Make a Wish

Paper Makeup Stamps has the honor of sponsoring this week's sketch at the Cardabilities blog. Here is my sample for this very fun sketch.

I used a variety of papers from October Afternoon's Modern Homemaker collection. The green stripe paper was die cut with a scallop die, then embellished with a number of shiny silver pearls. I stamped the swirl from Starstuck on the cork die cuts.

The sentiment from Dandy Wishes was stamped on a flag die and then embellished with a tiny library clip before being adhered with boosters.

Now, make sure to carve out some time to sample the sketch; the prize is a $15.00 gift certificate at Paper Makeup Stamps.

Dandy Day

The Sweet Stop sketch, SSS96, was a sketch with a spin this week. The spin was to Think Spring. Well, I've had spring in the brain for a while now, so this was an easy challenge.

I used Cosmo Cricket papers and the dandy cluster image from Dandy Wishes, the sentiment is from Little Moments. I can't tell you how much I love this set, there is a sentiment for nearly everything in it.

The flowers are CutUp dies, I just embellished them with a button and some twine.

Chewing Gum Slider

I found a few packs of chewing gum on clearance recently and thought they would make a cute little gift to have on hand. I've packaged it up slider style. I'm sure there's a tutorial somewhere, but these are pretty easy to figure out without a write up. It's basically a sleeve.

I used kraft cardstock and some October Afternoon papers, this is from the Farm Fresh collection, I believe. It was fun to use my crimper again too, it's been a while.

Here is a photo of it as you slide the treat in. You just thread the ribbon through the small hole punch and then place your treat on the other tail, push it in, and tie a knot or bow. Then, when you pull the ribbon, the treat magically comes out.

The sentiment is from Little Moments and is mounted onto a scallop circle punch decorated with lotso white pearls.

Birthday Wishes

The final February Viva la Verve challenge was just that. I found the sketch to be fun, but definitely challenging.

The papers are from Crate, I love the patterns and colors in the pad. I also dug out some cork sheets for a little texture, I do love how it looks and wonder why I didn't open the package sooner. Hoarding, I reckon! It was die cut using Mat Stack 4 from PTI.

The sentiment from Wishful Elegance was stamped with chocolate ink onto the oval nestie; then I stamped the medallion image from Easter Joy with Sea Breeze ink. I used a Bow Easy to make the fluffy bow to adhere to the top of the sentiment.

Another birthday card to add to the stash!

So Tweet

I needed a bright, sunny card to cheer me up recently and this cute Pure Innocence image fit the bill. The papers went a long way in helping as well.

The image is Pure Innocence You're So Tweet (must be out of stock), she was just colored with copics to match the papers. The moss cardstock was embossed before being matted with black; I also added some shiny silver pearls to the flower centers along the top for a little added interest. The Fresh Cut Grass Die-Namics was used to cut the felt.

Lastly, I added the big, fat bow to the bottom of the card.

Happy Spring Mojo

I was happy to find a little time to use the Mojo Monday sketch from a few week's ago, MOJO177; it was contest week after all. I received a few goodies from MFT: Pure Innocence Out on a Limb, Butterfly Die-Namics, and the Flat Bottom Cloud Die-Namics.

The papers are from My Mind's Eye Fine & Dandy, it's such a pretty pad of paper. I went a little bright and busy with all the elements, I am totally anticipating the arrival of spring. It sure has been a long, hard winter. The sentiment was stamped on the Sentiment Flag die, this might well be the best die on the planet right now, so versatile and handy!

You're Red Hot!

Rounding out this week with yet another Valentine's Day gifite, this one was for my sweetie! He loves Red Hots and IS red hot....hehehe. The tutorial for the Treat Bag Cover is here; I had to modify the width to accomodate my cello bag size, but it was easy enough to do.

All the stamps are from Verve: Love Notes, Bountiful Backgrounds, and Sweet on You. I am very pleased with Brilliance Graphite Black ink, look how bold and wonderfully it stamps. *sigh* The Classy Label die was used with the stamp from Love Notes, I love those lines; then the sentiment was stamped with red ink as were the cluster of hearts. All I did was adhere it to the bag with some boosters. Easy peasy!

