January Diva Dare ~ Day 11

"Smitten", January Diva Dare

Hello Verve lovelies and friends!  Welcome to the first Diva Dare of 2014!  This month's Dare is entitled "Smitten". Of course the first word that comes to mind with smitten is love, therefor what better symbol for love than some glorious hearts?

What we're daring you to do this month is to make a card or project with a heart, whether it's for the one you love, a sweet Valentine or a lunch note for a child.  Let's get smitten! 

Instead of going the traditional Valentine red/pink/white route (which I do love, by the way), I decided to combine my love of wintry objects with my hearts, i.e. snowflakes....

To make those crazy hearts, I cut out a bunch of Jotted Heart dies, Wavy Hearts and Heart Quartet dies. I then inked up the inside of a Snowflake embossing folder with some Cocoa ink and ran it through my Big Shot. The ink gives the designs a nice outlined appearance. I coupled those hearts with some wood veneer snowflakes....the big one is an ornament that I purchased at Michael's and the smaller ones I got from TJ Maxx...(you know all that cool stuff to look at while waiting on line?). The sentiment was pieced together from Verve's Merry Wishes set. All patterned papers are from Maja Design's Vintage Frost Basics collection. Lastly, a few strategic pearls finishes it off. 

Deadline to link your cards is 8PM Mountain on Wednesday, January 22nd.  Entries must be posted 1/3 or later, include at least one Verve product, include a heart, and be linked up to the linky widget by 8pm Mountain on 1/22/14.  

During this month's Diva Dare, there are 2 prizes up for grabs!

Win a $40 Gift voucher to Verve Stamps! Take our "Smitten" Dare and link up your card (created January 3rd or later) to the linky widget below to be eligible to win.  One participant will be randomly selected to win the gift voucher.  You can enter as many times as you like, but each card needs to be in a separate post.

Win a set of your choice! For another chance to win some new Verve, leave a little comment love on our design team's "Smitten" Diva Dare posts!  One lucky commenter will win a Verve stamp set of his or her choice, so be sure to tune in each day!  Comment deadline to be entered in our prize drawing is January 22, 2014.

Winners will be announced on January 23, 2014. 

- Go forth and get inky! We DARE you! -

September Diva Dare ~ Day 9

Happy Wednesday, Verve fans! It's Amy here today, checking in with Day 9 of our September Diva Dare! This month, we've come up with a fun challenge, we DARE you to Case-a-Diva!  With nineteen Divas (see the photos and links on the right sidebar), the inspiration is vast!  For those of you that are wondering...CASE means to copy and share everything.  And that is just fancy talk for copying!  What you copy is up to you!  It can be a layout, color scheme, or even something more subtle like a certain embellishment cluster!   

You will find the links to all the Diva's blogs on the right sidebar, or you can visit their individual Verve galleries!

I am honored to be CASEing the amazing Tosha! Her style is elegant and gracious and always filled with expert details. And she can seriously do it ALL! Multi-layered and dimensional, clean and simple, heavily distressed, crisp and clean all-white, 3D/altered -- it's all there! 

Some things that jump out most when looking through her gallery: distressing, vintage elegance, sheer beauty, layers, and lots of embellishing (we're kindred spirits there!). She's a genius with stamps and dies, using them in surprising and uber-creative ways that leave me scratching my head wondering why I didn't think of that.


Here's what I came up with ...  

... based on this recent beauty in Tosh's gallery. I used Tosh's overall layout and combination of elements, changing the colors and theme to Christmas. Tosh is a big fan of My Mind's Eye papers, so I stuck with MME, just a different line than the one she used. I love Tosh's punched border along the bottom and was tickled to have the same Martha Stewart punch in my aresenal. 

For the focal point, I started with a Rounded Scallop Frame that I die-cut from one of the rich burgundy patterns in My Mind's Eye's Lost & Found Christmas collection. On top of that is a Curvy Bookplate diecut that I stamped with the matching frame in Tag Time and a sentiment from Merry Wishes. As a CASE of Tosh's out-of-the-box thinking, I used the larger of Verve's Leafy Sprigs dies, the corresponding leafy sprig image from Sunny Days, and some white pearls to creative a mistletoe accent for the tag cluster (at least I hope it looks like mistletoe!):

That's it for me today! I can't wait to catching up on all of your gorgeous challenge entries so far! If you haven't played along yet, there's still plenty of time!

Want to know how you can win some fabulous new VERVE GOODIES?

