Summer Cards . . .

This is a card I made for summer this year:

For the card base I used kraft card stock. Used the LDRS "Quilted Plaid" cover plate die for the white card front. Used a rectangle frame die from the stash and cut out the green gingham frame for the card front. For the half watermelon I used scrap card stocks and cut out a watermelon from an older Taylored Expressions watermelon die set. I die cut the "happy summer" summer border die from Lawn Fawn using silver poster board from the Dollar Tree for the "happy summer". I trimmed that to size for the card front. I added red and green gems from the stash. To add a little sparkle and shine to the card front I used clear Wink of Stella over the black seeds on the watermelon:

Fun to dig through the stash and use products on hand..... or so I thought..... off to the 4th of July cards....

Plan in place for the 4th of July cards and I wanted to use the WaffleFlower Postage Collage die and stencil set they have for the 4th of July. Simple plan.... or so I thought.... 

First night after work I die cut all the postage collage card fronts using the postage collage die. Using red and navy blue inks from Catherine Pooler I stenciled the card front. Set those aside. I then cut out the mat pieces for the front of the cards as well as the card bases. 

Second night the plan was to stencil all the stars and the background stars from the stencil..... First problem???  The red and navy inks bled when I would add anything over them - white ink, stencil paste, etc.... grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Third night - let's begin again -- had to cut all new stencil collage die pieces for the card fronts and I used a red ink from another company and a blue ink from another company..... tried to keep my stencil paste to a minimum on these cards not knowing what would happen..... so on these cards I used a yellow ink for the little stars as accents rather than try a stencil paste or anything else. So happy I had in my stash a jar of the TCW Stencil Butter paste and here is a photo of one of the final cards that I made:

The TCW stencil butter paste was used for the stars on the flag, the hat, as well as the banner. This paste was easy to use and it did not alter the colour or texture over the second inks I used for my cards that other pastes I had in my stash did.... this process has been over 2 weeks so I am glad I was finally able to get card fronts I could use for the July 4th cards. Really like the postage collage stencil sets that are available - you can use it as a one piece card front or cut them apart to arrange on other card fronts or tags, etc.. Just happy I was able to find products that work well together so I could get these cards in the mail BEFORE the holiday.....

Crepe Paper BOO Day Embellishments

Crepe paper flowers were made following a pattern from Septeria I had seen on YouTube long ago. I made orange, black, pink, and purple flowers. (The camera shows the purple as dark blue but they are purple):

For my flowers I used 7 layers of crepe paper and used a 1 3/4" circle pattern I have in my stash to trace onto the crepe paper for my circle. Used scissors to cut the circle stack out:

As shown in the video I used a small stapler and stapled the center of the circle stack to keep them together. Then I scrunched up each layer and here is what the flower looked like before I opened it up:

Once all the flowers were opened I put them in a scrap cardboard box and sprayed them with a can of spray starch to help the flowers keep their shape since crepe paper is thinner:

The spray starch gives them some shape but they are not overly stiff. Once thoroughly dry I put the flowers in a box with the Witch Brooms I had made before for storage for upcoming BOO Day projects:

Also made two orange fringe flowers - shown in photo with pink flowers:

Also made some crepe paper fringe for gift bags or tags for future projects using 6 layers of the crepe paper - black, orange, and pink layered with hot glue and I used the fringe scissors by M Stewart for those:

The fringe strips do not have the spray starch on them as they hold the scrunched shapes well. Easy embellishments to make for Halloween projects ahead!

Whisper Blossom Thank You Card

Brass & Bliss (used to be RubberneckerStamps) recently had a sale and I bought their Whisper Blossom Die set. I wanted to put together a card using this die set using other stash items. Here is the die set packaging:

Here is a photo of the finished card I made:

The card stock base is white card stock, cut and scored at the top. For the front of the card I used a piece of light pink card stock. I wanted to use a cover plate for the card front so I looked through the stash and decided on a lattice looking die from Gina Marie Designs that I had picked up at a stamp show I had attended:

I cut the cover plate die out of white card stock. To adhere this die cut piece to the light pink card stock for the card front I used Artist-Tac. Once the lattice was adhered to the pink card stock I used liquid glue to put this layer onto the white card stock base. Set this aside.

