Dumplings by the Dozen

This is just a quick little post today….I have relocated my stamping supplies to the family room so no stamping going on in the last couple of days!!!  I wanted to share the gift that I made for my club hostesses; I lost the original picture, which showed ALL the different fabrics, so I will just have to show you two that happened to be at our last club meeting:

Sorry the photo isn’t better…I snapped it on my kitchen table!  They are called dumpling bags and I got the directions to make them HERE.  (I made the larger one).   I wish you could see the inside; they are lined with coordinating fabrics and they have a little ruffled ribbon tie on the zipper.  VERY cute and big enough to hold Snips & Snail to tote with you when stamping at an event!!!  And since some of the fabric on the Clearance Rack is $.99, you can make one for a song!   Here’s a closer view of one:

I made FOURTEEN of these!  I started back in the fall, and I don’t have my get-together until January,  so there was a lot less pressure than if I had to have them done by Christmas! 

Enjoy your day---be sure to stop back tomorrow for the Paper Players challenge, where I am the hostess!

Bubbles in the sink!

My Calypso Friend

Happy Saturday, peeps!  Do you have some stamping/fun time scheduled today?  I have a little free time, I hope I can get some in!  Meanwhile, I wanted to share a card with you that highlights some of the new mini catalog products:  Tea for Two Designer Fabric, Itty Bitties and the Borders Scoring Plate.  I love orange hues almost as much as I love blues, so when I saw the Tea for Two fabric, I knew it would be on my wish list!

But before I worked on the fabric, I cut my cardstock and embossed a little line of dots & scallops at the bottom border.  Can you see it there?  A big thing to remember when using the Borders plate is that you must work on the BACK of your project!!!!  I’ll give you a couple other hints at the end of the post, too!  Then I cut a strip of fabric about 10” long for my card with my pinking shears and gathered it on my machine with a basting stitch.  That step was rather moot, as my thread ended up breaking just before I adhered it to the card, so I didn’t bother to re-sew, just sort of hand-gathered it on top of a line of sticky strip.

I added another line of sticky strip on top of the gather and adhered my ribbon.  The final touch was the image from Perfect Punches and the little bird from Itty Bitties:

There are so many fun little images in that set, I find myself looking for ways to use it!
So here are some tips I have found helpful for using the Borders plate:

• Remember to have your project face down before you emboss!!!
• Use blue painter’s tape (my hubby wanted to know when I was going to return his and I told him NEVER—go buy some new) to anchor your project in place.  I used little bits, but do be careful, as it is not foolproof and it will tear the cardstock or paper if you don’t use a gentle hand when removing it!  I speak from experience!  This tape is also good for anchoring your dies in the Big Shot!
• A piece of waxed paper rubbed on your cardstock along the embossing area beforehand helps the stylus emboss smoothly.
• Hold your stylus upright, perpendicular to your project, not at an angle, to get the best embossing.
• If you butt your cardstock all the way to the top of the scoring plate and don’t get that last little area embossed because of the way the overlay is created (if you own one of these, you’ll know what I mean), do your embossing, remove the overlay and finish that last little bit without it.

Hope those tips help a little.  The Borders plate looks intimidating, but it is definitely a cool tool that helps to add interest to your cards!  If you have any questions, please shoot me an email!!!  Again, I cannot always answer your questions from the comment screen, so email is best!  And be sure to come back tomorrow for the Paper Players challenge!

Cassidy managed to get my church bulletin from my Bible and found fun ways to play with it:

Reading:

Arranging (she seems to like doing this to a lot of things):

and making it fly in the air!

Enjoy your day!

I Love My Friends….

because they make such sweet gifts for me!  I wanted to share with you some of the lovely items my stamp club girls have made for me lately:

Going clockwise and starting at the top, my friend Linda made me a wonderful “never-ending” card….you open it over & over again….and it is stamped in the loveliest colors; my friend Maryanne made a cute chicken pincushion from some SU fabric; my friend Ruth made a lovely post-it note holder; my friend Beth made an adorable St. Pat’s candy wrapper filled with goodies; and again, Maryanne made a cute little candy holder with a window and a fun little note card!   Maryanne had my chicken wrapped up in a nice cello bag with a cute tag & flower too, but I forgot to take a picture of that! 

