Thar be a birthday fast approaching!

I am so excited that the High Hopes design team started a challenge blog. They are one of my favorite stamp companies so I had to play along. This week's challenge is to make a birthday card and use brads. I can't help but say this is one of my favorite cards I have made in a long time. It was lots of fun to get all inky and distressed.

I started out by stamping On Guard Oberto and the treasure map on white cardstock. I started out coloring the map with copic markers. Then, I wrinkled it all up and distressed and tore the edges of the map. Then, I added some antique linen ink all over the map with a sponge. Then, I used the chocolate ink pad directly on the map to ink the high spots and the edges. Doesn't it look like an old torn up treasure map?!

Next, I moved on to Oberto. I wanted the image to look like an old worn photo so I did the same steps with him: colored with copic markers, distressed edges, inked with antique linen and chocolate ink.

Next, I cut all the layers for my card and inked the edges of the red layers. Then, I stamped the ships wheel in antique linen ink on the kraft paper for a subtle pattern. I stamped my sentiment in the lower right corner and added brads to the corners. Then, I wrapped the hemp around the brads and tied at the bottom. Then, I assembled all the layers. I added the map and Oberto to the card using dimensional foam so you can definitely see all the dimension, especially in the wrinkly map.

Here you can see the subtle pattern paper I made with the ships wheel stamp.

I wanted to finish the inside of my card as well so I cut cardstock layers to match the front and inked the edges. Then, I stamped the ships wheel again on the kraft cardstock. I stamped the sentiment and assembled the layers.

Last, I stamped the treasure chest on white cardstock and colored it with copic markers. I cut it out and then distressed the image with antique linen and chocolate ink.

This was such a fun card to make! I can't wait to play along with the next challenge. Have a great day!

Recipe

Stamps: On Guard Oberto, Treasure Map, Birthday Fast Approaching, Ships Wheel, Wishing Ye Treasures, Treasure Chest (High Hopes Rubber Stamps)

Cardstock: white, kraft (Papertrey Ink), real red, baja breeze (SU!)

Ink: black (Momento), antique linen distress ink (Ranger), chocolate paper stain (All My Memories), noir (Palette)

Accents: copper brads (Making Memories), hemp

Tools: copic markers, edge distressor, sponge

O Christmas Tree

Melissa's new Merry and Bright stamp set is so much fun! I love being able to customize the trees with different sizes and patterns. I stamped the trees on spring moss cardstock with spring moss ink and then cut them out. I also stamped the stars on lemon tart cardstock and tree trunks on dark chocolate cardstock and cut out the pieces. I tied some pure poppy satin ribbon around my sweet blush card stock, adhered the trees using dimensional adhesive with one tree being directly on the card. Then, I stamped my sentiment directly on my card. After everything was assembled, I added the red stickles to my trees for some sparkle. Very easy card to make and I like how the layers look with the trees overlapping.

Just a quick post tonight because I gotta get the kiddos ready for bed. Hope you're having a great week!

Recipe

Stamps: Merry and Bright (Papertrey Ink)

Cardstock: sweet blush, spring moss, dark chocolate, lemon tart (Papertrey Ink)

Inks: pure poppy, spring moss, lemon tart, dark chocolate (Papertrey Ink)

Accents: pure poppy satin ribbon (Papertrey Ink)

Tools: scissors, red stickles

Dimensions: A2

Family Holiday Tradition

Last year, we started a family tradition. My son made his first ornaments for our Christmas tree and even gave some to Grandparents for Christmas. He was so proud of them and couldn't wait to give them as gifts. I love how they turned out and they will be such a keepsake. I think it will be so much fun to look back on all the handmade ornaments that grace our tree years from now. So, when Nichole challenged the design team to create something with family traditions in mind, I wanted to create more ornaments with my kids (ages 2 and almost 5). The coloring may not be in the lines and the colors may be a little nontraditional, but I love how they turned out and my kids were so excited to get to stamp and use Mommy's stuff. *smile* They got to pick the stamp images, colors, ribbons, etc.

These ornaments are very simple to make. We stamped the images on 3.5 inch circle coasters using noir palette ink. (I got mine from americancrafts.com, but they are sold by the 1,000. I have enough coasters to last forever and they were a great price. I'm sure there are lots of other places where you could buy fewer at a time.) My kids chose what stamps they wanted like which snowman parts, etc. Then, they colored the images. They chose what ribbons they wanted and I punched a hole using my crop-a-dile and tied the ribbon through. They each made 6 ornaments and I have to share them all followed by my ornament at the bottom.


