Tyson's Birthday Card

This card was made for the cutest 4 year old I know, my friend, Kelley's son, Tyson (his sister is Trinity, who I made the Lalaloopsy stuff for). Kelley's mom watches my son and Tyson is his little buddy. His birthday was Pittsburgh Pirates themed, so I knew I had to make a baseball card! The DSP is miscellaneous Stampin' Up from my scraps bag. I made the baseball by cutting a circle out with the Coluzzle. I then used the same size circle and my bone folder to trace where I wanted the stitching to go. I drew little "v's" over the scored line with Bravo Burgandy and then sponged it with Close to Cocoa to give it a worn look. All of the other pieces of the card are also sponged. The flag was made on the computer and then cut out. I punched two holes for the toothpick to fit through and adhered it to the card base. The baseball was adhered using dimensionals.

Lalaloopsy Birthday Party

Today I'm going to share something other than a card. My friend's daughter had a Lalaloopsy birthday party in April. I had never even heard of Lalaloopsy until I met her. They are these really cute little dolls with button eyes. I found this wreath idea on Pinterest and just had to make her a Lalaloopsy one for her birthday. It was super simple to make and very impressive; and while it didn't take a lot of ribbon, it took a lot of cutting and even more time! I lost count at 500 strips of ribbon and it took me probably about 4-5 hours (spread out over a few evenings) to make it.

I started out with a foam wreath and small pins. I used about 8 different types of ribbons in varying sizes, colors, etc. I cut several 4 inch strips of each ribbon and placed them in piles. I then made a loop from the ribbon and pinned it to the wreath. I continued doing that with 5-6 ribbon pieces until I formed a little bunch, pinning them very close to one another. I wanted the wreath to have some sort of uniformity to it, so I worked in bunches at a time and made several of the same patterns all over before starting a new pattern. Once I got most of the wreath covered I went back through and just pinned left over ribbons to fill in any gaps. I finished it off by tying Lalaloopsy dolls and buttons to the wreath using fishing line.

Since there aren't really any Lalaloopsy decorations, I offered to help her come up with some things for the party. I made the little coloring book, buttons and banner on Microsoft Word using various digital scrapbooking papers. She had Lalaloopsy dolls propped up on dolls stands with paper pom pom flowers with little buttons scattered around as the center pieces. I wish I had taken pictures because everything looked so cute! Her one relative even made a Lalaloopsy cake that looked like it belonged on a competition show! The best was a picture of Trinity laying in a big pile of her Lalaloopsy dolls that was displayed by the cake.

These are the cookies I made to bring to the party. I used food coloring to dye sugar cookie dough six different colors. Once they came out of the oven I used a baby food jar to make an imprint and a straw to make the button holes. I thought they turned out super cute!

Simple Baby Card

I made this card last year for my friend April, who's son just turned a year old! She had posted pictures of his nursery on Facebook, so I made the card to match the color scheme. The alphabet is Stampin' Up's "Big Deal Alphabet" and the letters fit pretty perfectly inside the 1 3/8 inch circle punch. I used the 1 1/2 inch circle punch for the colored cardstock behind each letter. The "a" and the "y" are raised with dimensionals.  I also scored a border around the inside using a bone folder and my paper trimmer and then hand drew then "stitching" around it. The buttons were just miscellaneous ones I had laying around and were adhered with glue dots. I finished it off with the twine wrapped twice around the front of the card.

The inside had a 3 3/4 x 5 1/4 blue border (I'm sorry I can't remember exactly which color I used, but all of the colors used are Stampin' Up) to frame the writing space which was 3 1/2 x 5. I also punched the bottom to make a slot for the gift card to go.

Look Whooo's Graduating!

I know school just started and graduation parties have come to an end, but today I'm sharing a card that I made last year for my mom to give to someone she knew who was graduating. I absolutely LOVE punch art projects and was super excited at how cute this little guy turned out!

The eyes and belly were made from various sizes of circle punches, the body and wings were made from the scalloped circle punch, the feet were the horizontal slot punch, the head was the tab punch (I can't remember it's official Stampin' Up name) and the hat was made from the curly label punch with a thin rectangle on top. I free hand cut the nose. The diploma was made by rolling up a small rectangle of cardstock and tying it off with some shiny string.

You could use this punch art owl for many different occasions: put a birthday hat on him or a balloon in his hand, have him sitting next to a pumpkin, or dress him up like Santa...the possibilities are endless!

