Awnings for 'store fronts'

Hello, everyone!  I saw this cute idea by Becky Robinson about 6 months ago and thought it would be the cutest thing to CASE.  The dessert shop is a direct case of Becky, and the Flower Shop was created using Vases in Vogue, an older hostess set.  Becky Robinson's work can be found under Members, then type her name, on Stampin' Connection.  I have another idea for this 'store front' layout, so stay tuned for more store front punch art!

The awning is made with a 1 1/2" strip of card stock and two colors of card stock to be used with the word window punch.  I lay the 1-1/2" strip on my paper grid, and then adhere the punches using the lines on the grid to keep them straight.  Then you bend the edges of the punches that stick out over the paper strip - one side is a 'mountain' fold, or up, and the other side is a 'valley fold, or down.  The little 'shelf' that the desserts and vases are sitting on is cut to the height you want it plus about 3/4 of an inch.  Punch the edge with your choice of edge punch, then score the edged side at 1/2 of an inch and fold.  Remember to add your ribbon after stamping your sentiment and before adhering to your card.  I hope you enjoy making these darling cards, and also creating your own 'store front' ideas.  Happy stamping!

Fun Boy Card!

Kudos to Angela Helynck's wonderful layout here:
http://www.stampinconnection.com/photo/1006793-1?context=user

I knew I wanted to incorporate several stamp sets with some brayering to make a 'space/planets' card.

I went hunting and found Angela's card which I adapted to include the robot and brayering.

It's hard to see, but the ring around 'saturn' has peach parfait glitter on it. The moon is two layers - one of Going Grey brayered with Basic Grey, and the other is Brushed Silver. The moon craters were created with the 1/2" circle punch, and an eyelet paper punch set.

The stamps used are:  Background Basics, Best Bot Forever, Starring You, Valentine Defined, Pun Fun

The colors used are:  Tempting Turquoise, Pacific Point, Night of Navy, Daffodil Delight, Tangering Tango,
Poppy Parade, Going Grey, Basic Grey

The stars were embossed with Whisper White craft ink and White embossing powder. I also through in some dazzling diamonds to give the stars a little shimmer. The stars in the bottom left corner have some dazzling diamonds on them, too!

This took some time, but I had a "blast" making it!

Brayered Thank You Set

Many Thanks to Michelle Zindorf for her beautiful layout for the cattail card that is part of this set.  Kudos to jadoherty on Splitcoast too!  I made this set for my friend, Annie.  I love brayering because the results are so pretty and it really doesn't take all that long!

This last one was run through the lattice embossing folder after it was brayered and stamped.  I saw this same card on SC and SCS and had to try it!  Lots of different stamp sets used for these three cards:  Just Believe, Inspired By Nature and Watercolor Trio.  Several punches were used too:  Photo Corner, oval, scallop, and the slot punch (cattails).  The cattail card was brayered on to Daffodil Delight, and the photo corners were run through an embossing folder.  Next I'm going to make a brayered gift box to put them in!  If you want to learn more about brayering, I highly recommend Michelle Zindorf's website, tutorials and classes.  Google her and find over 300 tutorials for her beautiful work!  Thanks for looking and I wish you a fun and stampy weekend!

I'm holding an open house!

I've been invited to present Stampin' Up! Products at the Trendy Tulip Boutique this Thursday, Friday and Saturday.  I'm very excited to share many of Stampin' Up!s new products and to demonstrate our My Digital Studio software.  I can hardly wait!  Hope you can join me!  More information is available here:

Trendy Tulip Boutique!

Below is just one example of the Notecard Sets I will have on display:

Each set has 3 Birthday Cards and 3 Thank You cards contained in this cute little box!  I have several of these made using all different design paper.  This one uses the new Garden Gala DSP, Pumpkin Pie cardstock and ink, daffodil delight cardstock and the new pear pizzaz poly ribbon.  I heat embossed the sentiment with versamark and clear embossing powder, punched it with our large oval punch and popped it upon dimensionals.  Super easy, demonstrable and very cheery, don't you think?   I will also be displaying the wonderful card swaps I received at Convention.  It's wonderful to receive card swaps that use stamps that I don't have so I can display a wider variety of products.  I love that!  I'm off to prepare for this event.  Hope to see you there, and let me know if you saw this post and I will give away a free card!

Do you know how much I love the Heat Embossing Technique?

