Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Secret Stamper

Hello stampers, hope your week is going well.  Sorry I'm late in posting over the past week, but it's been a fun week.  We had our downline meeting last Monday and it was so much fun!  I'm blessed to be a part of such a special group with Rhonda Morgan and Diana Gibbs.

We also had the secret stamper exchange and it was fun with the small group of us there.  We were to create 3 cards with envelopes and wrap it nicely.  I drew the number 6 and when it was my turn to pick, I decided to "steal" a gift, which my friend Elizabeth M. had already opened.  I couldn't resist, the box is lovely!  And I love the flowers! My friend Marlene S. made this, isn't it awesome!!



These are the three cards that she made. She cut the flowers and layered them on top.  She even decorated the inside of the card.


I like the technique on this card.  Such a nice neutral look. Aren't all the cards beautiful!



Below are the card swaps I received. Interesting how we all we made Valentine's theme cards. I think I'm all ready for the love holiday!  This card was made by Rhonda Morgan.  Beautiful colors.


This one was made by Marlene, love the Calypso Coral color scheme. 


Tari created this one.  Tari just got married a few months ago, congrats Tari! She used a dryer sheet behind the oval punch.


Jacque made this cute card! Love the scallop envelope.  So many ways to use it.


Elizabeth Martinez made this card.  Pool Party looks beautiful paired with basic black and Primose Petals.  Gotta love the pool party bakers twine!


Which one is your favorite?  I watched another Christmas movie on the Hallmark channel.  I'm feeling the pressure to decorate my home for the holidays, but we're getting the carpets cleaned this weekend and I think it's better to wait first.  So hopefully I can start decorating by Saturday night and all day Sunday.  Wish me luck.  Well friends, hope your holiday season is going well.  Until next time. Thanks for stopping by.


Sunday, December 2, 2012

Freshly Made Sketches

Hi Stampers!  Hope you had a wonderful weekend!  I started my Christmas shopping yesterday but not quite done yet.  I have been watching the Hallmark channel as they have been showing Christmas movies all weekend.

Today I spent all day crafting and I had so much fun!  Tomorrow night we have our downline/upline meeting and we are swapping (of course) and we also have a secret handmade gift exchange.  The theme for the swapping is Valentine's or Friendship and I decided on Valentine's Day.  I came across the sketch from the Freshly Made Sketches blog challenge, you can see the other creations Here.  I didn't initially know which stamp set I wanted to use and as I was looking through my stamp I came across my favorite set, Button Buddies and the instant I saw the cherry stamp I knew what I wanted to create! I LOVE how it came out.


I looked through my Color Coach for a color scheme and it suggested I use Wisteria Wonder, Pink Pirouette and Cherry Cobbler, except I changed out the Cherry Cobbler for Raspberry Ripple.  I used the white craft ink pad to sponge onto Raspberry Ripple.


You can see the details in the heart cherries and Wisteria Wonder better. I used the smallest heart of the hearts framelits as the cherries.  I hope my fellow demos like it.  It was a bit odd to be working on a Valentine's card while Christmas music was playing.


I initially used this sketch earlier this past week and I was going to submit it to two different blog challenges but I didn't have time to submit it. Same sketch just laid out differently. I used Midnight Muse and the silver glimmer paper.  I like this one too!  


Well friends, I better get going.  Hope you have sweet dreams and I'll be back to show you my swaps my team meeting tomorrow.  

Until next time.

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Button Buddies Snowman

Hello again stampers!  Can't believe how quickly the day went today! I wanted to come home tonight and relax for a bit before I sat down to create, but my evening isn't going that route just yet.  By 6 pm it is already dark and mentally it feels like it is later in the evening so it just throws me off.

So here is another Christmas card I made.  Do you have own the Button Buddies stamp set? I love the variety of images in the set.  Mr. Snowman looks so much better with a button, doesn't he? And using the glitter paper is less messy when you want to create a quick card. Even on this card I used my paper piercing template again.  



My friend love the handmade birthday card I made for her last night.  But sometimes I find that once I'm done creating a card, I'm at a loss for words.  Does that ever happen to you? I look at the space available inside the card to write something and I don't know where to begin.  So the other day, we were at Barnes and Noble (seems there aren't many local bookstores anymore) and I came across this small and simple book.  I picked it up and started reading a few pages and immediately knew I had to have it! It is filled with many special messages to inspire or jump start your writing.  It will go hand-in-hand with my hand made cards.  Check it out if you have a moment.

Now that my creative juices are flowing I'm excited because I have several handmade projects I need to complete this.  Once I finish them, I'll take photos so that I can show you.  

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Hope you have a wonderful evening.  Thanks again for stopping by.  



Monday, November 26, 2012

Try Stampin' On Tuesday Challenge

Hello stampers, back for a quick post.  I came across this sketch from another blog challenge and with it being my good friend's birthday tomorrow, I knew I had to try it out.  Now the beauty of a sketch challenge is that you just follow it and create. Well, since I knew what type of card I wanted to create it should've taken me no time at all to create it, right?  Wrong-especially when you have a disorganized, messy craft room.  Sigh, organizing my craft room is a discussion for another day.  At least I finished my card before the submittal deadline!  Yay!

Okay, so here is the sketch from Try Stampin' On Tuesday:



And here is my take on it.  I love it!  I seriously love the new InColor-Primose Petals!  Gotta love the coordinating ribbon too!


Well I better get going, it is way past my bed time and I gotta get up extra early tomorrow.  Sweet dreams and talk to you soon.

Vintage Christmas Swap...Greeting Card Kids

Hello stampers!  So did you get a chance to check out the beautiful creations from the designers at Sunday Stamps?  Aren't they awesome.  Take the challenge and create something with the colors.

The Greeting Card Kids stamp set has been in the catalog for awhile now and I hope it does not retire(YIKES) because since I've purchased it, it has become one of my favorite stamp sets.  So I participated in another swap, this one with a specific theme of vintage Christmas.  Mind you, I like vintage style cards, but still working at creating "vintage" style cards. I think vintage is subjective and it means something different to each of us.  This card has a lot of details. I first stamped the image onto the newsprint dsp, then stamped again, to cut out the tree on gumball green dsp and second for the little girl, which I also cut out.  


The style of the card is called dutch fold card, which I really like! It lends itself to great paper layering.  The dsp I used is "Be of Good Cheer" and while the coordinating colors are cherry cobbler, gumball green and very vanilla, there is a lighter cherry cobbler color that I thought matched the primrose petals color.  I also sponged the edges of the card with crumb cake, to give it an aged look.  To me, this is a vintage, girly Christmas card.  What do you think?


 I also used frost white shimmer paint to create more definition.  Right now, that shimmer paint is my favorite because you can use it so many ways! Here is a close up of the center.


I hope the ladies who participated in swap with me liked my card. I received many beautiful swaps and a great variety of styles.  

You have no idea how good it feels to blog again and just share with you.  I know that my blog and blogging is a work in progress but thank you for stopping by.  I may be back with another post as I came across another blog challenge and I really like the sketch but I have 12 hours to complete my card and submit it, hmm, so much for going to sleep early. 

Until next time...

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Sunday Stamps Guest Designer

Happy Sunday stampers!  Can't believe how quickly the weekend went.  Back to my other "job" tomorrow.  I also can't believe that we are entering the last week of November and we are still having 80 degree weather, not that I'm complaining, but sometimes I wish we did have seasons in Arizona, well at least in Phoenix.

So as I mentioned yesterday, I was selected as a Guest Designer for the Sunday Stamps Blog challenge!  I was so excited when I got the email from Holly notifying me.  You can check out the blog here and all the other beautiful creations for this week's challenge.  The challenge this week is a color challenge, using the colors bashful blue, real red and crumb cake.


I used the stamp set, Moving Forward, such a cute stamp set. This stamp set supports the Ronald McDonald House Charities, for every purchase from this stamp set, $3 goes to the RMHC.  

Thanks for stopping by today.  Enjoy your day.  Until then.


Saturday, November 24, 2012

I'm back...

Hello fellow stampers and friends!  I've missed you all very much.  Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! If you shopped during Black Friday, hope you survived. This past month was a challenging one and expensive too.  Long, long story short, had my first accident, I'm okay, but truck got damaged-had to pay to get that fixed on top of taking defensive driving course; got really, really sick, went to urgent care, dr's thought I had kidney stones, I didn't, wasn't feeling better so I went to emergency room, turns out I didn't have kidney stones but a really bad case of the stomach flu! It was bad and not good.  But it in end, it could've been worst and I'm glad it wasn't.  I'm thankful for my many blessings.

I'm eager to get back to blogging and share with you more handmade creations. Now that the Christmas season is fully underway, gotta finish those Christmas cards.  This is a card I made for another swap.  It was such a fun card to make, because I used the dryer sheet technique.  The stamp set, Snow Much Fun is so much fun to use!  And until this Wednesday, the stamp set is on sale as part of Stampin' Up! Online specials!  



This is a close up of the window scene, which after the fact, I probably could of used more glitter, because sometimes glitter makes everything better! The dryer sheet technique gives it a soft glittery look.  I found the tutorial for it on the Splitcoast Stampers website.  Lots of different parts to this card and it came together nicely.  It's also easy enough to mail.

Well friends, hope your Saturday is going well.  Come back tomorrow when I showcase a card I made for a very popular challenge blog.  I was picked as a guest designer and I'm excited to share with you what I created. 

Until then...



Monday, October 22, 2012

Hello, Doily

Good evening Stampers!  Hope you had a wonderful weekend!  What did you create this weekend?

When the background stamp Hello, Doily first appeared in the catalog, last year I think, it was on my wish list but I never purchased it. When the new catalog was released this year I saw that the stamp set was now being offered in clear mount.  I created this card for the big swap I participated in and I knew I wanted to use to the new InColor-Raspberry Ripple and once I combined it with Crumb Cake and Very Vanilla, it makes for a yummy card! Once I stamped the image and mounted the cardstock layers, I ran it through the Big Shot with the Square Lattice Embossing Folder.  It gives it a vintage, quilt look, I think.  I kept the rest of the card simple with some crumb cake taffeta ribbon.



So did you watch any shows this weekend?  I recorded Once Upon a Time, Revenge and 666 Park Avenue-that show is creepy!  But not as scary and creepy as the new season of American Horror Story! Oh wow, I shouldn't watch that show at night! Well friends, I better start getting ready for sweet dreams.  Thanks again for stopping by.  We'll catch up again later this week.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Quint-Essential Thank You

Good morning friends!  Morning?  Yup, I decided to blog early today before the day gets away from me with chores and other things.  Before I forget, go and check out the Stampin' Up! Clearance rack, over 70 items were just added so if there is something you want, get it quick before it's too late!  I'm hoping to get some magnet sheets! You can shop directly from my online store here.

I still have a few more swaps to show you from the big all catalog swap. I really like the colors for this swap, I used Wisteria Wonder, Melon Mambo and Lucky Limeade.  I used the stamp set quint-essential flower.  I really like the stamp because it also coordinates with five of our punches; 2 3/8 scallop circle, 1 3/4 scallop circle, 1 inch circle, 3/4 circle and 1/2 circle.  The possibilities are endless!  I only used two punches in this card.  Using our itty bitty banners and coordinating stamp set is awesome.  Coordinating products just makes it so much easier for me to create.  The colors were recommended from our Color-Coach so how easy is that!  The fancy fan embossing folder also creates a nice background.


I also wanted to show you this card today as a quick thank you to all of you who are visiting my blog and leaving comments, THANK YOU!  I'm enjoying reading your comments and having fun sharing my creations with you all.  So thank you for allowing me to share my "stamping" "creations" and "life/vida" with you; hence my tagline, stamp-create-vida.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!  If I have a chance, I'll be back tomorrow with something new to share.  Hope YOU create something beautiful this weekend.

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Halloween Swaps-Part 2

Hello friends, let me begin by saying "I'm sorry", I was not able to post last night.  I still post "live" instead of saving my post as a draft.  Last night we had a friend stop by to visit for awhile...so after a few cocktails, pizza and lively discussion, it became a really late night!  It was fun to catch up, but it was painful to get up this morning to go to work.  I tried posting this morning, but our internet was down, again! Sorry, so without further delay, below are the other four Halloween swaps I received.  These four cards use stamp sets from the current Annual Stampin' Up! Catalog.  Aren't they awesome!





Two quick shout outs: first to my friend and downline, Jacqueline.  She made this card for a Halloween swap at convention this year, her first of many! The boots move across the card! Second, to Jacquel, aka Jackie...I met her last year at my first convention and bumped into her again at convention this year...some friendships are just meant to be, I believe!  

Well friends, I better get going, gotta make dinner and finish doing laundry, on top of finishing my vintage Christmas swap.  Hope you have a great evening and I'll be back later this week with more new things to show!  Thanks for your patience.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Halloween Swaps-Part 1

Hello friends! Can you believe Halloween is only 15 days away! Wow, we must be having a blast!  So if you have been reading my blog (THANK YOU) you know that I'm addicted to swapping! But please don't stage an intervention, I know I will have some serious withdrawals from not swapping! Tonight I want to share some Halloween swaps that I have received from previous swap that gave me chills down my spine because I liked them so much!  I'll show a total of eight swaps, four today and four tomorrow.

These first four cards all used stamp sets from the 2012 Holiday Catalog. So many great stamp sets in that catalog, and you can't forget the paper and ribbon!  What I really like about these cards, of course because they are Halloween, is that it's a great card design and you can change it to match your own theme or a different holiday, don't you think?  To me, that's one of the many benefits of participating in swaps, you have endless inspiration!





Aren't these cards boo-ti-ful!  I would love to hear (or read) what you think, please leave me a comment.  Come back tomorrow when I showcase the other 4 fabulous cards! Have a great evening and thanks for stopping by.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Three's Company...



Hello friends! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!  It was a busy and fun weekend.  I have three cards to share with you today.  My sister-in-law's baby shower was on Saturday and I didn't have to look far for inspiration.  When I went to convention this past July, I participated in a 3x3 card swap and I received 60 wonderful cards.  I received this great card from Connie Ingram, isn't it cute!  The dress is made with two of our punches, the owl punch and the scallop circle punch.  I love this little dress.  The card I made has a pocket to hold a gift card.  I had fun creating this baby girl card.

I also made a masculine birthday card for my boyfriend John.  Making masculine cards can be a challenge for me because I like to embellish my cards with ribbon or bling, and you sometimes have to be careful how you use them.  So I used the new In-Color-Midnight Muse with Crumb Cake and Very Vanilla.  I really like how it came out.  And the best part is he really liked my card! Yay!  Mind you, John is a graphic designer and he oozes creativity! Plus he has recently purchased several vintage bikes so the stamp set worked great.  This is a fun stamp set and can be used in so many ways.   Can you tell which tool I used yet again?  Hint, take a look at the previous post.


Well friends, sorry this is a short post.  I'll be back tomorrow to share more.  Have a great evening.  

Friday, October 12, 2012

Spice Cake Gifts



Hello stamping friends!  Hope you had a great Friday!  Did you do anything exciting on 10/11/12?  It's cool to see the numbers in that order.  Just a quick post tonight, I gotta make a baby shower card for my sister-in-law, a masculine birthday card for the love of my life and a few thank you cards, on top of working on...you guessed it...swaps, lol.

I have an awesome Upline-Maria Kosturik! We have been friends for several years now, I first met her at work and when I found out she was a Stampin' Up! Demo my heart skipped a beat!  I had been a demo before but unfortunately it wasn't the right time for me, I was only active for less an a year.  Maria and I became good friends and I knew that when I would made the decision to join Stampin' Up! again, it would be with her.  I'm so glad I did!  We can go hours talking about all kinds of things, especially stamping stuff.  And she is an awesome baker! She taught me the best way to make sugar cookies! Anyhow, we saw each other the day and she surprised me with some "just because" gifts!  Aren't those the best! She is also a sewer and using our wonderful fabric, she made a holder for my paper snips-best tool to use to cut paper, and a beautiful organizer for my paper piercing templates and mat.  I LOVE IT and I LOVE HER!! Thanks Chica! She and I are always sharing organizational tips and this is one cool way to organize the templates. Very cool and organized!  Now, I wish I could sew as good as her, but someday I do aspire to own a sewing machine and learn.  For now, I'll stick with trying to master paper crafts.

One other thing before I forget, thank you to design team from the Color Me Beautiful Blog Challenge, they chose my card as a winner, I'm a Color Explorer! This is the FIRST blog challenge I have won.  Yay!  You can see the original post here.  Thank you so much! If you haven't had a chance to check out their challenges, check it out here and participate.

Well, friends, hope you have wonderful weekend and I'll be back later to show you what new stuff I created.  Thanks for stopping by.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Color Me Beautiful #6


Hello Stampers!  I'm so excited to show the card I made for the Color Me Beautiful Color Challenge. When I first saw the color scheme, my first reaction was "Those are hard colors to use" and then didn't think about it.  Until the other night when the thought came to me in my sleep, does that ever happen to you?  My thought was to use the beautiful rose from the Papaya Collage stamp set.  Can you believe this was the first time I inked that image! Below is the color scheme.



