It's Monday and it's still overcast and chilly

OK, when is spring going to get here..... and stay??? Today the weather was chilly and overcast. I am so ready for spring. So, on that note, I made a card that reminds me of spring. Maybe it's the yellow cardstock. I used another Sparkle N Sprinkle set to make a card with flowers. The yellow flowers are actually Apple Blossoms (3164-399G) but I thought a yellow color would look great on this card. The background is called Spring Branch Background (3162-399G) and really gave this card some punch. This card gave me spring fever, I'm sure of it. This is set 399 in case you might want to order a set for yourself.

Can't wait for all the flowers to be in bloom and warm days and warm evenings. It's coming, I can feel it.

Well that's it for now. Thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

New Card Creations

It's been a while since I have posted anything. Well a lot has been going on. First, I have rearranged and added a few new fixtures to my stamping area. It really has turned out great. More room, more storage, and more organized. For me, that's saying a lot.

Next my brother is getting married next Saturday and I attended a luncheon held for the bride to be. It was so nice, her sisters, daughter, grandkids and other friends and family members were there. It was so nice. Next Saturday is their big day. Can't wait.


Lastly what has taken most of my time are the 4 cards that I designed for Sparkle N Sprinkle.I was given 2 different stamp sets of fairies and my task was to come up with two different designs per set. So, check these cards out. Hope you enjoy them. These sets are available at Sparkle N Sprinkle's online store along with a whole host of other stamp sets and other goodies.

This card is from set 395 and this fairy is called Water Fairy. She is so pretty, in fact all the fairies on this set and the next one you are going to be looking at, are pretty and will work for many different occasions.

This Fairy is from set 396 and she is called Sleeping Fairy. All the stamped images on this card are from that set.

Next is Garden Fairy, from set 396 . She looks cute sitting in her garden, doesn't she?

And last but not least, is Fairy Moon and she is in set 395. These sets were so fun to use to design cards. Do you notice that there is glitter all over the embossed background and the purple cardstock under the fairy on this card? Well, it is so easy to make your own glitter paper and you can use any color cardstock. You can punch, die cut and even use embossing folders to achieve stunning results.Here are the easy directions:

Use a Versamark stamp pad and coat the total area of the cardstock that you want to glitter. Next cover the inked area with Shimmer Embossing Powder (EP137) from Sparkle N Sprinkle, tap off excess and use your heat tool to set. That is all there is to making your own Glitter Paper. And it's less expensive to make your own.

Note: Items can be layered on top of you glitter paper, just make sure you use a strong double sided tape, like redline tape or Tear-ific tape.

Well that's it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

Watercoloring

Monday evening I got together with a few friends and took a watercolor class. We used stamps from Art Impressions and we made 3 different scenes. Are you familiar with the Art Impressions watercolor technique? No? It is so easy, and they have a whole array of stamps that will allow you to stamp a scene and then you add a damp brush here and there and it appears that it has been watercolored. Not hard and so much fun.

Here are the 3 cards.

Well that's it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

Happy St. Patricks Day

Boy I almost forgot what day it is, and I have no green on, oh well. The picture on the left is a pot of shamrocks that sits in my plant window.I bought it at the home and garden show probably close to 10 years ago. This and another one that is actually a deep purple instead of green, are pretty hardy. The other is on the mend right now, it was looking a little scrawny so no pic of that one.
Since I am German and not Irish the day doesn't hold the same importance for me as it does for the Irish. The other day I was thinking that since I am of German descent we really don't have a holiday that celebrates the German heritage. After much thought, I remembered two holidays that Germans celebrate. The first is St. Nicholas Day and I just read some interesting info that this saint is from Italy and after his death and his sainthood many different countries started to celebrate St. Nicholas Day. Read more about it here. It is more of a celebration of Christmas but the Germans celebrate it and growing up, we celebrated it. The next celebration is Oktoberfest and this is definitely a German celebration.Yummy food and plenty of beer. What a great celebration. Various areas in the US have Oktoberfest celebrations. They make for a great day of food and drink and a lot of fun. Click here for more info.

Well, enough about those cebrations, you know, we are just a few days from celebrating the 1st day of spring and I am so glad. I must have spring fever because I am ever so diligently cleaning out all my closets and getting rid of clothes and stuff. This is definitely long over due. (I was afraid the Hoarders show might call on me, LOL)

Speaking of spring, look what is blooming in my plant window.

These are two of eight orchid plants that I have in my kitchen plant window. Four of the remaining 6 plants have buds on them and will be in bloom before long. Orchids are really amazingly easy to grow. I just water them 1 time a week and I feed them once in a while and really thats about it. My plants all need to be repotted but that is easy as well. I will do repot duties after I get these closets finished.

I finished a card for Sparkle N Sprinkle and I will post that tomorrow. I have a few more cards to design ,so, as those are completed I will share those as well. OK my break is over, time to get back to the closets.

