Made of Snow

Hello friends!  It's been a crazy day in our household!  The phone was ringing off the wall, and it seemed like there was just one interruption after another all day long!  I kept trying to stamp, but I just wasn't making much forward progress!  I think it's gonna be that way for the rest of the weekend...on Monday morning some guys are coming to rip up the carpet and install some beautiful porcelain tile in our great room, so sometime before then we have got to get everything ready for them.  I've got community chorale practice from noon until 2:30 tomorrow, church Sunday morning, and the Advent Lessons and Carols service Sunday evening, so it is definitely gonna be a busy weekend!  And that doesn't even include any stamping deadlines!

The card that I was trying to work on ended up being more technique-based, so I decided to save it for a later date and start anew.  I decided to make this clean and simple card following a layout from another card in my gallery. It is a tall, skinny card with an overhanging horizontal strip that brings the card width to the standard 4 1/4 inches...which is nice because it still fits in a standard sized envelope. It's this week's sketch challenge over at Paper Craft Planet.

This Made of Snow man sports a paper-pieced scarf, and a hat colored and shaded with Copic markers...a layer of cool grays creates some dimension under a mint green top coat, which gives his hat a magical glow.  If I hadn't been so in a hurry to get this photo'd and uploaded, I would have given him a little Stickles sparkle, but I was too impatient to wait for it to dry!  I will definitely add it later!

Notes:
Gourmet Rubber Stamps' Made of Snow
Carta Bella Winter Fun designer paper
Copic blending paper
Memento Tuxedo Black ink
Copic markers
gold gelpen
Clearsnap white pigment ink
detail white embossing powder
Latte pearls
jute thread

Friends of SNSS Blog Hop!

Welcome to Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps 5th Birthday Blog Hop! I am so honored to have been invited to participate with lots of amazingly talented Friends of SNSS!

Here's what you need to know about today's hop:

• There will be 4 random participants from whom one commenter will be chosen to receive a $15 store credit. 
• To be included in the drawings, comments must be left by midnight EST Friday, November 30th.
• Winners will be announced on the SNSS Blog on December 1st at 8 a.m. EST

Celebrating this birthday with Korin is particularly special to me, since one of the very first teams I had the privilege of being part of was the then barely one year old SNSS.  I have such special memories of those early months of stamping, and such wonderful friendships were formed as Korin and the rest of the team showed me the ropes.  This amazing hobby and the world of blogging gave us common ground in the beginning, but our relationships grew to be so much more than paper-crafting!  We shared our creative struggles and real life challenges too, praying for each other and offering encouragement as well as companionship.  Even though our journeys are no longer so tightly intertwined, I know where to run to find a serious prayer warrior when I need one!

I have a sweet friend Bethany in my Bible study...maybe she's one of the reasons I so adore Bethany Bunny!  I chose the Baking Bethany digital stamp for today's card...it's colored with Copics, blinged up with Stickles, a gingham ribbon with a button and bow, and a few pearls.  The layout is this week's Sweet Stop Sketch! I love having a sketch or other challenge as a starting point...Korin's Sweet Stop and SNSS Digi Challenge blogs provide a great resource for stampers!

CardMaker-Flower Soft Blog Hop!

I'm so VERY excited to welcome you to the CardMaker-Flower Soft blog hop!  The CardMaker blog team is joining forces with our Flower Soft team to bring you some animal-themed inspiration!

You should have arrived here from Glenda's.  If you're jumping into the middle, head to the CardMaker blog to start at the top!

I love kraft and black together and black ultrafine Flower Soft is one of my favorites, so my card for today's hop is a simple design with a cute canine from Gourmet Rubber Stamps' Playful Pals.  It's a no-frills, guy kind o' card that's quick and easy to put together.  The tiny polka dot is actually from a Christmas designer paper pad, but it's a great contrast for the black and white dog bone cookie cutter stenciled background that I sponged with white pigment ink and dotted with Copic opaque white.

