Colorful Season Beach Chairs

With Labor Day Weekend being the last official weekend of the Summer, I thought this fun, beachy card was a good one to share today.

I used the Timeless Textures stamp set to create the sandy beach & water background and then sponged the sky using some die cut clouds as masks. The frame of the beach chairs are stamped over the background using Basic Black ink. Next the colorful part of the three chairs was stamped using the kissing technique.

To do this, ink up your solid image real well in a lighter color, in this case that is the canvas chair image from Colorful Seasons, and set it aside. Next, ink up a textured image in a darker color...I used both the polka dot image from Timeless Textures and the chevron pattern image from Work of Art. Use the inked, textured image to "stamp" or "kiss" your solid image stamp before using it to stamp onto your paper. This creates a fun, patterned chair instead of the plain, solid ones.

Colors of ink used:
Background: Crumb Cake, Pool Party & Bermuda Bay
Chairs: Berry Burst/Fresh Fig, Pumpkin Pie/Berry Burst & Bermuda Bay/Tranquil Tide

I hope you enjoy the last weekend of summer, whether it's squeezing in one last trip to the beach or perhaps a BBQ with family and friends...Autumn will be here before we know it. Yet again...Summer flew by way too quickly!

Special Reason Sweet Baby Girl Page

I've been busy doing a little scrapbooking this past week. Why is it that every time I get busy with a project (especially scrapbooking!) it looks like a tornado went through my studio!?

I swear....every flat surface is covered with a pile of supplies. Because I just have to pull out everything that could possibly work on my pages, and then decide nope, don't need that! I even had to drag in an extra table for my DSP!

Look at my messy desk...I end up with just enough space to barely work. Then I spend way too much of my precious stampin' time searching for things that I misplaced. It drives me nuts!  Please tell me I'm not the only one who does this! OK...rant over, and my space has been cleaned, so time to share my page.


I had a  "special reason" in mind when I purchased the Special Reason Bundle...creating some pages featuring our new grand daughter. I decided to use one of my favorite photos I took of her during our first official photo shoot for my first page. She was wearing a little purple headband...so I wanted to use purple on my layout...off to a good start!

I thought so...until I searched through stacks and stacks of beautiful paper (part of the reason for mess!) looking for the perfect print to use with the photo...only to realize I'm seriously lacking in DSP featuring a shade of purple anywhere near close to the headband! How could that be? Purple is one of my favorite colors, and I have enough pretty patterned paper to open a scrapbook store! (Don't tell my husband!) So I decided I needed to make my own Designer Series Paper.

Right now the closest shade that Stampin' Up! carries to the headband is Wisteria Wonder. I like the way it looks with Sahara Sand...which is featured in the lace printed paper from the Falling In Love pack, so I went with those two colors for this page.

In addition to the Special Reason stamp set I used Timeless Textures, Gorgous Grunge and Jar of Love (tiny flower and leaves) to create my own patterned paper. The tiny flower from Jar of Love is a smooth, solid image so I used the kissing technique with the burlap image in Timeless Textures to add some texture so they better coordinated with the flowers in the Special Reason stamp set. I die cut some of the leaves from the Mint Macaron Glimmer Paper that was available during SAB to add a little sparkle. I love that this set has a stamp and framelits to create layered labels, used here to record her name & age.

I used the retired Pennent Punch to create part of the title. I stamped the word "sweet" using the retired Occasions Alphabet set and punched them out with 1/2" Circle Punch. I made the bow using Wisteria Wonder Seam Binding Ribbon. I miss having the seam binding ribbon in the catalog...sure glad I stocked up on that before it retired.

Speaking of retiring...today is the day we find out which items in the current catalog will be retiring. Even after so many years as a SU! demo, I still have a hard time saying goodbye to my favorites. That's why I end up keeping most of my old sets!

Spring Butterfly

I had a busy weekend and then a workshop last night so I haven't got around to posting much lately. This is one of the cards that everyone made at the workshop last night. I kept it fairly simple since a large group was making the card. But since they were all experienced stampers and like to try different techniques, we did the kissing or faux shaving cream technique on the butterfly.My sample here shows the butterfly with the kissing technique. Simply ink your stamp in the lightest color, in this case Amethyst, then ink your wheel in a darker ink - I used Lovely Lilac, roll the wheel right over your inked stamp to create the "kissed" image, or for a marbled looking image, twist as you roll, this will create the faux shaving cream effect. (I forgot to take a pic of that...I'll try to do that later and add it)

