Flower-shaped card

Summer new catalog stamp-a-stack time! I designed this fun, light, shaped card, which isn't actually too difficult to put together and works well for assembly-line card making. I usually stick to the boring square and rectangular cards but I just fell in love with the Floral Frames Framelits dies and after seeing a few strange-looking shaped cards, decided to do something using the whole beautiful shape of the largest flower. I love how they match the Daydream Medallions. Just beautiful. My first new toys from the new catalog. I see them getting used a LOT - which is certainly already true based on recent activity here at the Create Escape blog. At any rate, the Stamp A Stack was held twice this week and this was one of the fun cards we featured.

As you can see, the entire flower is used to create this card. My sentiment seems to be twisted a bit but OH WELL. I used my Color Coach to tell me that Primrose Petals matches Pink Pirouette - but that light pink was TOO light, so I subbed Pretty In Pink. The base was cut using the largest flower die, cutting white twice. I scored the back piece at 1/2" and applied SNAIL adhesive to the small flap and attached the pieces together. The top white piece was sponged with Pretty In Pink.

A shot of the back, showing the score line.

The open card.

I stamped the largest Daydream Medallion in Primrose Petals on matching card stock, and PIP for the next size. The sentiment is from Blessings From Heaven, which will see a lot of ink!! I cut the medallions using the framelit dies, holding them in place with small Post-It notes once I had them centered over the stamped images. I used the Boho Blossoms punch with the waste from the die cut negatives to create the small layered flower, gluing the pieces together, applying the large Basic Pearl, and attaching the flower with a glue dot. LOVE this card. It ended up being about 5" square, so I put it in an A-7 envelope.

The trick to making an assembly line with this design - stamp, cut, score, sponge, punch, assemble! I love it and I hope you do, too.

Becca

Supplies used:
Stamp Sets: Daydream Medallions, Blessings from Heaven
Card Stock: White, Primrose Petals, Pretty in Pink
Ink: Primrose Petals, Pretty in Pink
Cutting: Big Shot, Floral Frames Framelits, Boho Blossoms Punch
Other: Stampin' Dimensionals, Basic Pearls, Post-It notes (small)

A Record Birthday!

My daughter's birthday was yesterday. She had told me she was digging orange and blue, and she recently picked up a record player at a local thrift store and has been having fun with it. She is a big fan of music in general so I was excited to try using this cute gloss-accented paper from the Mod Retro DCWV 12x12 pad. The card is 5x7 to accommodate the whole "title" of the record.

I used a long retired set, Life Is Beautiful, for the pretty flowers behind the Curly Cute Happy Birthday greeting. Colors are Tangerine Tango and Midnight Muse, same as the one I posted yesterday.

Here you can see just how glossy the record portion of the paper is. What a fun stack. I need to use it up on lots of cute cards and pages!

Happy 14th birthday to my girlie girl!

Love, Mom

Supplies Used:
Stamp Sets: Curly Cute, Life is Beautiful
Card Stock & Ink Colors: Tangerine Tango, Midnight Muse, White, Mod Retro stack (DCWV)
Other: square brad from stash

Orange and blue all over!

Today is my baby's 14th birthday. She requested an orange and blue card as orange is her favorite color and we had been talking about color pairings. Yes, we are nerds like that. Anyway this is NOT her birthday card, it is the card I made first. I had intended for it to be her card when I started out, but then I gave it some thought and decided the butterflies were great but I had an idea that fit her personality better. Stay tuned.

I feel like a broken record but forgive my color tweaking and variances that may occur!! I tried taking photos in different spots today of 3 cards and there may be some bright ones and some not so bright. I don't claim to be a photo editing expert. Anyway, this card measures 5" x 5". Midnight Muse and Tangerine Tango are the colors used, along with a large Mod Retro pad from DCWV that I picked up too long ago to just be cutting into it now! I used a ledger paper, orange graphics, and houndstooth from the pad to cut the butterflies. My daughter also digs houndstooth in a big way, which led me to this pattern choice. She actually came into the living room while I was working on this card and watching Downton Abbey (Season 2 now available on Hulu!), and asked if it was hers. By then I knew it wasn't and told her so. She said that was too bad, she liked it. :) I'm glad she did but I think she will really like her actual card! 

The back piece is Midnight Muse card stock stamped with the retired-too-quickly Wonderfully Worn background stamp in Midnight Muse ink.Since it is narrower than the card stock piece, I had to stamp it twice. With the spotty pattern, it doesn't show too much but the more noticeable part is covered by the punched borders. I used the Elegant Butterfly punch to make Jenni Bowlin-style butterflies. I punched each of the patterned papers twice. I attached with glue down the center of the body and popped the wings on Stampin' Dimensionals, and added 4 of the Basic Rhinestones from the attached rows for the bodies. The border is punched with the retired Eyelet Border punch from Midnight Muse and Tangerine Tango, and wrapped with a black ribbon from my stash.

I decorated the inside! I so rarely do this but it was just such neat paper I needed to keep going. Matted the Mod Retro ledger paper on Tangerine Tango and accented with a punched Midnight Muse butterfly. There is a punched houndstooth butterfly glued to the back of the card just for fun, also.

