In spite of our best intentions, Thanksgiving seems to give way to the upcoming December holidays. This is a card I am in the process of making. Although it is quite simple, it does require precision cutting on all four layers.
Heat embossing with white is always a challenge. I know this is a snowflake, but I don't want to have extra flakes on the card. The anti-static bags work well to keep the background clean.
Until next time, have a great Thanksgiving ... and keep designing.

The challenge was Fall Colors, and it worked so well by doing paper piecing for the clothing. It's hard to find patterned paper with a pattern small enough to use for clothing, but this one works.
Cleaning and rearranging has its own set of rewards. I now have three empty drawers in my stamp room, but they will soon be full. Now ... back to cleaning, sorting and rearranging.

It's a Bella sort of day ... and this Bella chef has her turkey and pie ready for dinner. Seems like Thanksgiving is just around the corner.
Enjoy the card and get ready for a feast in just a few short weeks.

Okay, so October is all about Halloween ... unless there are Christmas party invitations to be made and sent out. That is the case with the above invitation which is for the HAM (Amateur Radio) Association's Christmas party.
This invitation is 5"x7", and the wording of the invitation inside was computer generated in red ink. The first layer is a red card stock, and the white layer on top of that has been run through the Cuttlebug using the Swiss Dots folder. Since the folder is smaller than the larger-sized card, I used my Scor-It and made dry embossed lines on three sides.
The image is from Stamping Bella and was colored with Copic markers and highlighted on the holly berries with Christmas Red Stickles. I used the round and scalloped Nestabilities to cut the circles and embellished the invitation with a red ribbon.
Now ... it's back to the ghosties and ghoulies because, after all, it is still October, and Halloween is yet to come!

This month is about Halloween ... in the stores next to the Christmas stuff, in the neighborhoods, in the schools and on the blogs.
This witchy witch is from Stamping Bella. She was stamped with Jet Black StazOn and allowed to dry well ... oh, for about a year. (It doesn't pay to get too enthused, does it?) Since she had dried for so long, I was able to color her using Copic markers without smearing the dimpled darling. Even witches get tired of black hats, so hers is orange.
The card was made from orange CS with white CS on top. The white CS was Cuttlebugged Swiss Dots. I used the oval and scalloped oval Nestabilities to cut the image and background CS. A flat-back plastic haunted house was used as an embellishment.
I received several new sets of Elemental Doodles stamps in the mail last week and will be working on cards featuring those stamps.
Elemental Doodles has been named the October Vendor of the Month by Stampers Corner. The group address is StampersCorner@yahoogroups.com. If you are a member of this group ... or become a member ... there are special discounts on ED stamps being offered through the group.
Kudos to my fellow design team members for being published using ED stamps:
Connie - October Vamp Stamp News / Look for her card on the back page
Etha - Fall 2009 issue of Just Cards

It's October already?
How can that be? Where did March go?
It's been way too long since I have posted on my blog, but I will do my best to keep pace with life in the future.
This card was another simple card to make, and I used a black card with black spider web patterned paper on top of it. The skeleton image is a Tim Holtz design from Stampers Anonymous, and the cat image is by Inkadinkadoo. Both were stamped and heat embossed with black detail EP from JudiKins and were then layere on black CS and beige CS. The skeleton image was mounted directly to the card, and the cat image was mounted with foam dots.
I have new images from Elemental Doodles and will be in the ED Design mode this coming week. I spent last weekend in another city playing Cricut with my sister-in-law from MA. What fun! We also went shopping at Michael's and Big Lots. It's amazing what one can find in those two stores, and it's even better when they are located side by side.

This card was done for a sketch challenge, and although it doesn't show well, the colors were black, white and silver. Images were sent to me in a swap as was the beautiful black and silver ribbon.
I didn't realize that it had been so long since I posted anything on my blog, but since the last time, I have caught up with all my swaps and spent a week in the mountains of Colorado. What a wonderful, relaxing time I spent with my best friend. We read, watched movies, played on our computers, shopped, and toured the countryside. I slept so well and relaxed so much that I'm not sure I have any bones in my body!
I didn't even have a chance to miss my kitties too much because Karen brought her beautiful cats with her. I have pictures of her little furballs, so perhaps you will get to take a peek at them tomorrow.
Enjoy your day.