First up are Madison's ornaments:

She has a thing for the swiss dots plum pudding ribbon. I think I'm going to have to order more! The present the snowman is holding is from last year's Believe stamp set.
Recipe: Made of Snow, Believe (Papertrey Ink), plum pudding swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), glittery gel pens

Recipe: Made of Snow (Papertrey Ink), pure poppy swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), glittery gel pens

Recipe: Merry and Bright (Papertrey Ink), lavender moon satin ribbon (Papertrey Ink), chipboard snowflakes (American Crafts), glitter gel pen

Recipe: Merry and Bright (Papertrey Ink), silver tinsel weave ribbon (Papertrey Ink), glitter gel pens

Recipe: Merry and Bright, Believe (Papertrey Ink), aqua mist stitched ribbon (Papertrey Ink), glitter gel pen

Recipe: Believe (Papertrey Ink), plum pudding swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), chipboard tree (American Crafts), gel pen

Now, here are Tyler's ornaments:

Recipe: Made of Snow (Papertrey Ink), aqua mist swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), glitter gel pen

Recipe: Made of Snow, Believe (Papertrey Ink), spring moss swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), gel pen

Tyler added dirt below each of his trees. He has an eye for detail!

Recipe: Merry and Bright (Papertrey Ink), spring moss swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), chipboard snowflakes (American Crafts), gel pens

I love his two tone tree!

Recipe: Merry and Bright, Believe (Papertrey Ink), lemon tart swiss dots ribbon (Papertrey Ink), gel pens

I think he's been watching me layering ribbons lately and he wanted the layer his ribbons, too.

Recipe: Believe (Papertrey Ink), pure poppy stitched ribbon, spring moss twill (Papertrey Ink), chipboard tree (American Crafts), gel pens

This was the first tree Tyler made. He actually stamped all the pieces. Clear stamps make it so easy for everyone to use them. I let him color this tree with my copic markers while Madison was sleeping.

Recipe: Merry and Bright (Papertrey Ink), pure poppy satin ribbon (Papertrey Ink), copic markers, glitter glue

And here is my ornament for our tree this year. I used the new Home for the Holidays and Boards and Beams. I cut a circle the same size as my coaster and stamped my image. I colored everything with copic markers, sponged the sky with blue ink, and painted the entire circle with angel wings shimmerz paint to make it sparkly. It worked wonderful, but one word of caution. Be careful using it over the red copic markers as it wants to make the color bleed. It did not affect any other colors, just the red. Then, I adhered my image to the coaster. I added liquid applique to the eaves and ground, sprinkled it with glitter, and heated to make the snow nice and puffy. Let it dry for quite a while before turned it over and applying pressure when decorating the back or save this step for the very end because if you do it too soon, you will smoosh the snow. (Ask me how I know. )

Here you can see the shimmer on the ornament a little better. It's so hard to get a good photo of it, but it is shimmery without being overpowering.

Next, I added the lace to the back of the coaster. Then, I used nestability circle dies to cut out a pure poppy circle and a white circle. I stamped my sentiment and the stars from Merry and Bright. Then, I simply added the circle to the back of my ornament. Then, I punched a hole using the crop-a-dile and added the sheer dot ribbon.

I encourage everyone to make some ornaments with your kids. They have so much fun and they look so adorable on the tree.

Have a great day!

Papertrey Holiday Gift

Last year at Christmas time, we were given a wonderful gift from one of our neighbor families. They gave us a prebaked and constructed gingerbread house along with baggies full of candies and other things to decorate the house. It was such a fun gift! We had lots of fun decorating the house as a family.

So, when Nichole presented the Papertrey Ink design team with the challenge to make a holiday gift along with the packaging, I immediately thought of making a gingerbread house and packaging goodies that could be used to decorate the house.

I know how fun it is to decorate a gingerbread house with your kids, but having lots of the work done for you (gathering supplies and making the house) is even better. I started out by baking and constructing the gingerbread house. Then, I decorated an egg box to hold all the goodies in little bags and a tin to hold some buttercream frosting.

I started out decorating my egg box by creating a scene for the top. I just love the new Home for the Holidays stamp set! It is meant to be used with Boards and Beams. You can create the cutest little holiday scenes. I stamped the house and the snowman. Then, I masked the snowman and stamped the fences. Then, I masked the fences and stamped the trees. I colored my scene. Then, I stamped the door and windows on another pieces of paper, colored them, cut them, and adhered them in place. I love this Christmas house and will definitely be using this set a lot. I stamped the Fresh Baked sentiment in the corner from the Holiday Treats stamp set. Then, I matted my image with pure poppy and silver shimmer cardstocks.

This was my very last step, but I'm going to share it here while I'm talking about the top of the treat box. I added liquid applique and glitter to my house and let it dry. Then, I tapped the excess off and have some pretty shimmery snow.

