Rose Panel Bookmark

Hello fellow crafters! I hope you are having a marvelous summer! For the July theme at Die Cut Diva's we have chosen Anything But a Card, sponsored by

Dies R Us - enter so you have a chance to win a $10 voucher to the store!  One of my past Design Teams was on a blog dedicated {and aptly named} to Anything But a Card.  Unfortunately, the challenge closed and I haven't been creating as many projects other than cards.  However, this challenge has gotten my muse going again!

What I Used to Make my Project
White Card Base
Tattered Lace Rose Panel, #D307 {any of these would work as well}
STAMPlorations Literary Caffeine-ations, #STMP1155
Black Card
White Brads {stash}
Handheld Circle Hole Punch {1/8" and standard size}
Asian Inspired Tassel {stash}

I began this bookmark by cutting the Rose Panel out of black card, mounted the cut out onto a piece of white card which I then trimmed.  I punched small holes, using the handheld 1/8" circle punch, and attached white brads just to add some embellishment.  The sentiment was stamped onto white card, then trimmed and attached to the upper portion of the bookmark.  Lastly, I used a very old, Asian inspired, tassel to finish off the project.  Since I was making this for The Man, I didn't want it to be too feminine but I really wanted to use the Rose Panel die since it is the perfect size for a bookmark. I also attached a strip of cardboard to the back of the bookmark to give it a bit more stability. 

Thank you SO much for stopping by! I hope you and yours are having a wonderful summer - today was the first day that we here in Colorado have had a break from the heat!  Maybe you have had to stay indoors because of the weather where you are; this is a perfect time to get out some of your dies and make Anything But a Card to enter it in the Die Cut Diva's July Challenge! I hope to see you there!  Fondly, Christi

I am entering my Bookmark in the Following ANYTHING GOES Challenges:
Cardz TV - #58
Crafting with Friends - #72
Creative Fingers - #150
Crafting with an Attitude - #41
Crafting by Designs - July
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge
A Bit More Time to Craft - #72
The Creative Crafters - #6
Crafty Creations Challenge - #371
Through the Craft Room Door - Wk of July 24, 2018
Word Art Wednesday - #344/345

Keep Calm. . .

For years I couldn't drink coffee - my stomach just didn't approve of it, so I drank tea 'cause, you know, I need my caffeine.  I also have a huge addictive personality {just one look at my craft room will tell you that!} so if I made a pot of coffee, I drank the entire pot {this was before the single serve coffee pots came out}.  The good thing is, I can drink coffee again!  I've been a bit crazy buying coffee stamps and these are one of my new acquisitions - I LOVE them and I hope you do, too!

What I Used to Make my Card:
White Card Base
STAMPlorations Stamp Set, What's Brewing, #STMP1353
Tutti Designs Stitched Nesting Rectangles, #TUTTI-217
Your Next Stamp 6" x 6" Paper Pad, Crazy for Coffee, #YNSPP011
Versafine Ink in Onyx Black
Clean Color Marker, Beige
Distress Ink in Ground Espresso

This was a quick and easy card to make; doesn't take much time at all.  I stamped the coffee cups, using the 'to go' cups, facing each other, on white card using the onyx ink.  Then I colored the holders with a Clean Color marker in beige.  I stamped the sentiment under the cups using the Distress Ink and then

Another Look

cut out the rectangle using a die.

I trimmed a piece of plaid paper from the Crazy for Coffee paper pad, mounted the stamped card onto that, then mounted the entire thing onto a white card.  That's it!  I think this would make a great masculine card {you know how difficult it is to make those!} as well as the perfect card to give any coffee lover.

Thanks for visiting and leaving comments - I do read each and every one of them and I appreciate them SO much!  Don't forget to follow me and, if you do, leave me a note so I can follow you back - again, thank you for stopping by! Christi

I am entering my Keep Calm card in the following challenges:
STAMPlorations - M, April, Focus on the Sentiment
STAMPlorations Never Ending Anything Goes
Moving Along with the Times - #68, Food and/or Drink
Mod Squad Challenge - Simply Clean & Simple
Crafty Hazelnut's Patterned Paper Challenge - M, April, Anything Goes
NEW CHALLENGE Crafts Dreamy - M, Mood Board {Coffee!!}

Sweet Spring Wishes

Hello everyone! I hope you are having a fabulous day!  This card has been in design for almost a full year - I received the STAMPlorations goodies in April of 2017!  I've used all of the products individually, but this is the first time I've used both dies together.  There is a story behind why it took me a year but, thankfully, the story isn't as long as it took me to make the card.  I'll even condense it for you!

