Bold & Bright - #3 and #4

Well, we're home, we don't have company and I woke up early. That combination of events led me to my stamping room. Yippee! Personal updates later (including my dad) but first, I'll tell you about these two cards.

I'm not really enamored of this set, "Bold & Bright" from Stampin' Up!, but I "needed" to use it to continue my mission of using all of my retired Stampin' Up! sets. Now I'm done with it and can move on to the next sets. For this first one, I inked up the stamp with a Brilliance three-color pad and matted with a shimmery blue. I mounted the panel on pop dots. I stamped the sentiment (from Papertrey Ink) with the same pad. Lots of shimmer on the card, but not in the picture:)

Last card with this set - perhaps forever! LOL! I used black ink on the stamp and colored with water color pencils and an aquapainter. I matted with black and again used pop dots. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink and I added the Washi tape before added the image panel.

We have been very busy again, but like I said - we're home now. Our daughter and family arrived from Chicago on the Saturday before Christmas and stayed until Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve, Jim and I and our kids and their kids (plus others) all went down to my dad's to celebrate. Jim and I stayed there until yesterday, when we left to attend a funeral, visited his mom and then came home. Lots of fun times, but I must say, it's great to be home.

My dad is doing quite well. His mouth is a bit sore, he isn't hungry and he can't taste. But, he knows he needs to make himself eat, drink water, drink a supplement and put ointment on his face. He is taking very good care of himself. He is now over half done with his radiation treatments - finished up number 16 of 30 this morning. My brother and sister-in-law will be arriving on Monday to stay with him until he is finished. That is SO awesome of them!

Tomorrow I'll post my first calendar page of 2015. On Friday I'll post a picture of my birthday cards (tradition, you know) and then I'll start posting pictures of new cards again, assuming that I get some made in the next few days. I know for sure I have two more, because I got them done this morning. Thanks for sticking with me through all my days of not posting anything. I hope I'm back now for a while!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all! Tradition is for me to post a picture of our Christmas tree, so here it is. I hope you all have the opportunity to celebrate with family and friends.

Best wishes for the New Year, also.

Thank you all for your visits. Hopefully soon I'll be able to start posting more.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Hanukkah!

Every year I make one Hanukkah card, and here is this year's.

I cut the dreidels using my Silhouette and some "holographic" paper from Crayola. I glued them to textured blue paper and mounted that panel on foam squares. I printed the sentiment using my computer.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Birthday, Sheri!

Happy Birthday, Sheri!

I made this card last week when I got up so early one day and had a chance to play around in my stamping room. I actually made two cards like it - both for December birthdays. The snowflakes are from Inkadinkado and are stamped in Soft Silver ink. I used a Papertrey Ink die to cut out the "birthday" and used a Papertrey stamp for the the "HAPPY." I matted both panels with light blue cardstock. The sentiment panel is mounted on Dimensionals.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Bold and Bright #2

Here is card #2 made with the Stampin' Up! set called "Bold & Bright." The picture doesn't do it justice, although it's not a great card anyway:) Feels good to be stamping again, though, even if it won't last long.

I stamped the image on a yellowish/cream vellum with Versamark and used black embossing powder. I colored on the back with miscellaneous markers. I stamped the sentiment (from Papertrey Ink) on a scrap of vellum to check out the placement, and again I liked the layered vellum, so I just used it. I stamped it with black and used black embossing powder. Then I punched a couple balloons using the same vellum and a Martha Stewart punch, attached them and added the "strings." When I attach vellum, I always use Duck Tape brand double sided adhesive. It really is pretty "invisible."

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Precious Baby

I woke up really again this morning (hope I stop that soon!), so I had some stamping time. I didn't have any cards that I HAD to make, so I pulled out the next stamp set in my project to use all of my Stampin' Up! sets. Can't wait to get back to that project full force!

This set is called "Bold & Bright." I chose the baby image for my card for today. I stamped it using an old rainbow ink pad. (This pad is a Splendor pigment with ten different colors. It's from Tsukineko. Not sure if it's still available or not.) I trimmed down the image panel and mounted it on pop dots. I really want to start using some of my patterned paper, but nothing ever seems like the right print! So, I went with vellum. The sentiment is from a baby set from Inkadinkado and is stamped with Versamark and embossed with white embossing powder. I had some thin strips of vellum left and one of them landed on the larger piece of vellum. I liked the looks of it, so I added it above the sentiment before I attached the image panel.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Birthday, Owen!

