Kissing Technique

This is the kissing technique on both of these. I did it a little different on each one. They are not mounted on a card yet....I made them for samples of the technique.

You're The Best!!!!

I love her!!!! I really love the new little girl stamps...nice to color in with my Copics. I made the background, too....it is a stamp that I stamped with multiple inks and then I shimmered it.

Hello card....

I did some embossing on this card......and layered on some more embossing. I love how it turned out!

Wheat....

I did this card as a make-n-take at the store for the big unveiling party over the weekend. I don't know if you can tell, but the wheat is shimmery....love it!!!

Notebook Page Card

I love this stamp! It is a page and I just inked it up and cut the edge with a border punch.

Nothing Fancy.....

Nothing real fancy....I think it needs soemthing.... This is a sample I made for the store. The sentiment is actually stamped on the insideof the card.

Snowman Card

I didn't actually make this card....I just colored in the image! My friend, Susie...the owner of my LSS, actually put the card together. This is my next project at the store!

Jennifer McGuire Holiday Cards....

Here are the cards from the 2nd class today......

This is a treat bag....I love these bags...so cute and sooooo easy to make!!

I made this one on the dark side, but I think it would make a good man-card.

This card is clear....love it!!! AND the scarf is made out of a folded $20 bill (fake here but makes a really cute idea to give money!!!).

She turned this card outside in. Very cute idea! She made this by stacking stamps to shape a tree! (This was an extra card she gave us to take home and put together).

Very cute card....I love the colors in this one. The middle circle was actually stamped with pearlized water and it pushed the ink out of the way....I love the look of it.

This next card is a gift card holder....VERY cool!!!! The middle part on the front of the card is actually a slot to put the card in....I love this!! (And, no, that is not a real credit card....used to be a long time ago....I save all of that kind of stuff to use as props).

Jennifer McGuire....again!!

I went to another Jennifer McGuire class today....well, actually 2 of them. She was teaching in Columbus (Ohio) at a big weekend crop. Her classes did not fill up...GASP!!!....so they opened them up to the public....Yay for me!!!
The first class was a technique class and the 2nd was Holiday cards. I will now share my creations!!
These were from the technique class:
She gave us 2 butterfly's for this card so we could choose which one to use.....I elected to stack them and use both!

This card opens 1 inch from the edge...hard to see it in the pic. We pearlized the butterfly so I took a close up of that so maybe you could see it better.

The card opens right above the striped cardstock. I never wanted this flower stamp but now I think I "need" it....haha.

This one has a circle cut-out on the front of the card. I like how you can see the sentiment through the circle but it's on the inside of the card.

This one opens 1 inch from the edge, also. I took the 2nd picture trying to show you that.

I love this card. I like the shape of it....it's so different!!

Gypsy Contest.....

I made a lay out for the Gypsy contest. This is my granddaughter, Jayde. I am making an abc scrapbook for her. The pages will rhyme with each other....like a and b will rhyme....c and d will rhyme, etc... So, this is the  "S" page and it rhymes with the "T" page. Together they will read "S is for smile to chase away your woes" (turn the page) "T is for ten, tiny fingers and toes." On the "T" page I have pics of her feet and fingers from when she was 3 days old. I have a ways to go on it, but thanks to the challenge, I have one more set of pages done!!

This contest is open for voting until midnight October 29th. Go here to vote for my layout:

http://www.cricut.com/gypsy/designchallenge/entries.aspx?did=274

Butterflies.....

I think this one my be my favorite of my latest cards....I don't know because I really like the last one, too....

But this was made with one stamp. (Oh, the "Hello" is a different stamp). I stamped it, then stamped the butterflies again, colored them in and cut them out. I pulled up the wings to make it 3-d....turned out very nice! (I always shock myself when I really like something I make...lol)

 

More new stamps.....

I really love this card! Iused 4 different stamps to create it. Everything is cut out and put on the background stamp. It took me forever (at least it seemed like forever) to cut out those flowers!! Cuting around those leaves was very tedious, but worth it, I think  :)

Snowman.....

I reall didn't like this stamp at first, but now that I am stamping with it and coloring it in, I love him!! He is so cute!! I don't know why I didn't like him.....

Star Box

This is my very first star box....I could not believe how easy it is to make!! I made it with a gift tag on it so all it needs now is a present!!!

Snowman....

Another snowman image. I changed it up a bit. The other one I made for the store had some off color markers in it so I did another one with different color markers to see how it would turn out.
What cha think??

Winter Card

I hate winter....worse with every year. Probably because I am getting older and I just hate driving in it now. It was fun when I was younger....probably because I thought I was invincible and had no fears...now it is just a pain.
But, I still love to make wintery cards! So, I hope you enjoy this one!!
Sorry, they didn't turn out very well in the pics....the card stock is all shimmery and is VERY pretty in person!

