Grid Technique in Monochrome!

Good Afternoon all!

I am super EXCITED for today's new Loves Rubberstamps challenge because, not only is it fun, BUT we start the search for our September Guest Designer! I know we will have some amazing entries because our players each week do some G-O-R-G-E-O-U-S work! Can't wait to start seeing the entries :)

If you want to try out here are the details...

Our Guest Designer will create projects for our weekly challenges for the month of their term. You will have your work showcased on the Loves Rubberstamps challenge blog along with the design team samples, on our facebook page, and possibly in our store as samples. Term will be 4 - 5 weeks depending on how many weeks there are in your month. The only requirement is you HAVE to use stamps from companies that we carry in our store on your projects and they have to be in their current line, no retired images. Even if we do not have that particular image in stock, as long as it is a current one we can order... you can use it.

As a guest designer you will receive a 20% discount off any stamps that we carry in the store during your term!

If you want the chance to be our guest designer for the month of SEPTEMBER just play along in one of our weekly challenges and put GDT after your name next to your entry. We will be accepting applicants in this week's challenge and next week's and will announce who the Guest Designer will be on August 21st. We will be looking for entrants who stand out through any of the following... awesome coloring skills, paper piecing, great use of color, creativity, outstanding design, and just pure genius :) Hope you will try out for a spot!

Now speaking of this week's Loves Rubberstamps Challenge...this week we are playing BINGO! I love Bingo! There is a casino about 45 miles from us that has BINGO sessions and my husband and I used to go on Sundays. You payed $25 to play 17 games that payed out $500 to win. We didn't win very often but it was fun. In fact... I ended up getting myself a BINGO bag that said.... "How come everyone ELSE gets to yell BINGO and all I ever get to yell is "Oh S%#T" ... probably not the most appropriate but it was funny. It would give the elderly ladies a giggle :) 

The challenge is to create a card that features the three elements from our Bingo Card that creates a straight line. Here is our Bingo Card....

The line that I used for my card was - Monochromatic Color Scheme, Flowers & Buttons or Brads! Here is my card...

I used the Crafter's Companion Daisies from the Paint Fushion line from Sheena Douglass. I colored them with prismacolor pencils on Stampin Up's Sahara Sand cardstock and then clear embossed them to make the colors pop. I fussy cut them out and popped them on my background that I created using the grid technique. LOVE THIS! I also created the background for this week's Splitcoaststampers technique challenge. You were to go to their resources page...type in background... and then use of the techniques to make your card. I mentioned in another post that I usually end up creating my own backgrounds over using designer paper...not because I don't like it...just the opposite...I LOVE it and I am a paper hoarder because I love to look at it, over and over - LOL!

I hope you like my card today and will join our challenge!

Here are some other challenges that I will be entering this card in:

Splitcoaststampers - TLC389 Blissful Backgrounds
Papertake Weekly Challenge - Anything Goes
Shopping Our Stash - Monochromatic
Tuesday Alchemy - Bingo - Line Created - Ribbon or Bows, Your Choice & Buttons
Craft Your Passion - Anything Goes
Lollipop Crafts - Monochromatic
The Shabby Tea Room - Soft Neutrals

Happy Stampin!
Laura

A Little Love...

Hi all -

So sorry for the later post today! I have been super busy today and feel like I am accomplishing nothing! Ever have those days? I am just getting ready to go hit the grocery store because we are out of everything! I am not a huge grocery shopping fan so I tend to just grab a few things here and there and put off the "major stock up" trips - LOL. Then it is back home to make supper then package up some customer orders, write up tomorrow's new challenge post, try and list the new Kraftin Kimmie stamps that came today :) and then if I have time start on some MFT pre-orders! Whew!

So on to today's beautiful card! This beauty was created by design team member Olivia Marmara!

This was Olivia's first time trying the out of the box technique! I think she did a beautiful job! I love the unique shape of the main panel and those colors are so pretty! LOVE it! This gorgeous image is from Kraftin Kimmie Stamps and is called Rose from the Flower Girls Collection. We will be adding these beauties in the near future!

Well I am off to the grocery store...wish me luck! Have a great night all!

You still have just a few hours left to make this week's Loves Rubberstamps Challenge! Hope to see you play :)

Laura

My Sunday Shares - August 5th

Happy Sunday All!

Hope your weekend is going great! Last night I went to watch my husband race. He races a sportmod race car every Saturday night. He did awesome! He won his heat race and then came in 3rd for the feature...and the car is in one piece which is always a bonus :) Other than that I have been working in the store. Today I will be listing all of the Preorder Saturated Canary Stamps! This line is soooo cute! I love them all - LOL! Hard to choose my favorite! I also hope to get some other preorders listed too...but I am starting with those.

For today's Sunday Shares I thought I would share one of my newest obsessions that I have been spotting on Pinterest and pinning my favorites furiously to my boards :) SMASH Journals or Art Journals.  I think these are a cool concept. If you are not familiar with them they are like a pseudo diary mixed with scrapbooking. You can journal your thoughts, memories, favorite quotes, whatever you wish and then you add artwork or pictures or keepsakes - whatever  to help put your thoughts into a visual form. Pretty cool! Here are a couple of my favorite pages I stumbled across and pinned to my boards...

Art Journal Pages:

This is a sample page from a book on Art Journaling by Violette called "Journal Bliss: Creative Prompts to Unleash Your Inner Eccentric" You can buy it at Amazon in paperback or a kindle edition.

