Telescoping Snowman

While perusing through the Splitcoast Stampers gallery, I stumbled upon some fun telescoping cards! I knew I had use this technique in one of my upcoming classes, so I searched for good ideas and decided on the telescoping snowman! Awhile back I had bought this snowman face stamp by Dandelion Designs thinking I would need it one day. It came in very handy and was the perfect size for my project! Here he is all bundled up. I like to think of it as looking down at him... And here's what he looks like when he's open! I know I gotta change those brads to white, but I couldn't wait to show him to you, so I just left it gold. This is such a quick and simple card to make and the perfect size for a Christmas tag! I'll be back soon to share the rest of my tag projects for this class. Oh, and did you remember to check out the Sister Stamps blog for all of our blog candy and Debi's blog for more candy? If you haven't already done so, start here... and post on all introductory posts... then check out Debi's blog for Release #3 posts for more chances to win. Oh yes, and don't forget to like Sister Stamps on facebook- you just might be surprised with more candy!

Bubbles and Smiles Treat Box Card

Decided to make another Treat Box Card using this cute Dandelion Designs set. I really like this set as it reminds me of Akemi and her cousin Baby Z cause they LOVE playing with bubbles. Off the subject... I don't recommend those new crayola bubbles. Its not that great in terms of bubble making and its messy. Definitely not going in Akemi's b-day party goodie bags. Plus they cost a small fortune. OK back to the card... I decided to decorate the inside as well as the outside this time... And don't forget the Hershey's Nuggets! Yum!

More Class Sneak Peeks

I recently received a request to teach the treat box card and I guess I got too ambitious and came up with two different cards designs- one for Boy's day and one for Easter. Forgot to take a photo of the inside of this card, but I remembered to stamp the inside this time and used the Dandelion koi stamp. Here's the Easter version of the same card. OK- just noticed that these photos were taken before I actually finished the project! I finished it off by wrapping some nuggets with coordinating paper and inserted them into the box portion of the card. I guess you'll just have to use your imagination. So glad Dandelion is making these cute cling stamps where are actually larger in size than their wood stamps. I've always wished for their designs to be bigger and now my wish has come true! Thanks Jean! These cards are pretty easy to whip up and are great for giving friends a little something for any occasion.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Wowee! What a crazy crazy week this has been! I've been so busy making Valentine's Day goodies, treats for my club's annual dinner, more calendars, not to mention my regular job! Anyway, just wanted to share some treats I made for the girls at Island Scrapbooking. Didn't have a whole lot of time, so I just just used my Sizzix bag die for the goodie bags. I had gotten a book of K&Co. paper and MS Paper all in Valentine's Day themes that I wanted to use. Plus Island Scrapbooking got in a whole bunch of new Penny Black rubber stamps featuring my favorite little Penny Black Girl named Mimi (and her friends). She's so cute yah? I had Debi in mind for this one.. her favorite images are little critters.. This cutie is by Dandelion Designs. More Penny Black Mimi stamps... For Michele's one, I was sure to use some paper she just got in the store by Bo Bunny. Hope you all have a great Valentine's Day and a great week! DH and I decided to buy each other a new coffee pot since our's was really old.

Bubbles and Smiles

I'm loving my new Dandelion Designs cling stamps! Here's the other set I bought. After awhile of looking through my papers, I finally decided not to go with any patterned paper. These guys are too cute to have a patterned paper distract from them, so decided to make my own scene. Started with just some plain white cardstock and used my Tumbled Glass Distress ink on the sides to make it look like the sky. Then I punched out grass using my MS punch (my favorite!) and then just popped up the monkey and elephant. Added Island Scrapbooking mini sakura flowers and topped it off with the matching sentiment that came in the set. These stamps remind me of Akemi and Baby Z (Akemi's cousin). They sure love to play bubbles! Supplies:

• All stamps- Dandelion Designs
• Grass punch- MS Crafts
• Distress Ink- Ranger
• Mini sakura- Island Scrapbooking
• Stickles

Happy Belated B-day Liane!

