Stampin’ Up! – Page 2 – Stamped Smiles

It’s Graduation Time!👩‍🎓

Hello friends! It’s started to really warm up over my way, so now it’s time to stay indoors and have some crafty play in the cool air! I will be trying out some new goodies too! Yay!

A few weeks ago or so, I was commissioned to create some graduation cards using certain school themed colors for a few local grads in my area so I wanted to share what I came up with.

I made a set of 3 graduation cards each one of a different style/design and I was told the color theme for each school/college to use along with the instruction of adding a pocket or place holder to fit a gift card inside. So I pulled out what graduation themed stamps I had in my stash and came up with a few different designs you can see below…

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I dubbed this card “hassle with the tassel”!🤣

The colors were to be purple and gold. I just used my paper trimmer to trim out my cardstock to make the “V” line to mimick a grad gown and then I created the grad cap with a square piece of cardstock. The tassel was made with some gold metallic thread which was so very slippery that I went through like 4 “globs” of it to create a final tassel that looked decent enough to attach to the cap! Oh my goodness!🤨

I used gold mirror cardstock for the accent layers and I had a greeting for the sentiment from an older Stampin’ Up! set in my stash…(hadn’t pulled these out since my youngest graduated back in 2015!) I added the year along the neckline.

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And then to add pockets, as instucted, I took the Lawn Fawn Diagonal Gift Card Pocket die for the inside corner of the card along with stamping a sentiment for the grad. (All of these cards were made for females graduating, so I knew this would work!)

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For my next card, my colors were blue and yellow. Being limited on my grad stamps, I’ve used the same greeting as the card above, but this one was used in a slightly different way.

I wanted to have this card look like the “appearance” of a graduation cap flying in the air. So I took this “Spring Card” idea to make it so that although it lays flat to place in a regular A2 sized envelope, it springs up like this for display. I added some stamped clouds in the background along with the year and greeting at the bottom.

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When you turn the card over on the back, you can see that I’ve stamped a greeting along with leaving a blank spot for a message or to sign a name.

You can also see the little area at the top where the thumb hole spot is to place a gift card inside the pocket that I created. Thought that was a fun little card display for the grad!

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And for this last card, the colors were the same purple and gold colors to work with. I still wanted to work with the grad cap scheme as my supplies were somewhat limited and I wanted to come up with some different and unique designs for each.

So this is my take on a “Twist Turn Card”. This was so fun to do and actually super simple! I took parts of an older stamp image I had and used it for the stamping on this design. I die cut some numbers for the year and of course the design of the card mimicks the square grad cap. The tassel actually came from a Stampin’ Up! balloon die set and fit nicely with this.

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So when you open up this card, this is what it looks like on the inside with a nice little gift card slot at the top along with a stamped sentiment on the inside and space to write a personal message too.

Thanks so much for dropping in today! I hope you’ve enjoyed my graduation themed cards and were inspired! If you’d like to know how to make any of these cards, just let me know and I can show you!😉

I have some fun things coming…so I’ll see you soon!!

Challenges:

Creative Fingers – #188 Anything Goes
Sweet Stampin’ – Diecuts/Punches (Used both on all of them!!)
Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – PIP2024 Anything Goes
A Bit More Time to Craft – #118 Anything Goes
Papercraft – Geometric (Squares, diamonds, circles, triangles)
Creatalicious– #189 Anything Goes optional: no design paper

June 18, 2020June 17, 2020

*Vicki* from Stamped Smiles35 Comments

Merry Christmas Friends!

Merry Christmas to all of my friends here and I’m honored to be a little part of your life with you in some way…I hope you know that!

