Busy, Busy, Busy...

This weekend I'm busy prepping the Simply Stampin' kits for our team swap at our meeting on Sunday next week. 15 cards times 8 kits = lots of cutting!! Last weekend I put together my card directions sheets, and while working on progress reports on Friday afternoon while at work, I printed them up. I figured since I'm the one paying for the ink in my school printer, I'm going to use it for this project. Besides, the ink for my printer at home is easily triple the cost of the remanufactured ink that I use at school!

I managed to get the card bases cut, plus one of the designer series papers on Saturday night - and, I actually made a cutting template for the gals! Didn't know if I could pull that one together, but it worked, and it really helped me to cut the flowered designer paper from my Petal Party SSK. Now to do the other designer paper sheet, plus the card stock for the card fronts, and then there's the ribbon and other embellishments to cut and bag up... A labor of love, for sure! I think I'll bring the stamps I used for the sentiments and let the gals add them if they want. We've been having a discussion on that one, and since we may not have the stamps the artist used for her set of cards, it might be better to leave the sentiments off.

Probably won't get much more done this weekend, as we're celebrating my dear hubby's birthday tonight with my folks, and again with the rest of the family Monday night, but it looks like I'll get it done during the week and not have to cram at the last minute to get it all done (which is more the norm with me!). Have a great week, everyone!

Petal Party Simply Scrappin' Cards

Our team is taking on a rather ambitious swap this time around. Each of us picked a Simply Scrappin' kit from the new catalog and were to design 15 cards using the kit, plus any embellishments we wanted to add. Nine of us are participating, and we'll each get eight Simply Scrappin' kit of cards designed by fellow team members, ready for assembly at our next team meeting. I designed 5 cards last weekend, then got on my garland kick, so I had to get going on my SS cards this weekend. I made a few more last night, and finished them this afternoon. Now comes the 'fun' of cutting up 8 more SS kits and getting them ready to swap. I'll try to do a little each night over the next few days so I don't end up having to do them all the day before our meeting (we'll just see how well that plan works... :) I picked the cute Petal Party kit, which I'd like to actually use for a scrapbook in the future. For my cards, I used sentiments from various stamp sets, including Fresh Cuts, Spring Solitude, Hugs & Wishes, Warmest Regards, Heard from the Heart, and Say It with Scallops. I hope you like them, and I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else did with their kits!

Autumn Garland

Wowza, two garlands in one week! I'm going to do one for each season, but Winter will have to wait as I want to use the new Ski Slope designer series paper, and I don't have any of it yet! The Autumn garland was fun to make (and faster than the Halloween one). I love the Autumn Vine DSP. The letters are painted with a dark brown acrylic paint that I picked up at Michaels. More Mustard, Really Rust, and Chocolate Chip card stock accent the Autumn Vine DSP. Earth Elements buttons and brads were also used, along with Chocolate Chip 5/8 inch grosgrain ribbon, and Mustard 1/4 inch grosgrain ribbon. I hope you like it as much as I do!

Ok, I should be working on my swaps...

...but I'm having so much fun making garlands! I know, I said in my last post that I really should be working on my Simply Scrappin' Kit swaps, but I felt more like working on another garland, so that's what I did! I don't have any brown acrylic paint to paint my chipboard letters, but I'll pick some up at Joann's or Michaels on Monday. That didn't stop me from working on a couple of panels of my next garland project, did it?! Ok, so they're addictive... I thought you might like a peak at how it's coming along. I'll post again when it's finished. TTFN!

Halloween Garland Detail

Here are some close-ups of the Halloween garland panels. I think this is my favorite garland I've created to date. I think I'll also do an Autumn one, using the Autumn Vine DSP and Season of Friendship stamp set.

First, however, I need to get working on my Simply Scrappin' Kit swap for our stampin' team. We all chose a SS kit and are creating 15 cards with it, then swapping with fellow team members. The 15 cards have to use just the textured cardstock that comes in the kit, plus any embellishments we want to add, including ribbons and brads. An expensive swap this time, but I'm hoping it will lead to a few sales or at least a stamp camp or two. I designed the first five cards while hanging out with my dear hubby at our local coffee shop on Friday afternoon/evening, but I need to add a couple of embellishments and greetings to them (didn't bring any punches with me to the coffee shop). Then to come up with another 10 designs to use up the majority of the stickers and cardstock that comes with the kit. Next, the real fun starts - cutting up kits for each of our swappers, and we have a big group participating (10 or so). I have until the end of the month to get it all done, but I don't want to wait until the night before, trying to get it all together.

I have tomorrow off (yay!) so while the girls are at school, I think I'll work on a few of the swap cards (and maybe the Autumn garland)! Have a terrific week!

Halloween Garland

Looky what I made tonight! Ok, so it was last night and into the wee hours of the morning, truth be told. My brother-in-law was over Saturday night getting some much-neede tech help for his laptop from my hubby. While my hubby installed Ubuntu and Windows XP on the needy laptop, I decided to have myself some stampin' creative time! Here's the Halloween garland I created. My upline, the talented Jeanne Ciolli, created a garland with this paper and another stamp set (Batty for You), and I had intended to just copy what she had done when I got my stampin' stuff out. I'm glad that I decided to create my own so I can share it with any ladies at my stampin' group at work. I hope you like it! It features the new Halloween Frights stamp set along with the newest Halloween designer series paper, Ghostly Greetings. I just love these garlands, don't you?