I painted my egg box with dark blue acrylic paint and the lid and interior of the egg box with light blue paint. After they were dry, I used white acrylic paint to random stamp one of the snowflakes from Pine's new Rustic Snowflakes stamp set all over the bottom of the box. You can't tell in the photo, but there are little silver dots in the centers of the snowflakes (stickles). When everything was dry, I added some pure poppy stitched ribbon and some silver tinsel ribbon around the lid and added a bow.

Tucked inside my holiday treat box are lots of little glassine bags filled with all kinds of goodies for decorating the gingerbread house. I used the small glassine bags. I filled each one with a different type of goodie and then punched some scalloped ovals in silver shimmer and pure poppy. I layered the ovals, folded them in half, punched a hole through bag and all and tied them with pure poppy satin ribbons.

One last thing that I wanted to include in my holiday gift was a tin filled with buttercream frosting for decorating the gingerbread house. (It worked okay, but was not quite sticky enough. Another great option would be to decorate a container of premade frosting.) I filled the 8 oz tin with frosting first so that could wipe off any frosting that happened to get on the outside. (Luckily none did, but it was a good precaution to take knowing how messy I can be when I bake.) then, I cut a piece of silver shimmer cardstock to fit around my tin, random stamped some snowflakes, and heat set just for a second before adhering it to my tin. (Most likely, you would not need to heat set unless you were putting the cardstock right onto the container. If it sat for a few minutes, the ink would not smear.) I stamped the sentiment for the top of the container (from Holiday Treats) in pure poppy ink, punched it out, and layered it with a pure poppy scalloped circle. Then, I tied some ribbon around the tin and added a little tag.

After I got all the photos I need of the gingerbread house and goodies, my kids got to decorate the houses. I actually had plenty of dough when I made it and made two house so they each got to decorate their own. I spread the frosting and they decorated. They had so much fun and were hyped up on sugar right before bed!


Tyler's gingerbread house turned out so cute. When I bought the white fudge covered pretzels, I was thinking they would work great for a fence, but he wanted them on the front of his house and I love how they look. He pushed a little too hard while decorating the roof, so there was some bulging going on. It slowly collapsed on the backside not long after these photos were taken last night, but he still had so much fun making it!


Madison was so proud of her gingerbread house. This is how a 2 year old decorates her gingerbread house: put a few pieces of candy on the house, take one off and eat it, put a couple more on, take one off and eat it . . . *smile*

I had so much fun with this project and so did my kids. Gingerbread houses are always lots of fun and would make a great gift for a family at Christmas time. I can't wait to see what the rest of the design team came up with for this challenge. Be sure to check out all their blogs for lots of fun ideas: Nichole, Lisa Johnson, Lauren Meader, Heather Nichols, Mish Wooderson, Melissa Phillips, Debbie Olsen, Geny Cassady, Becky Oehlers, and Dawn McVey.

Recipe

Stamps: Rustic Snowflakes, Home for the Holidays, Holiday Treats, Boards and Beams (Papertrey Ink)

Cardstock: white, pure poppy, silver shimmer (Papertrey Ink)

Ink: dark chocolate, pure poppy (Papertrey Ink), noir (Palette)

Accents: pure poppy stitched ribbon, pure poppy satin ribbon, silver tinsel ribbon (Papertrey Ink)

Packaging: egg box, 8 oz circle tin, small glassine bags (Papertrey Ink)

Tools: copic markers, liquid applique, glitter, white acrylic paint, sponge paint brush, tag trio die (Spellbinders), circle punch, scalloped circle punch, scalloped oval punches, crop-a-dile, silver stickles (Ranger)

I moose you

I have a very special stamp to share with you today. Meet Ballet Sophie. She is adorable, isn't she?! A moose in a tutu has to be adorable, but that's not what makes her special. Hanna Stamps has teamed up with Electric Paperie to bring you this special little moose. A portion of the proceeds for the sales of this stamp set are being donated to The Childhood Brain Tumor Foundation. This cooperative venture is based on a young girl’s current battle against a childhood brain tumor, Kelly Laude. Please help us help Kelly fight her cancer. This stamp is only available through Hanna Stamps and Electric Paperie.

Here's a close up of Ballet Sophie so you can see her sparkle. I used Angel Wings Shimmerz after I colored my image. It added the perfect amount of sparkle.

Recipe

Stamps: Ballet Sophie, Things Riley Would Say (Hanna Stamps)

Cardstock: sweet blush, white (Papertrey Ink), wild wasabi (SU)

Patterned Paper: Pink Patterns (Papertrey Ink)

Ink: graphite black (Brilliance), noir (palette)

Accents: wild wasabi ribbon (SU), foam flowers (American Crafts), rhinestone brad (Making Memories)

Tools: copic markers, sewing machine, nestability circle dies (Spellbinders), angel wings (Shimmerz)