Cats always make good subjects for pet pages, and ours are no exception.

Background scrapbook paper was exactly what was needed to coordinate with the flourish stamp from the Just a Note stamp set from Elemental Doodles.

Next pet page will be of our Maine coon mix cat Tawny. I had laid out a stack of scrapbook paper on the bed after finding this paper shown here. When I went back in the bedroom, Tawny had pulled down the duvet and curled up under the stack of paper.

Now if only I could teach her how to cute and glue the pages for me!

Black and white with one bright ... that was the challenge. This is the card.

Cuttlebug and Nestabilities. Love them. They make life in the round so much easier.

So do background paper, rubber stamps, Copic markers and ribbon.

My favorite scrapbook store is having a 50% off sale through Sunday, and here I am on a negative scrapbook budget. It's way past time I use the goodies I own.

Once upon a time ... not so very long ago ... we had the nosiest kitty known to mankind. I always knew when she had been in my stamp stuff because she would have glitter in the corner of her eyes.
This layout was done using red Bazzill card stock, blue textured card stock, and an cream card stock that had small black flecks in it that look like pepper. I thought it was appropriate since Stamp Kitty's name was Pepper. I used the dragonfly and flourish from the new Mini Heavenly Tea stamp set by Elemental Doodles. I colored the wings of the dragonflies with the Ice Blue Twinkling H2O. Embellishments are simple ... Class A Peel stickers from Stampendous frame the page. I used my computer to print the words since I have very little patience for stamping, cutting and/or gluing letters to a page.
I hope everyone has had a great weekend. I spent it stamping most of the time except for to forage food at a wonderful Mexican restaurant this evening. My tummy is full, and my stamps are calling me.

This was such a fun card to make. I used my new Small Pinking Circles Nestabilities to create an orange, yellow and green circle and wrapped them with thread. I stacked them without using foam tape between layers. In the center is an orange circle and then a smaller, lighter orange circle that I stamped the teacup from the Elemental Doodles Friendship Tea set. The stars in the background are also from the same set.
I have forgotten to mention that ED has some new templates that are so cool ... and they're free for you to download. There are two ATC sized sets and one to use as a candy bar wrapper. When you print them out, they are in a pale gray so that you can use all those little solid stamps to form and oval or rectangle. Go to http://www.elementaldoodles.com/ and click on the FREE DOWNLOADS. You'll love these if you like the kind of designs that form a "frame" for the solid stamps. If any of you have ever used or seen the Stamps by Judith pages, you'll love these templates.
While you're on the web site, sign up for their newsletter. You may also want set up your gift registry ... just in case someone near and dear would like to give you a treat but doesn't know what you have or would like. And, of course, you can always mention to that near and dear someone that gift certificates are available.

Baby girl card? Why not try this. Cut a piece of dark orange CS to A2 size and set aside. Fold 4-1/4" x 11" peach CS legthwise. Draw or trace pattern of baby "onesie", making sure the shoulder seam is on the fold line; cut out. Cut 2 small pockets and glue to "onesie". Stamp flower from Elemental Doodles' Friendship Tea set across top of pockets and around edges of the "onesie" with Adirondack's Terra Cotta ink. Use fine orange pen to draw stitch lines around pockets. Attach white button brads to card.

