Category: Spring

Butterflies at Sparkles Monthly

Hello friends!  Hope that your week has been a good one for you!  Thank you to everyone for stopping by and taking your time to spend with me as I appreciate your kindness.

Today starts the August challenge over at Sparkles Monthly and for this month, our hostess is asking to see a butterfly or butterflies on your projects.  I love butterflies and look forward viewing the gallery on this one.  Be sure to stop by the blog to see what the rest of the team has created for you.  Here’s my project for this challenge:

I like how this one came together!  I’ve used several butterfly items from Taylored Expressions.  I started with the background by taking the Fluttering Friends Layering Stencil and stencil the colors Sour Gummy, Spearmint & Peaches ‘N’ Cream over a white card base.  Once the stenciling was finished, I used the Fluttering Friends 3D embossing folder over it which also impresses the bodies and antenna on them.  I layered this over a top folding A2 Spearmint card base.  (I also cut out a frame with the same colored cardstock using the Frame in Frame 3 Cutting Plate).

For the butterfly focal, I white heat embossed a butterfly from the Beautiful Butterfly Wings stamp set and cut it out along with the layered wings and body from the Beautiful Butterflies die set.  I layered it onto a piece of vellum cut out with the Petite Scallop Circle Stacklets die.  I also white heat embossed the sentiment from the Mini Strips-Fluttering By stamp set over Sour Gummy cardstock cut from the Mini Strips die.   I used foam strips to pop it up and I also added some rhinestones on the butterfly wings.

I hope you like my inspiration for the challenge and that you’ll take some time this month to create something with butterflies too.  

Thank you for stopping in and have a great day!

Challenges:

  1. Cut It Up – #310 ‘Thinking of You’ + use of die cut
  2. The Divas That Cut…Paper! – Wet/Dry Embossing (I did both)
  3. Crafty Gals Corner – #258 Anything Goes optional: Embossing Folder
  4. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
  5. Can You Handle the Pressure? – Anything Goes using Embossing Folder optional: wheels
  6. Stencil Fun – Anything Goes using Stencil optional: Summertime
  7. Triple B – Butterflies/Birds/Blooms (I used butterflies)

Mother’s Day Flowers

Hello friends!  Sending a happy Mother’s Day to all of the celebrating moms this weekend!  It’s a beautiful day out today and tomorrow will be too, so I’m going out to plant some flowers that I’ve been wanting to do!   I hope that you’re having a nice weekend in whatever you’re doing.

I just wanted to share a card that I had made just for Mother’s Day:

Vicki-TE-MothersDay

I love how this turned out with all of those blooms bursting out from the antique pail!  I’m in the middle of going back over some classes that I’m doing, and this was one of them that I’ve switched up to fit this occasion.   The original card had carrots as a base and I didn’t have the flower dies they used, so I made my own version with what I had.

The antique pail, flowers, leaves, bow and foiled sentiment dies all came from Taylored Expressions.  The scallop rectangle frame came from My Favorite Things and some of the design papers I’ve used came from Scrapbook.com.

The background papers and large flower came from the same pattern papers as a couple of other flowers and dark green leaves.  I used some light pink ink to sponge some of the other flowers and center of bow.  The center of the scallop frame has some light green blending, so that it wasn’t so stark white behind the flowers.  I also sponged around the antique pail.

I arranged the flowers inside the pail and turned it over to attach with glue over the center of the scallop panel.  I popped up the front flower and added some colored gem dots to the center of the flowers and bow.  I attached some mirror cardstock to the back of the scallop frame panel to match the foiled sentiment.  The sentiment was attached over the pail at the bottom.

It took a little bit of time to cut and arrange all of it, but it was fun to fiddle with.  

