a simple thanks

Today is a huge day... I get to register my oldest for kindergarten! It's crazy to think she is already 5 and ready for school. After debating over and over about 1/2-day mornings, afternoons or all day kindergarten, I've opted for mornings. I guess with 2 younger siblings that still nap in the afternoon, it's a good choice. We are getting a brand new school in our neighborhood that will open this fall and Avery's class will be the first to enter kindergarten there. What a blessing it will be to have a school so close - I just hope it's a good year for the school and there aren't many hiccups with staffing.

Today's card is inspired by Kristina Werner - I love her simple style and her cards and projects are amazing, especially her scrapbook pages. Love them! I got a Cuttlebug for Christmas this year and I've been wanting to use this 'thanks' sentiment die cut forever (ok, since I got it...). Well, here is the perfect little place to put it. The only stamping on this card is the little dots from sweet shapes. I used my 1/8" circle punch on the bottom and place a strip of Soft Sky underneath to pop out the circles a little more. The base is Kraft cardstock and then I used textured Blue Bayou and Groovy Guava. The Wild Wasabi and Soft Sky cardstock is smooth, but I really like the textured! I wish we could buy it in color packs instead of assorted packs from Stampin' Up! OH and hey! I finally figured out how to make a watermark! I'll be playing with that for a while and see what style I like best for my photos. Looks so professional - so not me! ha!

~Karen

xoxo

Does it seem like I'm posting Valentine's cards every Tuesday? I'm on a kick I suppose and by the time the day actually comes, I just might be tired of pink and hearts. Nah!
Time to use punches! I used my 1-3/8 square punch for the double sided paper (and I can't remember the name of it because it was a mini catalog item last year). The chipboard is from Creative Cafe and I decorated the pieces with craft ink, heat & stick powder and dazzling diamonds glitter. So fun! I was going to stick the letters directly to the paper, but they got lost in the patterns, so I just stuck a scrap piece of Tempting Turquoise underneath on a stampin dimensional and voila! This was such a fun card and out of my "usual" element, so I enjoyed putting it together. I may just have to step out of my box more often!
Well, I'm off to play with the kiddos - hopefully I'll have a chance to stamp this afternoon again. See you tomorrow!
~Karen

Starbucks Inspired

Happy Monday! So the story behind this card is inspired by a trip to Starbucks this past Saturday during my mommy-daughter date with my 5-year-old, Avery. We go there and have little girl chats over kids cocoa and vanilla chai tea and it's a delightful time, just the two of us. Of course Avery wanted to go buy some Mickey Mouse stickers at the scrapbook store with her money, so who am I to argue? We went there too of course. Anyway... Starbucks has all of the Valentine's mugs on clearance (already?) and I saw this mug there and instantly thought of the flowers in Heartfelt Thanks. You know you have a passion when you see stamps in a Starbucks... So here is the inspired Valentine's card that I did with Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge and it was such a fun and simple card. I stamped the Crosshatch background stamp in Versamark on Mellow Moss. The flower images are stamped with my markers - Regal Rose, Pretty in Pink, and the outline is Rose red. The stems are Mellow Moss marker as well and I flipped the stem upside down to make the stems go in different directions. The other ribbon is adhered separately behind the flower image, but I looks like it's all one ribbon on the card.

Have a great day and thanks again for stopping by!
~Karen

Wow!

Wow, there is a whole lotta brightness going on in this card! I put this card together using Wednesday's sketch challenge over at SCS and thought I'd use up some of this Petals & Paisleys paper. So we got stripes, polka dots, and bright, vibrant colors all in one small space. Very fun for the girly girl in your life or if you need to give a card to a crazy friend? heh! The stamp set is Celebrate Everything and I thought it would be great to use with embossing powder, but when I opened up my Tempting Turqoise craft ink, it was not very wet, so plan B. I used my Stamp-a-majig again to position the sentiments. I used the 1/8" circle punch to pull the ribbon up through the top and bottom of the sentiment.

Also, go check out Beate's blog, Fresh & Fun. She's calling all stampers for a last minute request to send blank Valentine's cards to her so she can send them to our troops overseas. Then they can send a love note to their loved ones here at home. I thought this was a fantastic idea! She also has posted her Weekend Sketch Challenge, which I'll be doing this weekend as well. Michael has poker with the guys, so I have stamping with cocoa when the kiddos are asleep. Love it! Have a great weekend everyone!

