Good morning! This blog has me so excited, I am living on little sleep and lots of diet coke! LOL I woke up at 4 a.m. and couldn’t go back to bed. So guess what? (think voice of Junie B. Jones, which is in my case, voice of little Rebecca. She reads Junie B. to me every day for 20 minutes. ) I started stamping. That’s what! LOL

Last night I already decided to use the polka dot paper from  the Au Chocolat Designer paper pack. I wasn’t quite sure yet how and with what stamp set though. I kind of decided that I wanted to do the closure Stampin’ Up! showed at convention. To mix it up ,I wanted to have the circle that holds the card closed on the bottom of the card. I just couldn’t decide on a set or what do do on the bottom of the page.

This morning I started browsing blogs and found a great idea for the bottom of the card. Check out this blog candy at Paper Ink-Pressions. Do you see how perfect this is????? I got all excited. I rummaged through my retired stash in the back of my closet and found my Stripe template and the foam attachment for my rubber brayer. I started with vanilla cardstock and brayered my lines on with So Saffron cardstock. (Little tip, when using the foam brayer, spray a bit of water on it before inking it up. It takes the ink faster this way)

The choice of the stamp set was decided by the blog candy as well. I wanted to have a small saying along the stripes. The smallest one we have is from the You make me Happy stamp set. I love that small saying “you make the word special just being in it”.  On the other side of each stripe I added a doodled chocolate chip marker line.

I started with a 4 1/4″ x 9 3/4″ piece of chocolate chip cardstock. I scored it at 5 1/2″ and rounded all four corners. For the front panel, I cut a 4″ square from the gorgeous polka dot designer paper. I stamped the background stamp of You Make Me Happy on it with So saffron. I also added the smaller flower with a leaf sprinkled all over on the paper. I did stamp off once before stamping the flower on the paper.

The inside has  a 4″ square of so saffron lined up on the top. I added the saying “You make me Happy” on the top right with a so saffron flower over it. I lined up my stamped paper with the bottom of the inside and then added a 4/16″ strip of chocolate between the saffron on the stamped paper.

For the closure I stamped the dragonfly of the set on vanilla cardstock. I punched it out with the 1 1/4″ circle punch, sponged it with saffron, drew a border matching my stripes lines and layered it on a 1 3/8″ circle.  I added dimensionals on the bottom of the chocolate layer. Then I used the 1 1/4″ circle punch to punch a 1/2 circle in the card front. I closed the card and positioned my dragonfly so that it would close the card.  I added some apricot and chocolate grosgrain ribbon and was done.

And to really make you understand how early I was up….I finished nine of these beauties already! Five of those will go to my top sellers in my downline beginning of next month.

I am loving it. My mojo seems to have come back. I have my radio going and I am enjoying playing with my new stamps! The sun is shining, we have about 70 degrees and the kids are all playing outside! I am having a real good day. 

 Here is my second challenge card for the Limited Supply challenge for today.

 I loved the double sided paper from the summer mini catalog. It’s so pretty. I sure hope it will make it in the next Big Idea Book & Catalog. I started with another layout challenge from Lisa Zappa. I love simple layouts like this. 

Stamps: Big Blooms, You make me happy, Polka Dots & Petals

Inks: Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie and Certainly Celery

Paper: Whisper White, Chocolate Chip and Bashful Blue Cardstock, retired Designer paper (can’t remember the name right now and I am too lazy to find that mini) and Petals & Paisleys Designer paper (Spring Mini)

Acc.: Marvy Urchida scallop punch, various other circle punches, brown button, blue gingham ribbon, vintage brads

Forget multi tasking…I can’t do that. But I can combine several challenges in one card. Lisa Zappa gave me a layout challenge that I used to make this card. She got it from KisaMarie, but you can also look at the layout challenge SC68 on splitcoast. I just added the bottom designer paper panel. This card was sponged, which was Julia’s “Ways to Use it challenge” yesterday. Jen’s Limited Supply Challenge for today was to use up scraps of ribbon no longer then 4 inches. Both of the ribbon pieces came out of my grosgrain ribbon jar.

