Sunday, May 31, 2015

June Inspiration Challenge #32 - Party Time

Yay!  It is time for the June Inspiration Challenge at Paper Sweeties!  We have a wonderful theme of "Party Time" this month:



Isn't that photo wonderful! The pinwheels and banner and bright colors! A wonderful party atmosphere!!!


For my card I wanted to create some balloons.  I started playing around with some of the "heart" shaped tags from the "Stitched Tags #1" Sweet Cuts set.  I had cut a bunch of them for a previous project out of some gingham papers and wanted to try to use them.  Here is what I came up with:


Gingham balloons anyone?  I think they turned out so cute!  To make the strings for the balloons I used a "robin egg" colored straw cut into thin pieces. I attached the "strings" to the back of the balloons with scotch tape and then gathered all three pieces with a cookie dough seam binding bow.  The sentiment "Happy Birthday" is from the "Hello Friend" stamp set.  A simple but sweet card I think!

There is tons of wonderful inspiration to see from the Paper Sweeties Creative Design Team:

Debbie Marcinkiewicz – Paper Sweeties
June Guest Designer:  Karen Oliver

Thanks for taking a look at my card.  It is back to bed for me as I am fighting a horrible case of bronchitis and barely got this card made and posted.....
Blessings and Hugs,
Jill







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Guest Designing with 12 Kits of Occasions!!!!

Hi Friends!
I am so excited to be this month's Guest Designer with the 12 Kits of Occasions! The amazing and talented  Marybeth was last month's kit designer and the winner was chosen from her blog comments.  Her husband drew for the winner and it was me!!!!  Talk about a wonderful surprise!  I have always wanted to guest and this month is a dream come true!  Yay!!!!  Can you tell I am thrilled!!!

The wonderful May 2015 kit is from the lovely and talented Jeanne Jachna who blogs at "A Kept Life".
She has chosen the theme "Let's Hear it For the Boys!"  Isn't that perfect with Father's Day approaching!  Jeanne is the queen of color and layers and is super creative in the way she uses dies too!  If you have not visited her blog before you are in for a real treat. 

If you are not familiar with the "12 Kits of Occasions" group and blog you can find out more about it: HERE.  The blog also lists the contents of each of the kits if you are interested in any of the products showcased on the designers blogs.  There are also links to each of the designers that participate each month.  They are all so talented! 

Oh my!!!! Talk about a kit full of wonderful goodies to play with!  I had so much fun and so far I have made 4 cards. Then my son got sick.  Then I got sick!   Sick with the worst case of bronchitis ever!  Ugh!  I am still not well as I type this and have not made more cards yet....but I will.  I cannot wait to see what everyone else created so that I can CASE some more cards in the coming weeks with all of my wonderful leftovers!  Thanks Jeanne for such a wonderful kit!

Here are my 4 cards:


Every year for Father's Day I send out a "fishing" or "golfing" themed card to my Father-in-law so I was excited to see these sweet fish in the kit.  The background die cut was also included and I decided it kind of looked like a net with the fish tucked inside.  I own the WPlus9 stamp/die set that the fish came from so I pulled it out to stamp the sentiment "Grandpa, Lure the Best".  Aren't the eyes on the fish adorable! Jeanne included them in the kit too and they were easy to attach with a dab of glossy accents!

This card is going out to my nephew.  He had a birthday on May 28th!  Happy Birthday Cole!  My son and I were not able to attend the party because we were both really sick that day!  Boo Hoo!   My sister throws the best barbecue parties with hamburgers, potato salad and all of the trimmings!  We were sorry to not be there!  Next year for sure!  The only thing I added was the black cardstock.  Everything else was from the kit!

I love this card!  I love this cowboy image so much!  I decided to just die cut it with my stitched rectangle die and add it to this wonderful paper that was in the kit for the card front.  A little bit of twine (also from the kit) was the perfect finishing touch.  I didn't add a sentiment to this one....yet!  I will when I decide how I want to use it! 


 And one more fish card....love this sweet sentiment!  Work Less, Fish More!!!!  Don't we all need to do that?!  I think this card could be used for so many occasions...a birthday, a retirement, someone who needs a break from a stressful job and LOVES to fish!  This one may end up going to one of my brother's!!!  The only thing I added was some "glitter" to the "sand".

Well that is it for me today.  A big thank you to Jeanne for the marvelous kit!  To Marybeth and her husband who drew my name out of the hat so to speak!  And to all the designers at 12 Kits of Occasions who inspire me each month with their wonderful creations!  I am just tickled pink that I got to play along this month!  Yay!!!!

To visit the rest of the amazing 12 Kits designers to see what they made with this wonderful kit don't forget to visit the 12 Kits of Occasions Blog.      All of their links are provided!

