More CHA!

Here are more photos from CHA:
(I am learning how to use my iPhone so bear with me.)

Photos from
1. Technique Tuesday
2. Savvy Stamps
3. Kaisercraft
4. Dimensions needle craft
5. Canvas Basics

Enjoy’

Fabulous finds… CHA edition

Here I am at CHA, the center of the craft universe! With a little help from my tech savy daughter, her hubby and my hubster I will attempt to post some great crafty finds.

From 7 gypsies:

Fabulous Finds Friday — Easy Stamping!

I found the perfect way to entice my non-crafty friends into stamping! Hero Arts has a new line called Add Your Message. This might not sound very exciting to all you experienced stampers, but to me, this line is the perfect way to show non-stamping friends how easy and satisfying it is to use a rubber stamp. Talk about enabling!

Check it out:

These pre-printed sets include 12 colorful cards, envelopes and four wood mounted sentiment stamps. How easy can it get? Besides the butterflies above and the Paris set below, designs include flowers, stripes and more.

Hero Arts has some other great new products, including Frame Cuts — cutting dies made by Sizzix to coordinate with Hero Arts images. What I love about these sets is that the dies are labeled so you know exactly which stamps match the shapes.

There are also more Stamp & Emboss sets, more die/stamp combos and new Mid-Tone Shadow inks that are a touch brighter than the existing Shadow Inks. I’ll share more later, when I’ve had a chance to test out these products.

Thanks for stopping by!

Valentines!

Valentine’s Day is my favorite card making excuse, er, holiday. I love sending valentines to my children, my friends, military troops, and of course, the Hubster.

Imagine my delight when I got this new paper pack — Kissing Booth — from BasicGrey:

Being the Queen of Impatient Stampers, I had to make something RIGHT THIS MINUTE.

So I made this very simple, very plain card from this adorable paper:

Just the paper, some distressing and I was done. Hmmm…. that really is way too simple…. I need to add something….

I got a little more creative by cutting out hearts from another paper and actually stamping:

(background: envelope lining by Hero Arts; love by Stampin’ Up) To create the varigated background I inked up my stamp (with a pigment pink), put the stamp on the table (rubber-side up) and pressed my card to the stamp. I used my thumbs to press a little more firmly in a few areas to get that random extra texture.

Okay… now I’m gettin’ into the swing of things:

(paper, BasicGrey; envelope lining background Hero Arts; words Stampin’ Up; heart trio Stampendous!  The brown ink is a yummy dye ink from the ColorBox Stephanie Barnard line) 

Thanks for stopping by … I’ll have more valentines coming up. I can’t stop using this paper!

Fabulous Finds Friday — A Crafty Mystery

I know, I know… I promised you some Valentine’s Day cards. But I’m too excited about an upcoming book — a perfect pick for a Fabulous Finds Friday. It involves friends, food and crafting. How can you lose?

My colleague  and fellow writer, Mollie Cox Bryan, has penned a delightful mystery, called Scrapbook of Secrets, about an investigative journalist who becomes a stay-at-home mom in picturesque Cumberland Creek, Virginia. She joins a scrapbooking group and the scrappy scrappers become involved in finding out why a young mother seemingly commited suicide. The friends discover that Maggie Rae was a closet scrapbooker who left behind more than a few secrets, and her suicide starts lookng like murder.

Who can resist such a crafty plot?

Mollie, a mother of two girls, is a food writer and cookbook author who loves food, murder mysteries and scrapbooking — not necessarily in that order. Scrapbook of Secrets is set to be published Feb. 6 by Kensington Books. You can find more information here.

She said the book idea came to her “when I was going to a lot of scrapbooking events and was blown away by the generosity and quick friendships of other scrapbookers. I wanted to write a story about the power of women’s friendships.”

Mollie is currently working on book three of her Cumberland Creek trilogy — so there will be more scrapy good reading to come. You can see more of Mollie’s work at her Website/blog, molliecoxbryan.com. (We’ll have to get Mollie to do some rubber stamping!)

Isn’t she adorable?

Thanks for stopping by … and stay tuned for some Valentines. Really.

Magical Book Art

I came across something I just had to share … it’s a magical convergence of books and art!

A mysterious book lover and artist has left tiny sculpted gifts to museums in Scotland. Anyone who loves books and loves crafty things, must check this out: http://thisiscentralstation.com/featured/mysterious-paper-sculptures/

I wanted to make a card to illustrate this post… but have run out of time. So I’m dusting off a fast and easy set I made several years ago (so long ago I was scanning cards because I didn’t have a digital camera!) So in honor of trees, here they are …

See, I told you it was simple and easy! (The color is off, but oh well….)

(tree stamp from Gloria Page; words Stampin’ Up.)

Thanks for coming by … I hope to have some Valentine’s Day cards posted Friday, along with some new products from Hero Arts.)

New Year’s Card and a quick Fabulous Find

Heavens! I believe this is my first post in the new year. Happy New Year everyone!

Since I was, ahem, a little late with some of my holiday cards, I covered nicely by sending out a few New Year’s cards, which was actually kind of fun. Here is a random card I dressed up for New Year’s:

(Argh, what a blurry picture! I don’t drink, so I don’t know what my excuse is!! I did, however, shoot this photo on New Year’s Day.)

Bird stamp by Martha Stewart; background done with various shimmer mists; bird painted with Twinkling H2Os.

And my Fabulous Find for this Friday is this lip-smacking packet from BasicGrey called Kissing Booth:

Doesn’t it just scream Valentine’s Day? I’ve already cut up a few pieces and will have some cards next week.

Thanks for stopping by… and here’s to a happy, healthy new year!