Thanks for taking some time to stop by and I hope you’ve enjoyed this pail of flowers for Mother’s Day!  Have a fabulous weekend whatever you do! 🌼🏵️

Challenges:

  1. Creative Inspirations – Feminine
  2. The Paper Funday – Anything Goes optional: Flower Shoppe
  3. Craft Rocket – Flowers
  4. Cardz 4 Galz – Celebration (Mother’s Day or other)
  5. My time to Craft – Mother’s Day or Friendship
  6. A Place to Start – Anything Goes optional: For a Lady
  7. Aud Sentiments – Foiling and/or Flowers + sentiment
  8. Unicorn – For the Girls
  9. Get Creative – Ladies Only

April Showers Bring May Flowers at Sparkles Monthly

Hello friends!  I’m so very happy to see April come as well as the warmer weather it has brought our way!  I’ve actually been taking sometime outside to see some blooms with daffodils, tulips and other buds popping out everywhere!  We are expected to get some rain tomorrow, but that is exactly what April is all about…and then the May flowers to follow!

This is exactly what it’s all about for this month’s challenge over at Sparkles Monthly too!  We hope you can share your “April Showers-May Flowers” projects with us this month!  Here’s what I’ve chosen to make:

I always love a good Spring rain with a little bit of sunshine peeking through that causes rainbows!  I never get a good photo of one, so I just enjoy it while it lasts! 

I’ve used a fairly new product from Taylored Expressions with my card today called “Create-in-quads ROYGBV” which creates 4 different card panels at one layered stencil session.  (I now have 3 other panels to make cards with too.)  I used the “Create-in-quads ROYGBV vase die” to cut it out and then another one in black cardstock for a slightly off shadow effect behind it.

For the background card panel, I had a DCWV rain drops stencil (that I’ve had for a long time) and blended some blue ink over it.  I’ve also cut a piece of blue/teal colored glitter paper for a thin border behind it to attach over an A2 white top folding card base.  I then took another piece of blue cardstock strip to make a “landing/grounding” for the vase to sit on.  Before popping up the ROYGBV vase, I took a marker to create a blue shadow underneath where the vase would be positioned.  I was going for a “rain puddle” look.  Popped it up with foam tape and added a white enamel dot in the center of one of the flowers.  I also took a glitter pen to cover over the raindrops and “rain puddle” under the ROYGBV vase.

The sentiment came from the Taylored Expressions Mini Strips-Rainbow stamp that I’ve white heat embossed over black cardstock and cut it out with the Mini Strips-Asymmetrical die and chose the ones that I wanted to use for this card to attach over top of the vase.  (I also have extra sentiments to use on other projects.)

Hope you’ve enjoyed my card today!  I also hope that you will take some time to stop in and join in the challenge with us this month!  I have several projects finished that I’d like to share, but I find it so hard to come and sit at a computer when the sunshine and happy weather is calling my name!  Maybe when it rains tomorrow, I will post more things! 

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

Challenges:

  1. Just Us Girls – Word Week: RAIN
  2. A Place to Start – One or More Flowers
  3. Crafts Galore Encore – #122 Anything Goes
  4. Try it On Tuesday – Rainbow Colors
  5. Addicted to Stamps & More – #465 Die Cut and/or Stencil
  6. Crafting Happiness – #170 Rainy Weather

Tricorn Fold Cuteness

Hello friends!  I hope that you’re having a wonderful week so far!  We have officially started Spring over my way and now I’m just waiting for the weather to warm up to match it.  I’m looking forward to being outside with the flowers!

Speaking of flowers, I saw this really cute image over at Beccy’s Place and wanted to play along, so I printed it out and colored it, but didn’t quite know what I wanted to do with it until I saw Beccy’s tutorial – Tricorn Fold Card: (click name for her tutorial)

Isn’t this so fun!?  I thought it was such a unique design that stands up, but also folds flat for a 4×6 card size.  I usually make an A2 (5.5″x4.25″) card size, but I can also easily create my own envelope for any size too.  It was a bit tricky at first and I messed it up because I put the scores going in the opposite direction, so I had to start over.  I wasn’t confident enough to figure out the mat layers of all the angles, so I just added some pattern papers to the largest two panels and then placed blank white on the back of the card for a message.

