The Old Black and White

Today my offering is an ATC - or Artist Trading Card. I make one of these every month and trade it with Misshelenstamps on SCS. You can see Helen's ATC's here. Every other month I choose the instructions for what to use on the card. May was my turn and I decided we had to use just black and white.

The ATC itself is a 3 1/2" x 2 1/2" white card. I added a slightly smaller black panel that I distressed the edges on and had wrapped with a piece of white polka dotted ribbon. I got this ribbon on an order from Flourishes - part of my order was wrapped in tissue paper and they tied this ribbon around it - how fun! So I'm re-using it on this ATC - how convenient that it was in the perfect colors! The stamp is from Tin Can Mail - Inkadinkado . I stamped that on a white panel and cut around the edges with my dekkle edge scissors from Stampin Up. It makes it look like a torn edge. Then I added layered white flowers from Close to My Heart that I had inked with black ink on my finger. I joined the flowers with a jazzy brad and attached it with a glue dot to be sure it was held securely. The last thing was to stamp small circles randomly on the black panel using white Stazon ink. The circle is from PapertreyInk Polkadot Basics. I really like this vintage image - don't you?

You can see my other ATC's on this post.

I appreciate you checking out my blog today!

Today's quote from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "A long Life may not be good enough, but a good Life is long enough."

Stamps: Girl image - Tin Can Mail: Inkadinkado, dot - PapertreyInk: Polkadot Basics

Ink: Onyx Black Versafine, White Stazon

Paper: PTI White, Basic Black SU.

Supplies: dekkle scissors: SU, glue dot, distresser, dimensionals, white polka dot ribbon: Flourishes, CTHM paper white daisys.

Tea and a Prayer

Isn't this the cutest little bag? This was the Try a New Technique challenge on Split Coast today. You can see the tutorial for this here. It's a folded piece of 12 x 12 designer paper and has two pockets. Just big enough to fit a few tea bags or maybe some cocoa packets etc.

I used Cosmo Cricket Dutch Girl Designer Paper and PapertreyInk Spring Moss stitched ribbon. I cut the ovals with my nestabilities on the cuttlebug. The 't' is part of a page of die cut letters that came in the Cosmo Cricket paper package. I attached it with dimensionals.

The holes for the ribbon are punched with a horizontal slot punch. I knotted my ribbon ends but you can also just tape them together as per the tutorial.


I added a cute metal tea bag charm from Custers Last Stamp. Here is a close up picture of that - I tied it through two punched holes with a piece of string that reminded me of the string on a teabag. The sentiment is by Inky Antics.

I will put my Earl Grey teabags in this little bag and give it as a gift to someone. I can see lots of uses for a sweet bag like this! A perfect little thank you for a teacher or neighbor, or a hostess gift when you're invited over to dinner or a cookout!

Thanks so much for spending some time of your busy day here! I hope you try making one of these bags!

Today's quote from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "An empty bag cannot stand upright." (seemed appropriate for this post!!)

Stamps: Inky Antics
Paper: Cosmo Cricket DP pack - Dutch Girl
Ink: Onyx Black Versafine, Real Red
Accessories: sponge, oval nestabilities, cuttlebug, dimensionals, double stitched ribbon - Spring Moss: PapertreyInk, Teabag charm: Custers Last Stamp, String, Dimensionals, sticky tape, horizontal slot punch

Featured Birthday and Some Simple Panels

I've got 2 cards to share with you today - one for the Featured Stamper Challenge on Splitcoast and one for Sharon's - Stamp Simply Friday challenge.
This is the card I made for the Featured Stamper Challenge.


You can see the card of Dawnsings that I CASED here

I love the stunning simplicity of her card. The things I did differently on my card: I used more stamps from the Stampin Up Mixed Bouquet stamp set than she used, I changed the color of the card stock and omitted the dots.

I also added a sentiment framed on nestability rectangles. Instead of a sentiment stamp - I used Karen Foster Snap Alphabet Stamps so this qualifies for Friday's limited supplies challenge to use alphabet stamps on your card.

Check out Dawn's Blog - it's quite terrific!

Stamps: Mixed Bouquet: SU, Karen Foster Alphabet Snap Stamps
Paper: PTI White & Berry Sorbet, Basic Black: SU
Ink: Onyx Black Versafine
Accessories: nestability long classic rectangles, cuttlebug, dimensionals
Techniques: dry embossing, nestabilities

The challenge for this card was to make a card using three panels.

You can see Sharon's challenge here.