My BFF's b-day was last week but I was late as usual in getting her present to her. Hope she got it by now! Anyway, decided to make that Sliding Pop-Up Card again to practice and this time used my new Dandelion Designs stamps! Woo Hoo! Island Scrapbooking brought them in for me (Thanks Michele!). I love that Jean is now doing them in clings instead of woods. Included in the set are also directions for a cute project! I didn't get to try it out yet, but hope to do so before girl's day. Traditionally Dandelion stamps are smaller in size, but these new clings are pretty good sized stamps! I was quite happy that Jean was giving us new sizes to play with too.. Thanks Jean! Here's what the card looks like when you pull on the ribbon... The sentiment inside the card comes with the set. It also includes another girl holding a cupcake. The Wising You sentiment is by Verve stamps. Hope you had a great birthday Liane! Can you believe how old we are getting???? Supplies:

• Girl and sentiment- Dandelion Designs
• DP- My Little Shoebox
• Wishing You sentiment- Verve Stamps
• Ribbon- American Crafts
• Oval dies- Spellbinders

Busy Weekend

Happy Monday! I'm still recovering from a long weekend (but feels like a very short one). We were super busy this weekend, but it was a lot of fun visiting family and friends.. My weekend started on Friday since we had furlough... I had to make a quick wedding card for my cousin who's getting married. Since I couldn't attend the ceremony, I had to make it this week to give to my mom who was planning on going. I guess the reason why I procrastinated so long was because I haven't made a wedding card in such a long time. I think I'm out of practice! I guess we are at the point in our lives where most of our friends are married, so weddings have slowed down. Anyway, I remembered a Dandelion image that I had and decided to use that as my focal point. Tracy reminded me of some cool striped satin paper at Island Scrapbooking that looks great on wedding cards, so I picked some up on Friday and got to work. Since I was giving $$, I decided to make a pocket to hold the gift. Here's a close up of the front of the card... And the reason for the rush rush on making the card is because we were headed to Honolulu for a very special event! Can you guess what we did by looking at the next picture?? OK- so that wasn't the best photo, but they wouldn't let us take pictures. Did you guess? We took Akemi to see Beauty and the Beast! I think I wanted to go more than she did! It was really good- better than I expected. Akemi really got into it- she was laughing and even cried (talking uncontrollably) during the performance. She said it was because Belle left the Beast. When we started talking about it again she said... "Stop talking about it or I'll start crying again!!". In addition to other numerous errands, we also stopped by to see our friend's new baby. Sigh... hard to believe Akemi used to be that small! Here's Akemi, Uncle Dayne and baby.. And here's the proud papa! Darn- forgot to take a photo of the new Mama! Next time. Hope you have a great week!

Spooky Halloween

OK- enough of Christmas projects for now... gotta start looking at my Halloween stuff! I recently bought some new Halloween punches by Martha Stewart and EK success that I've been dying to try out. I dug up my old Halloween stamps punches from last year too for this project. Decided on using my Dandelion Stamps since they were small and could fit more on the card. Before I show you the inside of my card... I have to tell you where I got the inspiration from. I first saw a cute card using this technique on Joy's blog. Joy got the card from Eunice, who credits Carol, who credits Valita for this technique. I think Valita says she doesn't know who originated this idea but Carol calls it the Pleated Center Pop Up Card. Both sites have tutorials on how to make this card. I used Carol's version which allowed me to stagger the placement of each item. Instead of using an 8 1/2" x 11" paper, I used a 5 1/2" x 12" paper. After it folds down, its about the size of an A2 card. Here I have the card leaning against the wall, so you can see it with the DP as the backdrop. I copied the idea of using my tag punch for the tombstones from Mr. Barnes- who did it on the card featured here.. Instead of leaving the tombstones blank, I decided to use these cute sentiments from Dandelion Designs. This is actually what inspired me to use her stamps. I love that it says "Trick or treat, smell my feet, gimme something good to eat". We used to say that all the time growing up in Hawaii. I inked up the tags using my distress inks and and trimmed one of them so that it was smaller. Here's what it looks like when it just lays flat.. I like how the bats look like they are flying.. Finally, added in the finishing sentiment to a Fancy Labels tag by Spellbinders. Somehow that label reminds me of Halloween. Added the three ghosts from my new MS Ghost border punch. Aren't they cute?? Now I'm in the mood for some candy! Thanks Eunice for sharing this cool card technique and the links to where you got the idea from!! Supplies:

• All stamps- Dandelion Designs
• Bat punches- EK Success (large bat) and Martha Stewart
• Spiderweb punch- MS Crafts
• Ghost border punch- MS Crafts
• Tag punch- EK success
• Crystals- Hero Arts
• Acetate
• Oval and Scallop oval dies- Spellbinders
• Fancy Labels die- Spellbinders
• DP- Bo Bunny

Dandelion Congratulations Cards

Michele asked me to make some Dandelion Designs samples for the store using the baby and wedding stamps. I was happy to make samples using these since Dandelion is one of my favorite companies.

I just love this married couple stamp but never got a chance to use it since we hardly go to weddings nowdays. I am never sure how to color wedding images since normally the bride and groom are in black and white. Instead of leaving her dress plain white, I decided to jazz it up a bit. At first, I thought of using Stickles, but chose not to do it... After all, she's getting married, not going to a club! Instead, I found some white pearly Smooch, and used it to color in her dress. You can't really tell from the photos, but her dress is a nice pearly white. I decided to use the Stickles for her veil instead. To accent her headpiece, I added a tiny pearl. To give the card some color, I added pink to the roses and a pink ribbon and finished off the card by using my corner punch on the black cardstock. I like the look it gave to the card.

My next project was to tackle the family with the baby stamp. I wish these came out when Akemi was born- I would have used it for sure! Anyway, had to make one boy and one girl card.. here's the boy version (please remember that I don't have a boy, so making boy cards are foreign to me... they always come out a little girlie!).

Here's the girl version...

Aaawwww! Aren't these stamps so cute! There are also a boy and girl stamp that coordinate with this stamp so you can stamp your whole family!

Supplies:

All stamps-Dandelion Designs

DP- Bo Bunny

Cardstock- Bazzil

Scallop square, square, heart, and Labels dies- Spellbinders

Circle, scallop circle and square punch- Marvy

Corner punch- EK Success

Markers- Copics

Smooch

Pearl accent- Kaisercrafts

Stickles

Ribbon

Embossing folder- Cuttlebug

Princess and Congrats die- Sizzix

Dandelion Designs Calendar

Received a RAK from Liann at Cute Stuff along with my receipt. She was so nice to mail me a stamp set and send me this cute calendar! Thank you Liann!

This cute monkey image is by Dandelion Designs. Jean creates the cutest animals and makes coordinating sentiments. She makes things so much easier for us, yah?

I don't know where they got this paper from but I love it! It works perfectly with the image and sentiment! That is so awesome. He's going right on my desk at work.

Here's a closer look... now I want some watermelon!

A Weekend of Classes

Phew! Another busy weekend for me! I had two classes this weekend for a total of 3 card kits to prep. My Island Scrapbooking class was more difficult to prepare as it included instruction sheets along with the kits. The other two projects were easier but still took awhile to prep. Thank goodness I prepped all the kits ahead of time, otherwise I don't think it would have gone well at all.

I already shared the card that we made in my Halloween Slider card class, so I won't share that again. Here's one of the cards we did at my club meeting card class that was held today. I decided to do a simple card featuring Dandelion Designs. I just love Jean's stuff, its sooo cute! When I had planned the card, I didn't have the new Baxter Vampire stamp yet, so I made the sample using my witch stamp. Since I also had to do a card to show them how in the class, I decided to ink up Baxter. I just love him!

Here's a close up of the witch- she's a cutie too!

Here's Baxter using the same design. Everyone seemed to have trouble using the border punch, but after awhile, they seemed to get the hang of it. They also didn't know what Dew Drops were or how you would use them on a card, so they were happy to find out.

I'll post my other projects later on. Have a great week!

RAKs for Fellow Bloggers

Hi Everyone! Having a good weekend so far? I had fun today at the Hilo Ben Franklin's Paper Party! Not only did I get to do some fun make and takes, I got to see some fellow bloggers! Cheryl from Life is Sweet was representing Sizzix and Jean from Dandelion Designs were both there with Cheri from Sizzix doing make and takes. I'll post those projects later.

Although I've met Cheryl a few times whenever she comes to Hilo, I've never met Jean in person. She's very sweet and so patient with everyone who came to her table. I thought I'd make her something since this was her first visit to Hilo to do a make and take. Gotta be nice so she comes back again right? Nah, only kidding Jean!

I used the scallop envelope die which is exclusive to SU. I really like how it makes a cute box, just the right size for packing up some Big Island Candies Lemon Shortbread cookies (my favorite) and some macadamia toffee. I had given some to Jean as a thank you for winning one of her blog candy giveaways awhile back and she seemed to like it a lot, so I thought I'd surprise her with it again.

I used some of Jean's Dandelion stamps for the focal point. I just love these stamps from last year! I was hoping to pick up the new Halloween stamps from this year but not all of them were available... I did manage to get a bunch of Christmas ones though!

Supplies used:

Witch, ghost and kitty- Dandelion Designs

Circle and scallop circle- Spellbinders

Scallop envelope die- SU

Cardstock- Bazzli

Stickles

DP- Doodlebug and Bo Bunny

Markers- Copics

Ribbon

Relaxing With Elliot

What a lazy Sunday.... I spent most of today vegging out in front of the TV. I finally got myself off the couch to work on a cool new card, which I'll be posting later. I'm sure its not new for most of you bloggers out there, but its definitely the first time for me.

Anyway, made this card yesterday for one of my friends. She retired recently, so I thought I'd send her a card to congratulate her. Couldn't resist using this new Dandelion stamp... Elliot the elephant is one of my favorites from Jean's collection. See her new stamps here. Now I wish I got the accompanying sentiment... It had something to do with relaxing. Darn!

Supplies used:

Elliot stamp- Dandelion Designs

Markers- Copics

Flower and circle dies- Spellbinders

Ribbon

Relax sentiment- Sizzix Deco Strip die

Stickles

Cardstock- Bazzil

Hope the rest of your weekend is spent relaxing!

Happy (Belated) Birthday Stef!

Trying to catch up on all my delinquent b-day cards... My sis-in-law's b-day was a couple weeks ago, but it passed by in a blink, so I'm yet again late... Sorry Stef! Anyway, had to make another pop-up card. You get a lot of bang for your buck since they are relatively easy to make but are very impressive.

I used one of the stamps I was lucky enough to win from Jean at Dandelion Designs! It was the first time I entered to win anything on a blog and I won! I wasn't even really into stamping back then, but her stamps have brought me back to my stamping roots. Thanks again Jean!

This monkey is just too cute. The only reason it reminds me of my sis-in-law is because she calls her son "Monkey". DP is unkown- I got it as a gift and it was part of a set! Sorry! Happy Birthday stamp is by Hero Arts. Thanks for stopping by!

Dandelion Designs Cards

I really must credit Dandelion Designs for getting me back into stamping. I was a true rubber stamper about 10-15 years ago (gee, has it been that long?), back when DJ Inkers was very popular! Anyway, I got away from it when I got into scrapbooking and totally stopped once I got my sizzix. But as I started looking at blogs for ideas, I came across the Dandelion Designs blog where Jean posts the cutest projects and even has patterns to download! In one of her giveaways, I was the lucky winner and received a lot of her new stamp designs. Ever since then, I've re-discovered the world of stamping and all the new stamp companies and COPICS! I just love how she makes sentiments that coordinate with her designs. Makes creating a card a no-brainer!

Anyway- I must thank Jean for inspiring me to go back to my stampin roots. Here's some recent projects I made using her designs... Enjoy!

Have a great week!