Now here’s an example of what my club hostesses received this month:

The pattern for this is available on the Resource page at SplitcoastStampers; I made this one with Daffodil Delight cardstock and ink and used Fresh Vintage and Creative Elements stamp sets.  The bow is white seam binding that I dyed with DD ink, and it is filled with little unused bits & bobs left from various projects.  It sure makes a sweet little creation!

It has been so warm here, Cassidy has shed her socks:

And is doing her reading barefooted!

Happy New Year!

Enjoy your day with your family---we’ll be “de-Christmasing”, as my girlfriend calls it, the house today.  I thought I would share a little gift that my sweet blog friend Shirley created and gave to me for Christmas! 

Isn’t he cute?  Or maybe it’s a she?  The party hat is something I added…..a little fun accessory that I will try to change each month!!!  So stay tuned!  I haven’t decided on a name for my little owl yet…..any suggestions?    Enjoy your day!!  And be sure to come back next Sunday when the Paper Players challenges resume!!!

More Fabric

Can you stand any more fabric projects?  I have been having fun with SU’s Spice Cake line….so pretty! Here is a gift bag I made for one of my club hostesses:

It’s just a brown paper bag trimmed at the top to fit a half sheet of cardstock.  I used some fusible web to adhere the fabric to the cardstock, then sticky stripped the cardstock to the bag; added a little button embellishment with a fabric banner and a fabric tie.  Sentiment is from You’re A Gem.

At the club meeting we made a simple box from the #2 die and used fabric as a tie-on embellishment:

And finally, I saw ADORABLE gathered fabric baskets here and knew I just had to make one!  Unfortunately, I again used that fusible webbing to adhere my batting to my fabric, and the type I used does not work with a sewing machine….so I had to hand sew the entire thing and it is a MESS!  So I will try this again, but I at least wanted to show you how cute it could be:

Be sure to look at Sarah’s baskets so you know what they’re supposed to look like!  Thanks for visiting today!

Big Buttons!

First, I have to preface my post with a warning:  this is a little long, and my printer, which is a photo printer, prints the WORST photos in the world.  If it weren’t for the fact that I just bought ink cartridges for ALL the colors, I would throw this thing out the window.  The first few photos I printed (several years ago) were wonderful; then boom….nothing worked; different brands of paper, different settings, nothing.  So this project could have been much better IF I had a better photo printer; suffice it to say, once the ink is gone, so is this printer.  I will gladly take suggestions, if you love your printer; I’d love to hear what you like!

OKAY, that being said, if you were fortunate enough to get a freebie bundle from SU, you might have gotten those big, honkin’ buttons in the Spice Cake colors.  PHEW….what in the world was I going to do with them?  They’re big enough to frame a picture—AHA!  Here we go, and I even used some more fabric:

This little project really is honkin’ cute, and speedy to make,  but unfortunately, it was also difficult to photograph (whine, whine).  I hope you can just imagine it….I tried to print Cassidy’s photos in sepia, after the b&w attempt came out sort of turquoise….not the effect I was looking for.  I tried a couple other things,  finally gave up, went with what I had, punched them out with a 1 1/4” punch and went to work.

I used a narrow strip of Spice Cake fabric, folded the long edges over and ironed them together with some fusible webbing.  I had some matching felt and pinked it into a strip about 10” long and hot-glued the fabric on top.  I found a D-ring (honestly, it’s probably 30 years old) and glued the strip through the ring; glued the photos to the buttons, the buttons to the strip and glued the bow to the top.  Done!

Enjoy your day!  Remember, if you LOVE your printer, let me know!

More Fabric!