I used this wonderful designer paper from American Crafts on my card for the panels and I thought it was so beautiful I really didn't need much else for the card! I cut each panel into 3 pieces and layerd it over a black panel onto a white card. I only added the scalloped Happy Birthday from the So Many Scallops Stampin Up set - which I punched out and put up on dimensionals.

This is what I stamped on the inside of the card. I've started stamping some kind of design or flower etc with my inside sentiment - I think it adds just that something extra to the card. These stamps are from Papertray Ink - the sentiment is from Birthday Basics and the design stamp is from Simple Little Things.

A truly 'stamped simply' card!

Well - I'm off to the cemetary to plant the traditional geraniums and marigolds at my parents, grandparents and great aunt's graves. I want to get it done before Memorial Day and before it rains today- it was a gorgeous day here in the 70's but it is just now starting to cloud up!

Thanks so much for dropping by!

Today's Quote from Poor Richard's Almanac by Ben Franklin: "Old Boys have their Playthings as well as young Ones; the Difference is only in the Price."

Stamps: So many scallops - SU
Paper: PTI White, SU Basic Black, DP - American Crafts: a la carte
Ink: Lettuce - Adirondack
Accessories: dimensionals, scallop punch: SU

Purple Haze

What a beautiful day it is here today! It started out rainy - but cleared up in the afternoon and is now sunny and in the 70's! I worked in the garden a bit putting up supports around my peonies and poppies and weeding a bit. Another job to check off the list!

Today was the inspiration challenge over on Split Coast and Stef gave us this to be inspired by. A candle and it's box from Papyrus.
I was inspired by the colors and the flowers and the black band along the bottom of the box.
I dry embossed a square on my lavender panel with my nestability die, then I stamped my flower inside the frame using my Versamark Watermark pad. I embossed the image with black detail embossing powder. I cut a ribbon tag with my new Spellbinders die, dry embossed it, ran a lavender grosgrain ribbon through it and wrapped it around a crimped black panel for the bottom.

The butterfly is a cuttlebug die/embossing folder that I highlighted along the body with some grape glitter glue (don't think you can see that very well).

I attached the whole thing to a black panel and then to the lavender card base.

I'm off to do a little more stamping and then to hopefully sit on the deck and enjoy the sunny day a little bit! Hope you can do the same wherever you are - thanks so much for coming by today!

Today's thought from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "Do not do that which you would not have known."

Stamps: Flower: Outlines Rubber Stamps, Sentiment: Papertreyink - Simple Little Things
Paper: lavender, basic black SU
Ink: Onyx black Versafine, Versamark watermark pad
Accessories: glue dots, crimper, black detail EP, hot gon, lavender grosgrain ribbon, cuttlebug butterfly die, Spellbinders Ribbon Tag die, nestability square, grape glitter glue

Coming Home to the Tree

Happy Friday!! I'm a day late and a dollar shy with this card tonight......

I made this card for Kristin Werner's Color Inspiration challenge this week - but when I went to load it tonight - I realized the deadline was yesterday - so I missed it!! So here is my card using the colors of real red, so saffon, pumpkin pie, old olive and tempting turquoise! (with some Taken with Teal card stock since I didn't have Tempting Turquoise).

I used this fun new stamp from a Swedish company called Scrapmagasinet and the stamp is called Tretoppen. I purchased it from a woman in Canada who runs a stamp/craft shop up there. She also sells the cute Tilda stamps from Magnolia. I found her name on someone's blog as a person who sold the Magnolia stamps so I contacted her since I was not having any luck finding where I could buy some!

I stamped 'Happy Anniversary' inside the card. The outside sentiment (which I love!) is part of a stamp by Penny Black - it has a house above it on the stamp but I only inked the sentiment part for this card. I used my Floral Fantasy cuttlebug folder for the background. I sponged the edges as well as the cuttled panel with so saffron ink to tone down the white a bit.

We're having rain tonight and supposedly on and off throughout the weekend - so it will be a good time to be in my stamping room - not feeling guilty that I'm not out in the sunshine!!

Thanks so much for coming over to see me for a bit - check back over the weekend - I'm sure I'll be doing the Inspiration and Featured Stamper challenges on Splitcoast.

Today's quote from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "He who multiplies Riches multiplies Cares."

