The Stamper

Paddy's Day Pin card

Do you ever have one of those weeks, that when the end of the week comes you only have 1/3 of the things on your list done and you are wondering what happen this week?  Well, that was this week as you can tell I did not get many post made this week but I wanted to share a this pin I made for St. Paddy's Day. 

I used Stampin' Up!'s Big Shot and circle dies.  I cut out several different circles in assorted fabrics and then I created the pin by layering the fabrics and sewing a button on the top and through all layers.  (Shelli showed us how to make one like this at Leadership)  I added some netting before sewing the button on.  Shelli suggested that you pucker the fabric just a little as you sew the button on by tugging the thread tight and taking a little tuck as you sew.  I attached a pin back with the thread while I was attaching the button. This is very easy to make and it was so cute I decided to add it to a card. 

The main card piece is Green Galore, textured with the texture plates and then I sponged Garden Green ink on the texture to make it stand out.  I also add sponging to the edges and Stampin Up!'s Itty Bitty Background stamp as well.  I stamped Stampin' Up!'s Go Green stamp on Whisper White card stock and tucked it under a piece of textured Crushed Curry card stock that I punched two holes into it so I could "pin" the pin to the card.

March is almost here and green will be in!  Enjoy. 

Stampin Up! DD grapes?

Do you remember this old Stampin' Up! stamp set?  I was working on a page from my daughter's MYSO weekend at Chateau Elan which is a hotel and winery in North Georgia and when it came to accents for the page I remembered this stamp set I have had for years and pull it out of the back closet and dusted it off and used it on this page.  It was perfect with the new Purely Pomegranate in-color ink and papers and add just the right touch to the page.  For my journaling; I added a top 10 list on the front page and then I wrote more about the weekend and tucked it into a pocket attached to the back of the page.  This is a great way to write as much as you want without taking too much space on your pages. 

I forgot to take a picture of the hotel but it worked out alright because I had picked up a folder from there that had this great sketch of the place that I had to use on the page. 

It was a great weekend in a beautiful place and a fun time with my daughter.  MYSO is the Metropolitan Youth Symphony Orchestra  and my daughter plays french horn and I have been volunteering to help be in charge this year, I am glad Sharon is in charge I just help her.  I do know that these youth have much more energy that this lady who is getting old.  Late nights making sure everyone is in their rooms and not skateboarding in their hotel room was quite a feat so I did not get much sleep but still have a great time. 

Stampin Up! Milk Carton die & Two- Step Bird

This project was made by Patty Bennett at Leadership and it was made with the new Milk Carton die and the two-step bird punch and the papers from the Eggcellent Eggs Kit.  It was just a sweet little project.  I love this two-step bird punch and how you can punch it from plain card stocks or printed papers and no matter what it looks great. 

I have made a milk carton birdhouse and it is a little tricky but the basic idea is to create the milk carton base and add a piece of card stock for the roof.  Patty decorated her roof with the printed egg stands from the Eggcellent Eggs kit and the new pinking hearts border punch.  I can't wait to get that border punch.   You might think I get to buy whatever I want but I too have to have a wish list of things I look forward to purchasing just like you. 

If the two-step bird punch is not on your list it is one thing I suggest you add to that list.   Enjoy

Hands On Class

I am excited to share with you these projects at my next Hands On class that will be held on the 2nd Friday in march.  March, 12th at 10am and repeated at 7:30pm.  We will be creating this birthday reminder box using Stampin' Up! sale-a-bration stamp set Happy Moments.  We will also be making this standing card and one of the fabric pins shown here. 

You will get to play with the Big Shot with fabric and then with paper on the embossed butterflies.  You will also get to use the new Satin ribbon and sweet pea felt. 

Join me and have a night of stamping fun.  To RSVP email me at wendy@thestamper.com today.

"About Me" album class

It's not too late to join this About Me Album Club that I am starting this Saturday, February 20th, at 10am-2pm.  This album will be all about you, it will include page ideas, a photo shoot and jounaling ideas for you to create a book about yourself or it can be adapted to anyone you want to create a about you book about. This should be a fun album that will give you different ideas on how to scrapbook your life or someone you love.

 The cost will be $30.00 per class and we will meet once a quarter.  You must prepay but it can be paid before each class or the whole year at a time.  
 
"About Me" album club dates: February 20, 2010, May 8, 2010, August 21, 2010, November 20, 2010

This page is just a sample of the type of pages you will be creating.  This page was created with Stampin' Up!'s All in the Family stamp set. 

When you join one of my Album Club you commit to the whole year, this helps me be able to offer this type of class and helps you to finish an album.  You can bring photos and finish the pages at my home or you can drop your photos onto them later.  I hope you will join me this Saturday and create a album I am sure you will love.

Stampin' Up! Holiday Line Up

It has been fun to scrapbook some pages for my family's albums.  This page was a Christmas page we did last year in one of my wow scrapbook classes and it fit my photos from this year so it was quick and easy for me to create this page.  I love Stampin' Up!'s Holiday Lineup stamp set, the only problem I have with this stamp set it is I want to use all of the stamps every time I pick it up. 

This page was created with the reindeer stamp and I water-colored the deer and then added chunky red glitter to the reindeer's nose. I used a play on words for my title and the frame was created by die cutting the Top Note die using the Big Shot machine. 

Now is the perfect time to scrapbook all the pictures you took at Christmas.  And if you want to create pages that you can drop your photos onto consider joining me for one of my wow scrapbook classes.  I hold these classes on the 4th Friday on the month, so plan to join me Friday, February 26th at my next class.

Stampin' Up! Enjoy every moment

I have done a few pages for my scrapbooks in the last couple of weeks and this is one of the pages.  We had friends from Utah come to Atlanta for a couple of days in December and we had a great time showing them the South East.  This page made using Stampin' Up! stamp set Enjoy every moment worked great for these memories. 

I loved the beaded center of the flowers and the button accents.  I also wanted a pocket for all the stuff I did not want to throw away and so I created one using the card stock base. 

Having Mark and Wendy here was like being on a Stampin' Cruise with friends and it made us want more vacations like that. 

Valentine Love

Last night I stayed up late (I am not sure why I can't seem to get these kinds of things done during the day), making Valentine treat holders to send my older daughter who is serving a church mission and sugar cookies for my girls for Valentine's. 

I grew up having my mom make a giant sugar cookies for my brothers and me with our name on them the night before Valentine's so we woke up in the morning with them on the table. 

I liked this tradition and did it with my girls.  Last night at dinner I told the 3 girls at home that I would have to make the cookies tonight because the next couple days and nights are so busy.  I found out that Tysha thought there was a sugar cookies bunny or Santa Claus who magically make these cookies and left them each year.  Here I thought my sugar cookies were letting my girls know how much I love them and instead they thought they just magically appeared at Valentine's Morning.  

These boxes are the sweetheart candies covered in card stock and decorated.  I used Stampin' Up!'s new papers from the Occasions Mini catalog called Sending Love Specialty  #117153.  This paper has glittered accents, that don't rub off.  The ribbon is the new colors of 5/8" satin ribbons.  

I also created the little box from yesterday's blog in the brown colors and filled it with hearts.  I hope my girls now realize that these treats are their mom telling them she loves them.

Big Shot envelope treat box

This cute little treat holder is created using the Big Shot and Stampin' Up!'s envelope die.  Jeanne my down line created this at leadership and I thought it was really cute.  She used Stampin' Up!'s Real Red card stock and the Sending Love Specialty Designer Series paper #117153.

You cut two envelopes and trim the edges to for the box.  One of the envelope flaps are folded forward and the other one is kept straight up.  She finished it with a red gingham ribbon bow and one of the Sending Love Epoxy Brads #117270.  A perfect size for a Valentine treat.

Fabric Pins from the Big Shot

I have been working on the projects for Hands On Class next month and was so excited to using the Big Shot dies to create pins like these pins in this picture from leadership.  We saw this idea first at convention when Shelli Gardner the owner of Stampin' Up! shared some that she did and the ones shown here were created by her aunt. I always have more ideas running around in my head than I have classes to do them all in and these fabric pins were one of the ideas that I just had not put on the schedule before Christmas but flowers and spring seem to go together so I am putting them on the schedule now. 

We will be making one using the scallop die and I will have a picture of it coming up later this week with the other hands on projects we will be doing, so check back then and see what is coming up in March.

My Digital Studio Christmas Eve!

  Over the weekend I did a little more scrapbooking with My Digital Studio and created this 2-page spread.  It was fun to start with the Jingle kit pages and tweak them by adding more photo boxes and images and to make the pages my own. 

I have had to learn to finish a page and stop tweaking it.  I have found that I can move this a little and then that a little and then start the process all over again. My husband told me a quote that goes something like: "at some point in every project you have to shoot the designer and ship the product." and that is just what I have to do with my pages, that way I feel like I finally finished something. 

My Digital Studio hint:  when you are trying to make a text box fit image lines like in my page one keep your lines to 4 and use the line spacer to add space or take away space between your text lines.  If you want more than 4 lines just add another text box.  Sometimes when you get too many lines the spacing is too hard to make just perfect. 

