Category Archives: Cards

Simple Friendship Butterfly Card

It's spring and that means it is time for butterflies……or "fooflies" as our daughter used to say! Stampin' Up! offers several stamp sets with butterflies right now and they certainly are the "in" thing! This butterfly is from the stamp set "Simple Friendship" on page 92 of the Idea Book & Catalog . I got the idea for this card on SCS and it was from a sketch challenge, a diagram of a layout. I used Baja Breeze for the card base since it coordinates with the beautiful new Designer Paper in the Occasions Mini called "Walk in the Park" on page 9. I almost hated to cover up the design of the paper on the bottom layer, but I can always make another card showcasing that paper! This card is 6×6 since the person I was making it for wanted a large card that a group of people could sign (therefore you would cut your cardbase 12×6 and fold in half). The ribbon is a new one in the Idea Book & Catalog, on page 179, the Whisper White Organza Ribbon. It is so beautiful to use! But if you wanted a new ribbon from the Occasions Mini, you could use the Whisper White Satin Ribbon in there on page 17! The words stamped under the butterfly are from another butterfly set called "Flight of the Butterfly" (page 98). My butterfly is stamped and cut out and the little half pearl is from the Pretties Kit, adhered with a mini glue dot.

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There are beautiful products in the new Occasions Mini AND a special "Get Connected"offer!

From April 1-30, spend $40 on products in the Occasions Mini Catalog or host a $150 workshop and get a FREE item from the “Under $10” page in the Spring-Summer 2009 Idea Book & Catalog (p. 208).

Item	Description	Retail Price
116209	Note of Thanks Mini Note Kit	$9.95
116210	Birthdays Count Mini Note Kit	$9.95
114494	Forever single stamp	$5.95
114492	Beautiful Baby single stamp	$7.95
114486	Birthday Wish single stamp	$6.95
114490	Glad Friends single stamp	$5.95
114498	Flowers in Silhouette single stamp	$7.95
114496	Celebrations single stamp	$7.95
114484	Elegant Thank You single stamp	$6.95
114552*	Gracias single stamp	$5.95
114488	Fun Flowers single stamp	$5.95

*In Celebrando Creatividad, p. 28

Contact me if you want to "Get Connected"!

My Houston Azalea Trail Card

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Last weekend was the annual Azalea Trail in Houston put on by the River Oaks Garden Club. This is one thing my husband and I have done every year that we have lived here except one! We love seeing the beautiful gardens and houses and basically seeing how the other half lives! We were excited that the four houses on the trail this year were new ones to us. There were other places on the trail as well, but we just did the four homes and gardens. One pool house was more beautiful than our house! Wow! And the azaleas were starting to bloom pretty nicely, even the ones in our own yard. Some years they have not been quite ready for the Azalea Trail. Just driving around the River Oaks area with its beautiful homes and yards was a treat in itself on such a pretty day.

So from the azaleas, I was inspired to make this card! Not sure that these flowers are azaleas, but they kind of look like them. This is the new Fifth Avenue Floral stamp set. I stamped, watercolored, and cut out the three "azaleas". On the background I stamped that same flower plus another one in the set and watercolored lightly to provide a background.

We have bluebonnets blooming in the backyard already so spring must be right around the corner!

If you need some stamps to make some spring flower cards, be sure to check out the online catalog at my website and click the Shop Now button! I used the Aquapainter and just refills and inkpads to color in the flowers. So easy!

An Easter Surprise Card

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While there are lots of creative Stampin' Up! demonstrators out there, you don't have to be creative yourself to be a demonstrator! This card is an example. I followed the directions in our demonstrator Stampin' Success Magazine….ask any demo….probably one of the best parts of being a demo is receiving this great magazine once a month from Stampin' Up! So many cute ideas for cards, scrapbook pages and other fun projects as well as business tips from other top demonstrators in the company. All I did on this card was change the image they used to my "A Good Egg" chick! It's not a card that opens the normal way, but rather the top half flips up (due to the mini brad on the side holding the pieces together so that they are moveable) to reveal the sentiment.

If you want more specific directions on how to make this card, just email me.

If you want to get the great Stampin' Success Magazine, just sign up on my website (to become a demo!)! The Starter Kit is even on sale! And you get a free stamp set as well!

Recruits
During Sale-A-Bration, anyone who joins as a demonstrator can choose any stamp set—a value of up to $47.95—from the current Idea Book & Catalog! Plus, new recruits get 15% off the Starter Kit—over $350 of Stampin’ Up! products and business supplies for only $169!

Read all about it HERE!

February Swaps

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Here are the swaps I received from my friends in our little demo group. We all made the cute box with the scalloped flower on top, but that warrants its own post! I just have to understand better how to put the pieces together.