Stamps: Treehouse: Scrapmagasinet
Paper: White: PTI, taken with teal, real red - SU, green bazzill
Ink: onyx black Versafine, So Saffron
Accessories: cuttlebug, Floral fantasy folder, dimensionals, glue zots, sponge, SU markers, Prismacolor marker: sky blue light
Techniques: Cuttlebug

An Inch of Pitter Patter

Today's Ways to Use It challenge on SCS was to use Inchies on your card. An inchie is a piece of chipboard measuring 1" x 1". You stamp a small image on some cardstock, cut it out to 1"x1" and attach it to your inchie. As you can see on my card - it adds dimension to the image. You can use lots of inchies on a card in a grid pattern or 3 in a row. You can stamp an image on a 4"x4" piece of card stock and then cut it into 4 1" pieces and mount each piece on an inchie. Check out the SCS Gallery for this challenge to see all the different ways people used them. The possibilities are endless. You can purchase Inchies at Ellen Hutson's store here. They also carry them at Michaels and AC Moore as well as other webb stores.

Today I just used one inchie and made it the focal point of the card by placing it inside an embossed frame made with my scalloped square Nestability.

I stamped this sweet pair of baby girl shoes on a piece of white PapertreyInk card stock and cut it to fit and attached it to the inchie. I colored the shoes with Stampin Up markers (Pretty in Pink and Blush Blossom) and added silver stickles where there were two buttons on the toes of the shoes.

Here is a closeup side view so you can see the embossing and the depth of the Inchie as well as the stickles. Isn't this the cutest pair of baby girl shoes? I didn't realize there was such great detail on them until I stamped them.

Here you can see the sentiment I stamped inside as well as the inchie on the front.. All these stamps are part of a clear set by Scraptrends called Classic Baby.




Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you will try using inchies on your cards now!


Today's quote from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "Hide not your Talents, they for Use were made: What's a Sun-Dial in the Shade?"

Stamps: Scraptrends - Classic Baby Clear stamp set
Paper: White, Sweet Blush: PapertreyInk
Ink: Onyx black Versafine
Accessories: Nestability scalloped square, cuttlebug, chipboard inchie: Magenta, SU Markers: Pretty in Pink, Blush Blossom, Stickles: Diamond Ice

How Sweet Is It? and An Un-Natural Tree

Hi Everyone - Happy Wednesday! Tonight's the Reveal over at PapertreyInk for their new stamps, paper, ribbon and inks for this month - so you should check that out They have a great baby stamp set coming out as well as beautiful new colors of DP and ink - it started at 10 pm EST and the stamps will be revealed at 11 pm EST - Hopefully I can stay awake that long - if not - I'll be checking them out first thing in the AM! I love their stuff - you'll see some of their papers and ribbon on my 2nd card below. You can also look under PapertreyInk on the right side panel index to see all the cards and crafts I've made using their products.

This card was made for the Sketch Challenge at SCS today.

This is the sketch.

I used Prismacolor Markers to color my slice of cake and added Stickles on the frosting and the flame for a little sparkle. I knotted ribbon through a hole punched in the sentiment panel and wrapped it around behind the panel coming up through the hole on the other side and knotting it. The cake panel is up on dimensionals. This cake stamp is part of a set called How Sweet it is sold by Gina K Designs to raise money for diabetes - check it out here.

This is a great sketch - I'll be sure to use it again.

Stamps: Gina K Designs
Paper: Taken with Teal, Pumpkin Pie, DP - SU, White - PapertreyInk
Ink: Black Onyx Versafine
Accessories: cuttlebug, swiss dots folder, hole punch, narrow grosgrain ribbon, dimensionals, Prismacolor markers: green tea, sky blue light, raspberry, pale vermillion, teal blue, stickles - Orange Peel & Strawberry ice

My 2nd card tonight is for a Double Dare I do every week with a group of friends at SCS. This week I chose the challenge - and it was to make a card with a tree but you could not use any brown or green anywhere on the card.

So - in order to keep me from grabbing any of the forbidden colors - (which is the first thing I do when there are rules it seems!) I went with the monochromatic look - and used Papertrey's Berry Sorbet for everything! The cute jeweled flowers are from www.petaloo.com. You can check out the other peoples challenge cards here. The challenge just started today so everyone has a week to get their cards in.

Thank you so much for stopping by - let me know what you think of my cards - I really appreciate feedback!

Todays Quote from Poor Richard's Almanack by Ben Franklin: "The doors of Wisdom are never shut."

Stamps: Summer Tree: Whispers
Paper: White, Berry Sorbet, Pink Patterns - PapertreyInk
Ink: Berry Sorbet - PTI
Accessories: Berry Sorbet Swiss Dots: PTI, jeweled florettes- Petaloo, dimensionals, Cuttlebug, Swiss Dots Folder