1. Play along with us and link up your new Case-a-Diva creation (posted September 16 or later) to the linky widget on the DAY ONE post before 9pm Mountain on Sunday,October 2nd. One lucky stamper will win a $30.00 gift certificate to the Verve Store. Verve Stamps are not required, but if you've got 'em we would  LOVE to see ‘em!
2. For another chance to win, be sure to give the Divas a little shout-out in the comments section as we share our Case-a-Diva  creations. One lucky commenter will win the Verve stamp set of his or her choosing!  Winners will be announced on Monday,October 3rd right here on the Verve blog.

Now it's YOUR turn!  We DARE you to show us your creations!

Have a fabulous day!!

Winter Project Parade ~ Day 11

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Hi there everyone!  It's Jackie here and before I get to my Triple Play Project Parade post, I just wanted to let all of you in on some more Verve fun.....The new release hop starts today!  The new sets are amazing  and the Diva's have some wonderful samples to show you.  For a list of hoppers, just head on over to Julee's blog.....

 

I don't know about you, but I am in awe of all of the inspiring projects we've seen from the Diva's so far on this Triple Play Project Parade!  When Jen told us this month's theme was Triple Play, I immediately thought of a trio of gift card holders.  I know I am always looking for fun ways to package up (boring) gift cards and this year I've found my answer!  So let's get to it!

 

I purchased a few of these Altoid style tins online and they make PERFECT gift card holders!  I prettied them up with some gorgeous Echo Park Wintertime dp and three new release winter sets from Verve, Glad Tidings, Merry Wishes and Vintage Oval Frame.

I stamped the Vintage Oval Frame three times in Dark Chocolate on white cardstock.  Inside each frame I stamped three different sentiments in Not Quite Navy ink.  I then took the smallest snowflake from Glad Tidings, inked it in Dark Chocolate, stamped off once on scrap paper and then stamped it over the sentiment.  I LOVE the way this looks!  I then used my trusty Vintage Oval Frame Die (I heart my dies) and cut out all three frames.  Each tin was covered in coordinating patterns from Echo Park Wintertime.  I love the beautiful blues and browns in this paper.  Lastly I stamped and cut out six of the smallest snowflakes from Glad Tidings and added two to each tin.  A few adhesive rhinestones (which were colored with Copics) finish them off!

Here are all three......

The decorated inside without the gift card........Hey, I'm a last minute shopper!  LOL!

 

Now, it's your turn!

---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!!

--- View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

Winter Release Project Parade--Day 8

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Hey everyone!  It's Charmaine here with Day 8 of this month's Project Parade!  This month's theme is Triple Play. . .to create a trio of  Verve-y goodness!  I'm here today to share my creation with you! 

One thing I get requests for EVERY year from family and friends is card sets.  Actually, they ask for them all year round, but for the holidays I like to create coordinating sets rather than just putting an assortment of cards together.  For this month's challenge, I decided to create a card set (of all of the same card), a coordinating box to hold the cards and a gift card holder. 

I started out with the card and used last week's Mojo Monday Challenge for the layout.  I used the Merry Wishes set paired with the Vintage Oval Frame set and coordinating die.  I used the Season's Greetings Cuttlebug folder for the base of the card.  I accented with a while gel pen and framed the edges with dots.

For the box, I took a panel of cardstock and embossed it before attaching it to the actual box so that the embossed sentiments would be right side up.  The box was made using an 8.5"x11" piece of cardstock and scoring the 8.5" side at 1.25" on each end and then scoring the 11" side at 4.75" from each end. 

After assembling the box, I added ribbon for the handles and used the Sweet Scallop Tag stamp for the tag along with the coordinating Sweet Scallop die. The sentiment on the tag is from the Glad Tidings set.  I added some tissue paper to house the cards.

I created a gift card holder to put in the box along with the card set.  This is great if you need a little something more to add to the gift.

I hope you've enjoyed my take on the Triple Play Challenge!  Now it's YOUR turn!  :)

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---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!!

--- View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

 

We look forward to seeing your creations!

Winter Release Project Parade ~ Day 7

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Happy Black Friday!  Hopefully you had a wonderful Thanksgiving that was stuffed with family and fun!  If you're shopping today, don't forget to stop by the Verve store to see the great sale that Julee has set up for all Verve fans!  It's a trio of savings!

During the holiday season, I like to give out little somethings from my kitchen to friends and neighbors. This year I made homemade caramel dipping sauce...DELISH!  Of course, I couldn't just give them a jar of caramel sauce, I had to give them a PRETTY jar of caramel sauce!  Here are the 3 jars decorated up in the spirit of the Thanksgiving season.  You could switch up the color scheme and add more "Christmas-y" sentiments to make these as Christmas gifties.  Details follow the below the pics.

{{CLICK ON IMAGES FOR LARGER VIEW}}

JAR ONE...

