Chris's 7th Stampin' Up! Anniversary

As the title suggest, today is Chris's 7th Anniversary

as a Stampin' Up! Demonstrator.

As well as being my downline, Chris is my Sister-in-law,

and also my very close friend,

Those of you who follow my blog will know that each Wednesday we get together

and spend the time together crafting, and chatting of course!!

Here's the card I've made her!!

The Hello motif is stamped in Memento Black,

the flowers coloured with Stampin Blends in Pink Pirouette

and the leaves in Old Olive.

the Happy 7th Anniversary is from the Number of Years stamp set

and I have added one of the Flourish Thinlits die cuts in the

bottom left corner.

Congratulations Chris and well done!!

Adam's birthday

Today is my nephew Adam's birthday 

- that's my baby sister, Anne-Marie's son

and here's his card.

Avery CAS card, but looks great I think, really bright, crisp and Cheerful.

I have used some retired DSP and matching cardstock for the background.

(I have resolved that I am going to use some of my retired Stampin Up stash this year 

and use it for making our Cards for Causes -as well as the occasional card for me to send too!!)

I have used the Happy Birthday Thinlits die (again!) which I find 

really useful for Men's cards, and Adam is cut using Little Letters Thinlits.

Happy Birthday Adam, sorry we cant be with you to celebrate tonight,

but hope you have a fabulous day!!

Had a superb Chinese meal with Maggie and Gerald last night!

Gerald's Birthday

Today's my brother-in-law's birthday (Maggie's hubby)

and here's the card I have made for him

This features the Birthday Memories DSP,

the Happy Birthday Thinlits Die and the name

is cut using the Little Letters Dies (sadly now retired, but still useful)

Happy Birthday Ger!!

Barry and I are going out with Maggie and Ger to celebrate

his birthday at a fabulous Chinese Restaurant tonight.

Can't wait!! (I love Chinese food!)

Cheryls Petal Passion cards.

At my last Saturday morning workshop Cheryl won the raffle and chose

the Petal Passion Memories and More Card pack.

I had told her that I intended to use these as quick greeting cards, 

and she has kindly sent me some photos of the greetings cards 

she has  made with this item, to share with you on my blog. 

So over the next few weeks I will post her piccies

Isn't this so sweet.

I think it would make a great Valentine card!

xx

More Heartfelt Blooms

Here's another Heartfelt Blooms card that I have cased from the catalogue.

This time I have used ink pads and Aqua painters to colour the image,

colours used, Sweet Sugar Plum, Old Olive, Daffodil Delight

Powder Pink and Smoky Slate.

On the Sweet Sugar Plum layer I used one of the Petal Pair embossing folders

The sentiment is from the Soft Sayings stamp set.

(There are some lovely sentiments in this set!)

I think I may have gone overboard a bit with the Wink of Stella 

and lost some of the definition on the flower!

Having said that I have lots of friends who just love loads of glitter and bling on their cards!!

And there's more....

Here's another card that Chris and I made on Wednesday,

once again using the free Sale-a-bration Amazing You stamp set

and the matching Celebrate You Thinlits dies.

Both Chris and I are really pleased with this matching set

and love it all the more since it was free!!

Amazing you

Here's a card that Chris and I made on Wednesday, when we got together to craft

for the first time in over a month as she and David have been visiting

Richard (their son) in Australia for a month.

It was great to get together and craft for the day, in between chatting incessantly!

We did manage a few cards between us - this is one of them

You may have guessed that we used the Stamparatus to stamp this card,

using the side panel and moving it down one tab after stamping each time,

but repeat stamping without reinking each time.

The sentiment and flower is from the Amazing You stamp set.

I love how the Tranquil Tide colour is fading as it gets further down the page,

and it's an unusual colour combination with the Blushing Bride and

the Copper Foil (used to trim the centre panel and to cut the YOU

out, from the matching Celebrate You Thinlits Dies)

I stamped the borders using the leaf part of the flower stamp just on the edge

 of each side and I am really pleased with the effect.

Really enjoyed using the Stamparatus again too!!

And here's Jean's Brusho project

As promised, here is the Brusho project that Jean made yesterday.

Hers is a subtler version of the same design as she didn't like the bright colours.

