Stair-Step Daffodils

I keep thinking I need to do a special fold card of some sort, so here is one. Not terribly "special" but different from standard. Here is a stair-step card - or one variation of it. I cut several of them a few years ago to give to friends, but I still had one blank one left. I covered the entire front with the black and white patterned paper. The image is the last one that I had of this kind.

The sentiment is from a stamp and die set from Gina K. The die-cut that it is mounted on is also from Gina K.

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

60th Birthday

We were invited to a 60th birthday party for our neighbor, and I realized about 45 minutes before we were heading over that we didn't have a card for him! So, this is what I came up with. I already had the stair-step card base cut and ready to go. (If you want to see other stair-step cards that I have made, you can click on the stair-step label at the end of the post.) I usually do some matting on the patterned paper, etc, but I had no time this time!! So, I simply adhered the patterned paper and then trimmed around the edges. That worked just fine and it was so much easier! I die-cut the numbers and the balloons and attached them and added the sentiment.

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

50th Anniversary

It's my cousin's 50th Anniversary in March, and I'm actually ahead of the game! I hadn't made a stair-step card in a few years, so I thought it was about time. I cut ten of them, so you MAY be seeing more in the near future. I used a Gina K embossing folder for the gold foil matting, and a Gina K die for the leaves. I also used another die to cut the little hearts that you can barely see in the photo. The image stamp and sentiment are from a Papertrey set. If you want to see more of my stair-step cards, you can click on the link at the bottom of this post.

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

Stair-Step Anniversary

A few years ago, I cut several stair-step cards to send to a friend. I also cut a few for me. I have finally used the last one. I do like them, but I am not good about figuring out what to put on the all spots, since I am such a "clean and simple" card-maker. I basically just covered this one with patterned paper. The papers were all from the same matstack from Lasting Impressions, I think. I had gotten them from a friend several years ago at one of our Group Gatherings and I had promised to use them. I'm still working on them, Vicki! The main piece had the heart already on it. I had another piece with the same heart in a square, so I cut the second one out and mounted it on foam squares over the first one. I cut thin strips of the stripes and added to the sides by the heart. You can't even see the center step, but that one is covered with a printed ivory piece. I added the same dotted pattern to the furthest-back panel. I used a piece of textured ivory cardstock for the sentiment panel and added matching stripes to that. The sentiment is from Inky Antics.

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

Happy 99th Birthday!

I was asked to make a card for a mother-in-law for her 99th birthday. This is what I made. The stamps and dies are from Gina K. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink and the numbers were cut with a Cuttlebug die. I added lots of Wink of Stella to the flowers. If you are interested in seeing other stair-step cards I have posted, just click on the link at the bottom of this post.

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

Happy 50th Anniversary, Kris and Ron!

Another member of our little stamping group is celebrating her 50th anniversary. Pretty awesome, I think! Congrats, Kris!

I decided to make a stair-step card for them. The image is from Inkadinkado. The sentiment is from Hero Arts. I embossed the image with detail gold embossing powder. The gold cardstock is shimmery. I embossed the front with a Darice embossing folder. The numbers were cut with some old Cuttlebug dies.

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

Not So Short Notes - Stair-Step Card

Finally, another post! I haven't been in my stamping room for what seems a long time! This card was almost completed a couple weeks ago, and I finished it up last night. Not sure when I'll get back in my room again, either. Oh well - that's life! And it's summer:)

Another stair-step card. For this card, I used the Stampin' Up! set called "Not So Short Notes." I used two of the stamps - the image on the front and the sentiment/image on the inside. There are two more stamps, but I'm not planning on using them at this time. One is an image very similar to the mailboxes, but it's three bird houses. The other is a very long and thin angel.

The sentiment was cut with a die. To make it fit, I cut the "BIRTHDAY" into two pieces. The little birdie on the bottom of the front is from the sentiment stamp. Not my favorite card, but after having it sit around almost finished for quite a while, it's good to have it in the "done" box!

