Easter Eggs

This is a quick to make Easter card :). We had six inches of snow last week so, in rebellion to winter, I used bright springy colors :-D. The eggs are stamped, then cut out, and popped up on dimensionals.

I am writing these and scheduling them to post ahead of time, but while I'm writing, I'm still sick- ick! So please excuse my lack of chattiness (is that even a word?). Thank you for stopping by and have a great day!!!

Blessings!
Barb

Easter Card

I thought I ought to get crackin' on some Easter cards before April gets here :-). I used mostly Whisper White with just a splash of So Saffron for color. White is such a clean and fresh color- makes me think of sheets drying on the line in the sun and how they smell when they've spent the day in the fresh air. 

I used the Ticket Corner punch on the corners for the inside and matted it on So Saffron. My sentiment is stamped in So Saffron and I added a little butterfly to finish up the inside. 

I am doing up the posts for this week in my bed on my laptop and I'm hoping my throat is much better by the time this posts :-). On that note, I think I need to rest a bit so please excuse me for not being too chatty this week. Have a wonderful day today!!!

Blessings!
Barb

Supplies:
Paper: Whisper White- 100730, So Saffron- 105118
Classic Stampin' Ink: So Saffron- 105213
Stamps: Easter Blossoms- 122057 clear mount, God's Blessings- 114972 wood mount
Dies: Beautiful Wings- 118138
Textured Impressions Embossing Folder: Framed Tulips- 121809, Elegant Bouquet- 115964
Other: pearls, So Saffron Stampin' Write Marker- 105114

Where is Spring?

We had snow again a few days ago- 3 inches! I'm so glad that it was gone in just a couple of days! I am more than ready for Spring to get here, although there are some tell tale signs appearing. The peonies are already sending up their shoots as well as the daffodils. Looking at a lot of white snow and brown grass made me really long for some Spring colors, as you will see in the next three posts :-) ....

I am not going to be chatty today :D. We made a trip to Chicago over the weekend because our daughter had a Meet and I got one entire hour of sleep the whole weekend. I learned that it isn't good to photograph Meets on one hour of sleep. I don't know how many good ones I got out of 1,434 photos, but I will be surprised if 200 of them are good ones :o(. After a brief look this morning I am really happy that I use a digital camera and not a film camera! Can you imagine the cost of losing that many photos after you took 1,434 of them? Anyway, I am absolutely exhausted! Hope you all have a GREAT day today! I may sleep part of it!

Blessings!

Barb

I will add the supplies tomorrow. I hope you don't mind :)

Supplies:

Paper: Pretty in Pink-100459, Whisper White-100730, Baja Breeze-111352, Marina Mist-119682, Old Olive-100702, So Saffron-105118, Designer Series Paper- 124156

Punches: Heart to Heart-119881

Dies: Daisies #2=114520, Beautiful Wings-118138, Sweet Buttons embosslit-121813

Textured Impressions Embossing Folder: Framed Tulips-121809

Build a Bear Workshop Easter Bunny

Sorry for being so late in posting and for not posting yesterday. My daughter is a figure skater (roller skates) and I made her a new skate dress for St. Patrick's Day on Wednesday so she would have it for class on that same day. It's emerald green, of course :-). I have a shoulder injury and amazingly, there is a lot of reaching when you sew- who knew?!! The reaching irritates the rotator cuff, so I needed to take a couple of days to rest my shoulder.

If you've been following my blog for a while, then you already know that the Build a Bear Workshop dies can be used for so much more than 'just' bears. This morning I was thinking about bunnies and an idea popped into my head, so I went to my stamping room and got to work. Yep, you guessed it, I turned the Build a Bear into a bunny... isn't he cute? :-) I love his little suit, lol!

He is all dressed for Spring and for Easter Egg deliveries! Have I ever mentioned that I LOVE my Build a Bear dies? Who says you have to have a child who is into Build a Bear Workshop to get these dies ;-)? Ah, well it happens that I do have a daughter who loves her Build a Bears, but I am the one who plays with the dies :-D.

