Swirls for As You See It Challenges

This Friday, on As You See It Challenges, we are having a theme challenge and the theme is Swirls! As soon as I saw it, my mind went immediately to Everything Eleanor, one of my favourite all time stamp sets, and a big part of its appeal is the beautiful flourish that's one of the images.

I was going for a sympathy/thinking of you type card, fairly clean and simple, but I needed an elegant, swirly font. Do you think I could find anything? I finally settled on An Open Heart, which has a nice sentiment, but it is definitely not swirly!

• I've created some interesting borders by the size of my panels using Mint Macaron and Basic Black.
• I heat embossed the black swirl onto the Whisper White cardstock. That took about 2 do-overs as I was getting such incomplete coverage. (A word of warning: stamp your sentiment first, making sure it is straight before doing the embossing, but make sure the sentiment has time to thoroughly dry.)
• In the end it needed a little sumthin' sumthin' to complete the look so I added some Rhinestones in the swirls.

This weekend, I will be in OK Falls, hosting our annual Creative Winter Escape with my stampin' friends down there! I know it's going to be a lot of fun. I'll try to have some photos on Monday.

Click on the links below to take you to my On-Line Store, where you can read about, look at, and purchase if you wish, the products used to make this card today.

Product List

Everything Eleanor Wood Stamp Set [131987]	Everything Eleanor Clear Stamp Set [124164]	An Open Heart Clear-Mount Stamp Set [135002]	An Open Heart Wood-Mount Stamp Set [134999]	Mint Macaron 8-1/2" X 11" Cardstock [138337]
Basic Black 8-1/2" X 11" Card Stock [121045]	Whisper White 8-1/2" X 11" Card Stock [100730]	Mint Macaron Classic Stampin' Pad [138326]	Versamark Pad [102283]	Black Stampin' Emboss Powder [109133]
Embossing Buddy [103083]	Heat Tool [129053]	Rhinestone Basic Jewels Embellishments [119246]	Liquid Multipurpose Glue [110755]

Happy New Year with Large Number Framelits

And here we are on the last day of 2015! I don't see how the year could have passed by so quickly, but then I'm finding myself saying things like that all the time now. What are you doing to celebrate the New Year? I am not a big fan of New Year's parties. I think it's because of the midnight kissing and hugging that happens. Now, I don't mind that with my hubby or with really good friends, but it's when you feel obligated to hug and kiss acquaintances and total strangers that my introversion really kicks in. Personal space is personal space and it doesn't really change just because the clock chimes 12 at the end of the year. But my hubby really does enjoy parties and so I soldier through for his sake. This year we have been invited to the home of some people from our new church and I won't know many people there, so I am a little more apprehensive about it, but I'm sure I will have fun.

I wanted to make a glitzy New Year's Eve card to celebrate the end of the Christmas card making season, so I got out the black, white and gold again for a last hurrah! And I used a new product from the Occasions Catalogue which you will be able to order from in 5 days! It's the Large Numbers Framelits* and they will be very handy for birthdays and anniversaries. And New Years! I used up some more scraps of Winter Wonderland Specialty Designer Series Paper (I had a lot of it!!) It is retiring in 4 days so if you haven't ordered this yet, better do it soon! It is honestly my favourite holiday DSP ever!

 *These products are found in the 2016 Occasions Catalogue and will be available to order on Jan. 5, 2016.

•  On a card base of Basic Black cardstock I layered some Gold Glimmer Paper and a piece of the Winter Wonderland Specialty Designer Series Paper so that there was just a narrow border of Glimmer paper - not overpowering, but upping the glitz factor.
• On the Whisper White card front I stamped some images from Gorgeous Grunge in Versamark Ink and heat embossed them in Silver Stampin' Emboss Powder and a mixture of Gold and Iridescent Ice Stampin' Emboss Powders. I was going for a kind of fireworks effect.
• The sentiment is from my favourite greeting stamp set this year, the host set, Six Sayings. It is also heat embossed with the mixture of Gold and Iridescent Ice Stampin' Emboss Powders.
• The numbers were die cut from Gold Glimmer Paper and pieces of left-over Winter Wonderland Specialty Designer Series Paper with the Large Number Framelits*. I die cut the same numbers in Basic Black cardstock and glued the numbers onto them off set a little for a shadow effect.

Well, where ever you celebrate tonight, I hope you have a lot of fun. And I want to wish you all the best for a happy and prosperous New Year!

Click on the links below to take you to my On-Line Store, where you can read about, look at, and purchase if you wish, the products used to make this card today.

