Thursday, April 25, 2019

Proud to be an American!


I feel so proud (and blessed!) to be American.  My husband spent nearly 30 years in the USN, and the city in which we live is very much a "Navy town."  Memorial Day, celebrated on May 27,  is our next patriotic holiday, but truthfully, every day is a good day to show your gratitude to a veteran, and around here we have plenty of opportunities!  


I love how the Stars 5 dies look when they're scored and folded 3D!  Scoring from the point to the "notch" all the way around and then giving the folds an alternating mountain/valley orientation and a little pinch creates that dimensional effect.  Then when they're glued into a negative space cut using the same die, there's a little border that really helps them to stand out even more.  

The angle of the fishtail banners is a perfect fit, too!  I cut the sentiment banner, then ran it through the machine again to create more of an arrow shape that nestles perfectly into the edge of that star.    


Here's the inside.  My stamping platform was really helpful in getting nice color saturation on those stars, and clear impressions on the sentiments.  

Here are the supplies I used for today's Stamp Simply project:
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Thursday, April 18, 2019

Thanking God for You!


Everything has been so beautifully green and gorgeous lately!  Yes, it's already hotter than blazes in Florida, especially when you're dressed for the 1860s as my friends and I have been for the last two weekends, but the hotter, summer-like days are interspersed with cooler, more pleasant Spring weather that is quite pleasant.   

Time is certainly flying by!  Easter is almost here, and Mother's Day is just a month behind it.  My calendar is filled for the next four weeks, so I'm trying to stay with my head above water.  For today's Stamp Simply project, I made a Mother's Day card for my husband to give his mom.  There's not a day that goes by that I don't miss my mom, and I am so thankful for my mother-in-law!   


I wanted this card to be bright and sunshiny, so I used the beautiful Graphic 45 Flutter designer paper with some bold green and yellow card stock.  


Using my mom's paintbrush to splatter things just makes me happy!  I love the bit of glitz that Delicata gold brings to this project.  It's also kinda cool that the font of the stamp set harmonizes so well with the font from the designer paper.  I always feel that I have to be so strategic with Graphic 45 paper, because it is too lovely to cover up and I don't want to waste a bit of it!

Supplies:
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Thursday, April 11, 2019

You're in my Thoughts!


A friend from back home lost his mother recently, so today's Stamp Simply card is a relatively flat-for-mailing sympathy card.  This paper is so beautiful that it really doesn't need much embellishing at all but I couldn't help but add those big ole pearls, so I may need to try to pad the envelope a bit after all.


As I have mentioned before, I often put butterflies on sympathy cards.  This one started with a small but wide rectangular piece of white tulle that I stretched, fraying the edges, then tying them into a small bow.  This was topped by double bow of jute string and a pearl.  


I love that these sentiments are so simply lovely and yet so versatile.  This pairing of sentiments would work for a variety of occasions.  

This card was splashed both inside and out with diluted Delicate silvery shimmer ink.  It just adds a bit of shine, sparkle and elegance to the paper, which has its own classic vintage feel.  I love it!  

Stamp Simply products used for today's project:
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Thursday, April 4, 2019

Rise and Shine!


Stamp Simply just released a new Java stamp and die duo and it is SO adorable!  Just look how darling that heart-shaped cup handle is!  The die set includes another larger cup with a regular handle that will even double as a beer mug, and the set has the perfect accompanying sentiment!  So much fun!  

This pretty girlie paper is part of Echo Park's Coffee designer paper pad.  Some Thursday mornings my BFF and I go by Spring Coffee Shop to grab a cup as we head to St. Augustine for the Textiles Fiber Guild meeting, so I thought this feminine floral was an appropriate choice for today's project.  There are more traditional coffee prints in the pad should you prefer to carry the theme a little further.

The Java die cut on the card front is cut from designer paper and card stock, one layer adhered with the other just barely peeking from under the other like a drop-shadow for just a little extra strength and dimension.  




The coffee cup peeks through the window that is cut through the front of the card, and when the card is open, the hidden sentiment is revealed.  This card is relatively flat, so it would be easy to send through the mail.

Supplies:
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Thursday, March 28, 2019

With Grateful Hearts, We Sing!


Last weekend The Orange Park Chorale celebrated 25 years!  My son and I have been singing with the group for 6 or 7 of those 25! We performed Friday evening and then again Sunday, with a catered reception afterward.  It was so much fun!  This coming Sunday we will be singing again with the Chorale and two other choirs with a total of ~100 voices...it is going to be amazing!

I have been practically eating/sleeping/breathing music lately, so it is no surprise that the beautiful Love Notes designer paper  would be the selection for this week's Stamp Simply cards.  ðŸŽ¹ Piano keys, be still my heart!  And (shhhh, hopefully I can still manage to surprise them!) one card for our director and one for our pianist.  