Blessing and Hugs,
Jill 







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Wednesday, May 20, 2015

"I Woof You!" - Freshly Made Sketches #187


A while back I paper pieced some Reverse Confetti images from the sweet "Puppy Love" stamp set and they have been sitting on my desk saying very loudly "When are you going to use me on a card?"  Well I decided that today was the day! Plus I saw the new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches and the idea for this card immediately popped into my head....



I love the Freshly Made Sketches blog. Each week the designers come up with such wonderful inspiration! I find it much quicker to make a card by following a sketch especially after seeing all of their wonderful ideas!


I added some glossy accents to the puppy's noses and decided to use a fence die cut in yellow to balance the yellow in my boy puppy's bow tie. 

Thanks for taking a look!
:) Jill
 
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Monday, May 18, 2015

"You're my cup of coffee" - FMS #186

Edited to add updated photo: 5-20-2015

Hello,
Here with a card for "Freshly Made Sketches #186.  I decided to make a card just for fun this morning and wanted to ink up my new Hero Arts "Need Caffiine" stamp set for the very first time!  I love the sketch by Jennifer Brum
There was only 1 hour and 18 minutes left to play when I started my card and I believe it is down to 45 minutes now so I am off to get this posted before the linky expires.

Thanks for taking a look!
:) Jill
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Friday, May 15, 2015

Paper Sweeties May Release Rewind

Welcome to Release Rewind Day with Paper Sweeties!  Yesterday Debbie released all of the new May 2015 products at Paper Sweeties and what a fantastic release full of wonderfully versatile stamps and dies! I  have thoroughly enjoyed working with all of these new items!  So fun!!!

Today all of the Creative Designers are sharing a card or project using the new releases with some of the existing products in the Paper Sweeties catalog.  I cannot wait to see what everyone has made!  Here is what I came up with....



I decided to get a head start on Father's Day and created a fun but fairly simple card.  I started by inking a piece of A2 white card stock with some lovely blue inks to create an ombre area on my card panel.   Then I die cut the "happy" word die into the colored panel and used a piece of scotch tape across the back side to keep all of the pieces from the word intact.

I did some selective inking to obtain the rest of my "Happy Father's Day" sentiment.  The word "Father" is from the "You are the Most Wonderful" stamp set.  The apostrophe was made with a Copic Multiliner in black and the "S" is from the word "Sister" in the same stamp set.  The word "Day" is from the "Hello Friend" stamp set and was selectively inked from the "Celebrate Your Day" sentiment.

I added some pieces of patterned paper to divide the card in three to add to the design....(rule of thirds) and rounded two of the corners to add interest.  I then finished the card off by using some little wood pieces I had in my stash.  I colored them with Copic markers to match the ombre area of the card.  I was trying hard to channel my friend Amy Tsurata who does such an incredible job with wood veneer embellishments and sentiments!  Mine have been sitting in a milk glass jar gathering dust! (A LOT OF DUST!)  Isn't that sad!  I am really trying to "use my stash" this year and am avoiding purchases as much as possible!  I have way too much stuff!  LOL!  If you know Amy then you have seen how well she uses them on all of her gorgeous creations! If you have not visited her blog you are in for a treat!

All righty then......off you go.....here are all of the links for today's "Release Rewind" hop:

Debbie Marcinkiewicz – Paper Sweeties
Emily Frasier
Jill Norwood  (You ARE HERE)
Nancy Penir


I cannot wait to go and see what the rest of my teammates have created!  They always inspire me with fresh and fun ideas that I immediately want to CASE!
Don't forget about the May Inspiration Challenge on the Paper Sweeties Blog.  Their is a $20.00 gift certificate and guest design spot offered each and every month!  We would love to have you join in the fun!


Thanks for all of your lovely comments throughout the May Release festivities! I so enjoy sharing this lovely craft with all of you!
Blessings and Hugs!
Have a GREAT weekend!!!
Jill




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Thursday, May 14, 2015

Paper Sweeties May Release Party

Happy Release Day!  Today is the day that all of the new goodies we have been showcasing for the past few days are available in the Paper Sweeties store!  The New Releases are as follows:

My card today features the "Life is a picnic" stamp set.  I dressed the lovely Emma in a sweet new short outfit from this stamp set using some Tilda papers to paper piece.  I added some pink bow embellishments to her blouse and a bit of petite pom-pom trim too.  I also added some bows to her hair. 

The lovely picnic basket she is carrying was colored with Copic marker and then paper pieced with some Tilda paper for the lining.  Then I filled the basket with the baguette, grapes and watermelon included in the stamp set.  I stamped, hand cut, and colored them with Copic markers also.  To insert them in the basket I used my craft knife to create a slit in the lining and slid the food items inside.  A little bit of glossy accents adds the finishing touch! 


I finished the card by adding an embossed fence die cut from the "Home Tweet Home" set and some clouds too.  The ground is a piece of green doily and a scrap of brown patterned paper from my stash. 

