Brother Birthday Basketball Card

by Joanne James12. August 2013 21:35

As promised, today I'm back with the other of Ben's birthday cards, this time from his big sister. Ben's biggest birthday surprise was his very own basketball hoop. He has been mad keen on ball bouncing for a while and he was thrilled to receive a basketball from one of his little school friends at his party. he wasn't at all expecting a hoop and his little face positively lit up when he opened up the box. So I used the new much loved basketball for the inspiration for his card:

A simple design of a jumble of bright orange basketballs, with a special one popped up on a couple of dimensionals to replace the 'O' in 'Brother'. I must confess this card was somewhat bourn out of being rather short on time too, but once I had the idea it didn't take long to execute at all (which was definitely a good thing!) That said, I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

Back tomorrow with another card; until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Great Sport

Cardstock: Pumpkin Pie, Basic Black, Whisper White

Ink: Pumpkin Pie, Basic Black

Tools: Typeset Alphabet Die, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, Simply Scored

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Cards | Stamping

Pop Up Lego City Fireman Birthday Card

by Joanne James11. August 2013 21:36

A busy weekend of birthday celebrations in the James family this weekend: yesterday my brother-in-law celebrated his 40th birthday (I was back too late and had drunk too many cocktails to blog when I arrived home yesterday evening; I will share his cards later in the week!) and today was my 'baby' the not-so-little Benjamin's 6th birthday.

I had something of a quandary when trying to decide what kind of card to make Ben; I needed something special but this birthday featured so many of the things that he loves that choosing was difficult. One of the things that he really wanted for his birthday was a Lego City Coastguard Patrol boat - he loves all kinds of Lego, but his first and enduring love is for the fire brigade - the only reason this wasn't on the wishlist is because I think he must own every mortal piece of the Fire Department and then some! His big sister bought him a Lego City Fire Chief alarm clock for his birthday and this ultimately became the inspiration for my pop-up card. This is the card from the outside:

A Lego brick number 6 (lots of glue dots used to get the pins on the bricks just right!). Then on the inside, this cheery little fellow:

I used my Pop 'n' Cuts base and modified my dress form insert to accommodate my fire chief mini figure in front of his desk. I am very pleased with how he turned out and doubly so when Ben opened it this morning and deemed his card 'totally awesome - the best card you've ever made!' Praise indeed!!

Back tomorrow with another of Ben's birthday cards - from his big sister. Until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Make a Wish

Cardstock: Real Red, Basic Black, Daffodil Delight, Whisper White, Basic Grey, Crumb Cake

Ink: Real Red

Tools: Pop 'n' Cuts Base, Pop 'n' Cuts Dress Form, Big Shot, Stamp-a-ma-jig, Small Oval Punch, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 1 3/4" Circle Punch, Itty Bitty Shapes Punch (circle), Corner Punch

 

 

 

 

Christmas Ornament and Decorated Box

by Joanne James9. August 2013 22:13

Today I'm sharing the last of the projects we made at last weekend's Christmas workshop: a stamped clay ornament and a decorated kraft gift box to put it in. Here's a photograph of the ornament:

These clay ornaments have a natural finish and can be stamped straight onto the surface, without any additional preparation. As we were going all out for Christmas, once we had stamped our design onto the ornament we stamped the pattern again with Versamark, sprinkled with Heat and Stick Powder and heated with the heat gun, then sprinkled with Iridescent Ice glitter and heated once more. This gives the finished item a more muted colour and a lovely sparkle that catches the light.

We also decorated one of the lovely ready-made kraft boxes from the catalogue to go with it - here's the top of mine:

Together they would make a lovely gift for someone, if you could bear to part with them of course! I will be using mine to decorate my tree during the festive season, but I'm sure I can make another one or something else to go in the box! I hope you liked my first Christmas projects of the season - there will be lots more where this came from. If you would like to join any of my classes, do get in touch for more details; my September card classes will be featuring the Mosaic Madness stamp set and then from October we will be doing Christmas cards all the way through until the end of the year.

Back tomorrow with the first of the weekend birthday cards: my brother-in-law is celebrating his 'big 40' with a party tomorrow and then my own 'Baby James' will be 6 on Sunday, so I've a few birthday cards to share. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Sweet Essentials, Four Seasons (hostess - retired)

Cardstock: Cherry Cobbler, Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Paper (retired)

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Real Red

Tools: Simply Scored, Big Shot, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 7/8" and 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punches, Merry Minis (star)

Finishing Touches: Champagne Glimmer Paper, 3/4" Cherry Cobbler Chevron Ribbon,  Cherry Cobbler 1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon (retired)

 

Christmas Tea Lights

by Joanne James8. August 2013 09:44

Another week, another late post - I'm loving the summer holidays but when school's out it sure is tricky to keep everything else on track! So today I'm posting nice and early, so that I don't run out of time again!

Today I'm sharing another of the makes from my Christmas workshop that I held last weekend: a lovely set of four tea lights in a handmade box. This workshop was less about the stamping and much more about the scoring - if my ladies weren't proficient with their Simply Scored scoreboard beforehand, they sure are now! So here is our finished box:

 

We made a box with a sliding sleeve cover, from which we cut out an oval aperture with the Oval Framelits and backed with a window sheet, to allow a glimpse of our lovely hand-stamped candles inside. Here's a picture of the open box, with a peek at our 'dressed up' tea lights:

We edged each of them with a strip of DSP; I'll be making more of these when my festive washi tape arrives, as this is perfect for this kind of project. The candle stamping was really easy to achieve and as none of the ladies present had done this before, was a real 'wow' moment for them. I suspect lots of their friends and neighbours will be receiving stamped tea light gift sets for Christmas now that they've learned this clever technique!

I love this spotted star/snowflake paper from the retired 'Be of Good Cheer' paper set; with so many designs to choose from, we all made different ones though - here's one of the other finished sets made by Kathy during the workshop:

These papers are just so lovely, but don't be too sad that they are now retired; I have had a 'sneak peek' of the new Autumn-Winter seasonal catalogue and can honestly say, you will not be disappointed with this year's offerings!

All being well, I will be back tomorrow with the last of my Christmas workshop projects. I'm off to have a quick spot of making before meeting friends in the park for a picnic - lovely! Until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Four Seasons (hostess - retired)

Cardstock: Cherry Cobbler, Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Paper (retired)

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Cherry Cobbler

Tools: Simply Scored, Big Shot, 1 1/4" Circle Punch, 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punches, Oval Framelits

Finishing Touches: Creped Filter Paper, Window Sheet,  Cherry Cobbler 1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon (retired)

Oh, Whale Party Invitations and Thank Yous - Take Two

by Joanne James5. August 2013 18:11

Today I am having a brief interlude in sharing the festive makes from my weekend Christmas workshop, to share with you another party invitation and co-ordinating thank you card made with the 'Oh, Whale!' stamp set. As I mentioned in yesterday's post, my youngest celebrated his forthcoming 6th birthday with a swimming pool party held jointly with one of his classmates, whose 6th birthday was last week. Having used the 'Oh, Whale' set for Rebecca's party a couple of months ago (you can see her invites here), it seemed the obvious choice, although a different design was required. Here is what I came up with:

This time 2 whales were the order of the day and they were attached to the inside of the card, visible through an aperture cut with an oval framelit. Here's the view of the inside of the card; the 'Make a Wish' set is great for creating party invitations and makes it really easy:

Luckily for me, the classmate who was celebrating his birthday jointly with Ben was no other than the son of one of my downlines, Barbara, so between us we managed to get a great production line going and knocked out these invitations in super quick time. We also created our co-ordinating thank you postcards, which we pre-printed with a short thank you message (well, have you ever tried to get two six year old boys to write a bunch of thank you cards from scratch during the school summer holidays? We needed to give them a helping hand!). Here's the finished card:

This time I created a mask to enable me to stamp two whales without the need to cut out and layer and I printed the text using MDS.

That's my last set of 'Oh, Whale' party invitations for a while. Back tomorrow with another of the projects we made in our Christmas workshop. Until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Oh Whale, Make a Wish

Cardstock: Whisper White, Marina Mist

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Night of Navy, Marina Mist, Basic Grey

Tools: Cloudy Day Textured Embossing Folder, Ovals Framelits, Happy Whale Clearlits, Stamp-a-ma-jig

Finishing Touches: 1/4" Night of Navy Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon, Basics Rhinestones (coloured black with a Sharpie)

Christmas Rosette Door Wreath

by Joanne James4. August 2013 19:36

As I mentioned earlier this week, yesterday I held an all-day Christmas workshop with a lovely bunch of ladies and we made a good start with our preparations for the festive season with a number of 3D projects. I'm going to share the first of these with you today: a door wreath made out of paper rosettes and featuring the sadly recently retired Be Of Good Cheer Christmas DSP. After much scoring, gluing and decorating, this was the finished article:

This picture shows my version of the wreath suspended. In hindsight, I should have photographed it in situ on my front door, although then my neighbours would have thought me completely mad (they already think I'm part way there, as I grow potatoes and pumpkins in my front garden, but that's a story for another time!!) The rosettes made from the patterned paper were cut using the Designer Rosette Bigx XL die, which is great for fast and easy cutting and scoring; unlike the ones made from the plain cardstock, which we scored using the Simply Scored scoreboard so they took a little longer. We used a variety of circle and scallop punches to create the centres; here's a close up of a couple of mine:

The one below was our focal point rosette, complete with ribbon trim - did you spot the lovely new Cherry Cobbler chevron ribbon in there? - and we also included a banner sentiment in keeping with the season:

The nice thing about a project like this though is that whilst everyone starts out with the same materials, each person has their own 'take' on what theirs should look like, so you end up with lots of similar but slightly different outputs. To illustrate, here is one of the finished wreaths of one of the ladies who attended:

Isn't Maureen's wreath just lovely? I'll share the other projects we made with you later this week. I'm off now to recover from the party excesses of my day - my downline Barbara and I held a joint party for our 6 year old sons this afternoon: swimming party followed by birthday picnic in the park. I will share the invitations and thank you notes we made tomorrow; meanwhile, time for a nice quiet glass of wine and to put my feet up, I think!

