Bordering on Romance ~ Summer Mini

I love my job as a Stampin' Up demonstrator one of the great things is being able to pre-order all of the new products a month before catalogue releases. Bordering on Romance is featured in the new summer Mini & is one of the first sets I ordered.

Accents are a quick and easy way to give any project a bit of extra panache. This versatile five-piece set coordinates with our nostalgiac Twitterpated product suite, Adorning Accents Edgelits Dies, and Adorning Accents Textured Impressions Folders.

This card uses

Cardstock

Whisper white

Crumb Cake

Poppy Parade

Tangerine Tango

Ink

Whisper white Craft ink

Stampin' Write markers

Pear Pizzazz

Stamps

Bordering on Romance

Tiny Tags

Tools

Paper snips

Heat Gun

White Embossing Powder

Jewelry tag punch

Embellishments

Basic Rhinestones

Victoria Lace ribbon

All of the above products are available to order through me from Stampin' Up

Keeping it Fresh

I have been using the same papers for a few weeks now, so I have become very conscious of keeping my daily projects fresh & trying not to get caught in a colour trap, something we are all guilty of, if you look back at my blog in the couple of months before Christmas over the last couple of years and I am definitely guilty of having favourite colour combinations.

Card Recipe
Cardstock
Whisper White

Cherry Cobbler

Old Olive
Ink
Wild Wasabi

Calypso Coral

Stampin' Write pens 
Stamps
Just Believe

Happiest Birthday Wishes ~ Hostess

Tiny Tags stamp set

Tools
Itty Bitty Shapes Punch pack

Paper Piercing Tool

Mat Pack

Stamp A Ma Jig

Jewelry Tag Punch

Bird Builder Punch

Scallop Trim Border

Papers

Everyday Enchantment ~ Sale-a-Bration papers

First Edition Speciality papers
Embellishments
Stampin' Dimensionals 

Basic Pearls

Silver mini Brads

Christmas wreaths

I have so many Christmas wreaths over the last couple of weeks I have absolutely no idea what I will put on my front door this year, When I was looking through a Christmas magazine in the shop yesterday i even saw an Eco wreath that was made out of sprouts, Not that I fancy one of those.

The wreath on these cards is from the Welcome Christmas stamp set, stamped whole it is a wreath but if you only stamp half of it across the top of the card then it makes a garland swag.

 A fake bow is a great way of adding texture to a card, by making a fake bow you use a lot less ribbon, but make sure if you are putting any kind of embellishment on a card that you take it to the post office to make sure that it fits through the slot & has the correct postage on it.

I always use fake bows on my cards, I can tie a bow but i'm never happy with it and always find the it sticks up at the wrong angle, I do also have a bow maker which does work, but is not very economical with the amount of ribbon you need, hence you wont ever see a hand tied bow on one of my cards.

Happy crafting until next time

Last nights Stampers 6

Last night was the final meeting of our current stampers 6 group. So we made three cards inspired by a workshop that Monica shared on her blog a few weeks ago.

The card above Was the original inspiration for the card set that we made I just love the real red & the crumb cake together, I chose confetti white for the mat, I love the confetti white for this style of card as it isn't such a bright white as the whisper white & the little confetti flecks just add a little something..

 This was the last card that we made during the evening so some of the ladies took theirs home to finish, I am mindful of time with this group as two of my ladies travel for around 50 minutes to get to me & yesterday was a very foggy day here in Easy Anglia. We usually make just two projects but we did manage to squeeze in a third last night.

As the ladies were colouring the little bird from Beautiful season, they decided they would mount their panel up slightly differently to my original sample, I love it when they add their own twist to their cards.

This card uses stamps from; Beautiful season, Serene Snowflakes  & Heard from the heart.

 Here is the first card that we made a nice simple card that would be relatively easy to mass produce, I know some people make batches of each design of card, I personally like to make one or two of each design. The card is the zig zag style card again in Real Red & Crumb Cake. The snowflake baubles are so sweet. The card is nicely glittered but thats not very clear in the pictures.

And lastly everyone's favourite Dasher, you can see from the second image that the snowy hill that dasher is standing on is torn from a white piece of card, the whisper white works better for this than the confetti white, on the rough edge of the tear we added dazzling diamonds with 2 way glue pen, this is great as it goes on blue so you can see where you've added the glue & dries clear.
We had a lovely evening & were spoilt with a beautiful sugar free fruit cake from Veronica who was the hostess & scrummy little chocolate tarts that Marie bought with her from Steph, Thank you ladies.

I plan to start another Stampers 6 group in January, if you are interested I will post further details later.

