GRS Weekly Recipe!

 

It is my turn this week to host the GRS Weekly Recipe.  I wanted to use my new Enchanted papers, a Chevron Stripes background stamp that had yet to see ink, some new-to-me Jolee rhinestone bats, and this fun Hallow's Eve stick chick.  I just love their long, skinny extremities, and using diagonal lines in a layout is a fun way to accentuate them.

I colored the image with Copics, then sponged in a stormy Halloween sky with soft yellow and yellow-orange inks using a scalloped circle as a mask.  There's just a tinge of gray-black along the edges to give it a tiny bit of spookiness.

The inside layout is a repeat of the sketch, using the party invite sentiment from Invite to Fright.










Notes:
Hallow's Eve stick chick
Chevron Stripes "coverall" background stamp
Invite to Fright sentiment
Memento Tuxedo Black, Cantaloupe and Dandelion inks
Copic blending paper
Copic markers
Enchanted designer paper
orange glimmer ribbon
Jolee bats
tulle

Flower Soft Santa Toppers

Welcome to my blog, With a Stamp and a Song!  If you're hopping with the Flower Soft design team, you should've arrived here from Linda's blog!  We are sharing some beautiful projects using our new series of Santa toppers.  These are gorgeous full color printed images that quickly create the focal point of a card, ready to be embellished with Flower Soft or Glitter Frosting for a fast and easy finish.  They're great for "mass production" of cards for your Christmas list, but they would also make lovely coordinated gift sets or even impressive home decor projects for the holidays.

I used Forest Santa to make a simple, standard-sized card.  Santa's beard and the fur trim of his suit are embellished with ultrafine white Flower Soft.  There's even a twinkling sprinkling of Glitter Frosting snow illuminated by Santa's lamp.  I just love the beautiful blue of this glowing scene!  (It's so hard to do justice to a photo with Glitter Frosting!)

For the inside, I used (stamped off) Memento ink to stamp a Silhouette Stamps Christmas Sentiment under a light dusting of snowflakes.  Glitter Frosting brings a little sparkle without overwhelming these delicate images.  I used distress ink on the edges to bring the warm woodland hues of the topper to the inside of my card.

Notes:
Forest Santa (check out Magical Santa and Workshop Santa too!)
Ultrafine White
Glitter Frosting
Flower Soft Glue
Silhouette Stamps Christmas Sentiment
Memento Danube Blue ink
Tim Holtz tea dye distress ink
Sheer "twinkle" ribbon
jute thread
button

From here, you will be visiting Cibele!  Just in case you're lost, here's the entire list, so you can make the rounds, including our FaceBook page and the Flower Soft blog!  So very happy to welcome new team member Vicki!  :)

• Jeanne Streiff 
• Krista Riley
• Stephanie Lee
• Dawn Lusk
• Linda Beeson
• Deb Felts (you are here)
• Cibele Glazer
• Jen Buck 
• Vicki Henderson Harper
• the Flower Soft blog
• Flower Soft on FaceBook

Boo!

I *love Love LOVE* stamping for Halloween!  Today's card is for this week's CPS sketch, sponsored by the {Stamps} of Life.  This sketch, with all its layers, was right up my alley and lent itself perfectly to the use of spooky2scare.  It is fun and just spooky enough!  ;)

Notes:
TSOL spooky2scare
TSOL chevron dies
Stephanie Barnard Colorbox ink
We R Memory Keepers designer paper
Bella Blvd washi tape
Crate Paper trim
Blumenthal Lansing button
Doodlebug twine

GRS DT challenge

It's GRS design team challenge day!  Our challenge is to use shapes...we could make a shaped card, or use shapes ON our project.

This challenge was a real stumper!  I thought about it for ages before an idea finally came to mind, and then I had trouble translating it from idea to reality.  I wanted to go for a simpler, more clean and graphic style than usual, and was hoping to achieve an illusion of a road extending from the foreground to the horizon, but after fussing with the hexagons for a while, I ended up with plan B!  Modern mo-ped meets uneven old-towne brick road!  Even though I'm missing my mojo (which unfortunately often happens for a while after I return from vacation), I still had a good time trying!

Visit the GRS blog to see what my teammates created for today's challenge!  And visit ihp to see the GRS sets that are available there!  LOTS of new product has been arriving from CHA, so you're likely to find lots of new pretties!

