Happy Chanukah!

A short post today.  If you're looking for my MFT Weekly Stamp Club card, please scroll down.

I made this card for a friend for the Jewish Hanukah season (a little late though).  :(   I decided to use the Papertrey Ink set called Mazel Tov. 

To keep with Jewish tradition for Hanukah/Chanukah, I made the card in blue and silver and kept the inside simple.  The Menorah is stamped twice on MFT white Perfect Panels and the background dreidel is stamped using PTI's enchanted evening ink.  Once I had the candles dry, I cut out the Menorahs, popped one up before popping up the entire Menorah panel, then added some MFT Winter Solstice ribbon.

Here's a look at the inside of the card.

Thanks for stopping by.  Have a great day and a Happy Hanukah/Chanukah!


Stamps: Papertrey Ink Mazel Tov, Damask Designs
Ink: PTI Enchanted Evening, Memento Tuxedo Black
Card Stock: MFT Perfect Panels, PTI Enchanted Evening, Stampin Up! Ballet Blue
Accessories: Silver Marker, Dimensionals, Silver Fabric Primas, Glue Dots, Silver Brads, MFT Winter Solstice Ribbon

Missing Sable

Unfortunately, I needed a sympathy card for a friend who had to put her 11 year old cat to sleep thanks to cancer.  I wanted to try a different color combo for a sympathy card, so I decided on pinks and purples for the majority of the card.  I used the flowers from Papertrey Ink's Spiral Bouquet to create the background for the layers as well as the main flowers. 

After stamping my flowers, I pulled my saying from Papertrey's With Sympathy and With Sympathy Loss Of Pet to complete my card.

Stamps: PTI With Sympathy, With Sympathy Loss Of Pet

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Almost Amethyst, Lavender Lace, Regal Rose, Sage Shadow, Certainly Celery

Cardstock: White, Stampin Up! Regal Rose, Almost Amethyst

Accessories: Prima, Pearl Sticker, Sponge, Brads

Praying For You

Happy Sunday everyone. I have a card to share today from the archives. I had considered sending it in for publication at one time, but just never did.

The card uses the Papertrey Ink set Wishing You along with Damask Designs. I had wanted a clean and simple card that could be used for sympathy or for someone that was having a hard time and just needed to know somebody else cared.

The tulip flower is stamped twice in PTI pure poppy ink on white cardstock so the flower can be popped up for added dimension with the leaves and "stalk" in PTI new leaf ink. The Damask backgrounds are also stamped in the same colors on their coordinating cardstocks. Two butterflies were added above the saying with bling bodies for a touch of whimsy before adding black mini brads for a touch of elegance.


Stamps: PTI Damask Designs, Wishing You
Cardstock: Pure Poppy, New Leaf, White
Ink: PTI Pure Poppy, New Leaf, Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Martha Stewart Butterfly Punch, Bling, Mini Glue Dots, Black Mini Brads

Butterflies With Razzelberry

Hello everyone. My second Color Throwdown and what awesome colors were chosen this week. I didn't get a chance to stamp until tonight thanks to a busy week with work, however , I knew I was going to use my All A Flutter stamps again from My Time Made Easy. I'm so in love with those stamps and razzleberry is a perfect color for a butterfly. Don't you agree?

I started by pulling out a PTI set, With Sympathy, that needed to see some ink for a non-sympathy card. I used the rose from the set in sage shadow (because I grabbed the wrong color ink and didn't realize it until now) to stamp the background on the card base, then the flourishes on the top layer in garden green with the tulips in razzleberry. After stamping the saying from the All A Flutter sayings in memento black, I stamped the butterflies in rich razzleberry with the outline in memento black before cutting out, adding and then adhering some bling stickers. I layered the butterflies to give a "in flight" look as though they were flying towards the Irish Blessing.

Stamps: PTI With Sympathy, My Time Made Easy All A Flutter, All A Flutter Sayings

Cardstock: Mellow Moss, Garden Green, Rich Razzleberry, White

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Garden Green, Rich Razzleberry, Sage Shadow

Accessories: Brads, Border Punch, Bling, Glue Dots

Owls & Bluebells

Another card from the archives. I made the card for one of the last MFT sketch challenges - MFTSC99.

