Hope Whispers

About 10 years ago I was a member of an online stamping community where we all had a gallery and posted cards. I made it routine to comment on people's cards every day to encourage them. I commented on this one woman's card and she did the unthinkable, she sent me the stamp sets she used to create the beautiful card.

The stamp company is out of business now but it was Paper, Makeup, Stamps... and these two sets together (one has images the other just a single sentiment) make an amazing card of hope and encouragement. I wanted to create something for a very special friend and reached for these old trusty sets.


I made this last night and wasn't sold on how it looked, but I let it sit over night and now I'm liking it more. I wanted the panel to look like the sun breaking in early dawn.

I used some papers from the American Crafts True Stories 6x6 pad, my Zig clean color brush markers and Jet black ink from Lawn Fawn. The dies were MFTs stitched rounded rectangles, Spellbinders oval and Lawn Fawn scalloped border.

Happy Birthday 2 You!

One of my best friends asked for some birthday cards, one for her sweet little daughter who is turning 2 in June and two more for her adorable boys.

Today, I focused on little Miss's card. I wanted something bright and fun and interactive. I chose to use these fun DCWV papers and a super cool number die from china and a very beautiful and bold stamp set from Catherine Pooler designs and CAS-UAL Friday.

I made the number into a little shaker by backing the opening with a piece of acetate and creating a pocket with some foam mounting tape by 3M. I put some of the SSS starfish sequin and seed bead mix inside. Some SU nesting dies worked perfectly to create the focal panel and the slight scallop border around the outside. Versafine Onyx black ink and some selective inking made the focal panel jump off the card.

Happy Birthday To You

A seriously quick but cool card for today. I used two dies to create the entire card, a little bit of patterned paper, 3/4 of a sheet of card stock, some foam mounting tape, a piece of acetate and a pinch or two of two different sequin and seed bead mixes. Now that I type that out, maybe the list of supplies seems a little bigger than I originally thought.

I was aiming for masculine but I guess by adding sequins in the shaker it makes it sparkle a little much for some guys. 

I used the MFT Happy Birthday To You die and the A Muse Studio Tag Bundle pinked edge rectangle die. A piece of MFT paper backs the main panel. 3M foam tape bundled up around the edges of the words create a pocket for the sequins and seed beads. Acetate keeps all of it from falling out the holes where the words are (because that would suck!) 

I replaced the letters without adhesive to use as place holders while I put the centers of the letters back in using liquid adhesive. Like on the O and B... etc... 

I think it turned out fun. Thoughts?

Out of this World

So Friday's blog has become Saturday's blog because... well... I've got a needy infant and my glossy accents took forever to dry. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. ;)

I created something I've never created before, a card with two interactive elements on it. You can see those almost complete circle channels cut into the card front, those allow both the space ship and the astronaut to "float" around in space. Sort of neat, right?

This card was created for our very favorite nurse at our Pediatrician's office. She will be leaving pediatrics and taking a position in oncology. She will be missed tremendously.

I figured this was a cute way to send her off to her future from my boys to her.

She has small kids so I thought something interactive would be super neat. I bet they want to play with this when their mom shows them. I know Cooper would be all over it if I'd let him!


I used the Lawn Fawn Out of this World set and stamped and colored the images with Copic markers. Then I die cut them with the matching dies. ( I wish the rocket flame would have a die, but I had to fussy cut that part) Then I chose this adorable star paper from Avery Elle, the Everyday Collection.

I used a bit of washi tape to stick the circle channel dies to the front panel and ran it through my big shot die cutting machine and kept the pieces it cut out. I temporarily adhered my panel to the card front with a little bit of washi tape and then adhered the inside of the circle channel pieces with some liquid adhesive and removed the main panel while that dried.

I applied a generous amount of foam tape to the back of the main background panel, making sure to leave an area around each of the channel so the pieces I wanted to slide had plenty of room.

MFT released several of these channel dies to make interactive cards over the last few years and they also have some little slider pieces. One set is round and the other look like a flat tic-tac. I used the oval tic-tac shaped ones for this because I wanted my elements to slide and not spin.

Some glossy accents on the astronaut's helmet and the ship's window and a heat embossed sentiment completed the card front.

I wanted the inside to be just as cute and coordinate, so I used another sentiment from the set and stamped the stars. Then I adhered an extra planet I had colored and die cut.  I really hope she likes her card.