Product List

Six Sayings Wood-Mount Stamp Set [139849]	Six Sayings Clear-Mount Stamp Set [139852]	Gorgeous Grunge Wood Stamp Set [130514]	Gorgeous Grunge Clear Stamp Set [130517]	Winter Wonderland Specialty Designer Series Paper [139588]
Gold Glimmer Paper [133719]	Basic Black 8-1/2" X 11" Card Stock [121045]	Whisper White 8-1/2" X 11" Card Stock [100730]	Versamark Pad [102283]	Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder [109129]
Silver Stampin' Emboss Powder [109131]	Iridescent Ice Stampin' Emboss Powder [101930]	Embossing Buddy [103083]	Heat Tool [129053]	Big Shot [113439]
Fast Fuse Adhesive [129026]	Stampin' Dimensionals [104430]

Large Numbers Framelits*

 *These products are found in the 2016 Occasions Catalogue and will be available to order on Jan. 5, 2016.

Technique Nights

I have a very awesome group of ladies who are regular and loyal attendees at my monthly Technique Nights! They are terrific crafters, lots of fun, very forgiving when I goof and they love my cats!!  How much better could it get??  But this week, they needed extra patience because I made them work really hard! They had to fussy cut several flowers, they had to make 3 rolled blossoms, they had to stamp with the Stamp-a-ma-jig, and they had to use a glue gun to assemble a paper rose!  Any one of those might make an ordinary person complain, but not my Stamp Club members!!  Like troopers, they set straight to work, and bless their hearts, they were done (mostly) before ten pm.  Love them all!

Mind you, they couldn't complain too much because these were the cards they chose to make.  The theme, Making Creative Flowers,  was at their request and they even picked out 2 of the 3 cards!!

I think most of them went home happy, except for the one or two that were battling headaches.  Hopefully, they're feeling better today!





I finally got around to making a card to enter in the MOJO Monday Challenge #305 this week.  Here's the sketch:

I decided to do a Christmas card, since I have a Christmas Stampers Dozen coming up this month.  Here's what I came up with:

• I used my top stamp set from the new Holiday Mini:  Joyful Christmas.  I stamped the image in VersaMark ink and embossed it with Gold Stampin' Emboss Powder on watercolour paper, then watercoloured it using Aqua Painters and Cherry Cobbler and Always Artichoke ink.  
• I added some of the new Gold Stampin' Glitter to the center, which was watercoloured in Crushed Curry.
• Unfortunately, there are no matching framelits for this set, so they had to be fussy cut.
• The card base is Early Espresso cardstock and the other panels are made from the beautiful Season of Style DSP, Champagne Glimmer Paper and Early Espresso Core'dinations cardstock, embossed with the Woodgrain Embossing Folder and sanded using the Stampin' Sanding Block.

• The sentiment is from the same stamp set, Joyful Christmas, and it is embossed in gold as well.   I like how well it shows up on the Early Espresso cardstock.
• I used the new Cherry Cobbler 1" Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon because of the colour and how well it suits the Season of Style DSP.

This is too involved for a Christmas Stamper's Dozen however, but it could be simplified by leaving off the Core'dinations layer (which I'm not that keen on anyway) and embossing the flower on Cherry Cobbler cardstock without having to watercolour it.

Hope you enjoyed today's design and we just want to let you know that you're welcome to join my crafters at our monthly Technique Nights, or any of the other classes I am offering this month and in the months to come.  Check them out here.  Out-of-town readers, please leave a comment and let me know what kind of programs you would like me to develop for you!  Thanks for dropping by, everyone!

Stamps:  Joyful Christmas (w131802; c131805)

Paper:  Season of Style DSP (Design Series Paper)  (132340); Champagne Glimmer Paper (127885); Core'dinations Cardstock in Early Espresso ( Neutrals Collection) (129956); Watercolour Paper (122959); Early Espresso (119686) and Cherry Cobbler (119685) cardstock

Ink:  VersaMark Ink pad (102283); Classic Ink Pads (for watercolouring) in Cherry Cobbler (126966), Always Artichoke (126972) and Crushed Curry (131173)

Accessories:  Cherry Cobbler 1" Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon (132135); Gold Stampin' Glitter (132205)

Tools:  Woodgrain Embossing Folder (127821); Aqua Painter (103954); Stampin' Sanding Block (129367), Ovals Collection Framelits (129381); Big Shot (113439)

Aqua Painters

1" Cherry Cobbler Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon

Gold and Silver Stampin' Emboss Powder

Joyful Christmas Stamp Set

VersaMark Ink Pad

Heat Tool