I also found a stitched hexagon layering die in my stash that worked out for the design which is what I used to cut out my colored mouse and layer behind him.  I found a sentiment that worked well for the space I had on my card and then finished it with a couple of teal rhinestones I had laying on my table.  It was fun to create, and it will also be great to send out too!

Here’s a closer view of the colored image that I’ve done using Copic markers.  I did add a few white dots to his cheeks with a white gel pen as well as the center of his eyes.

I have my card lying flat so you can see that it will fit inside an envelope for mailing.  It does spring back up, but I think that’s what will be great for a recipient to pull out of the envelope to see that the card stands up by itself.

Thanks for dropping in today and I hope you’ve enjoyed my card!

Challenges:

  1. Beccy’s Place – March Monthly Challenge optional Bingo (Not sure if the flowers in the image qualify, but if it does then I used the center across row)
  2. Crafty Catz – Anything Goes #667
  3. Crafty Animals – Anything Goes + animal #81
  4. Critter Crazy – Anything Goes featuring animal #84
  5. Creative Creases – Anything Goes with Fun Fold #78
  6. Creative Inspirations – Anything Goes
  7. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes
  8. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes #226
  9. Crafty Calendar – More Than One Fold

Playing With Paper Blocks and Bunnies

Hello friends! Easter is coming for us for very soon and I’ve been enjoying all of the Spring that’s starting to come up outside with flowers and buds on the trees!  It’s still a little cool, but hopefully the weather will even out and stay warmer!

Since I’ve been trying to get motivated for Easter, I’ve pulled out some papers from my stash and have been inspired to CASE (copy & share everything) a friend that really inspires me to use things I have!  First, I’d like to share a fun Easter card that I’ve made for a sketch challenge that I was inspired by as well:

That sitting bunny is so cute!  (Thank you Carol…more on that later in post!)  If you check out the sketch from the Sketch Saturday challenge blog (see in challenge list below), you will see all of the fun angle strips in the sketch.  I thought it would be fun to pull out some Easter papers from my stash.  I wasn’t sure how to do the background until I saw that this sitting bunny worked perfect for a part of the paper pad that had this wheelbarrow image in it!  I cut it out from the paper and placed the bunny on it.

For the background of the card, I thought it would be fun to use my stencils to create a scene with grass and clouds.  The wheelbarrow bunny fit in the open area and then I used the angles from the sketch to cut pieces with the same Easter paper pad.  I just eyeballed everything by marking notches and lining those notches in my paper trimmer to get a straight cut.  Even the solid paper on the base layer came from the paper pad.  I just cut it A2 size to fit over an A2 top folding white card base.

The sentiment was stamped and cut out with the coordinating die.  I added some shadow under wheelbarrow with a green marker (not really the color I wanted, but it worked), and colored a bit of pink on the bunny too.  I added teal rhinestones next to the sentiment and done.

Next, I wanted to share something else that I was inspired by from my friend Carol at https://ourlittleinspirations.blogspot.com who sent me a very cool card and kind gift:

She always inspires me with her “snippet” creations and coming up with cards like this one to utilize those pattern papers we hoard so much!  The pattern is very pleasing to the eye and so I wanted to create one myself!  With all of the papers I have, I’m sure I could make a zillion cards! 😆  I also love how she used a monochromatic green theme with it…which I will need to try another one with this idea!  You should go check her blog out and be inspired too!

Also, she was very kind in sending me these die cut sitting bunnies & stools!  I do not know exactly where this bunny is from, but I’ve seen it around the craft world.  So cute!  Thank you so much for your kindness and inspiration my friend! 