Notes:
Girls Wanna Have Fun custom set for ihp
Memento ink
Copic markers
black Spica marker
Lifestyle Crafts hexagon dies
Ranger distress ink
foam adhesive
ric rac
button
twine

CPS sketches

School started this week in Florida, so Summer is coming to a screeching halt and Fall is fast approaching.  It seems rather abrupt to me since our Summer was so busy.  I'm not quite ready for it to be over!  There are things yet to do that will be difficult to squeeze in once the routine of school cranks up in earnest.  Once Labor Day is over, we'll have to sincerely buckle down and get back to the grind.

As reluctant as I am for Summer to end, I'm looking forward to working with the wonderful colors of Fall.  This season is one of my favorites for stamping, with the fun brights of Halloween and the warm hues of Fall leaves and Thanksgiving turkeys!  I'm sharing two such cards today, both for Card Positioning Systems from this month's sponsor, The {Stamps} of Life.

My first card is this week's sketch, a combination of patterned papers from Kaiser Craft in a fun arrangement of layers with a cute little turkey as the focal point.  

Notes:
The {Stamps} of Life turkey2stamp stamp set, chevron dies
Kaiser Craft designer paper
Memento Rich Cocoa ink

Ranger tea dye distress ink
Copic markers
May Arts pom pom trim
foam adhesive

buttons

This is last week's sketch, which in the flurry of visiting with family in upper Michigan and then a Tuesday travel day, I completely forgot to upload.

Notes:
The {Stamps} of Life sea2flower and dots2love stamp sets
Stephanie's Colorbox inks
Basic Grey designer paper
Ranger tea dye distress ink
Robin's Nest dew drops
May Arts sage faux suede ribbon
blingy brad

Visit the CPS blog to see more great designs using this week's sketch!

ihp DT challenge!

It's time for this month's i {heart} papers design team challenge.  I was browsing Pinterest and found a beautiful inspiration photograph from a blog called A Creative Mint.  The colors are so clear and clean, almost transparent!  Those corals and oranges seemed to be everywhere at CHA...

My first impulse was to pull out the jar of flowers from GRS' Bloom and Grow, but then I had brand new Invite to Fright stamps that hadn't even gotten inky yet, and they just happen to look best in orange, so I pulled out my new Memento inks and the Authentique Enchanted designer paper.  Its color palette includes some of the ivory, creamy yellow, yellow-orange, orange, and orange-red hues that are prominent in the photo.  I used the rock-n-roll technique with Gray Flannel and Tuxedo Black for the swirly frame, and with Cantaloupe and Tangelo for the sentiment and pumpkin.  I was tempted to tie on a pretty turquoise bow...but then the card recipient isn't likely to see this photo inspiration, so I decided against it!

My original plan was to decorate a lovely transparent lemon-flavored sucker with candied corn inside that closely matched the colors in the vase of flowers...but the orange-flavored one with a spooky spider really looked prettier with this spider web patterned paper, and certainly has a much creepier aura!  I used my Scor-buddy to score 2 inch strips of paper each 1/4 inch to make the accordian-fold "web" embellishment.  Fun stuff!

Notes:
GRS Invite to Fright stamp set
Authentique Enchanted designer paper
Tuxedo Black, Tangelo and Cantaloupe from the Gumdrop ink assortment
Gray Flannel from the Snowcones ink assortment
Creative Impressions crinkle ribbon
dimensional adhesive
Scor tape
Scor buddy

Here's the list of today's participants!  Be sure to leave Loretta some extra love...this is her last hop with us as a design team member.  I just don't think it will ever be quite the same without her.  :(  Of course, I will be forever and always hoping that she will join us often as an alumnus in the future, and our paths will stay entwined!  {{LOVE you, Loretta!}}  She is going on to some amazing, wonderful things and I am very excited for her!  xoxoxo

• Carolyn
• Deb
• Gretchen
• Loretta
• Lori
• Tracy
• Kate

A few tips on bow-tying!

Here on my blog and also in the card-making classes that I teach, I get lots of comments on my bows.  :)  I love ribbon!  Most of my cards have bows of some sort...sometimes a small, stylish bow, but more often than not, a big, poufy one!

