Purple Elephant

The final card from my class today features this super sweet retiring stamp Elebration! This is the first time I've used it for a baby girl, or ya know, a toddler girl's birthday. Hence the pink and purple-ness, and isn't purple a cute shade for the elephant? I love it! I also like this fun way of emphasizing the sentiment by repeating it and making a pattern. So there you have it!

Supplies:
Stamps: Elebration, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink: Basic Gray, Wisteria Wonder
Paper: Wisteria Wonder, Regal Rose, Whisper White card stocks
Accessories: In Color Printed Brads, Mat Pack, Watercolor Wonder Crayons, Blender Pens, White Bakers Twine

Retiring In Colors!

This is another card from my class, and it features retiring In Colors! Every color you see here will be gone May 31, ...except of course the white. LOL! This card was inspired by the Mojo Monday sketch for this week, but I made it a collage panel instead of more CAS like the sketch. (see my staggered line of flowers? its there, I promise)

Supplies:
Stamps: Vintage Vogue, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink: Concord Crush, Blushing Bride & Pear Pizazz markers
Paper: Pear Pizazz, Concord Crush, Whisper White card stocks
Accessories: Word Window Punch

You know what? I didn't think that greeting was crooked until I edited this picture....wow... LOL!

Embossing Daisies

Today was my card class! Here is one of the projects we made - all of the daisies are embossed! I think its appropriate for an orange or autumn wedding or shower gift, a birthday, or anything else a person may send a card for! It was inspired by the CAS sketch last week.
Also, both the Fifth Avenue Floral stamp set (flower) and the Sincere Salutations (words) are retiring soon! If you love them, order them soon!!!

Supplies:
Stamps: Fifth Avenue Floral, Sincere Salutation
Ink: Early Espresso, Versamark, Peach Parfait (for water coloring)
Paper: Peach Parfait, Early Espresso, Just Add Cake DP
Accessories: Blender Pens, Clear Embossing Powder

Another Layout!

Wow- two in a row! Yippee!! This is for my class next week, and I just use two punches to make it! Its simple and quick but very cute, and isn't that grass clever?! That's the Scallop Punch punched twice, the second time its offset to make choppy blades of grass! (Another bonus of being a demonstrator and getting the Stampin' Success magazine!) I also used the same Simply Scrappin' Kit as yesterday, but with Pretty in Pink for the base.

 (and a closeup for better detail)

Supplies:
Paper: Pretty in Pink, Pear Pizazz, Spring Fever SS Kit
Accessories: Scallop Edge Punch, Wide Oval Punch

Simply Scrappin!

Happy day - I got a project done! No stamping, but I do love the ease and convenience of Simply Scrappin' Kits. This one is in the Occasions Mini and therefore qualifies for the SU-Only Challenge blog this week! And I got a little scrapbooking done too! Lots of good things out of one little project!
These are the back-to-school photos I took last summer on our town's Main Street and at a local park. The three on the second page are framed and on the wall. I don't know why the photo of the pages is so cloudy...its a rainy day so I took it with little natural light, but I don't understand why its weird like that. Anyway, here's my first scrapping for April!

Supplies:
Paper: Spring Fever Simply Scrappin' Kit
Accessories: Daffodil Delight thin ribbon

Spring Break Part 2

Still no paper crafting or stamping yet. Instead, here are the before/after photos of the rooms we've tackled this week. It was a LOT of work, and we crammed it into three days, but it is SO nice now! Yeay!!

You can see that the previous homeowners painted the chair rail, baseboards and trim around the closets really dark colors. I have yet to figure out why. We also replaced closet door knobs, a light switch plate, and installed a ceiling fan in the hottest room in the house, lol. Best of all, the kids each got to help with some of the work and were the first to paint the new color on their walls!
I will post an update when we get curtains made and things hung on the walls, but I am really excited about how much we've accomplished. The rooms both look so much brighter and cleaner, just by changing up the paint!

and I WILL stamp this coming week! *grin

Spring Break Part 1

Yep, its Spring Break around here! I did just get my Stampin' Success magazine, which I would love to drool over and create from...and I got a big order from Snapfish too! I would really love some play time, but that will have to wait!
This Spring Break we are working on some home improvement projects, which I will share later, haha. So for today, I'll share a quick project I did a few weeks ago, finally!
I don't know if you remember my love for the Nautical Expedition suite that Stampin' Up! offered last year in their mini catalog, but you can check out my projects HERE. I also loooved the amazing DP. So much so that I didn't want to cut into it! (I know some of you can relate...giggle) However, I also didn't want it to just sit in my box of paper and collect dust. I asked a friend if it would be stupid to hang the paper up...? A few friends thought that was a great idea! So finally I found some square 12x12 frames that were affordable (as in, less than $25 each!) and hung these in my main-floor bathroom!! YEAY!!!

