No Time To Stamp?

Since I had my velvet out yesterday, I couldn’t bear to put it away without trying to emboss on it. I had done this years ago using a rubber stamp, but the heart image I wanted to try today was an acrylic stamp, and it worked wonderfully!!! I used the Lace Heart by Flourishes and embossed it on red dressmaker velvet. Here’s my card:

Before I go any further, I want to say that this is a birthday card for my good friend, Deb, over at Dream in Color. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEB!!! Hope you are having a good one!!!

This is a 5.5″ square card. The background is stamped using one of the Plain Jane Christian sentiments by Verve, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm 37:4. The white and black panel are edged in gold.

Here are the steps to embossing on velvet. You’ll need an iron, and the fewer steam holes on the bottom the better, a spritzer bottle of water, a stamp with good line images and velvet fabric. My velvet is a leftover piece so I don’t know what type of velvet it is, but it worked great!!!

1. Lay your stamp right side up on ironing board.

2. Cover your stamp with the velvet, fuzzy side down.

3. Spritz the velvet with water over the area where the stamp is.

4. With a DRY iron set to Cotton/Wool, try to place it on the velvet over the stamp with NO or as few holes as possible on the velvet/stamp. Hold firmly in place for 10 - 20 seconds. I did 20 seconds. Check to see if the velvet is dry. If still damp, hold longer. Be very careful that the velvet does not move under your iron or your image will be messed up.

5. Carefully peel the velvet off the stamp and it should look GREAT!!!

I then placed my Heart Nestability over my embossed velvet heart, taped it into place so it would not shift, and ran it through the Cuttlebug. I ran it through twice to make sure it cut and it did. This time I only had 1 little string to snip with scissors. Just as I did yesterday, I turned my heart upside down and gave it a good spray with spray glue, especially around the edges in an effort to prevent the edges from fraying. I then adhered my embossed velvet heart to my larger heart cut from Black Mirricard from Marco’s Paper. It is highly reflective and looks great against the velvet heart. I added a stick pin and adhered to my card front. A fairly easy card again!!!

I made a card with a black velvet heart yesterday, using a slightly different method that you can read about here if you like. Having fun with velvet this week!!

Stamps: Plain Jane Sentiment by Verve Visual; Lace Heart by Flourishes

Paper: PTI White; SU Black

Ink: Versa Fine Onyx Black, Gold Calligraphy Pen by Marvy Uchida

Accessories: Classic Heart Nestabilities by Spellbinders; SU Pretties Kit; Black Sheer Ribbon; Glue Dots, Glue Glider, Dimensionals, Iron, Water Spritzer, Velvet Fabric, Spray Glue

Note: Joan’s Garden has the Heart Nestabilities and theGlue Glider.

Thanks much for stopping in again today!!! Tomorrow we have our usual Stamp Simply Challenge up and I’m excited about this one. It’s one I’m going to be especially excited to see all your creations from!!! Hope you’ll have time to check in!!! As always, wishing you all a wonderful week!!!

The Blog Candy I am offering today is a Stamp Simply set called Coffee with Friends. It’s a very versatile set with a variety of mugs, the largest of which is a paper piecer’s dream!!! Here it is:

And with the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons approaching, I like to get a few things made ahead when time isn’t so rushed. Today I decided to make a tag (I LOVE to make tags for gift baskets) for a coffee themed gift basket that could be given either at Thanksgiving or Christmas. Here it is:

I colored the stack of cups with my Copics and just added a few fun things to my tag. First of all, the background is stamped with one of the sentiment stamps in the set, and the little oval tag on top is a new die (new to me) I got from Spellbinders called Tag 5. It is one plate with 5 tags in it, so you are cutting 5 at one time — kind of nice!!! I have riveted 2 of them together, and they open so you can write your To and From on the inside white tag. I also got some new acrylic pieces, and having never used them before I know I wasn’t overly creative here, but I had fun. There’s just a clear button over the heart with a ribbon run through both the heart and clear button — it was fun!