Isn't this stamp beautiful? I bought it at a garage sale last year and never used it until yesterday. I am posting it so that I can write down how I did this because I used several different techniques on the card.
I used an aqua Mica Magic reinker to pour some ink over glossy card stock. I then placed a sheet of acrylic over it and "smooshed" it around. (Smooshed is a new stamping term I've learned that fits the occasion.) After removing the acrylic sheet, I dried it with my heat gun. I inked the stamp (Magnolia Floral by Stamps Happen) with black VersaFine ink and stamped it on glossy card stock. Heat embossed it using clear EP.
I then used the Copic blender to remove the color from the magnolia blossoms. I colored them with a light pink Copic marker and added a darker pink using a Prismacolor pencil. I blended the dark pink with Gamsol and a paper stump. The rest of the image was colored with Copic markers.
For the darker edges and corners, I used green and aqua Copic markers and blended them with the Copic blender. Over the top of this I used a spruce green Twinkling H2O to create a watercolor effect. As you can image, the H2O beaded up on the glossy CS so I dabbed it with a soft paper towel. All in all, I was pleased with the effect ... but more importantly, I was happy to be able to play with paints.
Good news today! The new Design Team for Elemental Doodles was announced, and I am once again on the team. What fun! My official enabler, Alex, was the one who sent me the information originally about the first design team challenge. This time I sent her the info ... she tried out and is one of the new Design Team members. Congratulations, Alex!

I love this card! But then, I love hot fudge banana splits.
The patterned paper was some I bought from a special on HSN a loooong time ago. I like it and have hoarded it for years. The strip with the saying (Art Impressions) was stamped with Marvy Matchables' Dark Brown on a piece of CS from Coredinations. The border punch is from EKSuccess.
The ice cream scoop (Penny Black) was stamped, colored, cut out and mounted with foam tape. The scoop and spoon were colored with a silver Spica pen; the whipped cream and banana were colored with a white pen. I used Copic markers for the other colors.
Let's all scream for ice cream!

It's hard to be sad about a rainy day when you see such a happy little chick as this one.
You can also tell that I have some new toys! One of them is the set of Small Pinking Circles Nestabilities, and the other one is a border punch from EK Success. I bought both of them at the Heirloom Rubber Stamp Convention at Grapevine from the Stamp On It booth. To me, their display of the Nestabilities was well done, and I liked the fact that I was able to use the border punch on sample card stock at the booth. I have been disappointed with the Fiskars and Martha Stewart border punches because they will not punch card stock. The EK Success punches will.
To make the card, I used an orange card stock for the base with a lighter orange dotted CS layered on top. Before I layered it, I punched a border on the right side. I liked the effect of the narrow strip so left it instead of trimming it as I had originally intended to do.
I used the Pinking Circles Nestabilities to punch an orange circle and a smaller yellow circle. The yellow circle was punched from a paint chip. I wound a darker orange thread around the orange circle, mounted it on the card and mounted the yellow stamped image on top. I stamped the Shower Chick image from Stampendous using Jet Black StazOn ink. I colored the umbrella, flower and beak with Copic markers and had a bit of trouble using them on the paint chip. I found that I had to use a marker that was several shades darker and had to use a dotting motion instead of a dragging motion in order to get the alcohol ink to adhere to the paint chip. I let the first layer dry and then colored it again before I could get the color as well defined as I wanted it to be.
The sentiment was stamped on regular CS and mounted on the darker orange. Since I have divided my clear stamps up so that the same sentiments go in one CD case, I don't know the name of the company that sells this stamp.
That's all, folks. See you tomorrow ... or whenever I get a round TUIT!

I found a new stamp company, or at least new to me, at the Heirloom convention in Grapevine this week. It's called Eccentric Images, and they are that indeed. I loved this little Queen Bee so much that I couldn't wait to use the stamp.
Card base is yellow cardstock, and the patterned paper is adhered to a green CS and placed on the card base. I stamped the bee on more of the yellow and mounted it on the solid green and then on the prepared card. The words were stamped with black ink, and the "Queens Rock" image was punched with a Stampin' Up oval punch. I punched a larger oval out of the solid green and sanded the edges lightly so the white core would show. It's mounted using foam tape. The bee is lightly colored with Twinkling H2Os and with darker Copic markers.
I can't wait to buy more stamps from Eccentric Images. They are available in both mounted and unmounted versions.

