Africa Themed Cards

Kim's Wedding Card

I attended a wedding today. The daughter of one of my stamping friends. Here is the card I made for the bride and groom.

I started with pink tissue paper and glittered hearts on it with SU's hearts wheel, the glue pad, and dazzling diamonds. I stamped "love" using SU's Wonderful Words on white cardstock and then xyroned the cardstock and put the tissue paper on it over the "love". I used the Sizzilits dies to cut out the rings and bells from shiny silver paper. I also used the bell die to cut out the flowers and ribbons in pink, and the leaves in green. I paper-pieced the bells together, and outlined the flower markings with SU's Pretty in Pink pen. I added a bow to the rings from SU's Pretty in Pink ribbon. The scanned image doesn't show the Dazzling Diamonds very well, in real life it is quite sparkly!

I'm Back!!! Halloween Cards

It's been awhile since I've posted...I have a new job! I've been looking for a job for almost 3 years now and finally found one. It is a contract position, for about 8 months, as a wafer polish engineer at MEMC. They are a company that makes the thin slices of silicon that the semiconductor companies like Intel, AMD and Texas Instruments use as the foundation to make computer chips. So far, I've really enjoyed the job!

But back to cards. I made 40 Halloween cards, but my favorite one (I made 10 of them) is a bit unusual...I found some chipboard at Michael's - in the $1 bin - shaped like a round ornament (with other Christmas shapes) but thought it would make a perfect full moon for Halloween! I covered one side with yellow paper (why do we always think of yellow for Halloween moons when the moon is white???) and used the new jumbo wheel from SU "Bring on the Bats". I tied ribbon through the precut holes in the chipboard and voila...

I'll post more of my Halloween cards later!

Stamp A Mania Cards

In celebration of Stamp A Mania's sale, here are some of my cards using Stamp A Mania stamps.

These two cards use SAM's rollers, the quail is a panel from the Spirit Dancer roller, while the other card uses images from their Southwest roller. Both use brown and cream/tan cardstocks from Big Lots, black paper, black ink and the Cuttlebug Embossing Folder Diamonds in the Rough. The sentiments for both cards are from SU, the first is from a very old set ??? and the "friendship" is from Wonderful Words I. I used deckle scissors on both cards.

These cards are also made with SAM rollers. All three use their Ancient Relic roller for the background (I love that one) and the Petroglyph Herder and Petroglyph Hunter rollers for the main image. The top cards use SU's Creamy Caramel ink while the other uses SU's Basic Brown. The lighter paper is from Big Lots, while the darker colors are DCWV. I used the SW corner punch on all the cards. I'm not sure where I bought the eyelets.

I love this stamp. The chile roller is a clearsnap (I think) that I got from SAM and the chile is from SAM as well. I used generic green and red ink and paper.

This eagle is embossed with a mixture of SAM's Silver City EP (the **best** silver EP I've found...and I've tried bunches!) and Desert Jewels EP. I embossed on black paper and put it on SU's Tempting Turquoise.

Card Candy - Father's Day

For the card candy swap I've joined, I also choose the Father's Day category. Here is my creation:

The topper is cut from ivory cardstock I got from Office Whichever and has the sentiment piece on it. The sentiment is from Auntie Amy's and is stamped on scraps using Adirondack's Cabin Fever ink. The saw, hammer, drill and screwdriver are Dustin Pike images colored with copics. Two of my drills have cords, but the other two are cordless, LOL! The golf tag and hardware tag are punched using SU's tag punches, while the saw tag is an Ellison Thin Cuts (Tag #7). The campfire tag is cut with Sizzix Tag Set.

The golf tag uses SU's Tropical Turf roller and Sporting Goods. The golf tee and the background tag are colored using Bic pen.

The campfire tag uses SU's Roughin' It, with the logs stamped with basic brown and colored with copic XXX, and the flame colored with generic orange and red markers and then colored with yellow copic XXX. The mosquitos are embossed with clear EP.

The hardware tag is SU's Builder Bits roller and embossed on black paper with Stamp A Mania's Silver City EP. This is the absolute best silver EP I've found. I tried multiple brands of EP and *none* work as well as Stamp A Mania's. The background tag is cut from silver envelope linings.

Graduation Thank You cards

Last night I was making thank you cards to give to my nephew at his high school graduation; I'd cut out 20 diplomas, colored the ribbon on them, rolled the background for all 20 and cut out the paper to finish them when my husband comments to me, "Do you think a teen-aged boy will use these?" Argggggghhhhhh! Really, 4 hours into the project (the cutting and coloring were done while we were watching TV) he says this???? Why not 10 minutes into it, when we were sitting 10 feet apart and I was cutting? Well, here they are, he better use them!!! His school colors are red and black.

The diploma is an Ellison thin die (like a Slizzlet) and the background is rolled using SU's "Graduation Day" wheel, the ink and paper are SU's "Real Red" and the diploma is cut out of American Crafts cardstock.

