Coffee and Cupcakes

Good morning friends! I posted this graphic a couple of weeks ago as a heads-up to the current Project Parade challenge going on at Verve. Yummy, huh?! Well, today it's my turn to post on the Verve blog.



I knew right away I wanted to use the cupcakes from Cupcake Affair - they're so perfect for this pink and brown challenge! I chose to work with Chocolate Chip as my dominant color. Dark and strong - just the way I like my coffee. Fancy drinks, not to mention fancy cupcakes, call for a fancy background, and the background strip from Artful Elegance was perfect!

Wanna play along with our Pink and Brown challenge? You still have time!! Just upload your creation to this post over on the Verve blog no later than noon on September 5th (that's tomorrow!). If you upload to SCS, use keyword VVPP05 so we can see all your delicious creations together. A random participant will be drawn on September 5 and will receive $15 in Verve Bucks. Good luck to you!!

My cupcakes are stamped on watercolor paper, colored with an aqua brush and reinkers, then glittered with Dazzling Diamonds glitter using a two-way glue pen. I trimmed them out and mounted them on dimensionals. The Pink Pirouette panel has been cut and embossed with rectangle Nestabilities. I cut the rectangle on the first pass through my Cuttlebug, then nested a smaller rectangle inside the larger one, and ran it through a second time with the appropriate padding for embossing rather than cutting. I like to do this as a subtle way to fill up empty space. The background has been stamped in Versamark and heat embossed with clear powder.

Halloween Tag

I haven't had a whole lot of stamping time here lately, so I'm pulling out an oldie to post today. I made this Halloween tag exactly a year ago for an online class assignment. I share it today not just because I have nothing else ready to show, but also because in a slightly roundabout way, this project helped kick off this whole blog. Let me explain. The class was called "Creativity: A Daily Dose" by Gretchen Schmidt, and it was through bigpicturescrapbooking.com. Each day during September, we were given a papercrafting project assignment and a photography assignment. Honestly, when I signed up for the class, I was wondering if I was completely out of my mind. I couldn't imagine finding time to make something every day. To my surprise, though, I quickly became addicted to the "create daily" mindset, and when the class was over, I knew I wanted to keep up the pace. I started the blog a couple of weeks later. The blog was not well thought-out, I just did it one night on a whim, thinking it would keep me accountable, even just with my expected audience of four (me included - LOL!) What a ride it's been since! I thank each one of you who stops by and those of you who leave such encouraging comments. It means so much!! You are the best!!

The pocket on this tag is created out of a standard office-supply page protector and hand-sewn together using orange embroidery floss. The strips of paper in the pocket are intended for journaling. I embellished with some Halloween stickers (not sure who makes these) and some white ghost ribbon that I got a year ago through a Really Reasonable Ribbon subscription (again, not sure who makes this ribbon). The patterned paper is from a retired, two-year-old Stampin' Up pack called Fright Night (I think?).

[Updated to add: I happened to find this very ribbon at my local stamp store yesterday! It's made by May Arts. Also, huntla1 asked about the finished size, since I had mentioned using a page protector for the pocket. I should have been more clear - the pocket only uses part of the page protector. The finished size of the whole tag is 3" x 6". For the pocket, I just cut a 3" x 4" rectangle out of the corner of a page protector.]

Have a wonderful day!

Sketchy Birthday Celebration

So how much of a whiner did I sound in my last post? I didn't mean to!! I was just tellin' it, you know, but when I re-read it just now, it sure sounded whiny. Sorry!

For today's project I got to play with some new Stampin' Up goodies that came this week. I am in love with this new Haiku patterned paper. Talk about happy colors!! I wasn't planning on getting the Upsy Daisy set yet, but when I saw that it was on sale, I took a few things off my order to make room for it. And I'm so glad I did!

The layout today comes from Jen del Muro's Sketch for You to Try. You'll find the sketch, Jen's sample, and guest designer Bonnie Sharp's sample at i{heart}2stamp. Then be sure to check out the samples from Amy, Shannan, and Susan. Carole is playing too, but not until Sunday, when she gets back from a weekend getaway. Hope you can play along this week! If you upload to SCS, remember to use keyword: SYFTT.