**This is a pre-scheduled post to wish you all a special happy day. I’m away spending time with my family right now, so sit back with your favorite beverage for a time out and I hope you enjoy today’s long post.**

Just wanted to share BATCHES of the cards and creations that I’ve made for the Holidays this year. I know that I make lots of creations, but for the purposes of mailing cards, I try to keep these particular cards as “mail friendly” as possible, so these are more simple in style for me, but really enjoyed making them and just had fun:

I tend to do bulk cards in a set of 4-6 so that I don’t get “bored” with it or run out of a certain supply or something! LOL! So this first set of 6 cards is using the gorgeous Stampin’ Up! stamp set “Winter Woods”. I stamped up the scene background and then covered the entire panel with double stick adhesive and then covered it with dazzling diamonds glitter. (The deer I added is from a favorite Newton’s Nook stamp set called Serene Silhouettes.) The white heat embossed greeting is from the Stampin’ Up! stamp set “Itty Bitty Christmas”. (I think this set was probably my favorite to do!)

I just *had* to get these penguins in there somewhere! LOL! These set of cards are actually all just a bit different, but I colored up the penguins from the “Pablo the Penguin” free stamp set included with the Making Cards Magazine for December and cut them out in different ways and then mounted them onto cards. Some of them use some of the free papers that were also included with the issue. So this is another set of 6 cards that were mailed out. Love those cute penguins with the different hats! LOL!

Here’s another set of cards that I’ve made to send out, but because these were even more simple than the ones above with very little stamping involved, I made 8 of these. (So if you’re counting, I’ve made 20 total so far…not including some other special cards I’ve mailed out to people along the way.) – I absolutely fell in love with this die set from STAMPlorations called “Two Reindeer” and was so excited to see that I had won a gift certificate from their blog and this was something that I knew I would be getting right away! This was cut from gold cardstock and mounted over a piece of various different Stampin’ Up! pattern paper from my stash…it’s always nice to be able to use up more of my hoarded paper stash! The sentiment is again from the Stampin’ Up! “Itty Bitty Christmas” stamp set.

Now I didn’t want to leave out a couple of cards that I made especially for my boys. They know their mom likes to stamp, but they know I have to add in a bit of my goofy humor with them as well! 🙂 So of course I had to pull out this fun Simon Says Stamp “Gnome for the Holidays” card kit (sold out) to make them! I think I ended up using ALL of the wobblers in the kit too! I told my son that this is me wobbling with the presents about to drop everything and my hubby is trying to save everything! LOL!

Here’s a little wobbler action for you too…

And of course I had to make another card for my other son too…

I absolutely feel in love with all of those cute gnomes that came out everywhere this year for crafting…so I still have more that I didn’t get a chance to use, but thought this would be perfect for my son with this trendy style design…of course using a wobbler too! And I do love him GNOME matter what! 🙂

For some reason, I thought the wobbler action on this one was more fun! LOL! Not sure if it’s because of the weight/size or what…but cool to see the difference.

And whilst in the middle of making up all of these cards to mail out, I also had fun playing with the Christmas Advent Calendar that I had purchased a while back. Because it’s an “Advent Calendar” you start with December 1st and open each day. So each day to open was pretty cool because there was a new surprise stamp inside! So I took each day’s stamp and made a tag for each one clear up until today’s last window to open: (obviously previously opened and made to finish! LOL!)

I will show by the week. So this is week 1 with the first 5 days opened. The stamp that I received for each day is noticeably featured in each tag.

And these are the tags made for week 2. The angel tag was made with Deco Foil in the background.

These are week 3 tags made. The purple colored tag on the left bottom is actually a shaker. The window sheet was glaring in the camera.

This is week 4 of the tags. Hubby picked out the candy canes as his favorite of all of them. Mine was the stockings tag.

And here is the final last week of the tags from the Advent Calendar. Really cool to have all of these tags on hand for gifts! I needed them! 🙂

And of course I wasn’t done with the Advent Calendar box itself because I thought I could “recycle” the little window flaps on the box because they had some cute images on them for each day…so I cut them off with my scissors after I opened that day and kept them:

So I thought it would be fun to use them to create a card! They had numbers on them, but I have covered them up in certain ways so that they’re not showing. The cover die was cut out from the same colored cardstock for the background too.

Whew! Now to get finished up with my wrapping and “merry making” before the big day! I hope you are or have enjoyed yourself a wonderfully HAPPY Christmas day no matter how you’re celebrating it! Thank you for spending some of your time here on my blog today!

