I Love Lilly

I just love the Lilly and Billly stamps from Pink Cat Studio. Since they are a Canadian company, I wasn't sure about ordering directly from them, but it was as if I ordered from the mainland. I had been eyeing the new Lilly at the Beach and Dress up Lilly sets for awhile, but once the sports Billy set came out, I decided to place my order. When Tracy found out, she told me that she liked these stamps too... so I decided to make this folder for her. Saw it first on Jodi's blog, Inked Inspirations, but have now seen it on many of the Hawaii girls blog sites. Jodi's instructions are very easy to follow, so I was able to crank it out pretty quickly. Thank you Jodi! Isn't Lilly the cutest? Here's the images inside. Have fun Tracy! Supplies used: Lilly at the beach- Pink Cat Studio Markers- Copics Cardstock- Bazzil Glitter cardstock- Doodlebug Designs Flowers- Prima Crystals- Hero Arts Brads Ribbon

Daba Slider

I just couldn't resist buying this bunny set from The Greeting Farm. They are so cute and I love the fact that you get 3 bunnies! The only stamp that is not from this set is the "Remember to Smile" sentiment. I think that's from the Hope and Grace set.

Supplies used:

All stamps- The Greeting Farm

Markers- Copics

DP- SEI

Cardstock- Bazzil

Oval and scallop oval die- Spellbinders

Dew Drops

Stickles

Ribbon

Circle Punch

Happy Hump Day and Remember To Smile!

My First Double Slider!

I know most of you out there in blogland have already seen this type of card before, and are probably thinking... been there, done that. Well, living in Hilo, we don't get as much exposure to the newest card making techniques. While browsing many blogs on paper crafting, I found instructions on how to make this double slider card. I know I've seen this type of card before, but now I found the instructions! Yipee! I must give credit to Dawn of Dawn's Stampin Thoughts, who also puts tutorials on you tube. I also found a set of instructions after I made the sample on Splitcoast Stampers.

Pull the tab and....

Ooooh, Aaaah! (So Smurfy!)

After I figured out how to put the card together, it was a snap! Miss Anya was the natural choice for this color scheme. I just love how I found all these papers that seemed to coordinate well. Since the area that pulls out is rather big, it was a good opportunity to use my large Hero Arts sentiment stamps. They filled up the space well. To add some color, I used some scraps of paper to layer for the background. I just love learning new things!

Supplies used:

Miss Anya stamp- The Greeting Farm

Markers- Copics

Stickles

Cardstock- Bazzil

DP- Die Cuts With A View, Fancy Pants

Plastic grocery bag

Ribbon

circle punch

Dew drops

Have a great week!

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!

Surprise!! Happy 25th Anniversary!

My mom has been married to my step-dad for 25 years this year. They were planning on renewing their vows in Vegas in front of Elvis (I wish I could've seen that!), but their plans fell through and they ended up not going around the time of their anniversary. Don't get me wrong.. they go to Vegas A LOT! Papa Joe can't seem to get enough of Vegas and begs mom to go as often as they can afford to. So I decided to do something nice for them since they do so much nice things for all of us.... I decided to throw them a surprise anniversary party. It really wasn't that hard since we don't live near each other, so I was able to plan the party without either of them knowing. Naturally, we had to go with the VEGAS theme.. right??

Anyway.. starting from the beginning... Here's the invitation to the party... It was relatively easy to put together. I just used stickers I found at Ben Franklin. Only had to make about 10 invitations, so I could afford to go with the stickers. Decided to use their wedding photo- which was a real challenge because it was stuck to the inside of the frame and apparently it was their only wedding photo- WHAT? I ended up scanning it while still attached to the glass of the frame. Even photoshop couldn't help this photo, so I ended up making it black and white. I guess it worked since we were talking about the past. To give it the Vegas touch, I used gold Stickles to outline the white part. The dies used were Spellbinders Megabilities set.

Here's what it looked like on the inside.

Like all older people... they go to everything EARLY. If you tell them to get there at 12 noon, they'll show up at 11:00am. I knew this was going to be the biggest challenge of the party, so I solicited help from Aunty Arleen. She invited them to lunch for Uncle Larry's Birthday. My only fear was that mom would say "no" which she's been known to do on occasion. We were all relieved when she agreed to go.. Phew! Since Aunty was going to drive them there, we didn't have to worry about them arriving before the rest of us.

We decided to go to the Hawaii Prince Hotel- Prince Court Buffet. Saturdays are the best! Its a Japanese/Hawaiian buffet that includes sushi, tempura, saimin, oxtail soup, shabu shabu and their signature chocolate macadamia nut pie. My DH says its like eating an almond roca pie (except using macadamias instead). Enough about the buffet- just go try it, you won't be disappointed. (Remember to go on Saturdays!)

So Auny Jan helped me with the centerpieces and favors of course. Larry's Bakery (where she works) makes these cool cupcake bouquets! Even the wait staff at the buffet were asking us where we got them since they've never seen it before. Aunty decorated the cupcakes using Vegas themed items. Akemi was in heaven. Aunty also decorated the flower pot and included a die cut frog for good luck.

Not shown here were the cookie favors they made for us using the Las Vegas sign. Sorry- forgot to take photos of the cookies- Hopefully we didn't eat all of them yet so I can get a photo later.

Here's Papa Joe, Grandma Helen and Akemi.

Here's the card we gave to them... I tried to use the same stickers that I used for the invitations.

Inside the card, I used the "slots o fun" sticker and covered the 7 7 7 with hearts.

Here's mom and Joe after the big surprise!

We had a great party. It was so nice to see everyone together to help mom and Joe celebrate their 25th anniversary. It was worth all the work to see the smiles on their faces!

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!

Happy Fodder's Day!

When it was Mother's Day, Akemi told me "Happy Mudder's Day!" So naturally, she told Daddy, "Happy Fodder's Day!" She cracks me up.

Anyway.. back to the card... Yes, its another magic card. By now, you should be getting bored of them yah? I'll switch to something new soon. Anyway, the story behind this card is that my husband plays Taiko for Puna Taiko. I bought this taiko stamp a long time ago and forgot about it. I found it recently when he asked me to wrap up something for the theater staff to thank them for the last performance. So since i used the stamp for the thank you gift, I decided to use it for his fadder's day card.

This Mari and Me stamp is small compared to The Greeting Farm stamps, so the window was much too big for the size of the stamp. I used the large oval anyway and decided to stamp the sentiment next to the image. Since the white image was so far to the right, I covered the area with a flourish. I wish the image was larger though- would have come out nicer.

Supplies used:

Taiko drummer stamp- Mari and Me

Happy Dad's day- Hero Arts

Markers- copics

Acetate

Ribbon

Washi paper- Hanko designs

Flourish die- Sizzix

cardstock- Bazzil

Wishing all you dad's out there a Happy Fodder's Day!

Thank You Aunty

If you follow my blog, you know that I have an awesome Aunty Jan that is very crafty and comes up with unbelieveable projects. Anyway, this weekend I threw my mom and step dad a surprise 25th anniversary party and Aunty Jan helped me with the favors and centerpieces (all from Larry's Bakery- yum!). I wanted to send her a thank you for all her help, so I decided to try to impress her with the magic card. I've been wanting to test using washi paper as the card cover, and thought the Geisha Anya stamp was a good match.

Here's what it looks like when its open..

Supplies used:

Geisha Anya- The Greeting Farm

Markers- Copics

Acetate

Arigato stamp- Hero Arts

Washi paper- Hanko

Cardstock- Bazzil

Ribbon

Sakura punch

Stickles

Thanks again Aunty for all your help!

Father's Day Card

My step-dad is a sports fanatic. He tapes all things sports, watches sports, listens to sports broadcasts on the radio, talks about it and used to play it back in the day.... you get the idea. So when I saw this baseball Ian stamp, I bought it with him in mind... The only thing I couldn't decide on was what color to make his uniform. Let's see, he played for Farrington High School, University of Oregon, Coached for Kamehameha Schools and Castle High, and I'm sure much much more. Anyway, I had to consult mom on this one... she told me to go with Oregon since he has fond memories of when he played for them... Green and Yellow it is!

Since I'm on a magic card kick, naturally I made a magic card for him... Here's what I came up with...

Akemi calls Grandpa "Papa Joe", so I used Papa on the banner.

Supplies used:

Baseball Ian Stamp- The Greetings Farm

Markers- Copics

Cardstock- Bazzil

Acetate

Ribbon

All Star Papa sentiment- printed on computer

happy dad's day- Hero Arts

Happy Wednesday!

More Magic Cards

While trying to figure out how to adjust the instructions for the Magic Card, I ended up making several samples to check if my instructions were easy to follow. Here's two of the samples I made.

The first one was using Hula Anya...

Supplies used: Hula Anya- The Greeting Farm Hibiscus and Fern die cuts- Island Scrapbooking DP- Reminisce Cardstock- Bazzil Markers- Copics Acetate Raffia My second sample was made using Flutter Anya... This time I tried putting a sentiment on the card so that when you opened it, you would have a secret message. Supplies used: Flutter Anya stamp- The Greeting Farm DP- DCWV Flowers- Prima Flourish die- Sizzix Markers- Copics Acetate Ribbon Have a great week!