My Exciting News

Heather Rolin over at H&M Stamps chose me to be a new member of her design team. I'm so excited to be included! Heather is such a sweetheart and I can't wait to share her designs with you. Thanks for choosing me Heather!

Here's the post announcement

Key-Ring Quilt

I've had an acrylic key-ring sitting on my desk for AGES so today I decided to use it! I stamped and punched some of the quilt blocks from PTI's Quilter's Sampler and assembled them on the 2 1/4" x 3 1/4" card insert from the key-ring. I've posted 2 pictures because the reverse side needed something too! I also put together a very simple card to go with the key-ring. My mum and dad have been treating Sarah while she's been staying with them in England so this is going over to mum to say how much I appreciate everything she does for us. Unfortunately you'll be reading this before the post manages to reach Suffolk {right mum?!} ... so it won't be a surprise but it's really nice in real life! Apologies to dad ~ I didn't think he'd really want a quilt key-ring!!

Recipe:
Stamps : PTI Quilter's Sampler
Cardstock : PTI Antique Ivory, SU Regal Rose, Certainly Celery
Ink : Regal Rose, Certainly Celery, So Saffron, Palette Burnt Umber
Accessories : Key-ring, SU 1/4" grosgrain ribbon, Nestabilities scallop square

Treat Bags

We're going over to Mandy's house, my old school friend, later today for supper and I wanted to take something for her 2 girls ~ so I decided to make them a treat bag each. I'm going to fill them with sweets! The girls both have the initial S so I made them a monogram each using Papertrey's Trajan font and a circle from Boxes, Bags and Tags. The paper is from SU and is called Spring Fling (retired). I found the cute treat bags on Cambria's blog here.

Recipe:
Stamps : Papertrey Ink Trajan Alphabet and Boxes, Bags and Tags
Cardstock : Old Olive, SU Spring Fling DSP
Ink : SU Old Olive
Accessories : Scallop Punch, Round Tab Punch, Sticky Strip, Scor-Pal, Ribbon

Here's a card using a sketch from SCS (here) and a 'ways to use it' challenge, WT178 to use jewels. I hope pearls class as jewels, they do in my book! I used my Pretty in Peony set along with the sentiment from Fundamental Phrases. The image is mounted onto 3 strips cut from an Anna Griffin stamped background. Quite easy! I placed 1/2 pearls in the centre of the Peony.

Recipe:

Stamps : Anna Griffin B/G, Pretty Peony, Fundamental Phrases

Ink : Pink Pirouette, RHRed, Tim Holz DI Old Paper

Accessories : 1/2 Pearls, SU Scallop Edge

A fun Sketch

This card was made from a sketch you can find on SCS here. I kept it really simple, the 2 off-set triangles were made using a scallop square 'nestabilities' die. Once the square was cut, I put it in my trimmer and cut it diagonally to make the triangles. The scallops were layered with the beautiful new SU paper 'Bella Rose'. I then made the centre rectangle, layered it with Riding Hood Red and Pink Pirouette and stamped 'happy' with my defining alphabet set and 'birthday' using fundamental phrases. Easy peasy lemon squeasy!

Recipe

Stamps : Defining Alphabet, Fundamental Phrases

Cardstock : PTI White, Pink Pirouette, Riding Hood Red, Bella Rose

Ink : Riding Hood Red

Accessories : Riding Hood Red Button (from the new catalogue), black gingham ribbon

Vellum embossing

I never used to heat emboss on vellum because the heat tool would make the delicate paper 'warp' and then it'd never lay flat. There is of course a trick to this technique! Once you've sprinkled your embossing powder over the damp ink, lay your vellum (this works for cardstock too) over a piece of foil-covered cardboard and clamp the edges down with clothes pegs. This holds everything flat while you gently heat the powder until it melts. Of course, you do have to go easy with the heat but by using this inexpensive home-made tool you can heat emboss without warping!

Today's card uses a sketch from H&M Stamps (here) and is made up of the following:-

Stamps : Blooming with Happiness

Cardstock : PTI White, River Rock, Soft Sky, Vellum

Accessories : Paisley cuttlebug embossing folder, River Rock Ribbon, Hodgepodge Hardware (antique brass), Marvy Scallop punch, Fiskars circle cutter, Copic markers, SU Corner Rounder

Fabulous Amanda

If you ask anyone to describe my uncle Robin's wife, Amanda, they immediately smile and say 'fabulous' ... she just IS! So I'm horribly late for her birthday ... August 6th, which is in 2 days ... and of course she lives in England so it takes a week for the post to get there. But I suppose at the time of writing the card, it was on time, right?!

I decided to use my Fabulous Flowers stamp set for her along with my new all-time favourite SU paper, Bella Rose ... TO DIE FOR! The sentiment 'dare to be fabulous' is too fun! The technique challenge on SCS today is to make a spring-fold card. For the tutorial look here. It's a quick and easy fold technique and the image is layered up with 3.5" square layered sheets of C/S. I decided to use my Tsukiedo glue pad and sprinkle dazzling diamonds on the image ... mainly because in addition to being 'fabulous', Amanda is also very sparkly (you can tell we love her can't you!).

Recipe:
Stamps : Fabulous Flowers
C/Stock : Bella Rose DP, Riding Hood Red, Pink Pirouette, Whisper White
Ink : Riding Hood Red, Basic Black
Accessories : SU retired square steps corner punch, SU dazzling diamonds, Tsukiedo glue pad