Leaving you with this video of a wonderful song and light show that is just not Christmas for me without this music. Enjoy!

I’ll be seeing you soon my friends!

December 25, 2019August 3, 2021

*Vicki* from Stamped Smiles14 Comments

Sparkles for Cute Card Thursday

Hello friends! Today starts a new challenge for Cute Card Thursday! The theme for this week’s challenge is “Sparkles“. Usually when I think of sparkles, I usually think of Christmas or snow, but this time I went in a different direction for a reason…

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Unfortunately, I needed a sympathy type of card this last weekened and it seems that I’m always making one as I need them instead of making several up at one time so that they’re ready and on hand when the time comes.

This is an older stamp set from Stampin’ Up! that I got a few years back during their Sale-a-bration time and it was a free set called “Heartfelt Blooms“. I actually really love the floral image and how detailed the image is so that you don’t have to color it if you don’t want to. It has been my “go-to” lately when I need something quickly.

I made it monochromatic green with the Old Olive color and Vanillia cardstock. The “sparkle” is that beautiful glitter paper behind the strip and sentiment. The sentiment was cut from oval dies and popped up with foam tape.

Hope you’ve enjoyed my simple card with sparkles today and please be sure to join us this week with your sparkly creations over a Cute Card Thursday! Looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

Thanks for dropping in and I’ll see you soon my friends!

Challenges:

Use Your Stuff – Tic-Tac-Toe (I used bottom row across)
Creative Moments – Anything Goes with optional: For the girls
Through the Craftroom Door – Anything Goes

October 24, 2019October 22, 2019

*Vicki* from Stamped Smiles23 Comments

Under the Sea Shaker for Cute Card Thursday

Hello friends! Welcome to another Thursday and a new challenge over at Cute Card Thursday this week! The challenge for this week is Brads, Sequins/Gems. So pull out your embellishments and have some fun creating! Looking forward to seeing your creations using these items!

I decided that I was going to use all three items for my card today:

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I’ve used an “oldie but a goodie” Stampin’ Up! stamp set for my masculine shaker card here. I’ve pulled out the “By the Tide” and “Hardwood” rubber stamp sets that I’ve had for a couple of years now. (Not sure if they’re still available or not in the catalog as it’s been such a long time since I’ve bought any SU! products.)

I started by stamping the background “Hardwood” stamp with Basic Gray ink over a piece of Marina Mist cardstock and then blended some gray and black distress inks along the edges of it. I mounted it with some Basic Gray cardstock. I’ve taken some twine pieces and used it to fashion a “netting” accent from the side of the card onto the bottom front and then added some blue glitter around it for some fun texture and sparkle.

For the shaker element of my card, I’ve used some circle dies to create the frames and that’s where I’ve attached the silver brads all around the edge. I’ve used some more distress inks and stamp some more images from the stamp set for the inside of the shaker design. I’ve added some sequins for the inside fo the shaker window and placed it over the front of the card over the netting accent. I stamped the images with Gray and Cajun ink pads and then colored them in and randomly placed them over the card design.

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Lastly, I’ve taken some rhinestones and colored them with a Copic marker so that I could get the blue color for my design.

Hope you can join in the challenge with us this week over at Cute Card Thursday! Please be sure to stop on over and see what the rest of the team has come up with for inspiration too! See you soon!

challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Monday – Going Around in Circles
Use Your Stuff – Yarn/String/Twine
Through the Craft Room Door – Anything Goes
Retro Rubber – Anything Goes #rrcb109
Crafty Creations – Anything Goes

April 25, 2019April 24, 2019

*Vicki* from Stamped Smiles31 Comments

Sympathy & Banish the Blues

Hello friends! Hope you have enjoyed a nice weekend. Unfortunately, I needed to make up a sympathy card and didn’t realize that I had run out of them, so I will need to make some up in the future so I can have them on hand and not have to worry about it when the time comes again. I had a friend who recently passed and needed a card for her family, so I pulled out a set that I hadn’t used before until now:

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This is an older set from last year’s Sale-a-Bration at Stampin’ Up! called “Heartfelt Blooms”. I think it’s so pretty and since the lady who passed was a happy crafter, I felt good about making this tribute for her. I will miss seeing you at lunches Penny, rest in peace my friend.