Yesterday was our grandson Owen's fourth birthday. Hard to believe he's four already!

His favorite movie at this time is "Nightmare Before Christmas," so I found a picture from the movie and printed it on some white cardstock. Then I downloaded a Nightmare Before Christmas font and printed the sentiment on some gray cardstock. I mounted the picture on Dimensionals and added it at an angle to the card front.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Snowflake Christmas and Updates

I stamped! :) I woke up early this morning (after going to bed relatively late) and couldn't get back to sleep. So, I went in my stamping room. Gosh, did that feel great! I'm sure I'll crash later, though:)

I needed one more Christmas card and I already had this die-cut piece on my table from when the grandkids were here at Thanksgiving. The die is from Impression Obsession. I trimmed it down and mounted it on foam squares. I cut a piece of white cardstock to fit it and stamped some snowflakes in silver using an Inkadinkado stamp, then I added some blue gems to a few of the snowflakes.

My dad has finished one week of radiation treatments. Five more to go.

Wyatt is very healthy now, so that is awesome. In fact, everyone is healthy right now. We're hoping everyone can stay that way through the holidays and beyond.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Life:)

Sorry - no card yet from me. Life has not yet settled down for us.

My dad started radiation treatments on Monday. He doesn't really enjoy being strapped down, but he'll manage that part just fine. I'm very concerned about how he'll be doing once he's finished his thirty treatments, but he'll make it. He's a tough Norwegian!

Our kids and their families have been quite sick, but I think everyone is finally on the road to recovery. One family was sharing pneumonia and the other influenza. Wyatt was in the hospital from last Thursday until he was released yesterday. He is doing well. We had Wyatt here one night so his parents could try to get a good night's rest, and we had Owen here a few nights, too. I even spent a night and most of a couple days at the hospital with Wyatt. 

I wanted to be all ready for Christmas by Thanksgiving, but gee ... that didn't happen! I'm still in the process of getting ready, but all that will happen, too.

I hope things are going very, very well for all of my readers and followers. I REALLY hope to get some time in my stamping room SOON! I'm getting anxious to continue on my quest to use my Stampin' Up! stamps. I haven't forgotten about that:)

Thanks for checking on me, and thanks for your prayers.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy (Belated!) Birthday, Harriet!

This is the card I made for my great friend, Harriet. I didn't even get it made until the day after her birthday, so it was quite late:( (Her birthday was last Monday.)

I did the die cuts using Spellbinders dies. I mounted the outer one on foam squares for some dimension. The sentiment is from Hero Arts. I added soft blue brads for the flower centers.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

December Calendar Page

The last calendar of 2014. My 2015 calendars are complete and ready to be gifted, so you'll start seeing them in January.

I did the embossing with Cuttlebug folders. I stamped the sentiment (from Paper Inspirations) on shimmery silver paper with Versamark and embossed with detail silver embossing powder.

If you are interested in printing your own calendars and would like to use my files, you can find a link to them under my blog title. I'd love to hear from you if you do!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Simple, Mass-Produced Christmas Card

I really felt like I was running out of time and have some busy times coming up, so I decided to mass-produce my remaining Christmas cards. I had only gotten 28 done throughout the year, so I needed to do about 50 more. What often happens if I DO mass-produce them is that I end up liking them more than most of my other ones!

Anyway, here it is. The embossing was done with a Darice embossing folder. The sentiment is from Momenta. (Got it at Michael's.) The ink I used is Gumball Green from Stampin' Up! and the cardstock is from Papertrey Ink.

My husband wrote our Christmas letter last night (love it when he does it!), so I still have to edit it and add pictures, print it and get them in with the cards. The envelopes are ready to go, too, so maybe I can still get them done tonight and mailed out tomorrow. That would make me very happy! We have about half of our shopping done and I would like to get what we have already purchased wrapped very soon. Like tonight or tomorrow! I didn't have Wyatt today, and that helped immensely with getting many things knocked off my to-do list. How are YOU doing with your preparations? 

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Anniversary, Annie and Ray!

This is the card I sent to a friend of mine in my stamping group. She should have received it by now, hopefully!

