Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Renovations and Watercolor Wishes

The new Watercolor Wishes card kit from Stampin' Up! is so popular that it's been put on backorder once already!  

I ordered mine after some of the hoopla had died down, and I'm so glad I ordered it!  Holy Moly!  The cards you can make with this kit are adorable and super, duper easy.  Just what I need.

I made this card for my brother's birthday.  
Love the colors and sentiments in this kit!
I decorated the envelope and inside of the card with the candle image from the Sprinkles of Life stamp set in Night of Navy ink.
What a great card kit!  Now I'll always have what I need for quick cards - until I use it all up!!
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We're also going through a crazy time here at our house - a kitchen renovation!  Whoa!  

I come home and clean, clean, clean.  It's amazing how dusty everything gets - and we're only on day two!  We have a very small kitchen (9 x 9), so we've been told everything should be done in two weeks.  I keep telling myself that I can do anything for two weeks.

Here's what's happening so far:
This was as I was leaving for work 7-20-15 - notice the lovely green carpet built into the parquet flooring of the dining area.
Here is what the same area looked like when I got home on 7-20-15.  Apparently where the frig had been standing, underneath the parquet floor, there was a big hole in the floor.  They patched it up with plyboard and screws.  How scary!

Here's inside the kitchen area where the stove and wall oven used to be.  There have been so many surprises with this house.  

So they'd laid the subflooring by the time I got home from work on 7-21-15.  The planks for the floors are leaned up against the brick and taking over the hallway.  
It's gonna be great to have a dishwasher - so exciting to see everything unfold.

Well, thanks so much for stopping by - hope you get inky today!


Thursday, July 16, 2015

Swapping Lovely As a Tree and Open Sea

Are you familiar with the stamp set "Lovely As a Tree"?

It's a stamp set that has been around for - I don't know - longer than I've been with Stampin' Up!  It's a stamp set that many people claim is a 'go-to' for them.

I use it sometimes, but not an awful lot.  And since it's been around forever, I (of course) have it in my stamping arsenal.  
Fabulous colors for a masculine card - perfect for graduation thank yous!
I had to make lots and lots of thank-you cards for my sons recently (one graduated from high school and the other was given gifts of money to help him with a study abroad program in Spain).  

This is one of the thank-you cards I made using the Lovely As A Tree stamp set.  

Just like I suggested in yesterday's post, I googled the stamp set name, selected "images", and this unbelievably-perfect-for-my-purposes card was one of them!  

So I CASEd it (Copy And Share Everything).  What a great card.  So quick and easy!  Love, love, love.

I really liked the layout, too, so I decided to see what could be done with that same layout and different stamp sets:
This card has a great masculine color scheme and was for the son who traveled to Spain.
So, you can see it has a different color scheme, (a Very Vanilla background paper) different stamp sets, but basically the same idea.  

It's so much fun to take a simple idea and expand on it.  

Hope you get inky today!
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Wednesday, July 15, 2015

Three Helpful Hints for Card Making Inspiration

Are you looking for card-making inspiration?  Sometimes we all need a bit of mojo help.

When you need a card, but you're having a bit of difficulty coming up with ideas, 
here are three helpful hints:

1.  Look for card challenges online like Mojo Monday or ColourQ.  Some card challenges will give sketch ideas for a card layout, and others will give color suggestions.  
They're all great ways to get your creative motor running. This is my favorite way to get inspiration for cards.
This card was created after looking at online card challenges
2.  If you have a stamp set you want to use and an absolute blank brain on how to use it, plug that stamp set's name in an Internet search.  After that, select "images".  Many ways fellow card makers have used that stamp set will pop up for you to view.  Maybe one of those ideas will springboard a few ideas of your own.  


If I'm going to make one card, I may as well make two!
3.  Look at bloggers' ideas.  Sometimes just cruising a card-maker's blog will spark an idea or two and get you eager to create.  I have a few favorites that I visit on a regular basis.  They have such great ideas, but maybe I don't have that paper or stamps - well, that's when I change it up by using some of their ideas, and swap it out with my own paper and stamps.

Hope you get inky today!


Here are the inspiration pieces from Mojo Monday and ColourQ that I used today:


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Tuesday, July 14, 2015

New and Improved Blog! - Plus Weekly Deals

I'm so excited because my happy blog has a new look today.  LOVE it!!

So I thought I'd post the latest weekly deals, and (Gasp!), when you use the "My Stampin' Blog" to put up the latest weekly deals, it apparently changes with the newest deals!!  I had no idea that was happening.  

So - I'll post them the old fashioned way today and try to keep that in mind for the future.
So - on to a card for tomorrow!

Hope you got inky today.


Saturday, July 4, 2015

Hope you have a wonderful 4th of July, my friends!

From Wikipedia, we find that ...

Independence Day of the United States, also referred to as Fourth of July or July Fourth in the USA, is a federal holiday commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, which was the date the United States formally declared its independence from Great Britain in order to achieve freedom from British rule.  

It's is commonly associated with fireworks, parades, barbecues, ball games, family reunions, and ceremonies, in addition to various other public and private events celebrating the history, government, and traditions of the United States. 

Independence Day itself has nothing to do with the military, or soldiers.