Lift Me Up Masculine Birthday

Here's a quick and cheery card using the Lift Me Up Bundle that is perfect for a guy or girl for any occasion. This great stamp set and it's coordinating dies will be available in the upcoming annual catalog, but they will no longer be featured at a cost saving bundle.

I used the retired Sleigh Ride Edgelits to cut the hill and pine tree out of the soon to be retiring Cucumber Crush cardstock. This color wasn't really one of my favorites, but I've been trying to use up my stash and have grown to really like it. For some added interest I stamped it with the line stamp from Gorgeous Grunge...one of my most used sets. How will I resist grabbing it all the time now that it's retiring?

The background is stamped with balloons and some clouds and then sponged. The largest balloon was stamped, diecut and popped up with Stampin' Dimensionals.

Have a beautiful day!

Lift Me Up Balloon Glow

I'm so happy to see that one of my favorite stamp sets from the Occasions Catalog will be in the upcoming Annual Catalog! Every year the town I live in has a huge Balloon Festival where balloonists come from all over to compete. It really is a treat for the eyes to see all the gorgeous colors as dozens of balloons inflate and take launch! In the evening many of the balloons return to the launch site to do a balloon glow. It really is quite spectacular!

When I purchased the Lift Me Up stamp set and the Up & Away Thinlits, I knew that I was going to use them to scrap some of the photos I took at last years festival. Here's one of the pages.

I used the Cupcakes & Carousels DSP, which is still available in the Occasions Catalog. I love this paper, but it's 6x6 size presented a little bit of a challenge to use on this 12x12 page. I had to get a little creative to hide seams and also used a larger piece of retired DSP from the Best Year Ever paper pack (retired SAB paper) for the main background.

The title was cut using the retired Little Letters Thinlits. Here's a closer look at the die cut balloon detail of my page.

I used a mix of both patterned paper and coordinating card stock for my balloon. The little pennant banner was fussy cut from one of the patterns in the Cupcakes & Carousels stack.

Thanks for visiting today!

Stepped Up Lift Me Up

My last blog posting a shared a cute, fairly simple card using the Lift Me Up stamp set. Todays card is a stepped up version.

This time I used Rich Razzleberry for the main panel and embossed it using the Festive Embossing Folder. I matted my image and also added some popped up, die cut clouds as well as a couple more balloons. I finished off the card with some Bakers Twine and a die cut flower and Basic Rhinestone. Here's a look at the two cards together.

Everyone who places a Sale-A-Bration order of $50 with me during the month of March and uses the Hostess Code will recieve a card kit to make these two cards + one more...which will remain a surprise! It will contain complete instructions as well as envelopes. I will ship out all the kits at the end of the month. Visit my stampin' store to order the supplies today.

Lift Me Up on Cloud Nine

I love this simple, yet cute and cheery card created with the Lift Me Up stamp set.

The background was created using die cut cloud masks and then sponged using Pool Party ink. The "hill border" at the bottom is one of my favorite images from the Delicate Details stamp set. It is is a FREE choice during Sale-A-Bration.

Colors used: Pool Party, Calypso Coral, Wild Wasabi, Peekaboo Peach & Rich Razzleberry.

Thanks for visiting today...check back to see my next post which will feature a Step it Up version of this card.

Lift Me Up Sugarplum

Here I've combined a favorite Occasions set, Lift Me Up, with a favorite Sale-a-Bration set, Delicate Details and used a favorite In Color...Sweet Sugarplum. The result is a super cute (if I do say so!) thank you card!

Since Delicate Details is a photopolymer set it is super easy to line up the images just where you want them to create a background like the one above which uses 4 of the 5 images in the set. To create the multi colored balloons, I first inked in the lightest color and then used a sponge dauber to add a darker color. I masked the balloons and then stamped the clouds.

Colors used: Sweet Sugarplum, Rich Razzleberry & Blushing Bride.

Thanks for visiting today!

Love is in the Air!

Valentine's Day is almost here...and the Lift Me Up Bundle was the perfect choice to make a cute card for my Valentine.

I just love the large, intricate die cut balloon and I was happy to see that after trimming away the top portion I could create a heart shaped balloon that is perfcet for Valentine's Day! I die cut Red, Silver & Gold Foil to paper piece the background of the balloon. I love that these dies has a die for each section of the balloon! Have I told you I LOVE these dies!???

I tried to keep this card more on the masculine side, but I couldn't resist adding a strand of the Gold Sequin Trim and some Red Glimmer Paper hearts. The large heart is included in the Up & Away Thinlit set and the tiny hearts are cut from a heart border die included in the Jar of Love Framelits.

The DSP along the bottom of the card is from This Christmas Specialty Paper.

Thnaks for visiting today...have a WONDERFUL weekend!

Up & Away Pretty Kitty

I love being able to combine favorite stamp sets to make something unique...so when I found that the flower pot kitty image from Pretty Kitty would work with the Up & Away Thinlits Dies I was "on cloud nine!" (to quote one of the sentiment stamps from the coordinating Lift Me Up stamp set!)

