Spring in my mind, definately not outside my house!!!

Okay, I should have the chilliest silver blue wintery card to portray the weather outside. Instead I have one more card (for now) with more retro colours and a stamp from the new Occasions Catalogue. Hope you enjoy this.

The colours are Tangerine Tango, Coastal Cabana and Baked Brown Sugar

Spring is in the air....

Well... At least in my head. 

I have been creating SO many Xmas cards, I just had to do something else (and I also got my goodies from the Occasions Spring Catalogue a week ago and I really wanted to play with some of the new stuff.

I already used some of the framelits (on film) on couple if cards (one Xmas and the WOW card.)

Here is a card using the new retro Washi tape (occasions catty)  and a new banner stamp (and punch) from the Sale-a-bration catalogue 

The hot air balloon is from the annual catalogue hostess set (incl, the frame around it). This image was supposed to be in another card, but didn't work for that (the scale was wrong), so I decided to pile on top of all the other stuff ;-)

The colours on this are: Coastal Cabana, Tangerine Tango, Baked Brown Sugar and Daffodil Delight

A true WOW card!!!!

Okay, I take NO credit for this! This is all Cortney Kaczor's design. 

When I saw this card! I thought WOW!!!! And I had to see how she did it = case it to the umpth!!!

This is also a sneak peek for couple of things available in the new occasions Catalogue (starting early January)

Wow, right???

It's using 'peachy keen' stamp set (has a camera, couple of sentiments, arrows...) and 'on film' framelits, which has a polaroid, film strip, camera, arrows...

The colours are basic black, smoky slate and whisper white. The patterned paper is Winter Frost Designer Series paper from the holiday catalogue.

 The images are stamped with black Staz'On ink, except the 'hello' is stamped with Whisper White craft ink on basic black card stock. Oh and the film strip on the background is an individual stamp from the annual catalogue (forgot to write down the name of the stamp)

Poinsettias, various ways

The first card is based on an earlier card cased from LeAnne Pugliese.

For this version I changed the colour into Blushing Bride and I stamped a striped background with Gorgeous Grunge stamp.

The sentiment is a Finnish stamp saying 'merry Christmas'

These two cards are partly cased.
I guess I got the first idea for the poinsettia stamped on vellum from Mary Brown.

So these ones are stamped with gold Encore ink and then gold embossed. Then they are coloured on the BACK of the vellum.

One is done with Strawberry Slush and the green is actually Wild Wasabi and the other is with Crisp Cantaloupe and Pistachio pudding, the sentiment on both is with Pistachio pudding 

You may see my mistakes too, well I actually dropped the encore pad once on the vellum and other time I dropped the stamp partly on already stamped image - well... I wanted to see how they work so I didn't bother to throw the pieces out.

Not very typical Xmas colours, but I wanted to see how they would look. I'm still working on my silver coloured versions.

Xmas cards, set 2

Some of these cards are from my Xmas card classes

For this one I got the idea from Dawn Olchetske. I used a different sentiment (all stamps from Santa's List set. The striped paper is from the holiday catalogue designer series paper stackThe belt buckle is 1"x1" silver glimmer paper and I punched out the center with one of the small label punches (looks like a stamp)

This one was the trickiest for my classes. Mainly due to the 'merry' and glueing it down neatly. I wish there was a trick.... I tried even one of those gadgets, that you drop the piece in, pull from other end and the piece has glue at the back (one of the xyron machines), but it got really sticky and the glue was too visible.

I wonder if I would glue the glitter paper on sticky page and then cut it out...... Well... Too late now ;-)

This is part of my masking tape and Xmas card classes. The background is done with masking tape and pear pizzazz ink. The tree is from 'lovely as a tree' and stamped with Gumball Green and the sentiment is from last years holiday catalogue 'more merry messages' which still is available.

Xmas cards, set 1

Some of the cards I have done this fall. Now I simply cannot recall if and whom I cased on these! so my apologies for that

This showcases some new framelits from the occasions catalogue - can you see them??

Now this one I cased from Tina Weller. The point here was to create an embossed image with the framelit shape. It was much harder than I thought but I think I got it okay. Would have helped if I'd have that silicone pad for my BigShot ;-) you can see her tutorial for this on YouTube, if you search for her or 'inside out embossing'

My new favourite card - so quick and easy to do. This also is a cased work from LeAnne Pugliese.

I stamped the image with Staz'On black ink and then used the Watercolour brush and real red ink to colour in the flower, then some crumb cake strokes around the flower and the splatter is done with Gorgeous Grunge set.

An I loved this! more before I went and cased it (I cannot make the name from the sample print).

Lots of small things and took quite a while to do. So this is definitely a WOW card and could be a card for a technique or advanced class, but not something for a 'stamp-a-stack' or a workshop!

Weekly Deals and Clearance Rack Blitz

NOTE! There seems to be some problems with clearance rack prices. Hopefully Stampin'Up! gets that sorted out swiftly


Here is the latest Weekly Deals - great stuff - great prices too!
(sorry, the picture is really small - you may want to check the deals on Stampin'Up! store - look for weekly deals :-)

Silver Embossing - 3 ways

I have, for a while now, wanted to try the difference in various embossing options.

Stampin'Up! has previously had silver embossing powder, which I have used a lot, but now with the Holiday Catalogue's Silver Encore pads, I was not 100% sure what the difference in the embossing was.

So I had to do an experiment

The first is using Versa Mark and Silver Embossing powder. The result is a smooth, almost foil finish.

The Second is using Silver Encore Ink and Clear Embossing powder. The Encore ink gives it a rough tecture, but there is this opaque look to the image, due to clear emboss (it does not show on this image that well)

And the final, and the best, result for me was the Silver Encore Ink combined with Silver Embossing powder. The texture is there due to Encore ink and it almost has this glitter effect. 

and don't forget to check the Clearance Rack tomorrow!!!

Clearance Rack Blitz TOMORROW

Clearance Rack Blitz: 

A new Clearance Rack Blitz begins December 10. Retired products-up to 80% off-will only be available while supplies last.

Cyber Monday Sale -30%

      24 hours only!!!!