Random thoughts of a Confessed Stamp-A-Holic

Bella Love

I have to admit, I love this project!!!! It was SO fun to make and I am so pleased with the way it  turned out!!!  At first I was going to use the word "stamp" and Bali Breeze paper but then I saw the preorder products and the Bella Rose paper and it was love!!!  I knew I had to use that paper for the swap but then to think of a word.  I didn't want to have to order any more chipboard so it was important that the work I picked didn't have any duplicate letters (there's only one of each in the Simon Uppercase chipboard).  SO I thought, and thought, and then realized-duh- LOVE!!! It was perfect!  Then I realized that the heart was the same size as the letters so I opted to use that instead of the "O".  I did most of this project while in Las Vegas (all the cutting of the letters, sanding, adhering paper to the coasters) and lets just say that I am "hobby knife challenged" no more :D  My blade and I got some nice quality time together (I made 12 of these babies).  I'm sure the TSA agents thought I was nuts carrying all of these blank coasters in my carryon but not as crazy as housekeeping must have thought I was after having to vacuum up all the paper dust from all the sanding I had to do *wink*  The things we do for our craft!!!  

As you can see, the back is pretty plain.  I mean I wanted it to be pretty but since it will most likely be up against a wall, there's really no need for it to be *that* pretty!  The old olive grosgrain goes the length of the project.  Then the loop is added on the top to allow for hanging.  I was going to sponge the edges of the coasters but opted last minute not to.  I love the look of sponged, distressed edges but not every one might...so I figured I'd leave them off. It is much easier to add that yourself than to remove it if you don't like it.

Images © 1990–2008 Stampin’ Up!

Materials used (all SU): bella rose DP; old olive, pink pirouette CS; on board simon upper chipboard; old olive grosgrain; boho blossoms punch; flower fusion; clear rhinestone (pretties kit); scallop edge punch

The weekend was really nice.  Yesterday was GORGEOUS!!!!  The weather was perfect-low humidity, beautiful blue skies, perfect temperature.  We went to a friend's son's 1st birthday party.  They had a "clown" (she wasn't dressed in costume thankfully) who did face painting and temporary tattoos and ELizabeth got some rocking glittery care bear tats *wink*.  They also had one of those huge inflatable bouncer things.  Well Elizabeth LOVED that!!!!  We had such a tough time getting her to stay out of it and when it was time to go home....forget it.  She kept trying to take off her shoes to go back in.   Today it stormed most of the day but we took advantage of that by spending the day playing playdoh.....seriously we spent the ENTIRE day at the table with playdoh, gotta love it!!  We did go out to a yummy dinner with DH's parents and Elizabeth had a blast with Grandma and Grandpa (as always).  

I am really looking forward to tomorrow though!!!!  It's the first day of the brand new Fall and Winter Catalog from SU!!!!!  It is FAB-U-LOUS!!!!!!!  I have such a huge wish list.....it is tough to decide what I want to get first-the stamps, the paper, or the Big Shot!!!!  Maybe I'll just get a sampling of it all *wink*  I'll get a link to it on the side bar (just as soon as I remember how I put the current one up-I am SO not computer literate!!!!!)  With the release of this catalog also brings on line ordering from Stampin' Up!  Now you can get your rubber fix any time day or night without having to wake up your friendly SU demo at 2 in the morning *wink*  Speaking of, I guess I should probably go and update my demo website....I just *might* have a few never before seen projects that I will share on there.  But right now, I am headed off to curl up in my comfy chair with an ice cold can of Diet Coke with Lime and my new SU catalog to drool over. Have a great day :)

Candy anyone?

Just a quick little post tonight.  I'm still trying to catch up on stuff since getting back from Convention.  I am happy to report that I actually stamped today :D  It's actually the first day since I got back that I even went into my stamp room.  To be honest I was a little stamped out (*gasp* I know!!!!!) but I guess that's what happens when you sign up for a bunch of swaps and then leave them all until the last minute!!!!  Duh!!!  I did a little cleaning today too, now don't get all excited and think I really cleaned, it was more of a move stuff out of the way, throw away some scraps and empty boxes, and put some stuff back in their place (for those few items in my stamp room that actually *have* a place that is).  I have a few more swap deadlines coming up (I know I said I wasn't going to do them anymore) and I've been asked by a friend to design her rehearsal dinner invites so I need to get back in the stamp groove and get to working :)  Now on to more convention swaps....