Stamps: Simple Friendship, Sincere Salutations & Always in Bloom wheel
Card stock: Almost Amethyst, Pink Pirouette, Certainly Celery and Tea Party DP
Ink: Almost Amethyst, Pink Pirouette & Lovely Lilac
Accessories: Simple Flower Embosslit, Celery ribbon (SAB)& SS brads

I must say that my hostesses last night really spoiled everyone...me included! They served up a wonderful meal starting with creamy chicken knoki soup topped with bacon, followed by Chicken Marsala over pasta. For desert they made delicious chocolate crepes with strawberry sauce, drizzled in chocolate. I'm telling you...my mouth is watering just thinking about it! Plus they made the most adorable file folders as a party favor for everyone. (I'll take a pic and post later.) It was awesome! Thanks again Minnie & Becky...you rock!!!

Born on the 5th of July

Here's a couple pages I scrapped of my Aunt's 60th birthday party we went to on the 4th of July. (her actual b-day is on the 5th, hence the title). There are a lot of details that don't show up too well in this small pic, so click on the photo for a better view. You may remember me posting a red, white & blue gift set and matching card a few weeks ago. I told you it was for my Aunt who loves to stamp...well, this is from her party. You can see her about to open her SU! gift bag on the bottom left photo.

I used Deluxe Cuts Color Blocking templates to create this layout. I was lucky enough to pick up a whole stack of them along with a matching book at a garage sale not too long ago. I LOVE garage sales! You never know what you'll find! Anyways...these templates are great if you like to use a lot of photos on your pages.

This is my favorite embellishment that I created for this layout. I used the Big Bold Birthday set for the cupcake and the little red flower. The happy definition is from Define Your Life and the word happy is from So Very. (an SAB set from a year or so ago) I layered it on a Soft Sky prints paper. The punched flower is from the Boho Blossoms punch.

Some fun & exciting news for me: While I was looking through a slide show of convention photos, I came across 1/2 of a two page Halloween layout I had submitted to Stampin' Up! for one of their contests last year. It was on one of the display boards! That was pretty cool! However, I do wonder why they used the right side of the layout which reads "night" vs the left which could more easily stand on it's own? The right side reads "spooky" and I actually thought it was a little cuter. Oh well...it was still fun to see my page on a display board at convention! It's good to know that my hard work didn't go totally to waste. I have yet to recreate the 2 pages for my own scrapbook. If you want to see both pages, click here.

More news that I'm super excited about! Stampin' Up! has teamed with Sizzix and will be offering the Big Shot die-cut machine! Along with several SU! exclusive dies! I've been wanting some type of die cutting/embossing machine for a while now, but held off since I couldn't incorporate it with my business. Now I will finally get one!!! WOO HOO!!!

Birthday Whimsy Scrapbook Pages

I had fun creating these pages of my youngest son on his 10th birthday. I think I'm a bit behind...as he is now 17! Oh well...at least they are done now. I liked the way they turned out so thought I'd share them here today. Just click on photo to see detail.

I used the Whimsy jumbo wheel down the side of each page then added cut out balloons to the lines for a festive border for my pages. By using the new textured card stock and lots of double stitched ribbon, these pages have some nice texture going on which I like. To add even more texture I dry embossed some dots on one of the thin strips of cardstock and I also used the kissing technique when I stamped the numbers.

If you've never tried the kissing technique with your stamps, (then you must not really love them! ;-) this is how to do it: First ink your bold image with a light color of ink - in this case I inked my number stamps in Soft Sky. Then you are ready to "kiss" your stamp onto another textured stamp inked in a darker color. Here I used the Canvas background which was inked in Blue Bayou. This acts as sort of an "ink pad" when pressing my numbers onto it before stamping them. This technique is a great way to add texture to any bold image.

Stamps: Birthday Whimsy, Canvas, Celebrate Everything, It's Your Birthday, Headline Numbers
Card stock: Mellow Moss, Blue Bayou, Purely Pomegranate, Soft Sky
Ink: Mellow Moss, Blue Bayou, Purely Pomegranate, Soft Sky, VersaMark
Accessories: Photo Corner punch, Word Window punch, White EP, Crop-A-Dile, Mellow Moss eyelets, Soft Sky & Pomegranate double-stitched ribbon

Have a whimsical day!