• Stamps: Stamp Simply Coffee with Friends by Flourishes
• Paper: PTI White, SU Real Red and Chocolate Chip
• Ink: Adirondack Espresso (heat set), and Copics R24, R27, R29, C1, 0
• Accessories: Spellbinders Dies (Long Rectangle Nestability, Tag 5, Heart), Clear Acrylic by My Acrylic Album, SU Large Eyelet, Sponge, Cropadile, Wal-Mart Ribbon, Corner Rounder, Deco Corner Punch

To enter this drawing for the Stamp SimplyCoffee with Friendsset, merely leave a comment below. A winner will be selected by a random number generator. This post is open for comments until 6:00 p.m. EST on Friday, Sept. 12. The winner will be announced onSaturday morning. Only one entry per person please. Good luck!!!

Thanks much for stopping in — I so truly appreciate!!! Hope your week is off to a good start!!

The winner selected by Random.org was #259 who is Karen M. CONGRATS! Karen!!! Here’s what she had to say:

1. Karen mon 09 Sep 2008 at 12:37 am edit comment link comment

Gorgeous!!! love the tag. I have this stamp set on my wish list. Maybe my wish will come true and be the winner of this stamp set.

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

259

Timestamp: 2008-09-12 22:22:22 UTC

Thanks so much for playing everyone!!! Much appreciated!!!

This being my 1st year Blog Anniversary, I just wanted to take a minute here to say “THANK YOU” to each and every one of you. Blogging is so much fun and I have so completely enjoyed it all. However, the reason it’s fun is because of YOU, each and every one of you. Knowing that someone will stop in to read, look or sharemakes it all so worth-while. I love to play games and our Friday Stamp Simply Challenge only works because we have players each week — and now our *Celebration* — oh my, what a fun party bunch you all are — it makes me want to throw parties more often — LOL!!! So, what it all boils down to, is that I’m able to get so much enjoyment out of this crazy venture called Blogging because of each and every one of YOU — and I just want to say “Thank You, Thank You, Thank You — EVER so much!!” You all mean more to me than you can possibly imagine!!!

So as Blog Candy today, I am offering you a Stamp Simply Thank You set. I LOVE these beautiful tulips and gorgeous caligraphy in the background stamp and sentiments.

And here’s the card I did today using the smaller of the tulips. As much as I love the sentiments in this set, I left my card with no sentiment. I do like to keep cards on hand that I can grab for any purpose and then finish them off with a sentiment when needed.

• Stamps: Stamp Simply Thank You by Flourishes
• Paper: PTI White, SU Bashful Blue, Prism Majestic Purple Light, DP Heartwarming Vintage Collection Classic Pad by Crafty Secrets
• Ink: Palette Charcoal. Copics: G40, G21, BG93, B21, BV02, C1, O.
• Accessories: SU Taffeta Ribbon, Pearls by SU and Kaiser, Button, Thread, Primas, Cuttlebug and Corner Die, Petite Oval Nestabilities by Spellbinders, Martha Stewart Lace Punch, Cropadile, Zots.

To enter this drawing for the Stamp Simply Thank You set, merely leave a comment below. A winner will be selected by a random number generator. This post is open for comments until 6:00 p.m. EST on Wednesday, Sept. 10. The winner will be announced on Thursday morning. Only one entry per person please. Good luck!!!

Blog Candy #3 has also been posted so either scroll up or click HOME. Thanks!

The winner has been selected — it is#140 — Darlene L. HUGE CONGRATS!!! Here’s what she had to say:

Darlene Lon 06 Sep 2008 at 3:37 pm edit comment link comment

Your card is simply beautiful! I love anything floral so would love to win this set. Thanks for the opportunity and sharing your talents with all of us. darlene

Random.org was used in the selection:

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

140

Timestamp: 2008-09-10 22:27:31 UTC

Thank you so much everyone for playing!!! It was fun!!!