Many thanks ladies for a lovely 7 months

On countdown to the new Mini catalogue

Just adding the last couple of cards made yesterday before I start to upload the samples made from the Yummy new stash from the Mini catalogue that goes live on Friday.


The first card is from a dusty stamp set that I've not used for a while called Fresh Cuts with the addition of some mini tags stamped from the Tint tags set that I also haven't used in a while.


Card 1

Cardstock
Whisper White
Chocolate Chip


Ink
Wild wasabi
Basic Grey
Soft Suede
baja Breeze
Asstd Stampin Write pens


Tools
Blender Pen
Scallop trim border punch
Jewelery tag medium
Colour Spritzer tool


Pretties
Linen thread


Stamps
Fresh Cuts
Tiny Tags




Card 2

Cardstock
Baja Breeze
Whisper White
Poppy Parade
So saffron


Ink
Blushing Bride
Versamark


Tools
Butterfly punch
Large tag punch
1" circle punch
1/2" circle punch


Stamps
Butterfly prints
En Francais
Medallion


Pretties
White embossing Powder
Dazzling Diamonds
Basic Rhinestones
1/2" Blushing Bride stitched poly Ribbon


Not long to go now until the new mini catalogue, Check back on Friday 1st April, this not not a fools day joke, but you would be a fool to miss the unveiling of the new catalogue.

Circle Circus

I still have the in colour capsule collection out on my desk so I thought I would Make use of them for these Circle Circus cards.

Cardstock
Whisper White
Daffodil delight
Concord crush
Poppy Parade


Inks Card 1
Pear Pizzazz
Peach Parfait
Poppy parade
Daffodil delight

Inks Card 2
Pear Pizzazz
Blushing Bride
Poppy Parade
Concord Crush


Tools
Stampin Dimensionals
1 3/4" circle punch
1 3/8" circle punch
1" circle punch


Stamps
Circle circus

Tiny Tags

All of the above products are available to purchase through me as a Creative coach for Stampin' Up. Contact me about business opportunities. 

Happy Valentines day ~ Twisted Easel card

Happy Valentines  Day I wish you a day of love & hugs.
I have DH home with me this morning as sadly he is working a late shift today, which incidently he only does once in a blue moon, I think I need to give him some lessons in the value of forward planning!!


This was my first attempt at a twisted easel card, Monica has featured a couple on her blog over the last couple of weeks so I thought I would try it for myself.
The papers are from the Love Letters collection by Stampin' Up

 Close up of the embellishment which is stamped using the circle stamp from Artistic Etchings stamped 6 times & cut out using the scallop circle punch. Before assembling I used a sponge dauber & tinted the flowers using Pink pirouette. Scrunch all of the layers up & layer up, gluing only the centre of each layer. The centre is then decorated with the self adhesive pearls.

Everything used in this project is available from Stampin' Up through me as a creative coach, please contact me for further information on products, parties, workshops or business opportunities.

Making time to blog surf

I'm having a kinda couch potato day today, I did have plans to clean the house from top to bottom in preparation for the Christmas decorations this coming weekend but I came home from work feeling kinda yucky, not ill but really yuck maybe my bodies way of saying " hey slow down there are still 23 days left until Christmas you don't need to complete everything in the next 48 hours".

So after completing the essential household tasks, today is a couch day & whilst sitting here I have come across some new blogs that weren't in my list. 

The first is Amanda's blog The craft spa where I found the most adorable little Christmas pudding table favours, now I have already made the Christmas day favours so I thought maybe Boxing day for these little beauties. So I hot footed it into my craft room to try making my own Christmas puddings. I am not good without instructions but these were surprisingly easy.

1. Soft suede card 10cm square

2. Scored at 3cm in on all four sides.

3. Cut a line into the creased line, one on each corner to make the flap ( dont cut them off completely )

4. Glue each flap & hold in place with a mini bulldog clip until dry.

This is the little box part of the Christmas pudding holder, ready to decorate.

5. Cut 2  x 13/4" circles from the soft suede, these will be the Christmas puddings.

6. Using a scrap piece of card punch assorted holes using the crop o dile, 1/4" circle, & 1/2" circle randomly but not adjoining.

7. Using the punched piece of card as a stencil take a sponge dauber & Chocolate chip ink pad & dab through the holes  on the two pudding shapes to make them look fruity, this can be repeated using a different colour.

8. From Whisper White card cut 2 scalloped circles & stick to the top of the Christmas puddings to make the dripping icing & trim. The bottom of the puddings will need to be trimmed to a straight edge.