I stamped the kitty onto Shimmery White Card stock and cut away the flowers. Then I stamped the flower pot onto Falling In Love DSP hoping to make it look more like a basket rather than a flower pot. The pieces were then water colored using my Aqua Painter and the pot was paper pieced onto the Shimmery White layer.  The little banner was cut using the Balloon Framelits Dies. I had hoped to stamp "HELLO" using my Labeler stamp set, but the letters were too big, so I wrote it myself using my Sweet Sugarplum Marker.

For Flashback Friday I used the retired Cloudy Day Embossing Folder for the background. Too bad it's retired because it goes perfectly with the Lift Me Up Bundle!

Have an uplifting weekend!

Lift Me Up Z Fold Birthday

Recently when showing my husband some of my creations using items from the new Occasions Catalog, he remarked on a card using the Lift me Up Bundle, saying he hoped I made him a card using the hot air balloons for his upcoming birthday. His birthday was on Monday, so I came up with an extra special card for him.

Above is how it looks coming out of the envelope...but when it unfolds it looks pretty special.

The base of the card is Pacific Point cut to 4-1/4 x 1" and scored at: 2-3/4" & 5-1/2" The Whisper White layer measures 4 x 10- 3/4" It is sponged to create the cloudy sky background. I used cloud shapes die cut from post-it notes using the Up & Away Framelits. These are used as masks before I started to sponge on various shades of blue ink. I also sponged some Old Olive along the bottom to create a hillside.

The die cut hillside was created using 10-3/4 x 2-1/4" Old Olive cardstock and a retired set of dies called Sleighride Edgelits. I then stamped it with the nice cross hatch background stamp included in the You've Got This stamp set. It is then scored at 5-1/4" & 8".

Here's another look at the card from another angle.

As you can see, I cut down the sponged background layer so that it just fit inside each scored section of the card so that it will fold open and closed easily.

We celebrated his birthday a day early, on Sunday, when our family could be here. Besides the birthday boy, we had another guest of honor who stole the spotlight the entire evening...

our 5 day old granddaughter! Isn't she adorable all dressed up in her party dress for her very first party? As you can see, Grandpa didn't mind a bit sharing the spotlight! Our little sweetheart made his special day all the sweeter.

Thanks for visiting today!

Lift Me Up Baby Girl

Today I have some very exciting news to share and my news was the inspiration for this card...

If you are thinking my exciting news is that today is the first day of Sale-a-Bration and the Occasions catalog...you would only be partially right. While that IS exciting news, my news is even better than that! (for me and my family anyways!) Yesterday, January 3rd, we welcomed our first grandchild...a GIRL and she is HEALTHY and BEAUTIFUL!

It was love at first sight! Yesterday was truly one of the most incredible, emotional & memorable days of my life! I was blessed to be in the delivery room to witness the birth of our precious grand-daughter. Seeing my sons pride as he looked upon the face of his beautiful baby girl for the first time is a moment I will never forget. Baby Madelyn Ann came into the world at 3:55 PM weighing a whopping 9 pounds! Being the mother of two sons, it's going to be so much fun having a little girl to love and spoil...and turn into my little stampin' buddy!

I used the Lift Me Up Bundle - Lift Me Up stamp set and Up & Away Thinlits, to create this card. I stamped the background balloons right onto a piece of Falling In Love DSP. I thought this DSP was perfect as it looks like its covered with tiny floating hearts. During Sale-A-Bration, if you purchase the Lift Me Up Bundle and one other small item...such as the DSP used here, you would qualify to choose one SAB item...such as the Any Occasion stamp set for FREE!

The Any Occasion stamp set works well with the large hot air balloon die cuts, to add banners to the balloon for, you guessed it...Any Occasion! Along with the sentiments in this set, there are many little stamps included to decorate the stamped banners in this 20 pc photopolymer set. I also used another great SAB set to decorate the balloon...the scallop and dot border stamped on the Calypso Coral portion of the balloon is from the Delicate Details stamp set. Other colors used are: Flirty Flamingo, Blushing Bride and Peekaboo Peach.

If you would like to purchase any of these products, please visit my online store. Thanks for visiting today and letting me share my exciting news. :-)

Lift Me Up On Cloud Nine

Happy Friday! Here we are...the last Friday of 2016! It seems unreal just how fast this year has flown by! It flew by almost as swiftly as a hot air balloon...like that segue?! ;-)

Well, that segue may not have been the best...but this bundle sure is! I think if I were told I could only select ONE (that would be awful hard to just pick one! lol) bundle from the entire Occasions Catalog it would be the Lift Me Up Bundle...but I LOVE hot air balloons! Luckily for me, nobody told me I only had to select one bundle because there is a LOT of great new product available in the Occasions Catalog starting on January 4th.

The Up & Away Thinlits Dies are really cool...I love that I can cut the super detailed balloon as well as sections of solid pieces to layer behind it. It sure makes paper piecing easy! The hardest thing was trying t decide on colors. I chose a couple of the colors used from the awesome Cupcakes and Carousels DSP Stack. The patterns in this stack are great, and have a vintage feel to them which I love.

This is more than likely the last post of the year for me. I hope 2016 was a good year for you and I hope 2017 is even better! I wish you much happiness, good health and lots of creativity in the New Year!