Today's The Day!

I'm so excited about the NEW Occasions Catalog and Sale-A-Bration!

As a demonstrator, I got first dibs at being able to see the new catalog, order from it and play with the products.

But now, it's YOUR turn!

Starting today, you can order from the new 2016 Occasions Catalog! And, when you place your order, if it is $60 or more (before tax and shipping) you can choose a product from the Sale-A-Bration Catalog for FREE!

But that's not all!

You can act as a HOST and when your personal order or party/workshop order totals $330 or more (before tax and shipping) you receive $35 MORE in Stampin' Rewards!

You also have the option of JOINING Stampin' Up when you choose to purchase the Stampin' Up Demonstrator Starter Kit you can get $195 in product of your choice for only $125!

So what are you waiting for?

Contact me

or

Place an order yourself in the online store.

Remember to choose me as your demonstrator!

Watch for projects from me using the new products in the upcoming weeks!

My Most Popular Posts of 2015

We have come to the last day of 2015 and I look back fondly on my creative endeavors during the year! I wish you all a Happy New Year and look forward to having you visit my blog in 2016!

January–Bokeh Technique and Sneak Peek From 2015 Occasions Catalog




February–My Least Favorite Card To Create




March–Projects From Stamping Group







April–Remnants of Easter






May–Corner Garden Blues




June–2015 Catalog Launch






July–New Floor and Grateful For You




August–Best Thoughts Joy Fold Card




September–Pretty in Pink Poinsettia




October

This was a busy month for me and I didn't get to post AT ALL :( Hopefully, 2016 will allow me to post every single month!


November–Color Burst Christmas and Wonderful Wonderland






December–Tag Exchange and December Stamp Class







I hope you have enjoyed this review of my most popular posts from 2015. I look forward to your comments in 2016!

Sympathy Card Using Zig Markers

More and more, it seems, I am in need of sympathy cards. I don't keep a surplus of them because I prefer to personalize the card for the recipient.

This time, the passing was of a former stamper in our stamp group and the mother of one of our stampers. She had been ill for some time and she hadn't attended a stamping class in at least a year. She was a special, one-of-a-kind lady and will definitely be missed.

The card I designed uses images from the Open Heart Stamp Set.

The stamping of this card gave me some difficulty! Because I wanted the leaves to appear to be behind the bird, it was necessary to mask the bird after stamping it with Basic Black Archival ink on Watercolor paper.

I didn't want to have to fussy cut so instead I chose to use my Molotow 2mm Masking Pen. Unfortunately, it was dry and I had to use my 4mm one. I colored in the area of the bird that needed to be masked and then waited for it to dry. I then stamped the leaves.

It was when I tried to remove the masking that it was apparent that I hadn't fully dried the masking fluid and it ripped off part of my bird!

So I re-stamped the bird on another piece of Watercolor paper. This time I decided to use Miskit Masking Fluid. I had it in a bottle with a fine precision tip but I still had trouble applying it to the area I needed to mask. After applying I again waited for it to dry and then stamped my leaves again.

Disappointment again as my bird ripped when I tried to remove the masking. :(

Now my only option left was to fussy cut a mask. I re-stamped the bird on Watercolor paper and then on ordinary copy paper. I fussy cut the bird on the copy paper, just cutting enough for where the masking needed to be. I then used my Scotch Restickable Glue Stick to apply to the back of the bird. After allowing it to dry for about 30 seconds, I stuck it over my bird on the Watercolor paper and stamped the leaves.

Then came the critical moment–removing the mask. It was no problem this time! This is the first time that masking has worked well for me in getting my image stamped the way I need it to be!

I used my heat tool to zap the stamps to make sure they were completely dry and then proceeded to color the images with my Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers. When I was finished coloring, I stamped the sentiment.

Next, I knotted a piece of Ruffled Pool Party ribbon around the right side of the colored panel and then adhered the panel to the Pool Party card base using Dimensionals.

I'm hoping I won't need any more sympathy cards for awhile.

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Glitzy Gift Bag

The Christmas season is such a busy time that I usually don't get the opportunity to do exquisite gift wrapping or create numerous embellished gift bags to give to my friends and family.

