MCE-Christmas in July

It's that time again!!! MCE (Monthly Card Exchange)

This time the theme was my all time favorite theme.......CHRISTMAS. Oh do I love that time of year. Last year I did 130 Christmas cards...my family and friends are now spoiled....I have been told...I am NOT to send them a store bought card or they will be insulted. Guess I better get

busy or I will be burning the midnight oil getting them done. Half the year has already gone by.

Well, on to my card. Some of you remember this post "Glitter, Tissues and Glue Oh My". I used the same technique on this background as I used on the flowers except I stamped all kinds of snowflakes with Staz-On on the Acetate.

I matted it onto a piece of cardstock and then matted it onto the white background. Merry Christmas stamp came from a set of stamps called "From Our Home Set" which is the cutest Mouse stamp set. I matted again onto darker cardstock and punch a snowflake out of the corner. The snowmen image I used is from the set called "Let it Snow". I stamped and colored it with Dick's markers, trimmed around it and set it on top of the acetate. The ribbon bow was ribbon I bought at Michaels. I am very bow challenged but am getting better!

Remember how we give a card and we get a card back? Well take a look at the gorgous MCE (below) that was given to me!! The photo just does not do it justice. It was stamped, heat embossed, colored and I just love it so much.

Kim...thank you!!!

(you can visit Kim at her blog here)

STOP and smell the coffee....well actually Latte

I have been wanting this set for a long time and finally broke down and bought it. It reminds me of waking up in the morning and smelling freshly brewed coffee or walking into a coffee shop. The smell of Lattes and coffee fill the air.

This set is called "Smell the Coffee" and I used two images from that set. I used Dick markers to color them with and for the foam in the cups I used White Tulip Puffy Dimensional Paint and before it dried I sprinkle a tiny amount of brown embossing powder to make it look like sprinkles of cinnamon.

After laying, I used the technique called "Faux Stitching" and if you knew me...you would say it looked like my real stitching which I cannot get straight if my life depended on it! lol But I like the way it came out.

The bigger cup was stamped, colored, cut out and then layered with liquid glass. After it dried, I popped it up with Sticky Doos to give it more dimension.

I stamped the words in brown which made it too hard to read...if I get daring someday...I will restamp over it with black.............if I get daring!

Men's Favorite-Toilet and Fishing!

....all that is missing is the remote control!!!! I fell in love with this stamp "Ye Ole Fishin' Hole" as soon as I saw it! I think it is a perfect image for guy card....two favorite spots they love to be.... the toilet or fishing by a pond....lol. It may look scary to color but it actually was very easy. I stamped the image with Momento and used a SU die cut to cut the shape. I used Blick markers to color the image with. The background was made from Cuttlebug Embossing Folder "Tiny Mosaic Texture". The corners came from a scrap that I had where I had glued mesh down on top. I just used a corner punch and punched out two corners from the scrap. The ribbon came from a package my boss got. (They have learned where I work-to give me all ribbon scraps and chipboard lol.) One of my brothers has a birthday in Aug.........I am saving this card for him.

Flutter By Wednesday

Make sure to scroll down...there are two post for today!

Every Wednesday Danni's Dreams has a challenge called Flutter By Wednesday. If you have a fairy stamp or a butterfly...you should jump on over and join in! You have to make a card using a butterfly or fairy and every week they add a little twist. This week you have to use brown and pink along with your fairy or butterfly image.

The fairy image was RAK'd to me and it is a fairy by The Greeting Farm. Her name is Fairy Chloe. I colored her with Dick Blick markers and I think she came out cute! I stamped a swirl and used my eyelet with interchangeable heads to punch out the different size holes. I matted it on brown paper so the brown showed through the holes. Ribbon was something I picked up from Micheal's long ago.

The sentiment is from the clear stamp set- Anytime Sentiments. I love this set...it has such a variety!

Sketch Challenges

There is a sketch challenge at a scrapbook group I belong to so I made this card to go with it. I stamped my Ocean Butterfly rubber stamp with Memento Black Dye Ink which if perfect if you are going to use alcohol free markers like Dick Blick. I used Dick Blick markers to color the butterfly and filled in bubble areas with stickles to make the image more fun. I needed something for the corner and remembered I had a Sizziz Sanddollar that I bought and used maybe once many eons ago! I blew the dust off , cut out a sanddollar and used a sand colored marker to color the edge and the middle. The flower image came from Hot off the Press which I stamped it in versamark ink onto of Stamping Up cardstock.

BREAKING NEWS!!!

My sister and I have been working on opening a rubber stamping store Stamping Palace online for years....actually I think it was months....I dunno.....just felt like years LOL! But it feels good to shout.... OUR STORE IS OPEN...www.stampingpalace.com! We are still stocking the shelves with additional rubber stamps and craft supplies but we would love you to go on in and look around! We have samples of cards on the products pages and will eventually have a gallery as well. Don't forget to look at the Tips page. As we collect more we will keep adding so keep checking back. You never know...you may discover something you never knew! We hope you are as excited as we are...because the fun has just started.

Image Contest

This card is one I made for contest in a Scrapbook and Card Yahoo Group that I belong to. We all received two stamped images of a hedgehog (one is in case you make a mistake or want to layer an image). After you made a card out of the image, you had to send a scanned copy back to the group member and she set up a poll of all the cards. She did not include any names on who did what. We had to vote for our favorite one and my card won!! I believe this image of the hedgehog is a Penny Black rubber stamp. I colored it using Black Markers which are similar to Prisma Makers. I used both stamped images to layer my hedgehog and paper towels, sponge & blue ink to make my clouds. The flowers and leaves have Liquid Glass on them to make them 3-D with a little bit of sparkle in the middle. White background is the Dots CB Folder and along the bottom is another border CB folder. After embossing, I took the blue ink pad and wiped it across the flower border. I had extra pieces left over from the second stamped image so I colored one of the flowers, cut it out and glued it down on the inside of the card.