The Petal Promenade Designer Series Paper can be used to make lots of beautiful cards, like this Easy Petal Promenade Card For Someone You Love. Of course, all you have to do is change the greeting for another type of card to send someone.  You might think of the Petal Promenade Paper as only gorgeous flowers, but here is one sheet that has something a little different in it.  And the opposite sides of the paper look like marble, which I used as a layer on the Whisper White card base.

The best part of this beautiful paper right now is that is it FREE during Sale-A-Bration with a $50 purchase!  And we know how easily we can spend $50 at Stampin’ Up!  This Petal Promenade Paper was quite popular when it came out in the new Annual Catalog so if you already have or had a package, you might like to restock or get an extra for free!

Watch this video to see how this paper came about!  I love behind the scenes stories!

Get your Petal Promenade Paper FREE after you spend $50 at Stampin’ Up!  Lots of choices to make that easy!  Then sit down and I guarantee you won’t be able to stop making cards with this beautiful paper!   Here is another card I made for a friend in THIS POST.

To keep this card simple I just stamped the greeting from the Forever Lovely Stamp Set and die cut with the oval in the Stitched Shapes Framelits Dies.  I also used the 3/16-Inch Braided Linen Trim across the bottom portion of the card.  I love this linen trim anyway, but I really loved it on this card. It seems “earthy” to go with the plants so well! I just like it!  It’s a good staple to have in your stash along with the original Linen Thread that I always keep.

This Share What You Love Floral Card is made with the beautiful specialty designer paper called Share What You Love.  This is a “specialty” paper because four of the sheets have a  translucent pearlized finish.  That makes it a little difficult to photograph with a bit of glare.  Perhaps you can tell in the photo that the silvery look of the flowers and leaves is really the shimmer in the light from the paper.

I think sometimes we get so caught up in the current catalogs, whether the Holiday or the Occasions Catalog, and we almost forget about the Stampin’ Up! Annual Catalog!  It was like going home and finding some old friends to go back and work with this Share What You Love Designer Paper!

This card was made because the ribbon you see on the side is now available FREE as a Sale-A-Bration item during March.  Stampin’ Up! added several Annual Catalog products to the choices of things you can pick with every $50 purchase.  This Rich Razzleberry 1/4″ Velvet Ribbon is one of them!  It’s a very nice, quality ribbon and will add a richness to your cards or projects. It coordinates with the beautiful Share What You Love Paper.  Be sure to click on or use the number on the Sale-A-Bration page in the Online Store for it to come up as free. Don’t use the regular catalog number.

To make this card I used a base of Pear Pizzazz Cardstock with a layer of Rich Razzleberry Cardstock underneath the designer paper.  The greeting is stamped on Whisper White Cardstock in Rich Razzleberry Ink.  This was then die cut with the Layering Ovals Framelits Dies and layered on a Rich Razzleberry oval die cut with the oval in the Stitched Shapes Framelits Dies.  The velvet ribbon is adhered on the side of the card with just a separate piece of ribbon tied in a knot at the top. If you were going to mail this card a bow would probably be too thick.

Here is an easy thank you card I made using the Velvet Ribbon you might like to see.

If you haven’t looked recently, be sure to look at all the current Sale-A-Bration choices.  If you don’t see it in the Online Store, then it is not available at this time.  If you have any questions about what is backordered or not available at any point in time, just ask me.

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Today is Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, the end of the carnival season, so here is a colorful card to celebrate Mardi Gras along with some of my own Mardi Gras beads! I’ve never been to a real Mardi Gras but I’ve been to a few parties with some good food and beads! Everyone thinks of Mardi Gras in New Orleans, but it is celebrated in other cities as well. Galveston, Texas has a big celebration, about an hour from Houston.

I made this card pretty easily just using Mardi Gras colors…..purple, green and gold.  Strangely enough, I used the leafy stamp from the Sheltering Tree Stamp Set to make the background on the Shimmery White Cardstock.  I just wanted a “splattered” look of some kind with the Mardi Gras colors in the background.