9. Using a Two way glue pen & some Dazzling diamonds i glittered the edge of the icing, this is personal choice I love glitter with everything.

10. The holly berry is punched from real red card stock using 1/2" circle punch, cut one for each pudding.

11. The Holly Leaves are Old olive cards tock cut 4 small ovals from the card & using the small  heart punch using just the very top of the heart nip the pieces off the small oval to shape the Holly leaves.

12. Using real red ink pad stamp the Merry from the tint tags set onto Very vanilla card & punch with the Jewellery tag punch.

13. Assemble the holly at the top of the Christmas pudding & stick a pudding on the front 7 back of the small box.

14. The box is now ready to fill with a Lindor ball or a ferro Rocher chocolate.

The next site that I found is an Origami site which I have seen before but never ever attempted to make anything from, If you know me personally you'll know that I don't do Fiddly & I really struggle with anything that needs to be measured precisely.

But I decided to have a go at the Christmas tree that Alice showed me how to make the other day.

The Tree

The tree is folded from some of the papers from the Simply scrappin kit called Christmas Jingle, I have now made about 10 different projects from that kit & still have a whole load of the papers & stickers left, I cannot believe just how far those kits go.

The card is made up from a Crumb cake base, the matt on the card is whisper white & a piece of the patterned paper from the Scrappin kit again & the eyelet border punch.

The stamped swirls on the card are using the beautiful swirl from the season of Joy set, stamped in Versamark, heat n stick powder & Dazzling diamonds.

The Tree decorations are the spiky flower from the boho blossoms punch with little nicks cut between the petals to get the star effect. 

Tombow glue dotted in the middle & then dipped in Dazzling Diamonds.

The final site that really caught my eye I found by accident in pursuit of the instructions for the folded Christmas tree in the previous card I found Lydia's blog ( well at least I think that's her name ).

From the blog understandtheblue

Check out some of her cool ideas, would you have thought to use printed petals to make thanksgiving turkey his tail feathers? No & neither would I.

On this blog I found another kind of folded tree card so I thought I would give that one a try. Please check out understandtheblue blog for tutorial on this card.

I know the tree is wonky, it moved after I had glued it down, I did weigh it down with a paper punch, which must have moved it before it dried.

What a cute & simple card if you need a card to mass produce, maybe this is the one. The bird is made from the wing of the bird on a branch punch & one of the basic pearls for his eye.

It's day 8 of the snow here in Norwich & despite having to go to work in the snow I am still loving it

Whatever your doing today take care & stay warm.

XX

My stampers 10 Ladies

My lovely stampers 10 ladies are so creative.
Last month when we met I set them a challenge to make a Christmas item that was NOT a greetings card, It had to be 3D & of course it had to contain a Stampin' Up product & not just Tombow glue.
On offer was a £15 Stampin' Up voucher to spend with me, so basically if you rise to my challenge your name goes into the draw for the voucher.


Lucy was inspired by Monica to make this beautiful pendant, she realised after she had made it that I had specified it must be a Christmas item, so creatively she made a 3D stand of a Christmas tree.

By Lucy

Lucy used Occasionally ( Retired ) Tiny Tags set & True Friend ( Retired ) The pendant is made from a domino.


Kate made the cutest snowman, can you guess what she is made from?

By Kate

Did you guess? The body of the snowman Is a children's white glove, her face is a polystyrene ball, the buttons are punched with the triple flower punch ( Retired ) with a brad through the middle, the nose is an orange pencil lead. The Stampin' Up item in this project is the 3D tree that the snowman is holding made from the A Holly, Jolly Christmas set ( Retired ).

Well done Kate that is lovely, How any are you making for Christmas?

By Alice

Alice made this tree decoration using an origami fold that she taught me, she made me a layer & I have searched for it all day, but I think I remember how you make it, Alice used Certainly celery ribbon to Hang her tree up with.


Thank you to all that took part, The winner of the £15 voucher was Kate, chosen at random during the evening.


Well done kate

Fine flourish

In the new mini catalogue Stampin' Up have released a range of smaller background stamps, one of which is Fine flourish.


If you look very carefully you can see that the die cut butterfly is cut from a stamped panel of the fine flourish stamp.

Stamp
Fine Flourish 115709
Tiny Tags 118091
Cardstock
Old olive
Basic black
Bravo Burgundy
Very vanilla
Elegant eggplant
Inks
Old Olive
Coloured with Stampin' Write markers
Decoration
Linen thread
Earth elements buttons



All of the above products are from Stampin' Up and are available to purchase through me.