Hanna Stamps Challenge

This is a card that I made to enter in the Hanna Stamps Prism Challenge over on SCS, however I can't get the website to come up to load it, so I am hoping to get it in (even though it is late) and maybe still have a chance to win a free set of stamps.

The image was stamped using Graphite Black Brilliance ink and colored in with WW pencils and an aquapainter. I then colored the lei and the grass skirt with my markers. The patterned paper was in my paper stash...I believe it is from My Little Shoebox. The flowers are a combo of the Flower Fusion from SU! and some dollar spot flowers from Target.

These little moose images from Hanna are so much fun to use and color in! I hope y'all enjoy this card. I won't be posting for a few days because I am going out of town, but I'll catch y'all again on Monday! Until then, Happy Stamping!

Kim

Morning Soft....

This has to be one of my favorite stamp sets in this catalog! I just think that you can't go wrong with this one, no matter which colors you choose to use with it. Today I was in a "brilliant" mood, so I chose Brilliant Blue for the base with Garden Green on the mat.

Here are the card details:

Stamp: Morning Soft

Paper: Brilliant Blue, Garden Green, Whisper White

Ink: Jet Black Staz-On, Garden Green

Accessories: Antique Brass Hodgepodge, WW pencils, aquapainter, sponges, dollar spot ribbon, corner rounder punch

After I stamped and colored the image I was playing around with the matting and decided that rather than go back to my old stand-by of the ticket corner punch, I would use the corner rounder on two of the corners opposite of each other to change it up a bit. Then I sponged the Garden Green ink all around the image. I wanted to do something with the green mat so I just pierced the paper around the entire edge to add a little detail.

This one is going to Nikki in the mail tomorrow morning. Hope everyone has a great night, and until next time, Happy Stamping!

Gardening Day...

Well, I just got back in the house from two hours of weeding after an already busy day. Off to make dinner then after I get the DD in bed it will be a stamp fest in the house! I have to finish getting ready for a workshop tomorrow, as well as make Nikki a card and work on two designs for a swap that I have coming up. Whew!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend and enjoying the beautiful weather! See y'all soon, and until then, Happy Stamping!

Kim

A Little Bit of Happiness

OK, I promised there would be a new card by morning, and my clock says 12:37 a.m., so technically that is morning. You can see the newest card I made for Nikki, who I wrote about yesterday. I'm still counting on y'all to make a card for this young lady (or two or two dozen...whatever you think you can do!).

Here are the details for this one:

Stamp: A Little Bit of Happiness

CS: Pink Passion, Gable Green, Green Galore, Lavendar Lace, Whisper White

Inks: Jet Black Staz-On, Lavendar Lace

Accessories: Stylized Flowers Cuttlebug Folder, SU! Markers, dimensionals, ric-rac from Target Dollar Spot

So, let me give y'all the inside scoop on that little popped-up piece you see on the card. I was coloring my image in (initially I stamped using Basic Black ink), and when I went to color in the background on that piece, for some reason the black ink bled into the blue. Really, really badly. So much so that I wanted to cry. However, recognizing the "chance for embellishment" and living by my motto that there isn't anything that has been done that I can't undo (at least in Stamping World) I decided to stamp that one panel again, this time using Staz-On, recolor it, and pop it over the original.

Voila'! Problem solved!

So, that is all for now...until I see y'all again, Happy Stamping!

Kim

Off to stamp some more....

Hi everyone! I am sticking to my promise of a card per day for Nikki. I sent the one I made yesterday out today, and now am off to the stamp room to make one to send tomorrow. I'll put pictures of it up here soon, so check back in the morning to see the latest.

I hope everyone has a great weekend! I'll see y'all again soon, and until then, Happy Stamping!

Kim

Important request....

For all of my staming friends out there...I have a very important request to make of you. First of all, I came upon this story two ways: through our local newspaper, the Austin American Statesman, then through Lydia Fiedler's blog http://understandblue.blogspot.com/2008/04/meet-nikki.html . Lydia is a Stampin' Up! demo that lives just a couple of miles from me, and I have really been enjoying seeing her creations day to day, so when I read Nikki's story, I asked her to send my Nikki's address right away so that I could send her some cards.

So, if you will, please take a look at the link above and read about Nikki. Then, if you want to send her some of your card creations, just email me and I will send you her address information. I would really love to just have this little girl's mailbox full of well wishes every day, and I know how talented all of you are! My goal is going to be a card per day for her this week from me, then next week I plan on setting the same goal again. Feel free to ask me how my cards are coming along, and hold my feet to the fire on this one....it is for all the right reasons!