So here’s the card that I created inspired by Carol.  I really love plaids and I thought it would be fun to re-create her design which I measured out her pieces and cut based on what I thought they were.  It was really fun and not as hard as it looks like it might be.  I wrote the measurements and cut from the same Easter paper pad as I used on the card above.  I started with a white base…that way if I messed up, it wouldn’t matter too much.  The sentiment piece was also from the same paper pad.  I just white heat embossed the sentiment and added some stitch details with a white gel pen.

I used one of the sitting bunnies that Carol provided me with, and tried to match up what I had from my stash the best I could to die cut some hearts along with the A2 side folding card base.

I brushed the hearts with a glitter brush pen and called it done.

 

I had so much fun playing with these paper blocks and bunnies!  I hope you’ve enjoyed my creations and inspiration today as well!  Thanks so much for stopping by!  C U SOON!

Challenges:

  1. Sketch Saturday – #746 optional twist: feature an animal (top card)
  2. Simply Create Too – Bunnies & Blooms #198 (top card)
  3. Make My Monday – Spring, Flowers, Weather, etc. #221 (top card)
  4. Fab ‘N Funky – Spring (top card)
  5. Daring Cardmakers – Spring is in the Air (top card)
  6. The Paper Funday – Anything Goes optional: dies #63 (top card)

Bugging Out With Sketches

Hello friends!  I hope you’re having a good week so far and staying safe wherever you are in the world.  Sending hugs to all experiencing a troubled time.  I hope that my post can bring a smile to you today.

I needed to create some get well type of cards and so I thought I’d try to incorporate some challenges while working on them which helps me to concentrate more in what I’m doing and maybe think outside the box a bit.

My first card is made with the Beccy’s Place Challenge freebie this month and she also challenged us with a sketch which I’ve decided to use for my card. (see sketch below)  I was really happy to use up some more pattern papers with it and I also decided to add a tiny dragonfly at the top to enter another challenge and to adhere to my “bug” theme today!

I printed the image in black and white and colored with Copics.  The dragonfly and the center pink strip were stamps that I cut out and added to the design.  The rest is pattern paper from my stash except the scalloped kraft border in the center that I cut out with a die.  I stamped the sentiment and cut it out to go with my twine around it. *You will notice in ALL of these cards that I’ve used some sparkly gems.  I wasn’t aware until posting them!  I must be on a kick of wanting to use them!*

Challenges for 1st card:

  1. Beccy’s Place – August challenge + sketch
  2. Paper Dragonfly Creative – Anything Flies (Goes) or Party
  3. Kreativ-Tanten – Anything Goes
  4. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes
  5. Crafty Calendar – Anything Goes
  6. Dragonfly Dreams – Dragonflies

And for this next card, I’ve played with a large bug:

Around my area this time of year, you can hear the sound of these cicada bugs with their distinct noise throughout the trees.  My husband likes the sound when a bird catches one! EEW!  This bug is a cute one from Inky Stamper called Cicada and I’ve colored it up with pencils this time.  Hard to see, but I’ve also added some shimmer with a glitter pen on his wings.

I’ve used the Picket Fence Tree Bark stencil over kraft on the background and then splattered it with brown and white paint. The leaves under the bug and the accent came from the Lisa Horton Variegated Leaf EF+die that I cut over light green cardstock.  I used some metallic green wax to go over the details in them.  I also used some gel pens to make some doodles around the strip, the circle and under the sentiment along with following a sketch. (details below) You will also notice more sparkly gems!  I’m also entering this in the Inky Stamper FB challenge this month which is using an IS bug image.

Challenges for card

  1. Sketch Saturday – #732 sketch + twist: add a doodle
  2. Creative Knockouts – #501 Anything Goes
  3. We Love Stamping – Masculine
  4. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
  5. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  6. A Place to Start – Anything Goes optional: leaves/trees
  7. The Corrosive – Anything Goes

For my last card I decided to keep this one simple’ish’:

So, I know these aren’t real bugs because I’m not squealing, but these guys are too cute! They’re popping up out of the dirt for a special greeting!  I mixed in both a new and older stamp set from Lawn Fawn on this one. I’ve used another sketch for this one and decided to keep it very simple.  The hardest part of this was the coloring which honestly wasn’t all that difficult either because they’re small images.  I’ve also added some shimmer with a glitter pen on the wings and of course, there’s those sparkly gems again!

