Hello!  Happy New Year's Eve!

I know I said I would post another scrapbook project, but in the meantime my daughter had to quickly put together a birthday card for her beloved grandma whose birthday is in the first week of Jan!
Actually we have 2 members in our family with early year birthdays beginning with Jan 1rst - my aunt Elsie is turning 97 and she still lives by herself at home - no homecare -amazing lady! Love you Aunt!!!

So here is today's feature - a birthday card for those who have "winter" birthdays!

The pics are pretty self-explanatory - we were after a soft effect after all the red and green of christmas - it just seemed the right way to go.....plus plenty of embellishments!  We tried to do "interesting' elements including a small peek-a-boo door inside!  The handle for the door is just a rolled up scrap of paper.

A variety of 8 beautiful snowflakes can be yours with the NORTHERN FROST Decorative Strip Die  catalogue item # 120901,  please see picture below under SU! Supplies.

Dressing up your envelope is always fun!  Here its been sponged using a snowflake as a mask. Neat!

All together!

close-up of punched circles, layered for depth.

So there you have it - and I am not sure if I will post a project tomorrow. 

xx

Beverly

Stampin' Up! Supplies: 

 Cardstock = Bashful Blue and Pretty in Pink.

Punches = 1-3/4 + 1 inch Circle Punches

Die-Cutting =  1.Perfect Polka Dots Textured Impressions Folder, Item # 117335; 

    2. Northern Frost Decorative Strip Die, Item # 120901

Now that we snipped and glued our way through Christmas - its time to think about scrapbooking some of those pictures!  DO IT NOW - at least 2 pages!!!!   If we put them in a box - ya' know what happens, they will sit there ad infinitum!

But - if you are like me, you purchased papers and accumulated a ton of scraps. I throw the scraps into a bin on the floor to save time. and so looking at it the other day and finding some old 'purchased' (gasp!) cards, I put two + two together and decided to do this......

and close up.....

And...I like it!  Its bright and cheery - just what I wanted.  I have to make some choices as to how I will use it, but that will come a little later. The feeling of satisfaction I achieved was that I recycled, and I managed to use up more of the pricier papers....and if you have read my earlier posts, you know its important to me to use up what I have because, after all, we pay for it with our hard-earned money!  

Now, I had one lady at a party recently comment - why would I create a page, isn't that why I purchase pre-designed paper for?  And yes, it is. But. If you have a quiet time, want to create something so unique that NO-ONE else is going to have in their albums - then I say, have fun and try this!  

TIP - I used white glue to assemble this, plain white glue and a glue stick and a slick surface ( two separate sheets of those annoying large,glossy, real estate advertising  that shows up every other week!) - and so, after you are done, position the paper between something flat and heavy to weigh down the paper to create flatness. I say that because the paper does buckle a bit from the water in the glue. This method is too much to use up expensive tape adhesive! Just sayin'! 

MORE OPTIONS Another cool thing you can do - is SCAN this and make a pdf. file!  Your own "digital design"....that is probably what I will do next. Then you can download and print your design and create other things such as tags, book covers or even wrappers for crackers, wall decor projects....lots of ways to use this. 

OK I will be back soon with some more scrapbook ideas for your holiday pics!

Bye for now!

xx

Happy Holidays!

We're still in a festive mood around here...but a more "relaxed" affair, thank goodness!  I hope that for those of you who celebrate the Christmas Day on the 25th, that you have had an excellent one - and for those who have Christmas still to come - I also wish great tidings for you!

However, today I was looking through my collection of  recent photos and thought to share this card I made for a lucky couple who travel a great deal, Eileen and Peter!  Thinking about the sunny surroundings one must enjoy if you were to celebrate Christmas far away from our frigid weather[emm-hmm!], I thought these two happy penguins reflected that!  Aren't they fun or what!

So if you have friends or family who will enjoy a family holiday this year or one year in the future - maybe make them a vacationers Christmas card!  As far as that goes, take any stamp and put a Christmas theme to it by merely adding those symbols of the holidays - a Santa hat, a Christmas tree, decorations, etc. - and you'll see that it will all come merrily together!

Time to trim the tree! Do you like decorations - of course you do! Care to make some......sure, the easy way!

Well one of the more 'fun' things to do in rubberstamping is when you work with a stamp set that allows you to a) stamp 2 parts to make a 'whole'  and  b) to interchange the design!

TREE TRIMMINGS is one of those stamp sets!  You'll see it on page 44 of our main Canadian catalogue, IDEA BOOK & CATALOGUE in the 'Holidays' section.

I like stamping the ribbon stamp and then stamp any of the 3 decorations I choose to use beneath it - it's fun!!

We made these cards at one of our demonstrator get-togethers and used the colours which match the holiday paper " A Cute Christmas" featured in our Holiday Mini Catalogue - see that striped cardstock - it goes with soooooo much!!!
 Pretty in Pink was always one of my fav combos with Real Red!  Adding Baja Breeze (a muted blue) is then triple-delish! Besides against Whisper White - it all pops beautifully. The stripes in the designer cardtock is excellent at adding just the right amount of co-ordination as it ties everything together - in patterns and colours! Then punch a trim using one of Stampin' Up!'s border punches - shown here is our EYELET BORDER punch which also matches nicely with the decoration's patterns.  So with a few steps you could have a multitude of Christmas cards on there way - all handmade - by you!