I chose to use a set I had not inked up yet, but had in my stash for a while. My little owls were stamped in memento tuxedo black on MFT perfect panels and then coloring with Prismacolor markers. Stampin Up! soft sky was stippled around the owls softly to fill in the white space.

The background stamping was done using PTI's Mod Squad set with Stampin Up! tempting turquoise and apricot appeal ink. The small flowers are the trio flower punch also from Stampin Up!

Here is a close up of the owls.









Stamps: PTI Mod Squad, MFT Owls & Bluebells Cardstock: Stampin Up! Tempting Turquoise, Apricot Appeal, Certainly Celery, MFT Perfect Panels
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Stampin Up! Tempting Turquoise, Apricot Appeal, MFT Perfect Panels
Accessories: Ribbon Bow, Glue Dots, Flower Punch, Bling, Prismacolor Markers, Baby Brads, Stipple Brushes

Christmas Present Wrap-Ups

Happy Saturday! Have you ever had a hard time hiding something from your daughter/son under the Christmas tree? Well I have. However, last year my daughter had NO idea what was under the tree for her since I used two My Timeless Templates to "wrap" two of her presents.

For the present on the left, I used the My Timeless Template Music Makeover to hide a Jonas Brothers CD my daughter really, really, really wanted. I set the template to print full page on the printer since I wanted the CD inside the template instead of the other way around. Once I had my template printed and assembled, I used my Flower Garden set to decorate the outside, a Velcro fastener to seal it, and a velvet red ribbon knotted so I would know if my daughter even tried to open the CD package. I even left off the TO/FROM info off of the outside so she would think it was for a Splitcoast Secret Sister or someone else.

It totally worked too! She had no idea what was inside until I handed her the CD package and cut the ribbon for her, showed her how to open the package, so it could be used again. There was NO way I was going to let her tear open that template package. :) You could have heard her screaming all the way to San Francisco 200miles away when she saw the Jonas Brothers CD inside; especially since I made her buy "the last one in Target" for her cousin in Arizona. I'm a mean mommy sometimes. lol

Now she also got some things to keep in her backpack for school and her purse as well. For example: nail file, lip gloss, etc and those I put in the My Timeless Template Pursonality Clutch. Once again, mom pulled one over on my daughter. The rose is hiding another Velcro closure and once the clutch is opened, the inside was full of all the little things normally inside her Christmas stocking.

Wish

Another card from the archives. I submitted this one for publication earlier in the year and unfortunately, it wasn't selected.

It uses one of my new favorite color combos for simple cards. I stamped the background in Papertrey Ink's Damask Designs in Raspberry Fizz ink before layering. I then inked the saying with Stampin Up! going grey dye ink, then wiped off the flower, and re-inked it with Papertrey New Leaf and Hibiscus Burst before stamping. A double layered prima with a gem in the center was added to finish the card off. A clean, simple, and perfectly easy card done in under 15 minutes.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Damask Designs, Wishing You
Ink: Stampin Up! Going Grey, Papertrey Ink New Leaf, Hibiscus Burst, Raspberry Fizz
Cardstock: Papertrey Ink Raspberry Fizz, Stampin Up! Going Grey, White
Accessories: Primas, Glue Dots, Prima Gem

Mazel Tov!

A friend of mine son is having his Bar Mitzvah today and I wanted to send him a card to celebrate the occasion.

Thank goodness Papertrey Ink came out with the Mazel Tov set. This way, I could create a card I felt was worthy for the occasion; especially since there are not many stamps out there with Jewish symbols or sayings. Thank you Nichole!

For my color combo, I decided to just copy the invitation or red, black, and gold. I started out by stamping my background in Memento Tuxedo black on Stampin Up! riding hood red cardstock using the Mazel Tov! saying and the Torah scroll before adding a layer across the middle of Stampin Up! black and riding hood red cardstock. Then I stamped my saying on the riding hood red cardstock scrap, layered on a black cardstock scrap, and outlined the black with a Pentel ziggy gold paint pen before layering. For the Torah scroll, I stamped that twice in Memento ink and cut one layer out to pop up on dimensionals, again layering on black and outlining with the gold paint pen. For a final touch, I wrapped gold cording around the center of the card before tying it off.



