah Solar White cardstock. The top layer is Bristol Cardstock - because it really holds up well to all that Distress Ink! The background was made with two shades of blue DIstress Inks and heat embossing. YUM. 

 

After I made my background, I stamped the snowman, his hat, scarf and birdie, and colored them in with my Copics. I added accents with a white gel pen, and then some Diamond Stickles for a bit of sparkle. The plaid on his scarf was made with the white gel pen. I colored it red first with Copic Markers and then just made diagonal lines across the red. SO easy! 

 

To make the background, I die cut the scallop rectangle from Bristol paper. I used Broken China and Chipped Sapphire DIstress inks and an ink blending tool to add the color in a circular motion, with the lighter color in the center. Oops! First things first! I heat embossed the sentiment and the snowflakes in white embossing powder first! The distress inks were applied over the top of the embossed parts. I love this effect! I used the Distress Sprayer to sprinkle water droplets onto the ink for some blotches. Then I used a small paint brush and Copic Opaque White to add snow splatters! 

 

This is the background before adding the water drops and white ink splatters. I like it this way too...

 

I attached the snowman onto the card base using foam tape. How cute is that little bird sitting on top of his hat? So fun! This stamp set comes with so many cute accessories - you can make your snowman a million different ways! 

That's it for today! Have a wonderful, happy week! I will see you back here on Thursday to launch the brand new release from Reverse Confetti! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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Pinkfresh Studio Holiday Cards Blog Hop!

Hi everyone! Happy November! Time to get in the spirit of the holidays! The rest of the year is coming fast and we're here today to help you plan out your holiday cards! I'm so excited to be part of this awesome Pinkfresh Holiday Cards Blog Hop today! This is a huge TWO DAY blog hop with fun, inspiration, prizes and a free gift with your order too! Please CLICK HERE to see the entire beautiful line of holiday stamps and dies from Pinkfresh Studio - one of my favorite companies! CLICK HERE to go to the Pinkfresh Blog to see all the details each day, or if you get sidetracked along the hop! The full list of all the designers is at the bottom of my post! Grab some cocoa and relax with us and get inspired for the Winter Holidays! Thank you for coming by today. If you're new to my blog - welcome welcome! Glad to see you! 

I made two cards to share today - one is icy blue and the other is warm and extra sparkly. Both are made with gorgeous stamps and dies from Pinkfresh in their truly unique whimsical and pretty style. The images are happy and they make me happy too. 

First up is a Magical Chrisma-corn! I just made that up! A Christmas Unicorn! Love her! She is flying through the air to spread glitter and sparkle over everyone. This stamp set is called Magical Christmas. Love. The card base is A2 in white. Then I layered red, some pretty patterned paper, and then vellum. I love the look of vellum over patterned papers... 

 

I stamped and die cut out the Christmas Unicorn and then colored her mane and tail with Copic Markers in red and green. Her horn is silver embossed and the scarf is red ink. The head, body, scarf, and horn are all different stamps - so you can make them different colors. Genius I'd say! Made it so easy to stamp a red scarf and emboss the horn. I used a bit of white twine and pretty small silver bells to put around her neck. She is a Chrisma-corn after all!

 

The sentiment and the snowflakes were stamped onto the vellum with white pigment ink. I also used Copic Opaque White to make snowy splatters onto the vellum. Be sure to set that aside and let it get good and dry before attaching it to your card. 

 

Isn't she beautiful? 

 

Next up are these adorable bunnies skating by to say hello and Merry Wishes! This card was made with the Pinkfresh Skating Bunnies stamps and dies. I used an icy blue and grey color palette for this card. I love how it came out! This is also an A2 white card base. I layered grey and then pretty plaid patterned paper on a diagonal.. 

 

I stamped and die cut the bunnies and colored them with Copic Markers. I die cut a circle for them to skate on and used Distress Ink and a blending tool to make a pretty matching blue sky. I stamped snowflakes in blue onto the sky portion. I also splattered some of the same Copic Opaque White as on the first card. (Supplies are all listed below). 

 

They are just so so sweet skating around. The one on the left reminds me of John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever! He's going for it out on the ice! This card is perfect for any winter holiday occasion. 

 

I glued on a few sparkly blue gems at the end to finish off the card. 

 

 

Now for the good stuff! Prizes and Free GIfts! Pinkfresh Studio will be picking SIX random comments from the designer blog posts, from each day to win a $25 gift card to the Pinkfresh Studio store. That's twelve total prizes! How awesome is that? AND - there will be TWO GRAND PRIZES picked from the Pinkfresh Blog posts: each day a different bundle of their holiday stamps & dies. (The prizes will be pictured each day on the Pinkfresh blog).

Pinkfresh Studio will pull the winners & post them on Sunday, November 11th by 2pm CST on their GIVEAWAY PAGE. Note: You must check that page & claim your prize within 2 weeks.

BUT WAIT!  Pinkfresh is also offering a FREE Holiday Vibes die with $25 purchase in the Pinkfresh Studio shop.  A photo of the free die is below! Yay!

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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FULL LIST OF TODAY'S DESIGNERS! ENJOY THE HOP!

An InLinkz Link-up

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Happy Halloween from A Witch Called Wanda!

Hi crafty friends! Happy Halloween!! Man, how did that happen? Tomorrow is NOVEMBER??? I say that every year, but doesn't the time go so fast lately? It's still warm here and I guess that hasn't really put me in the Halloween mood. Supposed to be 80 degrees here today! Yikes. I'm ready for sweater time! I've been working a lot in the studio making fun projects for next month. Lots to share!! I took all of my Election Worker training classes last week so now I'm on call to work at a voting center. And I'll be working every day at the center the days right before the election. I have to say that the behind the scenes of setting up an election are fascinating! I've really enjoyed being part of things and learning more about the laws surrounding voting. I am glad I signed up to do it! In bigger news my birthday is on Saturday! Woot! Not sure what we'll be doing. I'm happy with a low key birthday to be sure.... The hubs and I will find something fun to do. I am not that psyched about another year under my belt so to speak. 

Today I'm sharing a fun Halloween card made with a stamp named after me! I looooove wood mounted RUBBER stamps and buy them as often as I can! My friend Lindsay Ostrom is a local artist and she illustrates stamps for Impression Obsession! (VERY cool stamps I might add). I almost always buy her wood stamps. Well, imagine my surprise to find out that she made one called Witch Wanda! And she has a kitty! Awesome. I inked up Witch Wanda with my Polychromos Pencils on Kraft paper.... Kept a clean layout.... Used my favorite Ellen Hutson Background die... There you have it. Happy Halloween!  

 

There are three layers of Kraft cardstock on this card: The card base (A2), the background die/embossed layer, and the top layer with the image. I added just a touch of a hint of purple cardstock under that top layer. I like to layer the same color cardstock - it gives added dimension without having a ton of colors going on. I do this a lot with white cardstock also. Coloring with pencils on Kraft is a great technique to shake it up and get a different look. (The Halloween die is from SSS and unfortunately is not available anymore). I added some bitty bats from an old style punch. 

 

When you color with pencils, make sure to utilize that white pencil to add highlights! It makes your project pop! 

 

 

 

And there she is! Witch Wanda! LOL!

 

 

I hope you have a FUN HALLOWEEN with no tricks and lots of treats! Are you dressing up? We'll stay home and hang out and wait for trick or treaters. We don't get a ton of kids on our street but I love to see their costumes and pass out candy! I'll be back tomorrow with a fun blog hop for Pink Fresh Studio! Yay! See you then. XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY:

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Halloween Cuties from Elizabeth Crafts!

Hey there! How's your week going? I'm spending the day in training today for working the election in a couple weeks! Should be interesting! ALLLLL day training. Gosh, it's been a while for that! Looking forward to seeing what's up and what I'll be doing during election week. I hope your week is going great so far. Today I'm sharing a card I made with some SUPER cute stamps I bought at the Stamp and Scrapbook Expo last weekend. I literally could not wait to ink these up! They are from Elizabeth Crafts. Although Elizabeth Crafts is definitely not new to me, this new line of stamps (a new artist) was new to me and I BOUGHT EIGHT SETS! I couldn't help myself. They are so sweet and whimsical and adorable!! CLICK HERE to see all of them! EEKS! Love. 

I used the Halloween stamps and dies to make this card. I used my Distress Ink Mini Ink Pads and a small paint brush to do the coloring. I wanted it to look like illustrations! I used a clean and simple card layout with some cute gingham and just a bit of glitter and twine. This is an A2 card size with the fold on the left side. 

 

A little twine bow on the side fold always looks cute and cheerful! I stamped the sentiment directly onto my top layer. Simple layers here of gingham, black and white cardstock. All the little images were stamped and die cut out and attached with foam tape. 

 

To color everything, I used Distress Ink Minis and a small paint brush. SO fast to water color this way! Quick and easy. HOW cute is that candy corn witch??? OMG. 

 

 

 

 

I used the Elizabeth Crafts super fine glitter and a glue pen to add glitter bits to most of the images. A little touch of sparkle is always good!

 

 

 

 

 

I can totally picture this adorable crew showing up at my doorstep on Halloween night! 

That's it for today! Have a blessed and creative day! See you soon! XOXO

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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BOO! Fun shaker card with Queen & Company Fright Fest Kit!

BOO! Hey everyone! Happy Sunday! I'm getting a slow start today... Relaxing with the hubs and Lucky and enjoying a second cup of coffee with nowhere to be today. Ahhhhh. I had the best time the past three days! The Stamp and Scrapbook Expo was in town and I did it right! LOL. I had friends here from San Diego, Canada, and the bay area. In addition to all my Sacramento Crafty friends. Whew. Hugs galore, laughter, coffee, snacks, shopping....It was all wonderful. My back hurts and my wallet is empty. But my heart is happy. I really just had a great time. Two of my friends rented a house here and we stayed up long after the show talking and being silly. There is definitely not enough of that in my life! I hope you've had a great weekend too!

Next week is going to be super busy for me. I signed up to be an election worker and I have to go to ten hours worth of training next week. I also have a fun stamping class one night. All good stuff happens in the Fall. 

Today I'm sharing a super fun Halloween card made with a fabooolous kit from Queen & Company. The kit is called Fright Fest! It has everything you need included in the kit - to make tons of Halloween cards. The Queen & Company kits are the best value and the highest quality. Can't recommend them enough really. You get a full stamp set, tons of dies, a paper pad, the shaker shapes, the acetate pieces and all the shaker bits! I hope you will check them out! CLICK HERE to see all the fun kits. 

For my card I decided - if one shaker bit is good, then TWO is better! I used the BOO and the Pumpkin shapes to make this card. It's an A2 sized card. I started with a white card base, then layered black, and then the pretty stripes. I stamped the sentiment in black ink and added a few spooky splatters for effect. 

 

The dies set comes with all the little pieces to make the pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern treat bucket. LOVE. So easy to put this together!! 

 

I like this sentiment with the combination of different fonts. 

 

I wrapped a bit of twine around the card and added some gems. These gems are also from Queen & Co and they're called halos. They come in a bunch of colors! 

 

These are just a few of the items that come in the Fright Fest Kit!

 

 

 

I love that happy Jack-o-lantern!!

 

 

That's it for today! Thanks for popping by! Hope I didn't scare ya! LOLZ. I hope you have a fantastic week ahead. Not sure what I'll be posting next, but I hope to use some of the new cute stamps I got at the Stamp and Scrapbook Expo this weekend. I have loads of ideas. Take care! XOXO

Remember to check out my last post about Stampin' Up and how to get a free gift with your order! 

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY! 

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Fun with the Stampin' Up 2018 Holiday Catalog!

Hi friends! I have something fun to share today. And I also have some stories too! Today I'm featuring three cards I made using supplies, stamps, dies, and papers from the new Holiday 2018 Stampin' Up Catalog. Boy, Stampin' Up hit it out of the park with this catalog. I'm going to say it's the best one ever. I wanted everything! Yikes. My love affair with Stampin' Up goes back to 1994! Yes, almost 25 years ago! I still very vividly remember my first SU party! It was at my boss's house! LOL. His wife was really into it and she got us hooked. Back then, the SU catalog had stamps from tons of different stamping companies: Hero Arts, All Night Media, PSX, etc. etc. So you placed your order... Then Stampin' Up got all those items together from all those different companies and sent the big order to your hostess. The she had to bag everything for everyone. Whew. Oh yeah, and this all took about SIX WEEKS!!! Boy how times have changed! Now you place your order online and it's at your house practically the next day. Dang! I have so many wonderful memories, and so many stamp sets. A couple of years ago when I was doing the major purge of my studio I (sadly) threw out 20 years' worth of Stampin' Up catalogs. They were like old friends. Anyhoo I'm getting pretty far down memory lane - time to come back! LOL. 

My good friend Wendy is an AWESOME Stampin' Up Demonstrator! Always in the top 100 of all demonstrators! She is a total boss. I love her and I'm so happy she lives close enough that we can hang out. You guys have seen me post photos from her amazing retreats. This post is done in support from one girl boss to another. I really wanted to feature some products from Stampin' Up and maybe get you all connected with her. Please go by her wonderful, and newly revamped website to say hi and leave some love. I helped her do the photographs for her site. Yay! She is cool and talented and generous. I would be super happy if you would shop with her. At the bottom of my post is some info on a giveaway she's doing for you with an order. Thank you for supporting me - and my friends. 

Okay, first project is a winter wonderland, vintage, cabin, plaid, creation! OH MAN. This stamp and die combo was the first thing that caught my eye in the new catty. It's called Alpine Adventure. LOVE. I combined the stamps and dies with the gorgeous plaid paper and then went to town layering. The finished card is a 5.25 x 5.25 inch square. (Sometimes you need more room, amiright?) 

 

This card started with a kraft card base in a big square. Then I used the beautiful Tin Tile Embossing Folder and embossed it with cream cardstock. I used Antique Linen Distress Ink and a sponge to go over the embossing to add more visual interest and shadows. I love this look. Next I die cut the sled and the snowshoes and the snowflakes out of red, cream and kraft cardstock. Then I stamped and die cut that cute little wreath and bow! I used Copic Opaque White ink to add snow splatters to the pieces, and I inked the edges of everything with more distress ink. 

 

I wrapped a strip of that beautiful plaid paper around the embossed panel and attached it to the card base. I stamped the sentiment in brown ink onto cream cardstock. I hand cut it out in a banner using some small scissors. I added pearls to the centers of the snowflakes. 

 

 

 

Here is a close up of the embossing folder. I swear that thing weighs like ten pounds! It's super think and fancy. Look at that impression!! I first thought I was going to use Kraft for this part but then changed my mind and used the cream paper. 

 

 

 

 

 

I wanted the red sled to stand out more from the background so I die cut a second sled from cream cardstock and offset it just slightly. Gives it a pop! 

 

Next up is a happy snowman full of Winter Cheer! He's skating by to say helloooooo! I used the Spirited Snowmen stamp set for this next card. I colored him with Copic Markers and added some gem accents for a bit of snowy sparkle. I really like the sketch illustration style of this set. The stamps are all really sweet. I started with a white A2 card base and layered light blue paper and a bit of striped paper from my stash.  I stamped the snowman onto white paper and then die cut a circle around it. I added some snowflakes in a light blue ink around him and on the sentiment oval. 

 

I used the pretty new burlap trim for this card to add visual interest down the center and break up all those stripes. I stamped and hand cut out the holly leaves to add around the circle.

 

 

 

This is a good card layout for almost any stamp set. Clean and simple - and a good way to use that patterned paper!!

 

And lastly I made an elegant Fall card using the new Falling For Leaves stamps and dies bundle. This is going to be a Thanksgiving card. I went with a very simple color palette to show off those pretty leaves dies. I love the black, gold and vellum together. This is an A2 card base in cream instead of bright white. 

 

 

These intricate leaves cut like a dream and all the pieces fell right out. I did use my metal shim in my Big Shot and it was perfect. The background is another embossing folder from Stampin' Up that I've had for a while. I stamped the sentiment in rich black ink.

 

This is the perfect sentiment for lots of Autumn occasions...

 

Here's a side view so you can see that pretty embossing. I added a few sequins from my giant sequin stash - in a matte gold finish.

 

 

Thank you for coming by today! I hope you enjoyed my take on these great supplies from Stampin' Up! Please go over to Wendy's Blog and look around at her great content and hopefully shop too! CLICK HERE to go to Luvin Stampin! Wendy is very kind and generous to me - so let's be generous to her!

Wendy has allowed me to offer a freebie to my blog readers! Woot! Here are the details: If you make an order of $30 or more, Wendy will send you a package of the fun and pretty Santa's Workshop Enamel Shapes from the Holiday Catalog! ($7 value) I love enamel dots! PLEASE make sure that WENDY CRANFORD is selected as your demonstrator on your order! 

This offer is one per customer and US orders only. And your order needs to go through Wendy. This will expire on November 1st! In order to receive your freebie, please just send me a quick email to stampcatwg@aol.com and tell me you ordered! I'll let Wendy know and she will send out all the freebies after the November 1st date. THANK YOU! 

 

SUPPLY LINKS FOR TODAY!

(These are not affiliate links - they're helpful shopping links today!) 

Falling For Leaves Photopolymer Bundle - 149938

Price: $44.00

Alpine Adventure Photopolymer Bundle - 149919

Price: $41.25

Spirited Snowmen Clear-Mount Stamp Set - 148072

Price: $19.00

Festive Farmhouse 12" X 12" (30.5 X 30.5 Cm) Designer Series Paper - 147820

Price: $11.00

Tin Tile Dynamic Textured Impressions Embossing Folder - 147906

Price: $10.00

Quilt Top Textured Impressions Embossing Folder - 144687

Price: $8.50

5/8" (1.6 Cm) Striped Burlap Trim - 147889

Price: $8.00

Pearl Basic Jewels - 144219

Price: $5.00

Rhinestone Basic Jewels - 144220

Price: $5.00

Vellum 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock - 101856

Price: $9.0

 

I'm batty about Halloween! Fun project with Tim Holtz supplies!

Hello crafty friends! Happy Monday! Boo! Did I scare you? I'm sharing a Halloween card finally! Did you have a nice weekend? It was 85 degrees here yesterday! And, lots of my friends are posting photos on Facebook of SNOW! Sheesh. I wish it would cool down here and warm up there. October is a crazy month. I had a really nice weekend. I stamped all day on Saturday (for my post on Thursday). Then on Sunday we went for coffee and a nice drive and out to dinner. A perfect weekend. My husband is working really hard on a work project so I tried to get him out of the house for a bit and get his mind off things. This week has some fun things coming... It's the Stamp/Scrap Expo here in Sacramento and I have a friend coming from Canada and one from San Diego and some from the Bay! A full weekend of girls and crafting awaits me! But first things first...today's card!