 

JAR TWO...

 JAR THREE...

 

Recipe for Caramel Sauce posted HERE.

For the first jar, I created a simple rosette that is topped with a Prima flower, buttons and a sentiment from the MERRY WISHES set.

The second jar features a sentiment from the GLAD TIDINGS set and the cutie patootie mittens are from the WINTER MITTENS sets.  I love that there are little additions, like the heart that you can adorn the mittens with!

The third jar uses a sentiment from the GLAD TIDINGS set paired with both the SWEET SCALLOP TAG stamp and die.

I'm looking forward to making a bunch more of these for Christmas.  Hopefully I will find the time to decorate some bags and make cards to coordinate with the jars...a new trio, if you will!

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---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!!

--- View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

Winter Release Project Parade--Day 6

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Well, it's me, Susan and I'm here with Day 6 of our Verve-alicious Project Parade.
Well, it's me, Susan and I'm here with Day 6 of our Verve-alicious Project Parade.
Well, it's me, Susan and I'm here with Day 6 of our Verve-alicious Project Parade.
No, ya'll aren't seeing triple, I'm just getting into character and the spirit of our theme this month--The Triple Play! Jen challenged all the Verve Divas to come up with something in triplicate. This can be to create three different things that all coordinate (like a bag, a card and a tag) or to create three different cards or three different tags--just something in a group of three, it's up to you.


I went with this little box trio that hold a trio of goodies inside! It's a template that you can find and download HERE. So that means it's completely handmade (and super cheap)!


Wanna see what's inside? Keep reading...


Let's open the first one. Here we have some Hershey miniature chocolates that I wrapped with stamped Avery Address Labels. I used the Merry Wishes set for the snowflake flowers and the Holiday Phrases set for the sentiments. Can ya'll believe this little box holds almost the entire bag of chocolate? I had to exclude the Special Dark bars because they didn't match. And coincedence--they are my favorites (and they are gone.).


I filled the second box with 6 (because it's divisible by 3) tags ready to place on some brown paper packages tied up with strings. I finally got a chance to use my new Sweet Scallop Tag stamp along with the Sweet Scallop Tag Die that matches. At the same time I cut the stamped tags out, I also cut another tag in order to make the accent piece across the middles fit perfectly. The "to/from" stamp is from the set, Glad Tidings and was the perfect size for my little tags and the red berries are from the crazy fun Merry Wishes set.


And thirdly, I made a rosette ornament using the Vintage Oval Frame stamp and Vintage Oval Frame Die to match the front of the tray that holds all three boxes. The sentiment on the ornament is again from the Glad Tidings set.



Ok, well, that's all for now. Not a complicated project, just a lot of stamping, 6 different papers (again in keeping with 2 sets of three) and "putting together". I think ya'll can do it if you feel like duplicating it--or triplicating it, I should say!


NOTE: Due to the Thanksgiving Holiday, there won't be a new post tomorrow. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! (I know we have TONS to be thankful for this year!) Don't forget to stop back by on Friday, though as we have lots more to show! Say that three times fast.

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Challenges and Prizes:
---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade Posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!! Woot!!!

View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

Winter Release Project Parade - Day 3

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Hi Verve fans, it's Amy here with Day Three of our Triple Play Project Parade. Our challenge, and yours too, is to create a terrific trio of yumminess! This can be to create three different things that all coordinate (like a bag, a card and a tag) or to create three different cards or three different tags. What a fun theme, huh? And how about Sankari's and Shannan's projects so far? Oh my!

For my trio, I've put together a set of Christmas ornaments:

The first one features the "Noel" sentiment and wreath image from Glad Tidings:

The second one features a sentiment combo from Merry Wishes:

The last one features a sentiment combo from Merry Wishes and a two-layer snowflake made with images from Glad Tidings. I've also used Verve's new Vintage Oval die - love this shape!

And a couple of detail shots:

 I had so much fun putting these together - everything looks better in multiples! I hope you're inspired to play along with us. Just wait 'til you see what you could win for your Triple Play project! Check it out:

Challenges and Prizes:

---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the  official Parade Posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!! Woot!!!

View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form.

Winter Release Project Parade - Day 2

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Hello Verve Fans, it's Shannan here with day two of the Verve Winter Release Project Parade! This month's theme is "Triple Play" - where the challenge is to create a terrific trio of yumminess! This can be to create three different things that all coordinate (like a bag, a card and a tag) or to create three different cards or three different cards. I love adding handmade tags to gifts, but usually don't take the time to make them, so I thought I'd make a little set for you today!

