Travel Well SSC101

Great inspiration picture! Thanks to Sunday Stamps for this one which really had me keen to throw together a very quick card with stamps that are already out and being used.
Of late, I have been focusing on masculine cards, which makes these colours especially suitable. Traveler, with the train, boat, camera and world globe has been my stamp set of choice. Gorgeous Grunge has been featuring quite a lot to but there is just the tiniest bit of black splatter on this card base. The main stamp giving the texture to the background is the new You've Got This. I think this large stamp might just stay permanently on my table!


The quirky sentiment is also from You've Got This, -'Good Things are going to Happen'.

There are four layers on this piece on the front, so for balance I added some layers to the inside too. Fortunately I'd used black Stazon to stamp the globe, because after the first photos were taken for the blog, I decided to watercolor it, just for added interest.

Cheers,
Rachel

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Floral Bicycle Thanks - SSC99

I totally took inspiration from the stimulus provided by Sunday Stamps, picked up my favourite bicycle stamp, Postage Due, and partially inked it up, to stamp the half I wanted to use.

Then Painted Petals helped out with frothy floral images and some lovely leaves, to make this Thank You card. It was quick and easy, looks pretty much how I imagined it would, and soon I'll be able to pen the little message to my friend and it will happily leave my hands for hers.
Have a good week
Rachel

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Sweet, Simple Swallowtail SSC98

Sometimes it is good to get 'back to basics' and this week Sunday Stamps challenge has reminded me of that. They want a one'layer card with the image and sentiment toward the top right, so no die cut butterfly, or sentiment on a label, let's just keep it sweet and simple.

It's been a long time since Swallowtail saw ink and I've kept it fairly simple in black with a sentiment from Painted Petals with the only colour provided by splodges from Gorgeous Grunge.

Inside I've stamped two of the butterflies from Papillon Potpourri. One of my customers ordered that stamp set last week, which reminded me of all the different sweet butterfly images that I have.

Now, it's time for me to pop out into the Autumn sunshine to plant some bulbs I bought last week.

Cheers
Rachel


**Very happy for this card to be picked by Angel at Sunday Stamps, as a Top Pick. (11 April,2015)

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Wondrous Wreath - Again!

I needed some more Christmas cards this week and decided not to stick with my original card, mainly because I have so many lovely stamp sets, they should all get a showing!

Wondrous Wreath has been used before, but it deserved to be inked up again. I've kept it simple, in that I haven't cut it out with the Wonderful Wreath Framelits, but the bow has been stamped and die cut. The Bermuda Bay is a gorgeous accent colour!

The colour inspiration came totally from this challenge at Sunday Stamps.  The strip of Santa & Co DSP (on special in the End Of Year Closeout) seemed to suit  the colour palette, perfectly.

Its easy enough to stamp off the edge of the card front, especially as each stamp has a tab which I used to line up the layers. It doesn't seem to matter too much if you're slightly 'off' with this stamp either. With photopolymer stamps it is super-easy to make sure the sentiment is straight.




Now, I'm still not 100% sure that this is the last of my Christmas cards, I need to have a solid session of card writing tonight before I know for sure! Hope your preparations are going well.

Cheers

Rachel

Built for Free Using: My Stampin Blog

Happy Holidays!

This sketch from Sunday Stamps is such a cutie. It would have been fun to use the Tape It! stamp set and Polaroid frame but that seemed far too obvious, and too easy. I began by pulling Tap, Tap, Tap from my shelf, and stamped the typewriter onto a Chalk Talk tag. I liked it, but it wasn't developing the way I'd imagined, so I've put that away for another day.

I scrolled through some more challenges and found the colour challenge at The Paper Players. I had already stamped on Whisper White before I registered that it was actually supposed to be Very Vanilla, and I'm sure it would have looked lovely, but since I wanted to use the snowflake from Frosted Sequins, the white works better.
One of the four borders in Bordering Blooms has been stamped three times across the middle of the Cherry Cobbler layer. Mingle All the Way has some great Christmas tags and this one is my favourite. I love all the different fonts and it cuts beautifully with the Banners Framelits. They are in the Weekly Deals this week! All in all, this is a quick Christmas card.

We are heading toward our summer break at Christmas, and there is only 5½ weeks of school left! Also means there's not too long till Christmas itself....have you made many cards?

Thanks for looking
Rachel

Welcome SSC87

It has been a big thrill for me to add another member to my team this month, and I do like to send a card to welcome new recruits. Carmela decided to join during October to take advantage of the additional gift from Stampin' Up!® of a packet of free Designer Series Paper for 6 months. She has been a customer for quite a while, and LOVES Stampin' Up!® so much - I know she will enjoy being a demonstrator too.