~Karen

Pick-a-Petal

So if you haven't noticed by now, I pretty much stalk the weekly challenges over at Splitcoaststampers. I was soooo excited with Tuesday's color challenge because it was boy colors: Real Red, Blue Bayou, and Soft Sky. The real reason I was excited for this challenge is because I have a whole pack of Real Red and I never use it. I don't know why that is, well yes I do - it's because Stampin' Up! comes out with fantastic colors every year and the old ones get ignored for a while. Back to the boy colors - I had intended to make a masculine birthday card, but see what happens? I couldn't decide on a stamp set that was boy-ish and when I happened upon Pick a Petal it was over. I *had* to use it. Then came out the ribbon, button and scalloped edge again. No going back now! This card is a little more detailed than yesterday. I stamped the petals in versamark on Soft sky and embossed them with clear embossing powder and cut them out. I stamped the center flower in versamark on Blue Bayou and embossed it with clear ep and then added the Real Red button with a mini glue dot. The ribbon is red gingham and of course I used the corner rounder for the scalloped edge. And hey look! It's Soft Sky prints paper again. Love the prints paper. The thank you sentiment is from Taggers Dozen. Thanks again for stopping by!

~Karen

Sweet Pea

I love to make cards that are simple to do and easy to duplicate. Sometimes I can get too crazy with my cards and try to stamp everywhere and add all the embellishments and then I look at the card and I don't like it at all. I remember when I first started demonstrating with Stampin' Up! I would try to incorperate too many "things" on the cards - you know, trying to sell everything at one workshop. I'm over that now, thank goodness. Designer paper is the key to simple cards for me because it adds so much without a lot of work. Now that I'm becoming less selfish with my paper and actually using it on cards, I'm hooked! Wow, that really sounded like a workshop pitch, ha!

Here is another baby card and yet another hostess set that I didn't cut until after it was retired. I wanted to use this little pea pod for so long, but I started to get frustrated with this little guy because I couldn't color him without it looking like my 5-year-old did it. Ha! So, I just decided to stamp him in Certainly Celery craft ink and heat emboss it with clear embossing powder. Done! I did end up sponging Certainly Celery around the edge of the cardstock to soften the edges and make the image pop out a little more in the center. The scalloped edge was made using the small corner rounder and then I tied the ribbons over the seam. For this card I used Whisper White for the base, scalloped edge and main image. The patterned paper is Certainly Celery and So Saffron prints. Thanks again for stopping by and all your kind words!
~Karen

Sweet Love

I had major mojo going on yesterday while my husband was home, so I took advantage and made some fun cards to share with you the next couple of days. I started out with the intention of making a Valentine's card for Michael, but when I finished it I thought it looked a little girly. This seems to happen all the time! So now I have a card for Michael to give to me - ha! Ok, maybe this can be a card for the grandparents. I started out with Regal Rose for my card base and layered Chocolate Chip and Rose Red prints paper. The 3 eyelets in the corner are punched through just the prints paper and Chocolate Chip so you don't see the backs of the eyelets in the card. I used my Stamp-a-majig to position the letters just so and the "YOU" sentiment in the e. I love popping up little pieces of my images, so this little flower was perfect on the heart. I stamped the heart again on Regal Rose and cut out the flower. Of course I needed to add more creative candy bling to my flower to add that little spark. I added stampin dimensionals before tying the Chocolate Chip ribbon around my sentiment and since I really didn't have room for my little knot, I made room by punching a 1/8 hole in the corner to let the ribbon peek through and not seem too crowded on the card front. Stamp sets are: Celebrate Everything, Big Deal Alphabet, and Time Well Spent (hostess). Thanks for stopping by and enjoy your Tuesday.
~Karen

2-in-1 challenge... {sort of}

Ok, who else out there is really bummed the Packers lost yesterday? I was rooting for Brett, er.. the Packers, the whole season, but alas, we'll see Manning Part II in the Superbowl. My friend across the street is probably in severe mourning right now seeing how she loves "B", as she calls him. Do they have "Sorry for your football loss..." cards? Maybe I need to make one because they certainly wouldn't be girly enough, right?

