Using "stash" items

Have you ever bought something to use later...and then it just sits there for what seems like AGES? Okay, I admit I am a "hoarder." I am doing better at using up items in my stash, however, and not saving them for that special project that never seems to happen.

I bought some tags in a set at Target a while back, probably years ago... Anyway, they were a red tag item so Mega-cheap which of course means you HAVE to buy them. If you know me, you know I like saving a buck! So, I finally dug these little tags out of the drawer to use them.

Here is the final product. I have to admit, red is my favorite color and our new Miss Moxie paper is my FAV!! So, I decided to work with the orange accent color. I really like the result, so much I think I will use this as one of my swap cards. (HA! I won't say for which swap(s?)) This cards uses 2 sets: Ordinary Greetings & Happy Celebration.

Anyway, the Target pack came with multiple colors, so of course, more cards!! Here is an example of how you can take one idea and give it a totally different look by mixing up papers & colors. I used up the Target tags and then made a tag of my own using my circle punch, some miniscallop scissors, and an eyelet. Easy breezy!!

Baggie Books

For Demonstrators, "Baggie Books" are a great way to share and preserve samples. They can be organized into themes or sets and the plastic enclosure keeps them clean! I get samples by making my own, of course, but it's always great to get new ideas and see new art with swaps! It's amazing what others can do with the same stamp set!

Last Winchester Valentine

Look at how EASY this is!! I used the Kraft cardstock as the cardbase. The bottom had been cut off for another project. So what can you do with a cut off edge? Well, add some decorative paper, of course! I wish we had a whole page of this design from the Winchester collection instead of just a bit of a strip but, hey, at least there's that much! The rust ribbon from the Winchester ribbon package really brings out the rust colors in the tag and the decorative strip, unfortunately, it didn't photo very well! "Love" is from the Love Doodles set and stamped in Concord Grape. I also used the Concord Grape to dust some color around the edges of the Kraft cardstock. The "you" on the tag is cut from the same page as the lovely decorative strip of paper. The Instant setter was used to curve the ends and the concord grape was used to edge the piece before mounting it on the tag. To give it a big of dimension, the tag has mounting tape behind it. The knot in the ribbon was tied before putting it through the tag and adhering to the card to cover the paper seam.

...the rest of the paper

Do you ever cut decorative paper for a card or project and wonder, "What am I going to do with that now?"

If you are a scrapper or a cardmaker you save it for another project. Here is a card done with some of the leftovers from yesterdays card. It could be it's twin!! I used the other half of the 8.5x11 Birch cardstock as the card base for this card. More of the decorative Genevieve paper as the background and for the green piece stamped with "love" from the Love Doodles set. Both papers have been edged with Burnt Umber (as well as the card base) and distressed. The tag was from a pack of vellum tags I acquired and stamped in Noir with the tic-tac-toe image from the same stamp set. It's also embossed with the Transcendance powder. Landscape was sponged onto the tag to give it some green color and then attached with black Scrapper's Floss.

Sympathy...

All of us have occasions to use these cards. What else is there to say about that? I don't usually have any on hand and most often have to make one quick.

Here is an elegant yet very simple card. I used the Birch cardstock as the base. The decorative paper came from the Genevieve collection. Both of these are edged with Burnt Umber and then I distressed the edges of the decorative green background paper. The stamp is from With Sympathy and embossed with copper. I used the colluzzle for the oval shape and edged that with Burnt Umber also. The organza ribbon seems to add just the right touch.

Amelia Paper & Hearts

The first time I saw TAC Amelia paper, my first thought was, "It's perfect for Christmas!" And, it is featured with the Christmas stamps in our catalog. But, it's such beautiful paper and very multi-functional. So, I challenged myself to use it for Valentine's. In these cards, I admit, I used the very plain single colored paper, but it sure worked well!

Check it out. Do you think Hearts when you see red & green? Probably not! In fact, don't most people think Christmas? Well, here is my take on a red & green Valentine card. I used the green paper from the Amelia collection with scarlet and ivory cardstock. The card base piece was originally 5.5x 8.5 but I cut an inch off to use it for the small pieces on the front. The card front measures 2.25x7.5. The gold embossing with the Heartitude set looks good too! To get the effect on the ivory cardstock squares, I made a two templates from a post-it note and sponged on L'Amore red ink. The heart in the middle was used as a template and then set off the the side with a pop dot.