Back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Sweet Essentials, Tiny Tags (retired)

Cardstock: Very Vanilla, Gumball Green, Cherry Cobbler, Be of Good Cheer Designer Series Paper (retired)

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Cherry Cobbler

Tools: Simply Scored, Big Shot, Rosette Bigz XL Die, 1", 1 1/4", 1 3/8" Circle Punches, 7/8", 1 1/4" 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punches, Itty Bitty Punches (circle), Merry Minis Punch Pack (star), Jewellery Tag Punch (retired)

Finishing Touches: Champagne Glimmer Paper, Vintage Faceted Designer Buttons, In Colour Dahlias, 3/4" Cherry Cobbler Chevron Ribbon,  Cherry Cobbler 1/2" Scallop Dots Ribbon

 

 

 

August 'Best of' Set: Best of Shelli and 'Buy 3 Get 1 Free' on Designer Series Paper

by Joanne James3. August 2013 21:33

I've had a busy day today having fun with a bunch of lovely ladies making Christmas projects. I will share the first of these with you tomorrow, but today I want to announce the new 'Best of' set for August - Best of Shelli. Following the UK launch in June, to celebrate its 25th anniversary, Stampin' Up! is releasing a new 'Best of' stamp set featuring 3-4 past favourites and one brand new design, each month until October. Each set costs £13.95 and will be available to purchase until 31 March 2014 (clear mount only). This month's set was personally chosen by Stampin' Up's CEO and founder, Shelli Gardner, as her personal favourites from the last 25 years. The set features the following designs:

This month's set is an eclectic mix of styles and will offer a wide variety of creative opportunities. If you can't wait to get your hands on them, then drop me a line at [email protected] and I will happily place an order for you.

The month of August also heralds a new discount promotion: for every 3 packs of designer paper you order from the annual catalogue (*excluding specialty papers and paper stacks) you can choose an additional pack free!

So this is a great time to stock up on your designer paper - with 11 different sets to choose from, you will be spoilt for choice!

Back tomorrow with some fabulous Christmas inspiration; until then, happy stampin'!

 

 

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Promotions | Stamping

Mosaic Madness Christmas Card

by Joanne James1. August 2013 21:00

I know, I know - 145 days until Christmas, but as a crafter it pays to be prepared! I have been busy this week preparing for an all day Christmas workshop this weekend when we will be making a headstart on our 3D projects and gifts for the festive season.

As such, today seems like a good day to share another of our quarterly team training projects designed by Monica Gale: this time a Christmas card using the Mosaic Madness stamp set. I love this set and still have so many more projects to make with it. It is great for all kinds of cards, and the main mosaic shape does have something ornamental about it, so it works really well for a Christmas card. So here is the finished card:

 The hanging ornament is made by scoring four punched pieces vertically then adhering together around the bakers twine and is then suspended in the negative space of a punched circle. The nice thing about this card is that although it's very multi-dimensional, it still folds flat for posting. Also, if you're wondering where that piece of crumb cake DSP with the chevrons came from, you might be looking for some time as it's actually a strip cut from a Tag a Bag - these just have so many uses!

So the first of many Christmas cards and projects to come; I will share our weekend workshop projects next week, guaranteed to really get you in the festive spirit! This is also a good time to mention that Mosaic Madness is the stamp set that I'll be featuring in my September card classes. If you would like more information about my classes or to book a place, please get in touch to find out more.

Back tomorrow with another project; until then, happy stampin'!

 

Stampin' Up Supplies:

Stamps: Mosaic Madness, Greetings of the Season

Cardstock: Crumb Cake, Whisper White, Cherry Cobbler

Ink/Stampin' Write Markers: Coastal Cabana, Crumb Cake, Cherry Cobbler

Tools: Mosaic Punch, 1 3/4" Circle Punch, Scallop Trim Border Punch

Finishing Touches: Baker's Twine (Tag A Bag Accessory Kit), Tag A Bag

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Hi I'm Joanne and live in Northampton and when I'm not looking after my husband and two beautiful children, am an avid crafter with a passion for all things Stampin' Up!

I must confess that I have never been a big rubber stamper - until I discovered Stampin' Up! that is. I love the fact that I can get such great results with co-ordinating stamps, inks, papers and punches - the possibilities are endless! Join me on my stamping journey as I share the things I love and be inspired to create amazing things yourself!

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This is my personal blog and is not endorsed by Stampin’ Up! I hope you find it a plentiful source of ideas and personal inspiration but please don't copy my designs for contest submission or use for classes, publication or sale without express permission.