Simply Sunday Sketch Challenge

Hi everyone,

I've never participated in a sketch challenge, but I decided to take Heather up on hers since I need to come up with card ideas for the Door Prize I'm making for our church's Women's Retreat (I'm making Assorted Card Packs).  Most everything on this card is current except for the Designer Prints paper, which has designs from a couple of years back.  However, this could easily be swapped out with current designs or even solid paper - hey, I've got a lot of this stuff and it's still beautiful to use!  Anyway, I also wanted to play with a new technique for making paper flowers from the latest issue of Stampin' Success - this is one of the best perks of being a Stampin' Up! demonstrator - getting a magazine once a month full of great ideas for cards, workshops, and more!  Anyway, here was the sketch:

And here was what I did with it:

I didn't alter the design too much except to put the greeting on the horizontal piece instead of the side.  I started with the Prints Sampler and Prints Pack, and I found a color combination in the 2009-2010 Idea Book & Catalog using Pretty In Pink, Rose Red, Barely Banana, and Close to Cocoa.  The brads are also Rose Red except for the center of the flower, which is a Very Vanilla 5/8" Neutrals Brad.  The flower itself is made out of three sizes of circles: 1", 1-3/8" (3) and 1-3/4" - snipped the edges and chalked and curled a bit.  The leaves are also from the Prints Pack in Certainly Celery.

So, along with a couple of the card ideas from the February Stamp Club, I now have 3 designs done for my card pack!  Last year I put in 12 unique cards in each pack, so if I decide to do that again, I only have 9 to go!  I love projects like this!

Hope you enjoyed this!
Peg

Punch-y Leprechaun!

Hi everyone!

I've wasted no time in changing up my blog from Valentine's to St.Paddy's - we only have a month to go as of tomorrow!  If you recall the Easel Cards I posted recently, one of them featured a leprechaun made all of punches - I had a few bravel souls who made them at my Stamp Club this weekend - including one that looked like a "Blues Brothers" version!  Hilarious!  No picture though, sorry... oops... keep forgetting  I have a blog to put them on - or maybe I was just lazy... anyway...

So I thought about using him for my March Blog Header, but scanning him in is difficult since I don't have all those fancy Photoshop tools laying around.  Then I remembered - we have punches in My Digital Studio!  Whoo hoo!  So I built him from the punch elements available in My Digital Studio, and then applied him to one of the new background papers available for downloads - Textured card stock.

Not as fancy on the side-bars this month - I may change that up later, as I'm not sure what I want to do there yet.  I'm still new to this blogging thing!  But I tell you, if I didn't have My Digital Studio, I don't know what I'd do!  It really makes it fun and easy to customize my blog.

That's it for today - hope you like my little guy!
Peg

More Valentine's Day Cards!

Earlier I posted the cards I'm giving to Jeff and the girls - today I'm showing off the creations that the girls have made to give to their grandparents!

First, Nora's pop-up card (her favorite kind of card to make):

Second, and I love this, her "Heart Explosion!" card!  She's so dramatic, she has a simple cover with just a few hearts, you open the card and "Wham!" - lotsa hearts!  Poor thing, her arm was getting sore sticking all those hearts on so I helped her out (sorry for the blurry shot - I'm not a good photographer!)

Next are the cards that Ruth made.  Ruth used to LOVE to stamp when she was little, but now her interests are more "teenage" - computer games, I-Pods/I-Tunes, movies (especially scary ones - ick!) - however, she is STILL very creative, and when I told her I wanted her to make a couple of cards for her grandparents for Valentine's Day (as they are always very generous with her about that) - she came up with some very cute designs and even went a bit "outside the box" on one of them, as you can see, with the non-traditional colors.  I loved them both!

Finally, this is the card that I'm giving to Jeff's folks and mine (same card - I know, I'm boring).  I culled a few elements from card ideas I'd seen online, and using Sending Love DSP and the new stamp set Well Scripted again, oh, and the Polka Dots impressions folder for the Big Shot, came up with what I thought was a pretty nice design.  And I was able to use some of the Red Polka-Dot grosgrain from the Holiday Mini that I still had left over.  I'm really getting into decorating the inside of the card now too - can you tell?

Anyway, that's all for now - sorry for the delay in posting but I wanted to have them all together at one time.  Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

Peg

Jamie's Graduation Card!

Hey everyone!
My cousin-in-law Jamie Kendall just finished her Bachelor's Certificate in (I think?) Fashion Design and today is her graduation bash!  Wish we could be there, but this is a busy weekend for my family and we had to say no to something - sorry Jamie!  However, I did make her this really fun card!  The outside was CASEd 100% from Elaine Schader who also posted it on the Stampin' Up! Connection.  When I looked at her website, she had CASEd it from a similar one that she saw on Splitcoaststampers !!  And so it goes!  Elaine had changed up the colors and flowers a bit, but the only thing I added was the design on the inside of the card.

