Friday, October 26, 2018

Polka Dot Orchard-Coffee Pumpkin Flourish!


I have a quick post today as I should be doing other things (as usual...lol!) but I was so lucky to get a chance to play with this new digi set from Polka Dot Orchard!  It's called Coffee Pumpkin Flourish and it's available in the Polka Dot Orchard Etsy Shop here!  The shop is owned by my bloggy friend, Jessica!  She's got this one and another really cute set, Sketchy Pumpkin Spice available now with more to come!  Both are available at the above link!

Other products I used are: the adorable Lawn Fawn Knit Picky papers that I picked up at one of my local papercrafting stores, The Paper Collage and those pretty stitched leaves also from Lawn Fawn.  The Square Scallop dies are from Craftin Desert Divas and the stitched background is from Stamplorations!

Have to run!  Thanks so much for stopping by!

Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Caffeine Fueled Paper Play - Reverse Confetti!


I'm up on the Coffee Loving Cardmakers Blog today and playing along with the Reverse Confetti Stock Your Stash Challenge!  Hope you'll hop on over there and check it out and maybe even play along!  Here's a sneak of my project!



Monday, October 22, 2018

CAS-ual Fridays, a Homemade Stencil, and Some Foil


I'm up on the CAS-ual Fridays Blog and today I'm showing you how I used some CAS-ual Fridays dies to create a stencil and a cool foiled background.


I started by using the Jumping Jacks Fri-dies to create a stencil with some paper.  You may notice I haven't cut the dies apart.  Sometimes with smaller dies like this I'll choose to keep them together.  I feel like it's easier to keep track of them and I'm less likely to lose the smaller ones.  And because they're small, if I cut a few extras.. no worries!

 I turned the dies in various ways to create a random pattern for my stencil.  If you choose to use paper for your stencil, I suggest using something without a whole lot of fibers.  My first one was created with a red fibrous cardstock I thought would be good because it was heavy, but the fibers ended up sticking when I lifted it up.  So the next try I used some glossy paper and that worked much better...just old photo paper for the Inkjet I don't have any longer.  You could also use something like acetate or vinyl if you wanted to use it over and over.  You may have to play with your die cut machine... shims and all of that depending on the material.


Once my stencil was done, I placed it over my cardstock base and used some washi tape to hold down the corners.  Then I used a spatula and some Deco Foil transfer gel and scraped the gel over the stencil.  I did get some underneath my cuts, but I don't mind.  If you prefer a crisp and clean look you'll want to be a little more careful or maybe even use some temporary adhesive on your stencil.  As for me... I like a few splurts and splatters here and there.  Lift your homemade stencil (especially if it's paper) immediately so it doesn't stick to your piece.  Mine actually ended up drying a little stiffer and I was able to save it to use on another project!

It takes a while for the transfer gel to dry so you'll want to set the base aside for a bit while you work on the other pieces for your project.  Kind of like texture paste.  Once it was dry, I placed the foil over the entire piece and ran it through my Minc and voila!


Lots of sparkle and shine!  As I said, I like lots of splurts and splatters (not to mention sprinkles) so I also splashed some Gold Color Shine onto the piece with a paintbrush once it was foiled and set it aside to dry again.

While waiting I die cut my coffee cup from the Coffee Cup Fri-dies and stamped the sentiment from the Coffee Talk Stamp Set using Versamark and heat embossed with some gold embossing powder.  I also smushed my oval coffee piece from the mug into the Versamark and covered that with gold powder and heat embossed it.


I love the Scallop Tags Fri-Dies and cut the large one from gold vellum to frame my cup.  A few more of the smallest jacks cut from some already foiled cardstock as steam (or maybe champagne bubbles??) and that pretty bow I stamped, embossed, colored and cut out from the top of the pretty image from the Mistletoe & Holly Stamp Set.


Oooh!  Aaah!  Pretty!  Sparkly!  ...lol!


One more look at the finished project!  Thanks so much for joining me today!

