Blue Bird

I have been playing with stencils and 3D decoupage again. I embossed using a stylus and light box and then cut inside the embossing with a swivel knife. Cutting paper dulls a blade pretty quickly so I tried using my regular Xacto craft knife with a #11 blade. I use Excel blades as they are thinner than the Exacto blades. The #11 blades are much less expensive than the swivel blades but I don't seem to have as much control as I do with a swivel knife and the blades are smaller and thinner so I guess I will have to suck it up!
I cut out the bird and around the edge of the card with scissors. You can find the decoupage sheet HERE

Texturized!

This is the third set of cards I have made. This set only has 8 cards but it will sell for the same price. There is more work and materials involved in this set. These cards are similar, and a couple are almost the same, as some I did for the White Challenge. I just added a colored panel to them. As you can see there is a lot of texture to the cards. I used Cuttlebug folders and the Scor-Pal for the texturizing.

This is how the sets of cards are presented. I used clear boxes and stretch metallic cord.

10 Card Gift Set

Wow, I have been away for a while! Not intentionally but nothing I made seemed to turn out right so I had nothing to post. I hope this post makes up for it!

These are a set of 10 cards from one 8 1/2" x 11" sheet of decorator paper I made for my daughter Kelly to sell as a fundraiser for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. I will be making more sets using different papers and stamps.

You can download the directions for making the 10 cards HERE the file is a PDF file. If you need a PDF reader you can download a free one HERE If you have enjoyed and learned from my blog I sure would appreciate it if you would take a look at Kelly's fundraising page HERE and make a donation!

Swaps

This is a card I made for a swap on Crafty Card Creators (CCC) A great, friendly swap group. The theme is A Touch of Glimmer. Although the glimmer doesn't show on the picture it is there! The panel behind the flowers is painted with Lumiere metallic acrylic paint and the flowers are embossed with gold on watercolor paper and colored with Twinkling H2O's. I used an embossing stencil on 2 corners and colored the half pearls with a Copic marker.

The other swap I did this month was an ATC. It is a doodle using Micron pens. If you look closely you will find the recipients name.

Now I am going to get a headstart on my swaps for next month. I have signed up for four!

Teabag Folding

I decided to have a go at something I have never done before . . . teabag folding. Although I found some nice examples online I have decided it is not something I want to pursue. It is just not for me. That being said, I did make two cards before I came to that conclusion.

For the first card I printed the squares and made the medallion according to the directions I found HERE but I don't think it looks like it is supposed to. Oh well! I cut the apperture with a round Nestie and then embossed around it with a larger Nestie according to the directions in the video HERE. The stamp is a $1 stamp from Michaels and the butterflies are a Martha Stewart punch. The punch has one large and 2 small butterflies but after punching them I lost one of the small butterflies. When I find it I will add it to the card!

For the second card I started following directions for a different fold to make another medallion but got lost along the way so I just made more of what I had and came up with this. I mounted the folds on a piece of white cardstock that I punched with a Martha Stewart border punch, added some half pearls and called it a day! No more teabag folding for me!

Frugal Friday

You Bought It Now Use It!

This is what I have been telling myself. It isn't very frugal to buy something and then not use it! These are a set of dies from Cuttlebug that I bought a while back but have not used. They called Vintage and are 2" x 2" dies that come 4 to a package. The price varies around the web from $14.99 to $7.99 on Ebay.

These are 2 cards I made using a couple of the dies. If you take a close look at the lovely white card Sheila made she has used another of these dies on the corners of her card.

For the first card I used the die to cut 2 corners, top left and bottom right, from the colored panel and I cut 2 dies from white CS which I adhered to the other 2 corners.It doesn't show well in the picture but the two I glued on look like they are embossed while the two I cut look like they are debossed.

I cut the aperture with a Nestie and then cut a smaller one from the green and glued it behind the panel which I then glued to the card base. The stamp is from Inkadinkado. I stamped it twice, once on the card base and once on a scrap. I colored both and then cut out the flowers and a leaf and used pop dots to adhere them.

For the second card I used the Cuttlebug Textile Textures for the bottom panel and Swiss Dots for the narrow panel and edged them with a chalk inkpad. I cut 3 dies and used the chalk ink on them too. They are raised with dimensional tape. Now to use the other two.

White Challenge Day 6. LAST DAY!