I'm Late

Color throwdown day again, I am really loving this challenge. It makes me push myself to be creative. Check out the challenge here: CTD442

When I saw the colors for this week, I knew this was the stamp I wanted to use. It is this tiny set by Avery Elle called I'm Late and it is made up of three little stamps. The snail with the balloon and two sentiment lines, Happy Birthday and Sorry I'm Late...


And since this was such a simple little stamp set I wanted to make a simple little card. I chose a one layer, clean and simple card. I actually colored on the card base y'all!!! <---seriously don't know where the y'all came from because I'm from the Midwest.

I embossed a wonky stitched rectangle on the front of the card base and I loved how that looked. I stamped the image and sentiment in Lawn Fawn Jet Black ink and colored with my Copics. You can see the colors this week are a pale aqua, pale beige, pale grey and pale yellow. I used three greys, N0, N2, & N4 for the snail. I used Y0000, Y11, Y13 & Y21 for the balloon ( I probably could have skipped the Y11 it really didn't even show up). I used BG0000 & BG32 for the background aqua color  and E000 & E40 for the beige color. I blended the backgrounds out with the colorless blender 0 marker. I also added some texture to the ground with the 0 marker. A simple highlight with the white gel pen on the snail, darkened his eyes with a black glaze pen and then some spectrum noir sparkle pen and glossy accents on the balloon and the party hat and the card front was complete.

I finished the inside of the card with the remaining half of the sentiment, Happy Birthday and stamped the snail in an aqua ink. That finished the card for today.

Sketched Mother's Day

I pulled out one of my new favorite stamp sets to make a Mother's Day card and sample for the 4H kids project for the week.

I used the sketched ranunculus set and heat embossed the flowers and leaves onto some Bristol Smooth Cardstock. I used Versafine onyx black ink and clear embossing powder. You still get the crisp black embossing but not the stray black powder bits black embossing powder can sometimes leave.

Then I used my Zig clean color real brush markers and added a little color to each image and pulling it out with my water brush. I only used one shade of red and one shade of green for each image. I really like the variation in color you get by pulling it out with the water. I set that aside to dry and then die cut a panel of bristol card stock with this rectangle die from the Simon Says Stamp Stitched Shapes set.

 I used the MFT hybrid ink in a neutral shade to stamp a Stampabilities medallion onto the corner of the panel. I wanted this to be very subtle. With a little distress ink and a blending pad I blended in some blue from the corner.

I heat embossed a sentiment from Avery Elle in Antique Gold Embossing Powder from Simon Says Stamp and then fussy cut the images out. These were simple shapes so they were easy and took no time at all. I used some foam tape to pop up the main flower and then adhered the remaining flowers flat using Tombo Mono Multi adhesive. Once the flowers were placed I added my leaves.

I mounted the panel on a piece of black cardstock and that finished my card.

You're Sew Amazing

One of the benefits of participating in the Growing In Unity GIU week is getting to pick out a free kit from any of their stamps, new or old. 

I received my kit the other day and I had been eyeing up this sewing machine because I have these quilt dies and figured the combination would be sew perfect. ;)

I participated in this week's color throwdown challenge. You can check out the challenge here:  Ctd 441 

The colors are a pink, light aqua and light purple. White was also on the list and then any neutrals I wanted to use.

I really love how this turned out. I even used a bit of thread from my personal sewing machine and put that behind the stamped image.

All patterned papers were MFT
Colored Cardstock was MFT
White Cardstock Nina
Die from Gina Marie Dies

May the Fourth Support Heterotaxy Day!

Never heard of Heterotaxy Syndrome? It is a rare birth defect that involves the heart and other organs. The beginning of the word (hetero-) means “different” and the end (–taxy) means “arrangement.” There are different forms of heterotaxy syndrome. All usually involve heart defects of varying types and severity. You can read more about it here: CHoP

This is how it has become a part of our lives. Follow me, because this may be a bit confusing.

Delaney was born 10/22/13 in Kenosha, WI and was transported to the NICU at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, Milwaukee a few hours after birth. Two days later she was taken into the Cath lab where her heart was perforated and she ended up on an ECMO machine. For the nature of her care, she was in the CICU, Cardiac Intensive Care Unit. While we were there we had, what we would have called classic bad luck, and our electricity was turned off at our home due to an error. I was sobbing on the phone with the Electric Company, begging them to turn the electric back on because I had pumped breast milk in the freezer for my critical daughter and I couldn't lose both her and the milk in the same day... and this woman asked me if she could help.

