Inky Friends: Tropical Chic

My Inky Friends and I are ready for a big Annual Catalog kickoff, and want to share some projects with some of our new favorites from this Annual Catalog!

If you are following along in order, you just arrived from the lovely Shelly Zarling's blog where she featured Rooted in Nature!

I am using Tropical Chic. This stamp set caught my eye in the new catalog immediately! I knew that I would be able to use it in so many ways, and with so many other sets. I could not wait to get it home!

This is my very first creation with this set. I was going for the feel of a Hawaiian shirt, which my hubby loves to wear for weddings, graduations, and other special events in the summer time.

I stamped the images in Granny Apple Green and Gray Granite on Thick Whisper White, then used the Subtle embossing folder on the panel. Divine, I tell you!! Pinewood Plank has some competition now. 😄

Look at that delicious texture!! I am quite smitten, I tell you.

Inside got a bit of stamping too.

Next, I felt the need to play with some sponge-and-spritz color blending on watercolor paper. This is Shaded Spruce, Call Me Clover, and Granny Apple Green.

Here is a video I did showing the sponge-and-spritz technique.

The sentiment strip is a piece of watercolor paper with the sentiment stamped in Shaded Spruce, then I used the stitched line die from Stitched Labels framelits to add that detail.

Some leaves die cut from Granny Apple Green are tucked under the sentiment panel.

Inside, the leaf branch is inked up first in Granny Apple Green, then Call Me Clover and Shaded Spruce are sponged onto the stamp before stamping onto the card panel repeatedly.

For this card, I started by stamping a bunch of the fan leaves and the filler leaves images in Granny Apple Green, some of them stamped off first.

Then I stamped a bunch of Lovely Lipstick and Grapefruit Grove flowers, die cut them, then embossed with the Subtle embossing folder.

Then the flowers were adhered to the card panel.

The words were die cut using the Celebrate You thinlits from Gold Foil and Granny Apple Green and adhered to a 2" wide strip of vellum with Fine Tip Glue Pen.

Then stitched down to the stamped panel with my sewing machine. Seriously, stitching is so simple, requires no special machine, and no special skills.

And you know it, the inside got some love too!

That is it for me! I hope you have seen some of the potential this set has to offer, and get yours soon!

Time to go see what Sara Mattson-Blume has created with Enjoy Life!

Stamp Review Crew: Beautiful Bouquet

Well, it is a new Stampin' Up! year, kind of. The 2018-19 Annual Catalog just went live, and everyone is abuzz with the goodies we all want. Right. Now. But you know what? I bet all of us have stamp sets in our stash that we could not wait to get, but once we got them, we didn't do anything with them! Beautiful Bouquet is the set we are featuring this time, and it is such an awesome set!

What is the Stamp Review Crew, you ask? We are an international group of Stampin' Up! demonstrators that gets together to do a blog hop on the first and third (and sometimes on a fifth) Monday of each month. For each hop we chose a single stamp set for us all to use, and then we let our creativity loose! We have a blog with all of the hops archived, so you can hop through any of the hops any time. Click here to go to the blog to see all of the hops! To go to the specific post for this hop, click here, or on the banner above.

If you are following along in order, then you have just arrived from the delightful Dawn Tidd's blog.

My hubby and I just had our 28th wedding anniversary! And this stamp set is pretty perfect for all things wedding and anniversary.

There are so many fantastic and touching sentiments in this set, you might find yourself sending cards for occasions you don't usually send them for! I know I try to remember the anniversaries in my family, but I don't often send cards.

For the background, I did a wash of Pineapple Punch, Grapefruit Grove, and Poppy Parade. Drying and layering more color on a couple of times. That is what gives it the depth and variation that I love.

Then I stamped and die cut a bunch of flowers in the same colors, and the addition of Mango Melody. And leaves die cut from Granny Apple Green and Call Me Clover.

The sentiment is Copper Heat embossed on a strip of Thick Whisper White and adhered to the watercolor panel. Of course, I stitched around the watercolor panel.

Then all of the flowers and leaves were adhered with liquid glue or  mini dimensionals.

Yes, there was a lot of fiddling and moving of flowers involved and this took much longer than it should have. 😏

The inside is finished off with more stamping, and I did do a bit of masking here also.

For this card I started out using the Wreath Builder jig and the twig image. I was going to do an entire twig wreath, but when I got halfway around, I was inspired to do it half twig half floral! It seemed very masculine and feminine, and very wedding appropriate!

Now, I will confess that I almost did a watercolor wash night sky in purples and blues. But I thought I should try something else as I had just done a wash.

(you all have no idea how hard I have to try to not do watercolor washes constantly. for reals)

So I went straight to my other favorite, woodgrain everything! 😁

And copper embossing on vellum.

The flower image was stamped in progressively lighter shades of purple. Starting with Blackberry Bliss, then Fresh Fig, Rich Razzleberry, and finally Berry Burst.

Add some single leaves in Shaded Spruce.

Diecut some flower clusters in Berry Burst and Fresh Fig. Use the leftover Call Me Clover leaves from the previous card. They coordinate well with the Shaded Spruce, lucky for me! 😎

The Stamparatus helped with the shading on the flowers on the inside. I stamped the whole flower images first with Berry Burst, then add Blackberry Bliss on the bottom portion of the image, dabbing some of the ink off where it should fade into the Berry Burst.