I was inspired by my new paper from My Mind's Eye, from the Lost and Found collection, so I created a shabby trio of large gift tags that could be used for holiday gifts or other occasions.



I stamped and cut three pieces of the Vintage Oval Frame using the stamp and matching die. Then I stamped sentiments from Joy for the Journey, Merry Wishes, and Dream Big, as well as the little twig image from Merry Wishes inked with Wild Wasabi and Cherry Cobbler markers. Then I added some chunky glass glitter to the edges of the frames.


For the top of each tag, I used the Sweet Scallop Tag die to cut a piece from the damask patterned paper and adhered it to the back of the pink tag with the music score. Then I tied some seam binding to the top so I could attach each tag to my gifts.



After sponging the edges of the tag, I added another strip of damask paper across the bottom with a scalloped border, a strip of Cherry Cobbler cardstock, then finally some cream jumbo ric-rac.



To finish the tags off, the Vintage Oval panels were popped up with foam dimensionals. Here's a close-up view of one of the tags:


Well, that's it for me today...I hope you enjoyed my project! And of course we'd love for you to play along! Here are the details:

Challenges and Prizes:

---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade Posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!! Woot!!!

View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

Have a fabulous day!

Winter Release Project Parade - Day 1

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Hello Verve Fans! I am so excited to kick off the Verve Winter Release Project Parade for you today! The theme of this month's Project Parade is "Triple Play" - where the challenge is to create a terrific trio of yumminess! This can be to create three different things that all coordinate (like a bag, a card and a tag) or to create three different cards or three different cards. There are so many different possibilities for a Verve-a-licious trio of yumminess that its hard to choose anyone set, so I thought it would be fun to create a giftset from a couple of different stamp sets. I love making little gifts that I can have on hand and it was fun to create this little trio consisting of a card, a mug filled with everything ready for some hot cider with mulling spices and a CD that you can burn with your very own holiday playlists. Here is a picture of my holiday trio:

I used this week's lovely Mojo Monday sketch #165 for my card and used the sentiment from the Plain Jane Christmas Blessings. I stamped the Sweet Scallop Tag three times and cut it out using the Sweet Scallop Die and then embossed the cut tags with a Cuttlebug embossing folder. I love the tag from the Glad Tidings stamp set and stamped it three times and cut out the snowflake and adhered it to the Sweet Scallop Dies.

I created three of these tags for each of my projects to coordinate all three items together. For the second part of my triple play, I created a little mug filled with a small bottle of mulling spices, some cinnamon and a teeny little grater for the cinnamon. Nothing quite says winter like the delicious smell of mulling spices in baked goods or in hot cider :) I used the sentiment "Just For You" from the Glad Tidings stamp set and used the sentiment "Merry" from the Merry Wishes stamp set.

I used the medium and small snowflakes in the Glad Tidings stamp set to create a little topper for the bottle of mulling spices and decorated the rest with some ribbon and twine. Here is another angle for what is in the mug:

For the last project in my triple play, I cut out some cardstock for the decorated it as an insert for a CD. I thought it would be fun to create a holiday playlist and burn a couple of copies as quick presents. I used the sentiments from the Merry Wishes stamp set to create this sentiment: "Joy to the World". 

The ribbon can slide out for the CD case to open. I stamped some snowflakes from the Glad Tidings stamp set in Stazon Ink (first, I burned our holiday music onto the CD and then stamped and I heat set the snowflakes for a second after stamping it)

Project Details:

Paper: Echo Park Merry Christmas Collection and Bazzill cardstock

Stamps:Glad Tidings, Sweet Scallop Stamp, Merry Wishes, Sweet Scallop Die,  Plain Jane Christmas Blessings

Ink: Memento Bamboo leaves, Cottage Ivy, LadyBug Red, Stazon Olive ink and copics

Accessories: twine, heart punch, Spellbinders, MS snowflake punch, white gel pen, small bottle for the mulling spices, a holiday mug, CD case and ribbon from stash

I loved making each of the creations for today's Winter Project Parade's Triple Play and can't wait to see what you are going to create with the Triple Play challenge!!!

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Challenges and Prizes:

---- One lucky contestant who plays along with the Triple Play Challenge, will receive the entire January Release AND will be our Guest Diva for the month of January!!! WOOHOO!!!

---- As always, we've hidden a little prize along the parade. A lucky random commenter on one of the official Parade Posts (11/17 through 12/7) will receive a $25 Verve gift certificate!! Woot!!!

View all the challenge and prize details and submit your Triple Play Challenge projects using the official Project Parade Entry Form and check out all the details of this month's project parade!!!!

Thank you for stopping by today!

Hugs,

Sankari :)