This card was inspired by two things: I HAD to make a Halloween card and I just got this awesome new Diamond Shifter Stencil in the mail and wanted to ink it up! So I started by inking the diamond background....then I rummaged up some cool bat stamps....and it all kind of came together. I'm sure you'll recognize the supplies are all from Tim Holtz. He really knows how to do Halloween right. Vintage and cool. 

 

The project started with stenciling the diamond background using the new Diamond Shifter Stencil. It's SO EASY to stencil this!! I used olive and gray for a kind of spooky color palette. You simply stencil the first color (for me olive) and then shift the stencil over and stencil the second color (for me the gray). Seriously so simple and such a great result! To complete the background I added some text stamps and some black and grey ink splatters. I set that aside to make everything else. The finished card is a green A2 card base. 

 

I stamped the bats (small and large) in black ink and then cut them out by hand. I colored them with grey, black and purple Distress Inks and a paint brush with just a bit of water. Kind of let it all flow together. I think it's more spooky with the purple in there. 

 

I stamped the Happy Halloween stamp onto some cardstock and then really inked the edges with Vintage Photo Distress Ink. Then I splattered clean water over it and let that dry. To make the words blurry I used a paint brush and clean water and gently went over the letters. I think it makes it look old or something. And that font is AWESOME. I also inked the edges of my diamond panel with the same Vintage Photo Ink. I added a jump ring and a Tim Holtz 31 Halloween Token charm. Cool. 

 

I dyed my own crinkle ribbon using distress inks and water. I haven't done this technique in a while and I always love the results from this! Never comes out the same way twice. 

 

When I attached the bats to the card I used a bit of foam tape just in the middle. Then I used my fingers to gently curve the wings upwards to look like they're flying right at ya! 

 

 

 

Mr. Lucky was VERY interested in this project...until he fell asleep! LOL! He just turned seven months old the other day. Can you believe it? He is growing so fast and has been such a wonderful studio companion. He keeps me company and is the sweetest thing ever. 

Okay, so I need to try to make something else for Halloween but we're running out of time! YEEKS! Are you done with Halloween cards? Have you started? LOL. I got behind this year because we were on vacation. Oh well, it was worth it! I have some fun things to share on Thursday so I hope to see you then. Have a fabulous week and thanks for stopping by today! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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Guest Designing for Ellen Hutson today - with some new Leading Ladies!

Hello friends! How is your week going? Mine is going FAST! Dang! So much to get done around here and so little time. I feel like since Fall is my favorite season, that it goes by way too quickly. I wish I could slow down time for the next few months! And it's getting close to my birthday too. Fall slow down! I'm back on schedule after getting back from vacation. I need to start making Halloween goodies asap!

Today I have a super fun blog post for you! I am very excited to be the guest designer today over on the Ellen Hutson Blog! Wooooot! I am joining to fun in launching the newest product release which includes two fabulous new Leading Ladies! I am sharing two cards today - one Fall card and one Christmas card. Yippeee! Please be sure to click over and visit the Ellen Hutson Blog and leave some love. I'm so grateful for the kind invitation to join them!

My first card is a Fall explosion! I had so much fun making this card. She is ME! Lol. I stamped, die cut, colored, and inked to my heart's content with this one. I combined the brand new Bookworm Lady with a bunch of the smaller stamps from the Cozy Lady stamp set. I think they're perfect together. I created a cozy Fall scene. Can't you imagine sitting outside under the trees with a stack of books and a cup of coffee? I can!  

 

First I stamped and die cut all of the pieces. I colored everything with Copic Markers and added small highlight touches with a white gel pen. I used the same color palette for all the items and her clothes so that the card would look nice when finished. Warm tones of olive, brown, orange and slate blue...YUM. The arm on the lady is partially die cut so you can put a book in her hands. I love that. 

 

The background for the scene was made by inking Distress Inks onto white cardstock panels. I used olive green for the bottom and two shades of yellow/gold for the top. I also inked the small circle with the sentiment.

 

The sentiment was stamped in black onto a circle and attached with foam tape. All the elements were also attached with foam tape. I used clear Nuvo Drops to add accents around the card. A glaze pen was the perfect tool for her glasses.

 

 

 

This next card is a fun Christmas card made with the new Holiday Shopper Lady! She is also me! I have been known to wear an ugly Christmas sweater and a Santa hat....and I always make lists! She is ready to rock and roll and shop til she drops! I used the beautiful new Snowfall Backdrop die and turned the card into a shaker card. FUN.

 

I stamped and die cut the Shopper Lady, her hat and her sweater and colored it all with Copic Markers. I die cut the Snowfall Backdrop for my top layer and put a pretty blue behind it before adding the sequins for the shaker. 

 

LOVE this sentiment! I stamped some snowflakes randomly on the panel....

 

 

 

 

I used Diamond Stickles to add glittery accents to the snowman, pen and hat!

 

 

That's it for today! SO MUCH FUN to guest design for Ellen Hutson and share these projects with you! The Leading Ladies stamps are so creative and fun to work with. I am gathering quite a collection now! Who is your favorite lady? I think Cozy Lady is mine...or maybe Photo Lady... I can't choose! I hope you have a great day and I'll see you soon. Happy crafting! XOXO

VISIT THE ELLEN HUTSON BLOG FOR MORE INSPIRATION!

 

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An Autumn Hello with Pretty Pink Posh!

Hi everybody! It's good to be back home and blogging again! We got home from our road trip late Friday night...and you know what happens next... Laundry! And kitten snuggles. LOL. We had an amazing and fun time together on our vacation through California, Oregon and Washington. We saw so many beautiful sights, and ate good food, and took loads of pictures! I know a lot of you followed along with us on Instagram Stories! It might take me a while to sort through all the pictures and get a post ready to share about our trip. In the meantime, you can see some of my favorite pictures on my Instagram account. CLICK HERE! (You do not need an account to view the photos on your computer!) I am totally renewed by time away from the computer and the TV and all of life's responsibilities. I loved having my husband all to myself every day. We got to talk and laugh together and drink coffee and walk. It was wonderful!! My feet are tired and my heart is full. It is already Fall in the Pacific Northwest and we saw tons of Fall leaves! The weather was perfect too. Late September/Early October is our favorite time to take a break and travel. It was also our wedding anniversary last week! Yay! We thank God for a safe and fun journey! 

Yesterday was my first day back in the studio, and it also happened to be World Cardmaking Day! I had to hustle to make something for the day! LOL. I didn't plan ahead on that one! I hadn't created anything in more than two weeks and it was a bit of a rough start to craft! I decided to use some of my new supplies I got at Impress Rubber Stamps in Seattle! I got the beautiful Foliage Dies from Pretty Pink Posh! And my inspiration was all the gorgeous Fall color! So I got out my Distress Inks and made an Autumn wreath! I didn't have the energy to blog yesterday - so I'm sharing it with you now. I think after this I'd better get busy and make some Halloween projects! Be sure to read my last post, and comment for a chance to win a spot in a cool class I"m part of. Nice to be back!

I started this project by die cutting a bunch of the leaves and pumpkins out of Bristol Cardstock. I like the way Bristol interacts with Distress Inks and it's thick enough to stand up to lots of ink. This card is a five inch square and the layers are simple: Woodgrain cardstock and cream cardstock.  

 

I used LOTS of colors of Distress Inks and the small size sponge daubers to ink the color onto the leaves and pumpkin. Each leaf/pumpkin has at least five colors on it! Yikes. Yes, I was ready to play! The final touch of all of the images is that I sponged them with Walnut Stain ink. Really gives a rustic deep touch to the project. I don't normally use that dark of a brown, but I like it in this instance. The splatters were done with Vintage Photo Ink. 

 

There really is no right or wrong way to do these leaves! Play. Have fun. Get dirty! Try new colors together! This part of the process was so relaxing and enjoyable. I love mixing colors. The leaves were arranged onto the card in a circle/wreath shape.  A simple twine bow at the top to finish it off. I wasn't sure what to use for a greeting, so I used a pretty hello die cut. I think this would make a nice Thanksgiving card or any other type of Fall greeting. 

 

To attach the hello die, I used liquid glue on the h and the o and glued it to the leaves. The middle part is sort of floating there... 

 

 

 

The list of all the Distress Ink Colors I used is in the supplies section. 

 

 

 

This is a photo of a gorgeously perfect leaf I found on the ground in Seattle. The leaf colors are a perfect Fall rainbow! It was so pretty I had to snap a picture of it! This photo was the color inspiration for my card today. I took a lot of leaf pictures in the past two weeks! The perfect artist drawing a Fall palette for us to enjoy. Sigh. 

It's very good to be back! I missed you! This week I'm guest blogging over at Ellen Hutson (Yay) and I'll have two fun cards to share for that project. Can't wait to show you. Hope all is well with you in your corner of the world. XOXO

 

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World Cardmaking Day 2018 Online Card Class Giveaway!

10-11-18 UPDATE!!! MY WINNER IS HELEN G! She has been notified via email! Congratulations Helen!

Hi everyone! I have something really fun to announce! I'm one of the instructors for an awesome online card class created by Scrapbook and Cards Today Magazine for World Cardmaking Day 2018! World Cardmaking Day is tomorrow! Are you doing something fun to honor the day? Maybe crafting with some friends or taking a class? I hope you do something crafty tomorrow! I'm still on vacation so I'll be taking pictures! Cardmaking will commence the moment I get home! 

Would you like to win a free spot in the Scrapbook & Cards Today second annual WCD Online Card Class? Here’s your chance! SCT has amped up the creativity for this year’s 4-week self-paced class, bringing you special video techniques, step-by-step instructions, PageMaps card sketches, and loads of tips, tricks and trending styles. You will love the artwork created by many of your favorite cardmakers, including me! This four-week class begins Monday, October 15^th.

SCT Magazine has generously given me one class to give away to one of my readers! YAHOOO! In order to be eligible to win the free class, please leave a comment on this post and let me know what was the last thing you created! I'd love to know what you're making! I will pull a random winner on 10-11 and email that person to receive their class. Good Luck! 

 

Here is the description from the class website: 

"Join SCT to celebrate the love of cardmaking with our second annual WCD Online Card Class! We’ve amped up the creativity for this year’s 4-week self-paced class, bringing you special video techniques, step-by-step instructions, PageMaps card sketches, and loads of tips, tricks and trending styles. You will love the artwork created by Gina K Designs, Kathy Racoosin, Kelly Latevola, Wanda Guess, Latisha Yoast, Yana Smakula and many more of your favourite cardmakers!" 

CLICK the photo above or THIS LINK to learn more about this class and to see more sneak peeks. I guarantee you're going to love it - and it's an amazing value for the price. I am so happy to be part of it all. See you soon! XOXO

See you in a couple of weeks! We're on vacation!

Hey hey hey! I'm here with a quick announcement! I won't be blogging for the next couple of weeks and didn't want you to wonder what was up around here! The hubs and I are going on a road trip and I'm so super excited! I get to have him to myself! Yay - no work, no stress, no responsibilities. CANNOT wait. Our road trip is one of the celebrations of our Silver Jubilee this year. We haven't been on vacation in quite a long time. We'll be taking a road trip up through California, Oregon and Washington. Cool temps, crisp Fall air, waterfalls, coffee, whales...everything we love to see. 

Usually when I've been away for a time for work or play I have continued scheduled blog posts for my design teams. For ten years I haven't missed a week of posting! Dang. This time around I decided to schedule myself free time too. A creative break and a blogging break. I will definitely be sharing on Instagram and Instagram Stories along the way!  I'll be so inspired to create when I get home I'm sure. 

See you soon, friends! XOXO

 

 

You're the caramel apple of my eye! Lawn Fawn cards!

Helllloooooooo! There's a lot going on around the old bloggy blog lately! So many fun and cool opportunities...and I've been on a creative roll! Just getting around to posting some cards I made a little bit ago. Sometimes, when I get new stamps, I can't wait to color them! So I sit down and stamp and die cut the images, color them, and enjoy that part of the process. Then I'll come back around and make the cards. That's what happened with this adorable new Caramel Apple stamp set from Lawn Fawn! EEEK. It's from their brand new release. It makes me smile! Those little caramel apples with their smiles and cheeks. What a fun thing to color. I've been working on my Copic coloring lately - trying out some darker colors and getting a bit more bold with things. I really like how these guys (and gals) came out!  I ended up with a clean and simple card design to feature them apples! LOL.  

 

The background die is one of my all time favorite Lawn Fawn products. I use it a lot. It's clean and classic and just the perfect touch when you don't want plain white paper as your background. This card started with a Juicy Pear (my favorite green paper) A2 card base. Then I layered colors to match the apples. 

 

For their chubby pink cheeks I used Doodlebug Glitter Sprinkles! I love that tiny bit of dimension instead of flat coloring. I used my white gel pen to add accents over my coloring and to the red heart in the scene. How fun is that sentiment? I love it when Lawn Fawn separates out the sentiments so you can easily use different colors of ink. 

 

 

 

You're the caramel APPLE of my eye indeed! Can't wait to give these cards out! Maybe I'll have to make some caramel apples to go with them! I haven't made caramel apples in a long time. Man, does that sound gooooood right now!

Thanks for popping in today to see my card! Do you love these little apples as much as I do?? Too fun! Have a fabulous day, my fabulous crafty friends! XOXO

 

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Mama Elephant 6 Year Anniversary Release Stampede! Holiday Treats!

Hello and welcome to Mama Elephant's #celebrating6years Anniversary Release Stampede with some wonderful crafty friends and designers! What is a stampede? A blog hop! Yay! The wait is finally over! The new Mama Elephant release is now live and available for purchase in the shop!  CLICK HERE to shop mamaelephant.com! I'm super excited to be part of the fun here with the gang from Mama Elephant and some of my favorite designers. I'm introducing, and using the new Yappy Woofmas stamps and dies! SO adorable! I think this might be my first holiday project??? Is it?? I'm just dipping my toe into Christmas for now. I knew I wanted to make Favor Bags because that is one of my favorite products ever from Mama Elephant!  

 

To start at the beginning of the hop and see all the inspiration and details CLICK HERE to go to the Mama Elephant Blog!  Please read this post all the way to the end for special sale information, prizes and the rest of the hop list! XOXO 

 

    

 

 

 

For my project to share today, I made sweet treat favor bags and decorated them with all kinds of cute Mama Elephant Christmas goodies. The center images on both favor bags are from the brand new Yappy Woofmas stamp set. SO FUN. I made the favor bags from Kraft cardstock and then put on a layer of patterned paper before my top layer of stamping and die cutting images.  

 

 

 

How cute is the doggie wreath and kitty snowman! LOVE. 

 

 

 

 

I cut a white layer with the ME Basic Set dies and used the Landscape Trio dies to make a hill for my snowcat! I edged the hill in blue ink. Next I stamped and die cut the images and the banner and colored with my Copic Markers. I added glitter too!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The super tiny and adorable bow dies make me happy. :-)

 

 

 

 

I used blue ink to stamp snowflakes onto the main panel to make it more festive! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

To celebrate with you, MAMA ELEPHANT has an amazing sale and promotion and giveaway! Keep reading to the end! 

 

 

 

 

From 9/15 - 9/17

10% off entire store! No code required!

 

From 9/15 - 9/30

Spend $100* - receive 1 free 'Color Me Letters' 4x6 stamp set.
Spend $150* - receive 1 free 'Color Me Letters' 4x6 stamp set and 'Hilly THANKS' dies.

Spend $200* - receive 1 free 'Color Me Letters' 4x6 stamp set, 'Hilly THANKS' dies, and 'Hilly HELLO' dies.

 

Please read all the fine print carefully! :)

*Subtotal amount must be met before any shipping fees/tax/customs.
Free item(s) valid only a single order/transaction.
Limit one of each free offer per order.
Orders cannot be combined. New orders only.
Limit one free offer per customer/order.
We reserve the right to cancel/modify orders.
Free offer valid 9/15-9/30 or while supplies last!

 

 

To celebrate this mega anniversary release, we are giving away of ten $25 ME gift certificates throughout the 3 day stampede! Winners will be chosen at random from the collective blogs in the Stampede. Winners will be announced on the last day of Stamp Highlights. You have up to 4 chances to qualify to win!

 

» 1. Leave a comment on this blog post «

 

» 2. Like/share us on Facebook: facebook.com/mamaelephant ;«

 

» 3. Follow/tweet us on Twitter: twitter.com/heymamaelephant «

» 4. Follow/comment on Instagram: instagram.com/mamaelephant «

 

Each action qualifies for one entry, max 4 entries per stampeder please!

 

Joining Mama Elephant on this wild ride of a stampede are some favorite crafty designer friends!

Please visit each blog to see what we all did with the new goodies!

 

Laura Bassen
Anna Kossakovskaya
Vera Rhuhay
Lisa Spangler
Wanda Guess
Rina Galit
Francesca Vignoli
Joan Ma
Kathy Racoosin

 

 

  

 

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Guest Designing for Sunny Studio Stamps with some happy, cheery Autumn projects!

Hey everyone! Happpppyyyyy Weekend! I'm excited to share some projects with you today! I am guest designing for AWESOME Sunny Studio Stamps today! YAHOOOO! You know I love Sunny Studio and I always love it when the kind and generous Mendi invites me to stamp with her gorgeous stamps and dies. I had a blast making today's card and treat bag to show you. Of course... as you've suspected... More Fall projects! The latest release from Sunny Studio is so great. I am especially smitten with the adorable Nutty For You acorn die set! EEP! A smiling acorn?? Yes please! Sign. Me. Up! CLICK HERE to go to the Sunny Studio Blog to check out all the other inspiration and projects! I used several new stamp sets - all the supplies are listed at the bottom of my post. Enjoy!

 

First up a pretty Autumn greeting! I featured the Happy Harvest Stamp set and then the sentiment from the Beautiful Autumn Stamp Set! I started with an A2 card base and layered beautiful Sunny Studio Gingham paper in pretty teal, and then vellum... Yeah, lots of layers on this one! The background was made with Distress Inks in Peacock and Honey - such a pretty combination! 

 

All of the images were colored with Copic Markers. I LOVE to color! Looks at those cute crows on the pumpkins! And that tree with a heart carved into it??? 

I die cut the top panel using Stitched Rectangles dies. Then I used an ink blending tool and two shades of distress inks to ink the background. I also splattered some Copic Opaque White ink over the blended ink. I stamped the sentiment in black ink directly onto the panel. 

 

 

 

After all the images were colored and die cut out with the matching dies, I layered them onto the card with foam tape. I used clear Nuvo drops to add a few sprinkles of dew around the card. Such a fun accent!

 

And next up I have a cute and sweet treat bag! I really like to make glassine treat bags for presents or place settings for a party or dinner. A glassine bag is a great blank canvas to decorate for any occasion. I put some gold almond Hershey's Kisses inside the bag before decorating it. 

