My 10 Favorite Cards From 2014

Can you believe that it is already the last day of the year? I know I can't! It seems that December and blogging don't work for me–only one blog post in December so I thought I better get another one in before 2015!

Anyway, I decided to round up my ten favorite cards to share with you. Click on each photo to be taken to the original article.

Enjoy and Happy New Year! See you in 2015.

Time To Catch Up

Wow! It's long time since I've been here! So busy this time of year with work, shopping, and prepping items for my Stamping Group which met last Friday for our last time before Christmas. I couldn't show you any of these items beforehand because it would have ruined the surprise but now I can!

I made some Tea Light Holders for each of my ladies, using both the Silver and Gold Fancy Foil Designer Vellum and the Curvy Keepsakes die. I made a different type of tea light holder in Candle, Candle, Burning Bright.

I also prepared Christmas cards for each of my ladies using the Festival of Trees stamps and punch bundle. That set is getting quite a work out this season! You can view another card using the bundle in Trimming The Trees.

Next are the two cards which we made at our stamping group on Friday night.

This first card was cased in entirety from Justin Krieger's wonderful creation. Justin's card was lovely and I just didn't want to change anything–colors, design, etc.

One thing I did do, though, was to use the digital version of the Designer Paper he chose from the Motley Monsters pack. When I read his list of materials, I was quite surprised that the Bermuda Bay star paper came from that package. Because I knew I would not use the other papers, I opted to purchase the digital version and printed it off on Whisper White card stock, a much cheaper alternative at $5.50 instead of $13.50.

The second card was cased from Stampin' Up! demonstrator Jan McQueen. I loved her card and as I had never made a shaker card before, I decided that this would be the one to try! Instead of using the muted colors of the All Is Calm paper pack, I opted for traditional Christmas colors of red and green. I had to add a few non Stampin' Up! sequins into the shaker because there were none available in the two greens or the red that I chose. The other sequins came from the Frosted Sequins pack. (My shaker card below does not have any red sequins because I didn't have any at the time I made my sample card.)

My ladies definitely had fun working on these two cards:

After completing their cards, it was time for our annual Christmas Tag Exchange! Each lady designed one tag and reproduced it for each member of the group. We lay out all our tags so they can be viewed and then we take turns describing how our tags were made and what materials (doesn't have to be from Stampin' Up!) we used to create it. This is my favorite part of our Christmas meeting!

Here are some closeups of the tags. Mine are the shaker cards after the snowflakes.

Of course, the evening would not be complete without some Christmas goodies:

And a group shot:

A fun evening was had by all!


Tea Light Holders Supplies

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Christmas Card Supplies

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Tag Supplies

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Card #1 Supplies

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Card #2 Supplies

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Star Card: Simple Sophistication

I had lots of time to daydream during my shift at Walmart today. I'm not sure if it was the weather that kept people away or what but I was able to brainstorm several card variations to create.

The card idea that I tried first is a simple little number that uses the Heated Copper Technique that I used previously to create this card:

The technique involves heating a piece of copper sheeting with a butane torch until it changes color. When doing this, the copper changes color in this order: copper, dark orange, pink, blue and finally, silver. You move the torch to different spots until you create an effect you like. After the copper cools, you can die cut and emboss it.

I thought this effect would be wonderfully different for using with the Stars Framelits.
After heating my copper piece, I die cut a star and embossed it using the Lacy Brocade embossing folder.

I wanted my star to actually be on the inside of the card but show through to the front. To achieve this, I cut out a larger star on the front of my 5.5 x 5.5" Blackberry Bliss card base.

Next, I used two star framelits together to die cut a star border from Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer Paper to sit on the card front, framing the copper star.

I adhered the copper star to the inside of the card, lining it up carefully through the star opening on the front of the card. I used Crystal Effects for a secure adhesion. I then glued the star border to the front of the card
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I stamped the sentiment, from the Festival of Trees stamp set, on some Whisper White and flagged the end. I used a sponge dauber to ink the edges with Tangerine Tango.

I adhered the banner with a glue dot and then added a smaller copper star over top. In the centre of the star I added one of the large silver sequins from the Frosted Sequins and a rhinestone which I colored with a Rich Razzleberry Blendability marker.

The card is somewhat hard to photograph but here are a few shots of it.

The card is quite simple but I think it has a sweet sophistication to it as well. What do you think?

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DON'T DELAY! The sale starts at 12:01 AM tomorrow!

Here's Hoping It's Subtle

A new card today, based on a color scheme that germinated while I was working at Walmart the other day.

Those of you who read this blog regularly know that I have a big crush on Blackberry Bliss. Well, this time I decided to use just a few hints of Blackberry Bliss so this card is my attempt at subtlety!

The structure of the card comes from the Card Challenge #163 over at Freshly Made Sketches.