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

Petal Prints #1 Stair-Step

Moving along with my quest to use all of my Stampin' Up! stamps (and "cheating" by passing up several of them), I present to you this card using the SU! set called "Petal Prints." It consists of three outline stamps, the three more solid stamps to stamp under the outlines, and one background stamp of three leaves. I am only going to use the outline stamps in my two cards using this set. I stamped the flower and then colored it using Copic markers. I decided to use one of the stair-step cards that I cut quite a while ago. (If you want my instructions for this card, and to see other stair-step cards I have made in the past, you can use this link.)

The background was embossed with a Cuttlebug Anna Griffin folder. The sentiment was cut with a die.

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

Happy Anniversary, Eric and Brooke!

Today is our son and daughter-in-law's eleventh wedding anniversary, and this is the card that I made for them.

This is a side stair-step card. (If you want to see other stair-step cards that I have made, along with instructions, you can follow this link.) The matting was done with glittery paper from Die Cuts With a View - kind of greenish, bluish, silvery. The flower design on the left was done from silver foil cardstock. I embossed the sentiment (from Papertrey Ink) with silver detail embossing powder. The wedding couple was also embossed with silver. The stamp is from an Inkadinkado set. It is matted with silver in addition to the glitter paper.

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

Pasture Birthday #4

Here is the last card I made with the Stampin' Up! set called "Pasture Birthday." I made a stair-step card to showcase the stamps. The stamps from the set that I used on this card are the sheep, the grass and the sentiment. I embossed the card front piece with a Cuttlebug folder called "Matelasse."

We got back from a short vacation on Tuesday evening. We left Thursday around noon. We went with a group of friends down the Mississippi river - from Wabasha, Minnesota to Guttenberg, Iowa and back. How nice to have friends with boats, huh? :) The weather was awesome (a bit hot, but no complaints!) and we had an awesome time. If I run out of things to post, I might share a few pictures here. (And as I type this, I am out of cards finally!)


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

Heavenly Days #3

My third card using the Stampin' Up! set called "Heavenly Days." The stamp on this card is the heart. I stamped it with Memento black ink, colored with Copics, added Star Dust Stickles to the dots and the flowers, and mounted on foam squares. There is one more stamp in this set that I won't be using at this time. It is a sentiment stamp that says, "Have a heavenly day."

This card is a center stair-step card. I haven't made one of these for quite a while. (You can find the measurements and directions on this blog post. If you are interested in other of my stair-step cards, you can see them by following this link.) The textured, white-core paper I used is from Die Cuts With a View. I embossed it with a Cuttlebug folder and sanded it lightly with a sanding block. The sentiment is from Inky Antics. The butterfly was cut with a Memory Box die.

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

Happy Birthday, Danni!

It's Danni's birthday and some of us are celebrating with her. She's been kind of missing Flutter By Wednesday and thought this might help:) So, we're having a "Flutter By Hop."

We'd love to have you flutter around and leave comments. Danni will be giving away two gift certificates to people who leave comments. You can comment until Monday, September 7. Danni will post the winners on her blog on Tuesday, September 8. Enjoy!

Here is a list of bloggers joining Danni's birthday hop:

Danni
Peggie
Harriet
Sheri
Shirley
Kristie
Nancy
Margie
Jan
Marji
Denise
Netta
Lynette (You are here:) )
Brenda
Ashley

For my card, I decided to go with a stair-step card. I had never done a portrait-oriented step card before, so it was kind of fun to work out the dimensions. I like the way it turned out. I started with the border on the left, which was cut with a Memory Box die. I cut it again and used some of the pieces. I added gems to the flower centers. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink. The main image is also from Papertrey. I stamped it on white and matted with matching pink.

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

Glitter Rose

When Harriet was at my house last week, we used brass stencils to make glittered roses. Hadn't done that for a while.

I made my rose into a stair-step card. (You can find some other stair-step cards I have made, along with directions, by following this link.) To make the glittered rose, you attach the stencil to double-sided sticky paper (first rub some special soap on the stencil!) and then carefully sprinkle colored glitter through the brass stencil. Remove the stencil and sprinkle clear glitter on the remaining areas. I matted with red. The patterned paper is from a Recollections matstack. The sentiment is from an Inkadinkado set and the dotted circle is from Papertrey. I cut the circles with Nestabilities.

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

Simple Stair-Step Birthday

Well, this is my last daisy like this. I did it - I used something up! Of course, now I will be missing them:) I wanted to do something a little different with this last daisy - different than my usual white, yellow and black daisy cards. I happened to have some stair-step cards cut and scored and decided to use one of those. (You can find the directions and videos on-line, but if you want to check out my previous stair-step cards and instructions, you can find them here.)

I embossed the matting on the card front with my Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder. I had this die cut sitting on my table from when I was experimenting with new dies and my Grand Calibur. I really didn't know what I would do with a piece like this, until I realized it kind of looked like leaves, if I covered up the circle part:) I added another die cut piece in the middle section. The sentiment is from an old Stampin' Up! set. I added some scoring and some more Swiss Dots and matted with the same green as the die cuts.

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

Celebrating with Digital Two for Tuesday

Cora, over at Digital Two for Tuesday, is celebrating her 200th blog post, which was on New Year's Eve. She asked for six volunteers to help showcase her wonderful images, and I am one of them! Cora takes vintage images from old catalogs, magazine, books, etc., cleans them up, and then offers them for free on her blog. Isn't that cool and fun??

For both of my cards today, I used one of her images from June 10. She has so many flower images to choose from, and you know how much I love flowers! For this first one, I printed the image and then cut it out with a Labels 27 die from Spellbinders. I colored with Copic markers and sponged a little bit of light blue ink over the image. I added some Star Dust Stickles to the flowers. The sentiment is from The Paper Company Studio and I scored a few lines around it. The patterned paper is from a stack I got at Michael's.

For my second card, I made a stair-step card. (You can find other stair-step cards that I've made here, along with a tutorial in one of the earliest ones.) Again, I printed the image and colored with Copics. I matted the image with some Papertrey Ink cardstock. I cut the numbers using a Cuttlebug die set. I embossed the piece on the front with a Sizzix embossing folder, after stamping the sentiment.

Be sure to check out Cora's blog and see what her other guest designers have created. You will be amazed:) Thanks, Cora! (You can also find other cards that I've made previously with Cora's images by following this link.)

And finally, I decided to share this one, too. Our three-year-old granddaughter wanted to color something, and I had this image on my desk, so she got to color one, too:) She asked me to color the leaves for her, because they were "too little." :) I added Stickles to her flowers, too. She and her mom and dad and two brothers were here for about five days. It was a bit chaotic for a few days with them, along with our son, daughter-in-law and their two boys here for some of the time, too, but it was great!

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

Happy 95th Birthday, Mom!

Today is my mother-in-law's 95th birthday!! She is still in great health and lives alone in her home. Awesome! We went to visit her for the weekend to celebrate with her.

This is the card I made for her. The papers I used are from a Recollections matstack. I cut the main panel with a Spellbinders die and mounted it on foam squares. I embossed it, also, and sponged some green ink on it before removing the die. The numbers were cut using a Cuttlebug alphabet set. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink. The butterflies and heart border used Martha Stewart punches. You can cut your own cardstock for the base, or get it pre-cut from Repeat Impressions, on this page. (Called a Step Out card there.)

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

Black and White Wedding

This is another "card parts" card. In my box was this stair-step card base. I had mis-cut it and one of the sides was wider than the other. I just cut the wider end down to make them even. So, this card is not quite "normal" size - but close.


The patterned paper is from a pad from The Paper Studio. The stamps are from Inkadinkado. The flower is from Prima. A rather elegant card, I think.


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

Another Center Stair-Step Card

A friend asked me if I would make her mother-in-law a card for her 90th birthday.  I asked, and was told her favorite color was pink.  I think a Stair-Step card is rather special, so that's what I made.