I have second jar for non grosgrain ribbon. I know, I know….I am anal…I blame it on being German. LOL

 For the card I started out with So Saffron cardstock. I stamped Paisley on it in saffron ink and sponged around it to make the color richer. The sweet giraffe is from the spring mini set “Bundle Of Joy“. I also used the round tab punch and the Petals & Paisleys designer paper from that catalog. Add a little paper piercing, stippling and sponging and you are done.

Oh…after seeing Asela’s sweet prisma coloring tutorial on her blog yesterday, I got my prisma’s back out and colored the giraffe with those.

Have a wonderful day! Hugs and smiles

Rebecca has a soft stuffed animal that reminds me of this fun stamp from the Hip Hip Hooray stamp set. I had it for a while now but it never saw ink before. So I got him dirty today.

The card is a 5 1/2″ square made with cool caribbean cardstock.

Ribbon is from May Arts, the circle scallop punch from Marvy Urchida. The rest of the products are all from Stampin’ Up! I really need to get me some Prima flowers. I needed something to finish the card off. I punched out a flower with the Spring Bouquet Flower punch. I sponged the edges with chocolate chip classic ink and added a brad from the vintage brad assortment in the middle. Not quite a Prima, but it has to do for now.

The green strip is stamped with the Linen background. I use that background a lot. It’s so versatile.

Off I go to see if the “Ways to Use it” challenge is up now.

Well, I just got back from Splitcoast and it seems I already made my challenge card with this little guy. Today’s challenge is sponging.

Today’s challenge was FUN! I love this layout! I love it, love it, love it. Valerie Stangle makes the most amazing cards with this layout. She is one of my favorite stampers and a constant source of inspiration for me.

I had the stamp set Office Accoutrement and the matching Notations designer paper home for a while now. Both were untouched. That had to change!!! I loved this set since I saw the first pictures from Leadership. Today was the day I finally got to play with it.

I love the flowers in the set as well as all the office stamps. Okay…so I like all the stamps in that set. LOL I am a big sucker for Office stores, so this set is right up my alley!

I started with a chocolate chip card base. I stamped the big flower on it with chocolate chip classic ink. I used the ticket corner punch on the two bottom edges of a 2 1/4″ x 5 1/4″ strip of designer paper. I added a 1/4″ strip of white paper pierced cardstock over the designer paper.

For the focal point I stamped the Memo stamp on Sahara sand cardstock. On the right I used the new spiral punch. I distressed the edges with the cutting tool. The Important message is stamped in chocolate chip on so saffron cardstock and punched out with the new round tab punch.  The word Discover comes from the stamp set Handbill Headlines and “you are an” stamps are from Amazing to Zany. The later is so versatile. It’s my favorite of all our flexible Phrase stamp sets.

I stamped three little flowers in each taken with teal, so saffron and certainly celery and added coordinating brads in the middle. The celery ribbon is folded under the flowers. They are popped up with dimensionals.

The stamp “Original” comes from the set Office Accoutrement as well. I stamped it on So Saffron cardstock, punched it out with the 1 1/4″ circle punch and sponged chocolate around the edges. Then I layered it on a 1 3/8″ chocolate circle.

I love Criss cross cards from the first one I saw Michelle Wooderson create. I just have never done one. So yesterday’s technique challenge was the perfect time to rectify that.

I had some One heart…one mind paper (https://www.oneheart-onemind.com/) products for a while now and decided to use their paper and the acrylic tag for this project.

After that I got my still unused Bella stamps (www.stampingbella.com) out and worked with those. I love the fresh, hip look of those stamps.

I did use a few Stampin’ Up! products. I love the new tab punch coming out in the spring mini catalog and used that as well as Stampin’ Up! cardstock and ink. I also used the white gel pen Stampin’ Up! sells.

Ribbon is May Arts and can be bought from Starlitstudio.

 The only thing I would change on this card is running the girl through the xyron to stick her to the acrylic tag. I was just too lazy last night to get the Xyron out. Today I regret it.  Oh well….