I was experimenting again with using fabric on my projects and I was thrilled with the results of this!  Here it is:

I used the Tasteful Trim die to cut two 9” scalloped pieces from the Spice Cake fabric.  I then ran two strips of Sticky Strip down the Spice Cake DP (how convenient that this paper is STRIPED!) and “ruffled” the fabric along the Strip.  I anchored it at top & bottom first, then the center and out from there.  Does that make sense?  I guess I could do a tutorial if I had enough interest, let me know what you think.  I then covered it with some Pool Party Ruffled Ribbon, added a button and my sentiment.  Here’s a closer look:

I am still trying to come up with ideas using fabric; if you have any to share, let me know!

Wee Details:

• Stamps:  Fabulous Florets, Friendly Phrases
• Paper:  Naturals Ivory, Pool Party, Spice Cake DP
• Ink:  Early Espresso, Pool Party
• Acc:  Tasteful Trim Die, Ruffled Ribbon, Sticky Strip, Button & floss, Lots of Tags Die, dauber

Who says you need a bath to play in the bathtub?

Thanks for visiting today!

Paper Players Challenge 36

Happy Sunday to everyone!  I am back from my blogging vacation and ready to share my Paper Players Challenge 36 project with you.  This week, Nance is our host and she has chosen “Fun with Fabric” as her theme! 

What a great challenge!  SU has some really pretty fabric right now---and I made a really, really easy project using a baby food jar that I had in my stash!  This makes a great hostess gift when you fill it with some buttons, brads, ribbon or a little incentive stamp:

I took a piece of Springtime Vintage fabric and cut a circle using my pinking shears, then used Sticky Strip to attach it to the edge of the jar lid, pleating it as I went around.  Then I tied on some narrow black grosgrain ribbon.  I cut a felt flower with the Fun Flower diecut, added a “leaf” of Baja Breeze seam binding and a button center accented with a pearl.  EASY!!! 

The Paper Players can’t wait to see what you come up with!  Use some fabric or fabric-related images to make your creation and share it with us over at the Paper Players blog! 

• Stamps:  none
• Paper:  none
• Ink:  none
• Acc:  Springtime Vintage fabric, felt, Fun Flowers diecut, Basic Black narrow grosgrain ribbon, Baja Breeze seam binding, Subtles button, pearl, Sticky Strip

Yo Ma!

I’ve been hoarding my SU Candy Cane Christmas fabric, just like I hoard DP!  But I had an idea swirling in my head and a new pair of Dollar Store stretchy gloves, so I made some fabric yo-yos, added a button and tacked it on to my gloves:

Truthfully, I didn’t think about the STRIPES not looking so hot made into a circular yoyo, but oh well.  I’ll maybe try the polka-dots on another pair!!!  LOL!  Sorry I didn’t have any “hand models” on which to photograph these….but how about this tiny little hand:

She sweetly took a nap while I stitched these up…..really, they took no time at all!  Thanks for lookin’ and have a blessed weekend!

ColourQ41

Ooh, lala!! Wait until you see the bold color inspiration Arielle has chosen this week! I immediately ran to my fabric cupboard when I saw this:

I knew I had some black and hot pink felt, along with a piece of gray heather wool that I picked up at a yard sale for a dime!! I pulled out some dies and went to work:

Again this week, not much stamping (hangs head low)….but with the impact this flower makes, you don’t need much! I used the scraps from the flowers to diecut some additional little circles and blinged everything up!!! The card base is Pretty in Pink, the mat is SU’s retired Bride’s DP. Dies used were Nestie Blossom and SU’s Flower Layer 3. The little pink center is from the Sweet Pea felt flowers from the last mini! “Sweet” is from the PTI Cupcake Collection! I purposely left the inside blank, so that I could use this as the occasion arose! I just found out that this also qualifies for the Flourishes FTTC75, which is to use felt!

Now pop on over to the ColourQ blog to see what the Royal Court created this week!! You can also click on the blinkie on the sidebar! Come on and play along with us!!! You could be queen for a week! :D

• Stamps: Cupcake Collection, PTI
• Paper: Pretty in Pink, Brides DP
• Ink: Pink Passion
• Acc: Nesties, SU Flowers 3 Diecut, Felt & Fabric, Sweet Pea Felt Flowers, SU Rhinestone brads, Word Window punch, Bling from craft store, Corner Rounder punch