 

 

I used all kinds of mix and match patterned papers in Autumn hues for this project. Since the scale is small and the patterns are simple, it all just kind of works! I used yellow, brown, orange and marroon from the new paper packs from Sunny Studio. I'm quite sure I've mentioned about a million times how much I use these awesome papers!! You need them in your life. Trust me. I used the veins part of the stamps from the Autumn Splendor stamp set to stamp directly onto the leaf die cut shapes. I really like how this looks. The Nutty For You acorn dies set has all the pieces to make this cutie pie! 

 

I wrapped maroon paper around the glassine bag first. Then I put the acorn together and glued him on with foam tape. I added twine to his little top hat! I die cut a circle and stamped the sentiment and some leaves onto it. That part is also attached with foam tape. I used Doodlebug black sprinkles for the eyes. Like, don't you want to give him a hug? LOL.

 

 

 

 

Okay! That's it for today! Thank you to Mendi for her kind invitation to guest design! I'm such a fan and always enjoy teaming up with Sunny Studio Stamps! Already looking forward to next time. I hope you have a wonderful weekend! XOXO I'll be back TOMORROW with something else super fun and fabulous! See you then!

 

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Spending the day at Beautiful Palladio Shopping Center in Folsom!

Greetings Friends! It's getting close to the weekend now! I hope you have some fun things planned for your Fall weekend. I'm here today with a different kind of post - a photo essay of the beautiful Palladio Shopping Center in Folsom, California. This shopping center is close to my house and it's one of my favorite places to hang out with Mark and with my gal friends. I was invited recently to participate in their guest blogger program and I gladly accepted. Last Friday Mark and I spent the entire day at Palladio - shopping, dining, going to the movies, and generally enjoying the beautiful surroundings. I hope you saw my Instagram stories from our trip! Palladio is conveniently located right off Highway 50 at the Bidwell Street Exit. 

Palladio is a gorgeous outdoor destination. It's like walking through a European village. There are lots of benches and cozy places to sit down and chat while you're exploring. In the Summer they have free concerts and we have enjoyed several of them in the past couple of years. The center offers free yoga on the plaza and now coming into Fall, family game nights. There is always something going on here! CLICK HERE to go to the center website! 

I was happy that our shopping trip coincided with the change of the seasons. All the stores right now are stocked with wonderful Fall decorations and pretty things to buy for your home. The restaurants are all switching to their Fall menus too. The weather is perfect so now is the time to go! I love looking at all the home stores here - my favorites are Kirklands and Rod Works, but there are so many more! So today I'm doing a photo essay to share with you the shoppping center. I'll share stories as we go along....

This is the beautiful main plaza area - complete with gorgeous metal sculptures and waterfalls and benches. The perfect place to meet up! 

 

It was a beautiful day for our trip! Palm trees everywhere create a great vibe - so pretty. 

 

 

The shopping center has TWO movie complexes! the Palladio 16 Cinemas and the Palladio Luxe Cinemas. I've been to both and they are fabulous and new and clean! Great place to catch a flick! 

 

One of the views down the shopping area. VERY pretty and inviting!

 

This is the beautiful fountain in front of the Barnes and Noble store. This Barnes and Noble has a full coffee bar, but also a full service restaurant inside. It's beautiful! It's a great spot to meet a friend. I've even been to some of my photographer meet up groups here. It's a busy hub with books and even vinyl records! Love that. I'm going to take a minute and share a story about one of the main reasons I love to come to Palladio. I consider this a great date destination - either for a day time date or an evening date. You can park your car one time and go to lunch or dinner, to a movie, grab a drink after, do some shopping. I love that!! Parking is free and plentiful and I always feel very safe here. Great place to meet with girl friends for the same reasons. 

 

There are beautiful flowers everywhere you turn!

 

 

 

 

 

We started our day off at Barnes and Noble Cafe with tasty treats and lattes, and magazines! It's a delicious way to begin your morning. The almond croissant was DEElicious! They have a big magazine section - and I love to read magazines!

 

Right around the corner from Barnes and Noble is the awesome Kirkland's Store. ALLLL decked out for Fall! Pumpkins and leaves everywhere! I bought a cute pillow for our family room and some photo props for my upcoming assignments. They have beautiful farmhouse decor and even Rae Dunn items! Kirkland's is one of my favorite stores in the entire center. Be sure to sign up for their emails - they have great sales! 

 

I bought this beautiful wreath for our front door too! It's never too early to start giving thanks. 

 

This pillow is now on our couch! 

 

A fan favorite is always See's Candies! It's right next door to Kirkland's. We popped in and bought some candy treats decorated for Autumn. See's is the best! It's my favorite candy in the world. I love the Almond Buds especially. Mark is a fan of the Peanut Crunch. 

 

Such pretty Fall packaging. Perfect to bring over to a friend's house for Thanksgiving! And, they have awesome Halloween treats too - for all your ghosts and goblins!

 

The Painted Studio is soooooo cool! Pop in to create a painting and have a cocktail with your friends! What is better than that?? And, you can reserve the studio for your private events. Wouldn't it be fun to have a birthday party here? They are so nice and friendly. You can choose which painting you want to make. Right now they have cool Fall crafting projects too. Totally a place to hang out and have a blast! The space is bright and fun and cheerful. 

 

Another place I frequent at Palladio is the Whole Foods Market. Time for another story! Since the center is close to our house, it's my go-to place for gift shopping. It's so easy to pop in to Whole Foods and buy a gorgeous bouquet of flowers and a bottle of wine - if you're going over to someone's house. They have cards too - in case you're going to a party. Makes it so easy to accomplish your errands. See's is next to Whole Foods too. Palladio is my gift destination! I can always find a special present here at one of the stores.  

 

 

 

On our day trip, we definitely had to stop for a yummy lunch! We chose Panera as our lunch spot. They also just switched over to their Fall menu items. This Panera is huge! It has a fireplace and a pretty outdoor patio. Plenty of seating and fast service. Park in the adjoining parking lot and you're right there! I meet my friends and work clients here often. 

 

I had the Vegetarian Squash soup and the awesome Ancient Grain Salad. YUM. Mark had a delicious turkey sandwich. They also now have Mac and Cheese with Bacon! I'm going to get that next time. YUMMMY! 

 

We continued our shopping spree at the beautiful Rod Works Store. This place is another of my favorites... Pretty, on trend, cheerful home decor sure to make you smile. This photo below...sigh... I want everything in this entire display!!! They have cool Halloween decorations out right now too. I bought a cute pumpkin spice coffee mug and a wooden tray for our living room. I could have bought the entire store! I can't wait to come back at Christmas time. 

 

 

 

 

 

We finished shopping by taking a peek into Chico's. They always have the most unique and special accessories. (Another place I like to buy gifts)... This Chico's is very large and so nicely merchandised. It's a treat to stop in here. 

By this time it was around 4pm and we decided it was time to catch a movie in the cool theaters. So we walked over to the Luxe Cinemas and finished out our date day. This post was sponsored by Palladio Shopping Center and I was compensated. All of my opinions and views are my own and my honest take on a place that I love!  I hope that you will plan a day or evening trip over to Palladio and explore for yourself. I know you're going to love it here too! Maybe we can meet up? Many thanks to Palladio for this fun opportunity to be the guest blogger for September!

LINKS:

PALLADIO SHOPPING CENTER

PALLADIO SPECIAL EVENTS

PALLADIO DINING

KIRKLAND'S

SEE'S

WHOLE FOODS

ROD WORKS

BARNES AND NOBLE

PANERA

PAINTED STUDIOS

CHICO'S

PALLADIO LUXE CINEMAS

 

Wishing you pumpkin spice and everything nice! Fun Coffee cards for Fall!

Hi crafty people! How are you?? What's new? Are you enjoying the beauty of the changing seasons? We are! I am totally loving the change over to Fall. And you know I've been Fall crafting up a storm! Pumpkins, apples, leaves, and coffee! It's the best time of year! Mark and I are going on vacation in a couple of weeks and hoping to see lots of Fall color up north in Oregon and Washington. Can't wait. 

A couple weeks ago I got this awesome new stamp set from Pink and Main called Pumpkin Spice! OH MY! It's all kinds of pumpkin coffees and treats. You know that's right up my alley! I had so much fun coloring these images! And now, I finally made them into a couple of cheerful cards to show you! I loooooove teal/aqua/blue with the warm oranges of Fall. It just pops! So I used kraft, orange and dark aqua for my color palette. Lots of glitter too! 

 

 

This card started with a kraft A2 card base. Then I layered the aqua paper. My top white layer was die cut with the circles trio from Sunny Studio (link below). This die makes three circles at once and it's cool for featuring small images like these. I attached the white layer onto the top of the card using foam tape. 

 

I stamped and cut out the images and colored them with Copic Markers. I added Diamond Stickles accents to make them shimmery and sweet! I placed the coffees and the cupcake onto the circle openings using foam tape also. The circle trio die comes with stitched hearts and I die cut those out of orange paper. CUTE!

 

I stamped the sentiment in black ink over on the right side of the card. And, added orange and white enamel dots as accents and shine!

 

Happy Pumpkin Spice Season! 

 

Here's a close up of my coloring with the Copics.

 

 

 

The next card is very clean and simple with a graphic design. I started with a white A2 card base and layered orange and another sheet of white.... I wrapped pretty orange striped paper and twine around the top third of the layers. I die cut a circle from woodgrain paper...

 

 

The three images were attached to the circle with foam tape. I stamped the sentiment in black at the bottom and splattered some black ink!

 

 

 

 

If you're a pumpkin spice lover like me - you need this stamp set! It also has a donut!!! LOVE! I hope you have a great day, and a wonderful week! See you soon friends! XOXO

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Reverse Confetti New Release Blog Hop! September 2018!

Hi my crafty friends! Happy Saturday! I'm back today with another fun blog hop! Today we're hopping to launch the brand new September product release from Reverse Confetti! Gorgeous new stamps and dies release today! The September release has a little bit of Fall, a little bit of Halloween and a little bit of Christmas! Truly something for everyone! CLICK HERE to SHOP the entire new release! Full blog hop list and shopping links are at the bottom of my post. Enjoy the hop! You should have arrived here from Laurie Schmidlin's fantastic blog!

I made two cards to share and both were done with my favorite new Polychromos Colored Pencils. I am really loving the different effects I can get with these lovely supplies. One card is soft and subtle, colored on kraft, and the other is bright and bold! I used the brand new Fall Foliage Stamps and Dies and the brand new Cotton & Thistle Stamps and Dies! Yeah! 

 

You know how much I love Fall, and leaves! When I saw this new stamp set I was thrilled! The leaves are so beautiful, and the dies make a perfect, crisp cut. Perfect for any and all Fall craft projects. I had a lot of fun coloring all these leaves! I started with an A2 horizontal card base with paper from my stash. I layered watercolor paper die cut into a rectangle... and then LEAVES! Bright, bold, pretty leaves. I stamped and die cut a bunch of leaves and then colored them with my pencils. I love to put on some relaxing music and color...ahhhhh. 

 

The sentiment was heat embossed with white embossing powder onto a midnight black cardstock strip. I put the sentiment across the paper first and then arranged the leaves by tucking them into the black strip. Everything is attached with foam tape. The leaves were splattered with Copic Opaque White and then I added some Diamond Stickles. More is MORE! LOL. 

 

 

 

The Polychromos pencils are very soft and waxy and blend easily. I did not use gamsol or anything to blend the colors - just kept going over it with more and more color. 

 

 

 

This next card was made with the sweet and pretty Cotton & Thistle Stamps and Dies. Such a pretty set. I am in LOVE with the sentiments and that pretty font. So feminine and beautiful. This is a very clean and simple design. I started with a kraft A2 card base and then layered more kraft and then white paper. I inked the white paper background with Broken China Distress Ink to ground the image.  

 

I stamped the image onto kraft cardstock and cut it out with the matching die. I used a soft wash of colored pencils to color the cotton and thistles. I used twine to wrap around the stems like a fresh bouquet and then attached the little tag from the Floral Wrap die set. 

 

I stamped the pretty sentiment in black ink directly onto the top layer. 

 

 

 

 

Thank you SO much for joining me today on my stop on this awesome blog hop! YEAH for the new Reverse Confetti September Release! LOVE IT! The entire new release is available for shopping now! Woot! What are you most excited about? Enjoy the hop! Next up is the talented and fabulous Heather Hoffman! Full Hop list below!

 

BLOG HOP LIST FOR TODAY! ENJOY!

Reverse Confetti Blog
Amy Kolling
Laurie Willison
Crystal Thompson
Melissa Phillips
Amy Sheffer
Lydia Fiedler
Tricia Barber
Kelly Lunceford
Lisa Henke
Yana Smakula
Amy Rohl
Lea Lawson
Laurie Schmidlin
Wanda Guess
Heather Hoffman
Amy Tsuruta
Kathy Schweinfurth
Michelle Short
Audrey Tokach
Jeanne Jachna
Therese Calvird
Olga Moss
Maria Sabina

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Taylored Expressions 10th Birthday Bash Mega Party! Happy Unicorns!

Hey everyone! I'm very excited today to share this card and share about one of my favorite companies - Taylored Expressions! TE is celebrating TEN YEARS of crafting awesomeness. And, they are celebrating in style today with a giant (mega) birthday bash blog hop! Over forty designers are participating in this awesome hop - we are all former or current design team members who have a special place in our hearts for Taylor. I was on the TE Design Team for four great years and it was a wonderful experience to work with Taylor and Jon and all the other designers. Truly a sweet and kind group of creative people. So - here's wishing TE a HAPPY BIRTHDAY! And here's to many many more years of business! Congratulations! XOXO

Please CLICK HERE to go to the Taylored Expressions Blog to see all the details and the list of blog hoppers! Also, there are some brand spanking new birthday products that are being released today just for the celebration! CLICK HERE to see the new stamp sets! 

For my card to share today I'm featuring some already released birthday theme products from TE. For my card I used the Dreamer stamp set (with matching dies), the Rolling Clouds Dies, and the Sprinkles Embossing Folder. I combined these items with bright and cheerful colors of lime, aqua and purple! SO fun! I am wishing you a very magical day! Enjoy the Blog Hop today!  

 

 

My card started with an A2 card base in bright white cardstock. The Rolling Clouds dies are three different cloud borders. I used the dies to cut out a bunch of clouds from lime, aqua and purple paper and also vellum. Then I just played around with them until I got the combination of clouds that I liked. I trimmed them all the size - one step down from the A2 size card. I used foam tape to attach them together to give dimension in between the layers. The vellum layer was wrapped around the bottom. 

 

I stamped the sentiment with Stazon ink - works the best on vellum! I added a few rhinestones at the end of the process because it just seemed like this card needed sparkles! 

 

I stamped and die cut out those adorable unicorns and colored them with Copic Markers to match the papers I used. I added bits of glitter glue to the wings, tails and horn! EEEP. The layer underneath the clouds was embossed with the beautiful Sprinkles embossing folder. Such a nice touch of texture instead of flat white paper.

 

 

 

 

 

I want to take a minute to talk about something that is really important to the TE family - The SHARE JOY CAMPAIGN! At the heart of Taylored Expressions is a mission to share joy through the gift of handmade cards. As part of their 10th birthday TE is continuing that mission with the launch of a special Share Joy campaign focused on providing birthday cards to those in nursing homes and assisted-living facilities across the U.S. To make as deep an impact as possible TE is inviting card makers everywhere to join the campaign. Will you join us? Find out how to participate by viewing their Share Joy page here: https://www.tayloredexpressions.com/share-joy-birthday-2018

THANK YOU for coming by today and for hopping with us in celebration of Taylored Expressions 10th Birthday Bash! CLICK HERE to see the entire hop list and all the fun details over on the TE Blog! Enjoy your day! See you soon! XOXO 

Happy September! Celebrating Autumn with Watercolor Apples!

Hi friends! This past week went by in like five minutes! Wow! But, I'm so happy, because here we are at September! And I'm officially calling it Fall here on my blog! I LOVE FALL and live for it all year long! I am so happy to celebrate the next few months with pumpkins, coffee, apples, football, leaves....All that good stuff. Yeah! College football starts today too. And the weather has been perfect - cool nights and dark mornings.... Okay, yeah I'm excited! I've been Fall crafting for a couple of weeks already and that's going to continue. I hope everything is going great in your neck of the woods! Sending you some good wishes today. 

I went back and pulled out some of my favorite dies from Taylored Expressions to create my apple cards to share today. These apple dies are PERFECT for Autumn cards and I chose to watercolor them with my favorite watercolor paints. This project started out with some water color playing... I just die cut some apples and enjoyed painting. Then later I turned them into two cards. Sometimes I begin with a card design already formed in my head, and sometimes I just color pieces and see what happens later. So, let's take a look at the cards! How do you like these apples??!! LOL. 

 

No stamping on either of these cards today. Only die cuts and watercolors! I used a wet on wet watercolor technique to color the apples. Some red and one green one. I added in some deep golden yellow accents to the painting. The leaves were painted with three or four shades of greens. Apple leaves have that gorgeous deep green color. I colored the stems brown and then generously splattered gold paint over all of them. 

This first card started with a white A2 card base. Then I chose some woodgrain paper from my stash and splattered it with gold Finetec paint. I LOOOOVE GOLD SPLATTERS! Lol. Can you tell? I die cut out the AUTUMN letters from a Taylored Expressions alphabet set. I painted those deep golden yellow. The rest of the card came together fast. I used foam tape to attach the apples to the card and clear glue to attach the letters. A piece of pretty twine at the top finished it off. Oh, and a few gold Doodlebug Sprinkles too! Simple and pretty. 

 

Here's a close up of the leaves and painting!

 

I staggered the letters this way because they wouldn't fit across the card. It's kind of playful and fun this way though! Happy accident!

 

 

 

 

 

I turned the card for this photo so you can see all that yummy gold paint!! MMMMM.

 

Next up is another clean and simple design I made with the last apple die cut. I just bought the brand new Lawn Fawn Reverse Scalloped Circle Dies and wanted to use those! This is an A2 white card base layered with gingham from my stash. Then a pretty deep red layer die cut with the circle die. It creates the perfect frame for the apple! The 'hello' die cut is from Simon Says Stamp and I die cut it from watercolor paper (The same paper I used for the apples). 

 

 

 

 

The red paper layer was attached to the card with foam tape - and the apple was also. I added some glitter sprinkles in red and gold. Because I like sparkly things!! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Near where I live we have an apple growing region called Apple Hill. It's only about 25 miles from our house and in the Fall it's so fun to go up and see the orchards, get apple donuts, see the arts and crafts and generally hang out in the fresh air. CLICK HERE to read about Apple Hill! The weather was sooooo fresh and nice when I woke up yesterday I got the idea to drive up to Apple Hill for a photo shoot and some donuts! This is the last few days before the crowds and craziness starts. I went up super early and guess what? I was the ONLY person there! Gosh, it was magic! I got the first batch of hot donuts (am I mentioning the donuts a lot?? LOL) and I had the whole place to myself. Up amongst the pine trees and the orchards. Here are some of the photos I took! Hope you enjoy them! 

