Botanicals · January Mini Catalog

Birthday Blossoms

TGIF, everybody! We made it thru the first full work week since the holidays. How did it go for you? It was pretty busy here. I’m glad I had worked ahead in the craft room last weekend!

This week, we’ve been working with the new Lovely Blossoms suite that just released in the store this week. Today, we’re combining all of the suite elements to create this lovely birthday card.

We get started with a base of Cloud Cover cardstock, which provides a nice contrast with our focal panel background of Secret Sea. A sheet of the small white floral pattern from the Lovely Blossoms paper pack provides our backdrop for the focal panel. Our focal panel has lots of layers. We start with a piece of vellum machine embossed with the Lovely Stripes embossing folder included in the suite. This provides a subtle relief from our background and provides a soft landing for our bold focal backdrop of Secret Sea glimmer paper that has been cut using the Lovely Arrangements circle backdrop die. The floral elements use the coordinating Lovely Arrangements stamps and dies. The flowers are stamped in Cloud Cover on white and then cut with the coordinating die. We adhere them to our backdrop with dimensionals. The leaves are cut from Soft Sea Foam using the leaf die from the Delicate Pines die set and are tucked behind over flowers in opposing corners for balance. The sentiment from Lovely Arrangements is stamped in Secret Sea on white and then diecut with the small sentiment strip die from the coordinating die set. The sentiment sits atop a strip of the Cloud Cover broad ribbon placed in the center of our foliage. We finish things off with some Cloud Cover dots in opposing corners for just a flash of color and reflective sparkle.

I really love how this one came out. So soft and elegant. I’ll be taking a little break tomorrow as we travel out of town for a family funeral. But I’ll be back next week with some new products,

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Coming Soon

Great Friend

Happy Friday, everybody! What’s on your weekend to-do list? For us, a lot is going to depend on the weather. But we definitely have some outside work to do while we’re having more springlike weather. And it’s time to swap out the holiday decor, which means making some trips to & from the storage unit.

This week, I’m having fun getting some of my new crafty goodies out. We’ve been working closely with the new On Display bundle. And now we’re weaving in the Gliding Garden Swing bundle, as well. These two sets pair beautifully thanks to similar scaling with the images, which allows easy scene-building cards. Today we’re also getting a sneak peek at the new Lovely Stripes embossing folder. Both the swing bundle and embossing folder will launch in my online store on January 6th.

Today, we’re having some tea on grandma’s porch. I used my Granny’s porch as inspiration for the setup. So we get started with a base of white cardstock and emboss half of it with the new Lovely Stripes embossing folder. The focal panel starts with a base of Cloud Cover cardstock cut with the largest Textured Notes die. I used the fence die from the Notes & Totes die set to build the porch. We start with the floor, which is planks of Crumb Cake cardstock. Then we cut white cardstock planks to build the porch railing. Both the flooring and railing are adhered directly to the focal panel so they are clearly at the back of our scene. Next up, we build our swing by stamping the swing image on white cardstock with Gray Granite ink and then diecut with the coordinating die from the Gliding Garden Swing set. I also cut just the seat portion from white woodgrain paper from the Country Woods paper pack. The swing is adhered with dimensionals. We add some pillows and our comfy cat to our swing. The pillows are cut from Pretty Peacock, Lost Lagoon, and Cloud Cover cardstock using a combination of dies from the On Display and Gliding Garden Swing die sets. The center pillow uses the upside-down cookie jar from the On Display set to add some variety to our pillow collection. Our kitty is stamped in Gray Granite and Crumb Cake and cut with the coordinating On Display die. These are all adhered onto our swing using a variety of heights of dimensionals to give lots of depth here. Our little garden table is cut from silver foil and we add a pitcher and glass of tea on top which are cut from vellum to give a more realistic see-through look. And no porch is complete without some potted plants. The pots are cut from Cajun Craze using the swing dies and then filled with foliage cut using a combination of the leaf bunches and purple flowers from the swing die set and the large-leaf plant from On Display. I used the smallest rectangle from the Textured Notes dies to cut the sentiment panel and stamped the sentiment from the Words of Beauty set in Blackberry Bliss ink. I used a leftover flower to the end to tie things together. And we finish things off with a dab of shimmer with the frosted iridescent gems.

Do you want to sit a spell on this porch and enjoy a nice cup of sweet tea? I know I sure do! Brings back fond memories, for sure! We’re going to be wrapping things up tomorrow in our little On Display-Gliding Garden Swing mini series. I hope you’ll drop by and see what images appear together next.