This page was created by Michelle LaPoint Rydell - Inspiration Everywhere. This is a great idea to do every once in awhile I think. How fun would it be to read these years after? LOL!

Both of these pages were created by Lori Vliegen of Elvie Studio. I LOVE her style! You will have to check out her blog because there were MANY MANY more of her pages I could have pinned! Such a talented lady! I think the candy hearts page is such a cute way to show your favorite "mom-isms or dad-isms" that your parents used to tell you - LOL! I did find that on the Stamping Bella Blog - every Tuesday they dedicate to Art Journals. They have a prompt for you to create a page and then share it if you like along with samples from their design team. I was thinking of trying a few to jump start my thinking process :)

Those were a few examples or art journaling for memories sake. BUT there is another way to do SMASH journaling for crafters and that is to create journal pages of your favorite color combos! These are AWESOME and I really want to do one! You can use these for keeping track of different hair combinations, skin colors, clothes when you find a combo that rocks! You can make these for basically any coloring medium you use. Copics are popular ones but you could do them for any type - promarkers, spectrum noir, prismacolor pencils! Here are a few of my FAVORITE pages I found....

Created by Zoe Young Kirkby

Great hair, skin & clothes combos all on one page ...and it is super cute because it uses a Saturated Canary image :)

Focus on just Skin & Hair Colors

A Coloring Style

Or Colors for Clothes

The last three pages were all created by Emma from the Crafty Mummy of Five. This lady is AMAZING! Her cards and these journal pages are so cute!! Wouldn't you LOVE to just sit and look through these journals over and over? I know I would!

I think these would be so fun to do! Hope you enjoyed today's shares! If you do art journaling or smash journals for coloring techniques...leave a link...I would love to see them :)

If you want to see what else I have "PINNED" on my favorite boards see them here:

Art Journal Ideas
Copics and Coloring Techniques

Have a "SMASHING" day all!
Laura

A Spot of Tea

I totally said my title in my best British accent - LOL :)

Hope that you are all having a great weekend so far! I just finished loading the rest of the new C.C. Designs stamps that have arrived into the store and will be starting on some Preorders next! I wanted to take a quick break and share with you today's gorgeous creation by design team member Jacqueline Smith!

Jacqueline used a BEAUTIFUL stamp from LaBlanche called Tea Cup. She stamped it on their Specialty Stamping Paper and the detail is AMAZING! We will be adding this paper to our store soon. I think Jacqueline's tea cup looks like you could just pick it right up off the page and have yourself a little sip! Jacqueline also did a beautiful job coloring her image. I think I will go make myself a nice cup of tea to sip while I get back to work :)

Have a wonderful weekend all!
Happy Stamping!
Laura

A Little PERK ME Up!

Good Afternoon Stampers!

Well I only got a few of the new C.C. Designs stamps listed last night...only 17 more new C.C. stamps and cutters dies to go... but who is counting :)  I promise the rest will be listed tonight and then the Preorders will start getting added while we are waiting for more shipments to arrive. We have some more Kraftin Kimmie Stamps and Wild Rose Studio stamps on the way. The other Greeting Farm stamps came yesterday and those are updated in the store too! I will be back to listing as soon as I get some customer orders packed and shipped!

Ready for a cute Perk Me Up on this fabulous Friday....well wait no more

This is my favorite Peep Collection stamp from Stamping Bella called Perk Me Up Peeps! This cutie was created by our design team member Holly Flores - KopyKat Creations. Holly did a BEAUTIFUL job paper piecing the image using Summers End Designer paper by Fancypantsdesign. She added some glossy accents to the hearts and colored the peeps with copics. Holly stuck with this week's challenge inspiration theme to be inspired by this gorgeous photo from the House of Turquoise...

I think she captured those colors and textures PERFECTLY! Be sure to come play along with us in this week's challenge! We would all LOVE To see how you are inspired by this photo...and one lucky winner will win a $25.00 shopping spree to our store! Gotta love that!

Have a wonderful day all!
Laura

Beachy Dreams

Good Afternoon Stampers!

Starting next Tuesday on our blog Challenge we will begin the hunt for a guest designer for the month of September! This person will create projects for our challenges and be featured here and on our facebook page. Be sure to check back here and on our challenge blog on Tuesday for all the info :)

I wish I could be here today....

Isn't this gorgeous? I absolutely love those colors! So peaceful looking. This was created by design team member Ceal Pritchett using the Flourishes stamp set called Beach Life. I could see myself lounging in the hammock, sipping frozen strawberry margaritas with pretty umbrellas of course, being served to me by Ryan Reynolds...Ahhhhh a girl can dream :)

I am off to load some new C.C Designs stamps into the store, then hopefully will have time to get the Saturated Canary stamp Pre-Orders listed! So EXCITED for these!

Have a wonderful night!
Laura

Sweet Gertie

Holy Buckets....It is AUGUST already! Before you know it kids will be back in school, the weather will start getting colder, the leaves will be changing...hard to believe!

If that makes you a little sad...here is a super adorable card sure to make you smile!

This cutie was created by design team member Lisa Rasmussen. She used the Gertie Lulu stamp from Stamping Bella coloring her with copics. Isn't this adorable? Be sure to visit her blog... Eat. Sleep. Stamp. and see all the details :)

Have a great evening!
Laura