In case you are wondering how I turned the bear into a bunny, I'm gonna tell ya'. The first thing to do is to die cut a bear from Whisper White card stock. Next, punch out a circle with the 1 1/4" circle punch out of a scrap. Flip the bear over so he is face down. Line up the edges of the circle with the very edges where the ear meets the head. The circle punch out will be on the bear's face when you are lining up the ears with the head. Trace around the circle from the top of the ear to the bottom of the ear. Repeat for the other ear. Now take your scissors and cut along your trace line, removing the bear's ears. Punch three Small Ovals from Whisper White card stock. Two of the ovals will be for the ears and one will be for a mask to color the inside of the ears. Now that you have that done, take some Almost Amethyst Classic Stampin' Ink and a sponge dauber, and lightly ink around the edges of the bear body, the muzzle, and the ears. I think it's very important to ink the edges of your bears, otherwise they just look flat with no dimension. Cut a small piece of Pretty in Pink card stock and layer behind the nose on the muzzle. Finish the muzzle with a 1/4" circle punch of Basic Black behind the mouth. Take one of the Small Ovals that you punched to use as a mask and lightly draw the shape of the inside of the ears. You will cut out the 'inside' of the ear shape that you just drew. You will have just the outside of the ear left. Lay the ear mask evenly over each ear oval, hold in place, and with Pretty in Pink chalk, chalk just the insides of the ears. Lightly chalk a little bit of Pretty in Pink chalk on the cheeks, using the perforation of the muzzle in the bear die cut as a guide. Now adhere the muzzle. Adhere a 1/4" circle punch in Basic Black behind each of the eyes. Add some eye highlights, a nose highlight, and two little teeth with a white gel pen. Dress your little bunny with clothes from the Beary Essentials die. I used the Pawsitively Prints Designer Series Paper for my bunny's coat and his bow tie. See how easy he is to make? Ya' really do need the Build a Bear Workshop dies ;-). See my Polar Bear Christmas card and the little elf under the category for Christmas in my sidebar and the pirate is under the Birthday category. These Build a Bear dies are too fun to play with!!!
I will be back on Monday! Have a wonderful weekend and thanks for stopping by!!

Blessings!
Barb PS- the flowers were stamped with the small flower in Cheep Talk. Just stamp the flower once, then twist the flower and stamp again.

Supplies:
Stamps: Season of Friendship- 111776, Cheep Talk- 113204, Teeny Tiny Wishes- 115370
Paper: So Saffron- 105118, Bashful Blue- 105120, Certainly Celery- 105125, Almost Amethyst- 102158, Pretty in Pink- 100459, Creamy Caramel- 102514, Whisper White- 100730, Basic Black- 102851, Pawsitively Prints Designer Series Paper- 118060
Classic Stampin' Ink: Blush Blossom- 102609, Bashful Blue- 105209, Certainly Celery- 105217, Almost Amethyst- 101723, Chocolate Chip- 100908, Pretty in Pink- 101301, Crushed Curry- 115659
Stampin' Write Marker: Certainly Celery- 105106
Dies: Bear- 117977, Beary Essentials- 117978, Beary Hoppy Sizzlit- 117327, Beary Girl Sizzlit- 117982
Punches: Small Oval- 107304, 1 1/4" Circle- 104403, Scallop Circle- 109043 (to make the clouds)
Other: Pretty in Pink chalk- 105542, Stamp-a-ma-jig- 101049, White gel pen- 105021, green and yellow gems,

Easter Egg Display

One of the things that my daughter looks forward to every year is decorating Easter Eggs. She makes decorating the eggs an artistic project :-). I was looking at the egg holders that come with egg die kits and well, they just aren't very cute. So, I decided that I could make my own egg holders to display my daughter's egg art work this year. You will see two of them in the photos below.

These are really quick to make! Just cut a strip of Whisper White card stock 5.75" long by at least 1.50" in height so you have room to punch your edge. Adhere the Designer Series Paper of your choice to the Whisper White strip, leaving enough space for your punched border to show. To finish them up, I run my completed strip over the edge of a counter to help round it out. Overlap the strip 1/4" and glue. You have an egg holder! You can make your egg holders as plain or fancy as you like. You can stamp them, add flowers, use any border punches that you have. I am going to use the Chocolate Bunny stamp and glue him to the front of some of my egg holders with a little bow around his neck. I will be adding some little flowers and leaves to the Bashful Blue egg holder in my photo. You can make your egg holders varying heights for displaying your Easter Eggs for more interest in your arrangement. No more boring or cheesy looking egg holders!! Have a great day everyone!

Blessings!
Barb

PS- as soon as I am done creating all the egg holders for my daughter, I'll post a photo of the completed holders.