The only stamping on the whole card is the sentiment on the front "WellScripted" (Occasions Mini 117072 wood-mount, 118601 clear-mount) in Old Olive and I sponged the edges of the inside card liner and the flowers in Ruby Red.  The So Saffron wide ribbon is from last year's Occasion's Mini, so it probably isn't available anymore, but those who were in my stamp club last year should have a piece of it in their stash that I gave them with their End-Of-Year Hostess gifts!  I got the idea to angle-cut the ribbon from Andrea Walford - which is another card I want to CASE sometime soon since it uses those cute Stitched Felt flowers!

Anyway, the flowers were all cut using the Birds & Blooms Sizzlit (113485) and the Little Leaves Sizzlit (114511).  The dotted background is the new Textured Impressions Folder (Occasions Mini 117335) so the Big Shot got quite a workout with this one!  I didn't show the envelope, but I did stamp that with a flower from Vintage Vogue (Occasions Mini 117690 wood, 118598 clear).

So Jamie, I'm banking on the fact that you are too busy cleaning, baking, dressing etc. for your big night to be surfing my blog today (does anyone surf my blog?  If you do, can you let me know?  I may give you some blog candy just for telling me!) and this card will still be a surprise when you get it next week.

Until later - bye for now!

Definitely Decorative Decor Elements: Fleur-de-lis Accent

I have this cute bucket that I bought on a whim from Pottery Barn years ago - I liked it because of the attached bottle opener and imagined carrying the bucket full of my husband's home-brewed beers to the screen porch on warm summer evenings... Can't say we ever did that - it seems we don't sit leisurely in the screen porch very much at all (I mean when the weather is permitting).  So I'm trying to find other uses for this bucket, but in the mean time, I spied it in the closet and thought - ah ha!  Rub-ons!  Well, none of my rub-ons were suitable, so then I thought - ah ha!  Decor Elements!

I chose the Fleur-de-lis Accent (Definitely Decorative Insert 119575 - small white) because it fit pretty well on the side and make it pretty much "non-seasonal".  A word of advice when applying Decor Elements to uneven surfaces like this one, make sure you carefully press the image into each ridge - I did both sides, and although the first side looks OK, the piece "spans" the ridges and probably won't wear as well.  We'll see.

So that's what I have to show you today!  Stay tuned, tomorrow I'll show off my daughter's very creative Valentine card using all Stampin' Up!'s heart punches!

February Club Projects - Part III - St.Paddy's Day Easel Card!

One of my favorite parts of spring is St.Patrick's Day - it means winter truly is on its way out!  My family really gets into this holiday, and when you watch them dye the Chicago River green every year, that's my cousins out there doing it!  They have a huge party and really do it up big!  However, compared to some holidays it is somewhat minor, and I find it hard to find St.Patrick's Day stamp sets that suit me.  So I was thrilled when the Occasions Mini featured a new $10 and under stamp called "Go Green" (117074)!   I was poking around on-line for ideas, and I found two ideas that I decided to combine into my St.Patrick's Day card for the Club this month.

First, I used Dawn Griffith's demonstration on how to make an Easel Card on her blog.  Very easy, and a great way to turn a greeting card into a quick decoration.  Thanks Dawn!
Second, I saw a cute idea submitted by Christi Martin for making a leprechaun out of punches from the Stampin' Connection website (you can also see her card on her blog).  I love the creative projects I've seen with punches, and decided to try this one.  It actually was easier to put together than you would think - you kind of build him from the bottom up.  Thanks Christi!
I also decided to offer a simpler version using the new Small Heart punch (117193) from the Occasions Mini.

So those are my February Club Projects!  Interested in trying these?  Contact me to get a spot in my February Club Workshop or better yet, have a Workshop of your own!  With Sale-A-Bration going on this is the perfect time!

February Club Projects - Part II - Spring Thank You Card

This card was designed the old-fashioned way (i.e., not with My Digital Studio, just playing with packs of paper and colors), and it was actually the first card I made to play with the new Scallop Trim Border punch (SAB 118402) when I pre-ordered it back in December.  At the time, I was still in the last throes of Christmas projects, and it killed me to set everything to the side until I was ready for Christmas!

This card uses the Level 1 Hostess Set "Of The Earth" (115336).  I used markers to color the image - and if you look closely you can see the that flower and the butterfly have two colors each - an effect I especially love!  The "Thanks" image is from the "Thanks" embosslit (115957) and I trimmed off the striped portion for this card.  Topped it off with a Mini Library Clip (109857) (I love these!) and there you go!  I stocked up on both sizes of the Library Clips back in December during Stampin' Up!'s Holiday sales - good deal!  This card also features a stamped "inside" and when you close the card the Very Vanilla "peeks" out through the Scallop Border Trim!  I love that!

So check back tomorrow for the third and final February project - if you like these and want to try making them contact me about reserving a seat in one of my two February Workshop dates (Sat. Feb13th or Sun. Feb14th).

By for now!

Peg