This is also my sample for this week's challenge over at Our Creative Corner, which is to make a birthday card. I have quite a few birthday cards to send out (both overdue ones and upcoming ones), so this was a great challenge for me. We'd love to have you play along. You'll find all the details, along with samples from the other OCC designers (Cindy Haffner, Dawn Easton, Denise Marzec, Jennifer Meyer, Laurie Schmidlin, and Lynda Benden), plus guest designer Julee Tilman's sample, over on the Our Creative Corner blog.

I used Nestabilities to cut the circle window and to create the scalloped border. The top layers are mounted on 1/8" foam squares over the Very Vanilla stamped panel. For the stamped image, I inked the stamp in More Mustard, then used a sponge dauber to add Tangerine Tango to the edges of the flowers. The Tangerine wasn't quite dark enough after I stamped, so I used an aqua painter and ink from the lid of the Tangerine pad to deepen and intensify the orange edges. It really made a difference! While I had the aqua painter out, I painted some Angel Wings Shimmerz Glitter Paint onto the flowers as well. A very cool product available at Jacksonbelle Embellishments. (I don't see the Angel Wings color listed anymore, but there are a bunch of other colors.) Here's another shot of the shimmer that adds:



On the inside, I repeated the stamped image in the lower left-hand corner on a layer of Very Vanilla matted with Tangerine:



Have a fantastic holiday weekend!



Stamps: Upsy Daisy (SU!)
Paper: Old Olive, Tangerine Tango, So Saffron, Very Vanilla, More Mustard card stock, "Haiku" designer paper
Ink: More Mustard, Tangerine Tango, Old Olive
Accessories: classic and scalloped circle Nestabilities (Spellbinders); Floral Screen cuttlebug folder (Provo Craft); large oval punch, Tangerine Tango ribbon, aqua painter (SU!); Angel Wings Shimmerz; foam squares, paper piercer

Procrastinator's Special

I've been crazy busy this week. My oldest son turned 8 on Monday. He ended up sick, so we had to postpone his "party" (not really a party, just a few friends heading off to the water park for the day). We rescheduled it for today, but since it was supposed to be rainy (and is), we had changed it to bowling. He's still not fully well, so now we're looking at moving it to sometime in September. Bummer for him - he's so upset! School starts next week, so there's shopping and some PTO stuff to do. DH is going in to work in the late afternoon and working all night this week, which always makes dinnertime and bedtime kinda hairy. And I'm trying to help my mother get ready for a baby shower next weekend. Plus all the "usual." Anyway, it's all good (except for the sick stuff).

I've also been madly trying to finish up some of my design work for the month, and the good news there is that I have six Verve cards to show today. This first one I posted on SCS Tuesday for the color challenge: Rose Red, Black, and Kraft. What a fun color combo!



I absolutely LOVE the "Beautiful You" sentiment that the stamp set was named after. Beautiful You is made up of special quotes and phrases from the Verve design team members. This one was Laura Fredrickson's genius choice - just an all-around fantastic sentiment for so many things. I'm sending this card to my mom, who celebrated her birthday on Tuesday. My poor mom, I'm always so caught up in my son's birthday the day before that I'm never ready for hers anymore. Hopefully, her 60th birthday gift eight years ago (first grandchild) makes up for all future tardies :)

These next two cards are both made with Fairy Tales. On this first sample, I can't decide which I like more, the edgy color combo of black and Stampin' Up's new Kiwi Kiss or the awesome sentiment, "Make Your Own Happiness." No matter what the circumstances around us, I'd like to think we have the power to choose happiness over sadness or despair, to choose to see the good over the bad, to actively seek out that which satisfies. I just love it!!



This next sample shows an out-of-the-box combination of the ring from Fairy Tales and the flourishy circle from Artful Elegance: a Christmas ornament! The hook stamp came from a retired Stampin' Up set called Fun With Shapes. The tree branches are from another retired SU set, Peaceful Wishes. The sentiment is from SU's All Holidays.



Next is a 4 1/4" notecard using a sentiment from Notes of Prayer. I love Kiwi Kiss, Baja Breeze, and Chocolate Chip together. I added some dry embossing with the Argyle Cuttlebug folder for a bit of a masculine look and feel.




