Gold Foil Butterfly

I pulled out the new gold washi tape and the Gold Foil paper for the Stampin' Royalty challenge today. I was looking for a sketch and they had one that's easy to use the washi tape with to create the diagonals.

I'm glad that the gold and silver foil paper got carried over to the new Occasions catalogue - because I absolutely love how they emboss!

Here is the sketch...

We took Elliot for the day, so we picked him up just after he woke up so he could have breakfast with us. 

A perfect way to start the day and the New Year.

Thanks for stopping by,

Joan

Feel Well Butterflies

Yay! It's a sketch day at Sunday Stamps today - I love sketches - especially when I really don't have a whole lot of time to think - the sketch provides a perfect jumping off place and I love this fabulous design by Steph.  There's no end to what could be the focal point could be where the shapes are. 

I've decided to take a wee break from the Christmas theme and use some of the upcoming Sunshine and Sprinkles Designer Series Paper and one of the new Hearts a Fluter Framelits.  I'm pretty sure I'll be spending a good amount of time playing with my new toys once my school Christmas concert is over!

I hope you have fun with this challenge - we'd love to see what you come up with.  Here are a few things to keep in mind when you join us.

1)  Please provide a link back to us at Sunday Stamps in your post.

2) Please link directly to your blog post for the challenge.

3) Feel free to use any brand of product

4) Deadline is Saturday, December 22 @ 12am EST

5) Have FUN!  

Thanks for dropping by!  Hope you're having a productive weekend.

Joan

CAS & KickOff

It's Friday!

It's Summer!

It's the long weekend - WoooHooo!

I'm keeping things Clean and Simple today 'cause there's a lot to get done and I'm raring to go!

For today's main feature I used the colours from Create with Connie and Mary (Basic Black, Real Red and Sahara Sand) and the sketch from   Just Add Ink....which creates a perfect Clean and Simple card.  It's always difficult for me to leave crisp clean card stock - but I backed away today.  The butterfly has some texture - I combined the Elegant Butterfly punch with the Beautiful Wings Embosslit die.

Now on to even more texture....this is the card that my guests will be creating at my Holiday Catalogue Kickoff today.  It contains absolutely NOTHING from the Holiday catalogue - but I've got displays of lots of things that were created with the new toys.....

So - off I go - Hope your day is full of fun stuff to do.

Thanks for taking the time to visit.

Joan

MashUp! Bag and Card

It was party time over at the Friday MashUp! this week...here are the parameters...

1. Make a project using the " Party Time " theme.
2. Or Make a project using the " Box in a Bag "
3. Or "Mash it Up" and create a "Box in a Bag with a Party Time theme."

HERE is the tutorial for the Box in a Bag that I made - The tutorial is done by Amanda Corbet at Krafting Kreations.  It was really quick and easy to create.

I also used the sketch for the card from Stamping 411 from last week.  

Now I just have to fill the little bag with something yummy and pass it along to a friend to celebrate the end of the school year.

Hope you have something to celebrate - thanks for visiting.

Joan

A Bird, A Butterfly.....and a Snowman

Today I've used the Mojo Monday sketch along with the colours from the Paper Players....Lucky Limeade, Melon Mambo and Basic Grey.  I love when I find challenges that challenge me to use things I rarely use - like Melon Mambo.  I like the colour 'cause it's so bright, but I'm not really a pink person so I tend to neglect it.

After I inked the summer image from "Four Seasons", I spritzed it with water to change it up a bit.  You can barely see the spritz marks in the photo.  I love how this set has a tiny image to go along with the scallop image for each season.

On Saturday, at our Extravaganza, I demonstrated the embossing resist technique after having coloured an image.  This is the little guy I used for my demonstration - I hadn't had anything to add him to.  But...today I remembered that Lesley Croghan - Always Playing with Paper is now hosting a Merry Monday Challenge helping us get a head start on cards for Christmas.  Yay!!!

I'm starting to count down the days with kids.....there are shockingly few!

Hope you have something fun/exciting to count down to.

Thanks for stopping by,

Joan

Mixed Butterflies

Good Monday Morning - I decided to play with some new paper today while doing the sketch challenge from Just Add Ink.  The Designer Series Paper is Patio Party - available staring Friday.  I love the little butterflies on the one sheet - they go well with the Embosslit butterflies.

I'm off to school now - I like these particular afternoons because I'm teaching grades 3-6 - I like working with the older ones at this time of year.....well, except for the fact that some of them are just DONE with school.    It's all good!

Thanks for visiting - hope you had a great start to your week.

Joan

Spring is in the Air

As soon as I saw the challenge at Stampin' Royalty - "Spring Things", I knew I had to get busy with the project I had planned.....I was inspired by the photo on page 5 of the April Stampin' Success Magazine. 

 I have put this bird cage at our front door for the past two years.  Sometimes it's empty; last year I stuck a chickadee inside (ceramic of course).  When I saw the example in the magazine I knew I had to duplicate it.  I literally had to cram in  the wreath I used as a nest, and the eggs are drastically oversized, but I'm happy with how it turned out.

I've been using pearls or rhinestones as the bodies of my butterflies, but I like the added flowers too.  Linen thread was used of the antennae....it worked well.

The styrofoam eggs are covered with layers of the Blossom Bouquet Triple flower and then spritzed with Soft Suede.  I moistened the paper a bit to make it more pliable, and attached the layers with a hot glue gun.

These little flowers are standard....the Boho Blossoms punch - largest blossom in 5 layers.  Each layer was spritzed with water first before crumpling it up.  I used sewing pins through the middle to hold them together.

Finally, I used the left over butterflies for a card using the sketch from Stamping 411.

I've been babysitting Elliot the past three afternoons while his mom and dad get moved into their new place.  I'm bushed!  But I had a good time.

Hope your weekend is off to a good start.  Thanks for taking the time to visit.

Joan

Mucho Mojo

 I ended up creating two cards using today's Mojo Monday sketch.  The Soft Suede Butterfly was my first creation with a background collage using images from Established Elegance.  It took a while to get to that point because I was dead set on using Mocha Morning paper - but it just didn't work out.  I do, however, like this final result.

The second card might be a birthday card for a friend of my Mother's.  This photo didn't turn out very well.  I used Concord Crush, and I may just do it over again using a lighter background so that the collage of images shows up better - they are the important part of this card.  I'll give it another try tomorrow.

I got my report cards done today - I told myself I had to before I got to play.  The other thing I have got to do this week is get my head around what I'm going to have the kids doing for this years' Christmas Concert.  Time will fly by once this little break is over.

Hope your mojo is working for you today.  Thanks for stopping by!
Joan

Tri Fold Nature Walk

 

Today, over at Hand Stamped Sentiments, they've laid down the challenge for fancy fold cards - I don't think I've ever actually finished one of these Tri Fold Shutter Cards - but I'm relatively happy with the way this one turned out.  Lots of little pieces depending on the sections you want to highlight.  It's interesting to look through the gallery on Splitcoast for this type of card  - just to see the different ways that people have place their papers and what they've done to embellish their creation.

AND, over at Hand Stamped Sentiments, the DT has a wide variety of fancy folds cards to share for inspiration.

I'm off to the city to do some shopping and then I'm looking forward to having dinner this evening with a few of my former (won't say "old") college roommates.  We've been staying in touch for over 30 years!!!

Hope you have some life long friends to share good times with.

Thanks for stopping by to visit

Joan

Royal Birthday Mash Up

I got to use my new "Creative Elements" set today for two Challenges.  I used the sketch from Stampin' Royalty and the colours and theme from The Friday Mashup!

• use the colours Not Quite Navy, Always Artichoke, Cherry Cobbler, and Sahara Sand
• create a Birthday Card

I created the background piece first stamping the initial image with the Not Quite Navy and then colouring sections in.  I used ink with an aqua painter on regular paper, so some of the outside edges bled a bit, but that just added some age to the piece.

For the flower I stamped the image on watercolour paper three times using the Cherry Cobbler and then used a blender pen to pull colour into the open sections.  I cut all the flowers out getting progressively smaller and layered them with dimensionals (you can't really see the dimension in this photo).  I'm not altogether happy with the way the flower turned out.  There's almost too much colour - I'll have to play with it a bit.

The centre strip of Sahara Sand was put through the Big Shot with the new Stripes embossing folder - but it's hard to see the embossing in the picture.

It was a good day for stamping because it's been moving between misting and pouring all day.  Hope your day has been productive too.

Thanks for stopping by!
Joan

Mojo Way to Go

Way to go today - my friend Joan had her last Bell practice with one of the classes, my husband had his band concert tonight, I got some flower planted and my daughter made a frame for her friend's birthday.

I got the idea for this flower from Sandra at Sandra's Stamping Spot for THIS flower. She has given some instructions, and it was really easy. I just think I need to make a couple more and not flatten the pieces quite so much.
For the scallop along the top and bottom edges I took the new Lace Ribbon Border Punch and cut it in half down the middle. And talking of splitting things - I inked only one set of words on a "triple" stamp from the Happy Greetings stamp set from the Summer Mini
The sketch is a Mojo Monday sketch.


This is the frame that Allison made for her friend. She's also going to be making her one of the photo tins.

Well - hope your Monday was marvelous - thanks for taking time to stop by for a visit.
Joan

B&W Get Well

I'm not so sure how "cheery" a black and white get well card is - but it does have bling and butterflies! And I just HAD to make another one of those heated satin flowers. I only have three colours of Satin ribbon - I can see that increasing in the near future!

I've also used the new Lace Ribbon Border Punch that I got in my package of goodies yesterday. Gonna have fun this weekend!!!! (Guess I better think a little bit about report cards though since they'll be due soon)

Today's card comes courtesy of three challenges - Over at Just Add Ink they are looking for Black and White cards and Stamping 411 has this Clean and Simple Sketch (although the two flying butterflies are "extra".) It also meets half of The Friday Mashup - which is a Get Well card.

I hope all is well your way - and thanks for stopping by!
Joan

Happiness is - Fridays!!!!

Anyone out there remember the Peanuts having lots of ideas of what Happiness is? I had whole little book about it I think. Wow - those were the days! Today - Happiness is butterflies, a half day Friday with golfing and refreshments....and a husband who understands me!! WoooHooo!!!

I'm starting to get a bit used to these easel cards - it wasn't a necessary part of this card, but I liked the idea using the scalloped circle die for the Big Shot. The sketch is from Just Add Ink. The 4 Crafty Chicks are looking for anniversary cards this week. And finally, the colours are from the Color Throwdown - Certainly Celery, Melon Mambo and Pumpkin Pie.

I've also added this card to a newly discovered challenge blog - Hand Stamped Sentiments - their challenge this week is to use paper piecing in your creation.

My daughter came into my craft room while I was working on this and loved the color combo - she has to make something for a friend of hers - so we'll see if the colors pop up again.

Well, gotta get to work - I'll be finding out today if my "creative" idea of having the entire school singing a song in canon at four sections around the gym is going to work. I'm pushing the limits for the little grade 1's and 2's - so we'll see. It may just be a "crazy" idea instead.

Ta ta for now - thanks for stopping by!
Joan