Wedding Wishes

Hi All,

This weekend we are busy having a crafting weekend...we started last night and are going into Sunday evening.  So very much fun!!!  My living room has been transformed into "Craft Central"!

I don't often get time to craft these days but love it so much more when it's with great friends!!

I'd like to take a minute to thank the gals over at Create with Connie and Mary for choosing my Father's Day card as one of their top 3!  Thank you!!  You can check out that card here.

Today I decided to play along with a couple of challenges:

1. Colour Me...!

This week the color theme is Real Red and a neutral.  I decided to switch it up a bit and went with Cherry Cobbler as I really wanted to use the Cherry Cobbler embossing powder.  I'm sure the ladies won't mind...

2. Freshly Made Sketches

I really loved this week's sketch over at Freshly Made!

Here is my creation:

Card Recipe (all products used are Stampin' Up! products unless otherwise noted):

Card Stock: Cherry Cobbler, Whisper White, Something Borrowed DSP

Stamp Sets: For The New Two

Inks: Versamark

Tools/Techniques: Embossing Powder - Cherry Cobbler, Heat Tool, Linen Thread.

Thanks for dropping by, I'm so glad you did!

Steph

Sending Love and Sympathy

Hi Everyone,

I had to create a sympathy card this week for a wonderful friend who lost her Uncle a few days ago.  As always, I took my inspiration from a few challenges:

1. Freshly Made Sketches

I really thought this week's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches was beautiful.

2. All Sorts Challenge

This is a challenge that I have never played along with before.  I look forward to being inspired by this design team more in the future.  This week's theme is "Spring Flowers" and I thought this new stamp set from Stampin' Up!'s Occasion Catalogue would be the perfect choice - it is called Love is Kindness.

Here is my card:

I decided I wanted a different sentiment than the one that was included on the Love is Kindness stamp so I fussy cut out the flowers and used the sentiment from the stamp set Love & Sympathy.

Card Recipe (all products used are Stampin' Up! products unless otherwise indicated):

Card Stock: Whisper White, Painted Blooms DSP
Stamp Sets: Love is Kindness, Love & Sympathy
Inks: Momento Tuxedo Black, Wisteria Wonder Blendabilities, Wild Wasabi Blendabilities
Tools/Techniques: 1/4" Cotton Ribbon - Whisper White

Thanks for dropping by, I really appreciate you taking the time.
Steph

Blended Butterfly

Hi Everyone!!

Well this is my second post for today - strange huh?!?!  As mentioned previously, I spent the evening crafting with a wonderful crafting buddy and we were so productive!

Last week I watched an Online Stamping Workshop given by Diane Dimach over at DDStamps.com and saw a technique that blew my mind - it was amazing.  Basically, Diane cut out one of the butterflies from the new Stampin' Up! Butterfly Thinlet Dies, stuck it to a piece of Whisper White card stock and then coloured in the negative spaces with Blendabilities.  I was just amazed and knew that I had to try it right away!!!  I could barely wait for my order to arrive last week!  So tonight was the night...

You should really take a look at Diane's gorgeous card and tutorial HERE.

As always, I decided to play along with a few challenges, they really get my mojo going!

1. Freshly Made Sketches

I loved this week's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches.  I took a little liberty with it but I think it works.

2. Hand Stamped Sentiments

This is a new challenge for me and one that I think I will have a lot of fun playing along with.   Their challenge this week was to use the colours Basic Black, Whisper White and Melon Mambo.

3. NBUS

Darnell over at DJKardKreations.com has a super fun challenge on - NBUS - which is a term she coined for "Never Before Used Schtuff".  I think it's great to start pulling out the stuff in our craft spaces that have never seen the light of day.  I used my new Butterfly Framelits and the sentiment for the card is from a new stamp set that I received last week called "Sheltering Tree".  If you have never been to Darnell's blog, you really MUST go.  She is so much fun!  I love reading her blogs, they always leave me with a smile on my face.

4. CAS-ology

This week the word of the week over at CAS-ology is NBUS - how appropriate!

Card Recipe (all products used are Stampin' Up! products unless otherwise indicated):

Card Stock: Basic Black, Whisper White
Stamp Sets: Sheltering Tree
Inks: Melon Mambo Blendabilities
Tools/Techniques: Big Shot, Butterfly Thinlets

Thanks for dropping by, I'm so glad you did.
Steph

A Maritime (or Atlantic!) Birthday

Hi Everyone!

Hope you are all having a great week!

Today I am celebrating my grandfather who just turned 81.  He lives back in Newfoundland so I thought a nautical theme would be perfect to celebrate with.  The Maritime DSP from Stampin' Up! fit the bill perfectly.

As always, I decided to play along with a couple of challenges.

1. Freshly Made Sketches

The sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches is a great one this week:

2. CAS-ology

Check out this week's cue card:

How lucky did I get???

And here is my card:

This card ended up being super tough for me to get together - to put all the pieces together in my mind. I had stamped several images, fussy cut some, used different colours but finally it came together.  Sponging was the key to this for me.  I sponged around the oval cut out of the stamped anchor image and also took some of Stampin' Up!'s Whisper White Cotton Ribbon (which I love!) and sponged it with Early Espresso ink in order to "dirty it up" a bit.

I have to thank Hayley over at Hayley's Paper Garden for all of her help today including her photographing skills - she does a much better job of capturing the images than I do!

Card Recipe (all products are Stampin' Up! unless otherwise indicated):

Card Stock: Night of Navy, Real Red, Whisper White, Maritime DSP

Stamp Sets: Dictionary, The Open Sea

Inks: Early Espresso

Tools/Techniques: Sponging, Apothecary Accents Framelits, Extra Large Oval Punch, 1/4" Cotton Ribbon - Whisper White

Thanks for dropping by, so happy you took the time!

Steph

Joy!

Hi Everyone!

This is my second post for this evening - two cards in one day is a big deal for me these days!

Amy has such a fun sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches this week that I just had to play along!

And, ofcourse, Connie & Mary had a GREAT colour combination over at Create with Connie & Mary - Cherry Cobbler, Garden Green, & Baked Brown Sugar.  This combo just screamed Christmas to me and I had been dying to use my new Wondrous Wreath stamp set and accompanying framelits.

Here is my creation:

Card Recipe (all products are Stampin' Up! unless otherwise indicated):

Card Stock: Baked Brown Sugar, Garden Green, Very Vanilla, Festival of Prints DSP Stack (retired)
Stamp Sets: Wondrous Wreath
Inks: Garden Green, Cherry Cobbler
Tools/Techniques: Wonderful Wreath Framelits

If you like what you see, please take some time to follow my blog.  If you do, please let me know so that I can return the favour!

Happy Thanksgiving to all my Canadian friends!!

Thanks for dropping by!
Steph

Make a Wish - Maritime Style

Hi Everyone,

I need to do some more blog posts so that I can get all those cards up that I made during my wonderful crafting session over the weekend - I love those with good friends and a drinky-poo or two!

I am really in love with the Maritime DSP in the new catalogue so this card really focused on that.  As always, I incorporated a couple of challenges in order to find inspiration.

1. Freshly Made Sketches

Unfortunately, my timing was a little off with this post and I missed the deadline to link up to this challenge.  But, I used their sketch for inspiration and I love it!

2. The Card Concept

I simply love this colour combination - so "Maritime" style.  I chose to do a "Clean & Layered" effect on this one - it's one of my favorite styles!

Here is my card:

Card Recipe:

Card Stock: Coastal Cabana, Real Red, Whisper White, Maritime DSP
Stamp Sets: Perfect Pennants
Inks: Basic Black, Real Red
Tools/Techniques: Basic Black Bakers Twine, Basic Metal Buttons, Banners Framelits

Thanks for dropping by!
Steph

Wedding Congrats!

Happy Monday Everyone!

I trust you all had a wonderful weekend!  I did.  I spent some time this weekend celebrating some birthdays with some very special friends.  We spent Friday night together crafting until the wee hours of the morning on Saturday.  Between the three of us, we managed to create quite a number of cards.  We also got to enjoy lots of food and some libations so it was quite fun. :)

This morning I want to thank the ladies over at Sunday Stamps as my beach themed "H is for Happy" birthday card was chosen as one of the top picks this week.  Thank ladies!  You can check out my card HERE!

The first of the cards I will be sharing with you from our crafting session on Friday night is a card I created for my Husband's cousin who will be getting married next month.  I took the inspiration from her beautiful wedding invitation.  I photographed the back so you all could have a look:

I was lucky enough that this week over at CAS - Colours and Sketches blog, the challenge was to use Perfect Plum, Elegant Eggplant and Crushed Curry.  I thought this would work perfectly with my ideas for this card.

I was also in love with this week's sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches.  The card easily came together after this...

From all of this inspiration, here is the card that I created:

To create some of the lighter colours, I simply stamped off using both the Perfect Plum and Elegant Eggplant inks.  I love how the "splatters" look using the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set from Stampin' Up! - don't you?  I think this will become one of my favs!

Card Recipe (all Stampin' Up! products):

Card Stock: Whisper White, Elegant Eggplant
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, Perfect Plum, Crushed Curry
Stamp Sets: Secret Garden, Gorgeous Grunge, Label Love
Tools/Techniques: Decorative Dots Embossing Folder, Artisan Label Punch, Stampin' Dimensionals

Thanks for dropping by!

Steph

Friend to Friend

Hi Everyone!

Well the weekend has come to an end - I hope you have all had a wonderful one.

Just stopping in with a quick post before bed.  Not sure what I am going to do now - the Olympics are over - I am sure I will start to go into withdrawal starting tonight as soon as I hit the hay!

Anyway, tonight I put together a card using the sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches.



I was in love with this sketch as soon as I saw it and knew it would be the perfect sketch to showcase Stampin' Up!'s Watercolour Wonder DSP.  I have been wanting to use this particular sheet of DSP on a card for a while but have been wracking my brain trying to think of the best way to use it as it is just so very pretty and I absolutely love the colours in it!

I have also decided to link my card up with the challenge over at The Card Concept.  Their challenge this week is to Use a Floral Theme - I think I've got that covered.

I have decided to enter my card in the Clean and Layering portion of The Card Concept challenge.

Finally here is my card, I hope you enjoy it.

Card Recipe (Stampin' Up! products only):

Card Stock:

Island Indigo, Whisper White, Water Colour Wonder DSP

Ink:

Island Indigo

Stamp Sets:

Teeny Tiny Wishes

Tools/Techniques:

Neutral Candy Dots

Thanks for dropping by!

Steph

Christmas in February?

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all had an absolutely fabulous weekend!

I have been thinking about getting a start on my Christmas Cards for some time now and have been looking at various Christmas Blog Challenges but have been having a hard time getting into the mindset of going for it.  I want winter to be over so the thought of creating a Christmas Card was kind of scary...  But today, I decided to go for it, even though I didn't use a Christmas Challenge Blog to do it! lol

I decided to use the colour theme from Colour Me...! this week.  I thought Rich Razzleberry and Pool Party would make for a very non-traditional colour combination for a Christmas card.

I also drew inspiration from this week's Freshly Made Sketches fun sketch.  

And here is my card:

At first, for the circles, I had thought about stamping and punching out particular shapes but then I decided to stamp a bunch of snowflakes in Coastal Cabana (I did not have Pool Party ink so that was as close as I could get and it matches really well) and Rich Razzleberry on Whisper White card stock.  This created my own DSP, if you will.  I then took my 1" Circle Punch and randomly punched out circles from the generated DSP.  It turned out much better than my first attempt and created a much more fun look on the card.

Card Recipe:

Card Stock:

Rich Razzleberry, Pool Party, Whisper White

Ink:

Rich Razzleberry, Coastal Cabana (I did not have Pool Part Ink so this was as close as I could get)

Stamp Sets:

Endless Wishes

Tools/Techniques:

1" Circle Punch, Rich Razzleberry 1/4" Grosgrain Ribbon

Thanks for dropping by!

Steph