The main image stamp is Lupine from Repeat Impressions.  I colored it with Stampin' Up! markers, and sponged green ink on the edges.  The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Birthday Basics, and I sponged green on the edges of that, too.  I embossed the top of the pink with a Swiss Dots embossing folder.  The letters were cut with a Cuttlebug alphabet, and the butterflies were punched with a Martha Stewart punch and have pearl bodies.

Here are a couple more views. None of the pictures are very good - sorry! The first one was taken indoors at night without a flash, and the second two were taken outside when it was a little too dark.

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

Repeat Impressions Stamp of the Week - Lupine

It's Monday again, and time for a new Stamp of the Week from Repeat Impressions!  This week's stamp is Lupine #1711-K.  You can find the stamp here.  Just visit the Repeat Impressions blog, The House That Stamps Built, and learn how to get this stamp at 50% off - this week only!  Isn't it gorgeous?  But then, I love flower stamps!  Also check out the beautiful creations of other Design Team members.  You can find them here:

Harriet ~ Joy ~ Julie ~ Makiko ~ Robin

Here is another view of the card I made using the Lupine stamp.  (When we were in northern Wisconsin last year, we saw lupines all over.  We bought some seeds and planted them a few weeks ago.  I sure hope some of them grow!)  This is a modified side-step card.  There are several places to find directions for a side-step, but I wanted the "set-back" part to be in the middle.  I know there are directions for a card like this, too, but I just took some directions for the side-step and modified it to suit me.  First let me say how I finished the card, and then I'll get into the measurements I used.  I cut the blue cardstock (Stampin' Up!'s Blue Bayou, I believe) to fit on the front with a sixteenth-inch border all around.  I embossed the top parts with a Birds and Swirls Cuttlebug folder.  I scored the lines with my Scor-Pal.  The sentiment is from Repeat Impressions, also.  The middle section of the middle section (:) ) is just plain cardstock.  The back section of the middle section is the image.  I colored it with my blue Copic marker and a Certainly Celery marker from SU! and matted it with Blue Bayou.  OK.  I think that takes care of that part of my description.

One more view of the card, just for fun!, and also the measurements that I used.  I started with a piece of white cardstock cut to "standard" size - 8 1/2 by 5 1/2 inches.  I cut a slit an inch and a half in from each side, from one inch from the bottom to 6 3/8 inches from the bottom. ...  I decided the easiest thing would be for me to show you a diagram.  I had done a "test run" on a piece of computer paper first, so I just wrote the measurements on that.  The dashed lines are mountain folds, and the dotted/dashed lines are valley folds.  The solid lines are where you cut.  I scored the lines with my Scor-Pal, and then folded.   I hope that all makes sense!  I guess if enough people ask for it, I could do a tutorial!  Anyway, here is the diagram with measurements.  You can click on it to enlarge it.

Whew - are you still with me? LOL!  Don't forget - you still have today and tomorrow to make a card for Repeat Impressions' "WHAT IF Wednesday" challenge.  A random participant from the month of June will be selected to win a $25 gift certificate from Repeat Impressions.  Worth playing for, for sure!

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

Side-Step Birthday

This card is for my dad.  It's his birthday tomorrow.  Can you guess how old he will be?  Good guess! :)

I'm sure I've seen these cards before, but I was inspired to make one by my new Repeat Impressions Design Team-mate, Dana Joy.  Here is a link to her card.  She has a couple links to You Tube videos, but this is the one I found to be the most helpful of the two.  I started with a tree I had already stamped, colored and cut out.  Then I cut out the letters and numbers using a new Cuttlebug die cut set (Hippie Chick) I got from Oh My Crafts. (On clearance for $15, with free shipping!  The free shipping special is done now, though, I believe.)  I embossed the Kraft cardstock with a Cuttlebug folder.  The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Birthday Basics.  I did the scoring with my Scor-Pal, including the decorative scoring on the "DAD" layer.  The tree is mounted on Pop Dots.


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