I made this cute little jar for my Track 4 swap.  The idea was great but I am going to recommend to  you that you not sign up for one of these swaps and then travel across the country with 8 filled glass candy jars *wink*.  They packed ok but they did take up a huge portion of my suitcase but the real problem came to when I had to carry these babies around the convention center before the swap.  But they are cute and they are different and make a great hostess gift, cute club project, desk decoration....so it was totally worth it.  Plus they are pretty easy to put together.  The cutting of the flowers took a while but I brought them to Las Vegas with me and cut them while Elizabeth was taking her afternoon naps (along with working on my chipboard project-I'll show you that one later).  Each flower is clear embossed and then the pink pirouette flower is burnished with Old Olive ink.  I love this technique, it gives a nice pink flower with an olive background.  Plus it really works with this stamp set because it gives it a distressed look.  I'm really happy with how if came out.  Then a cute little half pearl from the pretties kit and you can call this baby done!!!  I tied an old olive ribbon around the lid and made a cute little tag to hang from it.  Perfect for giving :D  

Here's a close up of the flower on the lid.  Again I love how not all of the petals took the versamark.   It gave the flower a really nice distressed look once I sponged over it with the olive.  If this isn't an effect that you like you can simply avoid that look by being more cautious about covering the entire stamp with ink, I wanted to get the effect so I wasn't too upset if I didn't get it all, kwim??  I only did this with the pink flower though since I was going to burnish it, the other flowers I made sure to cover completely.

Images © 1990–2008 Stampin’ Up! 

Materials used (all SU unless otherwise noted): fabulous flowers, one of a kind stamp sets; pink pirouette, red riding hood, old olive, so saffron cs; versamark, red riding hood ink; clear embossing power; old olive wide grosgrain; ivory half pearl; half pint canning jars (Target)

Well, I am off to sleep.  My neighbor's lawn service came this morning to do their lawn around 7:30 am and of course it woke up Elizabeth.  That is well before her normal wake up time, my little lady likes to go to bed late and sleep in in the morning, just like her mommy *wink*  So having her wake up at 7:30 was not only just not fun, it brought with it a very cranky little girl.  Add to that we had a few errands to run this morning and she was not a happy camper.  Then her nap time was cut short by a delivery from UPS  (a beautiful site---a Stampin' Up! box :D) And while normally I love to see my brown truck pull up, the still cranky 2 year old was not a happy addition....and then she was up until 10 tonight playing Rock Band with Daddy.  Hopefully tomorrow morning she'll sleep a little longer.  I could use the rest *wink*  Have a great one!!!!!   Thanks for stopping by today :)

quick and cute notebook

This cute little notebook was for a gift swap.  I signed up for the customer slot and thought this would be the perfect gift.  After all, customers (and most demos) need a place to write down all of the new stamps and accessories that they need right? :)  I used the Bali Breeze paper (I {heart} that paper!!!!!) for the notebook cover. The color combo is from the SU color coach-certainly celery, regal rose, pale plum, and whisper white. I don't think I have ever used this color combo before but I have to say, I really like it.  It's subtle, girly, and just plain ol' pretty :)  I am totally loving the cute little felt flowers from the Flower Fusion set!!  they layer so nicely and just add the perfect touch to this otherwise simple book. The crystal brad is from the Pretties set.  I used the brandy new scallop edge punch (my customers are going to be SO happy that we have this as I am constantly making them use the corner rounder or slit punch to make cute little scallops) and just added a cute little white dot to each scallop using the white gel pen.  

There is a little flap-pocket inside the notebook cover.  I also added a place to put a business card, I mean really if this is a wish list for your customer you would want them to have your contact info pretty close right????  This was pretty easy to do using the slit punch, I just used my business card as a template to make sure that it would fit.  

Images © 1990–2008 Stampin’ Up! 