I started with stamping the image (from Penny Black) and coloring with Copic markers and adding Star Dust Stickles to the flower center. I stamped the lower flower twice. I cut out the entire image and also the single flower. I mounted the single flower on foam squares and mounted it on the full image, rotating it a bit so there would be more petals. Then I had no idea what I wanted to do with it! It took me a while to end up with this card. I ended up using a tri-fold card with a circle cut out of the front. I added printed vellum to the front, cutting out the same circle. I added a piece of cream vellum under the circle and stamped the sentiment (from PSX) and heat-embossed. I added the butterfly, which was cut with a Memory Box out of a velvety black paper.

Thanks for your prayers for my dad. He has decided to go with radiation. He had to have six teeth extracted first and still needs to meet with a GI doctor to have a swallowing issue addressed. If all goes well with that, he will begin his series of 33 treatments sometime in December. It will be pretty miserable, but he will get through it.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Simple Anniversary

Another of the anniversary cards I made this week.

I added some mesh material to white card stock, stamped the sentiment (from Hero Arts) and mounted that piece on foam squares and adhered to the card front. Then I added a butterfly which was die-cut with a Memory Box die and mounted on a foam square. 

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Purple Anniversary

I have a "stash" of lots of cards, but I didn't have any anniversary cards and I needed several this month. So, I took a little time and got them made. It felt good to make some cards!

This card is for a friend who loves purple. Can you tell? :) The butterfly was cut with a couple Memory Box dies and mounted on foam squares. The shimmery ivory die cut was done (I believe) with a Cuttlebug die. The sentiment was stamped with a Hero Arts stamp and was cut from shimmery ivory with a Spellbinders die. It, also, is mounted on foam squares. The bottom layer is vellum which was embossed with a Sizzix embossing folder.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Fall Anniversary - and an Update

An anniversary card for Jim's brother and sister-in-law. We got married on their eleventh anniversary:) We will be celebrating our fortieth on Sunday!

You'll be seeing this main image again next fall. The images are from a set from Cloud 9. I used SU! Earth Elements inks to stamp them. First I had stamped the background (from Tattered Angels) with a soft Memories ink. I matted with shimmery gold and mounted on foam squares. The sentiment is one of my few anniversary stamps and is by PSX. I embossed it with detail gold embossing powder. The card base is ivory.

I actually had a little time in my stamping room last night. It was very nice! I cleaned it up a bit and also made my October calendar pages for next year. I was trying to come up with something for November, but couldn't. It will come to me:)

About my dad - He really, really wanted to make a trip to Colorado to visit my younger brother, so when my older brother flew up from Georgia, my dad asked him to drive out there with him. That's where they are now. My younger brother will ride home with them. They found more cancer in his neck and removed it on Monday. He will be meeting with the oncologist next Thursday to discuss radiation again. My dad has said he will not do it. We'll see what happens. It's spreading pretty fast now.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Always and Forever

We had an out-of-town wedding on Saturday, so I needed to make a card. I didn't have much time, of course. It did feel good to be in my stamping room, though.

I sat and looked around for a bit, trying to come up with something. I even searched my blog for a card to case. But, in the end, I came up with this card. An on-line friend (thanks, Gloria!) recently sent me a few die cuts, and this pretty flowery sprig was one of them. I thought it would work well for a wedding card. I trimmed my white cardstock down slightly so I could have a black matting and still have white matting from the card front. I embossed the left side with my Swiss Dots embossing folder and scored two lines beside the right edge of the embossing. Then I glued the die cut on top of the embossed dots. The sentiment is from an Inkadinkado wedding set. I added several light pink gems to the sentiment and to the die cut to make it a bit more "fancy."

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

November Calendar Page

Here is my November calendar page. Looks simple enough, but it sure took a while! :) 

I cut all the pieces with my Cameo Silhouette - all 15 of them per page. I just glued them on. Easy peasy, right? 

My calendar files are available for your use. You can find the links under my blog title. I'd love to hear from you if you use them.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Halloween

 A couple quick Halloween cards for the grandkids. I also made another one like I had made previously. Since they're for two families, I can go with duplicates:)

This first one is for our one granddaughter. I used House Mouse stamps from The Paper Studio. I stamped the image with Memento black ink and colored with copics. I matted with black, mounted on foam squares and added Stardust Stickles to the wings. I colored the sentiment with markers.

I used a Stampin' Up! stamp and SU punches for this tag. I colored the spider and added googlie eyes and mounted on foam squares. The patterned papers are from a Recollections pad.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy Anniversary! And Another Update on my Dad

Today is our son and daughter-in-law's eighth anniversary! Sure doesn't seem like their wedding was eight years ago already.