I'm Back!...and Birthday Invitations

Well...it's been three long years since I've posted! When I decided to start posting again, I couldn't believe it had been that long!! A lot has changed in those three years. I got married in May 2011, started a new job in July 2011 and just had a baby in February 2012! I've still been stamping and making cards/invitations though. I'm really trying to grow my little business and right now they only advertising I've been doing is on Facebook where I have an album dedicated to my cards. I wanted to start blogging again so I can refer people who aren't on Facebook to it and hopefully continue to spread the word! I love mass producing...so weddings, showers, birthday parties, you name it and I can make an invite for it. Just shoot me an email and we can go over details.

For my first post back I'm going to share with you invitations I made for my friend, Shakira's, daughter's first birthday (which was today). I used digital scrapbook paper for most of it (I can't remember where I downloaded it from...I got it several months ago). The ladybug wings were created by punching a scalloped circle, drawing black spots, folding them in half and placing them over a clipart ladybug. I was really pleased with how they turned out. And how could they not be cute with that picture on the front?!

Ladybug theme

Close up of the wings

The inside

I also thought I'd share the card that I made for her. It's cased pretty much 100% off this card I found on Pinterest. I used the 1 3/8 circle punch to make the lollipop pieces and I pulled paper from my bag of scraps, so I'm not even sure which all colors I used :) The sentiment is from the Crazy for Cupcakes set.

That's all for now! I have lots of projects to share that I've made over the past three years, plus I have some I'm working on now. I'm going to aim to post 3-4 times per week, so watch out for more frequent posting!

Halloween Treats

As promised, here are the treats that I made for my fellow Directors at work! I am usually the first one in the office, so I went around to each of their offices and left all of these on their desks. I loved hearing each one of them come in...they all knew I was the Halloween elf! :)

Here is a picture of all 3 treats that I gave out.

A close up of the frappachino bottles

And the tops of the bottles

Little Ghiradelli chocolate holders made from the Top Note Die

The inside

And my favorite...the mummified Hershey's bar!

M&M Matchbooks

Hello Everyone! I'm so excited that it's Halloween week! Today's post is the first of several Halloween treats for staff at work. These M&M Matchbook's were cased from this post on SCS. I made a total of 30 to give to my Health & Fitness staff at the Y.

Stamps: Batty for You

Paper: Basic Black, Cast A Spell DSP

Ink: Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive, Elegant Eggplant

Accessories: Scalloped Circle Punch, 1 3/8 Circle Punch, 1 1/2 Circle Punch, Staples, Sponges

I ran out of M&Ms and had to use a few packs of peanut M&Ms and while they turned out okay, it was hard to get the belly band around the bigger candies.

Got a brand new stamp? Here's a tip!

As I was making some treats for my co-workers at the Y, I used my "Trick or Treat" sentiment from the Hostess set Holiday Best for the first time. I used SU markers to color directly onto the stamp and when I stamped it for the first time, it wasn't very pretty. Has this ever happened to you? Well, I have a solution! Simply take your sanding block and rub it across the stamp a few times. You'll be able to see the difference just in how the ink transfers to the stamp...and the result on paper is even more amazing.

The tag on the bottom was before sanding, and the one on top is after. Pretty cool, huh?

I am so anxious to share these and the other Halloween Treats I have made! There are 67 total (28 of one design and then 13 each of 3 other designs). I will start revealing them next Monday. My next few posts will show you a little more from the Open House! I hope you are getting lots of ideas from those pictures!

Halloween Birthday

This coming weekend I'm going to visit my friend and she asked me to make her a birthday card for her sister...who's birthday is on Halloween Day! This is what I came up with! I love this Little Boo stamp set, so I couldn't resist using him. This card is similar to this card, as the front is shorter than the back. In this case, the inside has a place to put a gift card. When it's laid flat you can see the black DSP and see the complete design. I'm going to be really sad when Halloween's over and I have to put away my Cast-A-Spell DSP. I can't wait to show you the treats I made for my co-workers and employees at work! I am going to save them for next week though, just so the secret doesn't get out :)

Stamps: Little Boo, Teeny Tiny Wishes

Paper: Pumpkin Pie, Basic Black, Old Olive, Elegant Eggplant, Whisper White, Cast-A-Spell DSP

Ink: Old Olive, Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie

Accessories: Scalloped Edge Punch, 1 inch Circle Punch, Pumpkin Pie Ribbon, Sponges

1. Score a 4 1/4 x 11 piece of Pumpkin Pie at 5 1/2 and fold on score line.

2. Cut 1/4 of an inch off of the front piece and then punch the bottom edge with the Scalloped Edge Punch. Sponge with Basic Black ink.

3. Stamp the Little Boo ghost three times, one each in Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive and Basic Black. Punch out with 1 inch circle punch. Also punch out a Pumpkin Pie and Old Olive circle with the same punch.