This is my last card for the challenge. I used the Anja corner1 stencil and dry embossed then cut out sections with a swivel knife. For the image I printed 4 copies of the image, cut out different sections and used dimensional tape to adhere the different layers. This particular image I have had for a long time. It is a Paintshop Pro tube. Do a search for PSP tubes and you will find gazillions. Some come with a PSP extention which means they can only be used with PSP but on a lot of sites they are jpg's which means anyone can use them.

SAUNDRA

DIANN

Diann assures me that this card is all white. Scanning cards with layers doesn't always work to well!

PHYLLIS

SHEILA

Remember the challenge ends TODAY at midnight EST! This isn't a contest. All you have to do for a chance to win is make a card and send it to me. The drawing for the random winner will be tomorrow.

CHALLENGE.
1) Create a card using only white cardstock. (today's card is a good example) Use as many layers
as you like but no colored cardstock or paper.
2) The color should come from the image. The card should be at least 75% white.
3) No embelishments like ribbon, buttons, primas etc
4) The challenge will run for 6 days, Saturday through Thursday. All entries must get to me by
midnight EST on Thursday, that is 11pm Central and 9pm PST.

When you have made your card email a picture to me with WHITE CHALLENGE in the subject line and don't forget to tell me who you are. My email address is in the left column near the top. I will put the picture on my blog using your first name only.

I will be making a challenge card every day, that is 6 cards. Your name will be entered in a drawing on Friday and I will do a random drawing and announce the winner on my blog and by email. The winner will receive the 6 cards that I make gift boxed plus a nice surprise!

White Challenge Day 5

This is my card for day 5 of the challenge. I used a scalloped Nestie and a $1 stamp from Michaels for this card.

There is only one day left for the challenge. All entries need to be to me by tomorrow.

BONNIE

RITA

THERESA

CHALLENGE.
1) Create a card using only white cardstock. (today's card is a good example) Use as many layers
as you like but no colored cardstock or paper.
2) The color should come from the image. The card should be at least 75% white.
3) No embelishments like ribbon, buttons, primas etc
4) The challenge will run for 6 days, Saturday through Thursday. All entries must get to me by
midnight EST on Thursday, that is 11pm Central and 9pm PST.

When you have made your card email a picture to me with WHITE CHALLENGE in the subject line and don't forget to tell me who you are. My email address is in the left column near the top. I will put the picture on my blog using your first name only.

I will be making a challenge card every day, that is 6 cards. Your name will be entered in a drawing on Friday and I will do a random drawing and announce the winner on my blog and by email. The winner will receive the 6 cards that I make gift boxed plus a nice surprise!

White Challenge Day 4

This is my card for day 4 of the challenge. It is a gate fold card. The image is from Inkadinkado colored with Prismacolor pencils. What doesn't show well in the picture is there is glitter on the rose and on the bubbles there is clear Stickles.

The image is cut with a classic circle Nestie and the panel behind it with a scalloped circle Nestie. I used very expensive tools to cut and prick holes in the card .... a plastic canvas circle and a push pin!

I used the edge of the canvas to trace the curves on the panels and cut them with scissors and then used the expensive tools to do the pricking on the card, the image panel and the scalloped panel.

White Challenge Day 3

This is my card for day 4 of the challenge. For the background I used a small embossing folder for the 'Many Thanks' and then scored two lines above and below it with my Scor-Pal. I then used the Spots and Dots embossing folder to emboss the space above the scored lines. The image was stamped twice and colored with Prismacolor pencils and OMS (Odorless Mineral Spirits) I cut one image out with a circle Nestie and cut part of the second image out with scissors and layered it using dimesional tape. I cut a second circle a little larger than the first and layered them with dimensional tape.

GLORIA

CHALLENGE.
1) Create a card using only white cardstock. (today's card is a good example) Use as many layers
as you like but no colored cardstock or paper.
2) The color should come from the image. The card should be at least 75% white.
3) No embelishments like ribbon, buttons, primas etc
4) The challenge will run for 6 days, Saturday through Thursday. All entries must get to me by
midnight EST on Thursday, that is 11pm Central and 9pm PST.

When you have made your card email a picture to me with WHITE CHALLENGE in the subject line and don't forget to tell me who you are. My email address is in the left column near the top. I will put the picture on my blog using your first name only.