What I Used to Make my Card:
Lilac Card Base
Watercolor Paper
Oxide Inks in Cracked Pistachio, Broken China, Spiced Marmalade, Worn Lipstick and Wilted Violet {set 1}
Distress Markers in Picked Raspberry, Seedless Preserves and Blueprint Sketch
Ken Oliver's Liquid Metal in Yellow Gold 
Distress Sprayer
STAMPlorations CUTplorations Sweet Spring Wishes Phrase Die
STAMPlorations CUTplorations Flutter Zen 2 Layering Dies
Pink Cardstock
Light Blue Glitter Cardstock

On with the story - Oxide Inks came out and I was as obsessed with everyone

Paper I Cut the Butterflies From

else who was pretty much not doing much of anything else but playing with these amazing new inks.  I had gotten the first set and was making background after background, positive I could never make a color combination with these inks that I wasn't going to like.  Until I did.  I don't recall what Oxide colors I used, but I remember strongly disliking it.  I had seen some crafters using Liquid Metals along with the Oxides, so I thought

I'd give it a try.  I ended up covering the entire thing with the Liquid Metal and I liked the color MUCH better! That's when it hit me - I had a butterfly die that was beautifully intricate and wouldn't this look nice cut from the "ruined" background? So, I proceeded to dig out the CUTplorations die and cut the "fixed" background paper.  It did look pretty!  I used a pink card to cut the underside of the butterfly and attached the top to it.  Then I set the butterflies aside and continued to play with the Oxide inks.

I played and played {remember, the Oxides were BRAND NEW!} and finally

settled on the card background.  Once the background was dry, I glued it to a matching card base which, in this case, was a lilac color.  Then I couldn't find the butterflies!  That pushed the card production back further; but I kept that background because I knew it fit the butterflies perfectly.  Eventually, I cleaned my desk off {and it stayed clean for about 15 minutes!} and found the 

wandering butterflies.  Happily, I glued them to the card and then decided to cut the sentiment out of Light Blue Glitter card.  I set the saying onto the card and the year long saga was finished!

Another Look

I hope my story didn't bore you too badly.  I recently got some more goodies from STAMPlorations; they are having a great sale and I just couldn't resist, so you will be seeing more of their stamps and dies shortly.  The card came out much prettier than I expected and I hope you like it as much as I do!  Thanks for sticking with me and, since you have made it this far, I'll let you in on a secret.  I'm getting ready for another giveaway and you'll need to be a follower to win, so you might as well follow me now and get ahead of the rush.  Thanks so much! Christi 

I'm entering my Sweet Spring Wishes Card in the following challenges:
STAMPlorations - M, Spring & Faith
Butterfly Challenges - #97, Spin the Wheel with the Letter L - I used Letters, Lavender & Layers :) 
Cuttlebug Mania - Spring
That's Crafty! - M, Spring into Action
Papercraft Business Challenges - M, Anything Goes
Happy Little Stampers - Anything Goes w/ Dies
STAMPlorations Ever Ending Anything Goes Challenge

Week 3 of Janis' Birthday ATCs {Adorable Teapot Collection}

You can read all about Janis' birthday celebration here and see my week one All Those Cats ATCs here, my And The Chickens ATC here, and for the current week, Adorable Teapot Collection, you are in the perfect spot; just read on! If you missed week 1, or even week 2, no worries as you have ALL month to whip up some ATCs and enter {the challenge and celebration end March 3, 2018}! 

What are ATC's? ATC stands for Artist Trading Cards.  There are no requirements to make them {unless you are participating in a swap or, in this case, Janis' third theme is Adorable Teapot Collection} EXCEPT they must be 2 1/2" x 3 1/2", the same size as a standard playing card or trading card.

For this week, Janis choose Adorable Teapot Collection. Seems that she's been collecting teapots {and some adorable cat mugs - she even beats my collection of cat mugs, which is still in the box from my move} due to her love for herbal teas.  Here I thought chickens was a tough theme; well, teapots just had me about ready to throw in the tea towel {ha ha, see what I did there?}  As luck would have it, I used to belong to this awesome kit club and along with the coolest papers and such, they'd send you charms.  Back in the day we used to put charms on our cards, long before CAS was a thing. I have all my charms in a little 6 drawer storage tower, neatly categorized and labeled, so I had no trouble finding my teapot, coffee, and cups charms.  I picked out a teapot and a teabag; I figured I'd use tea cups as my stamped background.  The charms were gold, as most of my charms are, but that was remedied with a few swipes of my silver leafing pen.  Once the charms were dry from the leafing, off I went.

I'm not going to go into detail about how I made each one; it's fairly self explanatory but if you have any questions, just ask! 

Tea ATC

What I Used to make my Teapot ATC:
White Heavy Card
STAMPlorations Sketchy Coffee Cups
Distress Ink in Tea Dye 
Teapot & Teabag Charms
Krylon Silver Leafing Pen
Round Letter Beads
E6000 adhesive 

I almost ruined the whole thing, but I think I did OK saving it. I'm not even go into why or how I almost ruined it; you'll have to trust me as I'm still a bit
skittish about the incident.  Let's just say it involves glue, a few cats, and a paper cutter.