To get this splattered look, I just colored the dots randomly with Stampin’ Write Markers in Gorgeous Grape, Daffodil Delight, and Garden Green. I couldn’t even see exactly which ones were colored but it didn’t matter.  After coloring on the dots with the markers, I spritzed the stamp with water from a small spray bottle (I use it by my Big Shot for the cardstock that goes in the Dynamic Embossing Folders (the big thick ones!) because it helps make a better impression in the paper.  I just left the stamp face up on the table and laid the Shimmery White Paper on top of the stamp.  After that, I inked up the stamp again with the markers, spritzed with water, and stamped some of the other areas that didn’t get any color.  Nothing had to be perfect because I just wanted that splattered, soft look.  The Shimmery White paper was good for this because it can stand up to a little water.

The card is layered with the Mardi Gras colors, same as the markers.  The greeting is stamped from the Detailed With Love Stamp Set. It is layered on a piece of Gold Foil. Then to get some real touches of gold on the card, I used the Gold Mini Sequin Trim and just placed it back and forth behind the greeting.  I like the way it turned out. Since I was thinking of Mardi Gras while making this card, I could be more “festive” than maybe you would normally be.  But I could still use this card for any kind of celebratory occasion!

Stampin’ Up! has the supplies to make cards for any occasions and other projects, too!  And if you shop now during March, you can take advantage of the Sale-A-Bration at Stampin’ Up!  It may not be Mardi Gras but with every $50 purchase, you get to choose a free product! And that in itself might be better than Mardi Gras for most of us!  Use this Colorful Card for Mardi Gras as inspiration to make a similar card for the occasion that you need and get your Stampin’ Up! supplies during Sale-A-Bration!

I had so much fun making these Botanical Butterfly Note Cards that I almost couldn’t stop in order to do this blog post!  Best of all, this Botanical Butterfly Designer Series Paper is available FREE during Stampin’ Up! Sale-A-Bration with a $50 purchase. Honestly, I often go to look up this designer paper in the Occasions Catalog because it seems too “nice” to be given away free in the Sale-A-Bration Brochure.

The Stampin’ Up! Note Cards are probably some of the best products and maybe often overlooked products in the Annual Catalog.  You will find them on page 193 and come in both Whisper White and Very Vanilla.  In one package there are 20 note cards and envelopes.  The note cards are made out of thick cardstock and measure 5″ x 3 1/2″. They are very nice quality, so nice in fact that I used them to make the response cards for my daughter’s wedding invitations.  The envelopes are a mailable size, which is great!

I took three note cards out of the package and folded them on the scored line to form the note cards.  They come already scored.  Then I used the Botanical Butterfly Paper to either punch out or cut by hand different butterflies with which to decorate the note cards.

The first card has three butterflies punched out of the designer paper with the Butterfly Duet Punch.  You can punch out certain butterflies on different sheets of the paper but almost always you need to cut into the paper in order to position the punch properly to reach the butterfly.  This punch is currently on backorder.

The second note card has a piece of designer paper (one of the really beautiful sheets, I think!) at the bottom with a bit of Lemon Lime Twist 1/4″ Ombre Ribbon tied around and a bow added separately.  The large and small butterflies are punched out with the Butterfly Duet Punch.

The third card uses a piece of the backside of the butterfly paper, so you can see many of the butterfly designs have a black and white design on the other side of the paper.  The large butterfly on this card is cut out with my Paper Snips (it is larger than the Butterfly punch), and the opposite side of the paper is this black and white check.

The greeting on all the cards is from the Butterfly Gala Stamp Set.  I love the font and the size of the greeting, as well as its usefulness when making cards!

The next time you pick up your Stampin’ Up! Catalog, please check out the Note Cards & Envelopes on page 193 and order some to have on hand.  Sometimes you may want to just make a quick and simple card or write a short note to someone and these are perfect!  And they might help you reach your $50 purchase in order to be able to choose a FREE Sale-A-Bration item, perhaps the Botanical Butterfly Designer Series Paper with which you could make Botanical Butterfly Note Cards.