Challenges for card

  1. Sunday Stamps – SSC316 in the corner sketch
  2. The Paper Players – CAS using any Bug
  3. Simon Says Stamp Wednesday – Clean and Simple
  4. Krafty Chicks – CAS (Clean and Simple)

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I appreciate your time and thoughts!  I’ll be seeing you again on Saturday with another AJ page!

Sparkles Monthly Challenge-Things with Wings

Hello friends!  I hope you’ve had a lovely Mother’s Day weekend and are enjoying the month of May so far!  I look forward to seeing those beautiful blooms and digging in the garden! 

Today starts a brand new challenge over at the Sparkles Monthly Challenge and the theme is “Things with Wings“!  This is a good one as there’s several ways to interpret it!  Be sure to check out the blog to see what the design team has come up with for inspiration!  Speaking of design team, Caz is looking to add to the team, so be sure to check out the details if you would be interested in joining.  Here’s what I’ve made for the challenge this month:

I thought the butterfly from this Taylored Expressions stamp set called Endless Joy would be so fun to color and use for this challenge.  They were stamped with Copic markers and cut out with the coordinating dies.

For the background, I’ve taken the rectangle masking stencil and blended some blue ink over the center and then I’ve added an additional stencil over top of it and blended bluer to get the pattern.  I then added some raw umber paint and opaque white Copic to splatter over top of it.  I cut out a stitched frame and added it over the blended area.

I added the flowers and butterfly to the card by gluing and popping out the smaller flower as well as the wings on the butterfly.  The sentiment was gold foiled and cut out with a coordinating die that was glued at the top.  I added some highlights on the butterfly with a white gel pen and added some Stickles glitter to the center of the flowers.  The white panel was attached to a top folding A2 white card base.

I hope that you have enjoyed my card today!  I hope that you will stop into the challenge and play along with us this month!  Looking forward to seeing the gallery of wings!!

Have an amazing day and see you again soon!

Challenges I’d like to enter this card for:

  1. Four Seasons – Spring Season
  2. Triple B (Birds, Blooms &/or Butterflies) – Spring 
  3. Love to Scrap – Anything Goes
  4. Unicorn – Flowers
  5. Crafty Animals – Anything Goes + animal
  6. Critter Crazy – Anything Goes + featured critter
  7. Fab ‘n’ Funky – Things with Wings
  8. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes

Creative Artiste Guest Designer with Altered Mixed Media Frame

Hello friends and welcome to May!  I’m happy to see this month come with all of the beautiful Spring things that pop out like the flowers and sun with the warmer temps!  I look forward to going out and working in the yard soon!  Hope that you’ve had a wonderful week and look forward to a great weekend!  I’m getting ready for a fun crafty retreat and I’m really looking forward to crafting with friends!

5 May 2023

I’m super excited to be a guest for this month’s challenge over at the Creative Artiste Mixed Media Challenge!  If you’ve been around, then you know how I enjoy creating a few mixed media projects once in a while besides my Art Journaling that I do each month.  The theme is always “Anything Goes” with Mixed Media, so this time, I decided to make some altered art with an old frame:

I thought this would be a perfect item to alter with a Spring theme in mind.  I know the frame “looks old”, but it was actually a really old wooden frame that was stained/varnished about 30 years ago!  I’ve sanded, painted, added some crackling paste, and painted over it some more to give it a Vintage “falling apart” look.  I like the texture and the crackling from the paste that came out in it. The total frame size is about 9″x13″ and it’s shown hanging on my wall.