Here's more of the bathroom, with the lighthouse theme I have in there.

How's that for thinking outside the box? *grin!

Teacher Appreciation

This year I was crazy enough to sign up to be the room mother in one of my kids' classes. Since its teacher appreciation week, at our school we decorate each teacher's door with a poster for the week. This teacher's hobby is cake decorating so I played with that! Of course I used my stamping supplies, lol!

Actually I used quite a bit of retired DP and three of my punches. *grin. I used the Blossom Bouquet Triple Layer Punch, the Pennant Punch and the Bird Builder Punch. Oh, and a few brads. And the sticks are actually a bamboo skewer cut in half. Its kinda simple, but I am pleased with it.

and here's a closeup for detail...

Baby Boy

Some friends of ours are getting their first baby boy very soon! I got to pick out a few cute things to give them, and the little bath towel set I chose had an adorable monkey face on it. Everything was brown and blue, so that's how I made the card!

Supplies:
Stamps: Teeny Tiny Wishes, Sock Monkey (retired!), Scouts at Play (retired!)
Ink: Early Espresso, Crumb Cake
Paper: Bashful Blue, Early Espresso, Crumb Cake & Very Vanilla card stocks, Bashful Blue retired DP

Distressed Spring Leaves

This is the last of my distressed cards class. I went with this set since its so easy to distress, and its a hostess set that's going to be on its way out in May!! gasp! annnd this is the last time a class will get to use this pretty Everyday Elegance DP for Sale-A-Bration. We used sponges to color in the leaves and scuffed the edges of the vanilla rectangles in Early Espresso ink. So purty!

Supplies:
Stamps: Faith in Nature
Ink: Early Espresso, Certainly Celery
Paper: Pear Pizazz & Very Vanilla card stock, Everyday Elegance DP
Accessories: Vanilla grosgrain ribbon, Stamping Sponge

A sunset!

This card is not so much distressed, as we used sponges to create a scene of sorts. But our fingers sure got messy, so I thought it fit into a distressed class. haha!
Its really such a simple thing...First we stamped the flowers. I punched a circle out of scratch paper, and laid the paper with the hole in it onto the paper with the flowers. We sponged it with Daffodil Delight for a nice, hot yellow. Then we put the punched circle on the yellow sun using Dotto because its removable and super handy like that! And we sponged the So Saffron and the shades of orange. I had Cherry Cobbler out too, but it didn't seem like it was going to work out after all. So we left it off! *grin!

Supplies:
Stamps: Upsy Daisy
Ink: Early Espresso, Daffodil Delight (sun), So Saffron, Peach Parfait, Tangerine Tango
Paper: Peach Parfait, Early Espresso, Very Vanilla card stocks
Accessories: Early Espresso quilted satin ribbon (retired!)

*The ribbon IS retired. bad me!

Spring!

I took this picture Saturday...

...and we made this card on Friday! It must be spring!!

Supplies:
Stamps: Forever Young
Ink: Soft Suede, Certainly Celery, Pretty in Pink, Bashful Blue
Paper: Soft Suede & Very Vanilla card stocks, Everyday Elegance DP
Accessories: Lucky Limade Sale-A-Bration Ribbon

Both the DP and the ribbon are now retired from Sale-A-Bration, but I have wanted this stamp set since the catalog came out and I finally got it and got to play with it! Yeay!! (also, when we made the card, the items were still available, lol) The sponging of the pink and green on the tree was something I saw in the latest demonstrator magazine. Such a fun idea and perfect for spring!
I even played with the inside of the card!

New Toys!

Happy April Fools Day! Did you do anything fun? We're having a quiet Sunday at home, but I'm sure my son has something up his sleeve....
Fortunately for my need to craft, (going back to yesterday's post) lol, I received a fun order this week that included some new stamp sets! That really is motivating, you know! *grin
This makes for a simple and pretty quick card, but I really like it. Its already a grunged up sort of stamp image, but then I used the Cutter Kit to rough-up the edges, and then we scrubbed some More Mustard ink around to further age and distress it. I think the Linen Thread adds to it well.

Supplies:
Stamps: Tool Shed, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink: Chocolate Chip, More Mustard, Night of Navy marker
Paper: Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake card stocks
Accessories: Denim Ribbon, Linen Thread, Word Window Punch, Stamping Sponges