10th Anni VERVE sary Release Spotlights Day 3

Welcome to Day 3 of our 10th Anni-VERVE-sary Spotlight Hops!  Have you been loving the inspiration along  Day 1 Hop and Day 2 Hop? Seriously fabulous cards! If you haven't had time to check them out yet, hop on over. All of our blog hop drawings are open until August 31.  Yay!

Our special 10th Anni-VERVE-sary release is a fusion of new and classic Verve and will be available to order on August 28. The release includes 4 stamp sets and 2 die sets. If our peeks inspire and you feel like you just need to have it all, you can pre-order the Anni-VERVE-sary Buy it All Bundle right now at a 30% discount through August 27. In fact, our whole store is on sale right now to celebrate 10 years of Verve!

Over the next few days we'll be shining our creative spotlights on the new Verve sets and dies, giving you tons of inspiration with the new goodies, and a chance to win!

Today's hop is spotlighting the Cake & Candles stamp set.

Today we also have special guest appearances from two rockstar Diva Alumni.... Michelle Woerner and Tosha Leyendekker. I am so honored to still consider these amazingly talented designers part of the Verve family. I remember how ecstatic I was when each one said yes to my invitation to be a Diva and I'm just as thrilled today to hop alongside them once again! Over the years, both of these wonderful women has blessed myself and Verve with their time and talents. I am forever grateful.

Want to win some shiny new Verve? We'll be picking a random commenter on one of the hop spots below to win today's featured products! Leave a little shout out in the comments section on all the blogs below to increase your chances!

1. Julee 7. Lesley 2. Maureen 8. Christyne 3. Betty 9. Laurie 4. Charmaine 10. Kelly (Guest) 5. Marisa 11. Michelle W. (Alumni) 6. Tosha L.(Alumni)

Comment deadline for prize drawing is Thursday, August 31.

My card for today is sweet and sassy. I was playing around with watercolors and created this pink and red background.  I loved how it turned out and wanted it to be the centerpiece of the card, so I stamped the wishing you a year of joy sentiment from Cake & Candles  in black.

I then embossed the cupcake in black and cut with a square die, watercoloring with the same pastel dreams watercolor confection palette.  I colored the wrapper with a grey marker and then also matted this square in black.  I selected this super cool black and white paper to jazz things up. Isn't it so dramatic?  So dramatic, in fact, that I opted for no embellishment at all.

Cake & Candles is a set of 18 clear photo polymer stamps that retails for $24. It's only fitting for our 10th Anni-VERVE-sary release to have a birthday set, right? This one is another fusion of new and classic Verve, with the re-appearance of the so very popular Happy Birthday and Birthday To You plain janes, as well as a fun Dr. Seuss quote from our 1st Anni-VERVE-sary commemorative set, Beautiful You. I added in a new cupcake and a few new sentiments that I frequently find myself writing inside birthday cards. Oh and a special request for a happy cake and candles stamp for Moe.

The hop starts over on my blog, Poetic Artistry, so click on over for another card from me using this fun set. See ya there!

Enabler's List
Stamps: Cake & Candles (Verve Stamps)
Paper: Office Suite (Fancy Pants), black, white
Ink: onyx black (Versafine), Pastel Dreams Watercolor Confections (Prima), copic markers
Accessories: pierced square die, clear embossing powder 

June 2014 Diva Dare - Day 9

Hi there! Amber here to welcome you to Day 9 of our June Diva Dare! This month, we're all about the boys!

 This month we're daring you to create a stamped card or project with a masculine theme. 

Instead of going for a straight up "man" card, I decided to make a birthday card for a LITTLE man!

I obviously had way too much fun with the spray mist on this card, haha! First step was to emboss the gears from Geared Up in white embossing powder on a piece of Tim Holtz's amazing watercolor paper. After that, I started dripping and splashing some Dylusions inks in blue, turquoise, and a deep blue. To achieve the layers, I dripped ink, then blotted, dripped more ink, then blotted, dripped some water on to pick up colors in some areas, and then dripped some more and hit it with a heat gun to  keep some intense colors as well as the washed out colors. 

The cute little robot is also from Geared Up. The balloons and sentiment are from Chevron Love, and the banner is from Wonderful Marvelous. I embossed the robot and the banner in white embossing powder on vellum paper so I didn't cover up too much of that fun background. For the sentiment, I did some out of the box trimming so my balloons are still attached to the sentiment panel. For one last detail, I added some Metal Mix sequins.

Two ways to win prizes for double the fun!

Win a $40 gift voucher to Verve! Take our A Man's World dare and link up your card to be eligible to win.  Entries must be masculine in theme, posted 6/6 or later, include at least one Verve product and be linked up to the linky widget by 8pm Mountain on 6/25/14.  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 Verve set of your choice! For another chance to win some new Verve, leave a little comment love on our design team's A Man's World 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 June 25, 2014.

Winners will be announced on June 26, 2014.