I recently received my Autumn (2008) edition of Take 10. I was lucky enough to get a few cards accepted, and in paging through I find it is, once again, filled with familiar names from SCS and Blogland — congrats to all!!! Here’s a few that jumped out at me –

Jen del Muro provided the Sketch Challenge and had many adorable cards throughout the issue.

Lisa Zappadid the Masterboard project creating a gorgeous One Sheet Wonder sheet and projects usingbeautiful Crafty Secrets images.

Kim Hughes was the main focus of 3 articles. Kim was the Guest Artist, and had articles on Kissing and No Frills.

Lisa Somerville had a page full of fun Artistic Outpost offerings.

I spotted cards by Cindy Lyles, Kendra Wiestockand my good friend IRL (LOL!), DeborahLynneS.

And I had a 3-page segment called Simple Sophistication, featuring 4 cards and 1 bookmark/sleeve using Periphery DP by Basic Grey and images by Flourishes (Flourished Elements and Flourished Words).Above isa photo I took of this project before mailing it off last January. The card on the upper left was something I had done for achallenge at SCS — the techniquewas called Stab Binding. That card and details can be seen here. The bookmark and sleeve was previoulsy uploaded here.

The little loop on top of the frame above was drawn in. This was a really fun and simple set to make as it was just a matter of selecting sheets of designer paper and making the most of what was already there — adding minimal stamped images and some pretty embellishments and ribbon to dress it up!!! This set is a perfect example of what I always say — If you use pretty things, you don’t have to DO much!!! So, so true!!!

Again, pretty things! The birds were on the paper, I added very minimal stamped images, a flower from SU’s Pretties Kit with stick pin, ribbon and pearls!!! It’s kind of like taking a sheet of paper and dressing it up for the prom!!!

I created the rose arch with a different sheet of paper, bordering it in black to highlight it. Again, as in the card above, the bird just needed something to look at or peckat!!!

I also had another page in this issue, A Different Point of View, again using all images by Flourishes (Cake Decorating 101). These cards haveall been previously uploaded, so I’ll just show you a pic of the magazine page. Unfortunately, mistakes happen, as did with this page.The images were listed as being by No Time ToStamp. Well, we all know, there are no images bearing that name. All images were by Flourishes.

And I once again thank you for taking the time to look today!!! It is always so much appreciated!!! Hope you are all able to enjoy a beautiful summer day, such as we are experiencing here — a bit on the cool side, but nonetheless, beautiful!!!

I made thiscard for Natasha’s Dare to Get Dirty 08 Sketch Challenge today over at SCS. She came up with a great sketch and I thought the Stamp Simply Thank You set would work perfectly with it. Here it is:

I followed Natasha’s sketch pretty much to a T, but due to the size of my main image I didn’t have room for my sentiment as suggested, so had to make some adaptations — where there’s a will, there’s a way — LOL!!! My tulip was stamped first. I then stamped it again on some Eclipse Masking Tape, cut it out for my mask (works great becauseit has a wonderful low tack adhesiveto the entire mask),covered my tulip with the mask, then stamped the scripted background which is included in the same set,pulled up my mask, then colored my tulip with Copics. I punched 2 holes in the main image panel, through which the ribbon was pulled up.

Card making is so easy when you follow a sketch — you only need to determine your images, colors, etc. — give this great sketch by Natashaa try!!!

• Stamps: Stamp Simply Thank You by Flourishes
• Paper: White, Basic Gray, Almost Amethyst, Euphoria DP by Basic Grey
• Ink: Palette Hybrid Charcoal and Noir Black and Copics (BV000,V09, V15, V17, G40, YG03, YG95, C1, 0)
• Accessories: Ribbon, Pearls, Eclipse Tape, Ticket Corner Punch, Piercer and Mat Pack, Mounting Tape.

And I still have a Blog Candy post which is live and active until 6:00 p.m. Eastern Time, tonight, Sunday 7/27. Sign up if you haven’t already!

Thanks so much for looking!!! Hope you all are having a great Sunday!!!

Keyword ssnotime45 -There is no time limit. You can play this challenge and upload yourproject at Splitcoastand/or your Blog, anytime at all! You (and that means anyone and everyone, blogger or not!)can play as many times as you like!!! The point is to keep it simple, quick and have fun!!! Please link back here.

The challenge this week is to get a head start on your Christmas cards. Everyone has Christmas in July, so thought we would, too!!! Make any type of Christmas card you like — that’s it. It can be traditional or non-traditional. Personally, my preference is always non-traditional. Cant wait to see what you doand, as always, try to keep it simple.Most importantly have fun!!!

Here are some samples (please be patient as we are uploading and linking tonight):

Check out Julie Koerberssample here.

Check out Dee Jacksons sample here.

Check out Tammy Hershbergers samplehere.

Check out Jennifer Bucks sample here.

Check out Janine Orchards sample here.

Check out Becky Oehlers sample here.

What a fabulous Stamp Simply Team!!! Thank you girls!!! Much appreciated!!!

And heres my sample:

Here’s my non-traditional Christmas card, which also qualifies for Julie’s DTGD08 Challenge to Embrace White Space and my DTGD08 to Stamp Simply. I love simple blue and white for Christmas — so fresh and pure — like the new-fallen snow we ususally have bythen.

The flourished tree from Flourished Christmas is stamped on white, cut and embossed with the my Rectangle Nestabilities. A single Pearl is added at the tree base. It is mounted onto the plain white card with foam mounting squares. The sentiment, cut and embossed with my Petitie Circle Nestabilities, is mounted with a dimensional. Steele Blue Sheer Ribbon is tied on the bottom for the finish. Quick, simple, white — and I love it!!!

• Stamps: Flourished Christmas by Flourishes
• Paper: White
• Ink: Color Box Chalk in Azurite
• Accessories: Steele Blue Sheer Ribbon, Pearl, Rectangle and Circle Nestabilities, Dimensional, Glue Dot.

Remember when you upload to use the keyword above, followed by a comma.Please come back here to post (as a comment) that youve played, and provide a linksowe can check out your card right away. You can find all cards uploaded for this challenge by clicking Gallery Submissions Here.

Some wanting to play said they have never uploaded before. If thats you and you need help uploading, just go to my Challenge No. 1 here.

I have an active Blog Candy post — sign up if you haven’t yet!

Read about the Midwest Flood Relief non-raffle going on at SCS and find out how YOU can try to win one of 55 fabulous prizes made and/or donated by SCSer’s and supporting companies.

Thank you all so much for stopping in. I do so much appreciate it!!! Hope you all have a safe and wonderful weekend!!! And hope you find some time to stamp or do whatever it is that pleases you!!!

Yes, that’s my Dare to Get Dirty 08 Challenge – to Stamp Simply — surprise, surprise!!!! Hope some of you havebeen playing the Dare to Get Dirty Challenges at SCS. If you are a Fan Club Member you are eligible to play and enter. And there’s even a chance at some fabulous prizes if you manage to play all the challenges, and combining challenges is A-OK. If you’re not a Fan Club Member — well, no better time to join than now — you can read about it here.

In setting up my challenge, I told the players what it means to Stamp Simply. Here’s what I told them:

Stamp Simply means, first and foremost, to keep the process simple, but at the same time, make it beautiful! And that perfectly sums up the way I like to stamp. I believe that if you use beautiful things, you dont have to DO much. Beautiful cards are easily achieved with the use of gorgeous images and a few pretty embellishments. Really, thats all it takes. If you follow these few simple steps, you’ll have a gorgeous Stamp Simply creation:

• Start with a simple layout/design and a beautiful image
• Use some favorite paper (either DP or cardstock)
• Add your stamped image and a sentiment if you wish
• Finish it off with a beautiful ribbon or other embellishment
• Simple, beautiful, done!!!

Another way to explain the Stamp Simply style would be to liken it to Clean and Simple I think most of you know what CAS (Clean and Simple) is. Stamp Simply would be somewhat Clean and Simple, but with a little extra *pretty* added in. Make sense?

Here’s the sample card I made using the Stamp Simply set, Thank You, by Flourishes.

This card measures 3 1/4″ x 6 1/2″ and fits SU’s small open end envelopes. Love this size. The small tulip is stamped in Palette Hybrid Charcoal, colored with Copics, cut and embossed with a Long Rectangle Nestability by Spellbinders, mounted on a scallop, and adhered to the card with foam mounting tape.There areholes punched to tie the bow around the tulip stem. The sentiment is from the same set, punched, embossed and framed with the Petite Oval Nestabilities by Spellbinders, brads added, and mounted on foam mounting tape.

A simple card made with clean crisp colors, a simple layout, one beautiful image, one beautiful sentiment, pretty ribbon and a couple of brads. Simple, beautiful, done!!! And I will add, the embossing you get from using the Nestabilities really does add a lot, lending richness and elegance withsuch ease.

• Stamps: Thank You by Flourishes

• Paper: White, Pretty in Pink, Basic Gray

• Ink: Palette Hybrid Charcoal, Copics for Coloring

• Accessories: SU Gray Taffeta Ribbon, Long Rectangle Nestabilities, Petite Oval Nestabilities, SU Pink Brads, Foam Mounting Tape.

I’m so glad you stopped in to look — hope you can play the challenges over at SCS!!!

Remember, I have a live and active Blog Candy post. Check it out.

Remember, too, the Non-Raffle for Midwest Flood Relief. My post just below explains it all.

The Splitcoast Non-Raffle for Midwest Flood Reliefis nowlive and active. You can click the link above to read all about it. Bascially a lot of people put together gorgeous offerings which can all be seen in the non-raffle prize gallery. Donations are being accepted on behalf of the Red Cross, and those donating will be eligible to win any of these prizes. There are 55 in all. This was my offering to the cause:

This prize consists of one Stamp Simply set, the first, called Coffee with Friends, by Flourishes, along with a variety of 5 different cards made using Coffee with Friends. These cards have all been posted here before, so I won’t go into any details. And Coffee with Friends, much to my dismay, has been sold out for quite some time now, so here’s your chance to win it!!! I will let you all know when Coffee with Friends is back in stock.

Please check out all of the beautiful creations in the Non-Raffle Prize Gallery, leave some comments for those who took so much of their time to put these packages together, and then go on over to Splitcoast to read all the details and make your donation.

Thanks much for your support of this cause.

My Dare to Get Dirty 08 Challenge will be posted at noonish today (Eastern Time), 7/24. Hope you can come backto check it out!!!

I also have a live and active Blog Candy post — scroll down two posts to sign up!

Have any of you been playing the Dare to Get Dirty Challenges over at SCS? Well, this is my first one — Jenn Balcer’s inspiration challenge — what a gorgeous, flourished cake she chose for the inspiration piece!!! I honestly think she MUST have had Flourishes images in mind when she chose that cake — LOL!!! You can see it here.

Ok, now this is one of those cards that I really fought to get an accurate picture and just could not.The color is a bright limegreen, not this yellowish-green we are seeing, and I’m sorry but I just could not get it corrected. Also the glitter is so pretty IRL, and is coming off this awful blue here — I almost didn’t upload this, but once I made it, I am, just hanging my head in shame over this photo. It is really quite pretty, IRL — please take my word — LOL!!!

Here’s the Cake Recipe:

• Stamp 1/4 sheet of white cardstock withPalette Noir Blackink using Damask
• Cut stamped piece into 3 strips each 1.5″ high
• Cut the strips to length as follows: 3.5″, 2.5″, 1.5″
• Round top corners of strips with corner rounder
• Sponge all edges of above strips
• Adhere to base layer as shown
• Add Pearls between layers
• Trace with Quickie Glue Pen and add glitter
• Clean off Pearls with a Swiffer cloth as all the glitter will stick to them

That was easy! The cake layer was matted onto a black layer punched with a Wrought Iron Punch. And can you see the sentiment — To a Special Couple — this is a little sneak peek at one of the new centers coming out by JustRite for the Monogram Stampers you all have — it’ll fit what you have known as the C-45 and the small wooden stampers as well. The new stampers coming out have new names, but don’t let it confuse you — when I actually have them and can take pictures to show you — I’ll explain it all — but anyway, this center is one of many to come out, covering all sorts of occasions and events.

