Monogram for Mother's Day

I hope all the wonderful mother's out there had a much deserved day of appreciation on Mother's Day this year! Not that we should'nt always make our mothers feel appreciated no matter what day it is, but I hope it was a good day nevertheless. My sister, Beth and I took our mom out tonight (yes...a little belated) to a great local Tex-Mex resturant for Mother's day, and it was so much fun. Good food, good talks, great laughs. It was nice :)

So I kept thinking about what to get my mom for Mother's Day, and I know she enjoys when I make things for her, so I thought a nice note card/stationary set would be perfect! And this is what I came up with:

This is a set of 6 note cards placed in a desktop organizer (template found at papertrey ink).

The desktop organizer was made out of one sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 Kraft cardstock. Lauren Meader makes the best templates! So many things you can do with them, they're very versatile and worth the $5.00!

I used white card stock as my base, and then stamped a flower image on sage shadow cardstock and cut that so that it was a little smaller than the base. I then used a corner punch and punch the corners of both pieces. The polka dot ribbon is AWESOME! I am in love with polka dots and I think that it adds some fun and a modern touch to the floral design. My moms name is Bonnie so that is why it's a 'B' monogram.

This is the card I gave her. I FINALLY used my new cuttlebug for a card! I love this machine and I am so excited to about using it more. The chocolate chip cardstock is embossed with a polka dot border. I used a ticket corner punch to get that look on the corners. I was inspired by this layout from clean & simple stamping.

Supplies:

Stamps: Delight in Life, Merci (Stampin' Up!), Studio G (Michaels)
Ink: Sage Shadow, Chocolate Chip (Stampin' Up!)
Paper: Sage Shadow, Chocolate Chip (Stampin' Up!), White (Papertrey Ink), Kraft
Accessories: Ribbon (Hobby Lobby), Ticket Corner Punch, 1" Circle Punch, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 1 3/8" Circle Punch, Cuttlebug

Thank you so much for taking a look, and I always appreciate comments, feeback, etc from those who wander to this part of the internet world :)

*love*

........and I'm back!

Who's the slacker and the one not keeping up with her blogs? Yes, that would be me. I don't really have much of an excuse other than life takes over sometimes! I've REALLY missed posting though and I'm going to do my best at posting more often. Hopefully at least once a week, since I think that's what I can handle for now. But ya never know, maybe I'll surprise myself and post more :) I have been making some cards, in fact I just got done with a big project! I made 80 graduation announcements for a friend of mine, so that took up a lot of my creativity time the past couple weeks. I'm so glad that I had the opportunity to do that and it really was fun! Ran into a few snags along the way, but I consider it a learning experience and I'm thankful for that! I'll do a separate post about that along with some tips on doing bulk orders. Today I would like to share a few cards that I've done during my absence! There will be more to follow in the coming days!

You know how much I love simple cards, and you can't much simpler than this! I made this one for Tim for Valentine's day this year. This card takes less than 5 minutes to make!

Supplies:

Stamps: Like it a Latte, Short & Sweet (both Stampin' Up!)
Ink: Real Red, Basic Black (both Stampin' Up!)
Paper: White (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Ribbon (Hobby Lobby)

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Pocket Silhouettes. It's a versatile set, and I like to use it a lot. You can use it for so many different occasions. My small group at church did a small ministry project in that we purchased a couple grocery gift cards to give to a couple neighbors in the neighborhood that was had our weekly meeting. We figured we parked in front of their houses so much, that we thought it would be nice gesture to give something back to them and also have an opportunity to pray for them and invite them to our group! I offered to make a couple cards for us to all sign, and this is what I came up with.
Supplies:
Stamps: Pocket Silhouettes, Itty Bitty Backgrounds (Stampin' Up!)
Ink: So Saffron, Chocolate Chip, Ruby Red, Bravo Burgandy, Taken with Teal (Stampin' Up!)
Paper: Chocolate Chip, Old Olive, So Saffron, Bravo Burgandy (Stampin' Up!), White (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Circle Punch, Computer/Printer for sentiment, Twine, Dimensionals

Buttons! Oh how I love buttons and need to use them more. They just add a whole other dimension to cards. On the cupcake I used a sponge dauber to sponged yo yo yellow to get the effect of the candle glowing. For the scallops on the designer paper, I took the corner guide off of a corner rounder punch and made the scallops that way instead of using a scallop punch (which a really wish I had!). Here's a tutorial on how to do that technique!
Supplies:
Stamps: Set from Inkadinkado (don't remember the name...), Studio G Stamp ($1 at Michaels!)
Ink: Jet Black (Stazon), Old Olive, Basic Black, Yoyo Yellow (Stampin' Up!)
Paper: Brilliant Blue, Old Olive, DP (Stampin' Up!), White (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories: Prismacolor Pencils, Buttons, Twine, Corner Punch, Dimensionals, Sponge Dauber

*love*

Changing my look!