Close up of the Torah scroll.






















Close up of the saying.







A clean, simple, masculine card for a teenage boy. Mazel Tov! Robbie. Enjoy your day.

Stamps: PTI Mazel Tov
Cardstock: Stampin Up! Riding Hood Red, Black
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Pentel Gold Paint Pen, Gold Cording, Dimensionals

It's Pink And Oh So Moddy!

So I've received my new Paptertrey order including my friend, Dawn McVey's new set Mod Squad. This set is so cool and is going to be so fun to play with.

I was inspired by Dawn's pink series she's been showing on her blog to make this card. Using hibiscus burst ink and paper combined with raspberry fizz, created a really bright and cheery pick-me-up card. Adding a prima, ribbon and a gem sticker were just the final touches needed.

Stamps: Mod Squad

Cardstock: Hibiscus Burst, Raspberry Fizz

Ink: Hibiscus Burst, Raspberry Fizz, Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories: Prima, Gem Sticker, Ribbon, Glue Dots

July Blog Hop

Hi everyone and welcome! It's hard to believe it's already time for another blog hop. This month's challenge is to use text, and since I don't own any of Papertrey's text sets, I figured I would go through my patterned paper and see what I could come up with. Bingo!!

I found this awesome vintage text background paper from Paper Pizazz that's been in my stash for who's knows how long. It's amazing what kind of goodies are hiding in that stash!

So I started off first by stamping on of the flowers in Enchanted Evening ink around the edge of my card before adding the kraft layer and text designer layer. I then stamped my leaves and flowers twice on white cardstock in Memento Tuxedo Black and then colored them with Prismacolor markers, blended and then cut out.

Once I had the flowers cut out, I decided to sponge some Stampin Up! Creamy Caramel ink around the edges before adding them to the card and then pinching the edges up. The centers of the flowers are popped up on dimensionals as well. Here's a close up of the finished flowers:

Close up of stamped card.

Text designer paper from Paper Pizazz.

Once I was done stamping the outside of my card, since I was still having so much fun with the set, I decided to stamp the inside of my card too. Now this is something I don't normally do. I then stamped the images again in Memento Tuxedo Black onto the designer paper and cut them out to adhere onto the kraft cardstock inside.

Here's the finished inside of the card:

Thank you for stopping by. I hope I've been able to provide some inspiration to you today.

Stamps: PTI In Bloom

Cardstock: PTI Enchanted Evening, Kraft, Paper Pizazz Designer Paper

Ink: PTI Enchanted Evening, Memento Tuxedo Black, Stampin Up! Creamy Caramel & Night of Navy

Accessories: Sponges, Prismacolor Markers, Mini Glue Dots, Brads, Dimensionals

June Blog Hop!

Oh my goodness, it's time for another blog hop again.

Welcome to my humble blog. This months summer theme is right up my "alley". I love lazy summer days at the beach, just listening to the ocean waves as they crash on the sand, and the wind whistling through my hair, the feel of the sand between my toes.

With this in mind I decided to use as my inspiration the beach, or the ocean. To be more specific, Pacific Grove, California and Monterey, California. I pulled out some pictures my grandfather had taken of the ocean, and the beach, on the famous 17mile drive between Pacific Grove and Carmel-by-the-sea. Recognize the Lone Cypress? It's one of the most photographed trees in California.

I was so inspired by these photographs, that I was able to come up with the following card. Using several different sets, I was able to mimic the tide pools I remember going to with my grandpa while growing up, and bring in the flowers from the upper picture. The rocks were created by using the turtle shell from Pond Life, and the tide pool ripples are from the same set. The flowers are from Forest Friends, sailboat from Men of Life, and sayings from Life.

I hope you enjoyed your trip to my blog and received a little inspiration.

Stamps: Life, Pond Life, Men of Life, Forest Friends

Ink: Raspberry Fizz, Hibiscus, Berry Sorbet, Spring Rain, Melon Berry, Ocean Tides

Cardstock: MFT Perfect Panels, Ocean Tides, Kraft SU Night Of Navy

Accessories: Pop Dots, Gem Stickers (Micheals)

Happy Father's Day!