It's probably my FAVORITE stamping technique!  I also love the effects of brayering.  I wanted to combine these two techniques in a set of card fronts for swapping at the Stampin' Up! convention.  I went back to some cards I've made in the past, and updated them with new stamps and new colors from the very exciting 2010 - 2011 Stampin' Up Catalog.  Here's what I came up with:

As soon as I saw the Silhouette Sentiments hostess set, I knew I wanted it!  You can get this set FREE when you host a Stampin' Up stamp camp or party.  Leave me a comment if you would like to host a card making class.  I would LOVE to teach you and your friends how to make cards just like this - it's easier than it looks!  The flowers were first stamped with black ink and versamark and then heat embossed with clear embossing powder.  I then punched a 1 1/4" circle out of a post it note to mask the paper so a sun is created.  I first used daffodil delight and peach parfait with a brayer for the sky.  I sponged cajun craze across the top and down the sides.  The hills were created by tearing the sticky edge of a long post it note in the shape of the hills.  I covered the sky with it, then brayered cajun craze across the bottom.  I finished the bottom by sponging early espresso at the bottom edge.  A white gel pen was used to bright up the centers of some of the flowers.  Yes, white gel pen drys on the top of embossing - go figure.  Markers do not do this, only gel pens.  Cool!  I used my stampamajig (love that thing) to align my sentiment into the sun after removing the post it note mask.  Brads were added and then it was mounted on to Cajun Craze cardstock.  I made six of these in about an hour and a half.  I know, right?  It really goes pretty quick!  Hope you'll try that brayer and heat gun you have stashed in a back drawer and share what you create!  Have a beautiful day!

Congrats to my Sis!

Can I just say, I'm loving the new colors and this Garden Gala design paper!  Can't wait for it to be available to everyone July 1st!  My sister got the job she wanted teaching 2nd grade and I couldn't be happier for her!  As a gift, I'm giving her the Teacher's Pet stamp set and some classic ink pads and stampin' spots, along with this card:

and here's the inside:

I really like the way it turned out!  Here we go on the details:  I used Daffodil delight as my base card, and the Garden Gala design paper for all printed paper.  Cherry Cobbler, Marina Mist and Pear Pizazz were also used as card stock and ink.  I realized later that actually, I think this paper may use Real Red and not Cherry Cobbler, but it still looks ok to me!  Four stamp sets were used:  The new Friends Never Fade was used for the flower.  I colored it with markers first, stamped it, then colored again with a versamark pen and heat embossed it.  Wonderful Favorites was used for the outside greeting, and 'the best is yet to be' is from the Best Yet set.  I didn't have any Pear Pizzaz ribbon - yet... but I will!  I used some miscellaneous ribbon that came close enough until I get the real thing!  There really isn't alot of embellishments on this card - It's pretty simple with lots of layers and color.  Funny, that's how I could describe my sister, colorful with lots of layers! 

A favorite technique - Emboss Resist

Morning Stampers!

I continue to practice my sponging and brayering techniques, and thought I would like to case something of Michelle Zindorf's and adapt her work to some of the new colors and stamps available at Stampin' Up!.  I am loving the Friends Never Fade stamp and the cherry cobbler color especially.  After surfing Michelle's website, I chose this card:

and updated it with Cherry Cobbler, Delightful Daffodil, Crumb Cake and Early Espresso, while using the new Friends Never Fade and Elements of Style Stamp sets:

The flower image was stamped first by coloring the stamp with markers.  I then colored them again with Versamark and embossed them.  After that, I used only versamark to stamp the flourishes around the edge and then embossed those as well.  I covered a 3" square in the middle, and then sponged Early Espresso along the edges, then wiped the ink of the flourishes.  I removed the 3" mask and lightly sponged the center with Crumb Cake.  I then took a ruler and the Early Espresso marker and defined the 3" square on the left and bottom edges to make the center pop a bit.  I used a little trick for the ribbon:  I tied my ribbon around a book first, then cut the ribbon in the back so I could position my bow/knot exactly where I wanted it, and then used snail adhesive to attach it to the back of the card front.  I used the Modern punch and some misc. brads to accent the red in the flowers.   I left some open space above the flowers so I can add a sentiment when I decide what occasion I will eventually choose for this card!  This was a fun card to make!  I'm looking forward to trying something similar with different stamps and colors.  Enjoy!