  Did you know that there is a Collaboration Hop going on with the CAS-ual Fridays and Coffee Loving Cardmakers Design Teams??  We're showing off the awesome array of Coffee themed stamps and dies available in the CAS-ual Fridays shop!  AND you have a chance to win one of three $25 gift certificates for hopping along and commenting at each stop.  There is nothing to lose and all kinds of inspiration to gain and possibly some free stuff!  You can check it out and start hopping at this blog post here!  You have until Friday October 26th to comment!


And should you decide to shop, here's this for you:


See you again soon!

Sunday, October 21, 2018

The Cutting Cafe Inspiration- Anything Goes!


It's Designers' Choice this time around over at The Cutting Cafe and I was so excited when I saw this beautiful printable sentiment set, Just Be!  I needed a quick card and this set makes it so easy to make a quick and BEautiful card.

Pretty awesome, right??


Feeling the rainbows lately so I printed a few of the sentiments and then die cut and foiled this one.  Some Lawn Fawn plaid and a few pretty flowers and it was done and ready to send!

I'm playing along again with the Colourful Challenge over at Time Out Challenges!  You have a couple days left to play along with this one!


Awesome enough to be the star of the show... LOVE!!  

Can't wait to see what all of my teamies have created for today!  Hop on over to the Cutting Cafe Blog and comment there for a chance to win three sets of your choice and then check out what everyone has created!


Friday, October 19, 2018

Coffee Loving Cardmakers-CAS-ual Fridays Stamps Collab Hop!

Woo hoo!  Today the CAS-ual Fridays and Coffee Loving Cardmakers Design Teams are hopping along together to show off the amazing array of Coffee and Tea stamps and dies available over at CAS-ual Fridays!  There are three... yes THREE $25 gift certificates up for grabs!  Just leave some love at every stop along the way for your chances!  I'm lucky to be on both teams so if you're hopping in order you've already seen everything my amazingly talented teamies from CAS-ual Fridays have created and after you leave here you'll head on over to the Coffee Loving Cardmaker's blog and check out what my awesome teamies from the Coffee Loving Cardmakers have created for your viewing pleasure!

Here's how I was inspired:


If you checkout ALL of the coffee and tea offerings over at CAS-ual Fridays you'll notice that Michele has collected bunches of the cutest, funniest and inspirational coffee sentiments... tons of awesome sentiments.  I wanted to use one of them from Time For Coffee as the main part of my project, but it wasn't quite big enough to be the star of the show so, I decided to use the Coffee Word die from the Coffee Cup Fri-Dies and parts of the sentiment stamp to re-create the sentiment in living color!!  LOTS of color...lol!  Those pretty Rainbow papers from Lawn Fawn were perfect!


I just cut the Coffee word 3 times from black and once from that pretty glittery paper for each one I wanted to use for my sentiment.  I did the same with the cute little cup that's included in the Coffee Cup Fri-Dies set.  Then I may or may not have cut my sentiment apart.  I do this often with my clear stamps because I hate masking... and they can easily be re-assembled onto a block to stamp the sentiment together.  I heat embossed them in white on black paper and cut out little banners.  For the background I just added various colors and sizes of Nuvo drops.  A few clear sequins from PPP and it was done!  I decided to hang this one in my cubicle at work since it was so pretty!

I'm playing along with the Colourful Challenge over at Time Out Challenges with this one!

If you stop here often, you know that CAS-ual Fridays has a couple challenges you can play along with each month.  One of them is the Friday Challenge and the current challenge that runs through this coming Monday is a color challenge.  I decided to play along:


I made this one a Christmas card.. I love these non-traditional colors for a Christmas card!  I cut that beautiful cup from the Coffee Cup Fri-Dies from some MFT paper.   I cut an extra cup from the gray cardstock, embossed my sentiment from the Mistletoe and Holly stamp set so that I could trim it down and it would fit perfectly across my cup.  I cut some pretty flowers using the 4 Petals Fri-Dies... just love those sweet dies for layering flowers!


I just LOVE the Ornament Tag Fri-Dies from CFS!  Such a quick and easy way to create a shaker!  I left my circles attached so it cuts a perfect frame every time!  I foiled some papers from Gina K using her Silver Sequins Foil; cut my Ornament from it and then used the center circle as the base for my shaker; attached some clear acetate to the inside of the frame, added a bunch of sequins and popped up the frame over them!  Then I took the ornament hanger parts and cut them from some silver foiled cardstock in my stash and popped up the main piece and just wrapped the squiggly hanger over the top of my card and adhered it to the back. While I was doing that I realized that hanger made the perfect steam for my cup so I cut another from some vellum and added it!

