Monkey'in Around today

At last, Saturday! I had hoped to sleep in a bit today but my body still woke up early. By 8:00 am I grabbed my book and read for an hour. After doing a few chores around the house, I went to a class at the LSS in the afternoon. The insructor was Pat - Sentiments Pat for you shack ladies, and I love to take her classes. She packs so many projects and techniques into her classes that the time just flies by. The theme today was using the new Changito stamps by Stampendous. I love this monkey so I had signed up for this right away.


Here are the first two cards. For the birthday card, the image was stamped in versafine and embossed so we could watercolor with markers. Glitter was added to the frosting and a bit of diamond glaze on the stawberry atop the cake. I have a secret to share to get your hand doodling evenly spaced. Pat gave us round plastic canvas coasters and used that as a guide around the circle. Pretty neat huh? For the ballerina card, we stamped the image first in versamark and embossed with white ink. The image was stamped again on a piece of white CS, embossed and colored with chalk for a softer look. The white scalloped felt strips are also by Stampendous. We took two strips of tulle, tied a knot in the middle and then spread it out for a tu-tu effect.

These next two cards were also fun to color. For the soccer card, we used the new EK Success slim punch that has a bubble look. We punched around the edges of the card then put a piece of light brown behind it. The image was stamped and embossed then colored in with watercolor paints by Hero Arts. The second card used watercolor pencils for coloring. Did I mention that Pat must have every medium there is to color with?! I used a multi-liner pen that was a size .05 to hand doodle. I didn't know they made them that tiny. It added just the right touch. Now that I am looking at the card, I see I forgot the stickles in the coffee steam. Oh well, I will add them when I am done here.

This last card was my favorite......

and here is why.....

It is a POP-UP!!! How cool is this? The images were all stamped, embossed and colored with Pearlescent watercolor paints. They shimmer like H2O's but are soo much cheaper. Isn't it adorable? Pat gaves us an extra template for the pop-up so we could make more at home. Didn't I tell you Pat puts a lot into her classes? If you see one you especially like, please leave a quick comment.

I have a Stampin Up workshop tomorrow so I need to check the kits to make sure all pieces and parts are accounted for. I will share those cards with you later this weekend and let you know how it turned out. The ladies attending are all good friends of mine so I expect to have fun.

Ciao

Hooga Booga

Now that I have dried my eyes after the last post, I need to post something lighter. Tonight is the monthly card swap at Stamp N Deliver. The theme was juvenile cards. I recently purchased the Hooga Booga set by MFT so I knew what stamps I wanted to use. Since Spring is officially here I chose to use the spring paper pack and ribbon by MFT for the background of the card. The cardstock is by SU in Regal Rose, Yo Yo Yellow and Old Olive. The flower is a new (to me anyway) prima that Michael's is now carrying. Nothing too fancy on the card as I only had one night to complete them. Sometimes simplistic is best:)

Tribute to Cathy

Did you miss me? I have not been able to post in over a week. We had an unexpected death in the family and I traveled up north for the funeral. My cousin Cathy died from complications with cancer. She fought for 9 years and lost the fight last Monday. I added a photo of her so you can see what a beautiful person she was. She loved to scrapbook and made many for her family to enjoy. She had so many people come to the viewing to pay their respects. It was a very touching ceremony. Cathy....if you see my Dad up in heaven, give him a hug for me!

Birthday cards for others

So today I started on making cards for my sister. She needs a few more than she originally thought so I am trying to pick some layouts that won't take me too much time to put together. I also would like to keep them so it doesn't take any special packaging or extra stamps to mail them. The card on the left was made with Papertrey Ink Summer Sunrise ink, paper and ribbon. The stamp inside is SU Upsy Daisy. This was really quick to put together and I think I will make this in more shades. The card on the right I hope she will find appropriate for a masculine birthday. I used the clear set by Stampendous Changito Baker. I just love that monkey!! I colored him in with Copics and added just a touch of Liquid Pearls on his hat. The strip of pp is from the DCWV Sweet matstack. So hopefully my sister will like these and I will make a few more of each to send up to her.

