Paper Smooches – Hey Chickie!

Welcome everyone! I’ve been having extra fun in my craft room lately, making a point to pull out stamps that have been neglected for far too long. Today I’m playing with Paper Smooches Chubby Chums. I love this series of stamps so much! Their unique look and punny sentiments lend themselves to so many fun scenes and silly ways to put them together.

Today I paired them with the Trinity Stamps Slimline die series for a giant stack of critters just here to say, “Hey!”

To create this card I actually started by die cutting the shapes because these dies are solid. You can’t see through to line them up so I die cut them first and then line the stamps up on the shape and stamp them with my MISTI. Then I colored them in with my copics and moved on to my background.

I cut a panel down to 3.5×8.5 and grabbed my distress oxides. For the sky I used tumbled glass and then I used my Newton’s Nook mountains stencil with antique linen, flipped the stencil over and used tea dye ink for another layer in the background. Then I used mowed lawn on a piece of white cardstock and die cut it with my Trinity Stamps Slimline Scenic Borders grassy die. I flipped that piece of cardstock over and die cut my clouds from that same die set. After I glued the clouds and grass to the inked panel, I brought my mountain stencil back in and added texture paste for snow caps on the mountains and set it aside to dry.

Now for assembly, I added foam tape to the back of all my critters and stacked them up like blocks. At this point I thought the card needed something else so I pulled out my Trinity Stamps Slimline Series: Frame and Fold dies and die cut a red frame to adhere to my card. I love the pop of color that gives the whole thing. I stamped my sentiments at the top and bottom and moved on to finishing touches.

I started with white gel pen accents throughout all the images and then black glaze pen on eyes and noses. I added glossy accents to noses and beaks and then finished off with some color coordinating gems throughout the background.

I plan to enter this into the Paper Smooches Challenge – Anything Goes that is going on right now.

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Trinity Stamps Craft Troop Challenge – Miss Your Face

I’m so excited that Trinity Stamps has started a monthly challenge for you to play along with! This month the theme is floral. I wanted to help you think outside of the box so I’ve chosen secondary images from two Trinity Stamps stamp sets to create this beautiful floral card. I used Love You Bunches from the January release and the Nutty Squirrel from last fall!

I had the general design layout in my head so I jumped right in to stamping my images. The cherry blossom and rose are from Love You Bunches and the smaller flower images are all from Nutty Squirrel. I colored them with my copics and used coordinating dies from Love You Bunches and Nutty Squirrel to cut them all out.

For my background, I was inspired by my friend, Candice Fisher, over at CandiCards. She’s always sharing beautiful inspiration. She used similar colors on a stenciled background last week and I loved it so much I had to try it. I don’t have the same colors she used so I chose distress oxides in abandoned coral, dried marigold and tattered rose. After blending with my Trinity Blending Buddies, I spritzed it with water and trimmed it down so I had a small white border from my cardbase.

I laid my images out to make sure I had enough to fill the space and get a general idea where I wanted them. Then I used foam squares for some and liquid glue for the rest to adhere them to my panel. Next, I die cut the hello senti-mini words from black and vellum, glued them together and then to the cardbase and stamped a sentiment from the hello senti-mini stamps below that. Then this panel is popped up on my card base with foam tape.

For finishing touches on this card I added Wink of Stella glitter brush pen to the flower centers and roses and also a scattering of Nuvo Crystal Drops around the design.

It’s fun to look at your stamps in a different way and get extra use out of them by using those secondary images that sometimes don’t get touched for a card all their own. I hope you’ll dig in your stash and join us for this fun challenge. Click here to head to the blog post where you can link up your creations!

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Coffee Loving Cardmakers – Sending Hugs Gift Card Holder

I’m over on the Coffee Loving Cardmakers blog today with this super fun gift card holder featuring a Honey Bee Stamps dies and two awesome Trinity Stamps coffee themed stamp sets – Coffee with Character and A Latte Love.

I started by die cutting my shaped coffee cup gift card holder from heavy 110 lb. white cardstock and the sleeve from kraft cardstock. Then I took my Coffee with Character stamps and stamped them randomly all over the cup. I chose a limited, sepia-toned color palette from my copics and started coloring. Then I stamped my sentiment on the sleeve and colored the letters on that with the same colors. I added a little shading on the lid with the lightest marker for some dimension too.

Here’s a look at the cup and the sleeve separated. I think it will be so fun to write a little message inside of, add a Starbucks gift card to and send it out for a little extra love to someone unsuspecting. Happy mail is the best!

Have you sent out any happy mail lately? Have you received any?? Share in the comments. We could all use some inspiration and a happy story from time to time.

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Heffy Doodle – Super Dudes!

Hello everyone! I hope you had a wonderful weekend and are ready to tackle a new week! ❤ I’m excited to finally own some Heffy Doodle stamps so that I can play along with their Facebook group challenges. This month you can choose between going green or interactive cards! For my first entry I decided to try a green and teal color palette with the Super Dudes and Rescue Dogs stamp sets.