This year, however, my work schedule at Walmart has been quite slack so I've had additional crafting time. This allowed me to create a gift bag for a good friend and crafting enabler.

Because I had already created Christmas cards for the ladies in my stamping group, I decided to match the bag to the particular card that I gave my friend.

I used my Gift Bag Punch Board to create a Medium bag (3.25" in width) by using a piece of Bermuda Bay card stock measuring a full 8.5 x 11". The 11" is necessary to make a Medium bag while the 8.5" determines the finished height of the bag, minus about 2" for the bottom bag closure.

Once the bag was punched, folded, and adhered, using Fast Fuse Adhesive, I sprayed all sides of the bag using my Heidi Swap Color Shine Spritz in Gold Lamé. I haven't quite mastered the spraying process yet! I tend to get too much spray on my projects or the drops are too big. Regardless, I think the addition of the spray really amps up the wattage on a project!

I used my heat tool to ensure that all sides were dry and then threaded a coordinating sheer ribbon through the holes I had punched in the top of the bag. I knotted the ends to form two separate handles.
Next, to match up with the Christmas card, I used sticky strip to adhere a piece of burlap ribbon completely around the bag, from one edge to the other. To cover the raw edges of the ribbon, I adhered two Metallic Foil Doilies, folded in half over the edges of the bag.

Since the card utilized snowflakes, I decided to use two of the Snowflake Elements on the bag. The top side of each snowflake was painted with Picket Fence Distress Ink and then I adhered Iced Rhinestones to the centres of each snowflake.

I adhered a folded strip of Bermuda Bay Sequin Trim behind each snowflake and then adhered the snowflakes with Dimensionals to each side of the bag where the doily met the top of the burlap ribbon.

With very few embellishments or time, I had a elegant gift bag to fill for my friend!

Though I did not take a picture of both the card and bag together, you can see below that they match quite well.

 

The Gift Bag Punch Board is ideal for creating unique bags for gifting. Have you used the Gift Bag Punch Board? Drop me a comment below with a link to your projects!

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Rustic Poinsettias

I was immediately drawn to the poinsettia on Wendy Weixler's card when I received it in my email and knew that I just had to CASE it! I thought it would make lovely Christmas cards for my stamping group and would look pretty in a number of colors.

Because I knew that I would punch petals from 3 x 7" strips of paper, I trimmed five Whisper White sheets to 7 x 9" and then used a stamp from Gorgeous Grunge to stamp over the entire sheets. I chose these colors–Real Red, Pacific Point, Strawberry Slush, Bermuda Bay, and Melon Mambo.

I trimmed each sheet into three strips and punched 8 small petals and two double petals using the Festive Flower Punch. I also punched Whisper White circles using the 3/4" Circle Punch to serve as a base for each flower.

For each petal, I folded it in half lengthwise to give it some dimension and then inked the edges with Soft Suede, using a sponge dauber. I used my glue gun to assemble each flower on its base.

I cut three mattes of each of the five colors of card stock and then used Heidi Swapp's Color Shine Spritz in Gold Lamé to spritz each one. This gave a festive look to the panels and I loved the look of the paint drops of varying sizes!

From Thick Whisper White I cut card bases and then used my heat tool to make sure all the mattes were completely dry. Next, I stamped the sentiment from the Embellished Ornaments Stamp Set on each matte and heat embossed it using Clear Stampin' Emboss Powder.

Using the Burlap ribbon, I cut lengths for each matte and then frayed the bottom edge. To make the ribbon not look quite so heavy looking, I also pulled some strands from the centre of each ribbon. I used sticky strip to attach the ribbons to each matte.

The mattes were adhered to each card base using Dimensionals and the poinsettias were adhered to the burlap ribbons, also using Dimensionals. To complete each flower, some Gold Cording Trim was threaded through a Gold Basic Metal Button and tied in a bow, and the button adhered to the flower using the glue gun.

The finishing touch for each card was to add three snowflakes from the now retired Frosted Sequins mix. However, the stark white of the snowflakes wasn't quite right so I painstakingly dipped each snowflake in glue from the Fine Tip Glue Pen and then sprinkled them with Dazzling Diamonds Glitter. Once they were completely dry, I adhered the snowflakes using the Fine Tip Glue Pen.