I decided to rotate the sketch 90 degrees to make it a vertical orientation.

I cut a 5 x 7" card base from Soft Suede and then stamped the Dictionary stamp onto a piece of Sahara Sand using Sahara Sand ink. I used my distressing tool to rough up the edges.

I used a sponge dauber to ink the edges with both Sahara Sand and Soft Suede ink. I then adhered it to a Blackberry Bliss matte so that only a thin matte edge was seen.

I needed a paper for the bottom section of the card but none of the papers I had looked quite right so I made my own using the same technique as the card in my blog post, Creative Gathering. This time I used Soft Suede and Blackberry Bliss ink on Sahara Sand card stock.

It was just what I needed! The paper was adhered to the bottom portion of the card front. The matted piece was adhered over top of it, sandwiching some Linen Thread between it and the card base, to add a little visual interest and texture to the top of the card.

I then used the Bordering Blooms stamp set to stamp a border in Soft Suede on a strip of Sahara Sand. I inked the edges with Blackberry Bliss and adhered it across the bottom of the card front.

I used a flower punch from the now retired, Itty Bitty Shapes Punch Pack, to punch several flowers from Blackberry Bliss. These I glued in an alternating pattern across the strip. I added tiny pearls to the centres of the flowers.

I stamped a sentiment from the Bloom With Hope stamp set on the top part of the stamped matte, using Blackberry Bliss. To draw more attention to the sentiment, I added another flower to complete the card.

In retrospect, I wish I had done a couple of things differently.

First, I would not have put so many flowers on the strip itself and I would have tried to place them more randomly rather than them being so symmetrical.

Secondly, I think the Soft Suede card front needs some sort of subtle stamped texture. It just looks a little too smooth to me.

So, what do you think? Did my card turn out to be a little bit more subtle this time? Do you agree with my suggestions for improvement of the card? Let me know in the Comments below!


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Candle, Candle, Burning Bright

Hi there! It's been a bit since I've posted but I have been busy.

On the weekend, I attended the Stampin' Up! Fall Conference in Winnipeg with my upline and best friend, Charlene. There was one session on Friday evening and two on Saturday.

Friday was a "play" session where you could bring non demonstrators with hopes that they would be inspired to become a demonstrator. We got a chance to play with different tools as we moved from station to station around the room. It was a bit hectic at some stations but good fun all the same!

Saturday morning was a business session and the afternoon session was another "play" session for demonstrators only. I have some neat creations to show you from the conference but you'll have to wait until another post for those!

The rest of the weekend was spent babysitting my beautiful granddaughter. We just can't get enough of her! My mother was coming over to our house for supper to celebrate her 89th birthday so Raine was dressed up in a special dress I had bought her. Of course, I had to snap a few shots of her . . .

She was a little shy at first but she had Bunny to comfort her!

She can't resist playing on the keyboard when she comes over!

My mother really enjoyed watching Raine! I was able to snap a few candids of her.

I was hoping to get a good picture of them together but Raine was a little bit shy around her so we didn't force the issue. I did manage to catch them in a couple of pictures together with the help of people holding her!

Here's my mother with her cake and a little sidekick:

All in all, it was a pleasant get together!

The last few days, I have been preparing some cards and planning for my last stamping class before Christmas. Unfortunately, I can't show you pictures of those items yet because it would ruin the surprise! I promise I'll post those after December 5.

Tonight, after work, I got a chance to try out an idea that I had been rolling around in my mind for over a week. I wanted to use the Star Framelits to create a festive tea light holder.
This was my first attempt at a 3D item so please be kind!

I knew that I wanted to use both Gold Foil and Gold Glimmer papers but I wanted to be sure that my idea would work BEFORE cutting! I made one mock up with scrap paper and another with Whisper White before I was satisfied with my design.

I used two of the star framelits–the smallest and the third largest–to cut a template for the star shapes so that each one would be identical. Then, for each star, I cut one from gold foil and one from gold glimmer paper. I also cut four small squares of vellum, which I trimmed into pentagon shapes.

Using Crafty Owl's Box Buster (a handy online tool for calculating measurements for boxes created with the Envelope Punch Board) I got the measurements for a box that was 2 x 2 x 3/4" in size. I created the box using my Envelope Punch Board and Gold Foil. (If you have never used the Box Buster, give it a try. It is a wonderful tool for using with the Envelope Punch Board.)

I then glued the pentagon shaped pieces of vellum to one star of each of the four star pairs. I glued the Gold Glimmer stars on the inside of the box so that they would really catch the sparkle from the candle. I glued the Gold Foil stars to the outside of the box and pressed together with the Gold Glimmer stars to act like a sandwich with the box in the middle!

I was quite pleased with the way it turned out! What do you think?

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