Last week over on Paper Craft Planet, Lyn shared her method for the perfect bow.  For this week's tutorial, I'm sharing a few of my own tips and tricks for tying bows.  Hopefully you'll learn something new that will help you tie a gorgeous bow on your own projects.

I'm happy to say that you'll be seeing lots of bows here on my blog...May Arts shared a lovely package of ribbon with each of us on the Our Craft Lounge design team, so I have lots of beautiful ribbon to play with!

Girls just wanna have fun!

Hi friends!  Happy weekend!  Hope you're having a good one!  

I took a few days off from blogging to recover from our travels and to spend time with my husband for his remaining days off from work.  Monday will be back to work for him, although I'll be starting back today because I've got several deadlines looming!

If you're a local, I hope you'll check out the Copic class I'm teaching Monday evening at Scrappies in Palatka.  We'll be coloring these fun Mo Manning girls on kraft card stock.  This is a long, tall card with just a little bit of frilliness and bling to make it just girlie enough!  I would love if you'd join me!

Day 3 GKD Inspiration Hop

The Design Team for Gina K. Designs welcomes you to another fabulous Inspiration Blog Hop!!! Gina and the Design Team will inspire you with many beautiful ideas! And as you hop through their blogs, make sure to leave a comment on each of them because we will choose a few random comments and those stampers will each win a grab bag of deeply etched, pre-cut Gina K. Designs stamps! To see the full list of winners check the Big News forum at Stamp TV a couple of days after the hops!!

Today our team is sharing projects using the Sun-Kissed Autumn kit and the "one FREE with three" set, Fall Foliage.

Here's a very clean and simple design using one of the leaf images from the kit along with the coordinating print of designer paper.  A card like this only takes a few minutes to make so it's easy to make multiples...this sentiment is one that will work for nearly any occasion at this time of year, so it is a nice style to have made ahead and saved in the stash for when you need it!

This one is also relatively easy to make using Memento inks of various colors and the rock-n-roll technique.  It's still a clean and simple design but has a more elegant appearance with the layers and sponging.

I had to fussy-cut the leaves for both of these designs because I've been away from home all week visiting my in-laws in upper Michigan...had I been home, I would have used the cut files and my Silhouette Cameo to cut them!  There's already a nice collection in the GKD store for quite a few of our sets!

Notes:

Gina K Pure Luxury card stock

Sun-Kissed Autumn clear or rubber

Fall Foliage clear or rubber

Memento Rich Cocoa, Cantaloupe, Potter's Clay ink

Tim Holtz tea dye, frayed burlap distress inks

Copic markers

GKD Sun-Kissed Autumn designer paper

Spellbinders Labels 18 dies

ribbons and dies from the stash!

Check out all the amazing designs and inspiration:

• Gina K
• AJ Otto
• Beth Silaika
• Carolyn King
• Cathy Tidwell
• Deb Felts
• Giovana Smith
• Jimmi Mayo
• Lee Murphy
• Lori McAree
• Melanie Muenchinger
• Sharon Harnist
• Suzanne Dean
• Tami Mayberry
• Theresa Momber
• Tina Gilliland
• Vicki Dutcher

GRS New Release!

It's time for two new appetizers from Gourmet Rubber Stamps!  I left for a week in upper Michigan before my sets arrived, so they're probably next door in the pile of mail that our sweet neighbors collected for us and I don't have any samples to share yet, but I do have links!

Here's "Old School"

and this is "Invite to Fright!"

Both sets are available from i {heart} papers.  Visit the Gourmet Rubber Stamps blog to see what ideas our GRS design team has for using them!  I'll be getting them inky soon!

Day 2 GKD Inspiration Hop

The Design Team for Gina K. Designs welcomes you to another fabulous Inspiration Blog Hop!!! Gina and the Design Team will inspire you with many beautiful ideas! And as you hop through our blogs, make sure to leave a comment on each of them because we will choose a few random comments and those stampers will each win a grab bag of deeply etched, pre-cut Gina K. Designs stamps! To see the full list of winners check the Big News forum at Stamp TV a couple of days after the hops!!

My first card for today features Tami's set, Lighthearted Wishes. That lightbulb with its heart-shaped filament is such a cute idea! The flower printed designer paper from Sun-kissed Autumn has a 60's feel, which for me brings back light-hearted, fun childhood memories.  It is a great match for the plaid print from the Sunshiny Day pack, too.  