I wasn't sure of Carmela's favourite colours so I used the challenge at Sunday Stamps, which is way outside my comfort zone, but it does you good from time to time, to shake things up a bit. The vase of flowers from Pictogram Punches is a good way to introduce a bit of colour, and I love punching them out with the cute little punch. When the vase needed 'grounding' I pulled a striped banner from Perfect Pennants.

I was lucky enough to get a great stamp set, Workshop Words Too, by attending Convention a couple of years ago and it has the "Welcome to our Stampin' Up!® family" sentiment, which is a perfect fit for a new recruit. I'm not sure if this stamp set was ever available to order, it is aimed at demonstrators.

Thanks for looking,
Rachel

Pictogram Punches Wood-Mount Stamp Set

$37.95

Pictogram Punches Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$28.95

Party Pennants Bigz L Die

$55.95

Itty Bitty Accents Punch Pack

$29.95

Brights Backgrounds Designer Series Paper Stack

$37.95

Brights Candy Dots

$9.95

Daffodil Delight Classic Stampin' Pad

$9.95

Tempting Turquoise Classic Stampin' Pad

$9.95

Pumpkin Pie Classic Stampin' Pad

$9.95

Cherry Cobbler Stampin' Write Marker

$5.95

Perfect Pennants Wood Stamp Set

$51.95

Perfect Pennants Clear Stamp Set

$41.95

Table by StampinBuddy. Try it FREE.

Happy Day SSC82

Who appreciates your handmade cards most? Is it your girlfriends, children or the men in your life? I'd have to say that my most appreciative audience are female & interested in some sort of crafting - it doesn't have to be papercrafting or stamping.

Naturally, they're the ones I most enjoy making cards for too.

In the new annual Stampin' Up! catalogue there are two paper stacks with 48 sheets of paper measuring 11.4cm by 16.5cm (about the size of a card front). One is Moonlight, which has been so popular that it is currently on backorder in Australia. The other is All Abloom, which has provided three of the four strips at the top of this card. They've been cut in varying widths and layered. I chose my colours from the floral piece (Strawberry Slush, Blushing Bride and Pistachio Pudding) and used Starburst Sayings, Petite Petals and And Many More to stamp.


I do have a recipient in mind for this card. It is so much easier when you know who you are making the card for!!!!





Then I had the sweet sketch at Sunday Stamps to kick-start my imagination and ...voila! (I watched Two Days In Paris last night, love an English/foreign  language film) my card is done. Yes...it is okay to rotate the sketch.

Very happy to report that this card was a Sunday Stamps Top Pick!



Thanks for dropping by my blog
Rachel

All Abloom Designer Series Paper Stack

$11.95

2013-2015 In Color Backgrounds Designer Series Paper Stack

$37.95

Starburst Sayings Wood-Mount Bundle

$77.25

Starburst Sayings Clear-Mount Bundle

$69.50

Starburst Sayings Wood Stamp Set

$44.95

Starburst Sayings Clear Stamp Set

$35.95

Kinda Eclectic Wood-Mount Stamp Set

$48.95

Kinda Eclectic Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$34.95

And Many More Wood-Mount Stamp Set

$65.95

And Many More Clear-Mount Stamp Set

$46.95

Petite Petals Wood Stamp Set

$27.95

Petite Petals Clear Stamp Set

$21.95

Petite Petals Punch

$18.95

Rhinestone Basic Jewels Embellishments

$8.95

Silver Baker's Twine

$5.95

Table by StampinBuddy. Try it FREE.

Happy Cakeday!

What a pretty inspiration picture The Fusion Card Challenge have this time. Those Peonies are displayed gloriously in the jug and look at the detail on the cupcakes!
Then over at Sunday Stamps it's Pink (and look at those cute little biscuits!)
I already had my pieces water-coloured and almost ready to go, so this was a quick and easy card. I took out a shape from the Chalk Talk Framelit Dies, and the tag was already punched, which was lucky because that shape is retired now! The gorgeous stamps have retired too, but I love the pretty images too much to sell it off - and this sort of cake isn't fattening!!!!
I did use one current (and new) stamp set, Age Awareness, which has some great greetings. I especially like "Thanks, Facebook" because FB does alert me to many a birthday.
The paper is from the Subtles DSP Stack and just to add a little more interest, the corners were rounded with the Envelope Punch Board, and a little paper piercing was placed around the edges.

Hope you're having a lovely day,

Rachel

Subtles Backgrounds Designer Series Paper Stack

$37.95

Age Awareness Photopolymer Stamp Set

$27.95

Chalk Talk Framelits Die

$42.95