Autumn · Autumn Trees

I’m Here

Welcome in on this beautiful Saturday, friends! It’s a stunning day here in North Texas as we’re getting our first real taste of fall weather this weekend. The sun is shining, the air is crisp, the leaves are just beginning to turn. It’s my time of year!

And speaking of fall, we’re closing out this week’s design series where we’ve been using the new Autumn Trees bundle by Stampin’ Up! to create this week’s projects. Today’s super clean & simple card design is inspired by all of the silhouette cards I’ve been seeing lately. It’s such a simple design technique, but it really does pack a punch!

So our design gets started today with a base of Secret Sea cardstock. This is the perfect blend of a blackish-blue that really brings out the moodiness in our beautiful backdrop from the Everyday Skies paper pack. We often see both sunrises and sunsets a lot like this scene, where it’s bright & beautiful and casts the perfect light for silhouettes. And here, our mighty oak and pair of deer are silhouetted by our beautiful sunset on the open prairie. To create this effect, we use the Autumn Trees dies to cut the shapes from black cardstock and then adhere them to our backdrop with dimensionals. I love how this accentuates the shadowing in our scene. The sentiment from the Beautiful Butterflies stamp set is heat embossed in black in top-right corner of our card and we flank the sentiment with some Secret Sea faceted shimmer dots as a finishing touch.

What do you think of this super easy design? I’m going to have to remember the silhouette technique more often with beautiful scene-building sets like this one! I hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s series. I look forward to spending a little more time in the woods next week as we feature some of the new sets that will go live on Tuesday!

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Autumn · Autumn Trees

Autumn Birthday Wishes

Happy Friday, friends! I don’t know about you but I can’t believe that we’re already at the end of October. The last part of the year always feels like it’s on fast forward.

We are continuing our design series for this week using the new Autumn Trees bundle by Stampin’ Up! And today we’re really letting the stamps take center stage in this beautiful masculine design, where we’re pairing our featured bundle with designer series paper and several die sets.

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake cardstock. A sheet of the neutral dot-patterned paper from the Gathering Together paper pack serves as our focal panel backdrop. I stamped the focal panel scene on white cardstock before diecutting it with the largest die from the Branching Out set. I used most of the stamps from the Autumn Trees stamp set to create our tranquil scene and then shaded everything with ink and blending brushes. I love the soft look that this lends. Our deer is stamped on Crumb Cake and then diecut with the coordinating die from the Autumn Trees set and adhered with dimensionals to give some depth to our scene. The sentiment from the 12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar is stamped on Crumb Cake and then diecut with the Stylish Shapes banner die using the extension method to get the perfect length. The sentiment is adhered with dimensionals over linen thread that is wrapped around the focal panel. And we finish things of with gold iridescent foil dots in opposing corners for a touch of twinkle.

We’ll be wrapping up our autumn series tomorrow. I hope you’ll drop in and see what’s in store!

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Autumn · Autumn Trees · L2S Group Instahop

Autumn Window

So glad you’re back, friends! You probably noticed that my day shaped up as I expected and I didn’t have the opportunity to post yesterday. But never fear, the card design I had in mind is about halfway finished and coming your way tomorrow!

But today, we’re hopping along with the Luv 2 Stamp Group over on Instagram. And our card today continues our design series using the Autumn Trees bundle by Stampin’ Up! I thought it would be fun to do a variation of last month’s window card design by making it a double flap card to make room for a nice note section on the inside panel. Let’s take a look!

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake cardstock and cut a window using the largest Everyday Arches die. To make the shaker section, we cut a window frame from a sheet of Country Woods patterned paper using the largest and third largest dies to make the frame wide enough for our two-sided tape to adhere the window sheet. The front window frame is adhered directly to the card front. The second frame and window sheet is assembled and then we use adhesive foam strips to create the box in which the shaker elements will move about inside our window. Before adhering this window frame, we add our shaker bits to the back of the outside window sheet and then seal everything up with the inside window frame. I used the new shaker bits that I scored from my SU! 12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar.

Now we move on to our inside fold-out panel where we build a fall scene using the Autumn Leaves bundle and a sheet of Thoughtful Journey patterned paper. The base is a quarter sheet that is cut a half-inch wider to allow for the small fold-over flap that is adhered to the inside card base under the message panel. We get started by building our background scene. The mountain is cut directly from our patterned paper using the Scenic Adventure dies. The top piece of the sky is cut down to size and then adhered at the top of our panel and then the mountain section is adhered over it with dimensionals. I added Wink of Stella to the portion resembling a lake, giving it time to dry while we work on the forefront of our scene.

From another sheet of Thoughtful Journey, we cut a small section of trees using the Light & Wonder die set and adhered at the water’s edge and just under the mountain ridge. Using a small scrap of black cardstock, we use the deer die from the Autumn Trees set to cut the doe and fawn. They’re adhered directly to the background. Next up, I stamped the tree image from Autumn Trees in Early Espresso on the slightly smaller quarter sheet of Crumb Cake and shaded the trunk with blending brushes and Crumb Cake ink. We cut leaves in several different colors. I especially love the look of the red and green leaves from the Season of Elegance paper. Each set of colored leaves is adhered on top of the other with dimensionals and slightly askew of one another to create lots of depth. The tree is then adhered at the base of our scenic panel along the edge using dimensionals. We finish things off with some grass in the foreground that is cut from the other sheet of Thoughtful Journey using the Scenic Adventure die. This panel is then adhered to our inside panel with tear-n-tape along the small fold-over flap. The inside message panel has a small buck in the bottom corner and the sentiment from With You in Mind at the top.

This card is even prettier in person. And I thought you might enjoy seeing it in action to get an idea. *grin*

Today’s card is a part of the Luv 2 Stamp Group Instagram Hop, which goes live at 9 AM Pacific Time (PST).  Click here to head over to my Instagram feed at 9 AM Pacific/11 AM Central and check out what the other demos in our L2S Group have created for you today! 

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Autumn · Autumn Trees

Grateful

Howdy, friends, and welcome back! I’m so excited to be bringing you some fall cards this week. I almost feel like that maybe inspired Mother Nature to send us our first real cool weather here in North Texas. *snicker* If only that were true, but we really are cooling off here and the trees are starting to look like the fall show is imminent. Man, I love fall!

This week is all about autumn as we pull together things in our crafty stash that pair well with the new Stampin’ Up! bundle called Autumn Trees. This is a gorgeous stamp and die set that allows you to finish all of your fall scenes with the perfect complimentary trees and things. And today the dies from the set take center stage in this very clean & simple (and incredibly easy) design.

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake cardstock. I left a teensy border of it exposed around the edges of the card to pull out some of the lighter colors in our sheet of Thoughtful Journey patterned paper. This sheet of fall grasses provides the perfect meadow backdrop for our doe and fawn pair from the Autumn Trees die set. The pair of deer are cut from a sheet of Cajun Craze cardstock and tucked behind our grassy panel to give the effect of them standing in an open part of the meadow. To create this look, I used the full 6×6 sheet of Thoughtful Journey and started by cutting around the top set of grasses to allow us to create some depth of field by adhering it over the top portion of the sheet with dimensionals. The sentiment from the Sentimental Framing stamp set is heat embossed in copper at the top of the sheet. A few drusy embellishments flank either side of the sentiment to draw the eye in and provide some sparkle in the sky.

And that’s all there is to this design. What do you think of this simple scene? The paper and dies really do all the work here with a stunningly simple result!

I have a full day at the office tomorrow but hope to have some time to bring you another clean & simple design using the Autumn Trees set. But you definitely want to tune in on Thursday when I’ll be bringing you a fun fold design as part of the Luv 2 Stamp Group Instahop. It’ll be worth the wait if it turns out half as well as the design idea!

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Autumn Trees · Fall

Means the World

Here we are at the start of another week. Did you enjoy last week’s series as we worked our way through the Stampin’ Up! 12 Days of Crafting Advent Calendar? I had a lot of fun coming up with things to make from each day’s new crafting goodies.

Well, this week, we’re turning back to autumn. I just got the new Autumn Trees bundle in a recent order, and I’ve been dying to get crafty with this awesome new set. The stamps and dies are so detailed and there are so many ways to really punch things up with this set. Today, the beautiful oak tree is taking center stage, along with our doe & fawn. Let’s see how this all comes together.

We get started with a base of Crumb Cake cardstock. This provides a nice neutral base that plays along with our nature-themed design. I used several different patterns from the Gathering Together patterned paper pack to create the backdrop for our focal images. The contrast from dark to light really let the beautiful tree and its foliage shine. The base image of our tree from the Autumn Tree set is stamped in Early Espresso on Copper Clay cardstock and then diecut with the coordinating die. (While this color is retired, you could just as easily substitute the Cajun Craze — it will simply be a bit brighter and I was going for a little more subdued.) The tree is adhered to the card front with glue dots. To really give some depth and realism to our beautiful fall foliage, I used the detailed leaves die from the die set and cut both Copper Clay and Oxidized Copper leaves and layered them a bit offset and affixed with dimensionals. I just love how the oxidized copper catches the light. The doe & fawn are the perfect addition to this serene scene. They’re cut from the woodgrain patterned sheet in the Gathering Together paper pack. The sentiment panel needed to be soft to allow our autumn scene to shine so I opted for some vellum. The sentiment from Gathering Moments is heat embossed in copper on the vellum and then diecut with the medium-sized banner in the Stylish Shapes set. It’s mounted over some Mossy Meadow & gold ribbon. And we finish things off with a touch of copper & gold in our Cajun Craze & Gold dots.

Tune in tomorrow as we take a stroll through the autumn meadow.

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Autumn

Grateful Heart

Although the weatherman tells us it’s fall here in North Texas, in usual Texas fashion, summer refuses to go out quietly. While it’s certainly not August, we’re not quite into the glorious chill of fall mornings or altogether pleasant days either.

But that won’t stop us from continuing this week’s design series – all about fall. And today we’re revisiting the beautiful Splendid Autumn patterned paper and pairing it up with the Label Me Grateful stamps to create a super easy fun fold card. When you have paper as pretty as this, finding a design that takes full advantage is a must! And the simple z-fold design allows you to use the full sheet of paper.

I chose Granny Apple Green as the card base. It really allows all of the colors of the leaves and flowering grasses in our patterned paper to shine. The Splendid Autumn sheet features a winding path through a small grove of fall trees. And as you open the fold, you see the full scene. The sentiment panel is facing front when the card is closed. The sentiment from the Label Me Grateful stamp set is stamped in Timid Tiger ink on white cardstock and then cut out with the Traditional Labels dies. A few In Color flat pearls add the perfect finishing touch to the sentiment panel. It’s adhered over a bow of Timid Tiger and Mossy Meadow & Gold ribbon using dimensionals. We add some green hexagons in opposing corners of the card front. I chose the lightest color so they’re more sparkle than they are a pop of color.

What do you think of this clean & simple design? I hope you’ll tune in for tomorrow’s Sketchy Fridays to see what else we can pull together with our crafty stash of fall-inspired products.

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Autumn

Thankful for Autumn

I’m having a good time with this week’s design theme – we’re all about fall! And today’s card is inspired by the Luv 2 Stamp Group monthly team challenge where I had to create a Thanksgiving card. Being in the heart of Autumn, my mind immediately goes to beautiful foliage when I think of Thanksgiving and, of course, we all tend to focus on what we are thankful for. So being that fall happens to my favorite season of the year, it only made sense to tie all of that together!

I drew inspiration from a gorgeous card I saw over on Insta from @didyoustamptoday. I really wanted to bring out the thoughts of fall when I worked on my version of the card. And so I drew on all of my favorite fall hues when selecting the foliage elements. I also wanted to recreate that sunrise/sunset feel from the inspiration card, which translates into some beautifully colored mountains in the background. And, of course, Everyday Skies and Wink of Stella do all of the work with the twinkling of the sun over the mountains.

So although it’s not readily visible on the front panel, we get started with a base of Cajun Craze cardstock. Our mountain scene is built with a combination of the Scenic Adventure and Lights & Wonder dies. I chose Peach Pie and Flirty Flamingo for the tall mountain range in the back that is catching all of the sun’s rays and they’re cut with the larger mountain die in the Scenic Adventure set. A sheet of the Everyday Skies gives us the gorgeous sunrise, and some carefully placed Wink of Stella draws the eye in to the rising sun and its rays peeking up over the range. To give the look of division between mountain ridges, I added the tree line of Pretty Peacock pines next. The next ridge is cut using the largest mountain die in the Lights & Wonder set. And then we have our trees along the water’s edge. These trees are cut from Daffodil Delight using Lights & Wonder die, and then to give the look of changing leaf colors, I used my blending brushes to give touches of Old Olive and Timid Tiger. The lake is cut from a sheet of the blue pastel ombre glimmer paper with the Lights & Wonder die. Each of our layers of mountains and trees are separated by dimensionals to give a more realistic depth of field. The sentiment is a combination of the Words for the Season dies and Beautiful Pumpkin sentiment stamp. A few drusy embellishments on either side really let the Autumn pop.

While some scene cards take a bit of time to build, I find it fun to stretch the creative wings and see if I can bring life to the picture in my mind’s eye. Do you like to undertake designs that take a bit more time sometimes? Tomorrow we’re going to get started with a sketch and see where that takes us. I hope you’ll drop by and check it out!

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Fall · Gathering Together

Let’s Gather

Welcome back, everyone! I hope you enjoyed a restful weekend. We always enjoy a weekend where we’re able to spend time together. And we had the perfect weekend for that. The weather was glorious. It’s really starting to feel like fall here.

And speaking of fall, this week we’re going to be creating fall-inspired designs with our crafty stash. We’re getting started with the Gathering Moments stamps and a more unconventional color palette. I love looking for unique color pairings and there’s no better way to pull inspiration than simply taking a walk and making mental notes of all the hues you see! And today’s color palette is inspired by the pinks, blues, and purples that we see but that don’t get as much attention.

We get started with a neutral base of white cardstock. Our focal panel is a piece of white cardstock that is diecut with the Textured Notes die and matted with a piece of the pink Flower Garden Foils textured specialty paper cut with the largest Perennial Postage die. The smaller leaf stamp from the Gathering Moments stamp set provides the repeated image for our wreath of foliage. The leaves are stamped in a combination of pinks, blues, and purple. The sentiment is also from the Gathering Moments stamp set and is heat embossed with copper embossing powder before being cut with the Stylish Shapes circle die. The sentiment banner is cut from the pink textured foil and the sentiment panel is then mounted in the center of our foliage with dimensionals. We finish things off with a bow of Petunia Pop iridescent ribbon and some two-tone sparkle gems.

I really love how combining the lesser-scene hues of changing leaves provides such a stunning result. Tune in tomorrow as we continue our tour of fall design ideas.

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Autumn

Golden Gathering

Welcome to the weekend, crafty friends! I hope yours has gotten off to a good start. We’ve been putting around today enjoying a pretty lowkey day. We’ve gotten a few productive things done here & there, but sometimes it’s nice to just be without the to-do list. I’ll be making up for that tomorrow, of course. *snicker*

This week we’ve explored the design theme of all that glitters is gold. And I don’t know about you, but it’s been a lot of fun to mix and match all of the glittery gold in the crafty stash. I was feeling in the fall mood when I created today’s card, so we’re mixing the lovely Regal Distressed Patterns paper with the Delicate Pines dies to create this gorgeous fall wreath full of the golden colors of a beautiful fall day.