Here's one made with Becky's set, American Made...makes me think of Levi's jeans, country living and canned goods with old-fashioned labels!

Beth's Stippled Nature is another fun set to work with!  I recently saw a tutorial on doodling, so I thought I'd try a little!

Notes:
GKD Pure Luxury card stock
American Made clear or rubber
Lighthearted Wishes clear or rubber
Stippled Nature clear or rubber
Memento Tuxedo Black, Grape Jelly, Canteloupe, Lady Bug inks
Copic markers, multiliner
Tim Holtz Frayed Burlap and Tea Dye distress ink 

Sun-kissed Autumn designer paper

Sunshiny Day designer paper

grosgrain ribbon

brads

flower
scrap of Simple Stories designer paper

Check out all the amazing designs and inspiration:

• Gina K
• Beth Silaika – Illustrator Stippled Nature
• Becky Oehlers – Illustrator American Made
• Tami Mayberry – Illustrator Light Hearted Wishes
• AJ Otto
• Carolyn King
• Cathy Tidwell
• Deb Felts
• Giovana Smith
• Jimmi Mayo
• Lee Murphy
• Lori McAree
• Melanie Muenchinger
• Theresa Momber
• Tina Gilliland
• Vicki Dutcher

Gina K Inspiration Hop Day 1

The Design Team for Gina K. Designs welcomes you to another fabulous Inspiration Blog Hop!!! Gina and the Design Team will inspire you with many beautiful ideas! And as you hop through their blogs, make sure to leave a comment on each of them because we will choose a few random comments and those stampers will each win a grab bag of deeply etched, pre-cut Gina K. Designs stamps! To see the full list of winners check the Big News forum at Stamp TV a couple of days after the hops!!

Today we're sharing cards made with Melanie's Basket Additions 3, and Theresa's Country Roads.  Such FUN sets to work with!

Here's a basket stuffed with spooks for Halloween!  These colors are some of my favorites to work with all year!  I added a creepy spider web to one corner, and lots of distressing.  I'd love to have a real live decoration like this in a corner of my house for Halloween!

This old truck from Theresa's Country Roads makes a great masculine card!  I chose to color the trees in varying shades of green with a red truck, but just as easily could've put the colors in reverse for Fall trees with a green truck instead!  I wanted to try something new for an embellishment...what do you think?  It is definitely different and was kinda fun to come up with!

Here's one more with Theresa's set and some new GKD paper.  This one needs a bit of green somewhere in the card to balance that green mat.  I think I'm gonna go back and color in a few of the stems and leaves to bring it into the designer paper.

Notes:
Gina K Pure Luxury card stock
Basket Additions 3 clear or rubber
Country Roads clear or rubber
Memento Tuxedo Black ink
Tim Holtz tea dye, frayed burlap distress inks
Copic markers
GKD Sun-Kissed Autumn designer paper
tulle
May Arts jute thread
Spellbinders circles, ovals, labels 3 dies

Check out all the amazing designs and inspiration:

• Gina K
• Melanie Muenchinger - Illustrator Basket Additions 3
• Theresa Momber - Illustrator Country Roads
• AJ Otto
• Beth Silaika
• Cathy Tidwell
• Deb Felts
• Giovana Smith
• Jimmi Mayo
• Lee Murphy
• Lori McAree
• Sharon Harnist
• Tami Mayberry
• Tina Gilliland
• Vicki Dutcher

Day 5 of OCL and May Arts!

What a great week it has been with Our Craft Lounge stamps and May Arts ribbon!  I hope you've enjoyed it as much as we have!

My card for today features an encouragement from Kendra's Everyday Sentiments, stamped directly onto Simple Stories designer paper. The seam between prints is covered by some beautiful scallop-edged trim.  A multi-looped bow of sheer iridescent wired ribbon forms the foundation for the Petaloo magnolia corsage-style embellishment.

Be sure to visit the OCL blog and FaceBook fan page for all the details on prizes for this week's hops!

Here are today's designers:

• Amber Hillman
• Debbie Fisher
• Kendra Wietstock
• Lori Barnett
• Michelle Pearson
• Tammie Edgerton

Peace!

It's time for another Flower Soft design team hop, this time to reveal "The Magic of Christmas!"  These are beautiful card creator kits, silhouette stamps and/or stickers.  You should have arrived here from Linda's blog.

