Card Club - Sept - Metal Ring

First class of the fall!!! There's has been some change as several from the group have moved away and I expect I will have a few new ladies join the group. I bought some of these metal rings by ScrapWorks for accents on cards. They hold a 1 inch circle greeting. I bought several colors including pink, green, mauve and the grey you see here. I added some of those white confetti daisies and a punched border. The punch is EKSuccess Swiss Cheese border. Works very well. I liked the less symetrical style of it. The white insert shows through. The girls could choose from several options for greetings.

Christmas Cards, Christmas Cards

I've designed a lot of Christmas cards recently. My personal Christmas cards are made which feels great.
The samples for my Christmas Stack class and my Card Club class in November are done. Check out my website for class details. In the brainstorming many ideas have been generated and those ideas rejected this year will be there next year for another go round.

A New PINK Blog Header

I have been wanting to add a little character to my blog header so today was the day. I managed to find some textured paper in a color I liked. With a bit of help from blogger help I was able to size it appropriately. I have adjusted the text color a bit to match better. Another check mark on the todo list.

Scrapbook Layout - 1st pages of 2008

This is a visit to my parent's place for Family Day. It was a cold but clear day so I took my camera outside. I managed to get ice crystals on the raspberry bush with my macro. Cool. Blue Alberta skies can be so great. I split my centre picture and snowflake between the 2 pages of the layout. A concept for me. This was a layout which was a part of a scrapbooking retreat earlier this year. Great Stampin Up products.

Last 2007 Page - Yahoo!

This is my last page for my 2007 scrapbook. Great fall page. I'm so glad to be done so I can move on. I printed the first 6 months of 2008 on the weekend so I'm ready! I didn't get as much scrapbooking done this summer. It flew by!!

Birthday Candle Card

I designed this card as a kid birthday card but it is a versatile design. By changing the decorative paper you can have a card for a boy, a girl, a teen, a woman or a man. The candle is a QuicKutz die which cuts the solid as well as several patterned ones. Great to use up small scraps of cardstock. It's a great size and the flame has 2 pieces.

Paper Storage

Paper storage is always a challenge. I have been storing my cardstock and bond paper in a inexpensive file cabinet. The weight of the paper has been hard on the drawers and it was difficult to see the very back of the drawer. I spent several months researching options. I finally decided on an Ikea piece (my favorite store). It is Trofast. It's found in the children section. It is deep enough to lay the cardstock on the eleven inches and still store boxes of envelopes behind. I have 3 shelves in each half. Of course it needed doors. The doors that come with the unit are chunky blue plastic ones which I didn't want. The temporary doors are cut from foam core with handles attached. I will make permanent ones with thin wood with magnets to keep them in place. I now have full access to all my paper. I have not sorted it all in colors yet but it gives me a really good idea which colors I have a decide supply. Much of this comes from my sister's trip south of the border. I use a lot of cardstock and envelopes in my monthly card club.

Stampin Up Party Thank Yous

These are my thank you cards for my Stampin Up Party. Susan my demonstrator showed us how to make an ink pad with reinkers and a baby wipe. At the end of the party it was to be discarded and I just couldn't do it. I used the baby wipe to produce 10 sheets of decorative paper with the ink left in the wipe. The colors she used were Melon Mambo, Rich Razzleberry, and Crushed Curry. I used the paper in my thank you cards by punching a negative flower punch then layering on pumpkin cardstock then a near match for rich razzleberry card stock. The greeting is a clear stamp from Micheals.

Craft Time

I had my sisters and neice over for a craft day yesterday. These are the cutest red reindeer which were part of our Christmas celebrations. My sister found red velvet paper to reproduce these cuties for her scrapbook pages. Excellent choice. I spent a couple hours fighting technical issues to gain access to all the the family photos from Christmas 2008. We have it solved. Thanks for all the help. We headed out for Thai food then back to scrapbooking. It was a good day.

Main Street Festival

I brought my crafts to this festival in Leduc, AB on Saturday, July 18th. It was a good day. It was sunny and hot (31C) with a breeze. With four blocks of street blocked off we had roaming performers, a car show, dragon boats on the lake, a petting zoo, face painting, food vendors (ice cream sold out) and lots of room to move around. I'm happy with my sales for the day. You can check it out next year for a good family day.
I found a scrapbook store named Scribblers 'n Such which carries a wide variety of QuikCuts dies. I will be back with a wish list.

Christmas Stack Class - Gingerbread

This class was requested by some of my card club girls who wanted a head start on their Christmas card making. I'll have another class in the fall with new designs. The Gingerbread man is a Sizzix die cut. The decorative paper is Christmas giftwrap. The twill tape greeting sold on a roll was applied with heat and bond. The white frosting is a gel pen on this sample but for the class I brought a Galaxy Marker - Milky Way White with a broad point which did a super job. The red paper background was a bonus because I didn't have to cut extra red paper to ensure the hearts were red (an extra step I've done in the past). The fiber on the spine is red cotton with a gold thread.