 

 

 

 

When you take pictures of things like fruit and flowers you really notice how many individual colors there are in them. I like to save this type of photo for reference when I'm using my Copic Markers or my watercolors. God is the master artist and no one paints like Him! I can try though! These apples were so pretty and you can actually smell them on the trees in the cool air. MMMM. 

 

 

 

 

 

As a photographer, I am a life long student of light. Photographs are all about light... Not your camera or your photo editing software. LIGHT. Pure and simple, taking a picture is using the light to create something beautiful. The light changes with the seasons. Summer and Winter light is very strong and harsh and bright - with hard shadows. As we turn into Autumn, the light becomes warmer and a bit softer. I felt that yesterday - the coming of the light of Fall. AND I LOVE IT!  

 

That's it for today! Have a super wonderful weekend! Labor Day Weekend! YAHOO! Are you doing something fun this weekend?? Tell me about it! I will be back on Wednesday as part of a fun celebratory blog hop! See you then! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Rubeena’s Crafting Anniversary Blog Hop! Watercoloring with Waffle Flower and lots of prizes too!

Hi there! Welcome to a super fun two day blog hop event! Our crafty friend Ruby is celebration her blog anniversary with a blow out blog hop of crafty friends! WOWZA! I'm happy to be included. The theme of the hop is friendship and support. Perfect for the occasion! This hop is huge - with more than 60 guests and over $600 in sponsored prizes! Not only are we celebrating four years since Ruby first discovered card making but also crafting in general. This industry is made up of wonderful individuals who are creative, inspirational, kind, and incredibly supportive! Hop along so you can learn about why we create and how much joy it brings us! Ruby is a very special and talented lady and I am wishing her lots of continued success in her crafting journey! Grab a cuppa coffee and settle in.

If you're following along the hop line up, you should have arrived here from Darnell Knauss' blog!  CLICK HERE to go to Ruby's blog to start at the beginning of the hop and read allll the details. If you're new to my blog because of the hop - I'm so happy to have you! I like to create projects with lots of layers and lots of color! 

My project for today was made with a GORGEOUS stamp set from Waffle Flower. It's called Always.... I loved it the minute I saw it, and I finally bought it a couple weeks ago. Couldn't wait to get inky with it. I have seen so many beautiful projects made with this stamp set. SO, I really wanted to think of a way to make it my own and not like anyone else's card... Hmmmmm. Then a spark came to me! I'll create with this stamp set, with an Autumn theme! And watercolors! YES! So this beautiful girl got combined with leaves, mushrooms and flowers and she became an Autumn Princess! (Like me LOL) I'm so pleased with how it all came together. It took me a long time to watercolor all the pieces but it was relaxing and fun to create and I truly enjoyed the journey.  

 

 

My card base is made with Kraft cardstock in an A2 size. I layered some pretty brown gingham for the next layer. The top layer, and all the pieces, are all watercolor paper. I used a beautiful background die from Reverse Confetti to make the rays on that top paper layer. I did a light wash of aqua watercolor paint for my background for all that color. I used my favorite Mijello Mission Gold watercolors for this project. (supply links are at the bottom of my post). 

 

After I had my background set aside to dry, I stamped and die cut out lots of elements for this card... The girl, an extra birdie, leaves, floral stems, mushrooms...and on and on. I should have counted all the pieces! I use Versafine Onyx Ink since it is waterproof. I used a pretty warm color palette of red, orange, gold and olive green to color everything. I gave her pretty brown hair and one little leaf in her headband. This stamp is everything. Truly. 

 

Here's a close up of my coloring/painting and the elements. I layered a second bird on top of the one in the main stamp - for extra oomph. Everything is attached to the card with foam tape, in layers. Tip: I lay all my pieces out first and play around until I get them exactly how I want them. Then I snap a quick photo with my phone so I can remember - and attach it all. I used the cute mushroom stamps from another Waffle Flower stamp set. 

 

Side view to show the layers.... The sentiment is from My Favorite Things and it was heat embossed with white embossing powder onto a strip of rich black cardstock.

 

 

 

 

Thank you so very much for stopping by today! ENJOY this amazing hop! Plus there are more blogs on Tuesday! Woot! Next up in the line up is the blog of TIffany Au! See you soon! XOXO

 

PRIZES! YEAH!

In celebration of Ruby's anniversary, there are several amazing prize sponsors. Winners will be randomly selected from comments left on all the blogs. The winners will be announced by Wednesday, September 5 on Ruby's Blog! Make sure you remember to check back in with Ruby to see if you won something! Good Luck!

Studio Katia - $50 gift card

Hello Bluebird - $50 gift card

Altenew - $50 Gift card

Pinkfresh Studio - $30 gift card

Gina K. Designs - $50 gift card

Clearly Besotted - $35 gift card

Simon Says Stamp - $25 gift card

Spellbinders - Card Kit

winnie & walter - $40 gift card

Mama Elephant - $25 gift card

Hero Arts - $25 gift card

Nichol Spohr - Rainbow pencil case with new Spellbinders dies

Jennifer McGuire - $50 Simon Says Stamp gift card

Danielle Flynn - $25 Simon Says Stamp gift card

Picket Fence Studios - four $25 gift cards

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Hero Arts Season of Wonder New Release Blog Hop!

Hi everyone! Thanks for stopping by today! It's an exciting day because today we are having a blog hop to introduce and feature the new Winter 2018 products from Hero Arts! The new catalog is called Season of Wonder and it is full of stamps and dies for Fall, Winter, and Christmas! Lots of goodies inside - that's for sure. We're having a super fab blog hop today to provide you a peek at the new items and give you some inspirations for creating. Also - there are two gift certificates for $50 each up for grabs! Woot! To be eligible for winning the prizes, simply leave a comment on the blogs in the hop. Two random winners will be chosen on 8/27 and announced on the Hero Arts Blog. Enjoy the hop! CLICK HERE to shop the new items!

I'm sharing two Autumn/Fall themed cards. I am not ready for Christmas crafting yet so I chose some of the pretty products in the catalog that evoke Autumn and late summer. Lacy leaves and bright yellow sunflowers... First up is this Fall Leaves Thank You card made (almost) from only die cuts! The Autumn Icons Leaves are sooooo beautiful! 

 

I started with an A2 white card base and layered bright turquoise and woodgrain cardstocks from my stash. Then I used the leaves dies and die cut shades of red, yellow, orange, red and tuquoise. I used the Thank You die and die cut it out of brown textured cardstock. I used a strip of vellum to add the "very much" underneath the Thank you. 

 

I played around with the leaves dies until I got a color/shape pattern that I liked. Then I glued them on to the card using liquid glue and my tweezers. I layered the Thank You over the leaves - after attaching the vellum strip. Always use Stazon ink to stamp on vellum!! 

 

Vellum is always a nice touch!!!

 

I glued on a few clear droplets to add a bit of shine to the card and add a different texture. This is a fun and easy card layout that is nice and flat for mailing. 

 

My second card is made with the brand new Sunflower Stem wood mounted stamp as the feature. I colored the pretty stamped image with Copic Markers and cut it out by hand. This is also an A2 size card. I layered pretty gingham paper and a beautiful background die cut. 

 

 

I die cut the Bold Graphic Confetti Die out of Kraft cardstock and then trimmed a piece to layer with the gingham and green papers to make the background for the sunflowers. 

 

The sunflower stem is attached to the card using foam tape. I added a few matte gold sequins as accents. I love this cheerful color combination!

 

Here are my Copic Marker choices for this card...

 

 

 

 

That's it for me today! I hope you enjoy the hop, and find something along the way to spark your creativity!! It's time to really start thinking about Fall and Winter crafts. I've sort of been in denial, but it's time... LOL. Thanks for joining me today! XOXO

 

CLICK HERE TO SHOP THE NEW CATALOG!

 

BLOG HOP LIST FOR TODAY! 

The Hero Arts Blog

Yana Smakula

Wanda Guess

Nichol Spohr

Michelle Short

Megan Hoeppner

May Sukyong Park

Lydia Fiedler

Libby Hickson

Laurie Willison

Kelly Latevola

Jessica Frost-Ballas

Jennifer McGuire

Jenn Shurkus

Janette Kausen

Ilina Crouse

Emily Midgett

Clare Prezzia

Amy Tsuruta

Amy Kolling

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Some Llama Love! Fun with Flora & Fauna Clear Stamps and Dies!

NOTE: Wow! What an overwhelming response to my last blog post. I already knew it, but you guys confirmed it! YOU ARE THE VERY BEST blog followers out there. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your responses. I have read every single one. I got tons of heartfelt, lengthy emails. Made me laugh, think, and cry too! Lots of comments and tons of support and love. I will try to write back to everyone, but it might take me some time. Just know that I read every word and I have a much clearer picture of what is going on in blog-land. I have been so immersed in it from this end that I didn't see all the changes happening. You have given me a lot to think about. I didn't want to give the impression that I am thinking of NOT blogging. I LOVE to write blog posts and share. LOVE IT. LOVE IT. So I'm just trying to make the best use of my time and resources. It's been nine years, so it might be time to change things up. I do not particularly enjoy the whole product linking thing. I did that because I thought people wanted or expected it. But then, I had come to count on that income. It seems that opportunity may have come and gone. Which is okay too. I'll give it a few more months to see if things pick up! You all have provided me so much good information!! I knew you would come through for me and you did. THANK YOU again. I appreciate the honest conversation. Now on to our blog post for today! 

Happy Monday! I'm super excited to announce that I am the guest designer for the Flora & Fauna Stamps Blog today! WOOT! Don't you adore their cute, happy and quirky designs? I love them ALL! I am always in a good mood when I stamp with Flora & Fauna! LOVE. These stamps are what happy crafting is all about. I love that all the images are the same style and scale so it's super easy to mix and match stamp sets to create your card. Today I'm using a bunch of Flora & Fauna goodies to share some LLAMAZING cards! LOL. Llamas are on trend and all the rage right now - and I am totally on board. Those cute critters are everywhere, and they make us smile, right? I llama love them! Let's get started! 

For this first card, I used some of the super cool background texture stamps with white ink on kraft - to create a neat backdrop for my watercolored llama and florals. I used some different colors for me. I hardly ever use purple, hot pink or magenta. But, I love how this magenta mixture came out! I mixed a few shades of red and pink water colors together to create this magenta color. I think it's super festive!! I'm happy that there are matching dies for those pretty floral sprays too. Score!  

 

I started with a white A2 card base and layered pretty patterned paper in magenta. Then another layer of white, then kraft for my top layer. I stamped the background textures with white ink and also splattered some white paint. I set that aside to dry. Next I stamped and die cut out the llama and flowers from watercolor paper. I used my Mijello Mission Gold water color paints to color the images. 

 

I stamped the llama love sentiment three times onto the kraft, using black ink. Then I wrapped some pretty twine around the top two layers before attaching them to the card with foam tape. The images are also attached with more foam tape. Some magenta sequins complete the look!

 

 

 

 

 

Next up is my second llama card! This one is for a sweet sweet friend who is about to have a baby! I wanted to make her a mama llama card to make her smile! She is llamazing for sure! I used shades of pink and white since it's a baby card. SOOOO adorbs!! I started with a white A2 card base and layered pink cardstock and then gingham from my stash. The top white layer was die cut with the awesome clouds die from Lawn Fawn. I used the Flora & Fauna Llama die set, which comes with the balloon. Easy to die cut out and a perfect cut!  

 

I stamped the sentiment in black ink onto a banner and attached it in the upper right corner. I used a white gel pen to add highlights to the cardstock balloons.

 

 

 

Okay, so I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that I am a genius - for this next idea! LOL. You know when you think of an idea and then it works perfectly??? That happened. High five me! I needed a cute and sweet blanket for the llama.... Then it clicked! The little Doodlebug Rainbows Sprinkles!!!!! ACK. I turned it upside down and it fit like a glove! Rainbows are always a good idea!! 

 

 

Thank you so much for visiting my blog today! You are are totally llamazing! I hope these cards inspired you and made you smile. I'll be back soon! Be sure to visit the Flora & Fauna Blog to see more ideas. BIG thanks to Cindi, Lara and the crew for inviting me to be a guest designer this week. Yeah! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Hi Crafty Tribe! I need your feedback!

Hey everyone! Happy weekend! I have some things that I've been thinking about and I need your help and feedback. I was hesitant to write this post, but I ran it by a few of my friends and they encouraged me to speak from my heart, as I always do. First of all, if you're reading this, you are my tribe. I consider you my crafty and creative friends and my girl gang. I'm super grateful for everyone who subscribes to my blogging content. There are about 2500 of you. THANK YOU! Some of you have been with me from the very beginning - nine years ago. I'm so glad to have this community of people who support me and encourage me. What a complete blessing it is to have that support from you. I wouldn't blog if I didn't feel like I was somehow making a difference. You guys make me laugh, inspire me, and lift me up when I need it. THANK YOU! 

There are many reasons to have a blog and I've been re-evaluating, and thinking about what I'm doing creatively in general,  and here at the blog. I blog to inspire others to create. That's my bottom line. I want A Blog Called Wanda to be a happy place of encouragement and creativity. I want to show others that they can make something beautiful. I want to share beautiful images and share my life. When I'm blogging I think of the three E's... Educate, Encourage, and Engage. That's what guides me. 

I do however,  have to think of what I want to get from my blog in return for my time and energy. Some facts that you may not know if you're not a fellow blogger: It takes me about 6-8 hours to produce a blog post. That includes making the project, photographing the project, editing the photos, creating link lists, linking/labeling photos, and writing the blog post. It's truly done with love always. It never feels like work! It also costs me money to run my blog. Each facet of things has a monthly fee: My Website ownership, Typepad Blogging platform fee, Mailing List app fee, Link Deli Linking list fee, Photo editing website fee, and of course, supplies. 

The things that I get in return are comments of encouragement and kindness, others sharing their successes with me, and just plain old love and community. When you comment on a post you are letting me know "Hey girl we like what you're doing. Thanks!" When you email me and show me your projects it makes me so happy! Those are the emotional things I get from blogging. I get a lot of satisfaction from that. As of a few years ago when I became a full time creative professional I started making earnest income from my blog as well. The income I receive from blogging comes in the form of Affiliate Sales. I'll talk more about that in a minute.  

As with anything and everything, blogging has changed. When I started blogging I got lots of comments and a lot of feedback from my readers. Over the years that has gone down quite a bit. Possibly because people are following on Instagram or Facebook now instead of just on the blogs. Now I get very few comments unless there is a contest. I would say comments are down about 75% from three years ago. So I'm left feeling like - is anyone out there reading this thing?? Is this thing on?? LOL. 

My Affiliate Sales income has decreased about 90% lately. Whoa. That's a lot. It is making a difference in my household's bottom line and in whether or not I can continue to be self employed. I'm trying to figure out why/what/how this is happening. A little background about Affiliate Sales and crafty blogs might help. When you see the supplies listed out at the bottom of my blog posts those boxes, when you click them, take you directly to the product in one of the craft stores. If you click to that store via my blog I will receive a commission from your sale. It is seamless to you and does not cost you anything. It's a small percentage, but over time it adds up! Something that happens frequently is that if a customer clicks on another blogger's link to that same store, my link is over-ridden and now that person will get the commission on the entire sale. It took me a long time to realize this! Last click wins. Maybe people are just buying less crafty supplies? I am sort of out of touch with that since I'm in the industry. You have to let me know! 

Because of the amount of time it takes me to build the link lists and the monetary cost involved, I'm at the point of wondering if it's important to keep doing it! I'm really happy to do it, if you all want it and use it. But if you don't necessarily care... 

Okay, so all of this information leads me to ask for your assistance and feedback! I would be extremely grateful if you could take the time to leave a comment on this post, or reply to the email newsletter or send me a private email (stampcatwg@aol.com) and let me know what you think! My goal is to be a better blogger for my tribe and to keep on moving forward in this endeavor! THANK YOU again for your time in reading this! 

 

FEEDBACK QUESTIONS: 

DO YOU STILL READ CRAFT BLOGS? MORE OR LESS THAN BEFORE?

ARE YOU GOING TO THE ACTUAL BLOG SITE OR READING THE CONTENT VIA EMAIL NEWSLETTER?

WHEN ARE YOU LIKELY TO LEAVE A COMMENT? OR NOT LEAVE ONE?

IS THERE SOMETHING YOU'D LIKE TO SEE DONE DIFFERENTLY ON MY BLOG?

DO YOU FOLLOW CRAFTERS ON INSTAGRAM MORE THAN ON THEIR BLOGS?

DO YOU WANT/NEED ME TO DO PRODUCT LINKING?

DO YOU USE PRODUCT LINKS?

ANYTHING ELSE?

 

 

Below are some of the shops that I am an Affiliate for - because I shop there, and will stand by their products and service.

I receive commission from your purchases at these shops if you click on the links. 

 

SCRAPBOOK.COM

SIMON SAYS STAMP

ELLEN HUTSON

PAPERTREY INK 

HERO ARTS

CONCORD & 9TH

QUEEN & COMPANY

WAFFLE FLOWER

BLICK ART SUPPLIES

SIZZIX

NEAT & TANGLED STAMPS

SPELLBINDERS

HONEY BEE STAMPS

REVERSE CONFETTI

 

Pear Orchards and Autumn Wreaths!

Greetings friends! How are you? Hope all is well in your neck of the woods. I have some fun photographs and a card to share with you today. I love to share about where I live and my California adventures! This weekend the hubs and I went on a Sunday drive to the Delta to see what we could see, have some yummy lunch, and take pictures. As you know, there are many wildfires burning in Northern California. As a result, we, in Sacramento, haven't seen actual blue sky in over two weeks. Every morning I look out the window to see how bad it is. Well, Sunday morning, alas, there was blue sky! I was giddy with excitement about it. So we packed up the ice chest, and the camera gear and headed out towards the river and Delta regions. I live in a veritable fruit basket of farming. There is so much to see and do and so much yummy produce all year long. We are so lucky! Right now is the end of pear season so I wanted to get some fresh pears and also snap some photos too! We drove out to Steamboat Acres and all around Courtland and Hood. It was at least five degrees cooler down by the Sacramento River too...an added bonus. It's such a pretty and quiet drive. Just a few miles from downtown but you feel like you left the city far far behind. A slower pace entirely. Beautiful God's country. We found some pears and got our photos. Then we stopped into a hidden gem place to have lunch - delicious burgers and fries. It was the perfect day. It felt like a one day vacation. Sometimes you need a change of scenery. These are the things that creatively inspire me!! 

I was inspired by the beautiful pears and the colors of late Summer. (I can almost barely feel Autumn coming) So I came home and rummaged around in my studio and found all the pear stamps. I had quite a few!! I decided to use the beautiful pear wreath stamp from PSX for my card today. It's from 1995!! OH MAN how I miss that wonderful stamp company. Most of my first stamps were from Hero Arts and PSX. No matter how many times I declutter and purge my studio, I will never get rid of my gorgeous wood mount PSX stamps. Do you have any?? Even after almost 25 years, that red rubber stamps like a dream.