What I wanted to show you was the multi-use of these stamps. Even though this is a center made for the Monogram Stamper, which you typically see stamped with a ring around it, today I used it alone — no ring around it. I put only the center onto my wooden stamper and stamped on white cardstock. I then punched it out with my SU Designer Label Punch — talk about a perfect fit!!! It is backed in black punched with SU’s 1 3/8″ punch that so many of us have. We know all the JustRite Products work well with the Nestability Circles, but I just wanted to give you some other options, using things many of you already have at home, and oh, what a perfect fit!!! And don’t you just love the font on this — I do!!! Anyway, when I get some final product to show you, I surely will, but this worked so perfectly here today I just had to use it.

• Stamps: Damask by Flourishes, Sentiment is soon to be available by JustRite
• Paper: Black, White, Green is by Prism (my chart is missing, I think it’s in the Kiwi family)
• Ink: Palette Noir Black
• Accessories: Quickie Glue Pen, Dazzling Diamonds, Pearls, Black Sheer Ribbon, Hole Punch, Sponge, Mounting Squares, and punches by SU: Corner Rounder, Designer Label, Wrought Iron, 1 3/8″ Circle

I am hosting one of the Dare to Get Dirty Challenges today (Thursday), so be sure to check it out and play along. I think they pop up at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time, which I think is 12:00 noon Eastern Time. It’s a fun one and, you guessed it — simple — LOL!!! Hope to see you later, playing along!!!

Yes, it is Christmas in July at Flourishes. Starting today, July 23, through the end of the month, July 31, all Christmas sets will be at 15% off. The price has been reduced on the item in the store to make it easy on everyone — no codes, no nothing — just click on the item and it will key in at 15% off. What a great time to stock up on some Christmas sets.

I’ve been quite sick since returning home from CHA, so I needed a really simple card for tonight. Also, I’ve always really preferred Christmas cards in a non-traditional color scheme, so that’s what I went with. Here it is:

This card was quick to make in that it contains merely one stamped image from Peace. I LOVE this set for quick cards — you can’t beat it! It isn’t showing well on the photo, but the image was stamped in Versa Mark and embossed with a mixture of retired SU brown embossing powder and SU Iridescent Ice embossing powder. It is so beautiful and sparkly IRL,just wishyou could see it as I do.

I used paper from the Provence pack by Memory Box. This is definitely not a Christmas pack of paper, but I just loved this sheet and thoughtwith the tree and flowers itwould work with the dove. I like it!!! Gussied up a bit with a ticket corner punch, a Pearl and a bit of ChocolateSheer Ribbon, all on an Almost Amethyst base, which brings out the color of the flowers. This card is 5.5″ square.

I challenge you to try some non-traditional Christmas cards — they’re FUN to do!!!

• Stamps: Peace by Flourishes
• Paper: Chocolate Chip, Almost Amethyst, Very Vanilla, Provence by Memory Box
• Ink: Versa Mark
• Accessories: Sheer Chocolate Ribbon, Embossing powders (Chocolate and Iridescent Ice mixed), Ticket Corner Punch, Pearl, Mounting Tape Squares

Please take a minute and check out all these wonderful Christmas creations done by our fabulous Design Team: Leslie Miller, Julie Koerber, Faith Hofrichter, Susan Roberts, Linda Duke, and Sharon Doolittle has a beautiful card as well!

Thanks so much for looking — remember 15% off all Christmas sets thru July.

Also, I have a live Blog Candy post going — just scroll down a bit.

Thanks so much for stopping in. Hope you are having a wonderful week!!!