A New Wall Banner for a New Season

Apart from greeting cards and scrapbooking, I also like to occasionally make some crafty things as home décor. Last fall, my intention was to make a wall banner for each season. I started off well and made one for the Autumn season...

But then life got busy and I skipped Winter and Spring.... My husband made a comment like 'soon we'll reach Fall anyway and you'll be up-to-date'. Well that made me think, OK it's time to change that banner! It will be almost a year since it's been up! Crazy how fast time flies!

Anyway... I made sure that was one of my goals this week, and it took a lot shorter than I thought to make one! Here's my new Summer banner:

 

This hangs in our dining room. I love how it brightens up the room!

 

 

I used Scallop Square framelits/nestabilities and added layers of cardstock and designer paper to each scallop square. I used Stampin Up's photopolymer stamp set entitled "Larger Than Life Alphabet & Numbers" for the letters. They are stamped, cut out and popped up to give the banner some dimension. A small flower with a rhinestone in the centre is added to 3 of the squares to embellish them. The squares are attached to burlap ribbon to make the banner.

Card-in-a-Box for a Baby Shower

I'm lovin' these card-in-a-box requests! I was asked to make one for a baby shower - a baby girl. I started with a brown card base and added a bunch of baby elements - any that I could think of - in the colour pink! 

Using punch art, I created a little onesie, a small bib and little baby shoes. A rattle was stamped and cut out, and a banner was created, hanging from the back panel. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

Card Ingredients:

Stamps: To the Moon (Verve), Little Additions (ret.), Rain or Shine (ret), Button Buddies (ret)

Paper: Early Espresso, Strawberry Slush, Pink Pirouette, Whisper White, Subtles DSP, Love Impressions DSP (ret)

Ink: Strawberry Slush

Tools: Petite Banner punch, 1/2" Circle punch, 1-1/4" Circle punch, 1" Circle punch, Word Window punch, Small Oval punch, Scallop Oval punch, Scallop Trim Border punch (ret), Owl Builder punch (for the hearts)

Accessories: Strawberry Slush Ruffle Stretch Trim, Early Espresso bakers twine, Rhinestones (Michael's)

A Multi-Layered Birthday Card

Happy First Day of Spring!

For today's KCRR challenge we have a versatile selection of elements:

Lucky Limeade

Birthday

Decorate Inside of Card

I decided to pair this challenge with a couple others. The Pink Elephant has a recipe challenge this week which happened to work quite well with what I had in mind! 

Lots of Layers

Ribbon

Pinch of Green 

And the Shabby Tea Room has a simple theme challenge this week:

'Anything Goes'

I combined all three challenges to make this multi-layered, bright and cheery birthday card:

I love the layered look in this card. After sketching out my design, I combined embossed cardstock, designer paper, punched out shapes and stamped images to make this fun layout.  The new Decorative Dots embossing folder adds the perfect texture to this card. I embellished the card with Lucky Limeade ruffled ribbon, bakers twine and a rhinestone on the cupcake. 

I kept it simple on the inside of the card and simply layered a scalloped edge border and striped designer paper. 

Thanks for stopping by! Hope it's starting to feel like Spring wherever you are! 

Make sure to hop on over to Karly's Creations to see what she has created with these 3 elements! I've seen her card and it's absolutely gorgeous! 

Join us tomorrow for a new inspirational photo challenge! 

Card Ingredients:

Stamps: Create a Cupcake

Paper: Lucky Limeade, Daffodil Delight, Tangerine Tango, Early Espresso, Whisper White, Summer Smooches DSP, Polka Dot Parade DSP, 2010-2012 In-Colour DSP, Brights DSP

Ink: Early Espresso

Tools: Scallop Squares nestabilities, Cupcake Builder punch, Banner punch

Accessories: Lucky Limeade ruffled ribbon, Early Espresso bakers twine, Rhinestone (Michael's)

30th Birthday Celebration

A couple days ago, we celebrated my hubby's 30th birthday! While he may think he's getting old, he is forever young in my eyes :) He is a wonderful, thoughtful, optimistic, determined, encouraging person; a talented photographer and an avid outdoorsman. Oh ya... and handsome too!

 

Words cannot express how much I love this guy!