CLICK ON IMAGES

STAMPIN' UP SUPPLIES:  Tree Trimming Stamp Set #116722 $17.95    Eyelet Border Punch # 119853 

$22.95 

Cardstock and Inks in Real Red #102482, 103133), Baja Breeze (#111352, 111833) and Pretty in Pink (100459, 101301) {example: 8 1/2 x 11 inch cardstock Pretty in Pink $8.50 and Classic ink pad $ 7.25} 

Snail Adhesive (acid-free roller tape) # 104332 $9.75 

CONTACT ME to place your order or to inquire about purchasing supplies as a gift! 

xx

Beverly

Hellooooo.....back to my blogging at last!  I've been hectic-smectic -  as I am sure "we all are" but tonight I am cleaning, watching Turner Classic and catching up on small projects, just need some chocolate an' I'm all snuggly-wuggly, lol!

Here is another card I created not long ago.....its one of those with extra-love, so it would go to someone close and personal, like a family member or best friend.

What I did which I liked especially here is I made my snowman a hat!  Just scrap felt and some crochet thread, and a little glitter glue!  I also used the scrap of the hat even - to add as snow in one corner.  May as well use up everything!

I used our Stampin' Up!'s AQUA PAINT BRUSH to watercolour him using our STAMPIN' CHALKS....they work just fine as if they were watercolour paints. Of course, the paint brush with the water in its handle and the slick nylon brush make it easy.  A wee "squeeze" of the handle brings a drop(s) of water to the brush and smoosh brush tip in the chalk tablet colour of choice; brush on paper.

Applying colour:... apply a bit more water or more colour to get the effect you want.  Move along so as to not over-water the paper or it will tear, but you will pick up on that by "practicing"  first on a scrap of paper! Just like painting, you can come back after drying to apply more colour. It's not complicated - choose two colours and blend. Pretty easy!

THIS is also why quality paper like Stampin' Up! cardstock WHISPER WHITE works!  Try a lesser brand of paper and you'd not get the nice colours or it would far easily tear.{ Whisper White has a semi-gloss top coat.}

OK!  You can see what I have done I think!  It's a card you add as much embellishments as your heart desires!  I love those kinds of cards!

Bye for now!

Beverly

Stampin' Up! Supplies:  Aqua Paint Brush;  Chalks; Whisper White, Bashful Blue and Night of Navy Cardstock.  Ready, Set, Snow rubber stamp.

I created a Holiday 'WOW' Card Swap on Love is in the Details forum, and so here is what I considered to be my 'WOW' style!  I love birds and the bird cage is the icing on the cake!

I also just purchased a new wheel stamp which creates Music Notes - and I have been just dyin' to get something like that, so I used it to create the crimped paper along the bottom.

Here they are all together!  I have to make another for myself -  I always keep a sample one so I can include it with the cards I will receive from the others in the swap.  Don't they look pretty together?

Here is the crimped paper 'ribbon' I created using our new Music Notes wheel - I squished the ends up into a partial 'fan' at one end and embellished with a snowflake, and the other end was cropped with our Scallop Border Trim punch.   

I will come back [dead tired today from yesterday's craft fair!]...and provide more details on making this card ! :)   Now I am off soon to take my dog to have his Santa picture at the mall - they allow dogs and I guess pets, to come after the mall hours tonight - last chance, so I better go groom him a bit!

Bye!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SOFIA !

I made this " One 12x12 Page Binding Mini-Album " for my online friend, Sofia and I had no idea till after I sent it - that it is her birthday today!  Whooo-hooo!  Hope you had a great day girl! [Sofia does crafts and gives lots 'n' lots of people a lot of nice gestures & gifts - she's a very generous soul! Glad we are pals, Sofia!]

Its a pretty cool project and like the title, you use a complete page of 12 x 12 cardstock, which when folded creates a 'fat' mini-album which counts as a 'page' because you can bind several together with the clever end section!

You can find the instructions FREE as I did, on YouTube from the fabulous Elsa  ( Hi Elsa! ) on her tubes, under JustafewDesgins  - scroll down to bottom of this post for the link to her tutorial for this project!


Not only is this an cool project, there is a ton of ways to decorate it and incorporate tags, photo's, etc.  And all from the neat folds!  The added bonus of the 'binding' element is great - you won't need anything special to create your own album - just some rings to connect the pages. 


So I can just show my pics and all I will say, is that I was trying to use some unconventional colours and patterns to make a holiday album. It was an experiment, and while yellow may not be the traditional colour I turn to for Christmas, it has just enough holiday-style elements to make you feel the vibe!  Least, I hope so!

I left sections open, and the front for Sofia to colour is she chooses....but you can add so many little 'gifts' tucked inside - even a Christmas Gift Card. I chose to help Sofia with some christmas tags. Or she can journal on them!

I will make my own project using this and am really looking forward to doing that!   OK! Cheers! xx  Beverly

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                                                                         Stampin' Up! Top Note Die & faux embossed metal technique                                                  

                                                                                               open up, and fold down sections with 2 pocket areas on each side

  fold down 'flaps' to reveal photo space, or more pockets!....

                                                                            create mini-envelope of ribbon tags to tuck into a pocket

                                                                          ...flip to the next section with more wide spaces for photos {used the negative space from my top-note die as a photo frame with one side open to slide a pic in); and with a pocket on opposite section! Do what you want really!

                                                                        

                                                                                                  side view of whole piece

  

....and moving to the last section....and a lovely fold-down flap pocket for a place to tuck a few things such as a tag, and a top note die-cut.........

 ...and we are back to the front! Ta Da!

Thanks to Elsa for the nice tutorial on YouTube and HERE is the project!

Supplies:

Stampin' Up!  Products = Top Note Die; Antique Brads, various Ribbons;

Stampin' Up! Cardstock = So Saffron Patterned Paper, Whisper White Cardstock

Stampin' Up! Inks = Craft Stampin' Spot - Old Olive, Classic Black, Classic Cherry Cobbler, Versamark Gold,