Ya know, you just cannot go wrong with black, white, and red!

Enjoy Today

I am posting over at the Market Street Stamps blog today!

I used the Treat Bag Cover tutorial from SCS to present some small Valentine's Day toys for my friend's son.

All the stamps are from Market Street Stamps- A Bit of Burlap, Enjoy Today, and Perfectly Pretty Grid. You may know that I love background stamps, they are just so versatile. And, Market Street Stamps sizes theirs larger then a card front which takes away the stress of lining them up properly.

Just a little die cutting and punching helps to add a little dimension. I am really enamored with buttons tied with twine....delish!

Just so you know, Market Street Stamps is starting peeks of their new release starting on February 21st. You better head on over to their blog to take a look, you won't want to miss it!

Baby Boy VLV

A fella in my office is expecting a little boy with his wife in the coming months; we're finally having a baby shower next week for the happy couple. The Viva la Verve sketch seemed like a perfect fit for the baby card I needed.

I used the sweet monkey, star cluster, and sentiment from To the Moon, it's a precious baby set. I was also happy to use the Jumbo Ric Rac and Notepaper Die-Namics from MFT, I hadn't used them much at all.

I enjoy using masculine colors without it being overly pastel as baby papers seem to be. This has just enough blue balanced out by some orange, yellow, and brown. I just love the star pattern! The last thing I did was tie three strands of twine around the ric rac, thanks Jami!

Valentine's Day Treat Bag

I packaged up 3 tubes of lip gloss in this 2,5,7,10 box, the tutorial for the box can be found here. I stamped the center panels with a tiny heart, medium and small flowers, and the leaves from Dream Big using a combination of inks.

I stamped the heart from Love Notes and then used the Jotted Heart die to cut it out. The sentiment from the same set was punched out and then matted with coordinating colors. Both are attached to the front using pop dots.

I used some BG magnets for the closure, then tied some sweet satin ribbon around the flap.

Just For You Valentine

Happy Valentine's Day!

I am taking two of these to work today to give to my co-worker's for the little ladies in their family for a small Valentine's Day giftie. Each holds 3 lip gloss tubes.

I used PTI's Favor It 2 Box die, MFT's Rolled Flower Die-Namics, as well as Verve's Classy Label and Embossed Oval dies; the stamps are from Sweet Treats and Blue Skies.

Got Love

This is the card I made for Cody for Valentine's Day. He loves penguins just about as much as he loves whales, so this cute Got Love set was perfect for him.

I used some great papers from Echo Park and the Simply Scallops Die-Namics from MFT; last thing I added was some twine through the hot pink button. The sketch is from The Sweet Stop, SSS95.

Natalie SFYTT

I could not get a good photo of this card for the life of me.

I am super thrilled to be using the birthday fairy, Natalie. She's available in digi form in honor of the 2nd anniversary of Paper Makeup Stamps.

I also used Jen's SFYTT for the month of February. Loved the sketch, will definitely use it again. The papers are from K & Co., it is a mat pack. Some of the designs are a little out there, so I chose some of the least strange patterns. LOL

I made Natalie a little smaller than the fairies are normally sized; that's the beauty of digital. Of course, these fairies are so detailed that sometimes smaller is harder to color. But, I managed just fine.

Once she was colored, I added some stickles to her wings and a glitter pen to her dress, shoes, and hair. A glaze pen spruced up the chocolate icing on the cake as well as the candle.

Enjoy

Today's card uses a new to me stamp company, Market Street Stamps. You need to go take a look at her store, the designs are so fresh and they stamp like a dream.

I am thrilled to be their Guest Designer for the month of February. I'm also posting on the Market Street Stamps blog today, so if you want to know more about the card, you can head over there.

I used A Bit of Burlap with Brilliance ink; I love, love, love how crisp and dark the ink is. The tea cup from Enjoy Today was stamped and then die cut using nesties. I decided to use only a portion of the image since it was too large for the sketch from The Sweet Stop, SSS94.

The colors really seem to pop with this color combo, I've used it before and I'll be using it again in the future.