I will be making a challenge card every day, that is 6 cards. Your name will be entered in a drawing on Friday and I will do a random drawing and announce the winner on my blog and by email. The winner will receive the 6 cards that I make gift boxed plus a nice surprise!

Break out the white cardstock and get creating. I look forward to getting your entries!

White Challenge Day 2

This is my card for day 2 of the challenge. The card on Frugal Friday was not one of the challenge cards. It was the card that inspired the challenge! For this card I used a Stampin Up stamp from the 'A Little Bit Of Happiness' set and the sentiment is a part of a $1 stamp. The yellow flowers are cut out and raised with dimensional tape and I used the Scor-Pal to emboss the lines above and below the image.

Here are some more entries in the challenge.

CHRYSTAL

JOAN

PENNY

White Challenge Day 1

Here is my card for day one of the white challenge. The image is from Whipper Snapper Designs and is one of my favorite stamps. To make the background I took a 5 1/2" x 4 1/4" piece of cardstock and marked the center point on each side. I folded the CS from the mark on the long sides to the mark on the short sides forming a diamond shape. With the CS folded I ran it through my paper crimper. Remember them? One of those things that were put away and forgotten! This was not my original idea. I saw it somewhere a long time ago and remembered it.

I cut a diamond shape to fit in the middle and embossed a border around it with the ScorPal stamped and colored the image with Prismacolor pencil and OMS and then did the dots around the image with a Micron pen. The image panel is raised with dimensional tape.

There is one entry in the challenge already!

SHELLY

Thanks for looking and I hope you will be inspired to try the challenge. Glitter and some sponging is allowed as long as the card is 75% white. For the rules of the challenge see the post below.

Frugal Friday and a challenge

For today's card I used a $1 stamp from Michaels. I have a few of these type of stamps in both horizontal and vertical orientations and have always found them more difficult than the square ones so I thought I would challenge myself to use this one today.

To me, being a frugal cardmaker is creating a beautiful card without a lot of expense. I would rather spend my crafting dollars on things I can use over and over rather than on rub-ons, stickers, primas and other embelishments that can only be used once. I also like my cards to go in the mail for the price of one stamp!

Which brings me to the challenge. I love cards with lots of white space too so here is my challenge to you.

CHALLENGE.
1) Create a card using only white cardstock. (today's card is a good example) Use as many layers
as you like but no colored cardstock or paper.
2) The color should come from the image. The card should be at least 75% white.
3) No embelishments like ribbon, buttons, primas etc
4) The challenge will run for 6 days, Saturday through Thursday. All entries must get to me by
midnight EST on Thursday, that is 11pm Central and 9pm PST.

When you have made your card email a picture to me with WHITE CHALLENGE in the subject line and don't forget to tell me who you are. My email address is in the left column near the top. I will put the picture on my blog using your first name only.

I will be making a challenge card every day, that is 6 cards. Your name will be entered in a drawing on Friday and I will do a random drawing and announce the winner on my blog and by email. The winner will receive the 6 cards that I make gift boxed plus a nice surprise!

Break out the white cardstock and get creating. I look forward to getting your entries!

Pastel Flower

I made this card using a 3D decoupage sheet I found free on the internet. I printed and cut out the sheet then mounted the base print on a piece of cream CS. I edged the front of the card base with a Martha Stewart border punch and put a piece of cream CS on the inside with a Happy Birthday sentiment.

Edited to add the link to the decoupage sheet HERE

Sweet Violets

Yesterday I received some embossing stencils I had ordered so of course I had to play today! This is the card I came up with using one of the stencils I bought HERE. I embossed and cut out the tag and then used part of the stencil to emboss two corners of the panel.

I printed the violets onto cardstock. I printed a whole sheet so that I will have more to play with. I used 4 prints to cut out the different parts with the first one being the whole print. After cutting the various parts I gave them some dimension by turning them over on an embossing pad (I use a piece of a placemat from the dollar store) and rubbing them with an embossing stylus until they curl a little. You can get the violets HERE I used dimensional tape for the different parts of the violets and to raise the tag. I finished the outside of the card off with a bow and half pearls from my stash.

I also decorated the inside of this card, a first for me but it took so long to make that I decided to go the whole hog! The sentiment is from My Sentiments Exactly.

Spotlight

This is a quick and easy card using the spotlight technique and great for a larger image that you don't want to color! In this case I stamped the image twice and cut 2 circles from the second image, colored them and mounted then on a larger black circle. The floral stamp is from Inkadinkado and the sentiment is from Papertrey Mixed Messages

I have gotta get away from pink!

Another 3D card

I used another decoupage sheet from THIS site for this card. I didn't use all the layers and there was a lot of cutting but it was a fun embelishment to make.
I used the Leafy Branch embossing folder from Cuttlebug for the panel and then used an oval Nestie to cut a window. I stamped the sentiment, which is from the 100+ unmounted stamps from My Sentiments Exactly that I told you about on Friday, onto vellum and adhered it to the back of the panel. I glued a piece of yellow CS onto the card base under the window and used dimentional tape to raise the panel and then glued on the embelishment that I made.

3D cards

Well, I got an IM from my youngest daughter yesterday telling me she was disappointed in me because I didn't have a card to share yesterday! I am making up for it today by having two!Todays cards are a bit different for me. I am stepping out of my box! While surfing the web I found THIS sit that has a whole bunch of decoupage sheets to print for free.

For this first card I saved and printed the images onto cardstock and cut them out with a ruler and Exacto knife.
The site is an English site and the standard paper size is different from ours. When I printed this set of pictures it cut the top off the one that was supposed to be the base. However it would have been to big for the card anyway so I just started with the second picture. After cutting out the pictures I glued the first one to a card base and then used dimentional tape for the rest of the layers.

The second card is bigger than I usually make. It is 6"x 6" but that is the size the image dictated. When I use this site again I will reduce the size before I print.

There is more cutting with this one but it is so pretty I think it was worth it.

Frugal Friday

If it aint one thing it is t' other today. My signature disappeared and when I checked it said I had exceded my quota for the day! What is that? Anyway I decided to have a new one and to change the host so hopefully that won't happen again. The other thing is I don't have a card today but what I do have are some links to great bargains so that qualifies as frugal right?

This link is for 100+ unmounted sentiment stamps from My Sentiments Exactly. It is on Ebay but it is a Buy It Now and the price has been reduced from $24.95 to $19.96. I have these stamps and they are great. They would be even greater if I hadn't paid $24.95.

The next bargain is for 50 unmounted rubber stamps from Hampton Art Stamps for $8.75 also on Ebay but hurry only 1 day left! I have also bought these stamps and there is a free gift included.

These are much less than $1 per stamp so hop on over and grab yourself a bargain!

Black & White & ?

What have I been doing these last few days? .....Making a mess! I got stymied for ideas when it came to making simple thank you cards for my daughter to send to guys. I made a few more in different colors suitable for ladies and then ideas came to a grinding halt.

This is the last ladies card I made. Looking at this again this morning a lightbulb came on. Black and white!

These are three cards I came up with. They are all basically made the same way just with different shapes. I used Nestabilities Classic circles and Labels 2 but I just cut the rectangles with a paper cutter. The "Little Note of Thanks" sentiment is from Stampin Up and the other one is a $1 stamp from Michaels. This is how I did the circle one.

First I stamped the sentiment, cut it out and embossed it. The size of the first circle depends on the size of your sentiment so I won't be giving sizes. I then used the next largest die which is 1/4" bigger and cut a red circle. Then I took a piece of black CS, a piece of white CS and a piece of plain copy paper big enough to take the two next largest dies and stacked them. I cut them out with one run through the Cuttlebug. The copy paper circle is for a pattern so don't skip it. Next you need to cut the black and the white circles in half. This is where the paper circle pattern comes in.

Fold the paper pattern circle in half. Stack the 2 CS circles and put the folded pattern on top so that the edges are even. The folded edge of the paper pattern is exactly half of the circle. Cut the 2 CS circles in half using the folded edge of the paper pattern as a guide. I find it easiest to use scissors with blades long enough to cut in one motion. Do this with both sizes of circles.

Take one half of a black circle and one half of a white circle in both sizes and tape them together to make a complete circle that is half black and half white. Glue these 2 circles together with the white of the smaller circle on the black of the larger circle.

The contrasting strip on all the cards is 2" wide. The sizing is different on the Labels 2 dies and so I only used one size for the black and white. I still made a paper pattern to get the center for cutting.