I had to take some time last night and make them a card. I wish I had had more time, but this will have to do. I did the background with Spellbinders dies. The image is a JustRite Stamper stamp. I colored it with Copics and added gems to the flower centers. That's it:)

More news about my dad: Radiation is not out of the question yet, unfortunately. I guess what they removed was not lymph nodes after all, but cancer cells. They are not sure if they got everything or not. He will have to choose between monitoring with ultrasounds or having radiation. He will be meeting with an oncologist on Thursday and will then meet with his doctor again and make his decision.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Updates

Thanks so much for all of your prayers for my dad! He had his PET scan last Thursday and got a call from his doctor already. He does not have to have radiation at this time! They are going to continue to keep a close eye on him.

As to my whereabouts for the past week, this picture is a clue. We went to Disney World! We left on Sunday and got back home on Saturday. We were there with our daughter, son, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and four of our grandchildren. (Wyatt stayed home with his other grandparents. Much better choice for him, and a bit easier for us.) What an amazing time we had - totally unbelievable! I think we saw most everything that there was to see. (Actually, I'm pretty sure it's not possible to see EVERYTHING on one trip, but we sure tried our best!)

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Update and Request For More Prayers

Still no stamping time. But, I have another update on my dad. His lymph nodes tested positive for squamous cell cancer. He will be having a PET scan on Thursday. If nothing shows up, hurrah!! If they find more cancer, he will have to undergo seven weeks of radiation. I would appreciate any prayers that his PET scan is clean. Thank you SO much..

 Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Another Update

My dad's surgery is now scheduled for Monday. My sister was able to arrange her work schedule to be there with him and stay through Tuesday. I'll be sure to let you know when we get the results.

I had a little bit of stamping time this afternoon and was able to finish up the August calendar page I was almost finished with and also got September done. Yippee! That makes me feel a little better. I'm actually caught up:) I have 29 Christmas cards done, so I have about 50 to go. Not too bad. I hope to be able to start doing some stamping again soon! Thanks for hanging in there with me.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Update On My Dad ...

Thanks to all of you for the prayers for my dad. I have a little update, but only to say that the surgery has been pushed back to maybe early next week. :( He just got back from Minneapolis this afternoon after having cataract surgery and then he had his pre-op appointment for his lymph node surgery late afternoon. But, the hospital called and said they didn't get the results from the pre-op in time and so they can't do the surgery tomorrow! That really stinks. My sister drove down to be with him and took time off of work and now it will be rescheduled. Bummer. I'll keep you posted. Thanks again.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

A Little This and That:)

I thought I'd just post a little something to let you all know I'm alive and well ... just still quite busy. When I have a little stamping time, which isn't often, I've been working on my calendars for next year. I'm making progress on them. About a week or so ago, I had only finished January, February and March. Now I have finished April, May, June, July and and almost finished with August. Yippee! :) I sure hope I can start making cards again soon.

Also, just a little prayer request. My dad has to have a couple lymph nodes removed from his neck and jaw on Thursday. They are "suspicious." If you are so inclined, would you please say a little prayer for him that it isn't cancer? We'd all sure appreciate it!

The rest of October is still very busy for us, and now November is about booked up, too! Amazing that we can have so much going on! Luckily, it's all good stuff.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

A Beautiful Thing - Part Three

The last card with the Stampin' Up! set called "A Beautiful Thing." I used two of the stamps to make the flowers and then I matted with black. The butterfly piece was cut with a Memory Box die when I was together with friends in June. The sentiment is from a Papertrey Ink set.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

A Beautiful Thing - Part Two

This card, along with tomorrow's card, completes my use of my first forty Stampin' Up! stamp sets. I will continue my project of using all of my SU sets, but I need to get my calendars and Christmas cards finished, so they will take priority. Yesterday, I finished up April 2015. Four months done - eight to go.

This card uses stamps from the SU set called "A Beautiful Thing." The sentiment, flowers and flower centers are all from this set. I inked up the sentiment with markers and stamped on ivory cardstock. I used the same pink marker on the flowers and then used a Summer Sun ink pad for the centers. I matted the sentiment and the flowers with green cardstock and mounted the flowers on foam squares. The embossed panel was done with a Sizzix embossing folder. (The first card with this set was the Christmas card from Friday, found here.)

