Emily has a House!

My friend Emily, after months of searching, has found a house! I wanted to mark the occasion with a card (we are both card-makers, after all), so I made this quick and goofy card: 

I don't consider this card particularly brilliant in terms of design or execution. So why am I even sharing it? Well... see that door? I MADE MY OWN EMBOSSING FOLDER! That's worth all caps in my book. :D 

(Note to self: do something about cat scratches on sideboard before taking photographs...) 
I wanted the door to have a little style, rather than just being a cardstock rectangle. I'd recently read this post about making your own embossing folders out of cereal box cardboard, so decided to give it a try in my new Cuttlebug. (Yes, I've finally joined the embossing/die cut machine brigade!) A little trial-and-error, and I had exactly what I wanted! 
I will confess that I stamped that roof image more than once before I realized... it wasn't my lack of inking skills -- it came pre-distressed! The words are from a Unity Marah Johnson set that I won on the All Things Unity blog. They seemed to express the process Emily had gone through. 
P.S. Another friend, Meg, is in the TOP 5 in the Paper Crafts magazine Gallery Idol contest! Her creations have all been amazing so far, and I can't wait to see what she comes up with next! The newest projects will be displayed Monday. View, admire, vote! 


Supplies: white & Stampin' Up real red and kraft cardstock, Unity October 2010 Kit of the Month (Take Time to Laugh) & Moxie stamps, Versamark & vintage photo distress ink, clear embossing powder, Cuttlebug, black half pearl, dimensionals Pin It Now!

Amber Ink Birthday Bash Winners

If you participated in the Amber Ink party train blog hop in honour of the company's first birthday, then you enjoyed some fabulous creativity! And if you commented, you were eligible for some fabulous prizes! The winner from my blog is... FrancineB! Congratulations! To see if you were a winner, head over to the Amber Inklings blog. 
Happy Friday!  Pin It Now!

Happy Birthday to Amber Ink!

It's Amber Ink's first birthday, and you're invited to the party! To celebrate, many of the past and present Amber Ink torchbearers are participating in a giant blog hop. If you've already been hopping, you should have arrived from Emily's always inspiring blog. If you're looking for hop directions, head over to Party Central (aka Amber Inklings) for all the details. And what would a birthday party be without presents, so be sure to comment for your chance to win! 
I have two cards to share today, one using a classic Amber Ink girl, and one using some brand new images! 

I made this birthday card recently for a friend celebrating a rather significant birthday. At first I was stumped as to what I could do for a card, but once I thought of this Amber girl from the set Hope, Popcorn & Wine, the idea soon came together. 

This card uses Amber Ink's brand new set, It's a Train Set, along with a few cupcakes and candles from Little Things: Birthday Fanfare - Bake Me a Cake. I put all the images together in Microsoft Word, printed it out and coloured them. The train's layered on my second-favourite iPaper, Spin Pin: Tiny. Quick and fun!
Your next stop on the birthday party hop is Meg! Not only a former torchbearer for Amber Ink, Meg is also currently in the top 15 in Paper Crafts magazine's Gallery Idol contest. Get ready to be dazzled! 
Thanks for stopping by, and enjoy the rest of the birthday hop! 


Supplies: (60th birthday card) white & blue cardstock, Amber Ink Hope, Popcorn and Wine stamps, Versafine onyx black ink, Prismacolor pencils, dimensionals; (train card) white cardstock, Amber Ink Spin Pin: Tiny iPaper, Amber Ink It's a Trainset & Bake Me a Cake digital stamps, Laurentien markers, Prismacolor pencils, silver & gold gel pens, Twinery charcoal twine

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Happy BARKday

I may lean towards cats a bit more than dogs, but I do have some friends and family that are dog people first and foremost. And sometimes I even take that preference into account. ☺

I do like this happy dog from Paper Smooches! (I also used him in a slightly different way here.) Although I do think that little twine embellishment on his party hat may have lowered (the appearance of) his IQ by more than a few points. Once again, I was happy to get out my Sharpies and add some quick colour both to him and to the fun sentiment. Once in awhile, it's nice to make a quick, fun, colourful card! 