Supplies:
Stamps: Teeny Tiny Wishes- 115370
Classic Stampin Ink: Old Olive- 102277
Paper: Whisper White- 100730, Cottage Wall Designer Series Paper- 115671, Bashful Blue Designer Series Paper- 112151
Punches: Modern Label-116630, Word Window- 105090, Trio Flower- 109183, Eyelet Border- 113692, Pinking Hearts Border- 117649

Fold Up Scrapbook for Spring Part 1

I have seen these fold up mini scrapbooks around on different blogs and have always loved them. Of course, I have always wanted to make one, but didn't want to spend a ton of cash on a tutorial. I found a blogger that had instructions for making these on her blog for only $3.97! What a deal! I jumped on that 'Buy Now' button, lol! This post is going to be in two parts because I have a ton of photos for this book so you can see all the parts. It is such a cool book- all the little pages that open up are like going on a treasure hunt. I did use a retired Sale-a-Bration 2009 Designer Series Paper for this 6x6 scrapbook. I love this DSP and wish they had added it to the 2009/2010 Idea Book and Catalog. Since it didn't make it to the big catalog, I use it only for special projects ;-). I just put together the book- there are no photos or embellishments in it yet. I am pretty sure I am going to use this one for Spring photos, so will get to the finishing touches later :-). OK, let's look at this cool little scrapbook...

This is the cover. As you can see it ties closed and has a little bit of an overlap on the front cover. The ribbon is added at the beginning of making this book, so no worries about it coming out.

When you open up the cover, you will see the front right flap, the first page in the middle, and the inside of the front cover. All great places to add journaling, stamped images, and other embellishments of your choice. The center section is where I plan to add my title.

The photo above is the middle section with the right flap opened up.

The middle page opens up to the left and this is the next middle page. You can still see the right flap from the previous page and then a peek of the new flap to the left. This book is just so fun! Please go to post number two to see the rest of the book and for the supplies list :-).

Barb

Easter Blossoms

I have some Easter cards to make, so decided to work on one over the weekend. I used 'Cottage Wall' Designer Series paper- one of my favorite DSP's! For the flowers on this card, the top right flower is flat on the card. The second flower to the left is popped up on 'one' layer of dimensionals, while the third flower on the lower right is popped up on 'two' layers of dimensionals. I inked the blossoms first with Pale Plum, although you really can't tell in the photo. Ah, it is not good to take photos at night :-). After I inked the flowers with Pale Plum, I inked the very edges with Perfect Plum. The Barely Banana flower centers have been inked on the edges with Apricot Appeal. The inking gives the flowers more depth on the card.

The butterfly is Barely Banana, inked with Apricot Appeal, and is actually two layers of butterfly. The large wings have dimensionals under them.

For the inside of my card, I stamped the cross in Pale Plum and the sentiment in Rich Razzleberry. I added a photo corner punched from Rich Razzleberry textured card stock to help balance out the weight of the cross. I have a little scrapbook that I made over the weekend and I will be posting that tomorrow :-). Hope to see you then! Thanks for stopping by!

Blessings!
Barb

Supplies:
Stamps: Teeny Tiny Wishes- 115370, God's Blessings- 114972, Special Blessings- 113411
Paper: Rich Razzleberry- 115316, Rich Razzleberry textured-115719, Old Olive- 100702, Pale Plum- 101658, Barely Banana- 102701, Whisper White- 100730, Cottage Wall Designer Series Paper- 115671
Classic Stampin' Ink: Pale Plum,- 102732, Perfect Plum- 101437, Apricot Appeal- 105218, Old Olive- 102277, Rich Razzleberry- 115658
Dies: Little Leaves- 114511, Cherry Blossom- 114516, Beautiful Wings- 118138
Punches: Trio Flower- 109183, Modern Label- 116630, Word Window- 105090, Photo Corners- 109042
Other: Stampin' Dimensionals- 104430, Sponge daubers- 102892, lavender gems

A Tisket, A Tasket

A Barely Banana Basket! ;-)

I must work on projects in my sleep sometimes because I woke up with this basket in mind, lol! I headed to my stamping room and got started with all the details already worked out. I wish it was that easy everyday! I chose to use Barely Banana and Lavender Lace for my basket, with a touch of Whisper White.