The center of the frame was done using a piece of cardboard sized to fit inside the frame.  (I threw out the glass front as I didn’t have a need for it.)  I had some papers that I thought was so pretty along with the sentiment.  The sentiment was way too large for a card and I thought it would work great for this project.  Of course, the size of the paper wasn’t quite large enough, so I worked on collaging some musical papers around the edges for a border.  I also went over it with a floral stencil and paste, paint splatters and waterproof ink before inserting behind the frame.

Here’s a closer look at the top of the frame where you can see that I’ve added a butterfly ephemera that was painted with some clear glitter paint and attached next to the sentiment with glue and foam dots on the wings.

I have tons of flowers in my stash, so I’ve created an arrangement along the frame with a vine and different sized flowers that I’ve added with twirled vines.  I’ve used more paint and even some art stones around the flowers as well as various places over the background for texture and interest.  More paints and metallic wax was used over all of these places to keep the Vintage feel to the design.  I tried to keep them coordinated with the papers in the background.  (It’s weird how the colors vary so much when you take a photo compared to what it looks in person.  The top frame photo looks more blue, but it’s actually more this muted green color.)

And as you scroll down to the bottom of the frame, you see I have this 3D arrangement with the painted chicken wire against the back panel with the papers.  (the flowers were added on top of that.)  On the bottom left you see I’ve made a “nest” for my bird with Spanish moss and even added a couple of twigs from my backyard underneath it.  I’ve also added a pinch of green moss in there which is also what I’ve used over top of the white picket fence section to the bottom right.  It actually sticks out in front of the flowers.

You can also see where I’ve added some more art stones and paints.  I’ve finished the whole design with some Finnabair white gold metallic wax.  This is hard to capture unless you get really close, but it adds a wonderful detail that brings out lots of the texture in your finished piece.

I really enjoyed creating this altered frame while I was thinking about Spring coming to life outside!  It was also fun to be able to find something I’ve had for so many years and give it some new life!  I hope you’ve enjoyed it as well and I look forward to seeing what mixed media art you make this month for the challenge! 

Thanks for dropping in today!

Challenges:

  1. Crafting From the Heart – Anything Goes (NO CARDS) challenges are back after 4 years!
  2. Crafting Happiness – Flowers
  3. Pearly Sparkles – Anything BUT a card
  4. Simon Says Stamp Monday – Paint It!
  5. Love to Craft – Anything Goes

Emboss It at Sparkles Monthly + Giveaway WINNER!

Hello friends!  I hope you’re having a great month so far and being able to enjoy the nice Spring weather!  It’s been really nice over my way, but I’m seeing we have a bit of cooler temps coming too.  Hopefully not too chilly! 

Today starts a new challenge over at the Sparkles Monthly Challenge Blog and this time we would like for you to “Emboss it”!  I hope you will hop on over to see the inspiration from the team and consider joining in the fun with us this month!

Here’s the DT creation that I’ve made:

I love to do embossing on my cards, and I know it’s a favorite for many!  I’ve decided to do a “Letterpress Embossing” technique and inked up an embossing folder to achieve the effect on my orange layer panel.  The raised areas stay white on the white cardstock.

For the two corners, I’ve taken a Simon Says Stamp Garden Greetings stamp set and gold heat embossed the floral spray image.  I’ve also used the same gold embossing for the “sending hugs” sentiment strip as well as the “Get Well Soon” sentiment over the shimmer vellum which was cut from a stitched circle die.  I added some gold sequins over it.

I wanted to keep it somewhat flat for mailing purposes, but I think some of it popped up would be pretty too. I was also very happy to pull out a past card kit and make another card with it.

I would love to see your embossed creations in the gallery this month, so I’ll hope you’ll play along!  Check out the challenge here – Sparkles Monthly

***ARE YOU A WINNER?!!***

vicki-tegiveaway

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I have taken all of the comments from my last post, added all of the names that mentioned they would be interested in the Beautiful Butterflies dies and foil package and wrote those names on pieces of scrap paper. I folded and crumpled them up and had my husband pick out a name. He threw them all into the hat he was wearing and pulled one out!

HERE IS THE NAME THAT HE PICKED OUT…………….

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Yay!  Congratulations Chrissy! 

Please contact me and send me your full name and snail mail address so that I can pop your package in the mail to you!  I hope you enjoy it!  (I haven’t even used mine yet!)  Sorry if your name didn’t get pulled as I only had one, but I know I have several “double” items that I’ve placed in a bin and will be pulling them out at some point to give away! So, stay tuned!

Thanks so much for dropping in and taking the time to say hello!  I appreciate you!

Challenges I’d like to enter my above card into:

  1. Creative Inspirations – Anything Goes
  2. Can You Handle the Pressure? – Anything Goes optional clouds
  3. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  4. Ally’s Angels – Anything Goes
  5. Little Red Wagon – At least 2 layers 
  6. Penny’s Paper-Crafty – Anything Goes
  7. Tic Tac Toe – TTTC204 (middle down: die cut, free, embossing)tttc-challenge-board-204

Class Fun & Square Samplers + Give Away

Happy April friends!  We have finished March already and onto Easter very quickly approaching!  I hope you’re enjoying all things Spring coming up your way!  We’ve had several storms and we’re in the tornado season as well, so I hope everyone is staying safe out there whatever the weather.  I do have some things that I had previously finished and wanted to share:

First, I wanted to share about the Virtual Stamp Joy Event by Taylored Expressions that I participated in a few weeks ago.  I always have so much fun and enjoy the motivation that it seems to generate!  I’m sharing them in the gallery below, so if you’re on my website post, then just click on each photo to enlarge it.

  • The first four photos were from a class using the same floral stamp set and the others are from the next day of make-n-take projects.  Please let me know if you have any questions about any of them!

The last set of four cards were a “mass production” using a background stamp in different colored cardstock panels and clear heat embossing over them.  The class sample had “hello” sentiment on each one, but I changed up the sentiments and have placed them in a card box to give them out with envelopes as a gift for someone.

Hope you’ve enjoyed the inspiration as much as I enjoyed putting them all together!

From the end of last year up until this last month, I didn’t have much time with the Holidays and everything going on, but as you may have seen in previous posts, I participate in a “square sampler swap” and when everyone sends out their squares, we then complete a home décor piece with all of the squares, so I thought I’d share mine finally completed:

  • CLICK PHOTOS BELOW TO ENLARGE

This was for the Christmas Sampler SWAP and you can see that I’ve used a black shadow box frame for my sampler and placed some red with red metallic dotted paper behind it.  The square on the right is the one that I made. (I’ve used My Favorite Things products for my square.)

This was for the Winter Sampler SWAP and I went with a white shadow box for this one.  I’ve placed some soft blue snowflake papers for behind my sampler as I thought it was soft enough to not look too busy.  The square on the right is the one that I made. (I’ve used Inky Stamper products for my square.)

And recently we finished up our Spring Animals Sampler SWAP that I used another white shadow box for the sampler.  I’ve added a piece of pink colored “Watercolor Wishes” paper from Lawn Fawn behind it.  It looks a little off in the photo, but it looks better IRL.  The square on the right is the one that I made.  (I used Taylored Expressions products for my square.)

Not sure if we’re doing any more or not, but I had so much fun making the squares to swap with friends!

Lastly, I have a fun little thing to give to whoever is interested in these Taylored Expressions dies + foil-it panels package. (It’s not sold in stores anywhere as it was a free gift with purchase) I have an extra and so I thought I’d give it away to someone!  Just leave me a comment below if you’re interested and I’ll pick someone from the comments.
Leave a comment below if you’re interested!

That’s all I have for today!  Thanks so much for stopping in!  I’ll be seeing you soon!