The twigs were stamped in Crumb Cake.

That's it for me! Next up is the fabulous Kelly Kent!

 

Stamp Review Crew: Sweet Cupcake

Wow, this is the last SRC hop before the new catalog starts! Can you believe it?! This time we are featuring Sweet Cupcake stamp set. It is such a fun stamp set, and has a wonderful coordinating die set!

For those who are new to the Stamp Review Crew, here is a little background. We are an international group of Stampin' Up! demonstrators that gets together on the first and third Mondays of every month to do a blog hop. Each hop features a single stamp set to give you loads of inspiration for that set! The hops are archived at the Stamp Review Crew blog, and you will be able to click through each hop at any time, going directly to the posts for that hop whenever you want! And you can click on the banner of this post to go to the master blog roll for this hop also.

If you are following along in order, you just arrived from Jay Soriano's blog. I am certain that he has come up with a something completely amazing!

Here I did a quite watercolor wash with Melon Mambo, Pumpkin Pie, and Daffodil Delight.

The cupcake frosting layers with stamped using the Stamparatus with an ombre of the same colors. Then the last layer was stamped again in Versamark and clear heat embossed.

The sentiment is stamped on the banner from the die set, and it handily pops itself up!

Eastern Medallion dies with some coffee filters (I am at my daughter's apartment and forgot to bring vellum, oops!) create a fun doily behind the die cut cupcake.

I was a little obsessed with the frosting image, which looks like poop to me too. I really wanted to make unicorn poop, but I didn't have any sentiments with me that would work for that. So lots of colorful frosting it is!

Stay tuned for unicorn poop at a later date 😉

The only embossing folder I have at my daughter's house is the Pinewood Plank embossing folder, but it seems to work for just about everything.

OK, that's it for me. I am hoping to really get my mojo going again soon. Family life has been crazy, but I think it is getting to the point that I can actually think about crafting outside of "Oh crap! I have a deadline today!"  😂


And now, Holly Krautkremer! Holly has been wonderfully helpful the last month or so with the hops as I have been less available. Be sure to leave her some extra love when you check out her lovely creation!

Scrapbook Sunday

Welcome to another Scrapbook Sunday, keeping you inspired to create your own pages. This month our theme is Floral.

These two young ladies are having such a grand time on the carousel at the Bemidji Water Carnival! I pulled the roses from horse on the left, and the colors from both horses. And the gold fancy details are a nod to the grandeur of the carousel design.

I used the Stitched All Around bundle from the 2018-19 Annual Catalog for the sentiment 

I apologize for the photography, I am at my daughter's apartment again, without my lighting system! And I spent all of my daylight hours between the Farmer's Market, garage saling, and cooking with the awesome fruits and veggies we scored at the Farmer's Market.

I used the Stamparatus to do the flowers, then fussy cut them. The Stamparatus saved me a ton of time, as I was working with my Spot sized ink pads, and they are getting a mite dry. So each layer of each flower is stamped at least twice!

The gold leaves are from the Petals and More die set.

Next up is the amazing organizer of this hop, Jenny Hall!

My Inky Friends: A Fond Farewell

Well, it is that time of year again. Time to say goodbye to some well loved stamp sets to make room for new stuff. OK, really I don't necessarily say goodbye. They just move to a different, but equally accessible, spot in my craft room to be used whenever I feel like it. Maybe you are like me in that respect 😁

If you are following along in order, you have just arrived from Mickey Robert's blog where she shared projects with So Many Shells.

I am using a sweet and adorable set, Little One, that I have only used a couple of times. I love it, and can't wait to play with it some more.

I could not resist making a wreath with the botanical image, and woodgrain just felt so right for the DSP and the embossing.

The teepee is black heat embossed on watercolor paper, watercolored, then fussy cut.

The sentiment is white heat embossed on vellum. 

And another angle. I made this card while at my daughter's apartment. I actually brought a few items with me this time, so I had a little more to chose from. It is good to have a limited supplies challenge sometimes. Far fewer shiny squirrels 😉

Next up is Cindy Elam with Happiest of Days! I am sure it is delightful!

Stamp Review Crew: Pop of Paradise

Hello stamping friends! I am going to jump right in and say that we are featuring one of my all time favorite sets, Pop of Paradise! I think it has been missed by many in the Annual Catalog, and now this is it's last hooray.

For those who are new to the Stamp Review Crew, here is a little background. We are an international group of Stampin' Up! demonstrators that gets together on the first and third Mondays of every month to do a blog hop. Each hop features a single stamp set to give you loads of inspiration for that set! The hops are archived at the Stamp Review Crew blog, and you will be able to click through each hop at any time, going directly to the posts for that hop whenever you want! And you can click on the banner of this post to go to the master blog roll for this hop also.

If you are following along in order, you just arrived from Dawn Tidd's blog. I can't wait to see what awesomeness she has come up with!

You would think that since I love this set so much, I would have a bunch of projects to show you. But alas, my life is at a new level of chaotic right now, and this is all I had time to pull off. And I may be late to work today to get this done. 😨

I wanted to do something with a black flamingo, so here you go!

And now, Holly Krautkremer! I can't wait to see what layering genius move she has come up with this time 😊