Materials:
ScallopEnvelope die
4 pieces of Barely Banana card stock 4.25" x 5.25"- die cut one envelope from each
1 strip of Lavender Lace card stock 2" x 11"
1 scrap of Lavender Lace card stock 2"x 3"
1 strip of Whisper White card stock 1.75" x 11"
1 strip of Barely Banana card stock 1/2" x 11"
Eyelet Border Punch
Trio Flower punch
Stamps and inks of choice
2 brads

To create this basket, die cut four Scallop Envelopes from Barely Banana. You will notice on your envelope die cut that you have two narrow side flaps where the envelope bottom will fold up and attach to the sides to create the envelope. You have a right narrow flap and a left narrow flap. Along the score line impression on the right side of each envelope die cut, you will cut the right narrow flap off of each of the envelopes. Use your bone folder and fold the remaining left side flap and bottom flap in toward the score lines. The top of the envelope that has the scalloped edge will be folded toward the opposite side. After you have creased your folds, adhere the remaining left side flap to the inside of the right side of the next envelope- where you cut off the flap. Make sure your edges are lined up. You will want all of your flaps on the inside of the basket. Adhere all the sides together to form a square box and then fold in and adhere the bottom flaps to form a square box. Cut a square 3 1/8" to adhere to the inside bottom of your basket. You will have a tiny opening in the bottom after adhering the bottom flaps, so the 3 1/8" square will cover that nicely.

For the handle of the basket, cut Whisper White card stock into a 1.75" x 11" strip. With the Eyelet Border punch, punch each side of the strip. Center and adhere a 1/2" x 11" strip of Barely Banana to the Whisper White Eyelet border strip. To attach the handle, find the center of two opposite sides of your basket and pierce a hole in each of the two sides about a 1/2" from the top edge of the fold where the scalloped edge flap of the envelope would fold down. Do not pierce the scalloped edge flap of the envelope. Attach the handle with brads from the inside of the basket so the prongs are on the outside, making sure the scalloped edge flaps are up and that you do not put the brads through them. The prongs will be covered in the next step.

I stamped Lavender Lace with one of my Razzle Dazzle stamps in Lavender Lace ink to create the stripes on my basket. Cut the Lavendar Lace in a 2" x 11" strip and stamp the entire strip. You will need to stamp another strip 2" x 3" for the last side of the basket. From your 2" x 11" stamped strip, cut three pieces 2" x 3", center and adhere to your basket sides, scalloped edge flaps up so you can fold them down later. Adhere your last stamped 2" x 3" Lavender Lace strip to the last side of the basket. Punch out seven little flowers with the Trio Flower punch and shape them with a stylus (see instructions for the flowers below). Die cut leaves from Old Olive with the Little Leaves die and cut the leaves apart. Adhere the leaves to the centers of the scalloped edge flaps and then adhere a prepared flower in the center of the leaves. I chose to adhere my flaps down over my Lavender Lace striped card stock, but you could leave them loose if you want to. Repeat with each flap.

Adhere three flowers and leaves to the center of the basket handle. I added some gems in the centers of my flowers before I adhered them to my basket, but you could also use brads for the centers. Cut very thin strips of Lavender Lace card stock, about 1/16" - 1/8" x 11" for each strip, and crumple the strips in your hands for the filling in your basket. I learned this trick from another Stampin' Up demo :-). Cool, huh? OK, one last view of the side of the basket.

To create the flowers: Punch out the flowers with the Trio Flower punch. Place the flowers on the thick foam mat from the Mat Pack. If you don't have the Mat Pack, thick Fun Foam will work. Using the large ball end of your stylus press gently while at the same time moving the ball in a circular motion in the center of each flower petal until you have formed a nice rounded indentation in 'each' petal. After you have done all the petals, flip the flower over on the foam pad and press down into the center of the flower with your stylus. Not too hard though- you just want to shape the flower, you don't want to put a hole through the center. At this point you can add a gem or a tiny brad in the center of your flower. And that's it- you have created a 3D flower!

Fill your basket with small Easter candies, a plastic egg filled with little treats or a small gift, or a real Easter Egg! Of course, these little baskets are great for other uses too, not just for Easter baskets ;-). Just picture a cute little flower girl basket for a wedding shower table, in pink or blue for a baby shower... these would pretty much work for a lot of holidays and themes. I hope you have fun making your basket!! Please let me know if you have any questions. Have a wonderful day today!

Blessings!
Barb

Supplies:
Stamps: Razzle Dazzle- 116714
Paper: Barely Banana- 102701, Lavender Lace- 101614, Old Olive- 100702,
Whisper White- 100730
Classic Stampin' Ink: Lavender Lace- 101305
Dies: Scallop Envelope- 113462, Little Leaves- 114511
Punches: Trio Flower- 109783, Eyelet Border- 113692
Other: Lavender gems