Convention Make and Take, Two Different Ways

Hi stampers! Well, I finally decided to finish up my Convention Make and Take projects this week. Yup, I was at Convention about three weeks ago but I didn't make my projects there for fear they might get crushed in my suitcase. Have you seen the way they THROW luggage around at the airport?? Yikes!!

After putting together the card above using the Affection Collection set, I was having so much fun that I decided to create a second version of the card with some dressed-up elements. That first card pictured was THE Make and Take project, just as it was designed by Stampin' Up. I love the collage-style look of the stamped images on the original card, but there is something about collage that makes me think "vintage." So that was what I tried to do with my second card. It's a "Make and Take, Two Ways." 

For the second card, I added a few more layers, a LOT more bling (which is not shocking in any way..haha!) and some vintage distressing, just to name a few things. The *new* Lacy Brocade Embossing Folder looks a lot like the stamped image, so it seemed like a perfect fit. I sponged the edges for some added detail. I changed up the punch for the scalloped border to incorporate some more sparkle and also embossed the popped-up heart with some Iridescent Ice (sparkly) Embossing Powder. It's tough to see in the photos. The paper piercing in the corner was something I just played around with...the corner seemed a little empty without it. I also used the Color Spritzing Tool to add more "dirty"elements. It was a little MORE then I had originally planned, but what can you do, right? 

Here are the two cards, side-by-side. Now I'm not saying one card is "better" then the other in ANY way. I just think it is fun to see how you can change up the style a card with a few simple products. I hope you like them and I would love to hear what you think. The supplies are listed below. 

Before I go, here is a little "Schnauzer-love" to share. My sweet Emmitt has been the BEST little friend during my ongoing recovery from foot surgery. Here is a photo I shared on Instagram the other day of my super-comfy, little dude. 

Isn't he a cutie?? 

Thanks for stopping by and have a very HAPPY day! :) 



Stampin' Up! Supply List

CARD #1
Stamps: Affection Collection (Holiday Catalog)
Paper: Primrose Pink, Early Espresso and Whisper White card stock
Ink: Primrose Pink, Midnight Muse, More Mustard, Daffodil Delight and Early Espresso Classic Ink Pads
Punches: Scallop Border Punch, Small Heart Punch
Accessories: Basic Rhinestones and stapler

CARD #2

Stamps: Affection Collection (Holiday Catalog)

Paper: Primrose Pink, Midnight Muse, More Mustard, Daffodil Delight, Early Espresso and Whisper White card stock

Ink: Primrose Pink, Midnight Muse, More Mustard, Daffodil Delight, Early Espresso and Crumb Cake Classic Ink Pads

Punches: Scallop Trim Border Punch, Small Heart Punch and Modern Label Punch

Accessories: Paper Piercing Tool, Lacy Brocade Embossing Folder, Stamping Sponges, Iridescent Ice Embossing Powder, Heat Tool, Stampin' Dimensionals, Basic Rhinestones and stapler

Convention 2012 - Part Deux

Hi there! It's me. THAT girl, who is finally posting more Convention pics...a week and a half after Convention ended. *sigh* My schedule hasn't allowed me much free time recently, but I figured better late then never, right? I did share another Convention post HERE, if you would like to check it out. 

On that note, I FINALLY cleaned up my stamp room today and that meant putting away all of my loot from Convention. Before I did, I wanted to snap a few photos to share all of the awesome treats we received in Salt Lake City, especially that fabby chevron bag! Eeek! 

Here is the big picture of ALL of the goodies I returned home with. (....not including the items from the famous Momento Mall) Oh my WORD!

Look at all of the stamps and paper! That's a lot of rubbah to get crafty with, folks! Not to mention, all of the inspiration we received from the thousands of sample projects on the boards and presentations at Convention. You have to see those boards to believe them! Every time I walked through, I found something new that inspired my creativity. 

Here is a close-up of my canvas wall art project from the fantastic "I'm a Pattern Mixing Pro" class presented by the always fun, Carrie Cudney. 

SO many amazing ideas in this class on ways to use DSP. Swoon...

A close-up on the dimension of the flowers and leaves. I actually put this all together after I got home (...yesterday, actually) because I didn't want to smash these little pretties in my suitcase. 

Don't you love this project? Well, if you are here in the San Antonio area, I will be having a class to learn how to make one of your very own. Stay tuned for details....I have a surgery on both of my feet to get through this Friday (can you say stressed out?) before I can set up my class calendar. I have 8-12 weeks of at-home recovery to look forward to. Hopefully the recovery will go as planned and my sweet hubby can wheel me into my craft room. I am optimistic about a class at my house in the next month. If not, then maybe HE can host a class...and who wouldn't want to come to that? 