For my card, I cut a Spellbinder's circular window in some sparkly card stock, then adhered the card creator image under the opening on a mat that was adhered to the card front.  The curve of the lovely Peace sentiment sticker echoes the curve of the opening...a stamped, fussy-cut evergreen silhouette that is glittering with snow (glitter frosting and ultrafine white) adds dimension and silver peel-off stickers line the edges.

From here, you're headed to Cibele's...be sure to also visit our Facebook fan page, and the Flower Soft blog.

Days Gone By!

I absolutely love cream and black together, especially when paired with vintage images!  This old sewing machine from OCL's Days Gone By is one of my favorites!  My mom actually has an old treadle machine much like this one!  She taught me to sew on a much newer Singer, and it is a skill I'm very grateful to have been given.  I used to sew most of my own clothes, but now I mainly sew on my cards!  :)

This Teresa Collins paper reminds me of beautiful fabrics:  dainty calico, delicate dotted Swiss, and masculine pinstripes.  I punched an eyelet through the sentiment banner and then used a few dressmaker pins to attach it to a May Arts gingham bow...LOVE how all these elements work so seamlessly together!

Visit the OCL blog to find out about prizes and see much more inspiration using OCL and May Arts.

• Amber Hillman
• Broni Holcombe
• Debbie Corbari
• Debbie Fisher
• Kendra Wietstock
• Lori Barnett
• Melissa Cash
• Michelle Pearson
• Stephanie Serrano
• Tammie Edgerton

Only a Number!

Here's a funny punny card made with Debbie Corbari's new OCL set, Miles to Go!  My husband happens to turn 55 in about a month, so this will be his birthday card.

This layout is *sort of* this week's Paper Craft Planet sketch.  I didn't adhere the front of my card because I wanted to use that octagonal "stop sign" shape and the arrow to indicate that it should be pulled open.  The inside (oops, I forgot to take a picture of it opened, so I'll have to add it later!) says "and yours happens to exceed the speed limit!"  :)  Hahaha, he and I remember well when 55 was the speed limit!

That beautiful May Arts velvet ribbon matches this designer paper so perfectly!

• Amber Hillman
• Broni Holcombe
• Kendra Wietstock
• Lori Barnett
• Melissa Cash
• Tammie Edgerton

May Arts/OCL Special Delivery!

I asked my husband what he thought of this card and he said something about a lighthouse?  Ummm...don't you see parcels, boxes, airmail letters?  LOL!  Makes me think of all those love letters I wrote and mailed to him while he was deployed back in the days before email...when it took about a month for them to get to the ship!

Here I'm using May Arts twisted burlap, which comes in several thicknesses and styles!  It's paired with a sentiment from my friend Kendra's new OCL set, Everyday Sentiments.

If you haven't already, check out the OCL blog and the info on prizes!  Here's more inspiration!

• Debbie Corbari
• Debbie Fisher
• Kendra Wietstock
• Lori Barnett
• Melissa Cash
• Stephanie Serrano
• Tammie Edgerton

May Arts Week for OCL!

It's the beginning of a special week featuring May Arts ribbons and Our Craft Lounge stamps (can you say prizes?).  I adore both, and thought it was appropriate to start the week with this particular card since orange and pink say OCL to me!  That gorgeous pink ribbon takes center stage on this colorful card front (the layout is SC395).  Here's what the inside looks like:

Notes:
MME Happier designer paper
Molla Cutie
Memento ink
Copic markers
frayed floral ribbon
white solid two-tone ribbon
Tim Holtz heart charm
pink burlap string
pink button

I mentioned prizes!  There are  plenty to be had in this week's celebration!  Winners will be selected from those who comment on our blogs, the OCL blog and the OCL FaceBook page from Monday through Friday at midnight Pacific time/3 a.m. Eastern time).  Kendra will announce winners on the OCL blog on Monday, August 13th.  And THAT's just the winners from OCL!  May Arts will have prizes too!  :)

Here's some great inspiration for you!

• Debbie Corbari
• Debbie Fisher
• Kendra Wietstock
• Lori Barnett
• Stephanie Serrano

Before you go, another little reminder...I'm uploading this card with keywords for two of the SCS Dare to Get Dirty challenges.  The deadline is tonight, so there's still time to play along with a challenge or two!