For this card I used a simple, classic card layout...just one layer on a 5.25 x 5.25 square card. The top layer is watercolor paper. I used my favorite Mijello Mission Gold Watercolors as my coloring medium. No sentiment.... Added some gold and white paint splatters as a finishing touch. Hope you like it! The green layer is my very favorite green cardstock - and it's called JUICY PEAR! How perfect is that?? Supplies are linked at the bottom of my post. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These are all the pear stamps I found in my stash! Makes me want to make more pear cards!! 

 

And here are my favorite pear photos from Sunday in the orchards. If you want to visit yourself, these orchards are right along the Sacramento River, mostly in the towns of Hood, and Courtland. Courtland even has a pear festival each year!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

That's what I have for today friends! Thanks for coming by my blog! Have a fabulous day! I'll be back soon... Until then, happy crafting! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

(Affiliate Links Used)

Start Each Day With a Song - Watercolors with Pink Fresh Studio Stamps!

Hi guys! Happy Friday! (FRI-YAY!) How was your week? Thank you so much for alllll the comments on my last three posts! Wowza! That was a lot - three blog hops three days in a row. I'm still recovering! LOL. But it's all good - I loved every one of them and I'm always honored to be in a blog hop for my favorite companies. Hopefully you found some new things to inspire you and get you creating. I had a nice week. I went to a fun Blogging event Wednesday night and that always rejuvenates me. Lots of wonderful bloggers here in Sacramento and I always learn something, and my cheeks always hurt from laughing so hard. Lucky is getting SO big. He's five months old already and growing like a weed. He's a curious guy and I run around him trying to keep him out of things. Thank goodness he sleeps a lot too! I've trained him to sleep on his blanket on my studio desk and he is a good boy while I'm crafting. He's learning!! 

Today I'm sharing a card I made a week or so ago when I had some free play time in my studio. I am kind of obsessed with Pink Fresh Studio stamps. They are so beautiful and feminine and artsy all in the best way. I used two Pink Fresh stamp sets (with matching dies) and my Daniel Smith Watercolor Dots. All the links are at the bottom of my post. I used a free, flowy water color technique and lots of splatters. I think I've finally found my favorite combination for splatters (more later in the post).  

 

I started with a white A2 card base and layered kraft cardstock and jade green cardstock from my stash. The top layer is watercolor paper die cut with a Memory Box Rectangle Die for a pretty border. Next I stamped and die cut out the bird cage, the birdie, and all the flowers and leaves. I always use Versafine Ink for my watercolor projects. It's a nice deep black that takes the water without smudging. Here is a close up of my watercoloring. Really free form - didn't even worry about staying inside the lines. NO STRESS!!

 

The background is a light water color wash of a pretty light aqua blue. I splattered everything with both black ink and white ink. The trick is to make sure that all the underlying water colors are DRY. Completely dry. I use my heat tool to dry everything before I go to the next step. I found a wonderful deep black ink that I use for the black splatters. I use Copic Opaque White for the white splatters. Again, be sure to dry one color of splatters before doing the next color. I use a paint brush and splash it on. The smaller/bigger the paint brush will determine how dense the splatters are. 

 

For this project I used my super cool Daniel Smith Watercolor Dots! These are AWESOME for quick coloring of small areas. They are also my go-to when I want to travel with water colors. The concept is that these are 'cards' with globs of watercolors on them. They are dry until you wet them with a water brush or a paint brush and water. EASY PEASY. And, you get a LOT of colors for a small price. CLICK HERE for where I got mine. They are fun and simple to use. I chose bright colors for this project. 

 

The sentiment is from the Aviary stamp set and is perfect with that cute little bird stamp! I stamped the sentiment right onto the watercolor paper. all the colored pieces were attached to the card using foam tape. I played around with the layout until I liked how it flowed. 

 

 

 

 

That's it for today! Thank you for stopping by to see me! I hope you have a happy, fun and fabulous weekend! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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My Monthly Hero - August 2018 Card Kit - Coffee or Tea?!

Welcome to the Hero Arts "My Monthly Hero - August 2018 Blog Hop!" Happy August! In my world August is just one month away from Autumn! Yippeee! I hope you're enjoying the lazy days of Summer and having fun. The new kit this month has a theme that is very near and dear to my heart...coffee! (and tea too!) Yummy stamps, dies, embossing powder and more! Do you love coffee as much as I do? You're gonna love this kit!   

I'm happy to be here with you today launching the latest edition of the My Monthly Hero Kit. I hope you find some (many) things to inspire you. I have two cards to share today! One was made with the main kit, and the other one I made with some of the fun add-ons. 

You may have arrived here from Nichol's Blog!  If you want to start at the beginning of the hop CLICK HERE to go to the Hero Arts Blog! As always, lots of fun and inspiration for you today from my awesome fellow bloggers! I'm always grateful to be included in the Hero Arts lineup! If you're new to my blog today - welcome. Enjoy the hop today! I will always warn you, THESE KITS SELL OUT VERY FAST (usually the first day) so if you like it, don't hesitate! I know I say that every time, but it's true! Get it while you can! They are such a great value! Each kit is $34.99 and the value is double that, at least. Enjoy the hop today! Get your kit while they last! 

My first card for today features the stamps and dies from the main kit... I love fall and I love Pumpkin Spice Lattes so I made a Fall card! I adore the sentiments that come in the main stamp set. They're so on point! Lots of different coffee mugs to mix and match together. It's practically perfect!  

 

I started with an A2 card base in white cardstock. Then I layered kraft cardstock and some new patterned papers. The focal point are the cute coffee cuts and the sentiment. I stamped and die cut the two coffee cups and the whip cream and straw, and die cut them out. I colored them with my Copic Markers! NOTE: The tiny pumpkin stamp is from another Hero Arts stamp set!! (It's in my supplies at the bottom of my post)

 

I attached the cups to the card using foam tape for added dimension. I used aqua and orange, which are complementary colors so they look good together! I tried to match the papers too.

 

For my accents I used a bit of twine and some Nuvo Jewel Drops!

 

 

 

We're the PERFECT blend!! :-)

 

My next card was made using some of the beautiful add-ons for this month's theme! I made a watercolor tea pot card! This card was inspired by my own kitchen! Our kitchen has a French Country theme with blue, red, yellow...and roosters! I love that look! So I tried to re-create that in my next card. I used the awesome new Tea Pot Nesting Dies along with the brand new Spill The Tea stamps and dies. I watercolored everything and used my trademark gingham check to complete the look!

 

 

I chose to use bright red paper with crisp white embossing for the sentiment this time around! I kind of like this look! I'm going to try some different colors now! I used heat embossing and Hero Arts White Embossing Powder. 

 

This card is an A2 horizontal card made with a Kraft card base. I layered gingham and white paper and then vellum as my foundation for the card. I die cut out the pretty tea pot die twice. (I used the second one to cut out the lid). I used Daniel Smith Watercolor Dots to color in my stamped images. I wanted it to look like a pretty teapot that would be in the kitchen! I stamped the lemons and flowers randomly onto the tea pot die cut (which was watercolor paper). I then stamped and die cut out the little chicken and colored her with the same watercolor dots palette! The Dot palettes are great for quick coloring or coloring on the go!! (supplies are listed at the bottom of my post)

 

I used one giant red enamel dot to be the top of the tea pot lid. I then added pretty twine to complete the look. I love these colors together!

 

My water coloring isn't fussy at all here. I used a water brush and quickly put the color on without analyzing it too much. SO easy - and fun!

 

The new kit is available NOW! Yippeeeee! Below is a photo of THE ENTIRE MAIN KIT CONTENTS! This is a great value for $34.99! Hero Arts is VERY generous with their beautiful kits! The other supplies I used are listed below in my links!  

MAIN CARD KIT CONTENTS!

PRIZE ALERT!! Hero Arts is giving away one kit as a prize to one blog reader – selected from the comments across all of the blogs in the hop. Giveaway closes August 12th at midnight, and the winner will be announced the following week on the Hero Arts Blog. If you've already purchased your kit, and you win, you will be reimbursed. So be sure to leave a comment at each stop on the hop!

 

This kit is available for a limited time only! Once it's gone, it's gone! Kits begin shipping from Hero Arts on Friday, August 10th. These kits have a habit of selling out fast! So don't wait if you like this one. I have a sneaking suspicion this one will sell out! 

 

Next up on the blog hop is the awesome Yana Smakula! The full hop list is at the bottom of my post. Have fun hopping and have a happy, creative day! XOXO When you make something with your new card kit, be sure to use the hashtag #mymonthlyhero on your social media! TO START AT THE BEGINNING OF THE HOP - CLICK HERE! Thanks for stopping by today!

 

 

 

 SUPPLY LINKS FOR TODAY!

 

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Waffle Flower August 2018 New Release Blog Hop!

Hi everyone! Thanks for coming by today for the amazing Waffle Flower August Release Blog Hop! I have been so anxious to share these cool, creative and innovative products with you! I made three projects! That should tell you my excitement level! It's been hard to keep this one under wraps. Waffle Flower is one of my very favorite companies and the ideas that Nina comes up with are always awesome. I'm very honored to be part of this blog hop today introducing everything to you. Did you arrive here from the blog of my super talented friend CHANNIN?? To start at the beginning of the hop CLICK HERE to go to the Waffle Flower Blog! 

The new items include cool stamps and dies to create your own color wheels, and paint/marker swatches. Like I said earlier - genius! Perfect for those of us that love to have our supplies organized! Also, a beautiful new Lacy Flower XL die and some cute stamps for coloring. The new products for August are geared towards the artistic side of all of us crafters. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced artist, you will find Waffle Flower’s newest release a great investment for yourself. This is a back to basics release that focuses on the function of stamps and dies and our preferences on coloring mediums. The goal is to help beginners gain confidence with coloring mediums, and to help experienced colorists learn more about their different mediums. There are some cool combos and packages available (CLICK HERE to see everything). A professionally printed guide will be included in the Color Swatches Combo. All combos come in beautiful Cloud Storage Pockets. CLICK HERE to check out the Waffle Flower videos with detailed instructions and background! Nina reviews everything in her professional video. 

I have some color swatches to share with you today, and two cards made with the new stamps and dies. I had a really good time creating these projects - truly an artistic endeavor. I feel like taking the time to swatch my colors really made me think about the textures of my watercolor paints, and when I made the color wheel card I learned a lot about mixing my colors together. Like a self taught art lesson! Okay....let's get started! 

 

 

I used the Swatch Stamp and matching dies to create swatches of my very favorite watercolor paints! These have been my go-to watercolors ever since I got them! I have a small palette swatch of these paints but now I have them on a beautiful ring I can hang on my bulletin board. I die cut the swatch die and the circles to go at the top. I used watercolor paper and black cardstock. After they were die cut I glued the black enforcers on. Then I used Versafine Onyx Black Ink (the only ink I use for watercoloring) to stamp the swatch image. I gave them a quick shot with my heat tool to dry the ink. Then I had FUN coloring in the swatch sections!! Aren't they pretty!!!??

 

Here is an overview of some of the new products - in the gorgeous rainbow packaging! Swatches, color wheels and shapes OH MY!

 

Here are my swatches before I added the colors.... This makes my OCD happy. 

 

Masstone is the SOLID version of any color. I used my MIjello Mission Gold watercolors.... For the masstone portion, I used the tiniest amount of water to wet the paint enough to swatch it. For the larger swatch area I wet it first and then added the color, slowly getting lighter as it moves from left to right. This is great practice for coloring!!! I learned how to be more patient and slower to get the right gradation...

 

 

 

I literally cannot get enough of this!!! I used these for watercolors, but you could just as easily swatch your Copics or Colored pencils!!! Use them in whatever way makes it useful for you in your studio!

 

 

 

 

Next up are the two cards I created for the blog hop and release! I used the fabulous Color Wheels Stamps to make a card perfect for one of my creative friends! I used a couple of other Waffle Flower Stamp sets for the sentiment and paint brush and it all came together in a fun way! I will use the Color Wheel Stamps and Dies later to make color wheels of my Polychromos pencils! Can't wait to do that project. 

My card is an A2 card base out of paper from my stash (in my fav color). I cut out a watercolor paper layer and stamped two color wheels in the opposite corners. I made sure to put different colors for each one. Then I stamped a few of the circles around them to balance out the white space. 

 

Here is that cute little paint brush stamp/die from the Little Painters Stamp Set! I watercolored it too. The sentiment was heat embossed with white embossing powder onto black cardstock.

 

It was really fun to mix and match the colors to get fill in the color wheels. I have never done that before! It made me pay attention to each color and how it works with other colors mixed. I put on some music in the studio and enjoyed this process. 

 

I added some black enamel dots to the centers of the color wheels and then some Pretty Pink Posh Droplets to look like water drops... I also added paint splatters (you know I love that!)

 

 

 

 

 

I attached the paint brush on the card and then layered the sentiment banner over it. I like the graphic look of that black and white banner. I tried to think outside the box and come up with a cool way to incorporate the color wheel into something else! A card! 

 

 

Next up is a card featuring the GORGEOUS new Lacy Flower XL die! OOH LA LA! It's so pretty, especially since I colored it in bright vivid GOLD! YUM. This card is an A2 purple card base. Again I layered with watercolor paper on top. I used lots of water and some shades of blue and violet to create a loose watercolor background. Once it was dry, I splattered gold paint and white paint over the color for more visual interest. (My paints/supplies are listed at the bottom of my post)...

 

I used clear glue to attach the gold die cut on top of the colored background. Then I trimmed off the edges. Next I stamped the Waffle Flower Hugs and Prayers sentiment onto vellum using Stazon ink. I layered the vellum around the bottom of the card before attaching the card front to the base with foam tape. I added a few purple gems from my stash. 

 

This is what that beautiful die cut looks like! I used these paints for the gold!

 

 

 

 

PRIZE ALERT! PRIZE ALERT! PRIZE ALERT! 

To celebrate the blog hop, Waffle Flower is giving away $25 gift certificates to THREE lucky winners. You can leave comment on my blog and all along the hop by 11:59pm ET on 8/12/18 for your chances to win. Winners will be chosen at random from the comments left on any of the posts on this blog hop and will be announced on the Waffle Flower blog on 8/15/2018. As a bonus, all orders placed by 11:59pm ET on 8/15/18 will receive an Adhesive Eraser from our friends at Xyron! No code required; Limited 1 per customer; While Supplies last.

 

If you're a new visitor to my blog today because of the blog hop - welcome! I'd love to have you sign up to receive my post emails! CLICK HERE to subscribe! Or, Follow along with me on Instagram! 

 

Next up on the hop is the awesome and talented Nichol Spohr! 

 

 

CLICK HERE TO SHOP THE ENTIRE NEW RELEASE!

 

FULL BLOG HOP LIST!

Waffle Flower Blog

Kathy Racoosin

Laura Bassen

Amy Rysavy

Channin Pelletier

Wanda Guess

Nichol Spohr

Debby Hughes

Emily Midgett

Yana Smakula

Lydia Fiedler

Mariko Brown

Kristina Werner

 

 

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

 

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Honey Bee Stamps Bee Bold Blog Hop!

Hi everyone! Nice to see you! Welcome to Day Two of the awesome Bee Bold Blog Hop for Honey Bee Stamps! The beautiful, fun, creative, fabulous new BEE BOLD Release is live now for purchase. We are doing a two day blog hop to bring you tons of inspiration and ideas for using the new stamps and dies. I hope you're enjoying all the stops on the hop! If you're new to my blog - thank you! Thanks for stopping by today.

To start at the beginning of the hop CLICK HERE to go to the Honey Bee Stamps Blog. To shop the new release CLICK HERE! Did you arrive here from the blog of Nichol Spohr?? Isn't she amazing?? There are prizes today too! BEE sure to leave a comment on everyone's blog posts for a chance to win a $50 gift certificate! There are two certificates for prizes! Woot!! 

Are you on board the llama trend? Lately, these cute critters are popping up everywhere! In crafting, in home decor, in silly fashions, and even at the State Fair! I think they are so funny and adorable. Soooo, my favorite thing from the new release is the stamps and dies set called No Probllama! This stamp set is perfect for lots of occasions! I combined it with some other fun Honey Bee stamp sets and created a fiesta on a card! 

 

Since I knew I was creating a big scene with this card, I made it a big square card. My finished card is 5.25 x 5.25 inches. I made the card base from white paper and then completely covered the front with Sunny Studio yellow gingham paper. Next I layered a big scalloped circle die. Next I stamped and die cut out the llama and his blanket and hat, the balloons, and the cacti... I colored everything with Copic Markers in a vivid bright color palette. I looooove orange, yellow and aqua together. So fresh! These images are so much fun to color. 

 

The "HOLA" dies are part of the llama die set and I cut it from black cardstock. I heat embossed the sentiment with white embossing powder onto black paper also. Doesn't he look like a party animal?? This would be a great birthday card!!

 

Here's a side view to see how I layered all the pieces. Everything is attached with foam tape onto the card.

 

 

 

 

That's my party on a card for today! So happy you stopped by! You're llamazing! LOL! Next up on the hop is the amazing Leanne West! I always love her cards! Enjoy the rest of the hop and make sure to leave comments for a chance to win the prizes. Have a wonderful day! I have two more blog hops the next two days...so you'll be seeing a lot of me! Yay! XOXO

 

SUPPLIES FOR TODAY!

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Cheerful Summer Cards! Ice Cream and Butterflies!

Hi friends! Happy Monday! How are you? I hope you have a great week. Last week I went down hard with a cold! YUCK. Summer colds are the absolute worst. Over 100 degrees outside every day and I'm hacking up a lung. It wasn't pretty... And I was pretty...crabby. UGH. Much better today - feeling human again and the morning was cool when I woke up. I'm in the studio trying to get some stuff done. I'm way behind now. I have good hopes though. It's still early and I've already checked off about six things from my to do list. Lucky is curled up on his blanket on my desk snoozing and my favorite podcast is on my phone. Bam...let's do Monday. 

Since I didn't make anything last week I'm sharing a couple of cheerful Summer cards I made the week before. I've already shared these on Instagram, but not here on my blog yet. Sometimes I'm doing that from time to time...making a card and taking some pix and posting to Instagram first. Then I can circle around and blog later with the supplies, etc. Pretty soon it will be time to switch to Autumn/Indian Summer cards (yay) so I wanted to share Summer today! 

First up is a pretty butterfly card combining lots of textures and colors. I love to mix papers!! Here I've used textured cardstock, vellum and metallic silver cardstock. I love the play and contrast of the mediums. I kept it simple - no stamping! Just a beautiful die cut from Pretty Pink Posh to finish it off... 

