Joy!

Imagine my surprise when I logged in to my blog today and discovered I had over 270 views.  I'm a small time blogger who has 40ish views on a good day.  I knew something was up to have that many views this early in the morning.  Something is up.  My card was chosen as a winner for Mojo Monday!!!! How exciting!  I'm pretty sure it is random generated numbers that caused me to win, but I'm still excited.  If you are viewing my blog from Mojo Monday, I just wanted to say thank you.  I hope you'll like what you see and come back often.

Today's card uses another sketch challenge, but I wasn't in time to enter their contest.  I do love using sketches, as you probably know by now.




The colors for my card came directly from the Snow Festival DSP.  I've used this paper pack a lot for my Christmas cards this year.  I just love the color combo in it.  It's classic, yet updated.  



It's hard to capture in the photo, but I played with my Champagne Mist Shimmer Paint in a new way on this card.  I've used it in a spritzer bottle with some rubbing alcohol before, but this time I took a sponge and applied it directly to my embossed cardstock.  Oh my!  The shimmer and sparkle is divine.  Why haven't I tried this sooner?  It probably would have been on every Christmas card I made this year.  :)

I'm not sure this card fits the CAS look that Freshly Made Sketches is going for, but it fits my style, and that's what creativity is all about.  It's making your creation be a reflection of you and your style in some way. 

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

Card Recipe (Stampin' UP! Supplies)

Stamps: Perfect Punches
Ink: Baja Breeze, Gumball Green
Paper: Snow Festival DSP, Baja Breeze CS, Gumball Green CS, Whisper White CS
Punches: Dotted Scallop Ribbon Punch, 1 3/4" Scallop Circle Punch, 1 3/8" Circle Punch, Corner Rounder
Misc.: Champagne Mist Shimmer Paint, (Retired) Embossing Folder, Sponge



Perfect Punches






Champage Mist Shimmer Paint



Stamping Sponges



Snow Festival DSP



Checking In

Just wanted to check in and let y'all know I'm still around.  It's such a busy time of year for all of us, that I'm sure you understand why I haven't been able to get a card posted the past couple of days.  I do have 2 cards and a video made, I just need to take pictures and edit.  I should have a new card up tomorrow. 
I'm working on some quick and easy last minute cards, gifts and gift card holders to share with you next week.  Don't worry.  I've got you covered.  ;)

In the meantime I wanted to let you know I am working on Round 2 of sending out the new Spring Catalog.  If you do not yet have a demonstrator and would like the new catalog I would be happy to send one to you for free.  Just email me your name and address.  My email is cr8tvblessings@hotmail.com

It seems sad not to have a picture to look at so I'll share a picture of what we did last weekend.  I need to take a picture of the lights on, but it's been raining since we were halfway done.  (yep, we had to do part of our lights in the rain.  Don't worry, we didn't do the ladders in the rain.)   I'll take a picture od our house and yard if it ever stops raining long enough.

Scrapbook Sunday



Sometimes I use sketches to create my layouts.  Other times the pictures seem to dictate the design.  Still other times the background paper really helps guide me in the placement of my photos.

 

 

I took advantage of the background paper to design this layout.  Especially the LHS.  My pictures are arranged in two columns, and I used the white "grid" to write on.

 

 

For the above layouts you can see how I placed my photos in the "white space" and used their pre-printed borders as my only "embellishment".  This made the pages go together very quickly.

 

 

Of course you can always take those "embellished" pages and ignore the "lines".  Go outside the box and layer over the printed elements.  It's your scrapbook.  Make it your way!

I actually don't use pages like these very often because I do enjoy the creative process, but I'm behind on my scrapbooking and wanted to get a bunch of pages done quickly.  This was a great solution.  If you are working on Christmas projects or are in a crunch for time consider getting a scrappin' kit to make your scrapbooking come together easier.

 

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

 

 

Oh Christmas Tree

Last year my favorite holiday stamp set was Christmas Lodge.  I was so excited that SU kept it as a part of their annual catalog.  This year though it has sat lonely on my shelf.  I decided to pull it out and give it some ink for today's card.

I used two challenges to help me create this card.  The first was a sketch from Try Stampin' On Tuesday.  It's perfect for this nice big tree.

I was trying to decide which shade of green I should use for the tree and thought a color challenge might be in order.  This time of year it's pretty easy to find a Christmas color challenge, but most of them I found were in shades of blue.  Then I clicked on Color Throwdown's site and fell in love with their color combo this week!  It is perfect!

The only snag I ran into was the bow.  I wanted to use Baker's Twine, but all my twine uses White as a base. It was too stark against the crumb cake.  I tried linen thread, but it was so similar to the crumb cake that you couldn't really see it.  So, I took out my crumb cake ink pad, a sponge dauber and the Cherry Cobbler Baker's Twine.  I placed the twine on my ink pad and with the sponge dauber pressing into the twine I pulled the strand across my ink pad.  I did this several times, turning the twine to get all the sides inked.  It worked pretty well.  I did let it dry for awhile, as my ink pad is super juicy.

The sentiment is embossed with black embossing powder and all the layers a sponged with crumb cake, except the black mats.  You could leave off some of those black mats, but I really like the look of all those layers.  :)

The banner is popped up using Dimensionals.  Mostly to get it to lay across the front of the card.

I like to decorate this inside of my cards to match the front.  Instead of embossing the greeting, this time I used Black Staz-On.

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

Card Recipe:
Stamps: Christmas Lodge
Ink: Crumb Cake, Gumball Green, Versamark, Staz-On
Paper: Crumb Cake, Basic Black, Fan Fair
Misc.: Black Embossing Powder, Cherry Cobbler Baker's Twine

Welcome Wreath

I have another wreath card for you.  Honestly this is the card I have been trying to make since the day my mom sent us our wreath.  I kept trying to make the card square, but it really needed to be a rectangle double door.  :)  Once I figured it out it was super easy and QUICK to put together. 

I'm thinking about making a video to share some tips I discovered as I made this card.  Let me know if you are interested and I will do that for you guys.

The inside is blank for now, but I will probably be using one of the greeting stamps from the Holiday Mini catalog.  One thing that greatly helped with this card was following the sketch at Unscripted Sketches.  It's a new to me blog that I need to remember to check out more often!



I want to try this sketch again and have it looked like a wrapped present.  So many sketches and ideas, so little time.  :)

Here is a close-up of the wreath so you can see the detail.  The wreath is what I made 2+ weeks ago and each time I go to the craft room I have tried to pair it up with other papers, colors and/or sketches.  I wanted it to look like it was on a door.  Finally I just made a door.  LOL.  It works. 

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

P.S.  Check out yesterday's post to see another wreath card with a similar layout to this one, only square. 

Card Recipe:  (all products Stampin' UP unless otherwise noted)
Stamps: Merry Minis
Paper: Very Vanilla, Gumball Green, Soft Suede
Ink: Soft Sued, Gumball Green
Misc.: Woodgrain Embossing Folder, Linen Thread, Gold Brads (non-SU, though SU sell something very similar), Merry Minis Punch Pack,  Punches, Real Red Stitched Grosgrain Ribbon.

The Wreath Tradition

Three or four years ago my mom began a tradition I just love!  She started it after we visited her house at Christmastime and I commented on how pretty the wreath hanging on her door was and how fresh it smelled.  She gets them every year, but a few years ago she started sending one to me too!  Now every time I walk through my front door from late November to early January I think of my mom and how the wreath is hanging from her door too.  She says she does the same thing.  It's a special way for us to stay connected even though we live 600+ miles apart.

 

Here is the card I made to thank mom and dad for sending us our Christmas wreath this year.  I wanted to use a wreath on the card, and discovered I have a stamp with a wreath on it.  Who knew?  I've only used one other stamp in this darling set.  Something I really need to remedy.



Happy You (hostess)


This card would be easy to mass produce.  It's a 4 1/4 x 4 1/4" square card, but you could make it a standard size card and leave the bottom blank, add a sentiment or add a ribbon and bow.  

While taking these pictures I decided to add some Dazzling Details in Cherry Cobbler to "bling" it up just a bit.  Here is a picture of it with the glitter glue still wet.  I think it adds a nice touch.

The inside of the card is decorated as well.

Best of all this card was easy because I used this week's sketch from Retro Sketches.   You still have plenty of time to play along if you like their sketch too.

Creative Blessings,
Heather North


Stampin' UP! Products Used~
Paper: Snow Festival DSP, Whisper White, Cherry Cobbler, Gumball Green, Baja Breeze
Ink: Gumball Green, Cherry Cobbler
Stamps: Happy You (hostess)
Misc.: Dazzling Details Cherry Cobbler, Punches, Fashionable Hearts Embosslits

Love Forever & Always

Yesterday was our Anniversary.  I was going to show you the card here when I got it done, but decided I should probably show my husband first, just in case he decided to check out my blog.  ;)  Here is a picture of the card beside the gorgeous flowers he brought me. 

I'm married to a wonderful man that I adore, and I know that no card I make could come close to display the love I feel for him, but I also know that by making it myself I put a little bit of my heart into it.

I knew I wanted to use glittery paper and the You Are Loved stamp set.  I also wanted Red.  What I didn't know was how to put it together.  Thankfully, Mojo Monday came to the rescue.

It's perfect!  I added a few more hearts to mine, and I shortened the skinny piece into a banner, but I think my card still captures the essence of this sketch.  You could easily make this card for a wedding or bridal shower too. 

From this angle you can see how I popped up the banner using 2 dimensionals on one side and a glue dot on the other.  This helps the banner to look like it's "blowing".  The Love is also popped up on the glittery decorative label, but it's hard to see that in this photo.

 The inside is decorated as well using some scraps from the front of the card.  Don't you love when it works out that way? 

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

SU products used:
Stamps: You Are Loved, Vintage Vogue (retired set)
Paper: Crumb Cake, Very Vanilla, Red Glimmer Paper, ?Champagne/Copper? Glimmer Paper
Ink: Crumb Cake, Sahara Sand, Cherry Cobbler
Misc.: Hearts Embosslits, Med. Oval Punch, Decorative Label Punch

SU Specials for December

Here are some of the things Stampin' UP! is offering right now!
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Get the Ornamental Elegance Kit (while supplies last) so that you can quickly make 10 of the ornaments featured on the front of the this year's holiday catalog.


The Ornamental Elegance Kit (132832) is $14.95 and includes:

• Die-Cut Cardstock Elements
• Cherry Cobbler 3-1/2" Scalloped Tulle Ribbon
• Natural Linen Thread
• Vintage Faceted Designer Buttons
• Large Pearl Basic Jewels

Order these now so you will have plenty of time to make them for Christmas gifting--or for your family tree! Available while supplies last.

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Holiday Bundles

There are 2 holiday bundles to choose from to make gift giving easy and adorable!


Petite Treats Bundle



Trimmings & Tags Bundle


SU even has a video you can watch below.  (or head to my blog to view if you are reading this in your email)

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Become a SU demonstrator and you can order NOW from the upcoming Spring catalog, plus be eligible for FREE Sale-A-Bration items.  (SAB)   Woo-Hoo!!!!    Can you think of a better Christmas present for yourself.

If you are not wanting to sign up right now, but DO WANT A NEW SPRING and SAB catalog(s) sent to you, be sure you are on my mailing list.  How do you do that?  Simple, leave a comment or send me an email (cr8tvblessings@hotmail.com) letting me know you want me to send you one or both of these new catalogs. 


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I'll be back on Tuesday to show you the anniversary card I made for my husband.  It is sparkly!

Creative Blessings,
Heather North

Scrapbook Sunday + Sketches!

Apologies again for the glare on these pictures.  Hopefully you can still see enough of them to get design ideas for your own layouts.  Also, I thought I had posted these pictures last Sunday, but they never got posted.  This gave me the opportunity to create 2 SKETCHES for you in MDS2.  Enjoy!

LHS= Left Hand Side
RHS=Right Hand Side

When you go to Mt. St. Helens and watch the movie about the volcano erupting they have a moment at the end where the curtains draw back and you see the crater through the window.  You can see the picture I took of that window on the top of this page.  The day was cloudy, so it's not the best picture, but this page captures that moment we all felt the awe of being so close to the volcano. 

Underneath that picture I created another "window", but matting 4 pictures together on one large rectangle, leaving space between each picture for the "window frame" to show through.

***I was playing in MDS2 and made this.  I could have added the circle titles, but figured my time was better spent actually getting this post posted.  :)

The RHS (Right Hand Side) uses different background paper, which is unusual for me.  I tend to like using the same papers for a two page spread.  To help the pages flow together I used a circle punch and cut out circles from the paper on the LHS (Left Hand Side) to mat the sticker letters on the RHS.



1/2" Circle Punch



Check out the LHS.  Can you see how I flipped the layout from the LHS above?  Basically I turned the "sketch" upside down, and centered the single photo instead of having it offset.  :) 

Here's the sketch I created by flipping the pictures.  (Done in MDS2 :) 



Disc, Download, Ugrade, Plus, Free Trial...the choice is yours!


Did you notice I used the same circle letters for the titles on all these pages?  I also tried to keep them in similar greens and blues.  These pictures were all taken on a field trip and I wanted them to go together. 

To get the pictures on the RHS to fit on my page  with a bit of space between each picture, I trimmed them all down 1/4".  They are 3 3/4" x 5 1/4".   (I get digital prints so they start smaller than the standard 4x6)

I would LOVE it if you used one of my sketches and told me about it.  <3  Just leave a comment below letting me know, or better still leave a link to your blog so I can see your picture!

Creative Blessings,
Heather North