Snowman

I love this card! This has to be one of my favorites, I think. I love these stamps, they are so cute and fun to color.

Poinsettas

This is something else I made for the LSS. This card was stamped on the entire card for the background. I made the stem from a branch cut out and the flowers are poinsettas. I just folded them to make them 3-d. The leaves were made from the same flowers. I just smooshed ink into them and cut them up.

Snowman card

I have been making samples for my LSS for her open house which is next weekend (October 24th and 25th). This is a snowman card I made....love the little snowman!! Colored him in with markers and stamped and heat embossed the words.

Frankie!!

This is a card I entered for a contest....I came in 3rd :( but that is better than not winning aything! I love this card!!

Christmas Card

More new Hero Arts stamps. I made the card from a Stampin' Up! exclusive Big Shot die and I made the mat from the Stampin' Up! scallop border punch. All 3 stamps are from Hero Arts.

Playing with my brayer

It's been awhile since I have had my brayer out so it is time I start using it again. Got some new Hero Arts stamps for this specific purpose so thought I would get back in the swing of rolling that brayer. I don't have it mounted and think I might add to it but this is the beginning.....

JustRite tags

Here are some tags I made with the JustRite Autumn Blessings set. I colored them in with Copic markers.

Clear Stamps FYI

Ok, this is an FYI that I received from someone who knows stamps. I am not going to mention names because I do not have the specifics of what she said.....I was busy creating cards. So, I can only say bits of what I heard her say and take from that what I heard....so you are not getting the complete explanation of what was said.

What I took home with me was this....not all clear stamps are created equally.

This was an FYI and we could do anything with this information that we wanted to do with it.
But, if you want to get a good clear stamp, I would recommend you make sure the stamp is made in the USA. Now, I cannot tell you every stamp NOT made in the USA is bad, but IN MY EXPERIENCE EVERY CLEAR STAMP I HAVE EVER PURCHASED NOT NOT MADE IN THE USA IS JUNK.
I have always got so frustrated with clear stamps....the ink always pooled up on the surfaced....no matter what I did. I tried priming them, sanding them, cleaning them...everything. The ink still pooled on the surface...I still got a mottled image when I stamped. I finally threw them aside and gave up on them.
Then I would buy a clear stamp, hold my breath, use it and it would be a perfect image!! I didn't get it. Same ink, same cardstock....what is the deal????
Now I get it.
The FYI.....Stamps outside of the USA are made of a different composition than the ones inside the USA are made of. This composition makes the ink pool on the surface of the stamp ....when we were told this, she actually told us what the stamps were made out of....sorry I was not listening better....wish I would have been, but, like I said, I was making cards :) I listened enough to hear her say some of the companies that make stamps within the USA and I know Technique Tuesday was one she said....and that was a stamp I had bought previously and thought hard about getting because I was making a card for my sister...a very important card..... I was very worried about the outcome......and it was beautiful! I was shocked at my stamped image!! Hero Arts clear stamps are gorgeous, too. And I have maybe one or two others that I like....I have very few.
However, I have many I hate..... When I got home from that class, the first thing I did was flip them over to see where they were made and every one of them were made outside of the USA!!!!!!!! I just stood there looking at them.
So, I am here to tell you.....all clear stamps are NOT created equally and I will now only buy USA made clear stamps (and I don't care how much I like them!). I am sorry to not give others a chance but stamps are too expensive to try out and be stuck with junk.....I have enough of those already.
I know there are probably ways to get around these problems, but I just want to grab my stamps and stamp. I don't want to prep or mess with my stamps to get them to stamp good images. I want to slap them on a block, ink them up and stamp my image! THAT is the way it is supposed to be!
Happy Stampin' !! And remember......this is just my opinion...... :)

Hero Arts FallColors Challenge

This is a wide open challenge!! We can do anything we want to do as long as we use a Hero Arts stamp and use one of 4 choices of cardstock colors they have listed on their blog!
Go HERE if you want to go to the Hero Arts blog and play along!
So, anyway, I wanted to do a Halloweenish card so I picked the green, purple, orange and black cardstocks to create with. I had fun with it! I finally got to use my core'dinations cardstock!!!! I used the black so when I sanded it, it was purple! I used my oval punches to make the pumpkins out of pumpkin pie cardstock. I inked the edges with pumpkin pie, too. The green cardstock is kiwi kiss from Stampin' Up! (retired, sorry...). I also used the branch punch from Martha Stewart and the stamps.....ahhhhhh, yes, the stamps...........
I have always hated clear stamps. But, I have quickly come to find out there really is a difference! I was given an FYI on clear stamps.....different post on this.....
I used Hero Arts "Happy Halloween" set for this card. I love the tiny spiders and webs!!! They can be used for so many things!!!! The faces on my pumpkins are stamps from Peachy Keen stamps.
Hope you like it!!!! I had fun creating it!!