 

I used a SUPER fun technique to make the background stripes!! If you look closely, you can see that I made that striped paper!! I took a sheet of white cardstock and covered it with sticky tape. Then I used several colors of AC Textured Cardstock and cut it into 1/4 inch strips. I laid the strips down onto the adhesive tape making sure to push them snugly against each other. Once I had enough stripes, I used a rectangle stitched die to cut it into a panel. SO easy! I can't wait to use different colors and different widths of strips of paper for different looks!! That served as the pop of color for the card, so everything else is pretty neutral. I die cut a butterfly from silver cardstock and the branches from vellum...then the sentiment from black cardstock (supplies at the end of my post). I used white ink to make splatters on everything! Glued it together and done! 

 

Here's my lovely photo assistant! He has to be right where I am at all times! It's the absolutely sweetest thing ever. I don't mind one bit. 

 

Next up is ICE CREAM! I made this card for National Ice Cream Day! I loooooove these stamps from Sunny Studio Stamps. They are my favorite ice cream stamps. You stamp them in three layers and the results are amazing. You can make such fun cards with this set. I used a beautiful background plate from Lil Inkers too....and Doodlebug papers....

 

I started with an A2 card base and layered pretty pink gingham (Doodlebug) and then a strip of plaid (also Doodlebug)... I used the cover plate to make the background on the white circle part...then die cut it into a circle. Love it as a background for ice creams!! I stamped the sentiment and some sprinkles onto a smaller circle. I stamped the cones, ice cream and cherry and added a few clear sparklies to finish. Another fun and easy card layout. 

Thank you for coming by to see me! This week will be kind of quiet until Friday...then I have THREE new release blog hops that I'm in! SUPER stoked for those! I love the excitement of new releases and fun blog hops. Don't you? I hope your week is full of blessings and joy. XOXO 

 

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Let's Chill! Fun Palm Tree Shaker Card!

Hi friends! Just popping in today quickly to share a card I made last week! I came down with a cold on Tuesday (BOOOO) and have been feeling yucky. It's worse because every day here has been over 100 degrees outside! I'm starting to feel better and it's just a cold. But I am being a total baby about it! LOL. Mr. Lucky has been a great nurse companion - sleeping and snuggling by my side all day. What a sweetie. Hopefully I'll be good as new in a few.... Hope you're having a great week!

I love working with Queen & Company! Both the awesome people, and the fantastic products! Everything about Queen & Company is pure bright color, and pure fun! Such a joy to make a quick shaker card and stamp the perfect sentiment. Their kits are the bomb. If you are intimidated by making shaker cards I would encourage you to try one of their shaker kits. It makes it so easy to put it all together. The foam is cut, the acetate is cut for you and all you have to do is assemble everything! CLICK HERE to shop their store.  CLICK HERE to see videos on how to put the items together.

I made a super fun Summer shaker with a palm tree! I used rainbow paper for the background from Doodlebug. The perfect match! Take a look!  

 

I started with a kraft A2 card base and layered rainbow paper. Then I die cut two white stitched rectangles and layered those. My palm tree shaker is adhered directly to that top layer of white paper. The sentiment was stamping onto an oval of white in dark black ink! Let's chilllll....

 

I added some gems and bling inside - all in clear and green tones. You could add whatever you like! There are so many choices! I used Doodlebug Enamel dots in brown to look like coconuts! Every palm needs some coconuts right??

 

The shaker kits come with matching dies to use to cut out your patterned/solid papers. I used Doodlebug papers in brown and green. 

 

 

 

Wonder why I feel like a trip to the beach right now!? 

Thanks for popping by today! I hope you have a beautiful day and a fun Summer weekend coming up! XOXO See you soon!

 

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Autumn cards with Concord & 9th!

Hi everyone! Happy Monday! I hope you have a great week ahead of you. I had a super fun weekend with a trip to San Francisco to the farmers market and a foggy ferry ride. It's one of our favorite ways to escape the heat here in Sacramento. We are so lucky that we can go about 75 miles away and it's 40 degrees colder! We love going to the ferry building and hanging out for the day. My favorite photos from the day are on my Instagram! I really enjoy taking photos of flowers and gorgeous produce... I find all that color and natural beauty so inspiring. God truly is the master artist! 

Lots of my crafting friends are already knee deep in Christmas crafting! I am so grateful that I can wait on that this year and enjoy the natural flow of the seasons in my art and creating. I can feel the light changing ever so slightly in the evenings signaling the first glimpse of fall... And that has me super excited and anxious for Fall cards. Because Fall is my favorite time of year. I'm sharing two cards today with Fall colors and themes. I couldn't help myself- couldn't wait! LOL. 

There were two amazingly awesome new stamp sets that caught my eye from Concord & 9th recently. Angie and Greg were kind enough to send them to me so I could play! (they literally are the nicest people and I'm so glad they are my friends). I've seen lots of projects with both of theses sets (City Stacks and Furry Friends)... But I wanted to put my own twist on them - I made them Fall themed!  

First up is a card using the beautiful and innovative City Stacks Stamps and Dies. One of the things at the very top of my life bucket list is to visit Central Park in New York in Autumn. I soooo want to do this one day. Until then, I've created a card to look like Central Park might look in October! I stamped and die cut and layered and water colored and had the best time making this! 

 

I tried out some new watercolor paper for this project - for the city pieces and the trees/ground pieces. It has a nice linen texture to it, instead of the typical bumpy texture. It colored very nicely! Coloring the city was easy with my MIjello Mission watercolors. I mixed black with indigo blue to create a steely blue grey color like buildings. I did a wet on wet technique and really didn't fuss over it too much. I die cut them out with the matching dies. The dies include a pretty cloud border that I used at the top of my layers. 

***One note about my watercolors... I got this set of watercolors about a year ago. They have been so 'life changing' to my crafting. Yes, they are expensive! But I have not regretted spending the extra money on them. The tubes are still about 80% full and I've been painting with them all year. So I figure that they will last me at least 6-7 years. They are creamy and vivid and beautiful. I never thought I would be able to see the difference but I can!! Just wanted to put that out there for some of you who are on the fence about the Mijellos. I like the set I bought because it comes with a palette and everything. XO

This finished card is a slightly modified A2. My card measures 5.5 x 4.5 inches. 

 

The stamp and die with the ground and trees has three trees on it. I stamped and die cut out three of these pieces so I could have extra trees to put in my scene. I water colored the ground with a few shades of green and water colored the trees using vivid yellow, orange and a touch of red. This is how my brain sees Fall trees! LOL. The welcome die comes with the set. The stamped and heat embossed sentiment is from an old set that I don't know the name of! 

 

Here's a close up of the trees/coloring. The biggest tree stamp has a tire swing on it, so I just trimmed that part off.  

 

This is how the city scene looks when stamped and die cut.

 

This photo shows how I layered everything.... You know I love layers!!! More is more!

 

If you look closely at the ground pieces you can see where I trimmed off the trees. Then I used foam tape to attach them where I wanted them! Never be afraid to play and change things up!

 

For this second card I used the awesome Furry Friends stamps and dies. This stamp set is SO GREAT!!! It has a deer, a bear, a fox and a horse and matching accessories. I love a good woodland creature stamp set, yes I do! I immediately wanted to make a deer with a flower crown! I mean, right?? I had just gotten some new Fall paper pads too, and I used two of them for the paper layout of this card. I combined it with my favorite wood grain paper too. Yes! 

 

 

This finished card is A2 size. I started by layering my paper pieces. I used cream paper instead of bright white for this one. I used a bit of brown twine to add texture and softness to the overall feel of the piece. And, as I am known to do, I got some gingham in there. 

 

 

 

I stamped and die cut out the deer, the antlers and the flowers/leaves. I colored them with inks and also with Copics. For the sentiment and the circle, I used Distress Ink and a sponge to ink the edges and make it look more vintage. I finished with a few enamel dots from my stash, picking up that pretty blue color from the paper pad. 

 

 

That's it for my first Fall projects of 2018. I'll be back to making Summer projects later in the week! LOL. But I literally could not wait to stamp these stamps and bring these ideas to life. Thank you for stopping by my blog today! CLICK HERE TO shop Concord & 9th! I hope you have a great week. See you soon! XOXO

 

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Inspired by Sunflowers! You brighten my day!

Happy Friday! The summer is rolling right along.... It was HOT this week here. The only thing is...I can smell August coming... And then FALL! LOL. I'm not really a hot weather person so Summer for me is just a prelude to Autumn. Let's get on with it! Hope you've had a great week. I've been crafting a lot and busy in the studio too. Lucky is growing like a weed (wish he would slow down and stay little!) He had his first doctor appointment check up and he's doing great. He keeps me smiling all day with his crazy kitten antics.

A couple of weeks ago my husband and I went out for a beautiful Sunday drive to see the gorgeous sunflower fields here in Northern California. It really is a sight to behold. Miles and miles of the brightest yellow you've ever seen. They're everywhere. About 30 minutes west of us and a bit north is Yolo County. And it's A+ sunflower viewing. They've peeked now and are starting to wilt and turn brown. I think we caught them at the right time for some photographs. I put some of my favorite photos in this post to share with you!

I was so inspired by the pretty sunflowers that I decided I had to make a sunflower card! I used awesome stamps and dies from Honey Bee Stamps, and my Copic Markers, to create a sunflower scene. I had to put some bees on the card too, because there were tons of bees buzzing around the sunflowers we saw. 

 

 

Here is one of my favorite sunflower photos from our day out!

 

I started with a white A2 card base and then layered pretty blue gingham paper. I was totally inspired by the golden yellow of the sunflowers and the bees against the beautiful blue summer sky. That's what I tried to re-create on a card! I stamped and die cut out a bunch of sunflowers, leaves and bees. Then I colored them all in with my Copic Markers. I used a white gel pen to add dots and highlights after I was done coloring. The cute little fence die and all the stamps/dies are from Honey Bee. I used deeper shades of yellow and brown to make the sunflowers golden instead of bright lemon yellow. 

 

The sentiment was heat embossed with white embossing powder onto black paper. I hand cut the banner with my scissors. There are bits of Diamond Stickles on the bee wings and the leaves and flowers. This mimics the sun hitting the flowers!

 

 

 

I loooooove these little tiny bees!!!

 

 The images and the sentiment banner were attached to the card using foam tape. I layered everything until I liked the way the composition looked. 

 

 

 

 

Here are some of my sunflower photos! To see a map of where to find them go to VISITYOLO.COM website!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have an amazing weekend! Thank you for stopping by my blog today! Lots of hugs! XOXO

 

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Hero Arts Summer Party Suite!

Hellllooooooo! I hope this day finds you happy and smiling! What are you up to this week? I don't really have a lot going on right now! It's been a quite couple of weeks which is fine with me. It's super hot here (over 100 every day) and that totally zaps my energy. I'm thoroughly enjoying spending lots of time with my sweet kitten. He makes me so happy and we have fun together all day in the studio. He alternates between Mach Five energy, and completely asleep! LOL. There is no in between with him! He is developing his little personality and I love him lots. He's a happy guy and very loving - follows me from room to room. I kind of feel bad because even if he is sound asleep, if I leave the room, he will wake up and come see me! It's so cute. He is already four months old! I don't want him to grow up!!! How come they grow so fast!!?? 

Today I'm sharing a neat project -- a pretty party invitation suite. An invitation, a thank you card, and a favor box! All made with matching beautiful florals from Hero Arts! A few months ago Hero Arts commissioned me to make this set of projects for them to use in some advertising, etc and I was so happy for the assignment! I used some wood stamps, some clear stamps and some dies....all coordinating florals from the Hero Arts collections. This set of projects would be great for a Summer Tea Party, a Bridal Shower, or a Birthday Party. So feminine and classic. I hope you like it!  

 

The favor box is from the big box crafting store and was inexpensive to buy. I like starting with a blank kraft canvas and then adding color! I coordinated everything with the beautiful Hero Arts Liquid Watercolors and bright pink and crisp white. For the box I stamped and die cut out the large peony and some leaves. I wrapped paper and vellum around the box and "sealed it" with the florals. You could put a small cake inside, or a present, or a note!

 

The thank you note is a flat card easy to mail and easy to write a note on the front. It coordinates with the invitation to carry the theme even after the party is over. I think sending thank you notes is such a lost art - and means so much to the recipient! The Thank You sentiment is heat embossed with Hero Arts Gold Embossing Powder. 

 

I used gold embossing on all three projects - this really ties it all together nicely! Gold embossing is so classy and timeless. Everyone appreciates this look!

 

Here is a close up of the invite! The Hero Arts Invitation stamp set allows you to choose which things you want on your invite.... Date, time, place, etc. Totally customizable and in a pretty font. I use this set a lot actually. 

 

I added a few pretty gold sequins to my projects for just a touch of shimmer, and to make them feel special!

 

I used Liquid Watercolors to make a soft wash on all the flowers and leaves. I also used them to splatter some extra paint around on the pieces. Looks artsy and cool I think!

Do you enjoy making your own invitations? I love to do that! I believe that the invitation sets the tone and mood for the entire event. Don't you just get so excited when you get a gorgeous invitation in the mail? You just already know someone put a lot of care into the party! The ones I've shared today can be made in any color palette to match your theme or party colors. Super easy to mass produce and no extra postage needed. I hope I've inspired you to plan a party! CLICK HERE to shop at Hero Arts! Have a wonderful week, until we meet again! XOXO

 

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Create Rainbows! Waffle Flower Little Painters Stamp Set!

Hi friends! Happy weekend! Happy Saturday! I'm going to a super fabulous and fun event today in the bay area! The awesome peeps from Queen & Company are having an all day crafting event and I'm heading down to help out and take pictures, etc. Looking forward to an AWESOME day of fellowship, laughter and great projects! I'll be on the road early....Keep an eye on my Instagram Stories for behind the scenes from the party! I hope that you have a wonderful and happy weekend. 

Today I'm sharing a COOOOOOL, bright, and artsy card made with supplies from Waffle Flower Crafts! YES! You guys know I love Waffle Flower! One of their newer stamp sets spoke to me right away. It's called Little Painters. It has paint tubes, paint brushes, a palette, and cute critters too. I made a rainbow of brushes and tubes and then used some other Waffle Flower stamps and dies to create my own sentiment. I originally colored in these images with my Copics during the 30 Day Coloring Challenge. I finally made them into a card!

 

My card base is bright yellow Buttercup cardstock in A2 size. (My very favorite yellow cardstock!) I layered a white layer and splattered it with black craft ink and set that aside to dry. I had already colored my images with Copic Markers. I stamped and die cut out everything first and then had fun choosing a rainbow of bright colors including hot pink and lime green! A non traditional rainbow!

 

I used the Rainbows word die and the Rainbows stamp set to make my sentiment in the upper left corner. I used black to contrast with all the bright colors.

 

Here is the image of the stamp set! SO CUTE, right? The little animals can peek out from behind the paint brushes!! EEPS. I love all those brushes!!! 

 

I cut and colored bunches of brushes and paint tubes so I just had fun rearranging them into a funky rainbow on the front of my card. All of the elements are attached using foam tape. I added some clear droplets to look like water splashing around. I also used a Gelly Roll Clear Glaze Pen to add clear dimension to the paint tubes, brush handles and paint. 

 

 

 

I put the paint palette on the inside of the card since I had already colored it in!

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you're inspired by this card to create something today! Best wishes for a fabulous summer weekend! Can I just say that I ordered a WHOLE bunch of Fall papers and things the other day! I'm all about Fall and I'm anticipating Fall crafting already! For the past eight years I have had to do Christmas in July for my design team commitments. I am so happy to have a small break from that this year. I feel like I create better when it's the season at hand. There is plenty of time to do our Christmas crafting right? Have a blessed day! XOXO

 

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Fiesta! Pinata! Fun party card with My Favorite Things!

Helllloooooo! Let's have a fiesta today! I've got a card with LOTS of color, fun dies, and a Pinata! What could be better than that?? Not much if you ask me! LOL. I can hear party music in the background as I'm typing this right now. These dies are so cool and fabulous. I've been wanting to make something with them for a few weeks now. All the stamps, dies and stencils today are from My Favorite Things Stamps. YESSSS! Let's party!

I started with a bright white A2 card base. Then I layered hot pink...then I stenciled some vivid yellow sun rays... THEN I made a pinata! This card has a lot going on, but it's all fun. I popped the sentiment in rich black for contrast with all those bright colors. This card has it all: stamping, die cutting, stenciling...

 

 

I really like the font on this fiesta die. It's really pretty, but festive at the same time. It's going to get used a lot. I added a stamped sentiment underneath the die to make this a birthday card. I stenciled the radiating rays using Squeezed Lemonade Distress Ink and a sponge. 

 

Here is a side shot so you can see how I layered everything...

 

 

 

This pinata die set is the cutest, most creative thing I've seen in a long time! It's so easy to make. There is a large background die and then you layer all the other pieces on top of that solid piece. It is very user friendly and easy to figure out which piece goes where. Genius! I used three shades of bright hot colors. You could make a rainbow too! Or any color combination that you love. I used some Lawn Fawn Cord to make a bow and tie up my pinata. I also added a few gems at the end. Ya know...it needed....MORE! Hahaha. 

 

This shot shows the layering of the pinata die pieces. I used thin foam dots to put the pieces together. I gently lifted up some of the fringe with my fingers. Careful not to bend the paper and crease it. 

 

 

Thanks for joining me on this fiesta today! AY CARUMBA! We stamping girls know how to have fun, don't we??? I hope your week is a party and that it's awesome. Take care - see you soon! XOXO

 

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Reverse Confetti New Release Blog Hop! July 2018!

Hi my crafty friends! Happy weekend! I hope you had a great 4th of July! I'm here today to share something really fun! I'm going to be joining in with the Reverse Confetti team every other month to help launch the new releases! YAHOOOO! Jen is a friend of mine, and any time she wants my support I try to give it! Plus....cutest stamps ever! I'm delighted to join a big fabulous blog hop today showing the new July 2018 release. I made two cards to share! CLICK HERE to SHOP the entire new release! Full blog hop list and specific shopping links are at the bottom of my post. Enjoy! 

First up is a FUN and sweet camping card with adorable little animals having some s'mores by the fire. Reverse Confetti has the cutest critters in their stamp sets. I also love the tent and the funky trees! I used lots of stamps and dies and built a scene. Even the sentiment is super cute! The new set I'm featuring is called Greatest Adventure!

 

I started with a White A2 card base and layered some blue and white gingham from my stash. I used large oval dies to die cut two green hills to layer at the bottom of the card. I used a very very old wood stamp and some versamark ink to stamp the splotches onto the green cardstock. Then it was a matter of stamping and coloring the images! I used Copic Markers and then added some Diamond Stickles to the clouds and the fire. The clouds are from another, previously released Reverse Confetti Stamp Set. Everything works great together!

 

I stamped and die cut out all the pieces and colored them in with natural, outdoorsy shades. Everything is attached to the card using foam tape. I stamped the sentiment in the corner. CUTEST font ever, right? 