4. Mat a 1 1/2 x 3 3/4 piece of Elegant Eggplant to a 1 5/8 piece of Pumpkin Pie. Punch two scrap pieces of Old Olive with the Scalloped Edge Punch and cut to 3 3/4. Mat onto other layers.

5. Adhere punched circles as shown.

6. Cut a 4 1/2 x 4 piece of Basic Black and a 4 1/4 x 3 3/4 piece of DSP. Adhere to card base.

7. Adhere image layer onto DSP.

8. Tie Pumpkin Pie ribbon around front layer.

9. For the inside, cut a piece of DSP 4 1/4 x 1 7/8. Use the 1 inch circle punch to punch a half circle where the gift card can be pulled out.

10. Adhere to inside, taping only the outside three sides.

11. Stamp sentiment from Teeny Tiny Wishes.

On a different note...I wanted to show you my crazy Halloween nails. I love to get my nails done and I used to get designs all the time. To save a little money I went back to just getting one color, but for Halloween I decided to bring the fun designs back!

Isn't my nail tech talented? She does it all by hand, not airbrush! (speaking of hands, I'm not sure why my fingers look so chubby! haha) Anyway, they look even better in real life because the black has a little sparkle to it :)

More Display Boards

Here are some more of the display boards from the Open House. I hope to have a few cards to share with you in the next couple of days. I was away at a Staff Training Retreat for my "real job" at the Y, so I wasn't able to get much done since Tuesday.

Open House Punched Art

Just a quick post today to show you one of my favorite cards from the Open House. This cheerleader was created using various Stampin' Up punches and was made by Cindy Mawhinney, a very talented stamper in the StampinStone's demonstrator group. I absolutely love her scalloped circle punch hair! How cute!!

To see more cards using Punch Art, click here.

Open House Display Boards

As promised, here are a few pictures of the display boards from the Open House yesterday. Click on the images to enlarge!

Holiday Board (do any of the 3D Halloween items look familiar??)

Roberta's board--with a few of my samples too :)

Holiday Open House Pictures

Well I just got back from the Holiday Open House and it was a definite success!! There were over 50 people there, some of whom had never stamped before and just read about the event in the newspaper. I have many pictures of display boards and cards that were demo'd, so today I'm just going to show you the four demo stations. I will post a few pictures each day...wait until you see some of these display boards...there are some talented ladies in this group!

Kathy demonstrated how to make a Recessed Window Card

Roberta demonstrated the new Build A Bear stamp sets and Big Shot dies.

Sue demonstrated how to use the Shimmer Paint in various ways.

And I demonstrated the Watercolor Roses that I have been sharing with you. I saved three of the roses that I demo'd today because the result was absolutely breathtaking! I used Summer Sun, Pretty in Pink, and Regal Rose reinkers and after everything blended I had shades of orange as well, so it looks very fall like. I can't wait to make a project with them!

Another Watercolored Flower

Well I managed to crank out another card with the watercolor reinker technique that I mentioned yesterday. Of all three cards this one is my favorite. I cased the layout from a card I saw on Splitcoast (I forgot to bookmark it though...sorry).

This is the card standing...you can really see the shimmer of the flower from this angle!

And laying down to show the inside layer. It's hard to see, but the butterfly was colored with coordinating SU markers :)

And from the side

I will try to take lots of pictures tomorrow at the Open House to share with you! I also have been working on some super cute Halloween Treats for staff at work. I don't want to post them too early in case any of them read my blog :) More fun stuff to come though...

Stamps: Oval All, Fifth Avenue Floral

Paper: Pale Plum, Ballet Blue, Whisper White, Shimmery White

Ink: Whisper White, Basic Gray, Brocade Blue and Ballet Blue Reinkers

Accessories: Eyelet Border Punch, Large Oval Punch, Scalloped Oval Punch, Whisper White Ribbon, Aquapainter, Clear EP, Heat Gun, SU Markers, White Gel Pen

Watercolor Roses

This coming Saturday is the Open House that I am going to be helping with for the StampinStones demonstrator group. I first mentioned it way back in August in this post. My job in the Open House is to demo the Watercolor Rose Technique (also known as reinker watercoloring). While I really like the effect of this technique and think it is awesome to demonstrate...I am not a big fan of the Fifth Avenue Floral set! haha Coming up with samples for my table was rough! Here are two that I have done. I still have a few more flowers made up and will hopefully have another one or two samples made before then. If you haven't seen this technique, take a peek at Patty Bennett's tutorial (complete with video!). It's really easy and definitely is a WOW technique...it works great with this set, I'm just not a rosey-rose type of girl!

I used Brocade Blue and Ballet Blue reinkers for this card

And Summer Sun, Pretty in Pink, and Regal Rose reinkers for this card

It's hard to capture the shimmer of the flowers on camera, but they are beautiful in real life!