I hope you enjoyed this card, it was a lot of fun to make and I hope to find a recipient soon! I've hinted a couple of times at the "theme" of the birthday card, see if you get it right! Next post!

Becca

Supplies Used - All Stampin' Up unless otherwise noted:
Stamps: Wonderfully Worn
Card Stock: White, Midnight Muse, Tangerine Tango, Mod Retro stack (DCWV)
Ink: Midnight Muse
Other: Elegant Butterfly Punch, Eyelet Border Punch, Basic Rhinestones, ribbon, Stampin' Dimensionals

Stamp A Stack Sneak Peek!

Stamp A Stack July 10th and 14th! Who's in? Here is a sneak peek of one of the cards we'll be making.

New toys! I just can't get enough! :) If you are in the GF area and would like to attend please contact me and I will send you the details.
Becca

Another Daydream Monogram cutie

A co-worker and his wife just had their first baby - a little girl. I needed a pink, girly card - stat! I had the bones of the card as it is pretty much a direct copy of the monochromatic greens in the last post but with one little added frill. I used my Color Coach to find the match to the new In Color, Primrose Petals - come to find out, it is a mono match to Pink Pirouette! Here's Part II of the previous post.

I need HELP with my photo editing! I can't seem to get decent light at home. Maybe I need to take all of my blog pics at work?? Sheesh! Anyway this is the same supply list as the last post with the exception of the colors and I also used the Boho Blossoms punch and a Basic Pearl. And off she goes!


Here are a couple more shots of the thank you card:

See? Exact CASE of my own work. I really like Pink Pirouette but it is such a light color, it is kind of hard to use. I'll get over it - seems to pop well with deeper colors and away from white.

Thanks for stopping by!
Becca

Daydream Monogram Thank You

I mentioned that my stepdaughter graduated. Well, that means a lot of gifts and many thank you cards in return. I made a small stack of these cards for her to send to her well-wishers. Just so happens they are the colors for the Dynamic Duos color challenge! Wonder how that happened... Anyway I wanted to use my new toys and this design helped me achieve a few different goals this week!

I took another photo but the light is hideous and the angle was wrong and it was just an unfixable disaster AND I was out of daylight, so I will post this card again with some other color combinations and letters I played with today. I managed to smash in 4 new items from the 2012-13 Stampin' Up annual catalog - the Floral Framelits, Adorning Accents Edgelits and matching embossing folder, and the new Daydream Medallions stamp set, along with my trusty Broadsheet Alphabet. Love this design. I thought it might work for the Stamp A Stack we have planned but if we have 20 people trying to make 4 of the same design at the same time, even using 2 Big Shots, it will just turn into Armageddon and we don't need that. :) So I used the medallions and framelits again and came up with a more multi-user friendly design. Now I can't wait for the big event!

I've been aware of Dynamic Duos and this is just their 8th challenge, and it is a great one. I'll be playing again! I keep trying to do more complicated things and the simplicity suits me well.

Thanks for stopping by.
Becca

Supplies Used:
Stamps: Daydream Medallions, Broadsheet Alphabet
Card Stock: White, River Rock, Always Artichoke
Ink: River Rock, Always Artichoke
Big Shot items: Floral Framelits, Adorning Accents Edgelits & Embossing Folders
Other: Stampin' Dimensionals

Papillon Sympathy

Wow, I have been busy. Almost 3 months since my last post?? Whoops! I have been busy crafting, but also with family, the end of the school year, my stepdaughter's graduation, more family... and a funeral. My great aunt passed away last week at 84 years of age, and we will miss her terribly. She was so fun and funny, and she could (and did) beat the pants off of anyone at a card game. I made this card in duplicate - one for her daughter, and one for my grandmother - her last living sister out of 9. I don't usually make sympathy cards. I have decided that I need to get over that and make them myself as a labor of love, and in this case it was a good experience for me.

I am so thankful that I ordered Blessings From Heaven. There are so many nice sentiments and a good pair of sympathy stamps. The Bible verse is on the inside along with a small butterfly. I made 2 additional white panels to layer up the card for a simple but sweet presentation.

I used the more realistic large butterfly from Papillon Potpourri for this design. I stamped it once on the card panel and once separately for coloring and punching. The Elegant Butterfly punch actually cuts inside the lines of the image, and cuts off the antennae, so it made sense to make a 3-D image. I colored the butterfly with muted yellows and oranges and popped it up on Stampin' Dimensionals. The coloring isn't perfect but I didn't want it to be. I have to say that I much prefer the new ink pads to the previous! There is a learning curve but the black is BLACK and not blue like my old one, and the lines are crisp.

It was a nice surprise to attend the prayer service and see that the family had chosen a bulletin with butterflies on the cover. My aunt was a wonderful woman. Since she had Alzheimer's that was quite severe, we have been missing "her" for several years, so now we celebrate her freedom to a body that knows no sickness and a mind that is once again sharp as a tack!

More projects will post later!
Becca

Supplies used:
Stamp sets: Papillon Potpourri, Blessings from Heaven
Ink: Basic Black (NEW!!)
Markers: So Saffron, More Mustard, Pumpkin Pie, Summer Starfruit, Soft Suede, Chocolate Chip
Tool: Elegant Butterfly Punch
Other: Stampin' Dimensionals, SNAIL