From here, you're headed to my friend, Jennie's!  I can't wait to get home from my Wednesday morning Bible study to jump on the hop myself!  :)

Notes:
Copic blending paper
Gourmet Rubber Stamps' Playful Pals stamp set
Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black ink
Copic markers
Flower Soft ultrafine black
Flower Soft glue
GRS dog bones "cookie cutter" mylar stencil
Clearsnap Frost White pigment ink
Copic opaque white
stylus
Spellbinders large and small classic ovals dies
Spellbinders scalloped circle die (for masking the sky)
Ranger Glossy Accents
Ranger tea dye, frayed burlap and weathered wood distress inks
foam blending tool
Gina K Pure Luxury card stock
Carta Bella Winter Fun designer paper
button
jute thread
dimensional adhesive

Emery Board Sleeves

Today I'm revisiting a project from a few years ago for the Monday Tutorial on Paper Craft Planet.  These are perfect little "thought gifts" that would also make great stocking stuffers for Christmas.  In fact, they make nice girlfriend birthday presents any day of the year!

My project uses a new product from Flower Soft/Katy Sue Designs, cake baking embellishment molds.  I used mine with some Martha Stewart white crafter's clay, which I colored with my Copic markers.

These little sleeves are really fast and easy to put together, so you can make a batch of them!  You can either view a video or see step-by-step photos here!

GRS Design Team Challenge

It's challenge day for the Gourmet Rubber Stamps team!  Here in the Felts household, we're doing our very best to switch gears from Thanksgiving into Christmas, so I'm hoping this cute little gnome will help me catch the Christmas spirit!  

Our challenge is a color challenge.  Our design seeds palette is absolutely beautiful! I love the coral and deeper red together against the ivories, browns and greens of the background, so that's the look I tried to bring to my card.  I used Memento inks, Ranger distress inks and Copic markers along with Simple Stories Handmade Holiday designer paper, some red pleated satin ribbon, brown pom-pom trim, a jute-tied banner (with very old rub-on letters!) and a heat-embossed snowflake.  And just in case there's any doubt this year whether you made Santa's naughty list or nice...here's the sentiment for the inside!

You will find more inspiration for the Gourmet Rubber Stamps' design team color challenge by visiting the GRS blog!  Be sure to look for Black Friday specials as you shop at GRS stamps and i {heart} papers!

This Thanksgiving was one of the best we've had!  I cooked for days, beginning on Monday with copper penny salad, and ending in a flurry on Thursday with fresh bread hot out of the oven for dinner.  I tried to take pictures all along the way...I'm sharing my favorite, straight out of the camera except for resizing.  The rest of the pictures are in an album on FaceBook if you'd like to see them.

ihp + Technique Tuesday

Welcome to i heart papers' November design team challenge! This month, we're teaming up with some of the girls from the Technique Tuesday team for a combined hop featuring Technique Tuesday's stamps and i {heart} papers' products.  You can browse the Technique Tuesday category of the ihp store here.

Technique Tuesday is committed to offering the most beautiful, high-quality, affordable clear stamps and paper crafting products and to sharing the art of stamping and our enthusiasm for paper crafting. Whether you prefer a simple style or an embellished look, are a beginner or have been crafting for years, our made-in-the-USA products will help you create beautiful scrapbook pages, personalized handmade cards, unique gifts, and one-of-a-kind home décor items.

i {heart} papers retails the industry's best paper crafting supplies from your favorite manufacturers while offering stellar customer service and super fast and FREE US shipping with any $60 order. (We also ship internationally.) We offer a 6 month Studio AE membership where members receive automatic delivery each month of their AE set, (free in the US, a $4 savings each month) plus a 15% coupon valid for all other IHP store orders during the subscription and occasional gifts or exclusive special offers. We also provide a publication incentive for our three private stamp lines, Mint Motif, The Petal Press and Chicken Girl. Visit our website and follow us on Facebook, Twitter and our blog for news, sales, coupons and more!

Celebrate Black Friday at i {heart} papers with a 20% store-wide coupon (excluding gift certificates and Studio AE memberships) using code: black20dt through Cyber Monday 11/26. And of course, always free US shipping with your $60 order! Happy Holidays from all of us at IHP!

My project for today features Technique Tuesday's set, The Moon!  Don't you think these are just the sweetest images?!

I've had this little printer's tray sitting around for a while now.  It *just so happened* to be out on my desk when my i {heart} papers box arrived, and I noticed that those little accent stamps would be *just the right size* to fill in the 2 x 2 sections of the tray.  At first I thought I would paint the tray white over blue and sand some of the edges to expose the underpainting, but I'm kind of glad that I stamped, colored and cut the images first.  It ended up that I really like the contrast of the original black against that pale blue designer paper.

