CASEd Trellis Card

The other day I saw this card on the Simon Says Stamp blog, and I knew I needed to CASE it. This is totally not my style, but I have the punch she used, and I needed to try it, just once.

Please keep in mind this is my first try, and it's a bit rough:

Okay, a lot rough, but I still tried! What I found interesting in her video is she completely ignores the measuring instructions that come with these punches (maybe more with the Punch Around The Page sets) and she does her own thing. I love a rebel, and someone who takes the time to figure this stuff out for the rest of us!

Me, being me, I ignored her advice to not cut the loops. Okay, I followed her advice about the loops to know which way to trim the diagonal, but I also trimmed the punched pieces, because I needed them to be smaller. Square is bad enough, but BIG square wasn't going to happen in my world.

I also had a rough time lining up the diagonals, so the worst of the lot got put on the top right and was disguised with a handmade rolled flower. It's all about the embellishments. :)

It's a lot straighter in real life than it looks in this photo. Or maybe not.  I may try this again one day, but for now I think it's out of my system.

In other news, I realized yesterday that Monday is a holiday in the USofA. With the 3-day weekend, I plan to disappear a few of my 6x6 paper packs based on the idea in this post on the Operation Write Home blog. I'm getting ready to send off some of my holiday cards, and what better way to fill up the box than with a pile of other cards? :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Retail Therapy

I may or may not have indulged in a bit of crafty retail therapy this past weekend, and I felt it necessary to use some of it, if only to justify its purchase. I made two cards that show off some of my, um ... acquisitions, and I'll show you the first one tonight.

This one uses some new paper (yes, I was weak):

This was cut from a parent sheet that jumped into my basket. I know, I know, I've sworn off paper, especially parent sheets, but this one spoke to me. It is ab.so.lute.ly luscious. In addition to the fabby texture, it has a sheen to it:

You can sorta see the sheen above the tree. Definitely a fondle factor purchase.

The tree was cut with the Memory Box Arbescello Tree die, and I used the metal shim plate to get it to cut like buttah. I find I need to do that with the more detailed dies. The sentiment was stamped with Ranger Distress Gathered Twigs ink and clear-embossed. I love that the Distress inks stay wet long enough to emboss. :) 

I actually started this card last night, but got stuck. At that point it just had the tree and the sentiment. It needed ... something, but I wasn't sure what. Tonight I added a brown twine bow to the trunk:

... but it was still ... yawn. Then I got a clue and added the blue heart to the tree. I die-cut it from a "clean-up" tag -- a Ranger manila tag I keep out on my desk to pick up excess ink from my craft sheet. See? I took the Tim Holtz online class and I even listened! So here's the die cut:

I needed a teeny tiny heart, and now I have many. :)

In other news, I've signed up for the next Online Card Class called Kick Start. In my opinion, these classes are a bargain based on the material you get and the stuff you learn. I cannot wait! How many of you have already signed up? Can we do our homework together? :)

Thanks for stopping by!

SOS # 66 - My Favorite Things

Happy Tuesday! It's time for another Shopping Our Stash challenge. This week we ask you to make a card using your Favorite Things. By that we mean: use what you loooooove to use, the stuff you'd put on every card if you could. It could be brads, pretty paper, ribbon, a certain shape, stickers, rub-ons ... anything you love to put on a card. C'mon, how much easier could this be?!

This one kinda stumped some of the DT, because HOW COULD WE CHOOSE?!?! heh heh Not so long ago my answer would have been RIBBON, and maybe you've noticed that lately I haven't been using much ribbon (I know!), but what I have been using is (are) washi tape and dies. A lot. So I chose those as my favorite things du jour and made this:

First: the washi tape. I used a green and white diagonal striped piece, but it was too narrow to span the die opening, so I put it on sideways, like this:

It was all hidden by the upper die-cut panel, so I only needed to make sure to keep it away from the edge. I love the non-exact science of it. :) You can see I even overlapped the bottom two pieces, since I was too lazy to trim it, and also, washi tape is very forgiving, and overlapping it is cool. Can you see why I love it so?

I die-cut the Memory Box Hexagon Border on another piece of card stock and popped it up on dimensional adhesive. I was following the Hero Arts August sketches (bottom right sketch):

So I've used washi tape and a die. And buttons. And green.  So now it's YOUR turn! Make a pile of all your favorite things to use on a card, use some or all of them to make a card, then come on over to Shopping Our Stash to link up so we can see what you've made!

Thanks for stopping by!

Lucky Stars

During my retail therapy session yesterday, I snagged the Hero Arts Operation Write Home stamp set, and last night I made this card:

The colors I used are SU's Not Quite Navy and Real Red. I fussy-cut the hearts and stars, and it took every fiber of my being to not glitter up the stars inside the red heart. I adore the fonts in that sentiment - it totally rocks! You'll be seeing more of this set here in the months to come - it has so many possibilities.

In other news, Lisa is packing her bags; tomorrow she leaves for home and I have to go back to work. :( Sad faces all around. I thank my lucky stars she could come visit! This has been one fantastic tweet-up, and I hope we get to do it again very soon!

Thanks for stopping by!

Just Playin'

While Lisa's been here, we've had some quality stampy time, which has been a blast. One night we played with washi tape (duh) but not just any washi tape. I chose to use a piece that was very cool when I bought it but once I got it in my paws, I couldn't figure out how to use it. I made this:

Yes, I know, it's (gah) pink, but it was part of a pile of Melon Mambo card stock I have left over from my SU monthly classes, and now the pile is one piece shorter. Also, the pink kinda went with the washi, or so Lisa said. I tried to resist, but she is pretty persuasive. I added a lot of black to make up for it.

I started out by putting two rows of the washi on a piece of SU Brushed Silver card stock (it was out, so I used it). The embossed sentiment was a practice one Lisa made, so I used it. I put two strips of black washi under the sentiment for contrast.

The paper clip was Lisa's idea, too. We tried a bazillion ways to get the vellum layer to lay flat, but it refused, so we let it flop around, and the paper clip holds it flat in one spot. 

Lisa is only here for one more day (waaaaaaahhhhh), and today we're going to meet up with RuffHaven and go eat Maryland Crab Cakes. YUM!

In other news, our fearless leader over at Shopping Our Stash has started up another challenge blog: Anything But A Card. The first challenge will be September 2nd, but she's got a blog candy offer going on here. Go check it out!

Thanks for stopping by!

Black & White & Green

When I saw the current challenge at The Play Date Cafe, it spoke to me. Black, White and a splash of green:

I pulled out my pack of KaiserCraft Chapter One papers, because they are blue and green and black and white and would give us sooooo many possibilities. This is what came out:

 I immediately knew I wanted to use this pretty paper. It's mostly black & white, with a subtle gradient green pattern in the background. I used all white and black elements - ribbon, sentiment, layers, etc., but when we rummaged through my every color pearls basket and discovered a pack of gorgeous KaiserCraft pearls, I went with black & white & green.

One other cool thing about this piece of paper: all the black on it is shiny:

Okay, here it's glaring, too, but that glare is reflecting off the shiny black flowers.

In other news, my sweetie-head pal, Lisa is visiting, and she played the same challenge! We had crafting in stereo! She even used one of my UFOs, so she totally gets bonus points for that. You should go over to her post and leave her some love.

Thanks for stopping by!