Getting Back In the Groove

I'm finally starting to settle in after a month of travel, medical appointments and other activities for my mom.  I'm afraid this has taken all my time, energy and attention, so apart from updating you on Stampin' Up! promos I've been unable to take time to blog or work on any projects.

Well, all that's about to change as things are starting to get into a rhythm around here and I feel like it's time to get my creative mojo working again.  To get me started I decided to dive in and make a card using Susan Horr's wonderful colour challenge WWC21 on the Wacky Watercooler this week.   When you see these colours you're going to know why it got my interest:

Here's What I Came Up With:
Earlier this year I received a birthday card from my friend Phyllis, that I absolutely adored.  Here's Phyllis' card: 

When I saw Susan's colour challenge yesterday I knew I had only a little bit of time to enter the challenge so I needed a quick and easy card. The colours in the challenge made me think of Phyllis' card and so I decided to CASe her idea adding some of my own touches, of course.  Here's my card:

The card base is Sahara Sand with a layer of Bermuda Bay.  I used the same image from the Work of Art stamp set as Phyllis, and stamped it with my stamp-a-ma-jig in Calypso Coral, Pool Party and So Saffron inks.  To me these stacked images resemble the layers of a birthday cake.  

The butterflies were embossed with the Beautiful Wings Embosslit, and are   adorned with small basic rhinestones. I used dimensionals to mount them to the card face. 

I'm a big fan of banners so I was super excited to use my new Balloon Framelits Die to create this fun little banner.   I added the teeniest butterflies from the Beautiful Wings Embosslit along the length of the banner and also adorned each of them with a basic rhinestone.  They are just so cute! 

When I bought the Balloon Framelits, I purchased them as a bundle along with the Celebrate Today stamp set.  This saved me 15% off the total cost.  I loved the script of the "celebrate" sentiment from this set and think it looks great stamped in Calypso Coral on the face of this card.  It's just one of 17 stamps in this wonderful photopolymer set and is available in the Occasions Catalogue until June 2nd, 2015. 

The raised embossing was done with the Filigree Finial Embossing Folder.  I think it adds a very festive look to this card, and reminds me of confetti.

The inside of the card is stamped with the birthday sentiment "celebrate" from the Big Day Sale-a-bration stamp set.

 

 

Supplies:
Stamps:  Work of Art, Celebrate Today and Big Day (Sale-a-bration)
Ink:  Calypso Coral, So Saffron, Pool Party and Momento Tuxedo Black
Cardstock:  Sahara Sand, Bermuda Bay, So Saffron, Calypso Coral and Pool Party
Accessories:  Trimmer, Big Shot Machine, Filigree Finial Embossing Folder, Beautiful Wings Embosslit, Balloons Thinlet Die, Basic Rhinestones, Dimensionals, Adhesive.

I hope you enjoyed this card and will come back and visit my blog again. The Wacky Watercooler challenges are a great place to get inspired and creative. If the urge hits you, there's still a bit of time left before this challenge ends. If not make sure you check out this blog link regularly to see the great challenges that are offered.  

Happy Stamping!
Penny Tokens 

All Occasion Cards in June

Note:  This post is late! June was an extremely busy month with birthdays, retirements and unfortunately more funerals, so I've been busy trying to keep up with my card making, and attending various celebration events.  

The downside to being so busy is that I slacked off on my blogging and card events, and to all my followers, I apologize.   The upside is that while the month flew by I've been exercising my creativeness and enjoying my get-to-gether's with friends and family.  

Here are some of the cards I made in June:

This "Just For You" card was made with the new Work of Art stamp set.  If you need a card in 5 minutes this is the set to use.

I love the inside of this card, it makes me feel happy just looking at it. 

Here you can see the various stamps used to create this card.  All from the one set.  You've got to like that. Inks used were Strawberry Slush, Crisp Cantaloupe, and Coastal Cabanna. 

Here's another Work of Art stamp set card.  These were my June customer appreciation cards for those wonderful customers who placed a June order on my on-line store.  Love you guys! 

This beautiful sympathy card is stamped with Early Espresso Ink on Very Vanilla card stock and then layered up with a Very Vanilla card stock base and layer of Early Espresso.  I used a transparency mask with a 2 1/2" circle opening to stamp the En Francais (retired background stamp) in the center of the card.  I stamped the tall floral silhouette from Serene Silhouettes and then added a simple "with sympathy sentiment from the Petite Pairs stamp set.  The butterflies are from the Beautiful Wings Embosslit die. 

For the next two cards I used a double embossed folder technique to layer one embossed image over another.  I plan on teaching this really neat technique at one of my July classes so stay tuned for information on how you can participate.  These unique cards have a real vintage quality about them and I love the colour mix of Coastal Cabana, Very Vanilla and Crumb Cake. 

So what do you think, isn't this card simply beautiful?  It's one of those rare cards that could be used for a birthday, thinking of you, sympathy or thank you.  Because it is so versatile, I think I'll make a few of these maybe in different colour combinations (think subtles) and simply leave the inside sentiment blank until I need them for an occasion.  

