Stamping In My Neighborhood

Shimmery Ornament

I just love the new Ornament Punch and Delightful Decorations stamp set from the Holiday Mini catalog (link is in the margin).  I used a scrap piece of Night of Navy cardstock and dressed it up using some Frost White Shimmer Paint (also in the mini) directly on one of the stamps. 

Add a little of the fabulous silver cord (yep, also in the mini), a dimensional and a sentiment stamped in Night of Navy and the card was done.  I will admit that I'm not the greatest at tying bows, so that did slow down this card (the bow is kept up by Crystal Effects), but it's definitely a card that's doable for Christmas.

Sharing Someone's Sorrow

Someone I know recently lost his wife to cancer.  Actually, she was the recipient of one of the gift cards that I purchased from last year's Breast Cancer fundraiser.  Unfortunately her cancer spread and she did not make it.  She was blessed by the generosity of my customers who made the gift card possible, though, so I wanted you to know that.  For those who don't know what I'm talking about, I held a fundraiser last October (and the one before that) in order to purchase gift cards to a local lingerie shop that specializes in undergarments for women who've undergone mastectomies. 

The background of the image layer has a Watercolor Wash on it (AquaPainters and Classic ink) of Bashful Blue, Apricot Appeal and Certainly Celery.  Once that dried, I stamped the daisies from Upsy Daisy and the sentiment from Thoughts & Prayers in Black StazOn.  A little matting completed the card. 

A 1-Minute Card

And that's probably stretching the time.  I made this for friendswho recently moved.  I was going for a very clean and minimalist kind of design.  I grabbed a piece of Crushed Curry (definitely not green, as it sort of looks like to me in this image), some Chocolate Chip cardstock and my Autumn Harvest rubons.  So quick and easy.  And I totally love it.  Most of you know that I like clean and simple anyway, but this really pleased me.  When I look at others' creations that are all decked out, it can be intimidating for me, but when all is said and done, most times they're a little too cluttered for my liking.  Maybe all the elements just overwhelm me.  But give me a card like this and I'm overwhelmed by it's simplicity and beauty...in a good way.  I still made it myself, which meant I cared enough to take the time.  I'm not going to get hung up on the fact that it only took me one minute.  My friends are worth more time than I could ever put into a single card, so I guess it doesn't matter if it took me one minute or 1 week.

Not my usual stuff

This is definitely not one of my typical cards.  First of all, I tend to rarely put anything other than rectangles on my page.  But the Big Shot makes it so easy to get this scallop circle shape, I decided to give it a try.  I also knew I wanted to use some of my beautiful Bermuda Bay polka dot ribbon, so I selected the combination of Bermuda Bay, Old Olive and Pumpkin Pie from a chart that SU provided us with for the new In Colors.  It's a great fall combination. 

It's a little hard to tell from the picture, but I used the Paper Piecing technique on the large flower.  It's actually three layers!  Sure it takes a little time to cut out each layer, but not that long and when you add them with dimensionals, it really adds realistic dimension to the flower.

I had to make something a little out of the ordinary because this was going to one of my friends (and former downline) for her birthday.