The Butterfly Cake

I asked the boys to make me a birthday cake. They know that I love butterflies so they created one out of 2 round cakes. They used rolled fondant that was dyed blue and colored sugar water. Let me say that in real life the cake looked much better. I am not a good photographer and I should have taken more shots from various angles before we cut into it. This shot was taken standing directly over it and I must say it is not the best angle :(

I will say that they worked very hard on it and it tasted wonderful. Thanks again guys!

More Birthday Greetings

I have received some wonderful birthday creations from fellow Stamp Shackies. Take a moment to look at each of these.

These are from Sue, Cindi, Lesa, Paula, Nancy, Lidia, Becky, Mary, Traci, Jan, Joanie, Sarah, Joanne and Joan. Thank you all for thinking of me. Cyber hugs to all of you!

Love it or Hate it?

So I am really enjoying this blogging thing here and I want it to look super cool with all the bells and whistles. I was very upset that my picture in the header was always to the left with sooo much blue space next to it. I had seen cute blogs with backgrounds from the cutestblogontheblock so I went searching for one. Well, lo and behold I found the background you are looking at. It looked really nice without any text and pictures on it. Now that I have uploaded it, and with the help and patience of my sister (love ya Cindi) worked through the colors so you could read my ramblings I am not sure that I like it. It has the cool butterflies, but... So please, if you have taken the time to visit here and read this, leave me a comment. I made it super easy to leave a comment now.

Cupcake Martini

Good Evening! I got home a little bit ago from teaching the La Costa Ladies the Easter cards that I showed previously. They were both a big hit. We had a special guest tonight, my Aunt Blanche. She has been visiting from New England the past couple weeks. She is not a regular stamper, but she did great!

On to today's card. I need to make a few birthday cards so I picked the stamp I wanted to use and then strolled through SCS gallery. This layout combines two different ones that I liked over there. The stamp is by Stampendous and colored with copics. I added Crystal Ice stickles where the liquid would be so it would shimmer. I used the Cuttlebug Happy Birthday embossing folder on a green scrap. The ribbon is from the MFT spring collection. I am loving the ribbons in this bundle! The background paper is from the Basic Grey cupcake collection.

You may be seeing more birthday cards in the future here. My sister called today and placed an order for 30! She would like 2-3 of each design so she won't be sending out the same card too often. She has been asked to send cards to preschool teachers and aides in her church. No problem. So do you think the above card is appropriate for a religious teacher? Hmm

See you soon!

Tea-licious!

Well, I have broken my goal of posting something every day. Yesterday I played chauffeur to my youngest Jeffrey so I did not get this finished in time to upload last night. OK, I also was not happy with the base card color so that delayed things. I love this stamp set from MFT called Tea for Two. The patterned paper and ribbon are from the MFT Spring collection. My friend Stacey taught me the trick of adding the second ribbon piece under the knot and I love it. After putting it together, I added the rhinestones in the corner to give it some balance. The weather is beautiful here in Florida today at 77 degrees. My mom was just over for a bit and we were both commenting if the temperature could stay like this all the time, it would be heaven. I can't believe it is 5:00 pm already. Did everyone remember to set their clocks ahead? I am off to go start dinner. Enjoy the rest of your weekend :)