Spooky Night

I can finally share the scrapbook pages I submitted to Stampin' Up! for their monthly contest back in August. I think they turned out awesome, (if I do say so myself!) but I guess it wasn't what they were looking for in a winning entry. Bummer! When I saw the category was pages created with a Halloween theme I thought for sure I had a chance (anyone who knows me knows I am a Halloween freak!)...so much so I had even picked out my free stamp sets! (now I know why my Grandma used to say, "don't count your chickens before they're hatched!" hehehe)

Oh well...better luck next time I guess. Now it just bums me out that all I have left are the these scanned images...wahhhhhhhhh! Guess I need to get busy and re-create them again for me to keep this time. Please note: to view these at full size, please click on images.

I absolutely love these photos of my boys in front of our graveyard entrance. (don't worry, I did not go into those details in my journaling to SU! hehehe They probably would have eliminated me just based on being weird enough to have my own graveyard!) Anyways...back to my layout. The title was stamped with Big Deal alphabet in matching color ink to card stock, but before I stamped it I used the kissing technique* with the Canvas background inked in Basic Black. I used my Stamp-a-ma-jig to add the spider, bat & cat from Batty For You to the letters. (used my black marker to ink just the image and not the words from those stamps) Each letter was cut out and matted on Gable Green card stock that was stamped in Wild Wasabi with the Canvas background...and cut out yet again...yes, I'm a glutton for punishment!.

The strip of Gable Green card stock in the middle also served as a pocket for my journaling tags. I hand lettered each of those in a spooky, dripping font. To do that all I did was pencil in my letters - penciling first allows me to figure out spacing and my mistakes can easily be fixed. After I had my spacing down, I went over the letters using my black journaling pen- I lettered all in caps. Then I went back and added the drips coming down off the letters...ooooh spooky! You might have noticed the black gingham ribbon with the pumpkin and black colored accents? I did that by taking the black gingham and running it over my Pumpkin Pie ink pad.

For the background I used the Spooky Skyline jumbo wheel, but I also have a hint to go along with that: When I wheel 2 pages straight across like I did here, I like to wheel them both together so that when they are next to each other in the scrapbook they are one continuous pattern. I used a bit of low tack artist's tape on the back of the card stock so I didn't have to worry about them moving while I was rolling them. Same goes with the Pumpkin Pie strip. I even kept the tape in place while using the Tearing Edge..

Stamps: Batty For You, Big Deal alphabet, Canvas background and Spooky Skyline jumbo wheel

Ink: Basic Black, White Craft, Perfect Plum, Pumpkin Pie & Wild Wasabi

Card stock: Basic Gray, Perfect Plum, Pumpkin Pie & Gable Green

Accessories: Black brads, Black Gingham ribbon, Round Tab, 1-3/8, 1-1/4 & Ticket Corner punches, Tearing Edge & Stamp-a-ma-jig .

*For those who don't know what the kissing technique is: Take a solid image stamp and "ink it up" by pressing it onto an inked up stamp with lots of pattern, and stamp as usual. This will transfer the pattern to solid image and make it textured looking. Hopefully I explained this OK. If you have any questions...just ask away..

Now I'm just wondering what the winning layout looked like? Oh well, my layout is still a winner in my book...oh wait...it isn't in my book now is it??? Gosh, I better stop before I make myself even more disappointed, hehehe. If anyone reads this and wants to make me feel a bit better - by all means post your comments! It's always nice to get a few comments - lets me know someone is actually looking at my blog.

That's what I call a mighty big blossom!

I finally had a chance to sit and play with my new Big Blossom stamp. Like it's name implies, it definitely is a big blossom! I can already tell that this one is going to be a lot of fun to try different techniques with. On both of my samples shown here I used the kissing technique. Before you jump to conclusions, no that doesn't mean I was kissing my new stamp because I was so lonely down in my rubber room!


Kissing is a technique where you ink one stamp and then press it against another stamp to pick up the ink and the design. The Big Blossom is perfect for this because it is so large and bold. I used craft ink because it is thicker and stays wet longer, which makes it perfect for transferring to another stamp. I hope I explained this well enough. If not, ask me next time we stamp and I can show you better in person than I can describe it here...plus I'm hurrying because Desperate Housewives is almost on! ;-)


On the first card I used the Canvas background inked in Orange craft ink and kissed it to my Big Blossom stamp which I then stamped on Apricot. I thought the Polka Dot Posies set would make a perfect center to this flower along with the "enjoy your day" stamp from the Riveting set.


The next card uses the Paisley background inked with white Craft ink, kissed onto the Big Blossom and then stamped on Pixie Pink card stock. I dry embossed the Bashful Blue background using the classy brass embossing template called Seeing Spots. For the center I used the thanks stamp which is also from the Riveting hostess set.

Hope you like these cards! Off to watch Desperate Housewives!