DTGD + OCL

I am so honored and privileged to be invited to make a sample for my friend, Bev Rousch, for her Dare to Get Dirty challenge!  My project is a combination of some old favorite OCL stamps and some brand new Authentique designer paper on a black "manilla" envelope for Halloween...it was a whole lot of fun, and it's a two-fer, also for this week's OCL challenge to use banners on your project. Perfect timing!  :)  

Access to the DTGD challenges is one of the privileges of being a SCS fan club member!  I hope you will join and play along!  Instant uploads and access to the monthly Dirty Dozen gallery are other perks, so membership is definitely worth it!

Before you go, be sure to check out the Our Craft Lounge challenges! A new challenge is posted on the OCL blog each Friday.  Our design team creates some fabulous projects to inspire you.

While I used old favorites on my card today because I couldn't wait to use my new Halloween paper, we *just* released three new stamp sets, so look for those if you missed the blog hop earlier this week!

Notes:

black "manilla" mailing envelope

Authentique Enchanting designer paper and companion alphabet stickers

Our Craft Lounge stamps:  Mummy X-ing, Granny's Potion (spider), On the Fence (bat)

Memento Tuxedo Black ink

Copic markers

Queen & Co Trendy Tape

Maya Road vintage kraft flag pins

Studio Calico wood veneer hearts

Flower Soft ultrafine moss green

black twine

Flower Soft's Wishing on a Star Blog Hop

I posted the teeniest of peeks of this card on Monday and today our Flower Soft design team is back with a blog hop of full card reveals!  Isn't this such a serene Christmas scene?!  It is made with Flower Soft's Wishing on a Star series of card creator kits, silhouette stamps and gorgeous glitter frosting...I love the soft monochromatic winter blues with just a pop of black!  So elegant!

Wishing on a Star has soft, lovely colors, beautiful images in either stamps or stickers, and wonderful sentiments in beautiful, delicately embellished swirling fonts.  You will love it!  Be sure to visit our FaceBook page this afternoon because Jen has some surprises to share!  All the fun will begin at 2 p.m. EST. 

Notes:

Santa Silhouette stamp set

Winter Wonderland Silhouette stamp set

Glitter Frosting Hint of Violet

Here is the list of participants for today's blog hop:

• Jeanne Streiff
• Krista Riley
• Stephanie Lee
• Dawn Lusk
• Linda Beeson
• Deb Felts (you are here)
• Cibele Glazer
• Jen Buck
• the Flower Soft blog
• Flower Soft's FaceBook fan page

Wishing You Were Here...

The first of the month means release day for Gourmet Rubber Stamps!  Of course, this lovely little sand castle from the new Diners' set, Pack Your Bags, is what caught my eye first, so I used the paper tole technique to build several layers of dimension, adding it to a background of embossed waves and a torn paper shore line.  There's even some glistening sparkly "sea foam" aka Smooch Spritz...it is really sparkly in person!

You'll also find the stamps I used in a custom set, Friends by the Sea, available at i {heart} papers.  Kate has grouped Diners' club images into smaller themed sets which makes them affordable and convenient!

Visit the GRS blog and my design team mates to see what they are doing with the images from Pack Your Bags!

Notes:
Friends by the Sea
embossing buddy
Versamark ink
white detail embossing powder
Memento ink
Smooch Spritz
Spellbinders ribbon tag die
ribbon
Kaiser Craft latte pearls

More New OCL!

I'm back with another OCL card which is also a Dare to Get Dirty challenge from Angela.  This is one of those rare "stamped only, no-coloring" cards!  Look Ma, no Copics!  ;)

The colors and design of this Olde World map designer paper provide a great backdrop for this romantic sentiment from Miles to Go!  I added Tim Holtz metal trinkets and some stamped accents from Vintage Traveler.  I actually had planned to use a Copic-colored line art image in place of the key hole accent, but changed my mind at the last minute!  This has more contrast and adds some vintage character!

Remember to visit the OCL blog for all the details about prizes!  Visit SCS to find out more about the DTGD challenges!

Notes:
OCL's Miles to Go sentiment, accents from Vintage Traveler
Memento ink
Ranger distress inks
Tim Holtz Idea-ology metal trinkets
two-toned satin ribbon
jute thread 
Kaiser Craft latte pearl
button