Partridge in a Pear Tree

This week's Pals Paper Arts challenge http://www.palspaperarts.com/ is to use Crushed Curry, Old Olive and Soft Suede along with neutrals as needed. As I thought about this challenge, I just kept thinking about Crushed Curry and the pear stamp from Cheep Talk set. And what do pears go with this time of year? Well, you can see how my thinking ended in this card.

I hope partridges can be gray. This one is so I could stay within the color parameters.

To get the message, I relied on good old Powerpoint - just like the days before I had any greeting stamps.

This challenge ends tomorrow (Tues at noon) so get in a card for a chance to win blog candy this time.

Ingredients: All by Stampin' Up! - Stamps: Cheep Talk

Ink: Crushed Curry, Old Olive, Soft Suede, Basic Gray

Paper: Whisper White, Soft Suede, Old Olive

DSP: Soft Suede

Ribbon: Crushed Curry Grosgrain

Fonts: Bickley Script and BernhardMod MT

Tree Tag

For Kristina Werner's Finally Friday video, she challenged viewers to create a paper pieced gift tag. Her tag was a very cute stocking shown here at Two Peas: http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/cg_display.asp?seed_id=31042

My husband's gift is a little difficult to wrap so I thought this would be a good opportunity to decorate it with a special tag. He gave me the Cricut for Christmas (quite a bit early) so I used it to create the little shopping bag. For the tree, I made a pattern and cut out several pieces of Stampin' Up!'s Designer Paper in Garden Green. I don't think I'd ever used this color but I really like it. The chipboard star was already cut and I just doused it heavily with Versamark and dunked it in loads of gold embossing powder. If only I could turn chipboard to real gold!

The traditional colors were dictated by what kind of ribbons I had available in small enough sizes for the packages. The tree finished out to be about inches high. I sort of got obsessed with this project once I started. I was going to wait and finish it today but stayed up later last night to get it done. Just couldn't wait to see how it would all come together.

Ingredients: Stamps: Polka Dot Basics by Papertrey Inc.; Block Elements by Impression Obsession; Winter Trails by Inkadinkado

Ink: Real Red, Glorious Green, Whisper White; Versamark

DSP: Stampin' Up!

Cardstock and ribbon from various unknown sources

So Tweet!

It's sooo Tweet!!! This set from Hampton Arts, that is. It is just the cutest Valentine set with hearts of all sizes worked into all the designs. The detail is perfect. I suppose the main design is supposed to be the owl because the set is called "Whoo Loves You?" I think this heart tree is my favorite and there are plenty more images including the owl to put to work.

Ingredients: Stamps: Whooo Loves You? by Hampton Arts

Ink: Riding Hood Red, Cameo Coral, Chocolate Chip by Stampin' Up!

Paper: Aqua Mist by Papertrey Ink; Chocolate Chip by SU!

DSP: Urban Garden by SU!; Nook and Pantry by Basic Grey

Papertrey Review

Another sure cure for the blues is a delivery of paper and ink. On many of the on-line forums, I'd always read great things about Papertrey Ink (PTI). Yesterday, I got in my first order. With the exception of one item, I'm extremely pleased with the sampling of products I ordered. (These are of course only my observations.)

Stamps: All are acrylic stamps sold in sets. Most are either $15 per set or $24 per set. They release new sets every month! The Polka Dot background set I ordered came packaged with the stamps, a jewel case for storage, clear labeling sheets for the case and instructions for care. I'm already repurposing the nice packaging for a Christmas gift :-)

You'll see my polka dots in this card. It is one of Kristina Werner's designs. I had picked out other sets before I saw her use this a couple of time. The set comes with several sizes of dots even individual dots in each size in case you miss one when stamping a strip - very thoughtful. I love this set! You'll probably be seeing spots of all sizes around here . They recommend using a gridded block which I already had.

Colors: Their Perfect Match ink, paper and embellishments are all available in matching colors. Each of the colors has 5 coordinating ribbons and a bag of buttons! No trying to figure out what paper has ribbon to match. (They also sell some other colors of ink that don't seem to have matching stuff but I'm not sure what that was about. I stayed with the Perfect Match colors.)

I compared the colors to my SU! colors and found many that are very, very close. The one that was the most off was Dark Chocolate. SU!'s chocolate chip, used in the card above, has more red in it. I like both colors they are just quite different. SU! has a much larger palette of colors. Papertrey's match more of the Earth Elements and Soft Subtles.

Ink: PTI's hybrid ink is a pigment ink. It is available in full size pads and ink cubes (like Stampin' Spots, but you can buy them individually). I love the Vintage Cream as it really shows up on dark paper. I do have two complaints with the packaging: I find the full size pads a little hard to open and the cover of the stamp pad is a brown tinted plastic. Why not make them clear so you can see the color inside? When I first opened my box, I thought they had sent me the wrong color. I have not tried to emboss this ink yet. I'll post about that experiment later on.

Paper: Their cardstock is excellent - a very good quality for card making. The only drawback is size. It comes only in 8 1/2 x 11" and there are no plans to add 12x12" which is my preferred scrapbooking method. I like having larger cardstock for background pages, cutting borders and stuff. I do love the PTI pricing. They are a little less expensive than Stampin' Up! The best thing is the option to purchase only 12 sheets of a single color for $3. I purchased a variety pack of colors - 50 sheets for $9 which is a great deal on this quality of paper.

Ribbon: It seems every time I see a beautiful bow on a card it has been made with Papertrey Ribbon. I'm trying the satin and the grosgrain. Their grosgrain is softer than most and I got a pretty good double knot (for me) on this card. Again, I love the pricing. Five yards of any style, any color is $3. This is a reasonable quanity of ribbon to purchase in a single color.

Another positive on their pricing is free shipping on orders of $55 or more. And I really LOVE that they price in whole dollars. None of this $12.99 or $3.95 stuff. Why can't everyone do that? Do stores and catalogs really think they fool us by dropping a penny or two from the price?

Envelopes: Here was my only disappointment. Stampin' Up! still sells the best envelopes for the money - actually better than anyone I've found for the money.

So I'm sure I'll buy from Papertrey again. There are more sets I want, the paper is a great price, and I really love the ribbon in price, quantity and usability. They sell a lot of other stuff too. I'f you've used their products and have a favorite, please leave a comment here. Check them out at http://www.papertreyink.com/

Card Ingredients: Stamps: Polka Dot Basics by Papertrey Ink; Trendy Trees by Stampin' Up!

Ink: Vintage Cream and Scarlett Jewel by PTI; Choc Chip, Sage Shadow, Kiwi Kiss by SU!

Paper: Chocolate Chip and Very Vanilla by SU!; Ocean Tides by PTI!

Ribbon: Ocean Tides grosgrain by PTI!

Comfort Crafts

We all have our comfort foods. I have my comfort crafts. It used to be crocheting or knitting; however, it really bothers my hands to do that so I've had to give it up. When I had a bad day at the office, I'd come home make myself dinner, fire up the day's episode of As The World Turns (ATWT) on the VCR and pull our my crocheting. In 40 minutes, my mood could be completely turned around.

I've been a bit down the last couple of days. Tuesday, Mother and I had a pleasant day shopping in Charlotte for her Christmas present from me. We had lunch at our favorite restaurant and browsed a few of our favorite stores plus some new discoveries. Even the constant rain on our way home wasn't a big deal.

Then that evening I found out CBS announced they were not renewing ATWT. While not unexpected, it was still numbing. ATWT has been my main television entertainment since high school. And it has often been my comfort food. They might as well pull all the chocolate ice cream off the shelves while they are at it. I'll miss it that much.

Soaps have long gotten a lot of flack - a little is warranted, but mostly it was overblown. Especially when you compare any soap to the trash that fills 24/7 on 200+channels today - a lot of which is called "news." If you have ever watched a soap and it is still on, watch it again. Don't let daytime drama die. After Guiding Light was cancelled, ATWT was left as Proctor and Gamble's last soap. In May, I also started watching General Hospital and am enjoying it. There was absolutely nothing worth watching on in the evenings during the summer and as I said, I was expecting ATWT to get cancelled at some point. I love an on-going drama where I can get into the characters as opposed to a movie where 90 minutes and you left with more questions than answers.

One plus today is that some shows - all the CBS soaps and General Hospital - are available through the Internet making it easy to tune in during the evenings.

To help get out of my funk, I needed another of my comforts - crafts. I have some scrapbook pages started but I wanted something simplier. Creative, yet easy on the mind. So out came on of my favorite stamp sets and I made a few of these Valentine cards.

I could rant and rave about the advantages of daytime drama over (un)reality TV, talk shows, and most of primetime all afternoon, but I'd better go. Pizzas in the oven.

Ingredients for card, not pizza :-) Stamps: Loads of Love by Stampin' Up!

Ink: Real Red, Brilliant Blue by SU!; Staz-on Black, various SU markers and watercolor crayons

DSP: Creative Memories

TIPsy Tuesday - Tree Trimming

Today's tip has nothing to do with paper or fabric crafts. It does fit my other love - decorating. I love to decorate for Christmas and occasionally do this for clients when the opportunity arises. Last night I opened up this large box of decorations for my tree and found my "notes" from last year. So one of my decorating tips is:





When you pack away your decorations, write notes on the inside box lid about what goes where on your tree or garlands. You probably can't read my scribble but these little notes reminded me that I purchased a new tree topper last year and about several other things I wanted to add or change to the tree this time around.

(Actually it is a good thing I bought a new top for the tree. When I was getting the decorations out of the attic on Sunday, I dropped the angel and broke off the head. That has to be bad luck!!! Oh well.)

Here are just a few other things I find helpful in selecting and decorating for Christmas:

1. When buying ornaments, buy in odd numbers when possible and choose at least 3 of each ornament. Look for odd shapes and larger sizes. If you want your tree to look like one in a a magazine, don't load it down with tiny little one of a kind ornaments you have to be right on top of to see the detail. Go for the big picture.


2. If you have collectable ornaments, mix them in with larger ones. Solid colored glass balls are available in large sizes and are very inexpensive.


3. Place your tree in a mat so you can pull it out to decorate the back. If you have hardwood floors, turn a carpet mat upside down and then put the tree on top. It will slide easily. If you have the tree on a rug, use a smooth mat that slides. I use a piece of linoleum flooring.


4. If you need something new for next year and can't find it during after Christmas sales, put a note on your calendar for early November of next year. I need to redo my garland lights so I have a note to buy 4 sets when Hobby Lobby gets them in and starts running them 50% off.

I'll share photos of my tree and garlands later on. The garlands are done but the tree is still in process. Today I went Christmas shopping today so I'll have to finish it tomorrow...

Stained Glass Butterfly

In Stamp Club on Saturday, Jeanie showed us a technique she called Stained Glass. We stamped on vellum and then colored in the image on the reverse side softening the colors. The stamped image can be embossed or not. I tried the technique here using classic black ink - not embossed.

Have you ever noticed how relaxing it is to color? It was a great way to wind down the busy weekend.

Ingredients: Stamps: God's Beauty by Stampin' Up!

Ink: Basic black, Gable Green, Bold Brights and Earth Elements markers

Cardstock: Gable Green

Ribbon and vellum from unknown sources

Distressed Notecards

I watched a great video from Two Peas the other night on distressing techniques. It is the Week 2 video from Fall Stamp camp. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpeekXdhaTY

One thing I had not tried before was to apply distressing ink colors to a paper, then stamp and emboss a clear image. Afterwards, apply more distressing ink. The clear stamped image will show the original color through. That's the technique I did on the frames above and I love it!!!

These cards were a great way to use some cool stuff I had on hand and out for other projects. The pointed square cuts and frames were left from the coasters I did this week. I cut some frames the wrong size so I had these extra. The centers are what are left from the ones I cut the right size. They were in just plain white cardstock but I hated to throw such pretty designs away.

The designer paper is Basic Grey from their Perpiphery collection. I've had it out for some scrapbooking. I did pull the blue ribbon from my stash. It is a polka dot just turned so the white dots don't show. These are good colors for "C" these cards go to.

I even had the Lovely Letters set still out. Now I have slightly less stuff to put away and some pretty note cards for one more customer appreciation gift.

Ingredients: Stamps: Lovely Letters by Stampin' Up!; Flourishes by Paper Studio

DSP: Periphery Collection from Basic Grey

Ink: Versamark; Soft Suede, Not Quite Navy, Brocade Blue, Bordering Blue by SU!

Ribbon: Peripery Collection by Basic Grey and blue from Hobby Lobby