Mock Stitching

I don't know about you but I love the look of stitching but I don't often pull out my sewing machine to stitch on a card or scrapbook page.  But if you love stitching there is another way.  Some of you may have done this technique before at one of my classes but if so It is always good to have reminders and that is what Monika did for me when she shared with card with me was remind me to use mock stitching again.  To achieve this look you run the perforating tool that is a part of the cutter kit #106958 and on page 191 of the main SU! catalog in a dark ink like Chocolate chip or black and then gently run it onto your card stock and you get a mock stitched look without having to pull out the sewing machine.  This card was created with the 3 heart punch, a couple of buttons and Stampin' Up! 's Define your life stamped set and the scallop edge punch.

My Digital Studio Merry pages

I decided to download some new digital kits today and make a few pages.  These "Merry" pages were fun to create especially since the page was mostly done in the Christmas Cocoa II digital kit.  I just flipped the page to create a two page spread and added my photo's and journaling and tweaked the images and I was done.  I liked the ornament stamp set and punch to make cards at Christmas and I like it even better on a scrapbook page.

Stampin' Up! has added several new downloads that can be purchased.  You can view downloads in the last 30 days on my Stampin' web site at: www.wendythestamper.stampinup.net  under my store, my digital images or contact me for a list of the downloads that are available since My Digital Studio came out.  

I know if you are like me you have "a few" Christmas photos to scrapbook and with My Digital Studio you will be creating great pages like me.  

Stampin' Up! Baskets and Blooms Big Shot Die

I have wanted Stampin' Up! Baskets and Blooms die (#113484) for a while but not bad enough to purchase it until I saw these cute felt baskets that Michele Scileppi, one of my downline, brought to our last meeting to share.  I just could not wait to make one of my own and use it for a Hands On class.  Can you just see a little gift for mom tucked into one of these adorable little bags.  I already have the earrings for my mom now I just have to make a bag to put it in. 

Michele cut the baskets from black felt using the Big Shot and Baskets and blooms die, she only used the flat basket pieces and she stitched them together.  On one she whipped stitched the edge and the other she did a running stitch, both of these are easy stitches most any one can learn to do.  She then finished them with a few brads and a Sweet Pea Stitched felt piece.  

I love that you can create fabric pieces using the Big Shot and Stampin' Up! dies and can't wait to see more ideas using fabric.  Thanks to all those who share great ideas with me. 

Stampin' Up! Starz Exchange cards

I love my downline and I think they are very talented ladies.  At our meeting this past week we exchanged cards and here are a few of those exchanges and other cards my girls brought to share. 

This first one is created by Monika, she copied the layout from Stampin' Success magazine (this is an information magazine Stampin' Up! sends to demonstrators, one of the perks for being a demonstrator) She used the sale-a-bration stamp set Happy Moments (you can choose this for free with a $50.00 order),different designer Series papers and colors.  I have used this layout a couple of times and find it fun to use.

Stampin' Up! has room for all types of business women.  Joyce created this cute card.  Joyce works full time at a bank and has one hands on class with friends each month but the bulk of her business is in creating and selling invites and thank you notes for baby showers and weddings.  This card is copied from a baby thank you card she created she just changed the words from thank you to Happy Birthday.  She used the Pun Fun #115054.

The  last card I wanted to share is created using the hostess level 2 stamp set Asian Artistry (you can get this for free with a $300 workshop total) The card was done is So Saffron and Sage Shadow.  I liked the the ribbon accent with it's knots. 

I always enjoy my downline meetings.  We get together every other month to share ideas, learn new techniques, make projects, exchange cards and just have a good time.  If you have ever wanted to be able of a group like this think about joining Stampin' Up! family and my Starz group.  The starter kits are 15% off and you get a bonus stamp set during Sale-a-bration.  contact me at wendy@thestamper.com for more information.

Stampin' Up! On Board books

The new Occasions mini catalog has a new product called On Board Books.  These are shaped chipboard books that are larger than they appear in the catalog and they are only $4.95 for 8 chipboard pages.  When you think about these board books you think about mini scrapbooks which you know I love to create those but these chipboard books can be made into other items as well.  At leadership one of the staff member showed this heart box that was created using the On Board Heart Book #117236 as the top and the bottom and she added sides to create a perfect treat box.  I loved how she decorated it with the new Extra Large Fancy Flower punch #118073 and the Sweet Pea Stitched Felt #117266 that I mention last week as a new product.  Who would not enjoy getting a box like this anytime of the year. 

Shelli also shared with us how to use these books as table decorations for a mother's tea.  She used the bird and decorated it and then used a jumbo glue dot to hold them upright on the table and add a little crimped paper as a nest around them. Birds are popular and these books can be covered with designer papers  or made fancy with different designer papers. 

However you decide to use these On Board Books I know you will find them good quality and economical to use. Call me today and order come for you to play with.