Last but not least is the totally gorgeous Cupcake Affair set. I'm certain I've never seen prettier cupcake stamps!





I'm sure I say this each month, but this month's Verve sets are the best yet! For many, many more samples, be sure to visit the Verve gallery!

"See" you again on Saturday for my regular Saturday challenges - Jen's Sketch For You To Try and a new challenge from Our Creative Corner.



Most of the supply lists are available in the Verve Gallery. Here are direct links: Beautiful You, Make Your Own Happiness, Merry Christmas, Our Prayers are With You, and Cupcake.

Cupcake Trio:
Stamps: Cupcake Affair (Verve); Polka Dot (SU!)
Paper: Certainly Celery, Rose Red (SU!); Stamper's Select White (Papertrey Ink)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Copic markers, classic and scalloped rectangle Nestabilities (Spellbinders); Regal Rose wide grosgrain ribbon, oval punch, Dazzling Diamonds glitter (SU!)

A Verve Kind of Day

I have a few Verve things to show you today.... This first card uses Artful Elegance. I just love how easy this set is to work with!

These next two use some of the Scripture "Plain Janes." First up is 1 Thessalonians 5:17-18:



Second is Joshua 24:15:



Thanks for stopping by!

Project Hope

I was taking an overdue peek at Sharon Johnson's blog recently and saw this beautiful accordian card she made using stickers of all things. (Only Sharon could make something this beautiful with stickers!) A few days later, Sharon had a link to this gorgeous coupon keeper that Sharon Harnist made from a file folder. The wheels began to turn in my little head. I wondered how it might work to make some kind of accordian book with pockets to hold either some bookmarks or tags using the new Hope set from Our Daily Bread Designs. This is what I came up with:



Each pocket holds a bookmark/tag. On the first, I left some extra white space for a personalized message:



The other three tags each have a Bible verse of encouragement:







I folded the two outside panels in, gate-fold style, then added a decorated belly band to hold it all together. So this is what it looks like all folded up.



Finished size is 5 1/2" square. You can see from the photo that it's a little thick when it's folded up. It kind of bothers me that it doesn't lie flat, to be honest. If I make another one of these, I think I'll try to design the base into a thin box to accommodate the thickness a little more neatly. On the other hand, it's like a thick scrapbook that doesn't close all the way ... you just can't wait to see all the good stuff inside!

This was really simple to make. I started with an 8 1/2" x 11" sheet of Pixie Pink card stock. From a landscape orientation, I scored at 2 3/4", 5 1/2", and 8 1/4". Then I switched to a portrait orientation and scored at 5 1/2" (so I'm scoring down the long side). I folded that long side in to create the pocket, and punched the edge with my Stampin' Up scalloped edge punch. I used Sticky Strip to adhere just the left and right edges of the pocket. The accordian folds do a pretty good job of keeping the bookmarks/tags in place. After that I just embellished the outside with some designer paper and added the bookmarks/tags. If you have any questions, just let me know and I'll update this post with the answers.

Don't forget that with the purchase of the Hope stamp set, you'll receive a free "Hope Pack" (while supplies last). Check out the details HERE. The Breast Cancer Awareness designer papers I used on this project, as well as the pink ribbon brad on the belly band, are both included in the "Hope Pack." [Update: These papers and the brads are also available for purchase. Just click the link above and scroll down past the set and the picture of the Hope Pack.]

Have a great Sunday!

Girl Meets Chocolate

I can't believe I completely spaced on letting you know about Verve's latest challenge - sorry! If this gorgeous graphic isn't enough to stir your creative juices, nothing is!! Is this not the yummiest? The Verve Divas are using this as the inspiration for our monthly project parade. Jen del Muro started off the parade yesterday with an absolutely spectacular project that will have you salivating for sure! And every weekday through September 5, another Verve Diva will post another project. It all happens on the Verve blog. We'd love for you to play along, too! Just upload your project to your blog or gallery and then link back to this post on the Verve blog. We're choosing a random winner who will receive $15 in Verve bucks. Deadline to enter is midnight ET September 3. Winner announced Thursday, September 4. Good luck!