Card Remake

One of the Splitcoaststampers forums that I occasionally participate in is for Clean and Simple (CAS) Cards and one of the regular weekly challenges is to give a card a makeover. I chose a card I made that I didn't like. I was trying a monochromatic theme, but just didn't like the end result. Here's the original card:

For this Makeover challenge, I colored the leaves with orange and yellow watercolor pencils and used gamsol to blend the colors. I then matted the card on a matching orange/yellow paper. Here is the end result:

I'm much happier with this version and will save it for fall and send it to someone.

Repeat Impressions Design Team "Audition"

I'm "auditioning" to become a member of the Repeat Impressions Design Team. They want to see 5 of my cards to decide if they like my style. Here is what I've chosen:

This birthday card uses Repeat Impression stamps for the words and the cat while the bird feet is a stamp from SU's "Best of Cluck" set. I colored the kitty with copics and embellished it with a real feather. The background and all of the words/images are cut with Deckle scissors and matted with DCWV paper, also cut with Deckle scissors.

This cat is from After Midnight and is colored with my copics. In the picture, the card base looks like it is 2 colors, but in reality it is white with a rectangle of SU's Chocolate Chip paper. Three black brads finish the card.

This cliff dwelling reminds me of one I visited a number of times in my childhod. I'm not sure if it is really the Gila Cliff Dwellings, but that's what it makes me think of. The stamp is from Stamp A Mania and so is the Flagstone EP I used. The paper is DCWV and I used twine and wood beads for the finishing touch.

This card uses all SU products. The paper is Basic Black and Old Olive and the inks used are Old Olive, More Mustard, Creamy Caramel, Really Rust, Basic Black and Night of Navy. The stamp set is "World Traveler".

This Father's Day card uses SU's "Builder Bits" roller, Only Orange and Really Red paper. The main image is from a background stamp of unknown origins as is the sentiment. I don't recall where I got the nut brads. When I first started stamping, I didn't think to keep track of such things.

Zoo Cards II

Here are some more of the zoo cards I made for my SIL. I utilized my Cricut for these with the Zooballoo cartridge. All of the animals are cut out on DCWV cardstock. The hippo's sky is chalked and the grass is done with SU's Terrific Turf roller, and the water is created with the Cuttlebug S'vine Swirls embossing folder and cut to look like waves/ripples in the water. The two koala cards and the giraffe card all use SU's Bamboo II background stamp and Old Olive ink. The first of these cards uses either Green Galore or Garden Green for the base while the other is white on Old Olive. The giraffe card uses drywall tape (it's so perfect - it already has adhesive on it!!!) to try and allude to a zoo cage. I'm not sure it worked, but...

Zoo Cards

My SIL loves

jungle/safari animal themed things and so I made these cards for her for Christmas. I got these animal images in a SCS swap and don't recall who made them...which is too bad, because I'd love to get them now. If anyone knows, please let me know. I used my Bic markers, SU's scallop punch, brads and fringe yarn (I don't know if it has an actual name) and my Spellbinder Nesties. The lion card uses the SU roller "Tropical Turf" for the grass and the sky is chalked. The paper is a zoo pack I got at Hobby Lobby and/or DCWV. The first giraffe card's background is sponged with SU's Really Rust, Creamy Caramel and Chocolate Chip.

New Year's Cards

I had a few people who got New Year's cards instead of Christmas cards, here are a couple of them.

I'd joined an image swap on Splitcoaststampers (SCS) and one of the categories was New Year's. I was all excited that I could use my Stampin Up! set "Ring in the New" and stamped out images/sentiments. I was disappointed to find out that I was the only one who wanted to swap these, and I got my own images back. Well, they ended up being very handy when I needed to make these cards quickly! The cards were prefolded DCWV cards, the paper is for the most part, DCWV and the stamps for the first card front are the roller "Party Streamers" from Rollagraph and SU's Contemporary Alphabet numbers. The inside of the first card and both the front and the inside of the second card are a Stampin Up!'s set from the early 2000's called "Ring in the New". The ink is a Color Box Paintbox with primary colors. I used SU's circle and scalloped circle for both cards.

Christmas Cards

Here are some of the Christmas cards I made for this year. Of the 26 different designs (some very similar) I created, these were my favorites.

This one is a Penny Black hedgie image that I colored with my copics and Bic markers, matted on generic red paper and then music paper I've had forever and don't remember where I got it.

The SU roller "Candy Cane Christmas" was used with Real Red for the background. The House Mouse Image HMJR1020 and colored with Bic Pens.

This one was sooooo simple. I was running short of time and so the cards like this helped! The background is embossed with the Cuttlebug Embossing Folder "Joy and Cheer". I don't remember where the sticker came from.

This card used the Cuttlebug Embossing Folder "Snowflakes" and the SU set of unknown name...it's my mom's and I don't recall what it's name is. The hat and mittens are stamped with Adirondeck's Cranberry. The hat is edged with flocking and the mittens are strung together with yarn.

Another simple card. I used the Cuttlebug Embossing Folder "Holly" and red Stickles. I think the paper is SU Forest Foliage.

I got this super shiny gold paper from someone via Craig's list and I don't know what company it is. I used the Cuttlebug Embossing Folder "Joy and Cheer" and used my Sizzix original die "Holly" with SU's Real Red and Forest Foliage.

Fall Cards

Halloween Cards

I made Halloween cards over the weekend whilst watching TV with Johnny.