Close up of one of the Melon Mambo cards.

Close up of one of the Melon Mambo cards  from another angle.

I am very pleased with how these cards turned out! The poinsettias and the gold-sprayed mattes remind me of the vintage enamel ware pots and pans people used to have! Such a homey look!


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Sale-a-Bration Freebie Sneak Peek

I have a Sale-a-Bration sneak peek for you tonight!

My husband, when I first met him, was busy building a glider with his father. This was a special glider because it contained an engine allowing it to be self-propelled to soaring height rather relying on a tow plane.

Though the completed glider was sold many years ago, my husband still has an interest in flying and exercises it through remote controlled planes and helicopters.

Because of this, I thought the new stamp set, Sky Is The Limit, would be appropriate.

You will be able to earn Sky Is The Limit for FREE during Sale-a-Bration which starts January 4! You should be receiving your Sale-a-Bration brochure and Occasions Catalog this month from your demonstrator.

I chose Blackberry Bliss for a card base, knowing that would work well with the gold embossing I planned to use.

I cut a piece of vellum for a matte and embossed the top half of it using the Cloudy Day Embossing Folder. (My husband always remarks when there are puffy clouds in the sky that they are "flying clouds.") I then used Versamark to stamp the images of the plane and its cute little contrail and then heat embossed them using the Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder.

I glued the vellum matte to the top of the card base using the Fine Tip Glue Pen on just the top part of it. To cover the glue, I used the Adorning Accents Edgelits Dies to cut two pieces, one from Gold Foil paper and one from the 2014-2016 In Color DSP Stacks. These were glued together and then adhered to the top of the card front using Dimensionals.

I chose to stamp a Happy Birthday sentiment, using Blackberry Bliss, on the inside of the card on the now retired Naturals White card stock and also inked its edges with a sponge dauber.

I think this works for a masculine card, don't you?

The Sky Is The Limit stamp set will only be available for a short time when Sale-a-Bration begins so be sure to grab it before it disappears!

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Festive Color Burst Ornaments

Such a busy time of the year! I've been working on Christmas cards lately but can't show you those quite yet! In the meantime, I got a chance to use my Color Bursts again!

Ever since seeing the Delicate Ornaments Dies, I have been dying to use them with my Color Bursts! Finally got the chance and this is the result!

I started by using my Color Bursts on three separate pieces of watercolor paper. I used Yellow Ochre and Orange, Pthalo Green and Ultramarine Blue, and finally, Alizarin Crimson and Violet.

I used the method where I wet the papers first and then applied the colors, adding more water and color until I was satisfied with the results. I set them aside to dry while working on another project but then returned to them and zapped them with the heat tool to ensure they were completely dry.

I used two of the ornaments from the Delicate Ornaments Thinlits Dies and one circle from the Circles Collection Framelits to cut from each of the papers. I also cut three ornament toppers from Gold Foil paper.

I then used the Leafy Vine Embossing Folder from Taylored Expressions to emboss each ornament. To make the embossing more apparent, I sponged on Black Soot Distress Ink across each ornament and then applied to the sides to give them a bit of shape. Once this was completed, I used Distress Glaze to seal the paints and ink.

I decided to make the ornaments even more vibrant so I brushed on a coat of Crystal Effects and left them to dry overnight and then attached the toppers using the Fine Tip Glue Pen.
On a Garden Green matte I stamped the Watercolor Wash background stamp using Versamark and heat set it.

I decided on my arrangement for the ornaments and then adhered them to the matte using Dimensionals. After die cutting the sentiment, from the Wonderful Wreath Framelits Dies, from Gold Foil, I attached it to the ornaments using the Fine Tip Glue Pen.

Using my MISTI and one of the ornaments from the Embellished Ornaments Stamp Set, I stamped on the bottom right corner of a piece of the now retired Naturals White card stock in Blackberry Bliss and then also inked the edges of the matte using a sponge dauber. Fast Fuse Adhesive was used to adhere it inside the card.

Lastly, I added a few gold sequins to the front of the card using the Fine Tip Glue Pen.

So, what are your thoughts on this card? Drop me a comment below!

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog