More is More

Today is the last day of Challenges in the SCS Dare to Get Dirty celebration and I get to host another one!  The Dirty Dare Gallery will continue to accept uploads through August 22nd and the forum will be open for chatter through August 15th.  After those dates the gallery and forums will be available for viewing only.  So….you still have PLENTY of time to play!  And my challenge today is super easy….Fall Back on Black! 

Here’s my sample:

This Garden Whimsy set is so much fun!  For this card I stamped on glossy white cardstock with Bashful Blue and Celery classic ink to coordinate with the Cutie Pie Designer Paper.  Butterflies were then outlined with a Sakura Black Glaze pen (yes – the same one that gave me so much trouble on my boat card!) and highlighted with a little stickles.  It’s really a very simple card and I think the black really gives it a bit of POP!

stamps:  Garden Whimsy, Warmest Regards

paper:  Bashful Blue, Celery, Black, Glossy White, Cutie Pie dp

ink:  Bashful Blue, Celery, Black

other:  Sakura Black Glaze pen, black and celery grosgrain, blue gingjam ribbon, puzzle decorative scissors, stickles, swarovsky crystals (thanks Debra!)

I’m off to work (hi Mom!) so I’ll have to catch up on the entries for my challenge when I get home tonight.  I really hope you’ll play!

I am so in love with the new SU set Boatloads of Love!  It was one that I knew I needed from my first glance through the catalog.  I always loved Loads of Love with the little truck and the accessories set to match, so this was a natural for me.  I haven’t had time to play with it much yet, but I did use it for a sample for Jeanne S for her Dirty Challenge today.  You can see it larger in my SCS gallery – click here.

I had so much fun making this card!  I love paper piecing and it’s really much easier than it looks.  The most fun part was rumaging through my drawers of stamp sets to find something to put with the boat.  That little cat from You’re Neat just cracks me up – especially along with the pups from the Loads of Love Accessories set!  He’s taking his friends on a little ride!  🙂 I wish I had photographed a step by step when I made this but Jeanne has a great tutorial on her blog  to show simple paper piecing. What I did was emboss the boat images (black craft ink and clear powder) on the polka dot and striped patterned papers from the SU Cutie Pie collection and cut them out.  The boat was also stamped on Confetti White cardstock and the pieces were then adhered over the stamped image.  Really easy – just takes a little time and some nice sharp scissors!

So that card was made a week or or so ago so Jeanne could have it for her challenge.  I also wanted to make a card for leslierich’s challenge as a player today and decided to use Boatloads for that as well.  For all challenge details SCS Fan Club members can click here.

This card really fought me.  Actually I should say that the black glaze pen I used for the border around the Not Quite Navy piece fought me.  Grrrrrr.  I had to take one completely adhered set apart and throw away the piece where the back pen smeared all over…..started again…was super careful and it smeared again.  I put the white tab in to cover up most of it….I just couldn’t start all over at that point.  I wish I would have just used a black cardstock layer there.  Other than than yuck-up I really like this card.

Colors used are: Wasabi, Real Red, Soft Sky, Not Quite Navy, Black.  The white is Paper Trey’s white cardstock – I have no idea why I grabbed that – it’s not the best for watercoloring and that’s another thing that fought me.

I haven’t been using my Cuttlebug enough lately, so it was really fun to emboss these two background pieces – the added texture was just what this card needed.  Ribbon was a gift from Taylor (maybe May Arts?  I’m not sure) and the tiny little bling is an Adorn it jewel (LOVE those things) from eclectic Paperie.

I hope you’re having a super Stampin’ weekend!  Thanks for stopping by.

Wow!  These Dirty Dare Challenges are so fun!  I was lucky enough to be a sample maker for my sweet friend Cami and here’s the card I made for her challenge today.

I have to say that I LOVE this card *sigh*.  It’s so PINK and shimmery and sparkly!  Card base is Pretty in Pink, matting layers are Rose Red and the white is Shimmer White cardstock (I swear I use that stuff on almost every card now!)  The stamp set used here is the Level 2 hostess set In the Spotlight.  I have to tell you….after I got this set and noticed the sample for it while thumbing through catalog, my hear skipped a beat…could it be?  Does the SU scallop punch fit the largest motif image exactly?  WooHoo!  I have to say that I could not punch without getting just a tiny bit of some of the border dots….thus I decided to sponge all the edges to camoflauge that.  I really wish SU would include a list with the purchase of each punch as to what sets have images specifically designed to fit each punch.  I never would have thought of this had I not seen the sample!  The SU scallop punch is layered with foam tape onto the Marvy super jumbo circle punch and then onto the Marvy mega scallop circle – I really like that progression!

The Rose Red edging was cut with Mini Scallop scissors – held upside down or backwards or whatever.  No – not on purpose!  I almost freaked out at first since my layers were already thoroughly adhered, but I decided to breathe and just go with it and I ended up liking the result.  That’s how lots of my stamping goes!  I rarely give in to a screw-up.

I used 2 shades of pink Versamagic chalk inks – Pink Petunia and Pixie Dust.  They give such a soft pretty finish on the shimmer cardstock.  Finishing touches include SU Pretty in Pink tafetta ribbon (if you don’t have this yet – believe me, you need it!), Amuse twinkle dot stickers, some paper piercing and a gorgeous pink rhinestone flower brad (purchased at Joanns sometime ago).

Next are the two cards I made as samples for the Challenge I’m hosting.  First a very nice version:

And next – the same card given my More is More treatment:

So how many extra little details can you find?  *wink*  Check it out in my SCS gallery for all the details!

I’m very anxious to have some time to play with this set – Abundant Joy more.  It’s so beautiful and so *my style*.

It’s going to be a very busy day today.  Hope you get to play some challenges – especially MINE!  *grin*  Thanks for stopping by!

I’ve got to get to work, but wanted to share a card I made that combined two of the challenges today in Dare to Get Dirty – Beate’s sketch and Jen’s (genie1314) clearly fun challenge.   I got this adorable penguin set from My Favorite Things a while back and hadn’t had a chance to make anything with it yet.  Aren’t they so cute?  The little oval under them came with the set too.  Black part of the penguins was colored with a Sakura black glaze pen and I re-drew the dots for their eyes with a white gel pen.

Card base is River Rock and 5″ square – stamped with stars from Paper Trey Text Box set in River Rock and the SU Whimsy jumbo wheel in Wasabi.  Sentiment is from Imagninations (I’ve had it for years.).  The color scheme came from the Basic Grey Fruitcake paper.  Retired Cranberry Crisp is used for the accent color.  The cross stitches are rub-ons from Doodlebug.

Curt took the whole week off for vacation, but I wasn’t that smart *D’oh* so I need to get going.  Thanks for stopping by!

WooHoo!!!! The Dirty Dares have begun on SCS!  If you are a Fan Club member click here to get directly to the Dare Challenge Forum!  There will be four challenges released every morning at 9:00am Pacific (with eight on Saturday and Sunday) all hosted by Dirty Dozen past and present.

Here’s the card I did for SweetMissDaisy’s challenge.

We just returned from a little mini vacation in Palm Springs and I needed a thank you card (filled with cash) for the 15 year old girl that fed our babies while we were gone.  Since we have a Greenwing macaw (R.B.) and a Red Fronted macaw (Beaker) and a Peachfront lovebird (Parsley) I tried to represent them all on this card using what stamps I had.  Before I really started stamping I collected parrot and burd stamps so I have a few, but they are never really the right kind of birds – I always have to fudge it a bit.  LOL!

Shimmer white cardstock was stamped with red and olive feather images and then run through the Cuttlebug for texture.  Unfortunately the sentiment placement was a bit of an afterthought and I messed it up when I stamped it, but I did this on my way out the door and there was no time to fix it.  I even had to scan as opposed to taking a picture.  It was fun though.

My next card is for StamperSharon’s challenge.

I’m finding Purely Pomegranate hard to photograph.  It’s such a rich beautiful color and not as red as it looks here.  For this toile look I used

paper – Purely Pomegrante, Shimmer White, Palette O Prints (Rose and Pom)

ink – Purely Pomegranate

stamps – Floral, See With the Heart

other – corner rounder (to make scallop), circle punches, foam tape, velvet ribbon from Fabric Barn, K&Co Adhesive Pearls from ecelectic Paperie.  The monochromatic look in this rich color just seems so warm and elegant to me.  This is really quite a simple card and I’m super happy with it.

ETA:  I’ve had some questions about the Palette O Prints paper I used.  I have noticed that a couple of the Rose Red prints actually have Pomegranate as the accent color in the print.  That is what I used on this card – I didn’t add any Pomegranate ink or stamping to it at all.  🙂

Today is the last day of my little vacation – it’s back to work tomorrow.  We had a nice relaxing time in Palm Springs and survived the Time Share presentation relatively unscathed.  If you get a chance to do one of their cheap trips it really is a good deal.  If it hadn’t been 110 degrees the trip would have been perfect! 

Hoping I can get in some reading and maybe a little more stamping this evening.  If you’re not already a member of the Fan Club at SCS, hop on over and join and come play some of these super fun challenges.  No time limits, no pressure, just FUN FUN FUN!!!

I wanted to take a minute to share a little item with you from the Stampin’ Up catalog that could be easily overlooked.  On page 193 toward the bottom are the Stampin’ Color Index Labels.  You get a complete set of 2 for $3.95.

I put a quarter in the picture for size reference.  The labels are clear with back writing and quite tiny so that they fit perfectly on the ends of our stamp pads.

They would also be great on file folders for cardstock or page protectors holding cardstock scraps (I wrote on mine with Sharpie).

I know some folks on SCS have made up their own files to print labels – even matching up the RGB code as closely as possible – and they are set up to punch with the word window punch.  It was my original intention to use one of those files, but for $3.95 to have these labels ready to go with no punching…totally worth it for me.

If you want to see some awesome organization check out Nicole Heady’s new stamp space – wow!

Remember Dare to Get Dirty starts on SCS Wednesday morning – make sure you have a current membership to the Fan Club!  I know you’ll want to play at least some of the fun challenges hosted by both current and Alumni Dirty Dozen for the week of July 25th – July 31st.  🙂

The exterior painting is finished!!  Huge YEA!  The house is now a pretty lemony yellow with white trim – not too bright, just happy looking.  I was going to take a picture to share, but we were unable to get the lawn mowed this week with all the painting going on, so the yard is looking a bit unkempt.

I said yesterday that I already had a card ready to share today and here it is.

I have been having so much fun with this Cutie Pie Designer Paper from SU!  One of the colors in it is So Saffron so I couldn’t wait to use it with the So Saffron long notes I got from SU a few months back.  This is a pretty simple lighthearted card.  The lady bug from Garden Whimsy was stamped in Purely Pomegranate on shimmer white cardstock and surrounded with spatters from Itty Bitty BGs in Bashful Blue.  The sentiment “hey lady” was stamped in Celery with 1/8″ Snap Stamps.  After punching the image with a SU circle punch it was covered with an Amuse clear dome sticker and mounted on a Bashful scallop circle (punched with the new SU punch).  Pomegrante and Celery were used for layering.  A little yellow heart charm (origin unknown/forgotten) hangs from a Celery grosgrain knot over a little Pomegranate circle.  The end of the note is folded back to reveal more stripes.  The flowers are outlined with a Sakura Stardust Gelly Roll pen for just a touch of sparkle.

This morning I met with a cabinet maker to go over specs for a custom built cabinet for my stamp room.  He’s the brother of a friend and did  some work in our kitchen several years ago that turned out wonderfully so I know I can trust his work.  I am absolutley giddy.  I’m also a little nervous because I realize there is a little part of me that thinks this will be a magic cabinet to solve all of the storage issues I have struggled with in there.  Of course that’s not going to happen, so I just hope I have planned well for efficient, easy access storage for all my current and future stamp sets.  Of course constant on-going purchases make the organization struggle almost impossible to conquer, but I’m looking forward to getting it under control in a beautiful new cabinet – even if it’s temporary!  LOL!  It will be about 8 weeks before it’s ready, but you know I’ll share pictures as soon as it’s here!  I better get my label maker going!

Thanks for stopping by.