Alright, enough of that. Today's card is a mix of two challenges - the first is the color challenge on SCS using only Rose Red, Apricot Appeal, and Sage Shadow. The second is Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge #31. Now if you are looking for inspiration, Beate's blog Fresh & Fun is the place to go! I started off with Rose Red as my card base and then layered on a piece of Apricot Appeal Prints DS paper, which coordinates so well with the stamp set Simply Said. I used this set all the time when I first got it, but had to chuckle when I got it off the shelf with a layer of dust on the case. Anyway... this is where the whole things goes awry. See, I went to my folder of Sage Shadow scraps and went on my merry way - I scalloped the edge with my corner rounder, layered Rose Red Prints paper on top and then add the jumbo eyelets (LOVE them), stamped my flowers, colored them in and sponged Sage Shadow all around the edges. It's at this moment when I realize my scraps are Mellow Moss - what?! Stink. Ok, no big deal. I like the colors together and I am definitely not going to waste 3 jumbo eyelets, so I re-stamped my flowers and re-sponged in Mellow Moss and went from there. So I thought I would be all cute and do 2 challenges together, but maybe next time I should stick to one. I wasn't able to use the fun Sage Shadow ribbon I had, so I had to settle with moss and apricot. Still fun though. I used the horizontal slot punch to make the hole for the ribbons to tie through and I used A-Muse creative candy on the center of the flowers just to add a little dimension to the main image. Sorry the photo is a little dark - it's snowing here today and doesn't look like it will be clearing up any time soon. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. Thanks for stopping by!

~Karen

Fantastic Friday

It's Friday AND a 3-day weekend for my husband. Life is sweet! I love Friday - it's the only day of the week I don't need to drive my daughter to preschool, or go anywhere for that matter. But, what are we doing today? Yes, we're having lunch out - just a lunch date with my 3 kiddos.

Today I thought I'd try out cracked glass. Why have I never done this before? It's fun (although my desk has embossing powder all over it because I got my heat gun too close to my powder tray and the powder went flying everywhere..) and its such a unique look. I love those techniques that look like you spent forever on, but in real life, they are super easy. So here is my super simple card, but I love it, and it's my last January birthday card. I'm excited to say I'm caught up! woo hoo! Anyway... This card uses Groovy Guava for the base and then I layered Wild Wasabi, Groovy Guava, and Purely Pomegrantate under a 2-3/4 x 2-3/4 piece of Very Vanilla. I stamped the Linen background with Creamy Caramel and then sponged the edges. The flower from Doodle This is stamped in Basic Brown and then I used blender pens to paint in the flower. Of course, I had to finish the card off with ribbon - Purely Pomegranate double stitiched grosgrain in this case. The Happy Birthday sentiment is from Amazing to Zany.


I hope you have enjoyed my rookie week in the blog world! This has been really fun and I'm happy to be using my stamps and paper instead of hoarding everything. What an adventure! Have a wonderful weekend and thanks again for stopping by!


~Karen

Sweet Valentines

Aren't these little milk carton boxes so much fun?! Beate has made an incredible tutorial - so fun and fairly easy. I think the most difficult part was taping the top of the box together, but even that wasn't all that hard. These little boxes are already filled with some cherry-filled Hershey's Kisses - scrumptious! I needed to seal them in there so I don't eat them - I'm planning on giving these to my daughter's preschool teachers for their Valentine's Day party. I'm sure they will love having more candy to bring home, right?

So halfway through my first box, I ran out of sticky tape, so I opted to use my Tombow Multipurpose Adhesive and that worked great! So if you don't have sticky tape, there are other options, yea! I decided to stamp one and then not stamp on the other, but I think I like the look of the stamped one - maybe next time I'll go ahead and stamp it and use the designer paper. I just got lazy on that second one, ha! Be looking for these at the February stamp camp girls!

Sketch Challenge

I can't believe I haven't inked up my hostess set, Sidekick Sayings yet! Now that Stampin' Up! has 2 catalogs a year, I can't keep up and this poor set was retired before I even cut the rubber. Poor thing. Today over at Splitcoaststampers is the Wednesday sketch challenge - one of my favorites because that's the most difficult part of getting a card together for me. So here is my entry - I love the Fall Flowers double sided paper and it adds so much to a card acting as a background. I stamped the sentiment in Old Olive and then the flower again in Soft Sky. This is such a simple way to add dimension to your projects without a whole bunch of work. Got to love that! I used a sponge dauber to sponge on Soft Sky around my Whisper White to soften the edges a little bit. I like those subtle touches. The ribbon is Soft Sky double stitched grosgrain. What am I going to do when this color is retired?! All in all, this is a very quick and classic card - enjoy!

Go check out the Wednesday challenge here and post a comment with a link to your card. I'd love to see what you come up with!