I hope you join the birthday celebration over at Her Peaceful Garden; get out those scraps and make some ATCs! They really are addicting and I think limiting yourself to the tiny canvas stretches your creativeness.  I appreciate your stopping by and stay tuned for more fabulous ATCs. Thanks! Christi



I am entering my Adorable Teapot Collection ATC in the following challenges:
Her Peaceful Garden - Adorable Teapot Collection
Pile it On - #139, 3D embellishments and/or stickers, washi tape
PDE - #7, Anything Goes
Inspiration Destination - #144, Anything Goes, TWIST: Use a Real Stamp

A good day has both COFFEE and YOU!

I just recently started drinking coffee again. I stopped years ago due to some stomach issues and found that English Breakfast tea was delicious and didn't give me ulcers. Granted it wasn't only the coffee that gave my ulcers, but I successfully got rid of everything that was causing them <wink>.  That was years ago and since my honey drinks coffee I began drinking it again.  I try to limit myself to one cup a day (unless I'm going out with my sister - then an ice cold, sweet, coffee drink is a must) and I still crave Dunkin' Donuts over Starbucks (Dunkin' Donuts are far and few between out here in Colorado.)  I felt that this adorable card could be given to anyone with whom that you enjoy a cup of coffee.

What I Used to Make my Card:
Kraft Card Base
StampCouture Small Cup with Foam Heart (Brand New)
Sentiment from STAMPlorations Literary Caffeine-Ations (Big Grins by Becca Cruger) (First Time Using the Set)
Brown Card (2 shades from stash)
Distress Marker in Festive Berries
Versamark Ink
Ranger Archival Ink in Jet Black
Pop Dots

My Custom Stamp

I recently needed to get a new "Stamped by Christi" stamp for the back of my cards.  My old one had finally seen enough ink and I put it to rest.  I love to support small businesses, and I found StampCouture on Etsy, to make it even more special they are practically local to me! Honestly, I had contacted - via Etsy contact - every manufacturer of custom stamps in the USA that were listed and they were the ONLY ones who got back to me!  But I am SO glad they did because I had many conversations with them about how I wanted the stamp to look and they were fabulous to work with.  While I was waiting for my custom stamp I browsed their shop and just had to pick up a few more stamps - this adorable coffee cup with the foam heart being one of them. The others are patiently waiting their chance to be used.  I highly recommend StampCouture if you ever need any custom stamps or if you are in need of some adorable little whimsical stamps. They kept in contact with me, even through the busy holiday season, where extremely helpful and the prices were very reasonable (and I get no commission from any manufacturer or company just because I link to or write about them!)

OK, now back to the card.  I used one of the coordinating brown papers from my stash and stamped the small coffee cup with Versamark ink sort of in a

Another Look at the Card

pattern, but I wasn't too careful about the placement of the cups.  Once that was finished, I trimmed the panel to fit the card (since I always use A2, 5 1/2" x 4 1/4" cards, I typically trim a panel to 5 1/4" x 4". If the card size or panel sizes are different, I will mention it in my post. Taking the Festive Berries Distress Marker, I chose one of the cups and colored in just the heart portion.

I then stamped the sentiment and the coffee cup onto a darker brown cardstock using the Jet Black ink. I used some thin Pop Dots to adhere the panel to the card.  Making this card brought back so many memories of when I first began stamping - the awe of watching embossing powder melt for the first time, finding amazing products like chalk, Versamark ink and the pure wonder of the entire art form.  It has inspired me to play with some of the products that were around when I first began stamping.  So, I'll be breaking out cool stuff like Shrink Plastic, Veggie Leather as well as some other "oldies but goodies" in the near future.  Is there any old product or technique that you loved to play with when you started stamping?  Please leave me a comment! Thank you SO much for sticking with me, and this post.  I'd love for you to become a follower. If you let me know in your comment that you have begun following me, I'll be sure to do the same for you.  Fondly, Christi

I am entering my "Coffee & You" card in the following challenges:
The Artistic Stamper - (M) February's Challenge - Love Hearts
STAMPlorations CAS Challenge - (M) Anything Goes w/ option of Hot Pink
STAMPlorations Theme & Sketch - (M) Stamp Retro (theme)
Simon Says Stamp, Monday Challenge - Young at Heart (too much coffee makes my heart race like when I was young and literally used to race <grin>)
Use Your Stuff - Love is in the Air (Use Hearts)
Addicted to Stamps - #141, Love
Simon Says Stamp, Wednesday Challenge - The Color of Love
Simon Says Stamp Work it Wednesday - (M) Use Something New
DL Art Thankful Thursday, #197 - Anything Goes option of Thank You
DL Art Monthly Linky Party - (M), February, Anything Goes