Well that's it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

Butterflies and Birds

Yesterday I made cards and embellished a bag all without stamping. Here is card with very little stamping. Sometimes you just have to use some of the cool things you've bought that are just sitting there waiting for us to use them.

Tag is from a Sizzix die, butterflies are from the Provo Craft set that has the cutting die and the little 2" embossing folders. I used vellum to do the embossing. The white cs design is made using a Fiskars border punch on both sides of the paper strip. And lastly the flourish stamp is from Great Impressions and the sentiment is Hero Arts.

Last, but not least is a double step card. I used the Sparkle N Sprinkle stamp set 348. From this set I used the western tanager bird. He is the one with a little yellow on him (in the back). And the other bird is a marsh wren (the bird in the front). I stamped and cut out more branches and leaves from the western tanager stamp to fill the background for this card. Lastly I added glitter from Sparkle N Sprinkle (G1003) on the leaves to just add a little shimmer. The sentiment is from this set as well.

Well that is it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

No Stamps - going "green" today

Have you ever gone thru your stuff that you have saved for eons and organized it?? Well I did that the other day and I decided that I would make a few cards that used things I already had on hand (for the most part).

The first card I made is using a part of a store bought card. I was given 2 pieces of a card front that were dry embossed flowers and leaves on white cardstock. The flowes just had a gold center part where the stamens would be.Well, I felt the images needed color, in fact, it screamed color me, color me, so I did. I colored the flowers pink and the leaves are now green. I used circles that I had made a while ago using a corner adorner. I did one in pink and one in white. They turned out really nice. The flowers are the ones that I received, however the image was too long to fit on this card so I cut it down. Now I get to use the images on more cards.The circle with Hello Friend is the center of the pink circle using the corner adorner. Finally that bow was utilizing just a small amount of pink ribbon I have had for a while.

Next I adorned a bag with a bag topper I made and added a paper flower to it to jazz it up. I added Sparkle N Sprinkle Majestic Purple glitter (G1005) to the edges and attached that to the bag topper.Since the bag started out white I felt it needed more color so I cut a coated piece of cardstock to fit the front of the bag and I applied alcohol ink to the cardstock. In fact I used the reinkers for Copic markers since they were more of a soft Easter color. I attached the cardstock to the bag with redline tape and put the bag topper over the handles and I am ready to give a gift for Easter, birthday or whatever the occasion happens to be.








Next I made a card that would go great with the gift bag. Now I don't know about you, but I have white paper on my work area that I stamp off onto, when I am stamping and want to test something. I used to throw that away but now I save it and used it on projects. Look at the paper behind the flourish and on the side of the card. I have had that for a while and I finally came up with a card to use it with. I also had a few ovals and so I used some of my Cuttlebug folders to add a design to the "eggs" . I lightly brushed the ink pad over the design to add color and added Sparkle N Sprinkle Glitter to the edge of one of the eggs. The swirl is from the Cricut and I just added some ribbon and the card is done.No stamped images as such, but reusing stuff on hand. That's a good thing.

Well that's it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon.

Barbara

Birds

Well, I have some great news to share with you, I have been added to the design team for Sparkle N Sprinkle. How exciting!!!! I am looking forward to this new venture and looking forward to getting to know the other design team (DT) members too.

I have a few stamp sets from Sparkle N Sprinkle, so I decided to stamp a card using one of the birds in a stamp set that Sparkle N Sprinkle has in their catalog. (I also used a corner punch to create the interesting white background paper.) The stamp set is 00-348P4 Birds and the 2 stamps I used are 1849-348K Chickadees and 1854-348B Peep from You. I really love birds and it was fun making this card.

These two little birds remind me of the wrens we have in this area. I am so ready for spring, aren't you?? This weekend the weatherman is calling for temps in the 50's, yahoo!!! I may have to break out the shorts!! Spring isn't getting here fast enough to suit me.

Well that's it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

Note Cards for a Friend

The other day I was having lunch with my friend Linda and she was looking at some of the cards I have done recently and she saw a card with birdhouses and asked me to make 10 notecards for her to give as a gift. She has a dear friend , Rosemary, whose birthday is approaching and loves birdhouses. So here is the end result, 10 note cards that are similar and ready to be sent to someone.Since Linda's friend Rosemary,likes birdhouses this will be the perfect gift.

I used watercolor paper and stamped the image in black India Ink, my favorite waterproof black ink ( I generally use this ink pad on most all my stamped images). Next I used a combination of Twinkling H2O's and Marvy LePlume markers to color this stamp of the birdhouses. I used Marvy LePlume markers to color the vines, the bird and the flowers. The birdhouse, vines, bird and flowers are stamps from Art Impressions that I have had in my stash for more than a year. I love the look you can get using these stamps. They interact so well. You know, these birdhouses look like condo's don't they?? Really cute. Hope Linda likes these notecards, I will be giving them to her Friday.

Well that is it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara