Welcome Baby Abigail!

Well, we finally got a baby!  Abigail Lane made her first appearance at 1:20 pm on Tuesday 5/5 and weighed 7 lbs 2 oz.  Morgan ended up having a C Section.  Marianne and Greg are officially Mimi and Poppy and I am a Great Aunt!  Can't wait to see her and hold her in my arms although I know that will be a while with the panademic going on.

I just put this card in the mail to welcome Abigail!

I don't have many baby stamps but found this one (thanks to Evernote for organizing my stamps!)  I think it was in stamp set called Feathered Friends.  I don't have any of the other stamps in the set though.  I colored the image with my Blends.  The pink cardstock and DSP are non Stampin' Up.  I used Stitched Rectangle Dies.

This is the Mother's Day card I made for the new mommy!

This stamp set is also an oldie but a goodie.  I used the retired Jar of  Love with matching dies to create this card.  I love that jar.  I stamped it on watercolor paper and water colored a little bit of Pool Party for the water in the jar.  Interesting enough is that in the new catalog coming out in June there is a stamp set called Jar of Flowers and it is bundled with a Jar Punch. 

My Stamp Club met last week and we made some fun cards.  You can sure tell it's summer time though - I had a really low attendance this month.  But we had a good time anyway!  Now I'm patiently waiting for some new products to arrive via Mr. UPS!!

Here are the cards we made using some new products and some that have been gathering dust on my shelf!

Supplies: 

Ø  Ink:   Grapefruit Groove, Smoky Slate, Blueberry Bushel, Granny Apple Green  

Ø  Cardstock:   Very Vanilla Thick CS    

Ø  Stamps:    Jar of Love 

Ø   Framelits – Everyday Jars

Instructions:

Ø  Stamp background jars with Smoky Slate.

Ø  Stamp the string around the jars w/Grapefruit Groove

Ø  Stamp 1 jar in Whisper White and die cut.

Ø  Stamp a bow w/Grapefruit Groove and die cut.

Ø  Stamp about 5 stems of leaves w/Granny Apple Green & die cut.

Ø  Adhere leaves to card with glue.

Ø  Stamp sentiment on Jar in Blueberry Bushel ink.

Ø  Use dimensionals to adhere Blueberry Bushel Jar to card.

Ø  Adhere bow to jar.

Supplies: 

Ø  Ink:   Blueberry Bushel, Highland Heather, Flirty Flamingo, Black, Granny Apple Green

Ø  Cardstock:   Thick CS, Whisper White, Daisy DSP (retired)

Ø  Stamps:   Love What You Do

    White Twine & Dimensionals

Instructions:

Ø  Cut 3 panels at 3” x 4 1/8” & 3 panels at 3 ¼” x 4 3/8”

Ø  Stamp the flowers on the 3 smaller panels.

Ø  Stamp “thank” on the bottom of one panel; Stamp “you” on the bottom of one panel in black.

Ø  Tie white twine around 3^rd panel (that you did not stamp on bottom)

Ø  Mat the 3 panels onto the larger 3 panels with dimensionals.

Ø  Adhere strip of DSP in center of white card.

Ø  Adhere panels to card.

I love, love, love this stamp set!!

Supplies: 

Ø  Ink:  Black, Whisper White

Ø  Cardstock:   Thick CS, Rich Raspberry, Basic Black

Ø  Stamps: Serene Garden, Sheltering Tree (sentiment)

Ø  Framelits –Garden Scene Framelits

Ø  Subtle Embossing Folder

Ø  Stampin’ Blends

Instructions:

Ø  Emboss flower (framelit) in bottom corner of Thick card; fold in half

Ø  Stamp image onto White CS (using Stamparatus).

Ø  Stamp & Die Cut single flower and butterfly.

Ø  Use Stampin’ Blends to color all images.

Ø  Stamp sentiment onto Rich Razzleberry strip of cardstock with White Ink (Use Embossing Buddy FIRST)

Ø  Emboss sentiment and cut flag at end.

Ø  Emboss sentiment w/the new Subtle Embossing Folder.

Ø  Adhere butterfly, single flower & sentiment with dimensionals.  Layer onto black cardstock & then onto card.

We had trouble getting the sun out of the framelit without tearing it up.  I suggest when you use these framelits, you sandwich a piece of wax paper between the cardstock and the framelit.