The card base and the inside insert are in Very Vanilla cardstock.  I stamped the floral image from Serene Silhouettes in Coastal Cabana ink on a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock and then layered this piece behind the Crumb Cake embossed layer.  The Crumb Cake layer was embossed with the retired Designer Frames embossing folder* and then re-embossed using a mask with the Beautiful Baroque Embossing Folder   Basic Pearls, a small butterfly from the Beautiful Wings Embosslit die and a piece of 3/8" Crumb Cake Taffeta Ribbon (retired) all add to the antique look of this card. 

 Note:  Stampin' Up! has replaced this embossing folder with two new ones called Fun Frames in the 2014-2025 IB&C. 

For the inside of this card I simply stamped the image again in Coastal Cabana and added two of the smallest butterflies from the Beautiful Wings Embosslit.   The envelope was also stamped with this image. 

My second card was embossed with the Modern Mosaic Embossing Folder and the Designer Frames Embossing Folder.   I chose the birds in a tree image from Serene Silhouettes for this card and again stamped the images in Coastal Cabana ink.

The small flowers on the face of the card were punched from Coastal Cabanna and Basic Black cardstock with the Itty Bitty Punch pack and Boho Blossoms punch.  Basic Pearls were added to the centers of the flowers. 

Hope you liked these cards.  Remember if you like this technique and would like to attend a class to learn how to do double embossing, simply drop me an email or give me a call and I will arrange a time.

The next card I want to share with you combines En Francais with the Work of Art stamp set to create a very unique and fun birthday card.  Once again, this card style could be used for almost any occasion.    The card base is Crumb Cake with layers of Daffodil Delight, Marina Mist and Whisper White card stocks.  I stamped the En Francais background stamp in Crumb Cake onto the Whisper White layer, and then stamped one of the images from the Work of Art set in a circular motion in Marina Mist ink to achieve the flower shape.  The Daffodil Delight accents are decorative dots 

 

Work of Art' painted swatches, swaths, and shapes make up the bulk of this set that comes in clear or wood mount.  With eleven different stamps in this set you have lots of options for deciding which strokes are right for your project. 2014-2015 Annual Catalog.

Happy Stamping!
Penny 

Soccer Theme Birthday Cards using PPA205

Earlier this week I planned to work on the Paper Pals Art Sketch Challenge PPA205 and enter it before the closing on May 27th, but guess what?  That's right, I didn't finish in time.  

My friend Sheri and I decided to tackle it anyway during our Tuesday stamping get-together just because this is such a fun sketch. We both thought it had potential as there are just so many possible ways you could use it.  

I wish I'd taken pictures of my stamping table because during our collaboration on the card it was just chaotic.  I think we hauled out most of my stamps before deciding to create our cards using the Great Sport stamp set.  

Supplies:
Stamp Set(s):  Great Sport, Work of Art, Elements of Style 
Ink:  Melon Mambo, Memento Black Ink, Versa Mark Ink
Card Stock:  Basic Black, Melon Mambo and Whisper White
Accessories:  Banner Framelits, 2 1/2" Circle Punch, Starburst Framelits, Black Embossing Powder, 1 3/8" Circle Punch, Basic Rhinestones, dimensionals, Tom Bow adhesive

My motive for this card was creating a birthday card for a teenage girl who's an avid soccer player.  I think I scored on this one!

I made a top fold card and rotated the design so the banners are facing downwards like an award ribbon.  Although the card has a sports theme, I wanted it to be really girly girl in style and that's why I chose to do it in Melon Mambo.

The soccer ball was embossed using Versa Mark Ink and Black Embossing Powder.  It was added to the center of the design with dimensionals.  Three basic rhinestones add a little bling on this part of the card.  I cut out the central design using the Starburst Framelit Dies and mounted this on a basic black circle that was punched out with the 2 1/2" circle punch.

The chevron banners were stamped with the brand new Work of Art Stamp set that will be available in the June 1st catalogue.  They were cut out with the Banner Framelit dies and mounted on Melon Mambo banners.  (Note: the Melon Mambo banners were cut out with the next largest sized banner die but it was too big for these pennants, so I adhered the chevron banner position the "v" over top of the one on the Melon Mambo banner and then hand cut about 1/8" off of each side of the pennant, to achieve this look).

Here is a view of the card and matching envelope.

I made three of these cards in Melon Mambo.

Here's the inside of the card.  I repeated the flourish stamp from Great Sport and topped it with a Happy Birthday sentiment that's mounted on a 1 3/8" circle of basic black. 

 

Great Sport, item #132010 is a six piece stamp set  that comes in Wood Mount for $32.95 or Clear Mount for $24.71.  This set has a little something for ever sports enthusiast -baseball, basketball, football, soccer and can be used to create invitations, tags, or to embellish scrapbook pages for your favorite sports lovers. Use with the 1-1/4" and 1-3/8" Circle Punches and the Bitty Banners Framelits Dies for a coordinated look that hits it out of the park!   It's on the retiring list and will no longer be available after June 1st.