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Coming Soon · On Display

Swinging Smiles

Happy New Year, everyone! Did you stay up until midnight? These days, I don’t ever make it to the new year in my own time zone, but I always make it for Europe. *snicker* We enjoyed a day full of family fun yesterday and I was just plain tired. But it was a great day and the perfect way to finish off the year. We’ve done much the same today, so I would call that winning as far as a fresh start!

This week, we’re playing around with some new crafty goodies that arrived in my studio over the last couple of weeks that I hadn’t had time (or felt well enough) to play with. We’ve been taking a close look at the new On Display stamp & die set and today I’m starting a little mini series to show you how well this bundle pairs with the *brand new* Gliding Garden Swing stamp & die bundle. In fact, today’s card gives you a sneak peek at the new swing set, some new ribbon, and another new stamp set! All of these goodies will drop on January 6th!

When all was said and done, I decided to make this a monochromatic backdrop rather than mixing in some patterned paper because, quite frankly, I didn’t find a small enough pattern that I liked well enough to pair up with the focal panel. That is, until I remembered the gorgeous new Beautiful Pattern embossing folder had just the pattern I had pictured and realized I could just make my own patterned paper by embossing!

So we get started with a base of Cloud Cover cardstock and emboss just the card front with the Beautiful Pattern embossing folder. To help the pattern pop a bit more, I went over it lightly with a blending brush and Cloud Cover ink to give the pattern a bit more definition. The focal panel background is also Cloud Cover cardstock and we start building our scene right on top. The tree trunk is cut from Country Woods woodgrain using the new Gliding Garden Swing dies and adhered to the focal panel with a glue pen. I cut it to size by removing the overlapping portions with my paper snips. The leaves are stamped in Garden Green on Garden Green cardstock and then cut with the coordinating Gliding Garden Swing die. I cut apart the larger foliage piece to allow layering that looked more realistic. Dimensionals are just the ticket to give good depth of scene. The bits of branches are filled in with a Light Crumb Cake Stampin’ Blend. The swing is stamped on Crumb Cake cardstock with Gray Granite ink and then filled in with a Light Crumb Cake blend. I also cut the coordinating swing from Country Woods and used the coordinating die for the swing seat for a more realistic look. The seat is adhered with a glue pen directly to the diecut swing. The pillows are cut from Peaceful Garden and adhered to the swing seat with dimensionals. The sweet grey kitty is stamped in Smoky Slate on Smoky Slate cardstock and then cut with the coordinating On Display die. The sentiment from the new Lovely Arrangements stamp set is stamped on vellum that has been cut with the Stylish Shapes banner die and adhered with glue dots so it looks like it’s just floating at the top of our scene. Our focal panel is then adhered to the card front with dimensionals and then we tie a beautiful twist of brand new Cloud Cover linen ribbon right over the far-left side. We finish off with a touch of sparkle using the Cloud Cover flat pearls.

Today’s card keeps the pairing uber simple with just a single image from On Display, but I’ll show you tomorrow how you can really put both sets together to build beautiful scenes. Because tomorrow we’re going to have some tea on Granny’s porch! I hope you’ll drop in and sit a spell.

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Christmas · No Stamp Design

Joy of Christmas

Happy Saturday, everyone! Who all is frantically trying to get all of those last-minute Christmas list items done this weekend? *raising hand* It’s been a busy one today as we’ve squeezed in all sorts of things, including (finally) getting our outdoor decor set up. And now I’m frantically working in the craft room working on gifties for friends, coworkers, and loved ones and still whittling away at the Christmas card stash in hopes that I might at least get them in the mail by Christmas Eve……

So this week we’re working through the crafty stash to put together some (mostly) simple holiday cards. Today’s design is by far the most detailed design so far, but I would still say it only took about 15 min to put together once I got everything situated. We’re pairing up the new Beautiful Pattern embossing folder with the Delicate Pines dies to create this lovely card full of joy!

I was inspired by a card I saw over at Stampin’ Fancy Friday, and I just ran with it from there. We get started with a base of Real Red cardstock. Our focal panel is a quarter sheet of red that is machine embossed with the Beautiful Pattern embossing folder. I went over the embossed panel lightly with some metallic ink to really make the embossing pop. You could easily use paper with a white core, but I like the sheen & sparkle from the metallic ink rub myself. Our sentiment panel takes center stage here with lots of detailed elements and pops of holiday color. The joy sentiment is from the Greetings for You ephemera pack and is mounted on a panel of Traditions of Christmas plaid paper diecut with one of the smaller Traditional Labels dies. We mount the sentiment panel with dimensionals on top of a bow of Real Red shiny ribbon, along with winter evergreens cut from Shaded Spruce and Mossy Meadow cardstock and pinecones cut from Crumb Cake and Pecan Pie cardstock using the Delicate Pines dies. We finish it all off with a scattering of gold glitter dots.