Supplies: 

Ø  Ink:  Pineapple Punch, Blueberry Bushel, Lovely Lipstick, Pool Party

Ø  Cardstock:   Soft Sea Foam, Blueberry Bushel, Whisper White, Pineapple Punch

Ø  Stamps:  Swirly Bird, You Are My Anchor (April Paper Pumpkin)  

Ø  Swirly Scribbles Thinlets, Duet Banner Punch, Seaside Embossing Folder

Instructions:

Ø  Die cut swirly sun

Ø  Stamp swirl from middle of die cut swirly piece (sun) with Pineapple Punch (or for darker image, use Daffodil)

Ø  Emboss Soft Sea Foam panel with Seaside Embossing Folder & adhere to Sea Foam card

Ø  Adhere “wave” & sun to card.

Ø  On scrap white paper, stamp sailboat – cut out.  Adhere w/dimensionals.

Ø  On scrap white paper, stamp sentiment & use Duet Banner Punch.  Adhere with dimensionals.

Sketch Swaps #2

These are the remainder of the Sketch Swap from Quarterly.  Hope you enjoy them!

This card by Carol Snow uses the Eastern Elegance and the Daisy stamp setts.  The pretty DSP is Delightful Daisy.

No name on this card but I love the Pretty Label punch she used.  The daisy is made with Vellum that she colored yellow and card stock.

This card is by my downline and travel buddy, Debbie Michael.  She put a lot of time into this card, folks!  It is a shaker card!!

Love these primary colors that Lisa Pressley used.  This Birthday Delivery set has grown on me and is now in my list of things to order.

Valentine Cards

Since it is almost Valentine's Day, thought I'd share a few of the cards I made for the occasion.  You have a couple of days to get your Valentine cards made.  I hope these will give you some inspiration!!

This first card I made using the Jars of Love stamp set, one of my favorites from the Annual Catalog.  I stamped the jars onto the DSP which is retired.  I think it was a Valentine pack from last year.  I punched little heart flowers with a small heart punch that is now retired also.  Pretty simple but different, don't you think?

This is my Valentine Grunge card.  I stamped the vertical lines in Smoky Slate from Gorgeous Grunge.  The little hearts scattered around are from Perpetual Birthday Calendar, which is a set I tend to use a lot for it's backgrounds.  You should check it out.  I stamped the hearts in Melon Mambo and Smoky Slate.  The "Love" heart is from last month's Paper Pumpkin kit.

This card was an easy one to make.  The DSP is a piece I found in my paper stash.  I die cut the heart and "love" from Sunshine Wishes Thinlits. I found a heart button in my button jar and thread the black thread through it and tied it around the white card.  Easy peasy!

I hope these cards are a help to you as you make your Valentines.

Hey Chick - Valentine

Happy Saturday!  I wanted to share another card we made last week at Stamp Club.  This is a cute Valentine card but you could also make it into a birthday card as several of my stamping friends did.  I used the darling chick from the Sale-a-Bration catalog - Hey Chick!  I just think he (or she) is adorable!!

I stamped the chick with Black Archival ink since I was planning on watercoloring and didn't want the colors to bleed.  I used the new watercolor pencils to color the chick.  The little hearts are from the Jar of Love set and the heart balloons are from Balloon Builders.  This proved a good lesson on masking.  We used a sticky note to mask the middle balloon after it had been stamped with Sweet Sugarplum ink and stamped the two balloons on either side.  I used a Sharpie Marker to draw in the balloon strings.

We are headed out this evening to watch the Charlotte Checkers hockey game.  This is the first time we've seen them play this year.  It's a fun outing.  We are going to try out the restaurant in the Bojangles Coliseum.  When Sonny and I were dating, one of favorite date nights was to watch the Checkers vs. the Greensboro Generals.  At the time, we both lived in Greensboro (where we met) and so we were pulling for the Generals.  There was always a fight that broke out between the two teams on the ice.  They were natural enemies I think!!  You know, a hockey game is not a good one unless there's a fight or two!

Make sure to check back tomorrow evening for the NC Demos Blog Hop.  We will be featuring products from Sale-a-Bration.  I will show you fun ways to use the Inside the Lines Designer Paper.