Thanks for visiting me today.  There is lots of inspiration still to see using the newly released sets.  Here is a list of links to help you along your way....

Debbie Marcinkiewicz – Paper Sweeties
Emily Frasier
Jill Norwood   (You are Here)
I hope you will come back tomorrow for our release rewind.  We will be featuring projects that mix the new sets with some of the existing items in the Paper Sweeties store!  And don't forget to join in with our Paper Sweeties Inspiration Challenge for May!


It runs through the end of the month and their is a $20.00 gift certificate as well as a Guest Designer spot for the winner!

:) Jill






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Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Paper Sweeties May Release Countdown

Welcome back to day 2 of our release festivities for Paper Sweeties May 2015 Release!  Today I have two cards to share with you using a wonderful new stamp and sweet cuts set called "Happy".  From this new set I used the "Sweet" word die to create my two birthday cards.


This first card started with inking a rainbow of colors onto a piece of white card stock.  I then created a rounded panel and cut the word "Sweet" using the new Paper Sweeties "Happy" set which contains word dies for both the word "Happy" and "Sweet".  The rest of the sentiment is from the "Occasions" stamp set. I actually cut apart the "Easter Wishes" sentiment and the "Happy Birthday" sentiment so that I could use the words "Birthday Wishes" together.  I cut my clear stamps apart quite often so that I can have the versatility of creating additional combinations with the words that are available.



This picture shows the dimension I added by gluing two additional "Sweet" die cut words underneath the inked version.  The word die cut actually pops up off the card which adds lots of dimension and interest. 


I finished the card off with a sticker party hat and added a sweet "Marshmallow" sequin to the pom pom at the top. I love the way these sequins catch the light!

For my next card I decided to go with a floral theme...

I used the same "Sweet" die and sentiments as on the last card but went with a floral theme for my paper and embellishments.  I tucked more of the "marshmallow" sequins in around my tiny paper flowers for a little bit of sparkle!

Once again I added two additional "Sweet" die cut words underneath the glitter card stock version to add dimension and interest to the card.  This picture shows how the word sits slightly above the inlay area.

Well that is it for me but there is a lot more inspiration to see on today's blog hop.  Here are links to everyone that is participating:


 I hope to see you back here tomorrow for Release Day! When all of these new products will be available at the Paper Sweeties store:

Life is a Picnic

Thanks for joining me today! I so appreciate your visits and lovely comments!
:) Jill

                        





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Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Paper Sweeties May Release Sneak Peeks

Hello and Welcome to the Paper Sweeties countdown for May 2015!  For the next 4 days the Paper Sweeties Design Team will be sharing all of the wonderful projects they have been working on with the new stamps and dies that are being released on the 15th!

This month's releases include:

My first card for this release uses the new MVP stamp set for all of you baseball fans out there!
 I paper pieced the Paper Sweeties Doll named "Jake" into a striped uniform and added some red Copic marker highlights.  I stamped the sentiments in red and then stamped and hand-cut the baseball and bat to add some embellishment to the card.  The background of the card includes a section of blue card stock that was embossed with a star embossing folder and rubbed with some white ink to bring out the detail. 

There is a lots more to see so let me send you on your way....here are all of the links for today's hop:

I hope to see you back here tomorrow for more new release projects! There is so much to see this month!
:) Jill




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Teacher Appreciation Cards - 2015





Hello,
Just a quick share of some of the cards I gave to my son's teachers and support staff for Teacher Appreciation last week.


These cards use the "Petite Places - School" and "Keep it Simple Teacher" sets from Papertrey Ink and were cased from a wonderful card by Danielle Flanders on this post:  HERE. 



I also used the new "Enclosed: Apple" set from Papertrey to make some other cards but only took this one picture....I was running late that day and just ran out of time! 

 Thanks for taking a peek.
:) Jill
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Sunday, May 10, 2015

Happy Mother's Day!


Hello Friends,
Just wanted to say a very Happy Mother's Day to all!  I hope that you all enjoy a lovely day with your families!  I know that many of us also will be missing our Mother's, Grandmother's, and other special women in our lives today so I pray that warm memories surround you and that you feel the warmth of their love in spirit!

I thought I would share the card and crocheted washcloth that I sent to Stuart's Mother, Prilla for Mother's Day today.  It was created with the Paper Sweeties teapot stamps and dies from the "Tea For Two Bundle".  The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink.
I embossed the teapot in white after die cutting it from some sweet turquoise gingham paper and mounting it on a half doily on my card base..  Some Robin Egg sequins from Paper Sweeties and an embroidery floss bow add the finishing touches to this simple and sweet card.

Again I hope that you all enjoy your day today!  My son and I and some of the family are off to see the new Avengers movie.  Tim is so excited!!!

:) Jill

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