Valentine Wishes VLV

This week's Viva la Verve sketch is another good one; would be especially wonderful to use up some of those scraps laying around. Unfortunately, I didn't go that route! LOL

The papers are Karen Foster and have been in my stash for a verrryyyy long time. I think the patterns are pretty timeless though, they look pretty good for this Valentine's Day card. The sentiments are from Love Notes.

PMS VIP Blog Hop

Happy Birthday Paper Makeup Stamps!

You should have arrived here from Peggy Toole's blog. If not, you will defintely want to start at the PMS Blog to see all this wonderful goodness from the beginning.

We're celebrating the 2 year anniversary of Paper Makeup Stamps today. As always, we celebrate with a hop on the 7th. Each DT member was given the task of inviting a special designer to celebrate with us; so you'll see lots of new names. I chose the super talented Cindy Haffner and am thrilled that she said YES!

The theme of today's hop is Things We Love. My card is an interpretation of some things I love: cupcakes and sweets, and bling. Then there's pretty ribbon, pretty paper, and the cute little flag die. Also, twine and buttons which are new loves.

For my card, I used last week's Mojo Monday sketch, mojo176. The curved panel was very intriguing and I immediately knew I wanted to fill it with bling. The cupcakes are from the So Sweet set. So stinkin' cute and it's on sale!

Tto enter yourself to win a PMS Prize Pack, please head on over to the PMS blog.

Now, you'll wanna hop on over to see the amazing and talented Cindy Haffner.

Repeat Valentine

Yep, I've posted this already, BUT it's anniversary time over at Papertrey Ink and Nichole has challenged us to pick our favorite Papertrey project from the last year and post it for a chance to win a ginormous prize pack.

I am a fan of PTI, especially the background sets and dies. Well, actually all of it, but those are the things that catch my eye first!


I used many PTI sets on this one: A Little Argyle, Sheet Music Background, Fancy Flourishes, It's Official, and a Fillable Frames sentiment. I also used their Notepaper die and cardstock.

Cool Beans

Miss You a Latte is one of my favorite stamp sets from MFT. What is not to love about the jumbo to-go cups and the little cutie carrying them. The sentiment is also from MFT, but from one of their sentiment sets. I looked for it, but didn't have any luck locating it.

I paired her up with some BG papers and the Sweet Sunday sketch, SSSC102. I stress out over the larger panels, but this one worked itself out. Miss You a Latte fits perfectly. It was fun to pull out my copics again, I've been using alot of word art and sentiments to avoid coloring it seems. But, I'll be back at it again soon.

PMS is having a VIP Blog Hop on Monday, February 7th starting at 7 AM EST. There will be loads of inspiration and prizes as well as we celebrate 2 wonderful years of PMS!

Love is in the Air

Yep, another Valentine's Day card. This time I used some BG papers from last year and some cute punches. The image and sentiment are from the Hugs & Kisses set at Paper Makeup Stamps, it's perfect for the sweet holiday coming up. You might wanna check it out, it's on sale!

And, we're having a VIP hop on Monday, February 7th; there'll be tons of inspiration and prizes to help celebrate the 2 year anniversary of Paper Makeup Stamps.

XOXOXO

Today is the 2nd anniversary of Paper Makeup Stamps. In honor of this event, Katie has a special digi stamp available for purchase, you can read all about it HERE.

I am still thrilled and honored to be part of the Design Team, it's been almost 2 years. And I still get excited with each release, just like all of you.

Happy Anniversary Paper Makeup Stamps! Here's wishing you many more!


This week's FTL125 sketch found on the clean&simple blog was really appealing. I especially love the samples with a monochromatic image panel, so I did the same thing. I am in Valentine's Day mode, so I chose to work with some pinks.

The lips are from Sending You Love, the hearts and sentiment are from Hugs & Kisses. Each panel was stamped with a matching ink, looks pretty snazzy. I just added some pink flatback rhinestones from Pizzazz Aplenty to anchor the sentiment and add some sparkle.

Love Much February VLV

Well, here we are for the first of the February Viva la Verve challenges. Another fun sketch, although I am terrified of the grid panels since I never seem to get them right, I had fun making this card.

The card uses more papers from Echo Park, found in the Mon Cheri kit. I really love this kit! I paired it with Verve's Dream Big, the sentiment is perfect for Valentine's Day.