Materials used (all SU unless otherwise noted): taking Care of Business stamp set; WW, regal rose, certainly celery, pale plum CS; bali breeze DP; rose red, old olive classic ink; slit punch; old olive wide grosgrain ribbon; flower fusion flowers; crystal rhinestone; scallop edge punch; white gel pen; notebook (staples)

I will leave you with a few more Convention pics.  All of the pics show the new Stampin' Up! Decor Elements in action.  I really *need* to get my hands on some of these....now to just decide which ones!!!!  As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask away :)

Cutie Pie Flips

Let the swap parade begin :)

I made these darling little flip flap books for my gift idea swap on SCS.  I love these books!!   They are so cute and they make a really cute little mini scrapbook.  Plus they are really fun to make :)  I altered the project a little bit to add the binding (used my Bind it All for that---what a fun tool!!!! Thanks Mom for such a great gift!).  I used the Cutie Pie Designer Paper for this adorable book.  Sadly, it's retiring in about a week but not to fear, there are lots of new gorgeous papers to replace this one in the new catalog (I have seen them and all I can say is they are to die for!!!!!!).  Since I was making this book for a swap I wanted to keep it fairly general inside so that it can be used for lots of "themes".  I also kept the embelishments inside to a minimum so that it would be easy for anyone to pick this book up and quickly make it their own.  

All of the interior pages are a Chocolate Chip base.  Then I pulled some colors from the Cutie Pie paper  to accent the inner pages--Rose Red, Bashful Blue, Certainly Celery, and So Saffron.  {You can click on any of the photos to enlarge them}  There are LOTS  of different products in this project-sadly too many for me to even remember at this point (I know, bad stamper *wink*) but if you need more information about this please feel free to contact me.  I will be happy to get you more detailed info if you need it :)

I am still trying to go through my swaps and check out all of the great projects I got. I am amazed at the talent that is among us!!!  I got so many great things!!!!  I can't wait to share  them :)  I didn't do any stamping today *sigh* but there was some much needed, and totally neglected, housework to do.  Plus I am *gasp* kind of stamped out after all of my mad-swapping pre convention (shh, don't tell anyone *wink*).   I need to get into my stamp room tomorrow and clean up the tornado that ran through  it before I left for Salt Lake City......otherwise there will be no stamping.  My room is such a disaster, there is NO way that I can do anything in there until it's cleaned up!  I really need to do a big huge purge, but I can't seem to let go of anything.  I am such a paper hoarder and I just seem to collect more and more of it.  So either I need to use it or it needs to go. Since I know that I won't be getting rid of it any time soon, I guess I better start coming up with some great projects to use all of this fabulous paper I have :)

I am going to leave you with a gorgeous photo taken from inside the Joseph Smith Memorial building at Temple Square.  Such beautiful buildings, gardens, fountains.....the whole area is just gorgeous!!!!  We ate at the very yummy Garden restaurant on the 10th floor and it had just a stunning view of the Temple. Not too shabby for a point and shoot huh??? *wink* Enjoy!!!   

swaps, swaps, and even more swaps!!!

I am up to my elbows in swaps these days :)  Silly me signed up for quite a few 3D swaps for Convention as well as a few SCS swaps...and I have been busy creating.  I am happy to say though that most of the swaps are at least mentally sketched out and planned, which for me, the eternal procrastinator, is awesome!!!  i am also happy to report that my Bella swaps finally arrived at their destination yesterday.  I can not believe how long it took for them to travel from NJ to WI.....we are talking almost a full week!!!!  I understand that there was a holiday in there but seriously, could they have taken any longer??!?!?!?!?!  Anyway, they are being swapped out  and mailed tomorrow so I guess I can share another one with you today *wink*  

Let me just tell you, I *love* this card!!!(yes, I know I made it but really I totally love it!!!!)  I had an idea in my head of how I wanted this one to end up and I have to say it's better on paper than it ever was in my head!!!!  Don't you just LOVE when that happens?!?!?!?  I colored this in with my prismacolor pencils and then blended them with some gamsol.  Then just the little flowers and her purse got some extra shimmer using my blue spica glitter pen.  The patterned paper is from the DCVW glitter stack so it has lots of shimmer and shine to it too!!!!!  Then I used one of the cute little white shimmery flowers I got from the wedding section at Micheals, colored it with a marker, and attached a cute little hot fix rhinestone to the middle. The sentiment is from Inky Antics.  I think it is SO perfect for this stamp.  My DH commented that he thought this was THE perfect stamp for me....hmmm you think he's trying to tell me something???  Nah...... *wink*