Card details: Stamps-dollar bin at Michaels

Ink: Basic Black

CS: Certainly Celery, Basic Black, Whisper White, Cameo Coral, Apricot Appeal DSP from the level 1 hostess pack

Accessories: markers, dimensionals, ticket corner punch

I hope to hear from all of you soon! Until then, Happy Stamping!

Kim

And now...for something completely different:

People who come over to my house on a regular basis know how I stamp. I sit and ponder what set I want to use. Then, I spin the big color wheel to come up with that perfect for me combo. After that, I start stamping and working on layouts, piece by painful piece, until finally, an hour later, I have the design I want.

Not last night! My hubby came home and reminded me how he needed a wedding card for a coworker, and could I just make one sort of quickly? Well, as luck would have it, I remembered this basic layout from SCS on a card that I loved, so I decided to put it into play. This card is a big step off from my normal multi-layer cards, but to make up for that I used Shimmery White paper in my Cuttlebug to get a different looking mat for the card. If you look closely, you will see that I used both the D'vine Swirl and the Swiss Dots folders on the one piece of cardstock, so there are two different patterns on that mat. Not knowing what the wedding colors were (because I was asking my husband, and we all know exactly how attentive men are to these types of details) I decided to stick with pink and white, figuring that the bride would like it. The hearts were also stamped on Shimmery White CS, the left one with Pretty in Pink and versamark ink (make sure to ink up the stamp with your versamark first, then ink it with you classic color and voila....instant "craft" ink). The right one was inked using Tsukineko's Brilliance Pearlescent Orchid ink. I embossed both using Clear EP.

The completely different part? I managed to complete this card, start to finish, in about 20 minutes! A huge step for me, let me tell you! So, I hope you enjoy looking at this card, and for those of you that have TCCDS (time consuming card design syndrome) like I do, have faith. And let me know when you churn out a 20 minute card so I can do the happy dance with you, because I am there with you sisters!

Happy Stamping!

Kim

Bad Blogger...No Cookie!

Hi Everyone! Man, I keep thinking everyday, "I'm going to post something on the blog today, I'm going to post something on the blog today" and I never get to it. So, here is a little bit of what is going on in my life.

I joined Weight Watchers last Saturday. To say that this week has been a challenge, is, well, quite the little understatement. My entire body is screaming at me for a cookie or piece of pie or any little bit of satisfaction, and while I know that I can indulge in a little something, I also know me. The inner me. The one that thinks, "Hey if one cookie is good then a box of Thin Mints is divine." So I have been trying to quietly strangle that inner me by drinking more water than I previously thought was humanly possible.

This has been a crazy stamping week with lots of classes going on and lots of schedule changes for me. Now, a normal person just takes this in stride and continues to move forward, but you need to know something about me. I like a schedule. It gives me a sense of purpose. I mean, I have a dry erase calendar in my stamping room, a day planner with me all the time, and I write the weekly schedule on the dry erase board in the kitchen just so I don't forget something while I am eating breakfast in the morning. I like a little order (although sometimes the toy explosion that is my living room would care to differ on this) to make me feel good about my day.

But, there is an end in sight. I have my across-the-street exchange student coming over to my house to stamp with me tomorrow night, and it will be just stamping for fun, not for business! Yea ME!!!

And, so, I will bring this little saga to a close after one little story about my precious little girl, who is four.

We have found that using a "time out" type of discipline is pretty effective with her, because she does not like to be away from the action and getting ignored. After all, she is a first-born (right now only child) and by golly, that is all about the attention. So, the other day I place said lovely little girl in the time out chair which is in our kitchen, right by the fish tank. Little side note here: she is extremely vocal and opinionated and will risk more time in the chair just to make her point. So I go about cooking and getting dinner ready while she is supposed to be mulling over reasons why you don't sass mommy, and she turns to me and says, "You can call this the time out chair if YOU want to, but I am going to look at my fish and I will sit here ALL...DAY....LONG."

For a moment I felt like the genie in the bottle and wanted to say, "OK master, your wish is my command" but decided instead to move her to a new time out spot in the front living room where there are no pretty guppies to look at. Problem solved. Although now she will tell me, "This is not the right time out chair, mommy." It's all about perspective, baby, it is all about perspective.

Have a great night, I have some cool new pics to post very soon.

Happy Stamping!

Kim