I love the really soft subtle colours that Jean has achieved by diluting the
colours in a palette, rather than sprinkling the brusho onto weet card.

Two totally different versions of the same card.
Will really enjoy spending time experimenting with these Brushos!! 

My first encounter with Brushos!!

Well this isn't one of my best, but it's certainly not the worst,

and I have to say that I am sort of pleased with the effect I have created -

and as I say in the title, this is my very first experience of using this product.

I think I may have been a bit heavy handed with the amount of crystals I used,

but I think that on the whole it's not too bad an attempt!!

I stamped the image from the Birthday Blooms stamp set 

in Versamark and heat embossed with White embossing powder,

onto watercolour paper.  Then I wet the various sections of the flower in turn, and sprinkled

the Brusho crystals on top, and used an aqua painter to spread the colour around.  

The bit where I could have done better is the very deep blue background, 

which I think is too dark -  a lighter one might have looked nicer.

That said, I love the speckles of Wink of Stella which I flicked onto the finished card.

I think that you can just see these.

My last words on this has to be - well I really enjoyed doing this!!

PS: call back tomorrow and see Jean's first attempt at Brushos -

hers is far better than mine!!

Liz's Christmas card

I make no apologies for sharing this Christmas card with you today.

It was sent to us by our good friend Liz,

who you may remember is particularly good at punch art

and has done all manner of cards featuring punch art, cricketers, rugby players,

skiers,Alan walking the dogs and even a card for a Master Mason!!

If you are a long term follower of my blog, I am sure you will 

know who I am talking about.

Any how!! Liz and Alan have two dachshunds, so when she saw

the Ready for Christmas stamp set, she had to have it,

and promptly set about her Christmas cards.

Here's the one we received.

Isn't this just fabulous!!

Thanks Liz - appreciated xxx

Nikki's Cozy Christmas Snow Globe/Shaker card

One of my Wednesday Class ladies asked me if I had a snow globe stamp,

 and as I don't own one, I suggested that she could use Acetate sheet and a circle die

to make a shaker card which would look like a snow globe.

Here's what she made

She used the Cozy Christmas stamp set (retired) and various glitter, confetti snowflakes
 and sequins to shake about inside the layer of acetate and the base card.

Don't know whether you can see the detail, but she embossed the front layer of White

 card with the Softly Falling Textured Impression embossing folder.

I just thought that you might like to share this,

 as I was really pleased to receive this card from Nikki.

(Some of my ladies are going to make at least a couple 

of  Christmas cards every month at class, so that they are 

not frantically crafting at the last minute,the week before the big event!)

I really must do the same!!

Lots of Lavender

Today is the birthday of my friend and downline Mavis

here is the card I have made for her.

I used the free  Sale-a-bration stamp set  Lots of Lavender,

and also used my Stamparatus to demonstrate to my ladies how it worked.

I used my watercolour pencils with an aqua painter to colour the lavender.

can you see the embossed strip behind the matted  image ?

I used one of the Petal Pair Textured Impressions embossing folders

then finished it of with Fresh fig ribbon and the Vertical Greeting stamp set.

Happy Birthday Mavis!!

Watercolour Pencils and Heartfelt Blooms

Here's a card once again cased from the Sale-a-bration brochure

Heartfelt Blooms stamped twice directly on to Whisper white card

using smoky Slate ink.  Then stamped again onto a separate piece of Whisper white,
then this image is coloured with Watercolour Pencils and an Aqua painter
 and  then fussy cut.

I used Real Red. Daffodil Delight. Pumpkin Pie and Calypso Coral pencils

The White leaves were cut using the Flourish Thinlits dies, 

which I used Wink of Stella on, don't think you can see that detail!

and the sentiment is from Blooms and Wishes Stamp set

This card is going into my box  as it's useful for various occasions.

More from the Waterfront

A couple more of Cheryl's Waterfront cards, that she is happy to share with us.

 Love this little beach scene with the cute beach huts and the relaxer chair

(which you may recognise from the Seasonal Laters dies which 

accompany the Colourful Seasons stamp set)

And another waterfront scene.

Aren't these great - my stamp set will be with me on Monday!!

I blame Cheryl for the expense!!