The card with the 3-D flowers was made with "Doodle This". The flowers are cut out and then the petals are turned under and adhered to the card. Very cute! Also, the card closes by tucking underneath the word "Joy". The very cute Valentine truck is stamped with "Loads of Love", a set I don't own but see the cutest things made with it. Of course the card itself is made with the Top Note die for the Big Shot (both, a must have!) with a Jumbo eyelet in the corner. The pink box is made from two Scalloped Envelopes made with the Big Shot. I love in the photo below how she attached a tab to the bag of candy inside! And the other little box was a tutorial on Splitcoaststampers recently….so cute! You can fit 4 Hershey Nuggets or even Ghirardelli Chocolates in it and the tab of the lid fits behind the scallop on the front rather than going inside the box. Thanks, ladies…..another fun get-together!

Happy Valentine’s Day! XOXOXO

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This morning when I turned on my computer and the Google page came up, I saw they had turned the two O's in "Google" into an "X O" for Valentine's Day. This inspired me to create this Valentine, which took less than five minutes! I used the Contempo Alphabet, the Heart to Heart Punch for just the smallest heart stuck inside the "O" and the sentiment from "A Happy Heart". The colors are Riding Hood Red and Whisper White.

Have a Happy Valentine's Day!

A Monday Valentine

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If you haven't done it yet, it is really time to get out that paper, scissors and glue and start making valentines! Valentine's Day is Saturday, Feb. 14th. Who do you know would love a handmade card from you? Think back to your childhood and how much fun it was to make valentines from construction paper and doilies! Stampin' Up! provides much better materials than those, but the idea is the same.

I was looking through some old magazines of cards and saw something that gave me this idea. I also wanted to use the new Stampin' Up! cardstock "Taste of Textiles" on page 156 of the catalog. These papers are quite different and this white one is absolutely beautiful! The picture does not do it justice. It would look beautiful on a wedding card. The other papers are Vellum with Not Quite Navy Polka Dots, Black Linen Texture, Bronze Metallic, Printed Kraft and Close to Cocoa Pin Stripe. Be sure to check them out! They are made in Italy!

To see the paper in the online catalog, just click on the link above, click the Shop Now button and then click on Paper in the left column and Specialty Paper.

I used the Heart to Heart Punch on pages 184-5 of the catalog to punch just the smallest punch. The greeting is from "Holidays and Wishes".

Feb. 7th…..Send a Card to a Friend Day!

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Yes, today is "Send a Card to a Friend Day!" Here's a card I made last night trying out my new Fifth Avenue Floral stamp set. The greeting happens to be a retired hostess set from the last catalog, but it suited the purpose since it had the word "friend" in it.

I love these colors together: Baja Breeze, Chocolate Chip, and Whisper White. I stamped the big flower in the lower right-hand corner, then stamped it again on scrap paper to make a mask. I cut out the flower on the scrap paper and placed it over the stamped flower on my card. Then I was able to ink up my stamp again and stamp the flower off to the left, as well as a different flower above. I used my Aqua Painter to lightly watercolor the flowers with the Baja Breeze inkpad. The greeting is stamped in Chocolate Chip. The ribbon is the 1" Double-Stitched Grosgrain on page 178 of the new catalog.

So now, are you going to send a card to a friend today?

Christmas Stamping

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I haven't really disappeared but just trying to get everything done for the holidays like everyone! I have been stamping even though I haven't posted. Here are some things I have stamped recently, most likely copied from another talented demonstrator. I usually like to give credit but I don't have those names in front of me right now and this is a rush!

Fun Diorama Card for a Boy

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So maybe he's not a "boy" anymore at age 23, but he will always be MY little boy! Here's a card I made for Eric for his birthday. Sometimes it is difficult to think of a card to make for any male. Some stampers even do swaps for male cards just to get a selection of ideas. I forget how it came to mind, but somehow I came up with the idea of making a card with a Yellowstone National Park theme after our memorable trip there this summer. I had even tracked down the retired set "DD Pines" to use for those Yellowstone scrapbook pages I still plan to make! (we'll see!) Long ago I had learned to make a diorama card, which actually folds down flat for mailing, and while they look impressive and are decorative, they are actually easy to make. So here is the Diorama card I made with the retired DD Pines, plus the ever-useful "Lovely As a Tree" stamp set….talk about a great "male" set!

It's difficult to tell from this angle, but that is a moose in the foreground and a bear in the background! You can see some of the "Lovely As a Tree" trees stamps on the inside layers of the card and the "Pines" tree stamped, embossed, and cut out adhered to the front with dimensionals.

Here is a view of the inside:

You can see how I cut out both the moose and the bear and attached them to the middle part and the back part with dimensionals.

And here is just another view of the front, maybe with better lighting.

If you want directions on making this easy diorama card, which you can adapt to any theme, just email me!

A Happy Birthday Pyramid Card

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Halloween has always been extra special at our house because our youngest son was born the night before Halloween, just missing being a pumpkin or goblin by about 45 minutes. I remember when I was pregnant with him seeing the cutest little Halloween t-shirt in one of the store windows at the Galleria and thinking if he had actually been born on Halloween I should really have that shirt for my Halloween baby. Didn't happen, which probably was a good thing for him, because he doesn't have to exactly share his birthday with a holiday. But of course his birthday parties were always Halloween-themed, which made them extra fun. I just wish I was into Stampin' Up! back when my kids were little because of SO many opportunities for gifts, party favors, invitations, note cards, etc. If you have little ones, you really should get into stamping because you will have many opportunities to be creative!