Christmas Card Stack - Embossed Vellum

The accent on this card is a color printed image on vellum which has been embossed with clear powder. The options for images are endless. This star is a symbol from a stars font on my computer which has been set to white in the document so no embossing powder sticks to it. The blue watercolor background is a scan from some work I did several years ago. I brought several corner rounders for different looks. This is the classic corner rounder. The white card sets off the bright colors of the accent. The greeting was color printed on the card. I found having greetings on the front created a challenge with I came to creating verses for the verses. I would recommend at least some with no words on the front.

Christmas Stack Class - Silver Star

The accents on these cards are silver stars from a tree garland. Of course a Zot keeps them in place. The decorative paper again is foil Christmas giftwrap. The red one has silver swirls which appear black on the scan. The blue one was blue foil with white swirls. The ribbon is red 3/8" gross grain ribbon and the blue is Martha Stewart twill ribbon. They were a great color match. The ribbon again is brought to the inside of the card through a slit in the fold. These were the favorite in the group in the class.

Christmas Stack Class - 3D Snowflake

Really like those Cuttlebug embossing folders! I used the snowflake one on this card in several colors. The snowflake worked with turquoise, royal blue, lavender, purple. I couldn't go down the pink road. The greeting is color printed to match the embossed layer and ripped on top and bottom and trimmed to the edge on both ends. The 3D snowflake attached to the card front with a Zot. Works very well. I've made up the last few snowflakes into kits. It feels great not to have leftovers!

Christmas Stack Class - Black & Copper

The background paper is copper textured giftwrap I bought at Superstore on clearance last December. It was a great deal! The ornament is a Sizzix die cut which has been splattered and painted with Making Memories Copper Glaze. The greeting is a Michael's $1.50 stamp applied with Versafine ink. I was expecting it to quickly dry on this pearlized paper but not so much. I ended up having to use my heatgun on them. Good thing I didn't leave it to do in the class! The accent is pop dotted and the string was put in with a permanent black marker. I offered Sizzix primitive stars as an option. Nice classic card.

Card Club - May - Scallop Note

This is a very simple note card. I used my Scor-Pal to create the embossed lines on the front of the card. The Stampin Up! scallop punch and 1 3/8 and 1 1/4 punches do such a great job. The white daisy shape is a die cut flower I purchased at Michaels in the wedding section. They come in many colors and I hear crafters are coloring the white ones with ink, etc. The greeting was color printed onto the card before it was folded. Again any color combination is possible. I had yellow, pink, orange, purple. A full rainbow of possibilities.

Card Club - May - Acetate Window

I have seen this style of card on a couple of places on the web. The greeting was laser printed on acetate (StazOn ink is an alternative). The fold is at the top of the card. The front was cut and the acetate glued into that space. The bottom of the card front is now trimmed to be even with the back piece. I sandwiched the acetate between the cardstock and the decorative paper. I made the same style with male oriented paper and placed 3 brads instead of the flowers. The insert then is just a quarter sheet so that you can see through the "window" when the card is standing.

Card Club - May - Vellum

The card is navy with a navy white plaid scrapbook paper trimmed to size and adhered to the front. The tree and greeting were laser printe onto vellum. There are two ways to the attach the vellum. In this sample I have made a simple knot. The other way is an inny-outty. You make two 1/8 inch holes on either side of the middle of the card. Pull through the two ends of ribbons from front to inside of card one in each hole. Now cross them and return the ends to the front of the card through the opposite hole. Pull tight and trim ends. Fits well in the masculine theme I had for this month.

Card Club - May - Father's Day

Father's Day is soon! Are you sending yours a card? I am.
On this card I used a leaf image I designed myself several years ago when I was screen printing on cardstock. Now the color printer can do the same effect with less mess. The cardstock is Always Artichoke from Stampin Up! I'm finding I am using that color a lot lately. The acetate greeting allowed my girls to add the greeting or not. The scrapbook paper was very versatile allowing quite a few color options for accent and card.

Scor-Pal Tool - Very good investment

The Score Pal tool was a great investment! I love it! It was expensive but after preparing 200 card kits in the last seven days it was invaluable. The score is straight, smooth and consistent. It handles 12x12 paper which just adds to it's versatility. My last tool was a scoring blade on my paper cutter. A little wobbly and not always straight. The scoring grooves provide all the popular measurements like 4.25, 5.5 and a bunch more. The scallop card had two scores at it was very fast to get them both done!

I would highly recommend it to anyone who makes cards on a regular basis.