A couple people asked about the tool I used to perforate the bookmark on this card. The one I used was from Stampin' Up! and included a little rotary cutter, rotary scorer, distressing tool and the rotary perforator. I don't have a current catalog, but I looked a little bit on-line and didn't see it in the book. The perforator is similar to this one on Amazon.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Antique Collectibles - Part Two

Here is the second card I made with the Stampin' Up! set called "Antique Collectibles." It was rather hard to photograph, but I hope you can get the idea. It looks great in person!

I stamped the five images from the set with Versamark on black cardstock and embossed with clear embossing powder. It makes a great background. I didn't want to cover it up! All I did was add a sheer black ribbon and a sentiment. The sentiment is from a Papertrey set. I stamped it with black ink and embossed with clear embossing powder. The cardbase and the sentiment panel are ivory and the sentiment is mounted on foam squares.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Antique Collectibles - Part One

I struggled with this set, but in the end I'm happy with the results. The set is called "Antique Collectibles." One more set and I get to move on to the next stack of ten:)

For this card, I decided to make a bookmark card. I've never done that before. On the front, I used decorative cardstock from Kanban, shimmery gold paper, and a gold-embossed sentiment from a Stampin' Up! set called "Birthday Greetings." The card base is ivory.

Here is the inside of the card with the bookmark section folded inward. I used a never-before-used tool from Stampin' Up! to perforate the card base so the bookmark can easily be removed and used. Again, I used cardstock from Kanban to decorate the bookmark. The heart image and the sentiment are from the Antique Collectibles set. They are both embossed with detail gold embossing powder.

And here is the inside with the bookmark folded outward. I embossed the sentiment with gold. It's from the Birthday Greetings set. I'll have to remember when I finally arrive at that set that I have already used two of the stamps!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Red and White Christmas

Finally - a card continuing my mission to use all of my Stampin' Up! stamps. We have been busy every weekend for a long time and it doesn't seem to be letting up. The evenings are busy, too, and Wyatt seems to need more of my time during the day. All of that adds up to no stamping time. When I have had a few minutes, I just sat in my stamping room and didn't know where to start:( 

This card uses a stamp from the retired SU! set called "A Beautiful Thing." That stamp is the center of the "snowflake" - which is probably a doily. :) I think it may have been cut with a Lifestyle Crafts die, but I'm not sure about that at all. The die belongs to a friend. I mounted the snowflake on foam squares. I embossed the background with a Lifestyle Crafts embossing folder. The red matting sentiment was cut with an Impression Obsession die.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

October Calendar Page

A little late, but better late than never. At least I still remembered on the First of the month:) At any rate, here is my calendar page for October.

The pumpkin with vines stamp is from Inkadinkado. I paper-pieced the pumpkin. I colored the flowers with a Stampin' Up! marker. The sentiment is from a dollar Studio G set.

If you are interested in printing out calendars to make, you can find a link to my file under my blog header. I'd love to hear how they work for you!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Batman Birthday

Our oldest grandson will be six (!) on October 2. This is the card I made him this morning. Last year he liked batman, and I suppose he's into something else this year, but I had this file for my Cameo Silhouette and I wanted to use it. All the colored pieces were printed on my printer and cut out with my Silhouette. I just had to glue it together. The batman on the card front is mounted on foam squares. The sentiment is from Hero Arts.

Here are a couple pictures of the inside. When you open it up, the background and the batman come out at you. I have had so little time for creating lately. Not sure where the time goes! It was fun to at least make a card like this. Hopefully I will get some time for stamping soon - to work on my SU! project and also to work on my calendars.

Our youngest grandson, Wyatt, who just turned one on the 19th, had tubes put in his ears on Tuesday. All went well. He also had a hearing test while he was under. It showed some low-frequency hearing loss, but they are fairly confident that it is not permanent. That was great news!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Beary Merry Christmas - Part Two

Here is the second (and last) card using "Beary Merry Christmas." It's pretty much identical to yesterday's card. I used the other image stamp and added the same holly spring and sentiment. I colored with Copic markers and matted with red. The image panel and card base are ivory.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

"Beary" Merry Christmas - Part One

The set I'm featuring today and tomorrow is called "Beary Merry Christmas." Both of the cards are pretty much the same, just using different stamps, but I'm sharing them with you separately so that I can do two posts with them:) I simply stamped the three stamps with Memento black ink on ivory cardstock, colored with Copics and matted with Always Artichoke cardstock. The cardbase is ivory also.