I started by stamping, coloring and die cutting my Heffy Doodle images and then moved on to setting up my scene. I used cracked pistachio distress ink with my Newton’s Nook Clouds stencil to create a sky and then inked some cardstock with mowed lawn distress ink and die cut it with my Newton’s Nook Land Borders grass die. Then I took both pieces and used one of the Newton’s Nook Frames and Flags dies to cut a rounded rectangle. I glued it all together and added my images. Then I took the largest Newton’s Nook Frameworks die and cut it from white cardstock. I adhered that panel to a teal cardbase with foam tape and then popped my scene panel up with foam tape as well.

This is when I put my card into my MISTI and stamped my sentiment from Super Dudes in green ink. Next I moved on to finishing touches which started with white gel pen accents on the images. Then I added glossy accents to the super dudes and rescue dog. Last I added Stickles to the stars for a little glittery fun too.

I had fun keeping to a limited color palette for this card and will definitely be entering it into the Facebook group challenge. Next, I think it’s time to make these fun super heroes do something interactive!

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Avery Elle – Peek-a-boo Pals Fair Fun

I am BEYOND EXCITED to finally have had the chance to play with the most recent Avery Elle release…specifically more of my beloved Peek-a-Boo Pals! I have had this idea in my head since I saw the stamps at Creativation in January and was so happy to finally put ink to paper and make it happen!

To create this card, I started by inking up a panel with distress oxide inks in mermaid lagoon, peacock feathers and tumbled glass and then die cut it with my slimline dies from Trinity Stamps.

Next, I moved on to stamping, coloring and die cutting all my images from Peek-a-boo Pals Fair and Peek-a-boo Pals! They’re so stinking cute! I just love all these critters!!!

I assembled all the bumper cars with their critters and flags and popped them all up on the inked panel with foam tape. Then I stamped my sentiment along with some fun stars to fill in the open space. I really like the look this gives without taking away from the main images.

I added the panel to a card base measuring 3.5×8.5. For finishing touches I added black glaze pen to the animal’s eyes, glossy accents to the bumper car lights and Stickles to the unicorn’s horn.

This card just makes me smile! I hope you enjoyed it too!

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Trinity Stamps – Slimline You Make Me Happy Bouquet

Hello everyone! I’m up on the Trinity Stamps blog today featuring this beautiful floral image – Love You Bunches. I had this idea pop in my head the other night when I was laying in bed and was so excited the next morning when I got up and put the flowers over the candy jar and could make it look like a vase instead!

I started by stamping and die cutting my candy jar from silver metallic cardstock. Since these flowers don’t have stems I wanted it to look like a solid vase and I thought the neutral silver would work well with whatever colors I chose for my flowers.

Next I stamped, colored and die cut my flowers from Love you Bunches and set it all aside to create my background. For this I cut a panel to 8.5x a scant bigger than 3.5 and used distress oxides on it – tumbled glass, peacock feathers, to blueprint sketch and spritzed it with water. I hit it with my heat gun to help it dry faster before die cutting it from the largest in the slimline series: scalloped card panels dies.

At this point I started assembling my card so that I could make final decisions on my sentiment. The inked panel is glued directly to my card base and then the flowers and candy jar are popped up with foam tape.

I ended up deciding to use the happy senti-mini stamps and dies together for my sentiment and glued them both directly to the candy jar base.

For finishing touches on this card I scattered fortune teller embellishments throughout the design and then loaded my Wink of Stella glitter brush pen on the flowers and the die cut happy.

Photos really don’t do the Wink of Stella justice. It’s sooooo cool to see it shimmer when it’s moved in the light. And I really love these iridescent embellishments playing off the colors in the card.

Trinity Stamps is starting up a monthly challenge today too! It’s a brand new, fun thing and I really hope you’ll play along. This month’s challenge is floral. Keep an eye out later this morning for all the details!

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Newton’s Nook – Newton’s Book Club

Hello again! Today I’m up on the Newton’s Nook blog sharing this simple but adorable card featuring Newton’s Book Club. I just adore this set because I’m not just a crafter, but a total book nerd too! This will be a fun card to send a book loving friend.

To make this card I started by stamping my image from Newton’s Book Club and coloring him in. I had an idea of the layout and now that he was colored, I pulled cardstock that coordinated with the colors I chose for the other elements of my card. I used the coordinating dies to cut my image out and started on the rest of my card.

The woodgrain paper gave great texture but the teal and red papers were too plain so I went over the red using my gingham stencil with red ink for a tone-on-tone look. I liked this much better. I adhered the teal to my card base and then die cut my red piece from the largest in the Frames & Flags die set and popped it up with foam tape.