 

 

 

 

 

Next up is a bright and funky floral card using the brand new Mod Floral stamps and dies. I thought this new stamp set was a perfect match for the already released Eyelet Cover Plate (which I LOVE). I used some 70's shades: aqua, green and orange, and popped it against dark grey and white. I really like how this card came out! I started with a white A2 card base and then die cut the cover plate and layered that over the white using foam tape. 

 

 

I wrapped a strip of vellum around the entire front of the card. I used beautiful cardstock and stamped the patterned flower sections onto the cardstock using Versamark Ink. It's a very subtle and pretty look. I used the matching dies to cut the florals out. 

 

 

 

I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment onto black cardstock with bright white embossing powder! Looks pretty with the other colors I think! The final touch was to use a few enamel dots from my stash.

 

 

 

 

Thank you SO much for joining me today on my stop on this awesome blog hop! YEAH for the new Reverse Confetti July Release! LOVE IT! The entire new release is available for shopping now! Woot! What are you most excited about? Enjoy the hop! Next up is the talented and lovely Lisa Henke! Full Hop list at the bottom of this post! 

 

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 FULL BLOG HOP LIST FOR TODAY!

Reverse Confetti Blog

Amy Kolling

Ali Farmer

Melissa Phillips

Amy Sheffer

Tricia Barber

Lydia Fiedler

Kelly Lunceford

Wanda Guess

Lisa Henke

Amy Rohl

Laurie Schmidlin

Heather Hoffman

Justine Hovey

Amy Tsuruta

Kathy Schweinfurth

Michelle Short

Audrey Tokach

Deanne Kuntz

Laurie Willison

Jeanne Jachna

Olga Moss

Eloise Blue

Happy 4th of July 2018! Sharing a patriotic card today!

Happy 4th of July! WOO HOOOO! Wishing you a wonderful, happy, fun filled day today with your friends and family! Not sure what we're doing today... I think I'll be making hamburgers and fresh corn on the cob... And maybe we'll do some fireworks here at the house. It will be a mellow day for us and that's fine with me! Happy Summer Holiday everyone! I made a quick card this weekend to celebrate the occasion. I have a big bin full of patriotic and Americana stamps and papers. Everything I used for this card is from my stash and is all old. I love using my old favorite supplies. It's also been a minute since I made something vintage-y and distressed. I kind of like how it came out! Have fun today! XOXO

I started with a cream card base in A2. All my layers are cream, and not bright white. I die cut an oval and a circle with my stitched dies. I used some old papers with a red white and blue color palette.

 

I stamped Lady Liberty onto the oval in black and then used blue ink and yellow ink to stamp stars and fireworks around here. Then I stamped the sentiment in blue and added yellow stars. The background paper was handstamped with Antique Linen ink onto the cream paper. Everything was inked around the edges with a sponge dauber and Antique Linen Ink. I added the metal stars as an accent. I also used a bit of red and white twine wrapped around the layers for some texture. 

 

 

Since all of the supplies are old they are not available any longer. So no supply list! The Statue of Liberty Stamp is from Paper Inspirations, the fireworks stamp is from Savvy Stamps. The sentiments are from the set from Taylored Expressions called Yankee Doodle Homestead. I saw that some of them are listed on Ebay if you're interested in stamping like I did!! 

HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY Independence Day from our home to yours!

 

Stay Golden! Watercolor Pineapples!

Hello creative friends! How is it Monday already? This weekend went by FAST! I'm so happy hubs is home and he and kitty are fast friends already. That kitty is so easy to love and quick to be comfortable with us! Yeah! I had a great time on Saturday at Hero Arts at the Coloring Road Show. I saw so many friends there! Not too much coloring happened actually...mostly visiting and watching Kathy color and just enjoying fellowship with other crafters. What a great time - I so enjoy hanging out with other stamping girls. Now that all the stamp stores are closed...there's really no where to hang out with each other like we used to. I hope you had a wonderful weekend too! Some more about the Road Show at the bottom of my post! 

Today's card is another Summer themed tropical creation! This time I used the awesome Stay Golden Stamp Set from Ellen Hutson. I love this stamp set! It's all pineapples and flowers... And the best sentiments!! It makes me happy to stamp out those golden pineapples! This time I chose to use dIstress inks to water color them. And I kept a cool vibe with my natural color palette. Stay Golden everyone! 

 

The card is a white A2 card base. Then I layered some olive-y green paper from my stash. I used a new pineapple embossing folder to emboss kraft paper for my center top layer. I think the embossing folder is the Joann's brand. I didn't recognize the packaging??!! It's aqua and clear and I've only seen it at Joann's. I stamped and die cut out the pineapples from watercolor paper.

 

The pineapple stamps are in two parts - the top and bottom. The top part is a solid stamp with no outlines. I wanted an outline, so after I colored the leaves I added a wonky, fast outline with a pen. The coloring was done with a water brush and a few colors of distress inks in yellows and greens. I also splattered Opaque White over the pineapples and the kraft layer. I think it looks kind of artsy. After I attached the pineapples onto the paper, I added two golden Doodlebug Sprinkles. 

 

Here are my FINE-apples! 

 

Some of my supplies - and that awesome stamp set!!

 

For the sentiment I used vellum with gold heat embossing. I thought I should use gold because of what it says! I wrapped some natural thread around the top layer before attaching the pineapples.

 

Here's a close up of the embossing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you guys for all the love about my new kitty! I really appreciate everyone being so happy for us. I know lots of you were very upset when Buddy died...and now you are happy for this next chapter and our new furry bundle of joy. Thank you for that. XO Mr. Kitty officially has a name now! His name is Lucky! (get it, Lucky Guess!) We named him that because he is very happy go lucky and because we feel so lucky to have him. He has already brought so much joy to our home. 

 

 

If you ever have the chance to attend one of Kathy Racoosin's Coloring Challenge Road Trip events I would say - GO! She donates the event fee to charity which is so nice. The events are all over the country. The one I attended yesterday was at Hero Arts which is about an hour from my house. I was surprised that there were people from all over there! Virginia, Texas, LA, etc. all came together. It was truly a day of laughter, fun, good food, crafting, friendship and happiness. Kathy did demos all day with small groups talking to us about her personal coloring style. It was fun to watch her in person and learn from her. I met lots of my blog followers which was AWESOME and had good conversations all day. I colored one tiny thing! LOL. I was expecting that because I'm kind of a chatter box. I met some wonderful women who are local and I hope it's the start of some new crafting friendships. Four of us even went out to dinner together. It was very good for my soul. These kinds of things really uplift me. Here is a shot of the whole group! 

 

And me and Kathy! XO

Thanks so much for coming by today! Hope I put you in a tropical mood to start your week off! What are you planning to do this week? Happy 4th of July too! I'll be back on Wednesday with a patriotic card! XOXO 

 

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Bitty Bear Hugs!

Hi friends! Happy Friday to you! I'm so happy it's Friday! My husband has been away for work all week and he's coming home today. He hasn't met the new kitten yet! I am so excited for them to meet. I've been texting my husband so many photos of the kitty all week and I know he wants to hug him! I'll be happy to see my hubs and catch up. Also, tomorrow I'm going to Hero Arts for the Northern California stop of Kathy Rac's 30 Day Coloring Road Show! YEAH! I know several people who are coming and it's going to be a great time. I have no expectations that I will get any coloring done. I will be tooooo busy talking and chatting! Keep and eye on my Instagram stories tomorrow for behind the scenes! I hope you have had a great week! Happy weekend!

Today's card is FUN! I finally finally inked up and colored my MFT Bitty Bears stamp set! I've been making an effort to use some of my cool stamp sets that I haven't used yet. These Bitty Bears are SOOOOOO CUTE! EEEK! I had a great time coloring the bears and bringing them to life! Then I made them into a happy card. It took me some time to come up with a good card layout for these guys. I wanted to put all six of them on the same card...

 

 

I made an A2  card base out of pretty deep aqua blue paper and then die cut a stitched rectangle from white paper. I die cut the "HUGS" die into the white layer about 2/3 or the way down the paper. I left room on the sides for the "bear" word and the little hearts. The bears were attached to the card with foam tape. The white layer was attached to the blue layer with foam tape also to let the hugs part be raised up. 

 

THESE BEARS! So sweet! 

 

The word "bear" is from a large sentiment that says "sending you a big bear hug" and it's from the MFT Happy Pandas stamp set. I wanted just the "bear" from the large sentiment... Here's my trick: I lay down washi tape over all the parts of the stamp that I don't want. Then I get the stamp good and inked up. Then I remove (carefully) the washi tape. Now only the small part is inked, and I stamped it down on the edge of the HUGS die. I use this trick all the time. 

 

 

 

Here is my little row of Bitty Bears! I had fun standing them all up to take a photo! It's easier to see how I colored them too. I used a few shades of brown and the way I colored them I tried to make the center of their tummies a lighter color to look round. The fun thing about these bears is that they can be brown bears, black bears, grey bears....even white polar bears - all depending on how you choose to color them. I made a few extra to put in my planner too, since they're the perfect size. 

 

 

 

Here's a side shot so you can see the way it's all layered and put together. 

 

This card won't fit into an A2 envelope because of the red balloon sticking up from the top. I almost always (90% of the time) use A6 envelopes, even for my A2 cards. This way there is a little extra room for a bow, or if something is sticking off the side, etc. Postage is the same for A2 and A6! 

 

 

That's it for me today! Thanks for ALL THE LOVE on Instagram and Facebook about my new baby kitty! He will get a name this weekend now that my husband is home. He's been such a good kitty already. Follows me around everywhere and is very snuggly. Just what I needed. He loves sleeping on my work desk - I have a blanket there for him. He makes me so happy. I hope you have a great weekend! Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

Thank you for using my affiliate links to shop - I appreciate it and it keeps my blog going! XOXO

 

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Popsicles and kittens!

Hi everyone! Just a quick post today with a card, some postage stamps and a KITTEN! We have adopted a new baby boy kitty and he is the sweetest thing ever! More a bit later in my post. First up is a cool treats card to cool you off on this hot summer day! 

I made this card with the Avery Elle Cool Treats stamps and dies, my new favorite background die from Reverse Confetti, and my Copics! It's an A2 card - quick and simple layout. Lots of color, and some bits of shine too! I used my white gel pen to add some accents on top of my Copic coloring and everything is attached to the card using foam tape. I am starting to really get in the swing of Summer crafting! I have lots of cards made - I just have to take all the pictures now.

 

The reason I was inspired to make a popsicle card is because of these brand new stamps from the post office! They are ice cream and popsicle treats stamps! And, guess what??? They are scratch and sniff too! How cool is that?? They really smell like sweet treats. After I bought them I put them in my wallet to stay flat. Later that day, I went to pay for something, and my whole wallet smelled like ice cream! LOL. Have you picked up any yet?? TOO fun!

 

And now for my super fabulous announcement! We got a kitten yesterday! He doesn't have a name yet! I have been so so sad since my sweet and loyal Buddy died in February. The craft room has been so lonely and I've missed the pitter patter of little feet around... We have really missed having a pet. A house just doesn't feel like a home without a pet. Yesterday I picked up this adorable little man at the Front Street Animal Shelter's adoption center at Petco in Sacramento. I'm in love - it was love at first sight. He purred all the way home and hasn't stopped purring since. He even purrs when he's sleeping! He was born in March so he's about three months old. His eyes are sort of dark blue/gray. His feet are all white and his tummy has spots. He's skinny and long and lean and can jump about five feet off the ground!! He loves sleeping on my studio desk (yay!) and is sweet as can be. He has already made himself right at home. Welcome little guy to our family! We'll get you a name soon! There are some more photos of him over on my Instagram account! (@stampcatwg)

That's it for today. I'll be back soon with some really colorful and Summer themed cards soon! Saturday I'm headed to Hero Arts for Kathy Rac's Coloring Challenge Tour! Will I see you there? Have a wonderful day! XOXO

 

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Birthday Bees! Fun with Honey Bee Stamps!

Hi there! Happy Monday! I'm buzzzzzing by today with a birthday card made with my favorite beeees! Of course, from Honey Bee Stamps! These Build-a-Bees are the cutest little bees ever! I adore this stamp set and use it often. I love how you can give them different faces and I LOOOOVE to color them! These bees today have a cheerful message for a birthday of any kind... I colored them with Copic Markers and made it look like they're coming out of the box! LOL. Throw in some vellum and embossing....you've got it all! I hope you have a great week! 

 

I really love crafting with yellow! It's so bright and happy. This particular shade of yellow is my favorite - bright and sunny. I started with a white A2 card base, then layered yellow and then white. I stamped and die cut out the bees, the balloons and the box. The box is die cut from kraft paper to look like a delivery box! I stamped some streamers directly onto my top layer of white paper. 

 

In this photo of the stamp set you can see all the different faces! SO CUTE! ACK. I have a hard time choosing. I love that winking one! I colored the balloons and bees with Copic Markers in bright primary colors to add punch. 

 

I wasn't really sure where I was going to put the sentiment on this card. So, I heat embossed the 'happy birthday' in gold embossing powder on a strip of vellum. This is a good trick for a sentiment when you don't want to cover up the art in the project. I wrapped the vellum around the top two layer and over the box. The box, bees and balloons are all attached to the card using foam tape. TIP: When you heat emboss on vellum, it is very easy to burn or warp the vellum (vellum is basically plastic).... So get your heat tool hot - pointed away from the project. Then give it quick blasts of heat. Don't hold it steady over the paper. This will ensure that it stays nice and flat and pretty!

 

It's hard to see, but their wings are shimmery. I used a clear Wink Of Stella pen to add the shimmer and shine to their little wings. The final step was to add a few yellow sequins. I wanted it to look like the balloons, bees and confetti POPPED out of that box! On the box lid I used Versamark Ink to add some subtle stars. 

That's it for today! If you have a birthday coming up - HAPPY BIRTHDAY to you! Have a super week ahead. I'll be back soon... XOXO

 

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Happy First Day of Summer 2018! Stay Cool with Waffle Flower!

Hey crafty people! Happy First Day of Summer! Yes, today is the first day of Summer! I'm happy it's here but only because now we are one season closer to Fall! LOL. I am loving the longer days and being able to be outside at night. There are tons of fun activities in Sacramento during the Summer - always something to do. I also love the Farmers Markets all over the place, and the beautiful produce to cool with.... Good things about Summer! And, tropical crafting! You guys have all figured out that I LOVE anything tropical.

Today I have another fun beach theme card perfect to kick off Summer 2018! I used fabulous stamps and dies from Waffle Flower, my Copic Markers, and pretty pink striped paper. These images were sooooo much fun to color! I added glitter tooooo! Happy Summer everyone!  

 

I started out with a white card base in A2 size! Next I layered some hot pink striped paper (From Sunny Studio) and then another layer of white. Then I stamped and die cut out all of the images and die cut the leaves from Juicy Pear Bazzill paper. I colored all the images with Copic Markers. 

 

After I Copic colored the images, I added touches of white with a gel pen, and then Diamond Stickles to make them shimmer in the sun! I stamped the sentiment in the lower right hand corner. SO perfect!

 

Here is the entire stamp set! EEEP. That bear! He looks just like me! LOL. 

 

My Copic Color choices for this project!

 

 

 

These Greenery Dies from Waffle Flower are my go-to for tropical cards. They are the perfect size and scale. After I die cut them, I inked the edges with a sponge dauber and Twisted Citron Distress Ink. Then I added white gel pen accents and Stickles. Delicious! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The other night Mark and I went to a fun event at a new Ice Cream Shop in Sacramento. It's called Cream! OOOH LA LA. This cone was to die for! It was 100 degrees out that night so I had to take this picture fast and then devour that cone! YUM! Another joy of Summer!

Thanks for coming by today! HAPPY SUMMMMEEERRRRR 2018! Wishing you fun in the sun and everything good that Summer brings. See you soon! XOXOXO

 

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A Tropical Explosion with WPlus9!

Hey there party people! It's MONDAY again already!? Wow! That was a fast weekend. Before I get too far into today's post, I want to say a giant thank you to everyone who left a comment on my last blog post! I loved reading everyone's love stories. It was so fun! Thank you for that - and for saying cheers to love with me! I appreciate all of you so much and your support and kindness. I hope you had a great weekend. It was super strange (in a good way) weather here this weekend. Cool and breezy and beautiful. Saturday we worked in the yard all day and we planted our anniversary tree! It looks so pretty! I can't wait for it to grow in some. Sunday I edited photos most of the day and wrote some invoices. A nice peaceful day in the studio. This coming week has lots of fun things happening and I'm looking forward to it. One of my blogging/crafty friends is coming to visit family and we're meeting up in Napa for lunch and wine tasting! CANNOT wait. Yippeee! 

Today I'm sharing a card that can only be described as a tropical EXPLOSION! I finished this card and I was like "wow, you sure put a lot on that one, girlfriend." But, sometimes more is more I guess. My card features the new release from WPlus9. When I first started seeing the sneak peeks for this release I kinda FA-REAKED out a bit. Everything that I love about Summer. YES. I ordered all of it. LOL. Couldn't wait to ink it up and play. On a side note, I'm super happy to be sharing Summer cards in, well, Summer! Last year at this time I was knee deep in Christmas cards already! I am loving the creative freedom that has come from not being on any design teams right now. I really love to be in the moment with my crafting.... Can anyone else relate? 

Okay, so put on your sunglasses, cuz here it comes....

 

I started with an A2 bright white card base. I didn't decide on the pretty aqua background until the end of the process... This cool stitched rays die is from Reverse Confetti and I think it makes a gorgeous subtle background for all those florals! SO pretty. I stamped all of the flowers and leaves using Versafine Ink and Prima Watercolor Paper (Supplies at the bottom of my post). I usually take a heat tool and set the ink before water coloring since I use a lot of water! I used matching dies to die cut the smaller leaves and florals after coloring. The large main image does not have a matching die, but it was super easy to cut with my detail scissors. 

 

Here is a close up of the water coloring of the different elements. I used my go-to palette of Mijello Mission Gold watercolors. Ever since I bought my set I haven't been wanting to use anything else! I love the colors and how vivid they are. I used tropical shades of green, orange and hot pink. I never met a tropical anything that I didn't like! LOL. 

 

The 'happy' and 'birthday' dies are both part of the same new die set, also from WPlus9. I die cut them both out of black paper to contrast all that color. For the birthday word I die cut it three times and stacked the die cuts so they would pop right off the page. In this photo you can see the stacked die cuts, and also the tiny sequins I used for the accents. 

 

In process and in progress....

 

The larger stamp is so pretty and the smaller stamps coordinate perfectly!! I layered two more hibiscus blooms over the one in the center of the large image. Lots of foam tape! Yeah!

 

 

 

 

Here is a side view so you can see how it was all layered together. There's A LOT going on here! KAPOW! I used foam tape to attach everything to the card. I went back and forth on what color to use as a background... I tried white, lime green, soft yellow... And finally decided to use the aqua. Aqua is definitely my most used crafty color.

 

Doesn't this card scream ALOHA!? Makes me want to get on a plane for the islands right now! Want to come with me? Until then, we will just create tropical cards and crafts.... Sigh...