Heartfelt Blooms and Garden Trellis

Here's a card I have made today, again featuring 

the Heartfelt Blooms stamp set - but fussy cut the flowers this time,

 with the Garden Trellis Textured Impressions Embossing folder.

This card is cased from the Sale-a-bration Brochure - so you not only get free products

 with your purchases, you get lots of ideas for projects to make with them too!!

Colour combination  is Pool Party, Calypso Coral, Pear Pizzazz. Island Indigo and White.

I intend to send this card to a friend who has not been well this last week 

and so missed our monthly Saturday workshop and this weeks class.

Its just to let her know that we have missed her!!

Heartfelt Blooms

I liked the look of this stamp set  when I first saw the Sale-a-bration catalogue,

but once I had used it, I fell in love with it!!

Can you see why!!

Do you see the definition of the flowers, and wouldn't you think that 

this was a two or maybe even a three step stamp set?

Believe it or not, but that is a single impression of the flowers

using the FREE Sale-a-bration  Heartfelt Blooms stamp set.

At the risk of repeating myself, I LOVE it.

You can easily make a card in a short time, and it looks as though

it has taken ages to get the depth of definition shown here. 

The flowers are stamped in Sweet Sugar Plum,

the sentiment is from the same stamp set and is stamped in 

Pool Party onto a Stitched Shapes Framelits oval.

I have used a Layering Ovals scalloped die cut from Pool Party cardstock

and the ribbon is  Pool Party 3/8" Shimmer Ribbon.

So if you need a card in a hurry, this could well be your go-to stamp set for the foreseeable!!

And don't forget between now and 31st March you can get this free 

with any £45 purchase'

Enjoy!!

Stamparatus and Amazing you

Tonight I demonstrated how to use the Stamparatus tool, using the "Amazing you"stamp set.
(Another free Sale-a-bration stamp set with a purchase of £45)

Here's the card that I made and the only addition was the "confetti" stamp from the
Balloon Adventures stamp set.
Colours used are:
Pool Party, Blushing Bride, Wisteria Wonder, Pear Pizzazz and  So Saffron ink pads.

Below is the card that Nikki  (from tonight's Wednesday class) made
using the same colours, the Amazing You stamp set
and the tiny balloons are punched using a retired punch which I think
looks just great for this card which is for a fella!!
Nikki drew the strings from the balloons freehand.

Hasn't she made a great job of this!!
(And enjoyed the opportunity to use the Stamparatus.)

Waterfront - sneaky peek

On Saturday my friend and Stampin Up downline demonstrator, Cheryl,

attended my Monthly Saturday morning workshop.

She brought along with her some examples of cards that she had made using items

 from the Spring/Summer Catalogue (which launches tomorrow).

Here are just a couple of the cards she made using the Waterfront stamp set.

Aren't these fabulous!  I wasn't going to buy this set, but seeing these cards

and a few others which I will post later, has convinced me that I must have it.

So its going on my order in the morning!!

What do you reckon??

Here's your New Year card

As promised earlier, here is the card that I have made to wish everyone a happy new year.

It's made the same way as the Noel card that I made for Christmas,

you can view this 

HERE

but it was too big to photograph the three words together stood up,

so I had to take these photos of them flat.

I have used a colour combo Sweet Sugar Plum, Basic Gray and 

Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer paper

Below is a close up of the letter R panel, where I hope you can see the background 

stamping done, using the Balloon Adventures stamp set

and hopefully you can see the glimmer of the letter and the punched star.

Letters cut using the  (dont know how I ever managed without it)

Large Letters  Framelits dies

So there you have it, your Happy New Year Trio card set, just for you!!

So all it needs now is for me to wish you all

a very happy, healthy and hopefully prosperous New Year!

God Bless!!

Happy New Year

I know that you were expecting to see my Near Years card, 

but I thought I would show you my Christmas table flowers

before they breathe their last.

They have lasted well in our centrally heated home, 

but I wish I had thought to photograph them on the day they were 

given to me (by two of my Wednesday class ladies, Jean and Julie.)

Here's the table decoration I made with them

I love these flowers, thank you so much Jean and Julie - greatly appreciated!!

Now I really must make dinner dinner or Barry will start eating the table!!

I'll pop back later and post my New Year Card.