Valetine's for Charity

Wow have things been a whirlwind around here! First we all got sick (poor Koen had to miss his friend's birthday party and he was NOT happy about it) then we found out we'll be moving at the end of our lease as the owners would like to sell the house (we would buy but it's a house we'll outgrow in a year or two). So I haven't been posting much as crafting has been limited.

Last night, however, was my monthly "meeting" with my upline Leisa. (We put on reruns of Glee or CSI and papercraft... sometimes with new product). Leisa gave me a HUGE bag of Valentine cards for the Ronald McDonald House that I collect for and I made a few more.

This card uses red cardstock that a friend gave me that was recycled from a closing business, two punches and treat cups from Stampin' Up, and the sentiment is from Clost to My Heart, a stamp set called "A Little Everything".

I wanted to thank everyone who has given me cards to include in the donation drop. As soon as my currect "Thank you" card swap is concluded I'll be taking the whole lot of them in.

Custom Card for Warcrafter in Love

Here it is, my first ever custom card! The request came from a woman who plays a Draenei hunter and is in a relationship with a fellow who plays a Draenei shaman in the game World of Warcraft.

Hunters use bows and shaman use totems. It was a lot of fun coming up with a template for a totem (each race has totems that look different). I used a chipboard parenthesis with waxy for the bow. For the "flame" around the fire totem I used white ribbon colored with a SU marker.

The tree embellishment is from SU Thoughts & Prayers and the sentiment is from CTMH Picture Perfect.

Obviously I couldn't post the picture until the woman gave the card to her love, so here it is... a month later! I'm happy with how it turned out (and I kept the template for the totem!) I just hope HE likes it too!

For more information on how to get a custom made card or craft of your own please check out my post detailing the process.

Stepping outside...

Now and then I try and step outside my "comfort zone" and try something new. Embossing isn't new, but for me working with patterned paper kinda is. Using more than one kind of patterned paper is even harder for me! I'm also not usually the type to use paper flowers or buttons without prompting... I finally got over that hurdle with ribbon though.

If I were to do this card again I think I might do the children in white emboss instead of gold. Without the light from the flash on it the gold sort of blends into the patterned paper... on the other hand it does make a neat effect when you hold the card and then the light hits it suddenly POPPING the children out at you.

I used CTMH "Childhood Portrait" and SU "Live Like You Mean It" along with random scraps in various project boxes. I mean I literally opened up Kerowyn's baby book project box and pilfered the ribbon and flowers. It was a late night card hehe.

Stampin' Ten Group

I have the pleasure of being part of a Stampin' Up group where we meet once a month and promise to spend a certain amount of money and trade off who gets to take home the hostess benefits. On those monthly gatherings our Stampin' Up demonstrator shows us several projects and techniques. It's great fun, it'd be great fun without all the other stuff just for a chance to get out of the house without the kids!!

I'm posting the cards we made. These are made entirely of Stampin' Up product (all current) and tools... oh maybe the adhesive wasn't Stampin' Up heh. We used tons of embellishments and techniques but all were super easy and super fast! (Note that these were not designed by me, and the demos looked way better than mine cause I like to switch around details a bit lol).

Tonight we did three cards and a "stages" scrap book page (which is a 6x6 on an 8.5x11 on a 12x12).

Swap Owl!

Well I joined a swap... and it's a punch art swap. I was going to create a new punch art character (working on them!!) but I had requests for the owl that Colleen Hilchie showed me how to do. I wanted to use up some of the retired pinks and purples from Stampin' Up and to challenge myself to work with colors I love but seem to have no luck working with! I'm pretty happy with the results!



So here it is! A sneak peek for those participating in the swap. I did something different this time, I made the wings mobile! I think moving bits on cards are really cool and fun. It means using more embellishments and dimentional tape, but I'm okay with that. Hey, I could teach my owl how to use semaphore flags!

Stampin' Up materials used: paper (sahara sand, some pinks and purples that I'm sure are retired, very vanilla), ink (perfect plum), stamps ("Sprinkles") and punches, (tag, scallop circle, trio flower, circles and trio heart).

Close to My Heart materials used: stamps ("A Little Buzz" and "Hodgepodge Alphabet")

Other materials used: ribbon, itty bitty brads, creative memories corner punch

Love Bug

Well, I like the idea but I'm not sure I'm happy with the result. My son (who thinks I'm Mister Maker's apprentice or something) asked if I could make him a worm. So I started playing around with some left over circles and thought it would be neat if they could still move when on the card.

The base is SU Barely Banana, the other colors are Certainly Celery, and I think Old Olive and Always Artichoke (I was using scraps). The images are stamped in Chocolatel Chip.

As you can see, the worm DOES move... that's a heart for a mouth, Koen's suggestion. I used itty bitty brads to link the circles and only glued it down by it's "butt". I think it's something I'll revisit... but this one gets tossed in the "Samples" box. Heh.

I love you!

Today is Mother's Day. My husband and children (who are almost 2 and just over 3) made me breakfast in bed, which the children ate for the most part. It was very adorable to hear all about how the kids helped daddy make the breakfast. It, along with the hormones of pregnancy, made me all mushy and gushy and reminded me of this card.

This was demonstrated by Colleen Hilchie at the Stampin' Up "Stampers 10" party that I hosted a few months ago. I modified her owl to have it's wings spread and add the "^this" to the card. The owl itself is made from various Stampin' Up Punches (of which I need to buy a few more so I can recreate this adorable card!). Trio flower, circle scallop, round tag, hearts and two sizes of circles.

I also love this card, another demonstrated card by Colleen Hilchie. I had to get creative with the photo due to the black on black emobossing in the bottom right corner. The eyes are adhered with dimentionals to "pop" them out a bit. Regal Rose, pretty in pink, whisper white and basic black are the colours. Lots of embossing touch ups.