Thought I would also share a shot of some of our fun at the Make and Takes with Ann, Ginger (who is snapping the photo), Amy and the fabulous Sandie Conner. Although I have to say, we chatted more then we crafted. Please excuse my "cheese-ball" grin...I think we had just received a free pack of rhinestones and I was still giddy from the sparkle. ;) 

Yes, I took a photo of one of our lunches. I realized on Saturday that I needed to take more pictures of this wonderful experience at Convention, so anything was fair game at this point! Lol! 

Saturday night we went to dinner at a yummy Brazilian restaurant in downtown SLC, Tucano's. Here is one of my favorite photo's from the evening, with two amazing women who always inspire me, in so many ways: Mary Fish and Ann Schach. I really needed to turn my flash on for this one, the lighting was not so great...but these ladies absolutely ROCK!! 

I can't say enough about my trip to Convention this year! I have TONS more photos but I'm sure you don't want to see them all. Such a great experience and such wonderful memories with all of my stampin' friends, old and new. Thank you Stampin' Up for hosting such a fun and inspirational event. I will see you again in 2013! 

Thanks for sharing more of my my Convention memories with me! 
Have a HAPPY day! 

Tic-Tac-Toe Ties for The Paper Players

Hi there! It's Sunday and I'm excited to finally be back in a routine after being on "creative hiatus" over the past couple of weeks. It's time for another fun challenge over at the Paper Players. This week, our hostess Lesley, has a Tic-Tac-Toe themed challenge to play along with. Simply pick a row on the challenge board...across, down or diagonally...and create a project with those elements. Easy peasy, right? 

I decided to use the middle row featuring the color blue, dry embossing and a masculine theme for my project this week. This card is becoming legendary, actually. (not REALLY)  Or, at the very least a never-ending project...as I brought a bonanza of these babies to Convention as one of my swap projects. After fussy-cutting almost 200 of those little ties, I thought this one deserved a blog post. Helooo hand cramp! Lol! I made a couple of tweaks (which I wish I made for my swaps, actually) and made yet another "tie card" for the Players this week.

I kind of feel badly for my poor roomies from Convention that I am subjecting them to this card, once again. They MORE then had their share of seeing it, as I was putting my swaps together in the hotel room in Salt Lake City. 


The fussy cut ties are popped up with dimensionals and the embossed texture plays off the patterns in the ties. The blinged out "tie tack" is a simple accent. I do think rhinestone accents are a-ok for a guy card...as long as they are used in moderation. What do you think? All of the supplies used are listed at the end of this post. 

Want to play B-I-N-G-O with the Paper Players? It would be awesome to see what you create with the challenge. You can play along until Friday, August 3rd at Noon (PDT). (Coincidentally, I will be in the operating room at that same time having surgery on my tootsies. Yikes!) It would be awesome if you would join us and play along. Stop by and say hello to the rest of the lovely ladies on the Design Team to see what they created for the challenge:

The Paper Players Design Team

Ann Schach

Anne Marie Hile (you are here)

Amy White

Dawn Easton

Helen Heil

Jaydee

Jen Arkfield

LeAnne Pugliese

Lesley Croghan

Nance Leedy

Thanks for stopping by!
Have a great day today,

Stampin' Up! Supply List

Stamps: Best Dad Ever and Itty Bitty Banners

Paper: Marina Mist, Gumball Green, Midnight Muse and Whisper White card stock

Ink: Marina Mist, Gumball Green and Midnight Muse Classic ink

Accessories: Chevron Embossing Folder, Argyle Embossing Folder, Bitty Banner Framelits, Midnight Muse 3/8" Stitched Ribbon, Finishing Touches Edgelits, lots of Stampin' Dimensionals and Basic Rhinestones

A Colorful Challenge for Our Creative Corner

Looking for my Dynamic Duos post? It's right after this one! 

Hello and welcome to another fun challenge over at Our Creative Corner. This week our hostess, Lori Rider, has come up with an awesome mix of colors to play along with. There is also one little catch to the challenge: you also have to feature fabric and/or circles somewhere on your card. I went with circles, as featured on the polka dotted paper along with the bling and the sparkly brad.