I would like to take a moment to wish all of the fathers out there a Happy Father's Day!

I've attached the cards I sent to my dad and my step-dad for Father's Day. Both cards were made using Papertrey Ink's Pond Life stamp set.

This set is so versatile. I stamped the "rock" using the turtles shell twice in Stampin Up's basic gray dye ink and cut one out to pop up later with dimensionals. The mallard duck was stamped in PTI's new leaf ink and the duck's wing in Stampin Up's bravo burgundy, then cut the duck out and popped up on all night media pop dots. The reeds and cattail were stamped in PTI new leaf, ocean tides & dark chocolate. I then stippled Stampin Up's soft sky around the top to fill in the white areas and Stampin Up bashful blue for water at the bottom before layering. Although the pictures do not show it very well, the center strip of cardstock is Stampin Up's creamy caramel.

Since my step-dad is a practical joker, I included the frog from PTI's Pond Life his card.

To all the father's out there, enjoy your day.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Pond Life
Ink: PTI New Leaf, Ocean Tides, Dark Chocolate, Spring Rain, Stampin Up! Bravo Burgundy, Bashful Blue, Soft Sky, Memento Tuxedo Black
Cardstock: PTI Ocean Tides, White, Stampin Up! Creamy Caramel, Bravo Burgundy
Accessories: Stipple Brushes, Dimensionals, All Night Media Pop Dots

Garden Stocking - My Time To Create!

Ok, this week Lauren decided to throw a curve ball at me by making me create our own patterned paper with our templates. Hmmmm, what to do, what to do? Oh, yeah, let's pull out the template I printed, cut out, and started to work with, and just never finished. I'll just finish it within Lauren's guidelines, right?

Well, the template I had printed out was the stocking stuffer one when her templates had first come out, so that tells you how long this has been sitting unfinished. So that part's been done....check!

Ok, make own patterned paper. Since I printed the template on plain white cardstock, I wanted to stamp on that too, even wwaaaayyyy back then when I first started this project, so I had pulled out Garden of Life and Butterfly Kisses. Who says stockings need to be just for Christmas, right? I had done the stamping a while ago in baja breeze, riding hood red, kiwi kiss and pacific pointe just to see how a "floral" stocking would look. Now all of those colors are retiring for Stampin Up! So my patterned paper was already done for the challenged. Check!

All that seemed to be left was assembly and decorating. Wait!!! Assembly....done! Dust that project off instead!!! Decorating to the rescue!

I found primas and pearl stickers to decorate the front with and then decided to do the same with the backside so it would look uniform. Now what else to have in a garden? A butterfly flying about! Since there are smaller butterflies on the backside, I stamped a larger one in baja breeze and pacific pointe, cut it out and made it look like it was landing on the stocking by pinching the wings up.




Now the back of the stocking.

My original intent with starting the stocking a while ago was to prove to myself I could do these 3-D packages, and/or stamping. Now that I've done a few, if I can do them, anyone can. Hmmm, think I can teach my husband to do one while he's laid up with a broken ankle?

Sunflowers, Butterfly and Blog Hopping!!

I decided to really step outside my comfort zone and participate in Papertrey's blog hop this month. Since I'm fairly new to blogging, I hope I'm doing this right.

When I saw what this month's project theme was, I almost backed out since yellow is not one of my favorite colors. Now if it was blue or purple, I'm all over it; especially the blue. :) Now being the adventurous troublemaker I am (shoot, I'm being a full time nurse right now for my husband's broken ankle) I attacked my project late last night with gusto and didn't stop until I was happy with it.

First I printed off one of Lauren's My Timeless Templates I had purchased but hadn't tried yet. Sorry Lauren! *ducks* Once I had my Perfect Match Box cut out, stamped and assembled, I continued to do things backwards by designing my card around the idea I had for my box before I finished embellishing my box. Fortunately, the card turned out pretty good.





Using Garden of Life, I stamped a sunflower background in Summer Sunrise allowing room at the bottom for the saying from Handwritten Notes. My sunflower layers were stamped in Lemon Tart & Summer Sunrise with Dark Chocolate edging the sunflowers. I had found these really cool gem stickers at Michaels and added those to the centers. Now with my card done, I finally had to finish embellishing my Perfect Match Box.