I stamped the floral image several times with a Copic friendly navy color ink over some cream colored cardstock and then colored in the images with my Copic markers. I also went around the images with some markers and blended it all out around the design.

I then took some distress ink and the foam ink blending tool to soften the edges a bit and make it look a bit more Vintage. I also stamped the sentiment with navy ink and die cut it along with some navy cardstock with a banner die. I sponged around the edges of this as well. I wrapped some linen thread several times around this panel and tied it off with a bow next to the banner. I then attached it over an A2 sized top folding navy card base.

I created a matching envelope by stamping the image in navy ink over it as well. Lastly finished off the design with some clear sequins.

Here’s a closer view of the coloring on the floral image I did as well as the sponged around the front panel and banner. I thought all of the blue colors turned out really pretty and made a nice Vintage feel.

Challenges I’d like to enter for the above card:

A Bit More Time to Craft – #84 Anything Goes
The Creative Crafters – Anything Goes
Crafty Catz – Anything Goes with optional: Blue, Green plus one other color (cream)

So on another {positive} note, I’d also like to remind you that there are still a couple of days left to play along with us over at the Cute Card Thursday Challenge this week! The theme for this challenge is “Banish the Blues” which I felt like doing in my craft room and so I decided to make this “Fun-Loving” card:

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Now how happy do these cute honey bees look?! They almost look like they’re dancing in the air!! I’ve used items from a February card kit for this card.

I’ve heat embossed the bees and colored them in with some Aqua Pigments. I’ve used the paper from the kit and stamped the background and the edges of the bee panel with some SU! ink that happened to match up with it. I then white heat embossed the sentiment from the same stamp set above the bee panel. I sponged around the edges of this red panel with white ink and attached it to a side folding A2 sized card base.

Here’s a closer look at the bees and how I’ve colored them. Some of the Aqua Pigments are shimmery and I’ve used a couple of those colors too! I’ve added some white dots on their cheeks as well as a few around the hearts. I topped off their eye-balls with some glossy accents. I’ve also stamped some more “xoxo”s on each end of this image border and layered it over a piece of black cardstock. I took two strips of glitter washi tape from the kit and added it above and below the image panel area and then attached the bees over top but between the strips. Lastly I’ve added a heart shaped sequins to the center of the white embossed heart “O” in the sentiment and the rest of the sequins from the kit randomly placed on the card. I topped off the circle sequins with some Nuvo White Blizzard Glitter Drops.

Hope this helped to end my post on a happier note with a smile and I hope you will stop by the Cute Card Thursday Challenge Blog and check out the inspiration over there and play along with us!!

Thanks so much for checking in with me today! I’ll see you again tomorrow for more crafty inspiration!!

Here’s some challenges I’d like to enter the above “Bee card” for:

Shopping Our Stash – #SOS386 Hearts On Fire
Moving Along With the Times – #89 Have a Heart
QKR Stampede – #331 Anything Goes
Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – #PIP1903 Anything Goes
Paper Girls – #168 Sparkle and Shine
Double Trouble: #20 Thing 1 Trouble Maker – “Love is in the Air” (honey bees!), Thing 2 Double Dare – Entered the Paper Girls Challenge #168, Thing 3 Twisted Sister – “Sparkling and Shining” (I used metallic watercolor, sequins, glitter drops and glitter washi tape)

January 21, 2019August 3, 2021

*Vicki* from Stamped Smiles35 Comments

Christmas Cards from County Fair, Invite and ICAD Week 8!

Hello friends! TGIF is what I am thinking today! Whew!

