Wonderful, Fabulous, Tags!

At the end of this month I will be celebrating 10 years of employment at Mayo Clinic.  I have a tradition of thanking my colleagues at work for "putting up with me" all year!  I bake brownies, and purchase Girl Scout cookies to give with a hand-made tag each year.  It's really delightful to visit some people later and still see the tags on their bulletin boards.

This was one stamp set called Wonderful You - - I absolutely love this sentiment.  There are two different bird images and both make a beautiful card quickly and easily.  

The diamond pattern is so easy to use (it's a double row but matches up easily so you could cover a much larger paper) and I used Sweet Leaf for that design element.  The bird was colored with the new CTMH alcohol markers. The sentiment is stamped in Momento Truffle (like the CTMH cocoa ink).  I like the Momento inks when I'm going to be coloring more (with water brush or alcohol) because it doesn't bleed.

I started these during Open Stamping and made great progress that day.  After work this week when Steve was away I finished up 24 tags.  That's enough for work and to put some on the packages that just arrived for my friends!  

We're looking forward to some rain here . . . hope your weekend will be wonderful and fabulous!   

Happy Birthday!

 

I can always use more birthday cards in my stash!  This was a case of a card by Barbara Anders here.  I guess I held onto this longer than I realized because I had the devil of a time finding the original post! I used stamps I had on hand - The music, sentiment, chicken wire and butterflies are all Close-to-My-Heart although some are retired.  The stripe was from somewhere else, a cling mount - could have been Hero Arts?  Not sure.  

I've had a busy week and my knee is getting stronger daily.  My last sutures fell out last night from my oral surgery so my mouth feels better now, too!  Finally - the end of the tunnel is ahead!  

My Love led a quiet day of meditation at our church today and it was just amazing.  I treasured the time to "hang out with God".   I hope your Saturday was good - what have you been up to anyway?!

Birthday - vintage CTMH

These stamps and papers are retired, but I'm having so much fun re-discovering the "old" stamps with the "new" tools!  I used alcohol markers to color this - it went so fast and is so easy!!  I added a little sparkle by way of Spica gel pen (stardust?).  Do you recognize the "base" of this card?  Last year about this time I held a workshop fund-raiser at church and we made valentines.  There were a few leftovers and I pulled out the bag while cleaning the studio the other day.  Here was the original card. 

Tonight Steve has invited the neighborhood to dinner!  No, I'm not kidding!  (You just gotta love this man!)  We think there might be 16.  The menu is low key and fun (grilled hot dogs / brats and sloppy joes). Some of our neighbors we don't know at all except to wave "hello".  I'm excited to get to know them better and thankful that my darling husband is such a generous and gracious host.  Hope your weekend is starting out as wonderful as mine is!

Hugs!!

New Spring/Summer 2014 Close-to-My-Heart Catalog!

The new Close-to-My-Heart catalog is here and there are a LOT of wonderful things in it!  I had a limited budget and had to really narrow down my choices, but these feathers (C1584) spoke to me - and I'm really, really glad I got them as I know I'll enjoy them!  I should tell you that the center feather doesn't come with white spots - I added those with a white pen after the ink was dry. 

Another brand new product on this card is the diagonal stripe cardstock.  This is a new paper pack called Paper Fundamentals - and the first set (I'm hoping there will be more! *wink*) is in the Basic color palette.  The side you can see is a rich Cocoa on white.  The other side (which I chose not to feature) is Cocoa with a shiny diagonal tone-on-tone stripe.  Very rich!  Each color has a different pattern featured with color on one side and shiny tone-on-tone on the other.  Don't miss these - they are beautiful!

I've been visiting your sites even if I haven't blogged recently.  The knee surgery went fine, but I must have thought I was Super Woman or something and scheduled oral surgery, too!  I hope to be back to my "normal" wacky self soon. (not sure if that's a promise, or a threat!)

Hugs!!

Birthday cards!

These birthday cards were inspired by Melissa Phillips here. (scroll down)

I used Close-to-My-Heart stamps (possibly retired?) and paper with the exception of the red piece along the top - that was another scrap that had a red-on-red pattern and I thought it looked cool run through the crimper (remember that old tool?).  I made a stash of them for my birthday card file.

I'm recovering nicely from the arthroscopy of my left knee (yes, the so-called good one).  My surgeon said the meniscus tear was larger than he saw on the MRI, but that he cleaned it up nicely and I should get a lot of relief from this surgery.  It's "day 3" today and I am sore but feeling better - the pain is a different type of pain.  Now if I can learn to walk without a limp again - golly that is a BAD habit!  My words of wisdom for you - don't wait too long to address these issues.

Hugs!!

Technique for Open Stamping 1/26

 

This is the card I designed to showcase the technique we will learn on Sunday for Open Stamping at my house.  I don't know the "real" name for it, but I call it creating "lighter images on darker paper" - that's pretty creative, huh!  (giggle)  I used a lot of different colors on the flowers just to see how the different colors looked - then I kind of liked the effect and just went with it.  

I photographed each step of the process so that my friends can see how to do this without me needing to stand at the station and demonstrate as each person gets ready to make their project (we don't all arrive, or decide to learn the technique, at the same time).  They will also have the handout to take home for the next time they want to try this one.  

I believe the person who inspired me used alcohol markers, but I opted to use sponge daubers and Close-to-My-Heart inks to color the images, even though CTMH has alcohol markers.  I like to use things people have readily available, and it's good to explore options.  

In a nut-shell: 

• you heat emboss an image with an outline
• paint inside the image with a white pigment ink and let that dry completely
• add colors over the white 

I believe I'm considered a "football widow" today.  I am not complaining!  It gave me the afternoon to play in the studio!  Hope your weekend has been wonderful!  Hugs!!

Holly Stencil - Christmas gift!

One of my dear friends gave me two darling stencils for Christmas - one was this holly, and the other is all hearts!  I thought it would be nice to make a thank you note for her using the new product (besides, it gave me an excuse to get it dirty!).  I used some washi tape to secure the stencil over a piece of CTMH White Daisy cardstock and then spritzed with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist (English Ivy).  Then I used a Liquid Pearls - Rouge to dot on some holly berries.  Those were not actually in the stencil - I just imagined them!  The little stars were cut on my Cricut and were spares just laying around so they were brushed with CTMH Ruby pigment ink, embellished with a red crystal dot and put to use.  The music Washi tape was intentional, not just left-over from the spraying process.  LOL

I hope to post the technique that I'll be teaching on 1/26 for Open Stamping some time this week.  I've got an idea - but it hasn't quite gelled into a project yet.  Hopefully I'll get that done this weekend.

Hope you're not frozen - I understand I have MUCH to be thankful for living in the Valley Of The Sun!  Hugs!!