Hi everyone,

I'm in the middle of adding a new template to my blog, so I'm having to format my page differently. Bear with me during these changes :)

Thanks!
*love*

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and all that Jazz

What a busy time it's been at our house as of late! Christmas has come, and it has gone. It's amazing how fast it seems to fly by each year. We had a really awesome Christmas. We spent Christmas eve with Tim's family, and we spent Christmas day with my family. There were special things about each day and I will always cherish those memories. We weren't able to go to church for Christmas this year, but we were able to celebrate the birth of Christ with each family and were able to honor Him as our Lord and savior through Christmas carols and the reading of the Christmas story.

This week I will be able to spend time with family and friends that are in town! I am so glad that I am off work all week so that I will have the time to visit with everyone. I'm looking forward to it :)

Today I am going to post the last 3 Christmas cards that I made this year. I duplicated these and most people I sent Christmas cards to received one of these.

The stamps used on this one are $1 stamps from Michael's! I love the $1 section...you can really find some great stuff!


I originally started with the green and brown pictured below, but I thought, hmm..maybe I should try red and brown! The ribbon I had just bought from Hobby Lobby matched perfectly. This is one of my favorite color combination's this year, and if I had more Real Red paper, I would've made more of them!


And here's the beauty. I came up with this card on a whim because being the procrastinator that I am, it was the week before Christmas and I still had a ton of cards to make. This card is elegant and simple all at once. It's easy to duplicate and was a life saver. It's one of my favorites! Once again, I used Stampin' Ups Snow Swirled set. It's a beautiful set and I am so glad I purchased it.

Thanks so much for taking a look! I hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas and has a Happy New Years!

*love*

I've been a bad blogger...

Well, I must say I've been terrible at blogging the past week or so. Honestly, I haven't had much time to make new cards, but I hope to change that here soon, maybe starting this weekend. We've kind of had our hands full with having 4 new kittens in our home that will be 5 weeks old on Sunday!

Aren't they adorable?

For the time being, they are residing with mama in our office, which happens to be my stamping place and used to be my place of solitude and serenity (ha!). It's been kind of hard to focus on making cards when I have kittens running up my leg (literally!) every few seconds. I have a couple projects I need to work on, so I hope to move a number of my supplies to the kitchen so that I can work in peace. I'm going through withdrawals here! Thanks for being patient with me, and just keep checking back, I'll have something here soon :)

*love*

Happy Thanksgiving

I thought this card was fitting for this wonderful holiday, one of my favorites. I made this card for a dear friend and co-worker of mine. I was informed that evergreens don't typically change color, so it's a little unrealistic, but I think the fall colors are beautiful anyways. I used the "Beauty of Life" set from Stampin' Up! which has been retired for quite awhile and I think it's a beautiful set, and perfect for masculine cards. The image and the card front are popped up with dimensionals and then I added the twine. Oh how I love thee. The coloring was done with prismacolor pencils and blended with goo gone.

I hope you have a blessed Thanksgiving spent with family and/or friends! And of course, enjoy all the FOOD! I know I will :)

*love*

I'm alive!

Yes, I am alive! Sorry for my absence, it's been one of those weeks. Well, I guess 11 days. Just some things going on that have kept me away from posting, but here I am at last!

I have a card to share today, but before I do that, I wanted to update you on another little something I started. When I originally started this blog, I wanted it to be focused mainly on my cards and other various projects. I want this blog to be a reflection of who I am through my art and my creative side as well as be an inspiration to others. I never wanted this particular blog to focus so much on my personal life, current events, etc. Not that the things posted here arn't personal, but as far as day-to-day happenings and what not, I don't want that to be the main focus here. So I started a new blog: with Words and Lattes
So if you are interested in reading up on my life, thoughts on current events, thoughts in general, recipes, etc. don't be a stranger and stop on by ;)

This is a card I made a few weeks ago and just never got around to posting it. This is what you would call: a simple card. I love it so much though. The fact that the image is stamped on white and there are absolutely NO layers makes the color of the image pop right out at you. I did a blending technique using Prismacolor pencils (gotta love them!), goo gone (yes, I said goo gone), and a stump. Who would've thought that you could use goo gone for something other than taking the stickies off of a picture frame? It blends the color beautifully...it is the best technique I've learned thus far.

Now, I think I am going to go make some tea and curl up on the couch and read a book....ah....

*love*