This card uses the darker paper from Amelia as the background. I thought it looked really nice with the "cracked glass." I've been looking for a project to use this technique and this seemed like a good opportunity. (This will be one of the tech's for February's class on the 5th.)

For the plus and the equal signs I had enough left from the strip I cut from the previous card to cut these out. I know it's a corny concept...but the card turned out kinda cute, eh? The flowers were stamped with Landscape and colored with Tombow markers. Burnt Umber was used for that aged look.

Back to Hearts for Valentine's Day

Here are a couple more samples for Valentine's. Of course, there are other times to use these fabulous love themed cards too! Every day is a good day to share a little love, afterall, it IS what the world needs now! Both of these use the Love Doodles set and some Sands of Time paper along with some of the improved Brown cardstock.

The first sample is on a Pink cardstock base with stamping versamarked & sanded for a background. The focal point is mounted on Sands of Time paper that has been edged with Burnt Umber & then distressed. The circle "love" images are stamped on white cardstock with Claret, circle punched and mounted on a larger brown cardstock circle. The ribbon was added with glue dots and then mounted to the card with pop dots (can't tell that from the photo, huh?) I love the Pop dots! It really gives your creations dimension!

Here's a tip: Don't throw out that foam after you've used all your dots! Cut it into pieces & use that as mounting foam for larger pieces or small cut-to-fit areas!

I decided it's best to post these 2 samples together since they seemed to look quite a bit alike when I looked at them. Sample 2 has a brown cardstock base and Sands of Time as a background for the focal point edged with brown ribbon. "Love" is also stamped on the lower right corner on this piece with Burnt Umber. The hearts are stamped on Sands of Time with Burnt Umber and jazzed up with Pink Stickles. These pieces have also been edge distressed. I found these mini spiral embellishments on a Hobby Lobby trip and they turned out to work very nicely for the ribbon on the corner of these little squares but, you could use some cute safety pins here also. Each piece is mounted with a pop dot over more Sands of Time paper that has been edged with, you guessed it... Burnt Umber!

I do have a few more samples to post for Valentine ideas then we really will have to move on to something else!

Yellow Swap

Here is a card going out in the mail today for one of the TAC444 swaps. The "HI" is stamped with the new level D hostess set. How can you possibly resist this alphabet? It is colored in with the Souffle pens. They added just the right touch to these letters. I also used the "Rock-n-roll" technique on the letters to get that dual color look. I tried it with just yellow ink, but it was TOO yellow and needed a splash of something else. I also added the lemon ice Stickles to the curls & swirls.

Just a reminder...open craft night will be Friday this week. Hope to see you there!!

Birthdays are always relevent!

I thought maybe it was time to change things up a bit! The hearts for Valentine's Day are beginning to make my pupils heart shaped and I'm beginning to see hearts everywhere! (Have you ever used "heart" that many times in a sentence before?)

Birthdays are always an opportunity to celebrate someone we love. Not that we need a special day for that but...here is a quick card made from premade packaged ivory cards/envelopes I got at the local Wal-mart. (Seems like Wally worlds are local to everyone, huh?)

This is created with the Happy Celebration set and a Kaleidacolor pad. I'm really glad this Hostess set made it into the new catalog! I used another card to punch the circles for the focal points and their backgrounds from Apple Green 1 & the Souffle gel pens to color them in. Too cute! And how can anyone resist organza ribbon? It's my fav! The saying is from the set Wishing you & stamped in Chartreuse Palette pad on Yellow cardstock trimmed with scallop scissors and then punched with a 1/16 round punch to create that eyelet look. Really!...it's a very quick way to dress up an edge! Hope you enjoy the idea and choose today to celebrate someone you love, birthday or not!

Tag Valentine

Another easy Masculine Valentine card. I used the Winchester cardstock, ribbon, and paper. The eyelets came from the Hemingway hardware. "Love" from the Love Doodles set is stamped on a tag with Burnt Umber Palette pad and embossed with the Transcendance Powder. You gotta love that stuff! Embossing in any color ink and fabulous detail!
That "love" stamp fit very nicely on the tag, don't you think? That is layered onto another tag with pop dots and then added to the cardstock with the purple ribbon. The circled hearts are stamped down the side with a Wheat Versamagic pad. The Y*O*U from Mini-bet is added using Burnt Umber also. A very simple, plain jane kind of card.