With the template done, this card will come together much more quickly each time since you can cut lots of greenery pieces, pinecones, and sentiment panels all at once. I really love how this turned out and can already think of some variations that I plan to do for my personal stash.

I hope you’ll join me next week. I’ll still be in full-on Christmas mode as I work to finish the card stash and continue making gifts and gift tags.

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12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar

Advent Thinking of You

Welcome to another day in our week with the SU! 12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar, where each day we’re opening two boxes together and then creating a fun project with the goodies we found inside. Thus far, we’ve scored a set of dies that coordinate with the Advent Calendar stamp set, some patterned paper, some glitter shaker elements, and a set of foiled diecut elements. Today, we’re opening boxes 5 & 6. Let’s see what’s inside!

Alrighty, so today we have a set of decorative masks and some fluffy felt stickers. I’m not gonna lie, I was initially pretty stumped on what to do with our new goodies. But I started looking through the rest of the Advent Calendar goodies for some inspiration and decided that continuing with the floral theme would work best, especially since I wanted to incorporate the new items in today’s design. After stacking the decorative masks and getting a sense for the scene they would create, I pulled a sheet of patterned paper that would coordinate and went to town.

We get started with a backdrop of Cloud Cover cardstock. A quarter sheet of Cloud Cover is machine embossed with the *new* Beautiful Pattern embossing folder, which releases next week. I used a strip of the coordinating Advent Calendar patterned paper on the left of the panel. The focal panel floral scene is created with today’s decorative masks, blending brushes, and a combination of inks — Daffodil Delight, Crushed Curry, Pretty in Pink, Strawberry Slush, Cloud Cover, Misty Moonlight, Garden Green, and Shaded Spruce. The panel is cut with the largest circle in the Spotlight on Nature die set and then adhered with dimensionals. The sentiment from the Advent Calendar stamp set is heat embossed in black on vellum and then diecut with one of the smaller circles from the Stylish Shapes set. The panel is adhered over Balmy Blue sheer ribbon with dimensionals and a pink bow from the new fluffy felt sticker set finishes off the sentiment panel. A fluffy felt flower and a few of the Hues of Blue Flowers in the corner finish off our floral theme.

Isn’t this fun? Every day we’re stretching our creativity! Can’t wait to see what our Advent Calendar brings us tomorrow!

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12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar

Advent Birthday Wishes

Happy Monday, everybody! Have you missed seeing crafty inspiration because I’ve certainly missed having time for it! Sometimes we just have to know when to make a little space for other things — like coordinating major work programs and family time, all of which were time well spent.

But we’re back at it this week with 12 days of crafty Christmas! Each day we’re going to be opening 2 slots in the Stampin’ Up! 12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar. Each calendar comes with a box of crafty surprises, as well as a coordinating stamp set. Let’s see what we have in store today!

So isn’t that fun — today we’ll be working with the coordinating dies and 6×6 patterned paper for the Advent Calendar stamp set. The first thing I wanted to do was put everything side-by-side to decide on a theme and color palette for a card design.

The pink floral pattern stood out to me in the selection of papers, so from there I looked for a simple design that would allow me to use the stamps & dies. I pulled out the Holiday Mini catalog and turned to the sketches on page 14 and was drawn to the very first one — clean and simple & a perfect way to coordinate the paper, stamps & dies.

So we have a sketch, our 2 Advent Calendar boxes, and the stamps. We pull coordinating papers together — Strawberry Slush, Pretty in Pink, Mossy Meadow, and white — to get started. To add a pop of interest, I decided to add some texture to the background panel using a *NEW* embossing folder that releases in just a few weeks.

We get started with a base of Strawberry Slush cardstock. The background panel is a quarter sheet of Strawberry Slush that I machine embossed with the new Beautiful Pattern embossing folder, which releases in just a few weeks! The sheet of pink florals is cut and then wrapped with Strawberry Slush ribbon before being adhered to the embossed background panel. Using the Advent Calendar stamp set, we stamp the large and smaller flowers on Pretty in Pink in both Strawberry Slush & Pretty in Pink ink. The center is stamped in Timid Tiger. The flowers are then diecut with the new coordinating dies we opened today, along with coordinating leaves from Mossy Meadow. Our flower is adhered over the ribbon on the left — substituting for the circle in our sketch. The sentiment from the Advent Calendar stamp set is stamped in Strawberry Slush on white cardstock and cut with the banner from the Mixed Labels die set and adhered over our flower element and just under the ribbon. A few Strawberry Slush & Pretty in Pink gems finish things off with pops of twinkle across the card front.