Here's a close-up of the shimmer on that lovely cross!  When our fishtail banners dies came out, they became my favorite, but now this lovely cross holds first place...and on this card I used them both!  The cross has such lovely embossing, and it shows even more when it is sponged with distress ink and given some Wink of Stella glamour.


All of the papers were given that vintage look with some tea-dye distress ink.  The sentiment was stamped with distress oxide.  


The inside is very simple and elegant.

 

Here's the second card...such beautiful paper, with the most perfect words in fonts that are so gorgeous!


And again, a very simple but elegant inside with lots of room for signatures and handwritten words of appreciation.  

Here are the supplies I used:

For those of you who might be interested, here is our chorale photo taken just before concert.  My beloved Matthew is next to last in the top right corner.  


Here I am with some of the lovely flowers that decorated the reception hall after the concert.  Those of us who were on the decorating committee were given the privilege of taking some home.  I am still enjoying them!

And finally, here are links to our Friday and Sunday concerts (same music/different venues and camera angles).  

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Thursday, March 21, 2019

Grace


This Stamp Simply card, made with another of our new sets, could be for Easter, or it could be just an everyday/anyday encouragement...I *love* that about these new sets, especially considering how versatile they are when combined with our former sets!


What an easy card to put together!  A  G45 ephemera card gave me a beautiful head-start.  I just trimmed a bit from the top and bottom to make it fit a standard card, notching the corners for added interest.  This larger sentiment looks so lovely when simply heat-embossed in gold right onto the designer paper.  I used some gold Gelatos and clear Wink of Stella to add some color and sparkle to the ivory die-cut cross, and smudged some of the gold Gelatos onto the gold cross underneath to draw more attention to that lovely pressure-embossing.


The splatters inside are both Gelatos and oxide inks.  


Just look how beautifully that sentiment embosses with gold detail embossing powder.
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Saturday, March 16, 2019

Because of His Mercy


Hello friends!  Happy to see you again!  Stamp Simply is releasing several new stamp sets, and I'm here to share my first card using one of them, Mercy.  


The passages in this set are beautiful verses that will work for many different occasions. They coordinate perfectly with their companion stamp set, Grace, and look gorgeous when paired with our new cross dies.  You can purchase the sets individually or as a combo.


These dies are so elegant!  I love them!  They look lovely separately but they are simply gorgeous when they're layered, and especially with tiny rhinestones peeking through.  Look closely, and you can see the embossing (even on textured card stock!)


I had one tiny scrap of green card stock left so the top layer of the inside of my card is a little smaller than usual, and because of that, I chose not to add any designer paper to the inside to save more space for writing.  But I had to include this verse!  Love it!  

Here are the products I used for today's project:
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Thursday, March 7, 2019

Happy birthday!


Hi y'all!  I'm here today with a bright "confetti-style" Stamp Simply birthday card using Graphic 45's colorful, amazing Flutter designer paper.  If you've had the winter doldrums, this will probably perk you up!

I had so much fun making this card!  My fingers and workspace got all inky with lovely distress oxide colors.  Lots of sponging and splattering going on here!



Even with all of those splatters, the pink rhinestones really pop! This card is like a ray of sunshine!  

Here are the supplies for today's project:
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Thursday, February 28, 2019

Sincere Condolences


Sympathy cards are always a challenge to make, and I'm grateful for lovely stamp sets and supplies from Stamp Simply that convey thoughts and words that I find difficult to put together on my own.  

I often deliberately choose brighter, more cheerful color schemes for sympathy cards but for this one, this muted color scheme really spoke to me.  Our brand new cross dies are so elegant they make a perfect focal point.


For the embellishment, I put together a cluster of Prima roses with a few die-cut leaves and a sentiment stamped onto a banner die.  


The sentiment inside is from our other new sympathy set.  It's nice that these come separately or as a bundle.  Being able to mix and match is nice...a sentiment that fits perfectly for one person or family might not be so perfect for another.  

Here are the supplies I used for today's card:
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Saturday, February 23, 2019

Happy Birthday!


Our new Stamp Simply Birthday Sentiments set is so beautiful!  I love how our new sets mix and match with former sets, giving lots of options for combining sentiments and styles.

Two of our more recent dies made those sentiments the focal point on a double gatefold card that was fast and easy to assemble.  The Fishtail Sentiments Banner die was used to create the belly band, and 


a Farmhouse Pierced Nested Hearts die allows the inside sentiment to peek through the inside layers.  Gotta love that pop of this year's color, Living Coral and these beautiful designer papers.

Supplies:
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