Supplies: white & green cardstock, Paper Smooches Birthday Buddies stamps, Memories black ink, Sharpies, Twinery peapod twine Pin It Now!

Amber Ink's Getting Ready to Party!

Amber Ink is turning one this week, and while the big party (i.e. blog hop) is on Wednesday, the preparations are already starting. Today, Amber Ink is asking everybody to show off their party hats! Here's mine: 

This little puppy from Unity seemed perfect for a party hat. His hat is made from Spin Pin: Tiny iPaper, and of course he needed his dog tag to match. The pom-pom ensures the hat is for a party, and not a dunce-cap. ;) 
And now I have a shaped gift tag, ready for any last minute birthday presents. After all, there's a birthday party on Wednesday! Hope you'll join in on the fun. 




P.S. For the first time ever, this is my second post in a day! Check out Simon's get well card here. 


Supplies: white cardstock, Amber Ink Spin Pin: Tiny iPaper, Unity Tail Wagger stamp, Brilliance graphite black ink, Sharpies, green Divine twine Pin It Now!

Poor Simon!

Earlier this month, I got to meet Emily, a fellow rubber-stamper and cardmaker. We've known each other online for about a year now, and it was fun to get together in real life. While we were visiting, we made a card for another stamping friend, Angela. Her new kitten, Simon, broke his leg and had to have surgery! How could we not make him a get well card?

We used a digital image from Pink Cat Studio. I let Emily work her Copic magic to colour the cat. We (okay, she) then wrapped some Twinery twine around his leg for a cast. My big contribution was stamping the Verve sentiment before we popped the image on the base. 
Please come back on Wednesday when I'm participating in a blog hop to celebrate the first birthday of Amber INK! You'll see lots of fun creations... and rumour is, there'll be prizes! 

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Two Quick Cards

The other day, I needed two cards in a hurry to celebrate a couple of good end-of-year report cards:

Fortunately, I'd had a play date ;) at Emily's place recently, and she had let me ink up some of her stamps and bring the images home.

I think some Hello Kitty stamps deserve a home in my stamp collection! They're so cute and easy to colour! I've been spending a lot of time using my Prismacolor pencils lately (more on that in a future post), so it was nice to just bring out the markers and add some quick colour. I punched out four 1" circles as a bit of sky on which to pop up the main image and added a contrail of iridescent silver stars. Further evidence these cards were done quickly: a hand-printed sentiment instead of printing something out on the computer. 

Next up, this cutie-pie puppy from Paper Smooches. (Sigh. More stamps to covet.) He, too, got a little quick colour, some Stickles bling on his party hat (otherwise, it just looked a bit too much like a dunce cap in the whole school context...), plus a sentiment from SRM stickers. I recently won some fantastic Hero Arts stamps from Virginia, and she was also generous enough to add some of these great sticker sentiments! 
So thank you, Emily and Virginia! You made these two quick cards even quicker! ☺


Supplies: (Hello Kitty card) white & blue cardstock, PSA Hello Kitty On the Go stamp, Memories black ink, Sharpies, Sandylion stickers, Stampin' Up ticket corner punch, dimensionals; (dog card) white & blue cardstock, Paper smooches Birthday Buddies stamp, Memories black ink, Sharpies, Icicle Stickles, SRM sticker, dimensionals Pin It Now!

A Chance to Win some Hero Art Stamps!

I became a member of Lily Pad Cards today! Go become a member for a chance to win a collection of Hero Arts stamps. Contest closes at 11:59 p.m. EST on Friday, July 15.

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Beautiful Music

My husb and I celebrated our anniversary this week.

I love the woodcut look of this stamp. We have a few Gerard Brender a Brandis engravings which made this image extra appropriate. It's embossed in clear, matted on black cardstock and then popped up on the red layer. Simple and classy. 


Supplies: white, black & red cardstock, Magenta musical instruments stamp, Versafine onyx black ink, clear embossing powder, dimensionals Pin It Now!