I hope you’ll pop in tomorrow to see what our next 2 boxes will reveal. I know I can’t wait!

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Autumn

Gather Decor

We’re rounding out this week’s design series with some home decor. I have a craft show in a couple of weeks, and I’m still working feverishly to prepare all of the things I have on my display wish list. Last year was the first year I offered home decor items, and they generated a lot of interest.

Today’s design is inspired by a recent post on the Stampin’ Up! official Instagram page. I, of course, put my own twist on it. And isn’t that the best thing about inspiration?! So let’s dig in and see how this comes together.

This is a 6×6 frame I found on Amazon. So we get started with a 6×6 card base. HINT: Before you fully commit to your layout, be sure that it shows through the frame as you intend. I neglected this step this time so my Cajun Craze base – that was supposed to be a small border around the focal panel – doesn’t show at all. *womp-womp*

The focal panel base is a sheet of the gold foil hashed patterned paper from the Nature’s Sweetness paper pack. I decided to use the retired Changing Leaves embossing folder to create the background texture because I wanted the pattern to more closely tie with the image theme. The focal image is an image rub using blending brushes.

I decided to create a mask and negative that I could use more than once using some of the acetate sheets I had saved in my stash. When I unpack my acrylic stamps, I always save the thicker acetate sheet to use for shakers and window cards later on. It’s the perfect thickness for a mask and negative too! I used the larger leaf from the Gathering Moments dies to cut through the acetate. I used both pieces to create my focal image. The negative creates the center image, which is rubbed in Mossy Meadow, and then the shape is used to create the highlight around the leaf image, which is rubbed in Flirty Flamingo.

The sentiment panel has several layers. The backdrop is a banner created from two strips of the Gathering Together patterned paper. The sentiment from the Gathering Moments set is stamped in Versamark on Cajun Craze and then heat embossed in gold. I cut around the sentiment using paper snips. The fall foliage arrangement on the left is created using the Gathering Moments images and dies. We finish up with a bow of gold striped iridescent ribbon and some Cajun Craze & gold dots.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s series. I’ll be in and out over the next two weeks as I prepare for the big educational program at the office and then head off to the woods for a little family fall break get-away. But I have new goodies arriving that I hope to be able to show you so don’t go too far!

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birthday

Cheers to Birthdays!

So sorry to disappear on you yesterday. By the time our day wound down and I got yesterday’s card finished, it was far too dark to take a photo that would do the project any justice.

This week, we’re restocking the birthday card stash by using a variety of products in the crafty stash. We’re pairing up the Label Me Grateful and Gathering Moments dies for today’s card. This design is inspired by a card that I saw on The Crafty O ink Pen over on Insta. And I must say that one of my favorite things about using inspiration is seeing how much or how little you can see the inspiration behind the design once it’s finished. And just for funsies, today I’m gonna show the two side-by-side and you tell me. Can you see it?

What drew me to the inspiration design to start with is our Luv 2 Stamp monthly team challenge bingo card – with one square being to design a fall card. And I figured what better way to kill two birds with one stone than to adapt this super beautiful fall inspiration design to fit the birthday design theme for this week. And one of the first obstacles I had to face was the color palette because I was completely out of my preferred base color of Crushed Curry and had to search for a suitable substitute that would work with the vision I had for the end result. I must admit that the new In Color Darling Duckling is NOT a favorite of mine. And if I’m being completely honest, I pretty much hate it because it has too much green and reminds me of … well, I’ll just say that I prefer not to say and let your mind wander. BUT I decided to give it a try here because I figured this would be the best context in which I ever could potentially use the few sheets of Darling Duckling I have in the stash. And from there, I worked to choose colors and elements that tamed the duck and let thoughts of fall shine.

So we get started with a base of Darling Duckling. I cut an extra quarter panel for the focal panel backdrop and cut it down using the largest Textured Notes die and then machine embossed it with the Forever Plaid embossing folder. This panel is matted with Peach Pie glimmer paper from the In Color pack. We move on to cutting our smaller detail elements with the Label Me Grateful dies using a combination of Cajun Craze, Crumb Cake, and the peach end of a sheet of Pastel Ombre glimmer paper. To really hit home with the fall theme, the center sentiment is matted by a large oak leaf cut from Peach Pie glimmer paper using the Gathering Moments die. It’s adhered a little askew in the center of the card and then the smaller fall foliage elements are tucked around on each side in opposing corners and held with strips of tear-n-tape. The sentiment is broken into two distinct but complimentary sections. The first part of the sentiment is from the Scenic Adventure set and is stamped in Early Espresso on white and then cut with the smallest banner die from the Stylish Shapes set. Birthday is stamped on a scrap of white, also in espresso, and then hand cut with paper snips. Both portions are affixed to the center of the card over some gold striped ribbon using several layers of dimensionals. We finish things off with a scattering of Cajun Craze dots and gold drusy embellishments.

This card is one big, fun, fall celebration. I just couldn’t be more pleased with how this morphed into one big sparkly birthday party in an envelope! I hope you’ll drop by tomorrow to see what other fun goodies we can pair together.

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Coming Soon · Holiday Mini Catalog

Merry & Bright Plaid

I don’t know about you, but I have a love-hate relationship with holiday weeks. We all love a short work week, but it always feels to me like I’m just squeezing in a lot more work into a shorter time period. That was definitely the case today anyway!

And I’ve been SO off on my days as of late that I was thinking today was the new product release day when it’s actually tomorrow….womp-womp! But it doesn’t dampen my enthusiasm for you to see all of the new stuff. I’m just sad you have to wait one more day.

Anywho, this week we’re getting another peek at some of the cute holiday products that will be available tomorrow. Our design focus this week is clean and simple holiday cards using the Joyful Days Memories & More card pack, the Greetings for You ephemera, and the Christmas Tags & More patterned paper pack with ephemera sheets included. So much good stuff! Today we’re mixing in an embossing folder.

Today’s card starts with a base of Cherry Cobbler cardstock. I had a leftover strip of light brown patterned cardstock from one of the sheets in the Christmas Tags & More pack which served as the jumping-off spot for the color palette and design for the rest of the card. I paired it up with a piece of Pecan Pie machine embossed with the Birch Wood embossing folder to create the backdrop for the focal panel. The focal panel backdrop is a combination of one of the smaller cards of plaid from the Joyful Days card pack and a plaid tag from the sheet of tags in the Christmas Tags & More pack. I chose the Merry & Bright circle sentiment from the Greetings for You ephemera pack and matted it with a banner of gold foil specialty paper and adhered it to the focal panel with several layers of dimensionals to be sure it really catches the eye. I finished things off with some gold sparkly sequins from the Traditional Sparkling Sequins pack so your eye catches some sparkles all the way across the card front.

I hope you’ll tune in tomorrow to see another clean & simple holiday card design.

Products used in today’s card:
Cherry Cobbler, Pecan Pie cardstock
Gold foil, Christmas Tags & More DSP
Greetings for You ephemera
Joyful Days Memories & More card pack
Birch Wood embossing folder
Traditional sparkling sequins
Dimensionals

Coming Soon · Holiday Mini Catalog · Peaceful Garden

Monochromatic Peace

We’re winding down this week, and I don’t know about you but I’m ready for the weekend ahead. The first week of school is always a rough transition as we work to find the school year rhythm again. Poor fella had a rough day yesterday after leaving some important papers and his school computer at home. Learning personal responsibility is tough!

This week, we’ve been working with a brand new suite of products that is due to release in September in the SU! Holiday Mini catalog. Peaceful Garden lends itself to a whole host of different styles and seasons. Today I thought it would be fun to work in a monochromatic color palette and with just a few simple elements from the suite. So our featured color is one of the new In Colors called Secret Sea and we’re letting the lovely Peaceful Greenery embossing folder do all of the heavy lifting for our design.

We start with a base of Secret Sea cardstock. Our Secret Sea focal panel is machine embossed with the Peaceful Greenery embossing folder and then matted with Secret Sea glimmer paper. One thing I love about the Peaceful Greenery embossing folder and Peace on Earth dies is that the decorative panels are made to inlay in the center of the debossed portion of the embossing folder. So I used the largest die to cut out the debossed section. And then I used the smaller die to cut down the cutout piece and create a smaller panel for the sentiment. The sentiment from Peace on Earth is stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with clear embossing powder. I cut some of the smaller greenery elements from a scrap of Secret Sea glimmer paper and adhered them on opposing corners of the sentiment panel before adhering the sentiment panel to the center of the card front with dimensionals. A few shimmer dots finish things off perfectly.

Tomorrow we’ll be using a sketch to create our card. I hope you’ll drop in and see what’s in store!

Products used in today’s card:
Secret Sea cardstock
Peaceful Garden glimmer SP (coming in Sept)
Peace on Earth stamp & die bundle (coming in Sept)
Peaceful Greenery embossing folder (coming in Sept)
Clear embossing powder
Charming shimmer faceted dots
Dimensionals
Adhesives