Used scrap card stocks for the green stem, leaves, and a darker pink for the flower pieces. I used inks to blend over the stem and flower pieces. With that done I used two layers of flowers for both the larger and smaller flowers using liquid glue to put them together.. For the circle in the center of the flowers I used a small circle punch from the stash and punched out a circle from silver holographic card stock. Used liquid glue to put the circle on the centers of the flowers. Used foam tape for dimension on the flower backs:

Used liquid glue to put the stem/leaves on the card front.  Wanted to use a hot foil greeting on the front of the card so I used a hot foil plate from Spellbinders - "All You Need Sentiments" which is a Glimmer of the Month set that I bought on sale at Spellbinders. This hot foil set has the word plates as well as matching dies to cut out the sentiments. I used thin foam tape to put this on the card front:

Easy card to put together using stash supplies - card stock scraps, a cover plate die, hot foil plate and die set, as well as holographic gems on the card front. 

More BOO Day Embellishment Parts

Of course when Stampin Up had released the Bewitching Bundle I had not seen this and I did not order it.... but had seen projects here and there from this bundle I liked but not the SU price..... forgot about it until I wanted to make Halloween embellishments and I liked that witch hat that punch made.... went to Ebay and put in a watch for the SU Bewitching Bundle so I could decide what price I was willing to pay with my craft room budget...... there were a lot of the sets on Ebay but for $50, $60, or higher with shipping. . . too high for my budget.  No hurry so just put in the watch and waited.... Finally a price I was willing to pay and the condition is mint..... my set arrived this week and here is the stamp set:

and the stamps:

and the matching punch:

To start with I wanted to make up the witch hats using glittered black card stock. I soon discovered the only glittered black card stock I have is scraps - so I need to buy more - but the scraps I have have a white core. Punched out all the hats from the glittered card stock and then I punched out hats using scrap solid black card stock. I used liquid glue to put the solid card stock behind the glittered card stock. (I wanted the back of the hats to be black on my projects I will use them on).  Once those layers were dry I used a black Sharpie pen to go around the edges of the hats to cover the white edges. I used glittered green card stock for the band across the hat. To put the green band onto the glittered black card stock hat I used Beacon 3 in 1 glue. Set those aside to dry. 

Using small flowers from the stash I added a flower to the hat bands using hot glue. Here are the finished hats:

To punch out hats with hat pointing in one direction I punched out the hats with the glittered black side facing up. To get the hat pointing in the other direction I turned the glittered black card stock over, with the white side up, and punched out the hats. Here is a better photo of the hats showing the glittered card stock:

I turned over a few finished hats to show the Sharpie marker covered the white edges:

Happy I was able to find this bundle on Ebay for a better price than SU originally sold it for and in the condition it is! These witch hats will look good on matchbook holders, treat bags/boxes, or on a Halloween embellishment banner. The punch makes a good size witch hat so they can even be used alone on a project. 

Fall Embellishments

Used items from the stash to make some fall embellishments for holiday projects ahead. First I made these banner embellishments:

First I made the folded banners using card stocks from the stash and the Ruffles and Doiles die set from Coco & Reno. I used liquid glue to keep that folded. Wanted to add more gold across the front of the banner so I used a die set from Sunny Studio and I used their rick rack die and cut out some gold foil poster board from the DollarTree:

For this banner:

It is hard to see but I did not want a wide rick rack piece so after I had die cut a regular piece with the rick rack die I then put this die on the edge of the cut poster board with a little of the gold foil showing and die cut that again - this gave me two die cut rick rack pieces:

Here are the two pieces die cut from one pass in the machine:

Here is a better photo showing the thinner rick rack piece across one of the banners:

For the rosettes I used the Sizzix rosette die set:

I used hot glue to put these together using my make-shift tool so I did not touch the hot glue:

The tool is one of the handles for ink blending and on the bottom of this tool I have glued with E6000 a circle of my brown craft no stick mat:

Used my circle patterns from 110# weight card stock to cut out two pieces of sparkle tulle to put on top of the rosettes:

I wanted to use a gold foil circle behind the banner in the center for the rosette to be in front of. Once I punched out the 2" circles I decided to put three of those behind the banner and I did that using liquid glue. To make these circles more sturdy I cut a piece of white 110# weight card stock one inch wide by 3 1/4" long and I used tear and tape to add this to the back of the circles:

Using two word dies from ScrapDivaDesigns I cut the words out of the gold poster board and the shadow pieces from solid card stock scraps. Used liquid glue to put the words onto the solid shadow pieces and set those aside to dry. With the rick rack pieces across the banner pieces I used tear and tape to put the banners onto the gold circles. Then used liquid glue to put rosette in the center of the banner. Used a dab of liquid glue to put the tulle on the rosette front. Used gold metallic thread to put on top of the tulle and then hot glue to put the word/shadow piece across the front of the rosette. Added holographic sequins to the banners for some sparkle and shine:

Also made some of the embellished ticket embellishments I had seen long ago made by Septeria on YouTube. Used scraps for mine and a ticket corner punch:

Here is a photo of how to make the tickets using her pattern:

In the photo the green piece, 1 1/4" wide by 2" long is the larger ticket that is the bottom ticket. The piece on the right is the top ticket and that is 1" wide by 1 3/4" long. I used a ticket (photo punch) punch for the corners for both sizes and with all four corners punched these look like tickets - like the plaid piece on the lower right of the photo. I used foam tape to put the smaller ticket on the bottom ticket piece for dimension. I used a 1" circle punch and punched out a circle from solid card stock. Used a 7/8" circle punch for the second circle on top of that. Used liquid glue to stack those. 

For the small banner under the pumpkin I used the Sentiment Banner die set from Pink & Main. For the little pumpkin I used a 1/2" circle punch and punched out three circles. I sponged the edges of those and put them together with liquid glue. Cut a stem using scissors and glued that to the back of the pumpkins. Added some small gems from the stash to the front of the tickets. 

Fun embellishments to make for Fall and Thanksgiving projects and happy to use more dies from the stash and more of the scrap card stocks. 

Worth the wait - - -

Lots of YouTube videos on new products introduced at the Creativation 2025 trade show in Seattle in April featuring new tools/products for paper crafters. I had seen a couple of videos showing the new Pear Blossom Press "Cardmaker's T-square A2" ruler/jig. This was put together by Amanda Stevens (owner of Pear Blossom) with help from JourneyCoachJenn who is Jenn Gross from FunStampersJourney. This new t-square ruler is a must have for layering pieces on card fronts. Here is a photo of the product as it is packaged:

This ruler has a "jig" for two size panels - one panel is 3/8" smaller than the card front and the other size is 1/2" smaller than the card front. You can use these a single panels or layer them. I made up three samples using a light gray card base that is cut and scored at the top to show these. The first is the white panel that I cut for the 3/8" size:

This second one has a green panel for the 1/2" side of the ruler:

This next photo shows the two size panels layered onto the card base:

This ruler/jig works really well in keeping the border on the card base straight and even but on the ruler there is no markings as to what size you need to cut your panel pieces.  For the 3/8" panel you need to cut your panel 3/4" smaller than the card base so your panel will be 3 1/2" x 4 3/4". The half inch panel needs to be cut to 3 1/4" x 4 1/2".  To make using this ruler easier I used my clear labels and made a label for each size. I put the clear label on both the 3/8" side of the ruler and the 1/2" side. This way when I use the ruler for the panels I will know what size my panels need to be. Here is a photo showing my clear labels on this ruler for future use:

When I placed my order I ordered one for my PIC (stamping Partner In Crime) also and I also made her a clear label with the panel sizes on it so she will have that for her ruler also. I did not put it on the ruler as I do not know if she would want it on there but I put it in the bag for her with her ruler:

Also the pink dots on the ruler is for centering a sentiment strip or a focal piece for your card. In this photo I cut a scrap piece of card stock to show how easy centering items on your card fronts will be using this ruler:

This ruler has the centering dots for both landscape and portrait cards so I will get lots of use out of those for sentiments! Happy some crafters were able to put this product out there for us as not only does it help keep panels straight but sentiments/focal points centered and straight! Thanks to Amanda and Jenn for putting their heads together on this product!

One Rom Com equals a bunch of flowers ......

Had recently bought the Desert Rose Flower die from Scrapdiva Designs during her 25% off sale. That arrived last week and happy me there was a rom com on cable so I turned that on while I cut the flowers out using her die:

Nice having one plate that cuts out all the flower pieces. I used scrap card stocks to make my flowers so happy more scraps were used up:

Used the three section organizers from the Dollar Tree that I had in my stash to organize all the flower petals by colour. Once they were all cut out I started to make the flowers -- it took me a few days after work here and there to get them assembled and am about 3/4 of the way through these:

I used different gems from the stash - pearls, crystal gems, flat stickers for the flower centers as I made the flowers.

When I finish making  the flowers I put them all in a clear box with a lid so I can easily see the colours I would need for whatever project I am working on. Happy to have this die set/plate as these flowers are very easy to put together and a nice size as well... Certainly happy I was able to get 25% off the regular price during her sale!! :0)

Most of the flowers I assembled and then put them in the box.  I will shape the flowers as I am putting them on projects I am making so they do not get smashed in the box.....