We get started with a nice neutral card base of Crumb Cake cardstock. Our background panel is a sheet of the beautiful gold foiled Regal Distressed Patterns in pretty peacock and falling foliage that we mat with a sheet of Lost Lagoon, which helps bring out the lighter leaf pattern in the background. But our focal point is the beautiful wreath in the center. We get started with the sentiment from the Gathering Moments stamp set that is first stamped in Versamark on Crumb Cake cardstock and then heat embossed with copper embossing powder. We cut this out using one of the smaller circles from the Stylish Shapes die set. It’s mounted just a tick above center using dimensionals. Next up, we cut our wreath branches from textured metallic gold paper and a sheet of Peach Pie glimmer paper using the branch of leaves from the Delicate Pines die set. The colors are alternated as they’re adhered around the sentiment using dimensionals. To really make things feel like fall, we cut acorn branches from Early Espresso and Crumb Cake cardstock using the Label Me Grateful die and then color the acorns with Wink of Stella to give some added sparkle to draw the eye in to this small element. The acorn branches are tucked into the wreath under the sentiment. I tied a bow of linen thread and then colored the thread with Wink of Stella also so that it sparkles. A few drusy embellishments finish things off with the perfect pops of sparkle around the wreath.

Next week, we’ll be in the snowy woods. I hope you’ll take the trek with me!

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Coming Soon · Gathering Together · Online Exclusives

Give Thanks

Happy rainy Saturday, crafty friends. Here in N. Texas, it’s the perfect day to spend in the craft room as we sit and enjoy a cup of tea while listening to the pitter-patter of the raindrops falling and soft (or not-so-soft) rumbles of thunder.

We’re rounding out our design series this week which has featured sneak peeks of upcoming Online Exclusive releases of Gathering Together and Beautiful Pumpkins that will be live in my shop on Tuesday! Today, we’re using the Gathering Together suite to create a lovely home decor project. If you’ve followed me for any length of time, you have maybe seen a post or two here and there about our family table prayers. And today’s featured project is a fall refresh for our framed prayer.

I’m continuing to use the 6×6 tabletop frame I bought off Amazon. I used a sheet of the Gathering Together patterned paper as the backdrop and cut it down to 6×6 to fit in the frame. Everything gets started with the selected scripture we’re using as the prayer. I used my computer to type it up and print it onto Crumb Cake cardstock and then cut it out using the Spotlight on Nature dies. It’s adhered in the center with dimensionals. Using the Gathering Moments stamps, I stamped both large and small leaves in a variety of colors onto Very Vanilla cardstock and then used the coordinating dies to cut them out. I also stamped some fronds of greenery and acorns onto Crumb Cake cardstock then diecut them with the coordinating dies from Gathering Moments set. I arranged these around the circular sentiment panel to create a wreath and adhered them all at varying heights with a combination of tear-n-tape and dimensionals. For some pops of sparkle, I cut some leafy fronds from gold foil paper and Old Olive glimmer paper using the Peace on Earth dies (another Tuesday release) and tucked them in and around the fall foliage wreath. I added a small bow of Mossy Meadow & Gold ribbon at the top and finished things off with a few Cajun Craze foil dots.

What do you think? All in all, this comes together really quickly. It’s really striking in person, and I’m super pleased with how this turned out. I think I’m going to make a few more to display in my booth at an upcoming craft show.

Next week, we’re going to jump ahead just a little and have a Christmas sneak peek as I show you some fabulous goodies that will be available to you in Tuesday’s release. I hope you’ll drop in and see what’s in store!

Products used in today’s project:
6×6 frame
Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake cardstock
Gathering Together (coming Tues), Old Olive glimmer (retired), gold foil DSP
Gathering Moments stamps & dies (coming Tues)
Peace on Earth (coming Tues), Spotlight on Nature dies
Mossy Meadow & gold ribbon
Cajun Craze foil dots (coming Tues)
Dimensionals
Adhesives