All of the images were stamped on Copic blending paper, colored with Copic markers, fussy cut and adhered to the Fancy Pants Hopscotch designer paper.  I used warm gray markers to shade the background before adhering the colored and cut image. Mom's dress is paper-pieced from another print from the same designer paper pack, and shaded with Copic markers to add a little more dimension and depth.  There are Stickles highlights in her hair, as well as on the moon and stars.  i {stick} papers tape adheres the finished designs to the tray.

As hard as I tried to add more to this project, it just demanded to remain clean and simple!  I added a few rhinestone accents, and left it at that!  With the addition of some eyelet screws threaded with ribbon (maybe some light blue twill or faux suede...or yellow-orange satin!?), it could become a wall hanging instead of a table-top display, but for now (since I don't have any eyelet screws!) I'm leaving it as is.  I really love this color combo and that clean, uncluttered look.  That way, these sweet images simply demand your attention!

Our designers are sharing lots of inspiration using Technique Tuesday stamps and ihp products!

our Technique Tuesday guests:

• Kris Chirhart
• Tobi Crawford
• Laura O'Donnell
• Sharyn Tormanen
• Daniela Dobson
• Teri Anderson 

the ihp design team:

• November's guest designer, Jen del Muro
• brand new team member, Stephanie Washburn
• Carolyn
• Gretchen
• Judy
• Lori
• Taylor
• Tracy
• Kate

Peace and Love!

Hello friends! Here is a card using one of GRS' new releases, Peace and Love Flowers. If you missed yesterday’s release (which also included Happy Heart Day), you NEED to take a peek at the galleries for the two appetizers that we released! Here are the links:

• Peace and Love Flowers
• Happy Heart Day

I find sympathy cards so hard to make, so I am glad to have a beautiful sentiment and accompanying image that gets the creative juices flowing. This set makes it easy to find a balance that is respectful and cheerful without being over-the-top, if you know what I mean!

For today’s card, I also had some new papers and a little coin envelope that I wanted to use. The greens and yellows of this paper really set a calm, serene mood, and the slide-out card provides another place to write an encouraging thought or verse.

Notes:

Peace and Love Flowers

Basic Grey Serenade designer paper

Memento ink (Cantaloupe, Cottage Ivy, and Espresso Truffle)

Ranger distress ink

coin envelope

Copic markers

twill ribbon

Zva pearls

New from Gourmet Rubber Stamps!

It's release day for Gourmet Rubber Stamps!  We have two brand new appetizer sets for you, and they're both available at i heart papers!  

The set that I used for today's card is called Happy Heart Day.  I love Love LOVE this newsprint flower!  I used Spellbinders heart and scalloped heart dies for a shaped card texturized with Lifestyle Crafts' Whimsy embossing folder.  That fab flower was stamped on both white and kraft card stock with MementoTuxedo Black ink, then distress inked with tea dye and frayed burlap.  A tiny heart button tied with jute accents the center.  Some Kaiser Craft lace, velvet ribbon, and Zva jewels add some interest while keeping the overall look open and uncluttered.

For the inside, I used Spellbinders Fancy Framed Tags 2 die to frame the sentiment.  I really love how these tags nest together!

The other set being released today is called Peace and Love Flowers.  It is a great set of solid stamps with a beautiful sentiment that is just perfect for sympathy cards.

Visit the GRS blog and Appetizers Sets gallery for more ideas on projects you can make with these two new appetizers!

Happy Veteran's Day!

It has been a busy couple of weeks in the Felts household!  We were out of town last weekend, and spent this past Saturday and Sunday volunteering at our church's Fall Arts and Crafts Festival.  Not a whole lot of stamping happening, but that's ok!  Lately craft time seems to come in spurts!

In keeping with the "busy" theme, my card for today is another busy bee card using bee4me, hive4bees, and background4bees, all from The {Stamps} of Life.  The bees have Stickled wings, and the smaller one has wire antennae laden with Flower Soft "pollen."

While we were at the Tampa Bay Ukulele Getaway, we entered a charity benefit raffle, and I WON!  Look at my beautiful new Luna Mo Mah ukulele!  It is a concert ukulele with beautiful carving on its cedar front, with mahogany sides and a pick-up, so I can play electric if I wanna!  How cool is that?!

I hope you have a wonderful Veteran's Day holiday!  I am grateful that my husband, now retired from the USN and working as a civilian in Fleet Readiness Support, is off from work today so we can celebrate!