This week, we are also saying goodbye to four amazing designers over at the OCC, which makes me really sad. These gals will be greatly missed. :( 

Vicki Burdick

Anita Houston

Tui Nathan

Kristin Tierney

I first saw the measurements for this fun card fold over at Laura Lipe's blog.  I happened to have one of these cards already cut and scored out in Poppy Parade (guess I was going to use it for another project at one time or another) so I just went with it. *CLICK HERE* for the cutting and scoring instructions from Laura's blog. This card super-simple to make and can be created from a single 4- 1/4" x 11" piece of card stock.

Here is a side view of the card:
(yes, those side panels of polka dot DSP are cut a wee bit short...I messed up the measurements when I cut the paper. Ugh!! )

I used the Make a Cake set for the layered cake and it was a snap to stamp using the Stamp-A-Ma-Jig tool for perfect placement. The "You are Fabulous" sentiment is from a stamp set that I earned FREE while attending SU Convention classes last week in Salt Lake City. I loooove those fun fonts! 

Here is a quick shot of the inside of the card, using the frame from the I Am... stamp set and a sentiment from the Petite Pairs set.

I sure hope you can join us this week for Lori's "color challenge with a twist" over at Our Creative Corner. We also have five new member of the OCC Design Team that I wanted to give a proper welcome to, as I missed their first week with us: 

Lisa Minckler - You Made Me Ink

Kim Price - Inkcognito

Paula McClane - Scrap Addict's Attic

Liliana Inguanti - Stampin' From Home

Chris Barnes - Dot Dot Stamping Designs

Also, please check out the rest of the lovely ladies on the team to see what they created this week: 

• Linda Coughlin- The Funkie Junkie
• Sue Butler- Scrumplescrunch
• Anne Marie Hile- Stampin' Anne
• Wendy Janson-  It's All About Stamping
• Marcy Kaminski - En Papillote Arts
• Holly Kean- Kean On Paper 
• Irena Kowalczyk (aka Rudlis) - Love, Life and Crafts
• Meihsia Liu- Simply Paper Crafts
• Lori Rider- The Diva Stamper
• Sharon Wheet- Designs by Sharon

Thanks for stopping by! 

Have a HAPPY day! :) 

Stampin Up! Supply List
Stamps: Make a Cake, I Am... and Petite Pairs (inside sentiment)
Paper: Subtles DSP in Pretty in Pink, Poppy Parade (ret.), Pear Pizzazz (ret.), pretty in Pink, Basic Black and Whisper White card stock
Ink: Basic Black and Poppy Parade Classic ink
Punches: Pinking Hearts Border punch, Itty Bitty Punch Pack and Large Oval punch
Accessories: Poppy Parade, Pretty in Pink and Pear Pizzazz Stampin' Write markers, Stamp-A-Ma-Jig, Whisper White Organza ribbon, Pretty in Pink Glimmer Brad, Dazzling Details, Basic Rhinestones and Stampin' Dimensionals

Convention 2012 - Part 1

Hi there stampin' friends! Wow, it has been a couple weeks since I have posted! Things have been crazy-busy around these parts and in the middle of it all, I took off to Salt Lake City, Utah for Stampin' Up Convention last week. After uploading over 1000 photos and finally unpacking my suitcases, I am finally back in blogging action, once again. Whew!

Convention was absolutely AWESOME!! Not only did I have an amazing time with my friends but I came back completely motivated and energized to create. What an amazing experience it was! 

I wanted to share a few quick photos tonight. These are mainly photos from the first two days of Convention and our tour of the SU home office in Riverton, UT. I will have more to share in the coming days, now that I am back in the blogging world. (Well, at least until next Friday when I am having foot surgery...but more on that later.) 

Here are a few photos from the Riverton tour, last Wednesday. Don't you just love this frame and the fabulous saying with the pop of color? 

 Speaking of color...isn't this room gorgeous? There is a creative museum set up right as you walk into the home office set up with awesome inspirational ideas for home decor. So pretty!!

 The last room on the museum tour featured a vintage typewriter and some pretty card samples.

 This is where the SU orders are packed and shipped. SO cool to see in person! 

 Here is a display from one of the meeting rooms. I love the bright colors, the framed words and the clean design. I really need to do something like this for our office here at home. 

Finally, here is a one quick shot from the first morning session last Thursday. Pictured here are my 3 roomies: Ann, Ginger and Amy...along with the fun-tastic Mike Funke.  

I just love my stampin' friends...even if we all have creepy eyes from the dim lighting at General Session! Haha! :) 

Thank for stopping by to visit today! I will be back soon with more Convention fun!