I joined a group recently that uses only Magenta stamps. I have been a fan of Magenta for years and was privileged to take some classes which were taught by Nathalie Metivier. What a lovely person!
The swap that I am doing requires that I make two cards a month and send them to two different swappers. This is the card I made for one of the swappers, and I played with colors on the card rather than a lot of "geegaws". (That's a down home term for embellishments.)
The card base was Cougar Opaque and was natural (which is a fancy term for off-white or ivory). I topped that with a light wine colored patterned paper from Hot Off the Press. On top of that I placed a light green CS to echo the green in the image. It's faint, but it's there on the flower buds. More patterned paper and then a rich wine card stock. The image was stamped on a pale, pale pink card stock scrap and embossed with JudiKins' Detail Black embossing powder. I colored the flowers with a Rose Pink Copic marker and then used the colorless blender on the end of the petals to remove some of the color. I went back over the flower close to the center with the Rose Pink to make it even darker than it originally was. Although the center of the flowers is mostly black, I colored the open areas with a Canary Yellow Copic marker. I cut the image out closely with scissors and glued it to the wine CS and embellished the flowers with a few drops of JudiKins' Diamond Glaze to resemble dew on the petals.
The Heirloom Rubber Stamp Conventioon was held in Grapevine this past weekend, and I went to the convention on Sunday. There were several vendors who were not there but also a few new vendors or at least ones I had never seen before. I think some of my favorite stamps were the ones I bought at the Eccentric Images booth. There were two vendors who had Nestabilities, but I thought that Marco's Paper did not have them displayed well. It was hard to see which of the Nestabilities they had because they were scattered throughout the booth. I saw the new acrylic Sizzix folders similar to the ones that are made for the Cuttlebug. These folders will work in the Cuttlebug, and there was a good selection to choose from. I'm not sure the name of the booth that I saw a lot of the Dreamweaver stencils in, but I think it was Polly's Pals. We watched a great demonstration using the embossing pastes, and I bought a couple of the stencils for Christmas cards.
The July convention is always smaller than the January convention, but I thought there was a good representation of vendors this year. I also liked the fact that we were seeing new vendors which means the show must go on!

Today's card looks a little wonky, but that's because I didn't get it in my scanner as straight as it should have been. I can't redo it because it was for a swap, and it's already been mailed.

The card base is white card stock, and the images were stamped with a black ink pad from Marvy Matchables. I punched the images using round circle punches from EK Success. I also punched out circles on a strip of white CS with a punch that was 1/8" larger than each of the stamped circles. I mounted the strip on black CS and then glued the stamped circles inside the larger circles on the black CS. This strip was mounted on aqua CS and then glued to a larger strip of black CS. The black strip was the height of the card base when glued to it.

Coffee, anyone? For someone who dislikes coffee as much as I do, it's a little strange that I love making cards using coffee images. Go figure!
This card was made using stamps from two different companies. The coffee cup image is from A Muse, and the word stamp is from the Coffee Cafe set by Elemental Doodles. I covered the front of the card with a patterned paper from Hot Off the Press, and stamped the images with Marvy Matchables' Dark Brown. The images are edged with a dark brown Copic marker.
Again, it's a simple but, I think, eyecatching way to use these stamps.

LOBSTAH CHOWDAH!The recipe on this page is long enough that it takes up most of the page, so I kept it pretty simple. The base is black card stock from Paper Pizzaz by Hot Off the Press, and I mounted a checkered patterned paper on top of it. The rest of the CS was red, white and black CS scraps. I used a stamp from the Elemental Doodles Coffee Cafe set to stamp the word "mmmm..." around the edge of the red card stock. The recipe was computer generated on white bond paper, and the embellishments are lobster brads from Eyelet Outlet, thanks to Jan, my sister-in-law who brought me metal lobsters instead of the real thing! (Jan, in case you're reading this I'm just kidding! Loved the brads.)
Once again, I want to remind everyone reading this that Elemental Doodles has a new design team call. The web site is http://www.elementaldoodles.com/.

IN LOVING MEMORY

Bonnie Allen Stewart

Arlington, Texas

LIAM & MAEVE

Aren't these wonderful pictures of a little boy and his baby sister? Maeve doesn't seem quite as thrilled with Liam, though, as he is with her!
This is a simple layout done with yellow and black card stock from Paper Pizazz by Hot Off the Press in an 8x8" format. The name and date ovals were punched using the graduated oval punches from Stampin' Up! I used Marvy Matchables black ink to stamp the sun and stars from the Heavenly Tea set by Elemental Doodles ... because aren't these two beautiful children the stars of the show?!