More for Valentine's

Just finished doing a BUNCH of sample sheets. Whew!

I wanted to get one more heart card in before the weekend is completely over! This one is done on birch cardstock and complimented with Sand of Time. The background hearts are stampe with Pearlescent Beige and the heart in You is filled in with pink Stickles.

Masculine Valentine cards

Have you ever gone (somewhere in the far distant past, of course, for anyone who stamps) to get your hubby a nice card for Valentine's Day at the local "you-know-where" store and faced rows and rows of pink, flowery, feminine cards? Even the cards intended for your male spouse just didn't look "masculine."

Well, thank goodness I stamp!! Isn't it great that we can make our own color combinations? I selected the Winchester paper collection for this card along with the Love Doodles stamp set.

The glittery hearts on the bottom were covered with the crystal lacquer and then covered with the prisma glitter. Did you notice the 1st, 3rd, and 5th heart have more glitter? Silly me left the glitter on a bit too long before dumping it off. It did make an interesting effect with the other 2 hearts though. What do you think?

January Stamp Camp

Last nights Stamp Camp was a complete blast! Being January I thought it would be nice to do something relating to organization... The first project we made were calendars from the chipboard clipboards. Thanks to fellow Angel Lori Betterley for the fabulous idea! I added some corkboard and some Post-it notes since my calendars were itty-bitty, but, DANG! They sure turned out CUTE! Can you see the thumbtacks? We also covered a washer with our fabulous TAC paper and glued it onto the tack. The clipboard here is done with our new Miss Moxie collectionand the phrase came from the Write It stamp set. Perfect for a calendar, huh?

Angel gatherings are so much fun! And, let's face it, we all like new ideas! I really liked the note holder we did at MHAG (Mile Hi Angel Gathering) and shared it with my customers tonight also. The Stickles were a big hit with this project. Like a little BLING, Lisa? She was an instant pro at decorating with stickles.

And finally, just to keep Christy happy, we had to do the tile magnets. I still love these little buggers. It's a shame we don't carry the UTEE anymore. It was fabulous for little items like these magnets, dominoes, & CD pins.

I hope you will all take a minute to check out the calendar on the right. I have updated it with all the classes and events planned through March. Don't forget to call me to let me know your coming to the Craft Cave!

Love is in the Air!

You know Valentine's Day will be sneaking up on us very soon. It's only a month away! So, it's time to start thinking about getting your supplies for your Heart Day Projects!

Here is a quick little card made from Amelia Paper, black & ivory cardstock and the Heartitude set. I used l'Amore Red ink and then gold embossing on the heart and mounted that with a pop dot. How easy is that!

Samples

How do you display your samples of inks and cardstocks?
Here is how I do mine:

I actually use my swatches a lot to match cardstocks, inks, ribbon, hardware. It makes it easier to do more mix & match with our fabulous new paper collections.

Here are a couple photos of the basic cardstock ring:

and here is the Glitter Texture Sheet:

So, I must apologize for the bad photos. I don't have great lighting in my basement nor an adequate place or set up to do fantastic photos. I am learning and hopefully this blogging with photos thing will get better with time! Thanks for stopping by!

Almost Leather

I thought maybe I would share at least one card I've done recently. This was for the Technique Tuesday class a couple weeks ago. We made a 4x6 card with a sample and instructions for the "Almost Leather" technique. Then we applied the technique to this card. I have found that the Cosmic Copper ink works the best for the leather look. Hope you like it!

Oh, Happy Snowy Day!!

Ordinarily, snow every day in a week is not normally cause for celebration and I did have to postpone my planned Stamp Camp due to weather. However, my new shipment of fabulous TAC stuff arrived yesterday. So, since I didn't have a Stamp Camp, I was able to unpack my boxes and prep all my new stamp sets. Yea!!!

I can hardly wait to get to my cave and start getting some samples made to post!! My daughter tells me she can help with doing tutorial videos also. Won't that be cool!?!

Happy New Year!

Welcome to my new blog! It's a new year, with a new Spring/Summer catalog for The Angel Company! It als0 seems to be the time when everyone makes "resolutions." I guess I can count myself among those who do but, I realize a new resolution can be made at any time, not just at the beginning of a new year.
I will be posting hand stamped samples here and publicizing classes.
Wishing everyone the best!