There are some wild sunflowers growing nearby my house and during the summer there are butterflies always around them so I wanted to try and create the same feel on top of my box. I colored some Michaels confetti flowers with Prismacolor markers two different colors of yellow, trying to match my cardstock as much as possible, since I already had a bucket of the green ones. (Note to self: next time buy the yellow bucket too) Once the flowers were dry, I adhered everything with mini glue dots to make my little flower garden. Then I stamped my butterfly from Butterfly Kisses in Lavender Moon and Plum Pudding, cut it out and adhered with glue dots it was time to add all the gem stickers to finish embellishing.

After that, it was time to figure out how to open the box. Problem solved. One more flower colored and adhered with a brad makes a great box opener, don't you think?

Thank you for stopping by. I hope I've helped provide some inspiration for you.

Stamps: Butterfly Kisses, Handwritten Notes, Garden of Life

Ink: Lemon Tart, Summer Sunrise, Lavender Moon, Plum Pudding, Dark Chocolate, Memento Black

Accessories: Brad, Prismacolor Markers, Confetti Flowers, Mini Glue Dots, Gem Stickers, My Timeless Template Perfect Match Box

My Time To Inspire MTTI01

This is post number three today even with a migraine, although my left eye doesn't like me. If I begin to ramble, please excuse me.

This week's inspiration piece was a beautiful dress and the colors were just so simple and easy to work with; they just screamed flowers to me.

I pulled out my Papertrey Wishing You set and again used the keep it simple stamper method thanks to my head. Stamped the tulips in spring moss and lavender moon with the tops being stamped twice so I could cut them out and pop up on dimensionals. Using a Martha Stewart butterfly punch, I punched some scrap lavender moon cardstock and picked the smaller butterflies to become "faux" brads in the top corners only. Using Handwritten Notes, I overstamped the saying in memento tuxedo black. Very simple and pretty just like the inspiration piece.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Wishing You, Handwritten Notes

Ink: Spring Moss, Lavender Moon, Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories: Dimensionals, MS Butterfly Punch, MS Glue Pen

Raspberry Suite Week 5

This week's Raspberry Suite color challenge was an easy one: pink, gray and white. Dawn had taken a picture while in Hawaii and wanted to see how we would incorporate it into our stamping. Easy peasy!

I chose to pull out her Scattered Showers set and use the keep it simple stamper method since I'm still dealing with my 3month migraine. The less work I have to do, the less my head is going to hurt. :)

I started by stamping the umbrella in Stampin Up! pixie pink twice and set one aside to cut out later to pop up on a dimensional. The umbrella handle & saying were stamped in basic gray with Stampin Up! felt fusion flowers added in the lower corner with Stampendous Class-A-Peel stickers. After stippling some pretty in pink ink around the edges and layering, my card was completely done; 15-20min tops even on migraine meds.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Scattered Showers

Ink: Stampin Up! Pixie Pink, Pretty In Pink, Basic Gray

Accessories: Stipple Brush, SU Felt Fusion, Stampendous Class-A-Peel Stickers, Brads

Rasberry Suite Color Challenge 04

Time for another Raspberry Suite color challenge. This time Dawn only gave us three colors to use with the challenge and that's what I found challenge at first! Guess that's why they call it a challenge. :)

I had found this really cool paper by My Minds Eye from their Bohemian line at Michaels and wanted to use it somehow for the challenge, so I pulled it out to see if by change the colors matched, so I could pair it up with Dawn's PTI Damask Designs stamp set. Lucky for me, the colors worked out perfectly with just a little bit of green tinting in the aqua coloring, but I took it as "artistic liberty" and used it anyways.

I'm really happy with the results (below), especially with adding the flowers from Stampin Up!'s pretties kit with bling added to the center.

Stamps: PTI Damask Designs

Card Stock: PTI Dark Chocolate, Aqua Mist, White, My Mind's Eye Bohemian Designer Paper

Ink: PTI Dark Chocolate, Aqua Mist

Accessories: SU Pretties Kit Flowers, Glue Dots, Gem Sticker, Dimensionals

My Time To Color!