For the next layer, I took a wood-grain patterned paper from my stash and die cut it with the rounded rectangle, also from the Frames & Flags die set, and then used the coordinating die from Newton’s Book Club to cut a window in it. This is when I stamped and heat embossed my sentiment. The woodgrain panel is popped up while the Newton image is glued inset. Kind of like Newton really is in the bookcase. 😉

For finishing touches I added white gel pen accents throughout the image and glossy accents to the spines of some of the books.

Thanks for stopping by today. I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Your Next Stamp – Challenge Take 2

Thanks so much for stopping by again today! I had so much fun with the Your Next Stamp challenge that I wanted to pull out the only other set I have from them – Snorkel Fun Penguin – and try another simple but fun idea I had for it.

For this card I inked up a panel with distress inks and spritzed it with water. Then I die cut some water from iridescent vellum using my sea borders dies from Newton’s Nook. Then I stamped my penguin and die cut him out. I thought it would be fun to put the sentiment in speech bubble like the penguin was saying it so I grabbed my Newton’s Nook Speech Bubble dies and chose the one that fit best.

The top of the card looked empty so I grabbed my sky scene builder dies and cut some clouds out. I needed a way to hide the adhesive under the vellum so I pulled out the largest of my stitched scalloped rectangle frames from Lawn Fawn, die cut one from white cardstock and set out to assemble all my pieces.

Once everything was adhered I moved to the inside of my card. I stamped my sentiment in two inks for added interest and then thought it would be fun to put some fish around it to bring the ocean feel from the front to inside too! These fish are from the Lawn Fawn Tank You stamp set.

Once those were glued in place I went back to the front for finishing touches!

Which happened to be simple white gel pen accents and glossy accents on the penguin’s goggles, snorkel and the polka dots on his floaty. The iridescent vellum adds some fun shimmer already so I didn’t think it needed much more.

I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Your Next Stamp – Inside and Out Challenge

Hello again! A little bit ago I shared a fun card featuring my very first stamps from Your Next Stamp. I love those little hammies and also had so much fun playing along with their challenge that I decided to play along again! Sooooo…guess who’s back??? 😉

Well, Hammie, of course! The challenge is “inside and out” which means you need to decorate the inside and outside of your card. Not difficult but I don’t typically do it so I thought it would be fun to give it a shot.

For this card, I used watercolor paper and my Tombow markers with the smooshing effect. I always love how this turns out. Then I used my largest Flags and Frames die from Newton’s Nook to cut the panel out. I temporarily adhered it to a gray cardbase and die cut a circle from both at the same time. Then I added foam tape to the watercolor panel and put it back in place so the windows lined up.

Then I grabbed my Hammie – Coffee and Tea stamps, inked them up and colored them with my copics. Once they were die cut I glued one inside the card peeking through the window and popped the other up with foam tape slightly overlapping the window.

Last, I stamped and heat embossed my sentiment and die cut it with a flag from the same Frames and Flags die set I used earlier. This was also popped up with foam tape.

I opened up my card and stamped a second sentiment that I thought played off the first one quite well and then set to finishing touches.

For those, I added white gel pen accents throughout the images, glossy accents to the Hammie noses and scattered a few colors of Nuvo Crystal Drops throughout the design.

Making this card totally on a whim, I love how it turned out! It will be fun to mail to someone just to make them smile. Happy mail is the best! Don’t you think?

Thanks for stopping by. I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

Trinity Stamps – Awesome Human Mini Card

Happy Weekend everyone! I’m hopping in today to share an extra special card for an extra special someone!

My daughter has a dance team competition today so I made her a special card. They do fun gift deliveries to the kids in their rooms while they are waiting to perform and I try to make a special card each time to tie to a balloon.

To make my card, I started by die cutting the stitched rectangle from Trinity Stamps Slimline Series: Frame and Fold dies. Then I stamped the Awesome Human stamp on it and colored it with copic markers. I chose a coordinating color of cardstock and die cut the card from the same Slimline Series: Frame and Fold dies. I love how many different things you can do with this die set. It’s got amazing potential!

The stamped panel is adhered to fun foam and then adhered to the card for a bit of dimension and interest on a simple card design.

Then, I decided to add a little something fun to the inside of my card too! I grabbed my hello senti-mini stamps and dies and started deciding how I wanted it to look. In the end I chose teal and white cardstock to make the hello from and stamped sunshine below it. This wasn’t quite enough so after digging through my stash I thought it would be so fun to have the cute frog from Puddle Jumpers hopping off the word hello.

This made me giggle for 2 reasons…it’s Leap Day after all! And because my daughter is always bouncing around and loves all things critter just like her mama. 😉

For finishing touches on the front I did a combo of all the things! I started with Wink of Stella glitter brush pen on the word YOU, then moved to yellow Stickles on all the stars. Next I added white gel pen to the banner and then finished it off with glossy accents on HUMAN.

Super fun card and I’m really excited to give it to her! This is the second of four competitions they have this season and my ideas are already turning for what to make next time!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Enjoy your weekend and have a fabulous day!