Thank you for coming along with me today on this tropical getaway! I hope you have a fabulous week! I'll be back soon with another Summer card! XOXO

 

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Our Silver Jubilee! A personal post today!

Hi there my lovely creative friends! I am writing today to share something personal. No card or project today - but I do have some photos. From time to time, as you know, I like to write from my heart and write about my life. My blog is my personal journal too, in addition to being my creative outlet. I really like to read about my favorite bloggers and their lives. I'm hoping that you will enjoy learning a bit more about me today, and something really important to me. Today I'm blogging about Mark and Wanda's Silver Jubilee Year - 2018! Yay! What is this you might ask? Well, my husband and I are celebrating 25 years together this year! Silver is the 'present' for 25 years so that's why it's our Silver Jubilee. Heck, the queen celebrates her jubilees for a whole year, why can't we? I feel strongly that this is an accomplishment worth celebrating and honoring. So that's what we're doing. 

My husband and I met on a blind date on June 4, 1993. A mutual friend introduced us and we had our first date at a local restaurant. I was worried, so I made it a lunch date so I could get back to work. LOL. Well....that lunch lasted THREE hours! I immediately knew that Mark was a good soul, a good person, a kind person. We talked and talked and talked. We had a lot in common already because of our jobs at that time. I went back to the office and told everyone about my date! The next day a huge bouquet of red roses showed up at work... So I became the talk of the cube farm. It was wonderful. Mark is a very thoughtful man and a true romantic at heart. Back in the day there were no computers and no cell phones (gasp!) We dated the old fashioned way. We went out every Saturday night, and during the week we talked for hours and hours on the phone. I remember laying on the floor in my apartment because I didn't have a long phone cord back then. Ahhhh. Young love! We dated for 8 1/2 years before we were married in Fall of 2001. We always celebrate the date we met because we dated so long before actually getting married. We were married in a small ceremony on the beach in Cape Cod Massachusetts - a fairy tale just for us. Our wedding was perfect. 

Anniversary Roses

I believe that it is SUPER important to honor our relationship and give recognition to this accomplishment. Life is hard. Life is crazy and scary and HARD. It is hard to be married in this day and age, don't you think? There is so much stress and bad influences, and bad things that can break a couple apart. So the fact that we are still here, respecting and loving each other after 25 years is sort of a miracle. I give credit to God for being part of our marriage and for being the force that binds us at the core. We have been through a lot in 25 years.... Good and bad. In the good category, we've been on some awesome vacations together, we bought our house and have lived here 17 years, we were mom and dad to the greatest cat ever, we learn and laugh together, we have built a life together with a tight bond. We've been poor, not so poor, really poor... But it never mattered. In the not so good category, three of our four parents have died in that time, we've been through many moves, many jobs, illness, grief, drama, disappointments, tears... For five years we even lived in different cities because of my career. But we made it! Now we're growing old together and beginning a new chapter of life. 

We made it through so much! I'm proud of us. We stay together, we love each other, we protect each other. We still laugh together and there's no one I would rather hang out with in the entire world. No one. We are far from perfect, but we are US. I'm very blessed indeed. Mark is the only person in my entire life to stick up for me, and I know without question he would lay down his life for mine. If you are lucky enough to have one person in your life like that you are a lucky person. I'm sure some of you have noticed that I never talk about my family. There's a reason for that and it's because all of that is just pain. Maybe some day I'll share about that. God sent Mark to me to be my family. I'm certain of it. HE provides us what we need. Mark lets me be me, and loves me even though I'm quite quirky! What an abundant blessing. I thank God every day. 

The past few years for me have been very hard. VERY hard. I've dealt with a lot of loss and really hurtful things, and it seemed like the bad stuff just kept coming. I felt like one of those bozo punching characters that we used to have as a kid. As soon as I righted myself, something else would happen and punch me back down. I really couldn't even catch my breath. People really hurt me. Things happened. Things I felt I didn't deserve and things that made me REALLY sad. I went to therapy for a while, and did some work and read my Bible and other books every day... I feel like I'm coming back around. Day by Day right?  I don't want to get way off track with this post, but it's important to me to say something, lest anyone think my life is all pretty pictures and water color paints. It isn't. Truly. My love of Jesus and my faith in what is meant to be is literally the only thing that keeps me afloat. And my loving best friend husband. Most days I am a hot mess. But some days I think to myself "you go girl" and I keep trucking along. So, because life is dirty and messy and hard, I think it's extra important to honor the happy things - like my marriage. That's how our Silver Jubilee came about. Let's celebrate something positive! Don't any of you for one minute compare yourself to anyone else. You are without rival. You were created perfectly to be you, because the world needs you and your specific unique combination of qualities. Social media can make us doubt ourselves and I hate that. This topic comes up a lot with my creative (and sensitive) friends. Encourage someone if you can. Tell people they matter to you before it's too late. Do your art and don't care if anyone likes it. Dye your hair blue and don't care. Share something wonderful and don't worry about the haters. Life is a miracle and it's too damn short. 

For our Silver Jubilee celebrations we are doing a bunch of fun things! On our anniversary date last week I received beautiful roses (photo above) and we exchanged pretty cards. Then we went out for a nice meal together and we talked about our history. We made up a secret 25 year handshake too. LOL. We are going to plant a tree in our front yard to be our 25 year tree. We'll be picking that out soon! A Japanese Maple - our favorite tree. In the Fall I think we are going to take a long road trip up the coast through Oregon and Washington which will be really fun. We haven't been on vacation in a long time. And, I received a very meaningful and thoughtful gift from Mark this week. A silver heart charm with our names and 25 engraved on it. Silver Jubilee continues! You know I love taking pictures of things..so here are some pictures of my present. It's so shiny and perfect. Good things come in blue boxes for sure. 

 

 

Thanks for reading my story of the most important thing to me (besides my faith). You are all always so supportive of me and I'm grateful for that. It feels good to write about and honor us. The world is so crazy. Sometimes I want to be connected and real and talk about meaningful special people and things. It's been fun celebrating with the hubs the past few months. Talking about our relationship is making us closer these days. I would love to hear about YOUR love stories! Will you please leave me a comment and tell me how you fell in love? What keeps you together? How many years have you celebrated? Do you have a special tradition with your spouse? Please share! Let's talk about love. Tell your person you love them. Tell them what they mean to you today. I'll be back with a card soon! XOXOXO 

Sweet Life - Watercolor Apple Card!

Greetings crafty friends! What are you up to this week!? Are you getting crafty?? Are you doing the 30 Day Marker Challenge?? I'm trying to color every day....but alas I'm not making it every day! The goal for me is to try new things or to try to improve my skills. Oh, and I'm also using some of my older stamps from my stash. Now that my studio is clean and organized I'm circling back to the things I really love, and some older stamps I never got around to using. It feels good. 

Today's technique is watercoloring! I stamped the apple image four times and colored it four times, getting better with each attempt at blending my colors. Then I chose one of the colored images to make into a clean and simple card! The stamp set I used today is an older stamp set from Close To My Heart. It's not available any more, but I did see several on Ebay if you're interested! It's called Sweet Life! All my other supplies are listed at the bottom of my post.  

 

 

The card base is A2 and made from Woodgrain paper. I love the texture of the wood combined with the texture of the watercolor paper. The watercolor paper (image) layer was die cut with some new dies I just got! A cool twist on a stitched edge! These are from Memory Box. I attached the top panel to the card using foam tape, and tied on a simple twine bow. Really classic and clean layout. I used my MIjello Mission Gold watercolor set. I LOVE them!!

 

For the leaves I used two shades of green watercolors and then a bit of a teal color too. I'm really learning and concentrating on leaving white space in my watercoloring. That is the key to getting that nice flowing effect (at least for me)! In this photo you can also see how I outlined the edge with aqua blue watercolor paint. This is a super fun technique that can take your project to the next level. To get this border effect, first make sure that your main image is completely dry (I used my heat tool when I watercolor). Then take a paint brush and, with clean water paint around the image. Then take a tiny bit of color and add it to the water already on your paper....and let it spread out. Let it be for a minute because it truly looks much different after it dries! Repeat this process around the entire image.

 

To color the apple I used two different shades of red and one shade of rich yellow. I finally got the shine effect I was going for! I left the center of the apple completely white/plain paper until the very end of the coloring. Then I added the tiniest bit of color. I was finally happy with how this one came out. I stamped the sentiment after everything was completely dry. 

 

I love using the Prima 8x8 watercolor block to paint on. It's the perfect size to give some room to color but not too big to have to be cut down. Coloring on a block keeps your paper from warping also. I have every size of these Prima pads!! 

 

 

 

A side view of the finished card showing the layout! 

Thanks for coming by today! I hope that you will try something new or get out some old stamps and have fun playing! Creative play is so important to me and it truly enriches my life! Have a wonderful day everyone! XOXO

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Ellen Hutson New Release - Chasing Coffee & Dreams with the City Lady!

Hi everyone! Happy Sunday! Hope you're enjoying a lovely Summer weekend! Our weather here is perfection right now and we've been enjoying being out and about - especially at night. I love being outside in the cool evenings of Summer. One of the great joys in life I think! I did my State Fair judging gig on Thursday all day and that was a super cool experience. It seemed like a lot of pressure but so fun at the same time. The other judges were so kind and so interesting. It was very neat to be 'behind the scenes' to see how everything works. Looking forward to attending the awards ceremony once the Fair starts in July! 

Today I have something REALLY fabulous to share with you! I'm excited to help launch the brand new stamps and dies release from Ellen Hutson! I adore the "Leading Ladies" Collection of stamps from Ellen Hutson and this release has three new ones! Yippppeeeee! Immediately I neeeeded City Lady - because she is ME! Lol. This card today is entirely autobiographical! Even down to her outfit and the sentiment. What a joy to create this card! Don't you love it when new stamps speak to you? I used paper piecing, and Copic Coloring and lots of layers.... The new release is all available NOW! CLICK HERE to see it all, or find my links at the bottom of my post. {smile} This is me....Chasing dreams and coffee! 

 

This card started with a bright white A2 card base. Then I layered some red cardstock and then one more white layer die cut with a stitched rectangle. Red and white is so crisp for Summer. I actually have about four red/white striped shirts! (I love wearing stripes in the Summer and have tons of shirts like that!!) Her shirt was paper pieced with patterned paper. The wrapper on the flowers was also paper pieced with kraft cardstock. Everything else is colored with Copic Markers. 

 

I stamped and die cut out all the fun images and accessories first. Then I colored everything in with markers. I used a relatively simple color palette to keep the project uniform. The shopping bag pattern was made using the new Pattern Play stamp set that is also launching today!! I masked off the edges of the shopping bag and then stamped the symbols inside. 

 

Here is my go-to color palette for coloring denim and jeans! It's very easy to get a worn denim look! I used these four shades to color and shade... Then I used the Colorless Blender pen to take away the color in the center! I think it really looks like denim! 

 

Close up of those denim blues....

 

This is the PERFECT sentiment for me! That's my life... If you follow me on Instagram you know how much I love COFFEEEEE!

 

 

I made her shoes red to match her outfit!

 

All the elements were attached to the card front using foam tape. The top white layer is also attached to the card with foam tape. (be right back while I go buy stock in 3M...) LOL. I use a lot of foam tape!

 

 

Thank you so so much for popping in today! The rest of the month is pretty quiet for me creatively...I'll have to think of something! Are you participating in the 30 Day Coloring Challenge? I've been trying my best to color each day! XOXO

 

CLICK HERE TO SHOP THE NEW ESSENTIALS BY ELLEN RELEASE! 

 

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Honey Bee Stamps - Ladybug Hugs!

Hello my sweet crafty pals! How's your week going? It's been a great week so far here in California! The weather turned a bit cooler yesterday, and I'm still thinking of my really fun weekend full of both personal and work activities. The Hero Arts Kit sold out quick this time. (Monday's post) I hope if you wanted one that you got one!! I had a sneaky feeling that one was going to go fast.

I'm suuuuuper excited about what I'm doing tomorrow!! This year I am one of the judges for the California State Fair! I'll be judging the Paper Crafting Divisions along with my fellow judges all day tomorrow. I am seriously so excited about this awesome opportunity. I can't wait to see all the entries! There are four categories: Card Making, Scrapbooking, Origami, and Other paper crafts. I will try to share some Instagram stories from the fairgrounds tomorrow once I find out if it's okay. Yippeeee! Totally the highlight of the Summer for sure. 

Today's card makes me SMILE from ear to ear! You already know that I {heart} Honey Bee Stamps! And their new ladybugs stamps are seriously the cutest. The stamp set is called Little Ladies! They are big and chunky and fun to color. The little faces are separate stamps so you can choose the expression for your ladybugs! I adore the one with the big red lips!! And the sentiments...Don't even get me started. Ladybug Hugs??? Are you kidding me? 

 

Here's a side view so you can see all the layers and the shine on the ladybug spots. I used mini wobbles to attach the ladybugs to the card. More on that later! I started with an A2 card base and then layered Doodlebug Gingham Paper, Red Cardstock and then another white layer. I used a few different stamp and die sets for the flowers, leaves and ladybugs. Info on supplies at the bottom of my post. I stamped and die cut everything out first.... Then I used Copic Markers to color everything. For the green leaves, I used green cardstock and then I inked the edges with Twisted Citron Distress Ink and a sponge dauber. A white gel pen was used to add highlights over the coloring. 

 

I used Glossy Accents to make the spots very shiny and slightly raised. I used a few different shades of reds to color the girls. I didn't use black for the 'black' parts - but rather darker shades of cool greys. I think this looks a bit less intense and vivid. I almost always use dark grey to color black objects. In this pic you can see those ladies popping up off the card!

 

Those lips, right???? EEP. 

 

I love the sentiments set - It's called Love Bug. All the words are separate so you can choose your perfect sentiment. I chose this because I loved it, but also because these words fit right into the space I had for words. The flowers, leaves and heart were all attached to the card with foam tape. 

 

I used Mini Action Wobbles underneath both of the ladybugs. These are cool little things that attach one side to the card and one side to your object and then there is a tiny plastic spring in between...so you get a wobble!!!

 

Here you can see the plastic spring mechanism! These are so easy to use. They go flat for mailing and then pop back up!

 

It's not easy trying to get an action shot!! LOL. 

 

 

 

Here's a close up of the flowers and leaves.

 

 

 

 

So, my little ladybugs, that's it for me today! I truly hope this card made you smile too! I want to put ladybugs on everything now! Have a wonderful, happy and blessed day! I'll see you soon! XOXOXO

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My Monthly Hero - June 2018 Card Kit - Beside the Sea!

Welcome to the Hero Arts "My Monthly Hero - June 2018 Blog Hop!" Happy June and Happy Summer! It's a special day today at our house - the hubs and I are celebrating 25 years together today! We celebrate the anniversary of our first date as well as our wedding anniversary! SO....YAY US! I'll probably write more about that later in the week or next week, but today there is a lot to cover with the new Hero Arts Kit! It's all about the beach!  

I'm happy to be here with you today launching the newest, greatest card kit from Hero Arts! This month's kit has ink pads, and cool layering stamps, and matching dies, and sand! SO much good stuff. I hope you find some (many) things to inspire you. I have two cards to share today! One was made with the main kit, and the other one I made with some of the fun add-ons.  

You may have arrived here from Nichol's awesome blog!! If you want to start at the beginning of the hop CLICK HERE to go to the Hero Arts Blog! As always, lots of fun and inspiration for you today from my awesome fellow bloggers! I'm always grateful to be included in the Hero Arts lineup! If you're new to my blog today - welcome. Enjoy the hop today! I will always warn you, these kits sell out VERY FAST.   (usually the first day) so if you like it, don't hesitate! I know I say that every time, but it's true! Get it while you can! They are such a great value! Each kit is $34.99 and the value is double that, at least. Enjoy the hop today! Get your kit while they last! 

My first card is a pretty, and tranquil beach scene that I wish I could walk right into! I used the beautiful Beach Frame Fancy Die (an add-on) and the stamps from the main kit to create this ocean dream... I also used the sand that comes with the main kit - too fun! The sentiment is PERFECT! Because the beach is my happy place! 

 

 

I started with an aqua A2 card base. Next I die cut the beautiful Beach Frame from crisp white paper. I used that as the template for stamping the ocean, beach, clouds and seaqulls. All of the stamping was done on a smaller white layer to go behind the frame. 

 

I affixed the sand to the die cut using some clear glue (whatever you have on hand will work) and let that dry. I heat embossed the sentiment in white embossing powder onto black cardstock. I stamped and die cut some yellow and pink starfish! I added pearls later. I always think that ocean cards need pearls! 

 

Isn't that die cut so pretty!? So intricate. I love the leaves around the top. It cut out like a dream, too. 

 

When I attached the top layer, I used foam tape to give a bit of space between the two layers. I think that looks nicer than putting them together. 

 

My next card was made with two of the add-on die stamp sets: Seas the Day Seagulls and You & Me By The Sea! All of the stamp sets and add-ons work so well together! I made a happy and kinda cute card with some seagulls and some fishies! Had fun coloring with Copic Markers and added lots of sparkly Stickles! I think the seagulls are super fab in their jaunty hat and scarf! LOL. Everything is colored with Copics. 

 

 

I started with an A2 white card base and layered some stripes paper. Then a layer of white and a white circle die cut. I stamped the waves on the bottom half of the flat layer and added Stickles. I set that aside to dry and worked on the other images. I stamped, die cut and colored the fish, seagulls, shells, clouds and wood pieces. They were all arranged and layered onto the card using foam tape. 

 

I put the little fishies into the waves like they are just swimming on by... 

 

 

 

Here's a side view so you can see how I layered everything! 

The new kit is available NOW! Yippeeeee! Below is a photo of THE ENTIRE MAIN CARD KIT CONTENTS. This is a great value for $34.99! Hero Arts is VERY generous with their beautiful kits! The other supplies I used are listed below in my links!  

MAIN CARD KIT CONTENTS! 

PRIZE ALERT!! Hero Arts is giving away one kit as a prize to one blog reader – selected from the comments across all of the blogs in the hop. Giveaway closes June 10th at midnight, and the winner will be announced the following week on the Hero Arts Blog. If you've already purchased your kit, and you win, you will be reimbursed. So be sure to leave a comment at each stop on the hop!

 

This kit is available for a limited time only - once it's gone, it's gone! Kits begin shipping from Hero Arts on Friday, June 8th. These kits have a habit of selling out fast! So don't wait if you like this one. I have a sneaking suspicion this one will sell out! 

 

Next up on the blog hop is my sweet and talented friend Amy T! The full hop list is at the bottom of my post. Have fun hopping and have a happy, creative day! XOXO When you make something with your new card kit, be sure to use the hashtag #mymonthlyhero on your social media! TO START AT THE BEGINNING OF THE HOP - CLICK HERE! Thanks for stopping by today!

 

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