Tic-Tac-Toe

It's sketch time for the Gourmet Rubber Stamps team!  First look at this sketch made me think tic-tac-toe, probably because not long ago I bought an Epiphany Crafts punch and matching bubble caps.  I've just been waiting for the right opportunity to use it!

You might've noticed that GRS is Moxie-Fab!  My game board pieces are made with a tiny snowman from the first set in Cath's post, Love and Joy Labels.  This is a sentimental set for me, because it was my very first Lizzie Anne-GRS set, given to me by Tricia and Meridith as a thank-you for helping with make-n-takes for the consumer show after CHA Orlando.  (There's still time to read and comment on the GRS is Moxie Fab post so that you are eligible to win, so don't pass it by!)

Many of Gourmet Rubber Stamps' images are also available at i {heart} papers, where you'll also find lots of great tools and supplies to use with your GRS stamps!

Notes:
Love and Joy Labels
Carta Bella Winter Fun designer paper
Memento ink
Copic markers
Copic blending paper
dimensional adhesive
Epiphany Crafts punch and coordinating bubble caps
tiny buttons

Visit my GRS design team mates' blogs for more ideas using GRS stamps and today's sketch!  (I've published my post very early because I'm off to volunteer at a Fall Festival today and didn't wanna risk any hiccups...look for their posts to go live closer to 9 a.m. EST)

• Jeni Allen
• Jennifer Ingle
• Kelli Palmer
• Kendra Wietstock
• Stephanie Lee
• Taylor Usry

"hive" been missing you!

Here's a bright yellow and black bee card using two new sets from The {Stamps} of Life, bee4me and hive4bees.  With these colors and that cute smiling face, one can't help but bee happy!  ;)

Here's the inside, which shows some of what's so fun about these stamps. There are bees of different sizes, some solid and others that are line art to color, along with sentiments for various occasions, a hive, and a bee trail...you can mix and match all kinds of cute scenes!  There's another coordinating stamp, too.  It's a honeycomb background4bees that can be mixed and matched with other sets, used CAS-style, or fancied up if you like!

Notes:
bee4me
hive4bees
Stephanie's inks
distress inks
button
The Twinery twine
Stickles

The Lampost

Today's project is a long, tall card is made with a Flower Soft stamp, The Lampost. It reminds me of the street lamps in the French Quarter of New Orleans, so I paired it with the Tessatina border that also brings to mind the look of delicate wrought iron.

The Lampost, a "naked rubber" stamp, is on sale now at a huge markdown!  Get it for only $1, this week only! 

I stamped the image with Memento ink, and colored it with Copic markers, stamping another to fussy cut and pop up with dimensional adhesive dots.  I used a scrap of acetate from some packaging to stamp the "glass" with Stazon, and added a Stickles flame.  It is embellished with a dusting of ultrafine Flower Soft, a few sprigs of greenery punched with Martha Stewart's fern punch, and red rhinestone "holly berries."

Notes:
Flower Soft's stamp, The Lampost
Ultrafine Flower Soft in Pine and Sage
Memento ink
Copic markers
Stazon ink
scrap of acetate
Kaiser Craft Twig and Berry designer paper
Tessatina border die
MS fern punch
scrap of ribbon
red rhinestones
dimensional adhesive dots
Stickles

Tiny Triangle Treat Box!

Many of you have seen (and pinned!) the little triangle treat box that I made for i {heart} papers' second birthday bash!  It was a beautiful gold box (approximately 2 inches tall) with an accompanying card.  Here's another version of the box in a soft, serene green.

I'm so excited to have been invited to make a tutorial for this little project for Splitcoaststampers, and that it is the first of their Holiday Project Showcase!  You'll find it here.

Notes:
Our Craft Lounge Shades of Fall stamp
Memento ink
Copic markers
Ranger distress inks

ihp celebrates Black Friday!

ihp is celebrating Black Friday every Friday in November with a sale each Friday through Sunday this month, with the culmination on Black Friday through Cyber Monday after Thanksgiving.

This week's special: all Gourmet Rubber Stamps & Market Street Stamps are 30% off! Hurry over to get yours today!

What's the Buzz?

The {Stamps} of Life club set this month is the adorable bee4me, which has this cutie along with some fun, punny sentiments! Stephanie just added some really fun new products to the online store, so you NEED to go check 'em out!

Look at the bee4me gallery while you're there!  LOTS of cute ideas!