All in the family

I've been trying to do the challenges over on splitcoaststampers and Friday's limited supplies challenge is using only 2 colors out of one Stampin' Up! color family. I thought this would be easy, but it's the "only 2 colors" part that tripped me up. Here's my attempt at this challenge - Earth Elements was my choice. Maybe it's because it's overcast today that made me pick Really Rust and Old Olive. Not the most fun colors, but I do like them together. I'm an autumn girl after all. Then it all came together when I looked at this entry in Nicole Heady's blog over at {capture the moment}. I loved this little technique and thought it added so much to the picture while using simple stamping. I borrowed a lot from her card, and hopefully soon I can be so creative all by myself without needing to CASE other stampers so much. Cheer me on, won't you? I used Artfully Asian for this card and stamped the twig in basic brown on Kraft cardstock. I colored in the flowers, berries, and leaves with Stampin' Up! watercolor wonder crayons (really rust and old olive again), then used my blender pen to soften the color. Now I was on my last leaf stamp over on my tiles and I didn't stamp straight, so there is some missing ink. I hate that! I wasn't about to go and cut out a new sheet and distress it again, so I'll just leave it. It's killing the perfectionist in me though. I really like stamping on Kraft paper, especially with craft or chalk inks, so I'll have to play around with more of these later. I used my Stamp-a-majig to break up the phrase "Each day provides its own gifts." and put it on 2 lines since the sentiment was too long to place over my fun tiles. I love my Stamp-a-majig and use it all the time to rearrange my sentiments. Much easier than cutting the blocks... heh!

Getting Organized...

I had my MOPS post Christmas white elephant gift exchange last night and had a blast. These ladies give the funniest gifts and I'm going to keep a lookout for something big and hideous for next year. My gift I brought just didn't cut it next to the sauna suit, the enormous sofa picture, the camoflauge santa hat, or the uh.. beautiful purple porcelain unicorn head (with gold glitter to boot!) The show stopper was a pair of wooden shoes, straight from Holland. What? I wish I had brought my camera! The gift I managed to open was three little booklets "for dummies". How appropriate... One was for taking digital pictures, the other was for 10 minute tone-ups and the last was organizing.


So on this note, I give you my attempt at organizing my cards. I found this CD holder at Target about a year ago and thought it would be perfect to bring all my swaps to my Stampin' Up! workshops. Now I'm thinking I'd like to use it just to keep some cards on hand, you know, Karen's Hallmark or something. The files are pretty straight forward - I used the Key Tag punch from Stampin' Up! and made the labels and used American Crafts "Rue" rub-on for the titles. I think I need to make one more for baby cards because there seems to be quite the boom lately. When I store my cards, I put them in clear envelopes and that way they don't get dusty, the embellishments don't fall off, and I can see what I have at a glance. I'm hoping now I can just grab a card and mail it when I need it, but for now I'm just trying to keep up with all the January birthdays!

Jumping in

Hello from Colorado! Well, I thought I'd give it a try and start a blog. One of my resolutions this year is to stamp every day, ok well maybe most days, and get caught up on cards and scrapbook pages. A stamper/crafter's dream right? So far so good with my card making... Not quite as overwhelming as cropping though.

So on to the stamping!! My SIL is really wanting to get this blanket for her baby, due the middle of March. She got this blanket for my son 2 years ago and now it's the hottest thing going on eBay. Seriously... it's going for $85! Really? It's a baby blanket. Cute, but it will just get pooped on and spit-up on, right? Ok... So inspired by this blanket (don't tell her, but Andrew's is sitting on the floor of our car at the moment) I made this card for her baby shower next month. Since this is my first post, I doubt she'll see it, or I hope she won't anyway *wink*. I don't know why the colors are so off in my photo, but I'm hoping to get better at taking great pictures as well.

I finally broke out this set, Wild About You, after about a year of owning it! I had bought it to use to make 1st birthday invitations for my son, but they sat in the drawer neglected until today. Poor things. I used Chocolate Chip craft ink and heat embossed the elephant with clear embossing powder. The background is alternating rectangles of plan Certainly Celery paper and Certainly Celery paper stamped with the linen background stamp with Celery ink. I thought it would have stood out more as dark/light squares, but it will do. I like the way it turned out and I hope she enjoys the card, even if she never finds the Peanuts blanket.


Thank you so much for stopping by! Please come back and visit soon.

~Karen