I finally got time to do mytime's (Lauren) new color challenge posted on her blog this last weekend. Definitely not colors I would have chosen to put together, but I really like how these cards turned out.


I decided to use my new Papertrey Ink sets from PTI's April release for this challenge: Tea For Two and Scattered Showers.


For the teapot card, I stamped the teapot in PTI pure poppy ink on SU so saffron card stock; then again on vanilla scrap paper before cutting out to pop up on a dimensional. The saying was stamped in SU basic gray ink and then SU so saffron ink was sponged around the edges of the image panel before layering on spring rain, basic gray, and then pure poppy. Gem stickers from Michaels were used to create "faux brads" as well as highlighting the center of the prima flower.

For my umbrella card, I stamped the umbrella in PTI spring rain ink on PTI spring rain card stock then cut out and layered over the handle stamped in SU basic gray. SU so saffron ink was then sponged around the edges of the image layer before stamping the saying and layering on spring rain, basic gray, and pure poppy card stocks. Gem stickers were once again used to create "faux brads" and to highlight the prima flower as well as the umbrella.

I can't wait to see what the next challenge is that Lauren comes up for us on Saturday. Join in if you can.

Stamps: PTI Tea for Two, Scattered Showers

Card stock: PTI Pure Poppy, Spring Rain, SU So Saffron, Basic Gray, Vanilla

Ink: PTI Spring Rain, Pure Poppy, SU So Saffron, Basic Gray

Accessories: Sponge, Primas, Gem Stickers, Glue Dots

Better Late Than Never

I made this candle gift box for mytime's (Lauren) timeless template challenge that was posted on her blog a week ago. However, due to a death in my husband's family I didn't get a chance to do the challenge until this weekend or post it until now.

I decided to use the For Keepsake template since I was going to be putting a small candle & nail file set in there and used Papertrey Ink's Flower Garden set to decorate the outside. After assembling the template, I stamped the images on vanilla card stock in memento tuxedo black ink and then colored them with prismacolor markers, cut out and adhered to the gift box with glue dots. The leaves were stamped with memento pear tart ink on vanilla scrap card stock then cut out and adhered to the box with mini glue dots.

Below I have included a pic of the entire ensemble with everything pulled out.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Flower Garden

Card Stock: Stampin Up! Creamy Caramel, Vanilla

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Pear Tart

Accessories: Prismacolor Markers, Glue Dots, Ice Stickles, Candle, Nail File Set

SCS Christmas Card Challenge

Second Post today.

Do you like to make your own Christmas cards? I sure do, that's why I always do the Splitcoast Stampers Christmas Card Challenge. This helps me make sure I have plenty of cards to send out at Christmas without all of the stress and fuss of making them last minute and not enjoying the season, not to mention the real reason for celebrating Christmas. Depending on how many cards you need, depends on how many you need to make a month. This year I'm only needing to make five cards per month since I've got so many left over from last year (I had made 10 a month).

I decided to use a set I had bought on the Splitcoast Buy/Sell/Trade forum from Papertrey Ink called Snowflake Serenade. I love snowflakes, snow, when it's snowing, ect. It's so peaceful and quiet during that time that it's somehow soothing. I decided to keep my cards monochromatic as well which is using one color family to make my cards; in this case the color family of blue.

I stamped the snowflake cards themselves using Papertrey Ink's Spring Rain color on Stampin Up! soft sky (retired) paper. Then stamped the peace saying in the same ink on white paper and stippling Stampin Up! soft sky ink (retired) around the edges. Using two different sizes of clear gem stickers, I highlighted the "dot" flourishes of the peace saying before adding primas and a punched snowflake all highlighted with a clear gem sticker. Below are two close up samples using the two different sizes of clear gem stickers.

Want to be involved in the challenge? You can jump in and sign up anytime.

Stamps: Papertrey Ink Snowflake Serenade

Card stock: Stampin Up! Soft Sky (retired), white

Ink: Papertrey Ink Spring Rain

Accessories: Stipple brush, primas, mini glue dots, Martha Stewart snowflake punch, clear gem stickers