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This Easy Floral Card For a Friend came about because I found the paper pieces already cut to the right sizes in my cardstock and designer paper packages!  I didn’t even have to think about it!  Sometimes scraps and pieces you didn’t use for another project all come in handy at another time.

The Rich Razzleberry card base was already cut to 4 1/4″ x 11″ so I just scored it at 5 1/2″ and it then became a card base with the fold at the top. There’s no reason not to make cards that open at the top sometimes instead of always at the side!

The Share What You Love Specialty Designer Series Paper is one of the prettiest we have ever had, I believe!  I love that paper with its shimmer and pretty patterns.  I found this designer paper already cut to almost the correct size for the card.  Then I took another scrap of Whisper White and stamped the greeting from the stamp set Detailed With Love in Petal Pink Ink.

I also love the Whisper White 5/8″ Polka Dot Tulle Ribbon and added it to this card with a bow. Even though the ribbon is “busy” with the polka dots and the paper is a floral print, since you can see through the ribbon it doesn’t interfere too much, I don’t think.  It adds a pretty embellishment to the flowers on the paper.

For the greeting,  I grabbed the leftover adhesive hearts from the January 2019 Paper Pumpkin Kit and stuck on a couple of those. That little sheet of heart embellishments is one of my favorite things I have gotten in a Paper Pumpkin Kit!  So cute!!  I also used them on my card yesterday with some other extra pieces from the kit.

Inside the card, I added a layer of Whisper White since the Rich Razzleberry is too dark to write on.  I also stamped one of the images that looks like a narrow scallop border in the Detailed With Love Stamp Set at the bottom of the Whisper White in Petal Pink Ink just to have a little something on that piece.

Sometimes take a look at your scraps and see what kind of card or project you can come up with.  The result may surprise you! I made this very simple Easy Floral Card For a Friend just by finding some pieces in my scraps that were already cut and ready to go!

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We had a pretty nice almost-spring type day here in Houston so I thought this Daisy Card For a Friend could exemplify that and give everyone hope that spring will arrive! Here is how to make this easy card.

I loved the fresh look of this pattern in the Happiness Blooms Designer Series Paper and I also thought the Daisy Punch would go well with it!  The card base is Night of Navy, but I wanted to add a layer of Whisper White in between the Night of Navy and the designer paper. I seldom think of doing this, but if you wanted to save some paper, use the area under a layer that will be hidden anyway to cut out a piece of paper that you need!  Here is a photo of how I punched out the two daisies from the Whisper White layer and I’m positive no one will get this card and say, “Why was she so chintzy punching out daisy shapes underneath this?!”  They won’t be able to tell and won’t even know your papercrafting secret.

I like to layer two daisy punches for more fullness.  I think it looks more realistic.  I also like to turn up the leaves at the ends a little bit.  For the flower center, I used the 1/2″ Circle Punch and even stuck it in an embossing folder to give it some texture!  Just for fun!

I thought I would like a ribbon on the card, and even though it is not the same green, I thought the 1/8″ Shaded Spruce Ribbon from the Metallic Ribbon Combo Pack.  Close enough! It’s fine.

I thought most greetings would be too big on the card with the daisy, so I stamped a greeting from the Itty Bitty Greetings Stamp Set and tied it on to the ribbon with a bit of Linen Thread for a different look.  I hadn’t done that in a long time!  I think Linen Thread is one of those staples everyone should have on hand just for things like this.  I have used it many times.  You can cheat and add a bit of adhesive or Stampin’ Dimensional underneath the little greeting tag to hold it in place.  Or you can leave it loose and hanging.

Easy and fresh card to make for a friend, for a birthday, for a just thinking of you card, whatever you like!  The Happiness Blooms Designer Series Paper is perfect for those bright and happy cards you want to make while we wait for spring to arrive!  Did you see my card I made yesterday HERE?

Dust off your Daisy Punch that you may have forgotten about and make a Daisy Card For a Friend!