Our skydiving that was scheduled for Saturday has been postponed again! :( This time the pilot cancelled. We may try to get our money back and look for a different place to jump. Very disappointing. I'll keep you posted.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Best Blossoms - Part Two

Part two of the Stampin' Up! set called "Best Blossoms." I'm really not sure what those round things are, but they became a kind of weird leaves for this card:) The stamps I used for this card are the flower, the stem, and the "leaves." I added Star Dust Stickles to the flower center, but it looks kind of funny in the picture. I used my Scor-Pal for a little decorative edging on three edges. I die cut the "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" using a friend's die, and I don't know who made it. My guess would be Memory Box, but it's only a guess. I mounted the image panel on foam squares. 

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Best Blossoms - Part One

I had a little stamping time while Wyatt was napping today, and finished up this card that I started last night.

I'm continuing on with my project of using all of my Stampin' Up! sets. This set is called "Best Blossoms." Even though the image panel looks like it's layered, it's really not. I masked off the sentiment strip across the middle and stamped the flowers. Then I masked the flowers and stamped the leafy image over. I removed the masks and added the sentiment and scored two lines above and below it. I had trimmed a tiny strip off the green matting piece and decided I liked it between the scored lines, so I cut another very thin strip and added them. The flower beside the sentiment was stamped, cut out and mounted on foam squares. I'll have one more card using this set tomorrow, and then a Christmas card.

Our sky diving has been rescheduled for Saturday, weather-permitting. Sure hope we get to go this time!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy First Birthday, Wyatt!

Can you believe it - Wyatt (our youngest grandson) will be one on Friday! His birthday party was yesterday, and this is the card we gave him.

I'm not terribly pleased with it, I'm sad to say, but I was really in "crunch mode." Just not enough time to play these days. Anyway, this is what he got! The giraffe was stamped with Memento black ink on ivory cardstock and colored with Copic markers. I trimmed around it, leaving a thin border. (There was no way I was going to take the time to cut around all those little parts.) I mounted the giraffe on foam squares. I stamped the sentiment with a Stampin' Up! set and embossed that panel with a Darice embossing folder. I matted with dark brown and used an ivory card base.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Alphabet Soup

I finally had some time in my stamping room to continue working on my Stampin' Up! stamps. The four cards I'm sharing today were made with the set called "Alphabet Soup."

I used markers to color the words on this first one. I matted with an olive green and added a sparkly red brad for the dot on "jingle." I embossed the background on a quarter piece of white cardstock and added it to the card front.

I stamped the thank you stamp with Versamark and used white embossing powder. I mounted on foam squares. I also added a piece of ribbon on the patterned paper.

Again, I used markers for this stamp and again mounted on foam squares. I didn't have exactly the patterned paper I wanted, so I drew over some of the lines with the same purple marker I used on the stamp.

Markers for the words, matted and mounted on foam squares. The sentiment coloring reminded me of a candle, so I added a flame to the patterned paper:)

Our September and October are very busy, so please excuse me if I'm not around here much. I'll stamp when I can and share what I make! I also NEED to get working on my calendars. I only have January, February and March done so far. I should be done with them through September. :( And I need to make more Christmas cards, too. At least I have made a few as I've been working through my SU! sets. I hope you all are doing well, and that you have managed to stay with me through the end of this post!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

All I Have Seen

This set was almost enough for me to drop my quest to use all of my Stampin' Up! sets! I bet I spent three "sessions" in my stamping room just staring at this set and trying different things. The stamps seem nice enough. They just didn't do anything for me! The set is called "All I Have Seen." The images are made to stamp "splotchy." That works for some stamps, but to me, these just really looked like they should have stamped better, but trust me, it's the way they are meant to look:) I tried so many things and wasn't happy with any of them. Finally, I remembered a black and white card I saw recently and thought, "Aha! That is what I have to do!" So, here it is. I added a rose-colored enamel dot  to the flower for a tiny dash of color. And I added some Washi tape on the bottom and matted with black. Finally! I can move on to the next set.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Four Thank Yous

 For these four cards, I used two more of my Stampin' Up! sets. Each of the cards consists of one stamp from the set called "Stippled Stencils" and one stamp from the set called "Thank You Kindly." For each of them, I colored the images with markers, spritzed them with water and stamped them on watercolor paper. Then I cut them out with a Nestability and matted with Always Artichoke cardstock. Each matted image is mounted on foam squares.

This completes my 34 sets of the smallest size. (I did skip two sets, as they were "Handmade By" sets.) On to the next size bigger starting tomorrow!

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!