Once I started inking the image I realized how beautiful the colors are.  They work great for any two-step stamping or creating definition. I stamped the leaf in Always Artichoke then colored it in with Certainly Celery.  The rose is stamped with Regal Rose then colored in with Pink Pirouette.  It came out so pretty.

I made the card a gate fold card using a 12x12 piece of card stock.  The base of the card is in Regal Rose layered with Basic Gray and Basic Gray dsp. I really like how the card came out and these colors as well.  I also stamped the inside of the card with the foliage stamp image. 


Well friends, I better call it a night, my internet is acting up. I'll be back later this week with another card.  Have a good night!




Tuesday, October 9, 2012

A Fitting Occasion...Happy Birthday



Greetings fellow stampers! What a day, my "other" job was stressful today, good thing, Lord willing, I get a chance for a do-over tomorrow.  When I have a stressful day I relax by creating something.  I completed a card for a blog challenge that I'll show you tomorrow.  This is another card...did you guess...lol...for another swap I made! Given how today was, the bright colors really cheered me up! Melon Mambo from the Brights family color is one of my favorites! Of course when I say it, I feel like shouting Melon "MAMBO" like Perez Prado and then do a little mambo dance, whatever makes us happy right! But seriously, with the four color families, plus the in-colors that Stampin' Up! has, the Brights has always been my favorite! With this card I used, pacific point, melon mambo (MAMBO), daffodil delight and whisper white.  The stamp set I used is called "A Fitting Occasion" and it is such a neat set! I earned this stamp set for free based off my sales during Sale-A-Bration. It also coordinates with several of our punches. I love it when our stamp sets coordinate with a punch, framelit or die. I also used the new chevron embossing folder and the Itty Bitty stamp set with the Bitty Banners Framelits.  Gotta love products that coordinate! And it's fitting that I have this card made because tomorrow is my younger sister's birthday, so now I have a handmade card to send her, yay!

Well friends, I better call it a night. Come back tomorrow when I show you the card I made for a blog challenge.  Have a good night!

Monday, October 8, 2012

Make a Cake


Hello stampers! Hope you all had a great weekend! Saturday was a lot of fun! I'll tell you more in a bit, but first things first, showing you another card I made for the all catalog swap. Remember, I joined 12 groups, over 200 cards made.  This card uses the "Make a Cake" stamp set along with the "Itty Bitty Banners" along with the bitty banners framelits dies. When I was first deciding on how to create this card, I used my Color Coach to figure out what colors go well with the one of the new In-Colors, Primrose Petals. The coordinating color is Pink Pirouette, along with Crumb Cake. I also used one of the sheets from the Patio Party dsp and the new fancy fan embossing folder.  I really like our paper piecer, it's so easy to use and adds a nice touch.

So this Saturday, we attended and participated in our first Tour de Fat bike event.  It was held in Tempe, at the Tempe Beach Park. This was the 7th Annual Event. We took our bikes and rode in the bike parade, which was a 3 mile ride.  Afterwards, everyone gathered at Tempe Beach Park to listen to bands, played various bike games and just enjoyed the awesome weather. Just a bit history on the logo on our shirts, the logo was called "Tico" and it was used on our public buses. It was a bright smiling sun with a sombero. Our t-shirts were a vintage throw-back to different times in Phoenix. If you're from Phoenix and took public transportation, do you remember Tico? Overall, it was a great event and we're already looking forward to next year.


So this week I'll be showing you more card swaps.  I also be participating in a couple of blog challenges. Thanks for stopping by.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Blessing from Nature

Hello stampers! What a long day!  We finished irrigation late into the evening so we had to pull out the spot lights.  The light shined onto our trees and I took a photo of one of our trees.  I keep wanting to decorate it for Halloween by hanging paper bats from it, or maybe ghosts.  But I haven't yet. Can you spot the doggy pool?



This is another card I made for the big catalog swap.  I used the new stamp set "Take Care" from the catalog.  The colors I used are very vanilla, pool party, soft suede, early espresso and midnight muse. The dsp is from comfort cafe.  I love, love, love the woodgrain embossing folder from the holiday catalog. I find myself using it a lot lately. 


We're gearing up for Tour de Fat this Saturday at the Tempe Town Lake. We'll be taking our bikes and going for a ride! We've never been so we're excited.  I hope to take good photos so I can share. I'm signing out for the night.  Until next time. Thanks for stopping by.