Timeless Talk

It's another sunny day here in Abbotsford, and very warm.  But not too warm that you can't muster up the strength to stamp. My stamping buddy Sheri and I spent the morning in my craft room working on some challenge cards.  

We decided it would be a lot of fun to combine a sketch, a theme, and a colour challenge to create our first card of the day. And it was.  What a challenge!

For the first challenge we picked the theme challenge "Cute as a Button" by The Paper Players Theme Challenge #207, called "Cute as a Button" hosted by Sandy Mathis.  For this challenge all you had to do was use one or more buttons on your project.  Easy Peasy!  Make sure you check out all the great cards by the Design Team and submitters for this week's challenge, there are some really great designs! 

For our second challenge, "color", we used the Create With Connie and Mary colour challenge, which features Tangelo Twist, Bermuda Bay and Basic Grey.  We threw in a bit of Whisper White for our stamped image.  I hope you'll check out the amazing designs by the design team and submitters, especially if you're not used to using such bright colours, there are a good range of ideas to work with. 

And for our final challenge we needed a good strong sketch.  We chose sketch #179 by the gals at Try Stamping On Tuesday challenge site.  Not only did we like the sketch, but it seemed appropriate to choose this site because we always "Stamp on Tuesday".   This was a great sketch to work with.  Try Stamping on Tuesday have just added five new gals to their design team, so it's really worthwhile to check out this challenge site.  And, if you have an opportunity to make something, this challenge doesn't close until August 12th, 2014, so there's still lots of time to play along.

Here's My Card:

The card base is Basic Gray and the layers are Tangelo Twist measuring 5 1/8 x 4 1/8" followed by a 5 x 3 3/4" piece of Bermuda Bay.  This piece was embossed with the Arrow Embossing folder and then cut into three pieces and adhered to the card front.  I added 3 small flags cut with the Banner Punch.  I added Washi Tape to two of them before punching.  I also added a strip of Washi Tape in Basic Gray across the bottom of the card instead of adding ribbon.

Supplies: 
Stamp Set:  Timeless Talk, Cycle Celebration and Good Greetings* (Holiday catalogue 2014)
Ink:  Bermuda Bay, Basic Gray
Card Stock:  Tangelo Twist, Bermuda Bay and Basic Gray
Accessories:  Trimmer, Arrow Embossing Folder, Circle Framelits, Basic Rhinestones, Washi Tape, Banner Punch, Small and Large Oval Punches, Stampin' Up Buttons, dimensionals, adhesive
 

Here are the buttons I used for The Paper Players Challenge. They look so cute on these wheels.  Brings back memories of childhood when we decorated our bikes for the May Day parade. 

 

The "Celebrate" sentiment is from a brand new stamp set called "Good Greetings" which is soon to be released in the up coming Holiday Catalogue.  As a Demonstrator for Stampin' Up!, I had an opportunity to get mine free for matching a sales quota in June.  Find out how you can have an opportunity to get this stamp free too, by contacting me.

 

I liked this sentiment and image from Cycle Celebration so stamped it on my card liner in Tangelo Twist and then stamped it again in Bermuda Bay on a scrap of Whisper White Card stock.  I then punched out the center of the sentiment with the large oval punch and mounted the cut out piece with adhesive to the Tangelo image.

 

Well that's it for this post.  It was fun stamping with Sheri today.  We have so much creative energy together and we always come up with fun ideas.  If you're stamping on your own and not having much fun doing it, or your Mojo's not working, think about getting a stamp buddy, it makes life so much more creative and enjoyable!  



HAPPY STAMPING!
PENNY TOKENS 

Stampin' on Tuesdays Project #2 - Watercolor Wonder Thank You Card

Here I am back with the second of three projects from last Tuesday's stamping get-together with my friend Sheri. We made a card featuring the Watercolor Wonder Designer Series paper from Stampin' Up!

Project #2:  Butterfly and Flower Thank You
My inspiration came from a card I made at Cheryl Lefore's stamp camp in February.  I immediately fell in love with the clean design, color combo and designer paper she used.  The card comes together effortlessly.  It's one of those great cards that takes about 5 minutes to assemble but looks so great you'd think you'd worked on it for a much longer time.

Cheryl used Pool Party card stock for her card base and added layers of Basic Black and Whisper White Card stocks to compliment the designer paper. The small flower design with the black dot centers is simply beautiful.  It's from the retired Sweet Sorbet Designer Series paper featured in the Sale-A-Bration sales promotion.  You just had to see these papers in real life to appreciate the high quality and beautiful designs. 

Her sentiment is from the Lots of Thanks stamp set featured on page 29 of the Idea Book and Catalogue (IB&C).  To tell the truth, I've skipped over this stamp set many times as I've browsed the catalogue.  However, once I used it I was hooked and had to put it on my wish list.  Variety in sentiment stamps is so important and this is one of those perfect sets you'll want to have in your stamping arsenal.  

This 9 piece sentiment stamp set is also available in French and German and comes in Wood Mount #129687 $27.95 or Clear Mount #129690 $20.95. 

Our Version:

Although I had some Pool Party card stock and Sweet Sorbet DSP on hand, I didn't have any of the blue seam binding.  After digging through my ribbon stash Sheri and I decided to use some old Pear Pizzazz Seam Binding after matching it up with a swatch from the Watercolor Wonder Designer Series paper featured in the current Occasions Catalogue. 

The DSP we used has a pansy like floral scene coloured in a rich blend of Island Indigo, Smokey Slate and Gumball Green.  The color combo and large flower design might have been overpowering for our card, but because the design has this soft watercolor appearance it actually works.  We made another change by going for lighter colors and swapping out the Island Indigo and Gumball Green for Marina Mist and Pear Pizzazz.


Supplies:

Card stock:

• Smokey Slate:8 1/2 x 5 1/2  score at 4 1/2"
• Marina Mist: 2 14/" x 3 1/3" & scraps for punching out the butterflies
• Whisper White: 2 7/8" x 3 1/4", 3 3/4" x 5" for inside of card

Stamp Set:

• Another Thank You Photopolymer Stamp Set 
  

 

The beautiful Another Thank You Photopolymer Set features 7 beautifully crafted thank you sentiments.  A terrific value for just $16.95.  Order yours today at my on-line store: 

 Ink:  

• Staz On Black Ink #101406 pg 165 IB&C

DSP:   

• Watercolor Wonder  #132994 pg 23 Occasions Catalogue

Accessories:  

• Elegant Butterfly Punch # 127526 pg 183 IB&C
• Bitty Butterfly Punch #129406 pg 183 IB&C
• Basic Pearl Jewels #119247 pg 171 IB&C
• Pear Pizzazz Seam Binding Ribbon (retired)
• Two-Way Glue Pen, Adhesive, Dimensionals

Tips for Punching the Butterflies:

You don't want to end up with something like this because you used the wrong adhesive.  See tips below.

Step One:  Punch out the large butterfly using the Elegant Butterfly punch from the piece of 3 3/4" x 5" piece of Whisper White card stock. Decide which side of the card stock you want the image to be on, then slide the punch up from the corner until you feel it stop and punch out the image. Save the image for the front of the card.

 Step Two:  Punch out the small butterfly using the Bitty Butterfly punch from the scrap piece of Marina Mist. Set the image aside for the front of the card.

Step Three:  Fit the large Elegant Butterfly punch over top of the negative image of the small butterfly and punch out the larger shape.  BE VERY CAREFUL when you do this step because the center parts of the butterfly are narrow and fragile.

You can see there's only a tiny bit of card stock showing at the top and bottom center of the punch. If it breaks glue it on anyway you just have to work a bit more with it.

 

Step Four:  Flip over the Whisper White piece and run a thin line of 2-way glue around the butterfly shape.  Fit the Marina Mist butterfly image against it so the shape shows up in the cut out on the front of the card stock. Use Tape runner or Tom Bow glue to adhere the white liner to the inside of the card.

 

If you use the Silicon Mat underneath the piece you are applying glue to you will save your work surface and your glued piece won't stick to the mat. Just run a very thin line of glue using the two-way glue pen and you'll achieve perfect results.

In this view I've layed the large butterfly image over the one cut from the white card stock.  It's just barely catching the edges of the outline, but it will adhere.  I used my poking tool to push down the bottom of the butterfly wings after I took this picture.

Here you can see the liner adhered to the inside of the card. 

Finishing the Card Front: 

To finish off the card front, stamp the sentiment on the bottom of the card.  Adhere the Marina Mist piece about 1 inch below the top right corner of the card face and approximately 1/4" from the right side.  

Adhere the DSP to the left half of the Whisper White layer leaving enough room to attach the ribbon on the right hand side.  I used 11" of ribbon.  Make sure you place your ribbon before adhering this layer to the Marina Mist layer.

Use dimensionals to attach the butterflies to each other and to the DSP piece.  I finished off the smaller butterfly by adding three basic pearl jewels as an accent.

Stepped Up Version of this Card:

For this version I swapped out the Marina Mist for Island Indigo card stock. I embossed a 5 1/4 x 4" piece of Smokey Slate card stock with the Honeycomb Embossing Folder and then mounted it on the front of the card with dimensionals. The butterflies and DSP were sponged with Smokey Slate ink to give them some added dimension, and the pearls were replaced with small basic rhinestones for a glimmer effect.  
 

Honeycomb Embossing Folder

I sponged the butterflies and the DSP with Smokey Slate classic ink before I adhered them to the white layer.  I also added basic rhinestones instead of pearls for this stepped up card version.

The final change was the placement and choice of sentiment.  I didn't want to too much happening on the front of the card, so I moved the sentiment to the inside and changed the stamp to a larger "thank you" sentiment from the Another Thank You stamp set.

I hope you enjoyed this second project as much s Sheri and I did and that you find these instructions helpful.  Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you'll take the time to leave me a comment and let me know which version of the card is your favourite and come back to see the final project tomorrow.