I have lots of fun things to share with you all today…so please take your time to read, relax, sip on your beverage and enjoy! 🙂

First, I’d like to share a couple of Christmas cards that I had made earlier this month and I didn’t take a photo of them until (with the exception of one of them) because I was in a hurry to meet a deadline of course and had to wait until I received them back! (I will explain that as we go…)

Vicki-SU! Christmas Card-County Fair 2nd place

I am glad that I have started making up a few Christmas cards now because I literally ran completely OUT of any Christmas cards I had last year and didn’t really have quite enough to send out all that I had wanted. Well I’m going to be working DOUBLE hard on my Christmas from here on out because I have 2 craft shows that I’m going to be at and I know I will really need some including several in a boxed up form!

I have TONS of Stampin’ Up! products and I was happy to pull some things out and use it on my card here. I knew I wanted to go mostly white with this one because I wanted it to look elegant. I used some chunky silver glas glitter around the edges of my oval. Both the pine needles and outter pine cone where heat embossed with some clear glitter embossing powder. The embossing folder and ribbon are all from SU! too. I just used a wonky stitched rectangle die from My Favorite Things to cut out main panel.

This card won 2nd place at my local County Fair! (You can see more about that below)

Vicki-SU! Christmas Card - County Fair 3rd place

Here is another Christmas card that I made using some more of my Stampin’ Up! products that I keep on hoarding in my stash and don’t use! LOL! The only thing I did different was the background pine trees are actually a Tim Holtz stencil from last year and then the die cut pine trees along with everything else including the paper and ink are all from Stampin’ Up! I added some Stickles clear glitter over the die cut pines and though it’s hard to see in the photo, I sprayed the DSP with some shimmer spray.

This card ended up winning 3rd place at the County Fair!

Vicki-County Fair Christmas Card entries

Here are the entries that I entered in one category at my local County Fair this month. I won 1st, 2nd and 3rd all in the same category which was “Hand Stamped Greeting – Holiday”. They don’t award any more than than this in any category. So I was happy to see that I placed all three! Above, you can see that I have entered the bauble Christmas card I previously posted and it ended up winning 1st place! You can see the close-up details of the card in THIS POST if you are interested or missed it.

I just needed to start making up Christmas cards and I thought this was a great way to not only get some done, but make the most out of it by entering them for the fair! I’m glad I did that too. Thanks to mom for helping to nudge me along as well! LOL!

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So if you are familiar with Splitcoast Stampers, then you know what time of year it is and the time is getting closer! Next week will start our annual “Dare to Get Dirty” event for our special fan club members! Not a member? Check out the details by CLICKING HERE!

There will be tons of fun with the Dirty Dozen Design Team both past and present (like myself) coming together to bring the fan club members a special treat with at least 5 challenges a day, lots of fun, chatter, glitter in your face and prizes! 🙂 And especially for your family, you will need to fill out this form below and present this to them as to not bother you during your time to have fun!!…..

DTGD-Header-e1371861527847 I hope that you will be able to come join in the fun with us! I will be there to present a challenge that especially a paper crafter will love! 🙂 – Be sure to check out my blog for some of the creations that I’ve made especially for this event too!

And of course since it’s Friday, it’s also time for my weekly ICAD results!! I only have ONE more week left of this 61 day challenge….can you believe it?!! So here is the ICAD 2018 week 8 results:

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As always, things are a bit random and weird, but each day the prompts inspire me to keep on going to my room and have a play with media!

For one of the cards, I have used a Chibilights Electronic and yes it is showing as there is a reason for it! LOL! But, I wanted to share that it DOES really work on my card:

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I just had to share that as it is the very first one I’ve ever done that I got to actually work!! LOL! I was pretty excited! I will be back next week with my very final share from this!

Now you all know WHY I had random and spotted postings…I’ve been a busy stamper with getting projects done and ready for the County Fair (I’ve entered 16 projects and I will share more later on), and I’ve been getting samples ready for my challenge as well as my fellow Splitcoaststampers DDDT challenges getting ready to start soon.

I am tired now and I think I’ll relax with hubby this weekend! Tonight we are going to go to a hot-air balloon moon glow in our area. The weather is beautiful for it! Hope you all have a wonderful and fun weekend too! Thanks so much for dropping in!

Challenges for Christmas card(s) at the top: