I just found Your Next Stamp this past April, and I'm really enjoying their stamps and dies! I'm usually not drawn to people stamps [I'm all about animal stamps!], but this elf is pretty cute! He's from their Holiday Buddies stamp set [which I bought because of the animals, of course!], and after I coloured him with alcohol markers, I die-cut him with the coordinating die. I can't say "I coloured him with Copics" because I used a mix of different brands. Copics are great markers, but they're way overpriced, so I just buy what I can find at a good price!
I used the Little Notes stamp set and die set to make that super-cute little clipboard. I have a thing for anything with an office theme, so I was so happy to finally get the Little Notes stamps and dies during YNS's 40% off sale! I die-cut the clip of the clipboard from silver cardstock, and I used a black fineliner to write what's on the little note paper. :D
I die-cut the little holly using Taylored Expressions' Little Bits Holly die -- I die-cut multiples of the berries and layered them to give them some dimension. For the card base, I used We R Memory Keepers dies [linked below]. The card measures just under 4" x 4", so it's a cute little size that just seems easy to decorate and finish. I shared three more projects using these dies in this blog post. :o)
SUPPLIES USED
To be up front, these are affiliate links, folks! For some products, the exact version I have is no longer on Amazon, so I've linked to the version that is available.
Today we celebrate Humble's birthday!! :o) As a tradition, I like to include a handmade card and handmade little surprises with his gifts. This year, I made this for him...
I just love him! :o) I'm not sure if I should call him a box or a bag, so I'm calling him a box-bag. :D I could fit two small gifts in there! Here's another view of him...
I have him sitting on the bookshelf in our living room and keep smiling at the sight of him. :o) I wanted to make a video showing how to make this, but my hands aren't healed yet. The construction is not very difficult, though. I used a cute die set from Taylored Expressions called Sack It Kitty -- this die set gives you the details of the cat but not the body. Their Sack It sets are designed to be paired with their Sack It To You die, which makes a treat bag, but you're not limited to using them together. I don't have the Sack It To You die, so I just used a Sizzix die to create the body of the cat, and I cut four pieces [two for the front of the kitty and two for the back just to make the box-bag sturdier]. For the sides and bottom, I cut a strip of matching paper -- all it takes is a bit of measuring, scoring, a little more scoring and some little snips to create tabs for attaching the strip to the front and back pieces. Hopefully my hands will be normal-ish soon so I can make a video!
Here's the card I made for Humble this year...
I used lots of stickers and wanted to make his card fun and dimensional! :D The card base is actually a trifold card that was in a kit I bought. The heart lifts up, and then the polka dot part folds down.
I thought I would share a few more things that I made for Humble in the past! Here's a shaped card from another birthday...
For this card, I used my favourite embossing folder: Paw Print from Darice! Love that folder! The adorable kitties are stickers from American Crafts. :o)
Here's a card I made for one of our adoption anniversaries...
I found this super-cute 12x12 cat paper from Best Creation's Meow collection, and I cut part of the paper for the front of the card and decorated the inside of the card with other images from the paper. Since the little guy is taking a nap in his bed, I decided to make a 'dream bubble' using the Cloud Border die from Taylored Expressions. I used Thickers for the sentiment -- these are my favourite Thickers, so I bought three sets [the set's called 'Kitten', too!]. Same Thickers I used on this year's card for Humble! :D
Here's a Christmas card I made for him...
To make this, I used the same Sack It Kitty set that I used to make this year's box-bag! The hat is a printed die-cut, and I added some Flower Soft to it for texture. :D
I love making things for Humble...he means so much to me. :o) Happy birthday, Humble boy! I'm so happy you're in this world!
After making the monster tags for my last video, I had one monster left over and didn't want to neglect him!
I made this card using dies from We R Memory Keepers -- the frame die is from one set, and the square with rounded corners is from a separate set. I thought this sentiment was a good fit for the monster because he's got his cute little hands out! :o) I wrote "I Love You" with a black fineliner and spelled out the rest with little foam Thickers from American Crafts.
In my video, I showed this card that I made back in February using Taylored Expressions stamps and dies [click here for the original blog post for this card]:
Here's the other card I showed in the video -- I made this for my dad's birthday this year!
The cat is from Penny Black's Good Day stamp set. I coloured him to look a little bit like Humble! :o) They have a range of stamp sets and rubber stamps featuring these adorable cats doing different things -- typing, driving a car, riding a bicycle...they're just so cute!
Here's my video showing how I made the monster card, and I also share a simple tip for placing letter stickers!
If you're reading this post in an e.mail and don't see the video, click here to go to my blog post or click here to watch on YouTube.
SUPPLIES USED
To be up front, these are affiliate links, folks! For some products, the exact version I have is no longer on Amazon, so I've linked to the version that is available.
Here to share this card I made using the Souper Soon stamp & die combo from Taylored Expressions...
:o) I really like this particular series of stamps with the smiling characters -- they're so cute! I've collected three of the sets so far. I also used TE's Cloud Border die -- that's a fun one! The cute little heart is from their Stamp of Approval set of Little Bits dies.
I coloured and die-cut the characters a while back, and they were just waiting to be made into something! I set out to make a card based on the sketch only, but by the time the card came together, I realized that I had used three of the colour challenge colours also. Hoo-hoo! :o)
It's been a long time since I last blogged! A lot has happened since my last post.
In November, we celebrated Humble's birthday and our adoption anniversary! :o) We've been buddies since 2004, which is a big deal to me...over a decade! I always get very emotional thinking back to the day I adopted him.
Unfortunately, I had to put him through a few vet visits in November and December, and we were on a bit of a roller coaster trying to get him onto a new medication. He's doing well, thankfully -- just not super-jazzed about taking more medication, but that's understandable. I made him a bunch of things for his birthday, our adoption anniversary and Christmas, including a stuffed toy that he actually plays with!WOO-HOO!! Makes me feel useful. :D Here's the card I made to celebrate his adoption...
:D I think a lot of folks living with cats can agree: Cats are THE LAW.
The funny stamps are from Starving Artistamps, one of my favourite stamp companies. I tried to colour the cat to look like Humble. :o) He has a brown patch right in the middle of his belly that is really the most adorable thing ever. EVER!
"WANTED: treats" was handwritten with marker. :o)
Yesterday I reshared a bunch of office themed projects, and now I'm back to share some of my old favourites with the same theme!
:o) This file folder shaped card appeared in 75 Creative Card Challenges! Most of the stuff on this card is from October Afternoon's 9 to 5 collection, which is one of my favourite collections from OA! When I first got my 9 to 5 supplies in the mail, I was so excited and made four cards in one sitting -- this card was one of them!
:o) I made this card way back in 2010 with supplies from another October Afternoon collection called Hometown. I remember how much fun it was to make this and love how it turned out! :D
:o) I have such a fondness for this card! I made this in 2010 with a stamp from Lawn Fawn's Hello Friend stamp set. Being such a fan of office themed things, I have a lot of little clips and love making stuff where it looks like pieces of paper are clipped to the card. Inspiration: clipboards!
By some crazy luck, this card was one of the projects chosen to be replicated for display in Archiver's stores when they started carrying Lawn Fawn products. I couldn't believe it! The stores needed the sample projects within a very short time frame, and certain supplies needed to be substituted for things that could be purchased at Archiver's, so I couldn't make the cards myself. I was able to help, though, with the stamping and fussy cutting of the letters and happy faces! Here's what they all looked like:
:o)
That's actually all I could do -- there wasn't enough time for anything else! I packed up the pieces in little baggies and sent them to Lawn Fawn via FedEx, and guess what? FedEx was LATE. The package was checked by customs and they actually opened everything! Can you imagine the reaction to all of those little letters? When the package was delivered, the LF folks and some volunteers put all of the samples together in time for Archiver's. Amazing!
:o)
Another fun one to make! I made this card in 2011 with various Lawn Fawn stamps. I was going for a "pen doodles on a notebook page" look! :D
:o)
Here's another card I made in 2011 using Lawn Fawn stamps. Love that notebook page die and thought I'd use the die-cut horizontally, just for a little change. I knew I wanted to make the sentiment multi-coloured, but when I tried inking the stamp with the markers I had, I didn't quite get the look I was going for...so I came up with this! :D Some crazy fussy cutting, but it was worth it!
