Hello

Happy Friday all,

I have a busy day today, but before getting started with work, I wanted to quickly post these cards for this week's Paper Players Challenge. LeAnne is the hostess this week with a color challenge. I made these Tuesday evening, but didn't have a chance to get the pictures taken until this morning.

I made two cards using LeAnne's colors. One fairly simple, another more involved.

Card #1 is the fairly simple version.

Card #2
Outside

Inside

Both cards were stamped and colored with Copics matching LeAnne's colors.

Supplies
Stamps: SU sets Up in the Air & Endless Birthday Wishes, Simon Says Stamp set Kind Flowers
Paper: SU Tranquil Tide, Wisteria Wonder, Elegant Eggplant and X-Press It Blending card stocks
Ink: SU Elegant Eggplant, Tranquil Tide, Memento Tuxedo Black and Copics
Other: Simple Stripes, Spring Flowers and Small Dots Embossing Folders, We R Memory Keepers Embossing Folder, Die-namics Stitched Rectangle and Stitched Scalloped Frame dies, SSS Kind Flowers die, Gemini Jr, Big Shot, rhinestones, diemensionals

Feliz compelamos a ti (Happy Birthday to you)

Hi all,

I hope your Thursday is going well. I'm "working" in my home office today. I actually was working but just put it aside for a while to take some pictures of my card for this week's Paper Players challenge. This week, Laurie is the hostess with a music theme.

I have lots of patterned papers with sheet music backgrounds which is what I originally pulled out to use and I made a Christmas card. But, I just wasn't feeling it was all that fun, so I put it in my stash and made this one instead. My sister's "honey" has a birthday in a few days and he is hispanic. I think he'll get a kick out of this guy.

The images are from SugarPea Designs. They are stamped with memento black ink and colored with Copics. I fussy cut them out and glued them to the card. The base is SU Basic Black and the three stripes are Hello Honey, Glorious Green and Real Red. The sentiment is printed with my computer and is part of the "Happy Birthday to You" song in Spanish. I added the music notes from an Avery Elle set.

Here is the inside. The paper picado banners are also from an Avery Elle set called Papel Picado Banners. The sentiments are from the SugarPea set. The banners are stamped with SU Glorious Green and Real Red inks using a Misti.

Supplies
Stamps: Let's Fiesta set by SugarPea Designs, Papel Picado Banners & Caroling Critters sets by Avery Elle
Paper: SU Basic Black, Real Red, Hello Honey and Glorious Green card stock, X-Press It Blending card stock
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, SU Glorious Green and Real Red, Copics
Other: SU dimensionals

A few months ago I began my craft room re-organization. I took everything out and had it painted. The color is Sherwin Williams Sea Salt and it is a very light sea green. I love it! The accents and ceiling are all bright white. I decided to go with IKEA shelving and drawers. The shelving and desk are from the Kallax line and the drawers are from the Alex line. They have been up for about a month. I had ordered ink pad and marker inserts for the Kallax and some drawer divider storage for the Alex from Organize More. Those finally arrived this week and I've gotten them filled. Hopefully, you don't mind a few pictures of the final organization. (It's not to say I won't be tweaking things as I use it, but for now, it seems to be good.)

As you can see, my card stock is in plastic sleeves, labeled with a label maker and stored sidewise in the top cubes. The desk is 5 ft x 5 ft. It removes from the cube wall unit very easily, which is important because this room also serves as the guest bedroom. I wanted a large surface area for cutting fabric when I decide to do quilting. I've stored things that I don't use often in the cubes under the desk in the fabric cubes inserts like the ones you see on the right side above the desk.

At the end of the drawer units is a closet. One side has the plastic drawer units that hold my old wooden stamps. For the other side, I bought some metal shelving on rollers from Bed, Bath, Beyond for my patterned papers. They are stored in mesh boxes from The Container Store. Also, one of my Raskog carts lives next to it. Above these is a shelf that is bowed from years of storing my card stock on it. I've placed 3 of the fabric boxes to store various things. I moved my punch (some of them) storage to the wall of the closet too. The closet had sliding wardrobe doors. I've taken them off and will replace with bi-fold doors at some point. (I really don't like it open, but it is easier to access)

One Raskog cart has all of my various adhesives, washi tapes, and stamp cleaning supplies. I had my Copics in the top of this Raskog cart until the inserts arrived. The other Raskog cart has my dies that are not stamp set dies, like the MFT STAX etc. For dies that coordinate with stamp sets, I store them with the stamp set on magnetic panels, including my SU set dies.

As far as stamp storage, for the companies such as Lawn Fawn, Avery Elle, Simon Says Stamp etc that are all photopolymer, they are stored in plastic sleeves in refrigerator bins as many stampers are doing. They sit on top of the Alex drawer units within easy reach. If the set has coordinating dies, they are stored with the stamps. For my SU and Taylored Expressions sets, some are in a book case just as you walk in the room. The rest are in two bookcases in our garage. (I don't sell my stamps. They are my friends.)

So, it's not as fancy as many craft rooms and it has to do triple duty, craft room, home office, guest room, but I'm really enjoying the space more. Before, I had a portable table facing the wall with stacks and stacks of stuff. Now it's organized, and I look out at the ocean!

I hope you all have a great Friday and weekend. We will be at our friend's house in the Central Coast wine region for a long 4 day get-a-way. Thanks for indulging me in sharing my "new" space.

Colleen

Hello

Happy Monday peeps,

I hope the start of the work week went well for you. I worked in my office today which was a nice way to start the week. The last three, I had to be up very early to get to the airport.

Mr. Personal Chef and I went out to the Temecula Wine Country yesterday afternoon. It was a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon. We tasted at a couple of wineries and had lunch, then headed home. After dinner, I spend the time making this card following Claire's sketch for this week's Paper Players challenge. What a fun sketch this week.

I pulled out some Carta Bella Spring Market patterned papers that came with the Simon Says Stamp March kit which was the inspiration for my card design. The stamp set is from Hero Arts.

After adhering the pattern papers to the Whisper White card base I cut a circle from X-Press It Blending card stock with a Die-namics Double Stitched circle die. I stamped the daisy flowers using Memento tuxedo black on X-Press It Blending card stock and colored them with Copics. They were then cut out using the set dies and placed on the circle. The top daisy is popped up with dimensionals. The bees and the sentiment are from the same Hero Arts stamp set.

Here is the inside:

The inside flower is stamped with SU Blushing Bride ink. I used my Misti to align the inside sentiments.

I'll be working around San Diego tomorrow and then we have a Little League game to attend in the late afternoon. I hope your Tuesday is a good one.

Thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Daisy and Bugs set by Hero Arts
Paper: SU Whisper White, X-Press It Blending card stock and Carta Bella Spring Market patterned papers
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, SU Blushing Bride, Copics
Other: Hero Arts Daisy & Bugs set dies, Die-namics Double Stitched Circle and Fishtail Flags STAX dies, SU green Baker's twine, Gemini Jr, dimensionals, Misti Stamping tool

We Must Celebrate

Happy Friday to all,

TGIF!! I don't know about you, but this week seemed like it went on FOREVER! I didn't think that Friday would come. I think I was exhausted by Tuesday night, LOL. This week's work travel took me to Phoenix, AZ and to Los Angeles. While LA isn't all that far, it's dealing with the traffic. But, it's all done and I'm waiting on my Personal Chef to whip up some noshes for Happy Hour.

Last night after dinner I made a card using the layout from this week's Freshly Made Sketch and the colors from this week's Color Throwdown. I've used the uber cute SU set called We Must Celebrate.

I stamped the celebration crew using Memento tuxedo black on X-Press It Blending card stock, colored them, sparingly, with Copics then fussy cut them out. The pink plaid paper that makes the circle element is from MFT. The black and white flower paper is from We R Memory Keepers "Chalkboard" 6 x 6 pad, and the card base is pink card stock from Taylored Expressions.  Both sentiments are from the same SU set.

Here's the inside.