I love this Pun Fun stamp set, but especially loved this rocket for my son. When I started looking for ideas for this card, I came across this Pyramid card made by Trina on Splitcoast. You can find different pyramid template lots of places on the internet, but I loved the colors Trina used on her card. I added a Jumbo Eyelet for the window on the rocket and some stars, punched with the large and small star punches…..all found in the Stampin' Up! catalog, of course…. and also added a velcro dot just under that front flap to hold it closed. The pattern I used showed a slit but I couldn't figure that out. The card had to be mailed so it had to be flat. I hope he can figure out how to assemble when he receives it!

Trick-or-Treat! Happy Halloween!! Last Minute Halloween Cards!

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Wow! This morning a black cat ran right across the street in front of my car as I was driving back into my neighborhood! Is that real Halloween or what?! I know it is bad luck to have a black cat cross your path, so that freaked me out a little bit! Hopefully today will be nothing but good luck because I love Halloween (it would help if we had some fall leaves here in Houston!) and I get to see my boys. One was nearly born a Halloween goblin because he arrived just 45 minutes before Halloween! But that was twenty years ago! More about his birthday card later.

I usually have a lot of trick-or-treaters at my house, but it is often about 80 degrees, at least when the kids start out after dinner, sweating in their costumes. When I was growing up in St. Louis it was often a problem on Halloween with the weather being very cold, and we had to wear a winter coat…..either over our costume, which meant no one could see the costume, or under the costume, which of course looked ridiculous! "Back in the olden days" we always had to have a joke ready to tell people before they would give us candy. I don't think they do that anymore.

Here are some Halloween cards I've made (okay, mostly copied from somebody else!) to help celebrate the day!

My San Antonio Regional Swap Cards

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Here are my swaps I took to the Stampin' Up! San Antonio Regional held yesterday and today.

This one I stamped with a set in the Holiday Mini called "A Happy Heart". I also used the Spiral Punch on the side of the tic-tac-toe. The little heart in the middle square is popped up with a dimensional and so is the big heart. The designer paper is the fabulous Bella Rose.

And this one is the famous "Mr. Twigster" in the Holiday Mini. I guess you either love him or hate him since lots of people say snowmen don't have legs. But he was quite popular as a swap yesterday and I enjoyed making the card! I used the snowflakes from "Merry and Bright" and stamped with white Craft ink. The greeting comes from "Season of Joy". I added a little Dazzling Diamonds Glitter for the snow at the feet of Mr. Twigster after coloring just a little bit of blue ink with my Aqua Painter.

You can click on the photos to make them larger.

Halloween Witch Hat Card

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Here is a picture of the card I made for our demo group swap. I saw it in a magazine and changed it a little bit. It didn't give directions, but I just cut two triangles and then the band on the bottom has a fold which holds the triangles together. The stars are punched, of course, and the big one is sprinkled with our chunky glitter, adhered with some Tombow Multi glue. Fun card to make!

Fall and Halloween Swaps

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Our "demo group" meets once a month and we always enjoy making some project, swapping, and having lunch. We still refer to it as our demo group, even though not everyone is a Stampin' Up! demo, but it is still fun. That's why not everything you see here is Stampin' Up! but it displays a lot of talent regardless. So here is a photo of all the swaps I received last week!

A Pocket Card College Graduation Announcement for UT

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Rather than purchase the expensive pack of way-too-many graduation announcements from the university (and because I am a stamper!) I decided to make my own for my son's college graduation. I almost forgot about it so it was a last minute deal. Somehow I was inspired to do a pocket card style using the "Great Grads" stamp set. Rather than use the G in the stamp set in the center of the graduation medallion, I chose to emboss the UT with copper embossing powder and punch it out to put on the medallion. I also used some of the designer paper I had previously purchased at the University Coop in a UT scrapbooking pack. I also wanted it to coordinate with my graduation card for him. I hope this will inspire you to add your personal touch to your own events by making your own announcements, invitations, etc. Supplies and ideas are easy to get….just contact me!

Stamping With Karen

Having Fun With Paper, Ink, and Stamps

Category Archives: Cards

Simple Friendship Butterfly Card

My Houston Azalea Trail Card

An Easter Surprise Card

February Swaps

Happy Valentine’s Day! XOXOXO

A Monday Valentine

Feb. 7th…..Send a Card to a Friend Day!

Christmas Stamping

Fun Diorama Card for a Boy

A Happy Birthday Pyramid Card

Trick-or-Treat! Happy Halloween!! Last Minute Halloween Cards!

My San Antonio Regional Swap Cards

Halloween Witch Hat Card

Fall and Halloween Swaps

A Pocket Card College Graduation Announcement for UT