 

To celebrate, we enjoyed a delicious dining experience at a local restaurant called the White Goose Bistro. He had his favourite - red wine and seafood, and I tried chicken cordon bleu with roasted potatoes and white wine. So good!

 

Of course, I made him a unique handmade card. I struggled at first with the design of my card, knowing that it had to be special. I decided to stick with the "30" theme and I was very pleased with the result:

 

 

I started with a 5" x 5" square card, then simply drew the '30' and cut it out, leaving the fold at the top of the '30'. I cut 1" strips of designer paper and glued them on the card front, then re-cut the 30 shape. I added a fun banner using bakers twine and the pennant punch. Three candy dots embellish the card.

 

 





 

For his birthday this year, I decided to get him a unique gift, something he would never guess! And I totally surprised him! (this is hard to do, as he usually picks out exactly what he wants or simply buys it himself). I wanted to give him a chance to guess, so I made a gift tag with a hint on it...

 

 

 

You're probably thinking, a shark? really? What could this gift possibly be? haha... this was Kevin's reaction exactly. Well let me explain... usually once a year we like to drive down to Kelowna for a mini weekend getaway. They have an awesome store called "Bones and Stones" and we make sure to stop there every time. They have the most unique house décor items from all over the world. We have added a few stones, etc. to our collections. But one thing Kevin has been eyeing up are the megalodon shark teeth that they sometimes sell there and so I knew this would be the perfect gift.

 

 

To give you an idea, this single tooth is actually 5.09" in length. Here's a better picture of how big these sharks actually were:

 

 

Here's wishing Kevin the best year yet!

 

Card Ingredients:

Stamps: Family Reunion (ret.), Pennant Parade, Fundamental Phrases (ret.)

Paper: Crumb Cake, Very Vanilla, Well Worn DSP, Regals DSP

Ink: Early Espresso

Tools: Petite Pennant Builder punch, 3/4" Circle punch

Accessories: Early Espresso bakers twine, Square Lattice embossing folder, Crumb Cake candy dots

 

Gift Tag:

Paper: Smokey Slate, Night of Navy, Baja Breeze, Basic Gray, Whisper White, Basic Black

Ink: White gel pen

Tools: Oval nestabilities, Petite Pennant Builder punch (for fins), Owl Builder punch (for the eyes), 3/4" Circle punch, 1" Circle punch (for waves)

Accessories: Gray bakers twine (CTMH)



KCRR #12 {Butterfly Prints}

Happy Friday!
Yesterday, Stampin Up made an announcement, introducing a Colour Refresh for the new 2013-2014 catalogue! This means that some colours are being discontinued while others are being brought back. Here's the complete list:

I am SO happy that Island Indigo and Pool Party are here to stay! I absolutely love these colours! And there are so many other great colours that are coming back. A couple that I'm slightly upset about is Bashful Blue and Certainly Celery... Unfortunately, these are being discontinued. However, I think I will get used to Pear Pizzazz as the new 'light green' and Soft Sky as the new 'light blue'. As much as I dislike change, I think it's a good one!

 

Time for...

 

 

This week's randomly chosen items are as follows (we chose three this week!):

 

Butterfly Prints Stamp Set

Monochromatic

Banner

 

This was a good challenge because it encouraged me to take out a stamp set that I haven't used yet! I love monochromatic colours! I chose Wisteria Wonder and Concord Crush/Elegant Eggplant as the colour combo for my card. I still have a DSP paper stack of old In-Colours that I need to use up and this was the perfect opportunity.

 

 

I wasn't sure at first how I would incorporate a banner in this card, but then after seeing some inspiration on pinterest, I decided to make a banner along the bottom half of the card using all different patterned paper in Concord Crush. I stamped the sentiment "happy birthday" from the Curly Cute stamp set and embossed the edges with a cross-stitched design. The butterflies are stamped in Elegant Eggplant, punched out and popped up.

 

 

Thanks for stopping by! Make sure to visit Karly's Creations to see how Karly incorporated these three elements in her card!

 

Card Ingredients:

Stamps: Butterfly Prints, Curly Cute

Paper: Concord Crush, Wisteria Wonder, Whisper White, 2010-2012 In-Colour DSP

Ink: Elegant Eggplant

Tools: Butterfly Punch, Needlepoint Embossing Folder