You see, her daughter had been born a few days earlier and was in the CICU because she had HLHS (her heart didn't completely form and she was born with basically half a heart). HLHS wasn't her daughter's only diagnosis, she also was born with Heterotaxy Syndrome. I'd never heard of either condition at that point in my life. Although she was in a tremendous amount of stress with the uncertainty of her daughter's life, she reached out to help us!

After Delaney passed away we stayed in touch.

It was amazing to see their daughter "B" grow and get stronger and go home and become a person, an honest to GOD person. I had the pleasure of meeting "B" when she was 2. One of the hardest moments of my life since Delaney passing away.

Anyway, back to my reason for today's blog post. B's mom Kristen was able to get our Governor to acknowledge May 4th as Heterotaxy Day a few years back, she wanted to bring awareness and fund research and help these special kids live full lives.

The colors used to represent Heterotaxy Awareness are Aqua/ Teal and Yellow. I saw this photo of "B" from last year and had to create a card to send her, to blog about to try to do my little part to raise awareness.

I finished the inside of my card with a simple restamping of the main image in the Tide Pool color. I cannot wait to write a message in this to a little girl who is stronger than she thinks.

 All stamps used are from Unity Stamp Company.
Paper from DCWV, AC, & MFT
Ink from Lawn Fawn
Pearls from A Muse Studio
Coloring with Copic Markers


*** Please leave Miss B a comment below, I'm sure her almost 4 year old self would love to know you are all thinking of her and others with this rare disorder***

Welcome, Baby

I love mixing old and new sets and products to create cards. I feel like you really get a one of a kind look when doing it.

My brother and his girlfriend will be welcoming a baby in early July and I received an invitation for a baby shower so I needed to make a card.

I recently received a set from My Favorite Things called Welcome, Baby and it has amazing sentiments for new baby cards. I also picked up a paper pad by Taylored Expressions called Double the Joy and it has a mix of baby boy and baby girl themed papers.

I could have found a new set for the image but I wanted to use these two sets by Stampingbella, Ketto's Clothesline (with pegs) and BabyLingerie. I've had these two sets for years and love to pull them out to make cute baby cards.

I die cut a white panel of Nina Solar White with a wonky stitched rectangle and then stamped the clothes line using my Misti and some Lawn Fawn Jet Black Ink. I also created a mask for each of the poles (but I probably didn't need to). I stamped the clothes onto a scrap of Nina Solar White and the center image was stamped directly onto patterned paper.

Post-it notes laid around the outside edge of the panel masked the stitching off so I could keep that white border. I hand cut a cloud border on a sticky note and used that as a stencil to sponge in some sky and clouds with tumbled glass distress ink.This is where I used the masks but the tumbled glass ink is so light I could have skipped this step. Then I used a little mowed lawn distress ink to add some grass.

I colored the image with Copic Markers, the clothes line poles, flowers at the base and the two outfits; one blue, one green. Then I fussy cut the three outfits, one from patterned paper and the two I colored, as well as three clothes pins.

I used a bit of foam tape to pop them up over top the clothes line. I mounted this main panel onto a piece of patterned paper from that same Taylored Expressions paper pad and added it to a standard A2 side folding card base made from Smooth White Cardstock (MFT).

I finished the card by adding the rest of the sentiment to the inside along with a strip of coordinating paper from the same paper pad.


That finished today's card off.

Magical Day

Since receiving this cute Doodlebug 6x6 pad and this Taylored Expressions stamp set I knew I had to create a card using both, together.

A simple layout helped me keep the focus on this adorable, sparkly, dragon. I say, even boy dragons would sparkle and have shimmer, right?

Simple Copic coloring helped me create this coordinating dragon image. I cut the panel out with a MFT pierced rectangle die and used foam tape to mount it to the card.

I thought the Richard Garay Amazing Dots in the matte grey were perfect so I added a few of those around the sentiment panel.

I finished the inside with a strip of the cloud patterned paper (side note, the castles and the clouds are the same piece, just different sides!) and I stamped the Have a Magical day sentiment inside.

I think some little boy, or girl, would love this one.