AT THE POUND

This layout brings back some good memories of the lobster pound in Maine which is located just before crossing the bridge to Bar Harbor. My husband's father used to take him to eat at this pound when he was a child. I think he enjoyed it even more as an adult.
To assemble this layout, mount a square of red card stock on an 8x8" black page. Stamp the corners of the red with black Marvy Matchables ink using the leaf stamp from the Elemental Doodles' Create a Basket stamp set. Mount the pictures on light gray, medium gray and black card stock; place on page. Cute a black card stock rectangle, punch the corners with a ticket punch from Stampin' Up!, and run through the Cuttlebug using the Swiss Dots folder. Mount on a larger rectangle of medium gray card stock; punch the corners and glue to the layout page. Mount a lobster embellishment from Jolee's with foam tape on the black rectangle. Use rub-ons from One Heart ... One Mind to embellish the page; stamp flourish under the word "entree" using a stamp from the Elemental Doodles' Create a basket stamp set.
Today was a fun day. We went to visit friends who own a ranch in East Texas. Part of our visit included lunch at a wonderful Italian restaurant and ... my fave ... a visit to the scrapbook store. Tomorrow promises to be good also since my Coast Guard son called today to let us know he is here from Alaska for a visit and will be over tomorrow to see us. This calls for a celebration ... a fireworks display is in order.

LET THEM EAT CAKE!

I have finally started using more of my stash of scrapbook papers. This layout is done on an 8x8 page using the following:
Dark brown base - Coredinations 8x8"
Medium brown CS 7-3/4x7-3/4"
Buttercup Yellow CS 4-7/8x3-7/8; 3x7"
Chocolate Chip CS - Stampin' Up! 5x5; 5x4"
Brown patterned paper 4-7/8x4-7/8"
Flowers - Prima
Flower centers - Dew Drops by The Robins Nest

Stamp - Coffee Cafe by Elemental Doodles
Brown ink - Marvy Matchables
Instructions: Print recipe from Word document on Buttercup Yellow CS; trim to 4-7/8x3-7/8"; mount on 5x4" Chocolate Chip CS and set aside. Stamp image on three sides of 7x3" Buttercup Yellow CS; mount on page. Glue patterned paper to 5" Chocolate Chip square; offset and mount over stamped paper. Glue prepared recipe to patterned paper, offsetting slightly. Embellish with flowers and Dew Drops.
I made this page for Elemental Doodles, but I like it. Do I have to send it in? Yeah ... guess I do. A deal's a deal.

It's a Good News Day!
I sent the card I posted on my blog on June 24th to a stamping friend in Florida. She showed it to her boss, who liked it so much that she is having the card framed as art for her vacation home in the Florida Keys.
The card I'm showing today was so much fun to make. The dress was a two-part pattern I received in another swap, so I used my copier to copy it on the back of my paper. The light green paper was plain so I decorated it using a flower stamp from the Elemental Doodles' Create-a-Basket stamp set. The ink was Adirondack's Lettuce.
I punched the corners of the dark green card stock and mounted it over a piece of the light green CS. I then trimmed them to be the same size and mounted it on a white card base. I then folded the pleats in the skirt and mounted it and the top of the dress on the card. A small strip of dark green CS made the belt, and flat-backed pearls were used as buttons. A gold slipper and gold purse are the embellishments.

IT'S INDEPENDENCE DAY!


Well, not quite yet, but it's coming fast and furious. To celebrate this wonderful day, I have made a quick and easy card.
The base is dark red card stock. I drew a template on the back of the patterned paper and cut out the three wavy rectangles with an Exacto knife. I then glued the patterned paper to white CS which had been cut to the same size. The stamps are from Elemental Doodles Firecracker USA set, and I stamped them with Adirondak's Red Pepper dye ink. The photo corners were punched from white CS using the photo corner punch from Stampin' Up! I then punched small stars from patterned blue denim paper and glued them on the photo corners.