So there is another challenge and opportunity to win some free stuff over at CAS-ual Fridays!  The Calling All Sistahs Encouragement Challenge.  This time around it's a sketch challenge!


All you need to do is create a card of encouragement using this sketch!  You don't have to include a ribbon on yours, but if you want to you can!  Here's how I was inspired:


Well, of course mine has coffee on it!  Are you new here??  But it also includes some words of encouragement!  I've been wanting to use that beautiful floral background stamp, Full On Floral!  I stamped it with Versamark onto watercolor paper and embossed in gold.  Then I used my Zig markers with water to add color to the background.  I picked a pretty plaid from MFT that matched the colors and then used a strip of gold glitter tape over the seam.

I cut my cup pieces out using the To Go Cup Fri-Dies.  I heat embossed the "You've Got This" sentiment from Dream Then Do stamp set and added the little "Coffee" word from the Time For Coffee stamp set.


I was lucky to have some extra of the background paper left so I cut hearts using the Heart Board Fri-Dies and some pretty flowers from the 4 Petals Fri-Dies.  I placed a vellum layer underneath that I cut using the Bubble Box Fri-Dies and layered a couple leafy gold vellum pieces cut using the Casual Trees Fri-Dies under the flowers.

I hope you enjoyed your stop here and are inspired to create something and maybe even play along with one or both of these challenges!  AND don't forget to leave some love here and all of the other stops for a chance to win one of three $25 gift certificates from CAS-ual Fridays!  Commenting to close on Friday, October 26, 2018 at 11:55 pm pacific. Winners to be posted on the CAS-ual Fridays Stamps + Coffee Loving Cardmakers blog on Saturday, October 27th!

Your next stop is the Coffee Loving Cardmakers Blog!  You'll find linkies below for all of the stops along the way!





Thursday, October 18, 2018

Beautiful Flowers and an Awesome Sentiment


What do you get when you combine some beautiful flowers and an awesome sentiment?  Lots O' pretty!  For this one I combined those beautiful Spring Blossoms from Honey Bee Stamps and that awesome sentiment from CAS-ual Fridays Be Stamp Set.


I started off with the pretty black and white striped packaging I got in a Honey Bee order.  My top two layers were cut using the Distressed Edge Rectangles from Kat Scrappiness!  Love those fun dies!


And these flowers!  I colored them with Copics and added some green Nuvo drops to the centers.


And that sentiment, right??  Could make someone's day.. this one did!

With this one I'm playing along with a challenge over at Time Out Challenges.. #120 is "Colorful".  Check it out and play along!



Wednesday, October 17, 2018

Paper Smooches October Challenge!


Took a few moments to play along with a fun challenge over at Paper Smooches!  The October challenge is a sketch challenge and the graphic is below.

I decided to make a Halloween card because I'm also playing along with the Twisted Thursday challenge over at the Outlawz which is any Autumn Holiday and the current challenge over at Double Trouble is Halloween/Fall and they're partnering with the Paper Girls this time around who also have a Halloween Theme so I'm playing along there too!

I started with my background and ink blended some blue, purple and black onto the cardstock.  Then I sponged some Versamark through a star stencil and embossed with some white and gold glitter embossing powder.  I kind of messed up because I didn't think I'd gotten any versamark through the stencil so I went in a second time but of course it wasn't lined up and I had gotten Versamark on initially...lol!  But I'm good with it... it's just a little more distressed than my initial plan...lol!  The buildings and bats create the design that is in the sketch.



Love the adorable ghosts in the Spookalicious stamp set!  They're not really in the sketch... but that's ok... they're part of the "background"...lol!  I use sketches quite loosely most of the time.  The cool bat die cuts were cut with the Halloween Icons dies. 


And these buildings from the Super 2 Dies... so cool!  And the sentiment is from Spookalicious... so sweet, right?

So here's the sketch for Paper Smooches:

Hope you'll play along!  And don't forget that we're all about Fall/Halloween over at Three Amigos this month too!!