A Basket of Violets

Good Evening. I bet you thought there wouldn't be a new post today. I am going to do my best to post something daily...until my stress level increases. I have had this small stamp by Karen Lockhart sitting on my table for a couple of weeks now and was determined to use it. I colored the images with copics and added a hint of stickles to the inside of the flowers. I was also determined to use my new Ornare piercing template. Let me backtrack a second. I was looking at blogs one evening a few weeks ago and saw a lovely card that had used the piercing template. Sorry I don't remember who I can give the enabling credit to. She mentioned that she had got hers from Ellen Hutson's store. Like a good little girl, I promptly went to the website and ordered two ( my buddy Char got the other one). Well, Ellen's store is so friendly that it kept telling me that shoppers were also purchasing the violet stamp. So naturally, I had to add it to my cart also. Now back to the card above. The punched strip is the Martha Stewart eyelet border punch. The flowers were originally white. None of the purple flowers I have went with the CS I had used, so I just used my copics to color them so they matched my image. Robin's Nest dew drops complete them. My original thought was to have the flowers on the bottom purple strip, but after painstakingly piercing it, I couldn't cover it up! I think they look just fine in the corner. Thanks for stopping by :)

Flourishes Easter Blessings

Hello everyone...I know at least two readers who look at this daily :)

This is the second card that I will teach at La Costa next week. To me this is a more traditional Easter card. With the image being a bit longer than I am used to, I had to make the card base bigger than my average cards. Hmm, the cutesy card from yesterday was a long card and now this one...maybe I am breaking away from the traditional A2 size. On to the details. I purchased this set from the Flourishes store a few weeks ago. I used Lavender Moon CS from Papertrey Inc and covered that with a layer of vellum that was run through my Cuttlebug with the Swiss dot folder. With the layer being larger than the embossing folder, it took three time to cover the entire piece. The image was embossed with gold and colored with Copics. I wrapped Lavender Moon ribbon and tied a simple knot. I sponged Lavender ink around the outside and then used a gold krylon pen to outline. This layer has a single layer of foam to raise it a bit. The sentiment is stamped in black and layered on nestie ovals. I raised it with taller pop dots for height. I think the ladies will like this one. Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Easter and MFT Idol Audition

Today's card has two purposes to it. The first use will be as my audition for MFT Idol Contest. Kim has created a contest on the SCS forum. The requirements are: you must use MFT stamps only and you can't be a past or present design team member. Well, this qualifies! The second purpose for this card is that I will use it next week for the La Costa Ladies as one of the class cards. They requested Easter cards and this will be the "cutesy" one. I used stamps from both "Eggstra Special" and "Hoppy Easter". Copic markers were used to color in the images. The long rectangle scalloped nestie, SU word window punch, SU ticket corner punch, Kaiser rhinestone, white satin ribbon and pop dots helped to complete the card. Stay tuned for the second class card to be posted soon.

Flourishes Stampers Dream Weekend

I recently attended the first ever Stampers Dream Weekend at Flourishes studio in Pensacola, FL. I drove over with one of my best stamping buddies Char. We had a fun filled weekend and learned a few new techniques from Stamping greats like Faith aka Markies Mom and Becca aka Amazing Paper Grace . Jan Marie from Flourishes also taught a class. These are just a few of the cards that we created. Jan Marie spoiled us with a delightful lunch on Saturday and a traditional Mardi Gras dinner on Sunday night. On Monday we attend a Copic certification class with Marianne Walker. Now to just keep practicing with them.

Birthday cards have started arriving!

My birthday is coming up soon and I have started receiving cards from my fellow Shackies. What's that? You don't know what a shackie is? You need to hop on over here to see what you have been missing. I have tried to copy the link for the blinkie but something didn't work quite right. Any ways....these cards are by Amy (Scraphappy908) and Sherri (iloveflipflops). Thank you so much ladies!

A favorite card

Here is a card I made almost two years ago, but it is a favorite and sits on a shelf near my craft table. I made it during a class at my LSS - Stamp and Deliver. There are three layers to the butterfly and lots of glitter. If you aren't a fan of cutting out images, this is not for you :)

Hello and Welcome

I have finally decided to join the blogging world. I decided to name my blog after my Dad. His nickname was the Blue Angel when he was younger and raced cars. Shortly after he passed, we started seeing a blue butterfly hovering near the house. It was not afraid of us and even landed on my sister Cindi's finger. I truly believe it was him letting us know that he was okay. I can't promise daily posts, but I will share my creations as often as possible. See you soon !