Materials used: lemon tart, stamper's select cs (papertrey); certainly celery, bashful blue cs (SU); patterned paper (DCWV); black noir (palette); prismacolor and gamsol; tag corner punch; white grosgrain ribbon (SU); hot fix rhinestone; blue spica pen; white flower (brides collection @ Micheals)

I hope that you all had a wonderful holiday!!!  We had one of those lazy days at home.  My town did their fireworks on Thursday so Elizabeth and I sat out back and watched them from the comfort of our swing set :)  It ended up being great that they did them on Thursday b/c it rained, no correction, POURED on Friday night, not that it stopped most of the surrounding towns from setting off their displays but it certainly kept us inside :)    But the best part about staying at home is I got quite a bit of stamping done this weekend!! I did put my swaps aside for a little while to play with my new stuff, which means I have lots of new stuff to  share with you this week, including some new stamp set previews and the new In Colors from the upcoming SU catalog (ordering begins on 8/11)!!!    Until then, I am back to my swaps and I should probably start thinking about what projects we are going to make at my hostess club this Friday night.......sigh, the life of a procrastinator is never easy *wink*  Have a great day!!!!

life is a highway

Sorry, couldn't help myself.  That's just the song I hear when I see this bella :)  This is one of the cards I made for my bella swap.  They were due today but I'm pretty sure they didn't make it on time (sorry again Sarah).  They went out on Saturday but the guy at my post office said that they already did the mail for the day *sigh*.  Anyway, they are on the way so I figured why not start sharing them (and yes I know I said I was going to wait until they got to their destination but I have no patience *and* I didn't get good pics of the project I wanted to share today *wink*).  

I loved this sentiment stamp and really wanted to use it for this swap.  And seriously, can you think of a better, more expensive "accessory" than a fabulous red shiny car???  :)  I did some paper piecing for the car-it's actually stamped on a metallic red paper. I mean every bella wants/needs a shiny red sports car right????  Of course she does!!!!  I used some colored lacquer for the head lights and the windshield, oh and the car trim too.  I also filled in the tire rims with some and glued a clear rhinestone in the center of the flower.  This is definitely a car worthy of cute little cruisabella. 

Materials used: cruisabella (stamping bella); sentiment (inky antics); stamper select cs (papertrey); basic gray, cool carribean cs (SU); jupiter metallic cs (stardream); black noir (palette); prismacolor pencils and gamsol; basic gray taffeta ribbon (SU); dew drops; spica glitter pen; colored lacquer (not sure of source, I'll check it and update this later)

Well, my SU preorder is in and has actually already been shipped :)  I have to say I am really looking forward to actually seeing the new in colors in person, I am still kind of "eh" about them on my computer screen-they just seem so bright!!!!  I am not usually a bright kind of gal, but I guess we'll see.  I love the new DP that was in the preorder and there is a scallop border punch that I can not wait to get my hands on!!!!!  I'm sure my hostess club ladies will be very happy about it too......I think they are really tired of me making them use the corner rounder and slit punch to make cute little scallop edges :)  I got the last of my supplies for my convention swaps today (my bind it all coils) so I can really forge ahead on them. I am happy to report that the 3x3 cards that I am filling my little double pocket bag with are done and they are C-U-T-E cute...or at least I think so *wink*.  

I will try (again) to get a better picture of the project that I was going to share today.....truly it should have been shared a while ago....i just keep forgetting to take that picture *oops*.  If not, I will share bella swap # 2 with you. We have a fun, but busy, day planned tomorrow, starting with a visit with Elizabeth's friend and ending with a trip to the vet for my little Opie. I'm hoping to get some stamping time in there too!!  I hope that you have a great day!!!!  See you soon :)