I'll add this one to my stash.

I hope you have a super fun and relaxing weekend! Thanks for stopping in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: We Must Celebrate set from Stampin' Up
Paper: X-Press It Blending card stock, pink TE card stock, pink plaid patterned paper from MFT, black and white patterned paper from We R Memory Makers
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copics, SU Blushing Bride
Other: Die-namics Inside Out Stitched Circle die, Gemini Jr., mini-dimensional, black enamel shapes

Happy Birthday

Hi again,

I mentioned in my post this morning that I would share the cards that we made at our "craft day" yesterday. I usually try to put something fairly simple together for the others to make from my SU supplies. Since this year's Sale-a-bration is almost over, I thought I'd use one of the newer sets from the Occassion's Mini Catalog and I picked the Birthday Wit set with it's too cute sentiments.

The pattern papers are from SU as well, an older set and a new set of DSP.

This first card is based on this week's CAS(E) This Sketch! layout.

Here are the others all using the same SU stamp set.

Simple and fun cards!

Thanks again for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Birthday Wit set by Stampin' Up
Paper: SU Whisper White, Lemon Lime Twist, Old Olive card stocks, SU Summer Smooches and SU Bubbles & Fizz DSP, SU Gold Glimmer Paper
Ink: SU Island Idigo, Basic Gray, Bermuda Bay, Lemon Lime Twist, Calypso Coral, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Tangerine Tango
Other: Die-namics Stitched Rectangle, Pierced Circle dies, Spellbinder circle die, Gemini Jr, sequins, SU candy dots, dimensionals

Everything Is Cooler With You

Hi and Happy Sunday,

I finally managed a little time for stamping Friday evening and this morning. As I mentioned in my last post, I've been traveling every week for work which means weekends have been used for getting other chores done. Last weekend, my sister came for a visit and we spent the weekend planning for a trip to Ecuador and Peru to visit my nephew (her son) who is in Ecuador for school (semester abroad.)

Yesterday was "craft day" with my little group and I put together some cards for them to make on Friday evening. I'll show you what we made in another post.

Today's card is for this week's Paper Players Challenge. Nance is the hostess with a CAS theme for this week. I decided to keep things very simple by using some rainbow inspired patterned paper and when I went looking through my stash this popsicle paper from Doodlebug caught my eye. Then I looked through my Lawn Fawn sets and found this winter holiday set that I thought would make a fun combo, especially with the greeting. The sketch is from this week's Freshly Made Sketches, a fun one by Linda.

My brother has been having some health issues and this should cheer him up a bit.

I cut the square frame using a Die-namics Stitched Square Frame die. The bears and iceberg are stamped with Memento black and colored with Copics then cut out with the set dies. The greeting is stamped in Memento black as well. Super simple and probably took all of 15 minutes to make.

Here is the inside. I used the reverse side of the popsicle paper and die cut some clouds. The greeting is from the same stamp set. A fun non-holiday card made with holiday stamps.

I hope you have a wonderful Sunday afternoon. I'm off to Phoenix, AZ for a few days, then I'll be in Los Angeles on Wednesday. Hopefully, that will be the end of back to back travel for awhile.

Thanks for stopping in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Lawn Fawn Beary Happy Holidays set
Paper: SU Whisper White card stock and Doodlebug Fruit Stand patterned paper
Ink: Memento tuxedo black and Copics
Other: Lawn Fawn Beary Happy Holidays dies, Die-namics Stitched Square Frame die, Taylored Expressions Cloud dies, Wink of Stella, SU mini glue dots and dimensionals, Gemini Jr

Happy Spring

Well hello everyone,

It's been quite a while since I've done any stamping. I decided it was time to makeover my craft space/room, so about three weeks ago I took everything out of the room and the storage closet and piled it in our garage. I had the room painted, ordered some wall storage, drawers and new desk. I also ordered some ink, marker and drawer inserts from Organize More. This afternoon I finished putting all of my "stuff" into the new storage, with the exception of the inks and markers. Unfortunately, the Organize More pieces have not come yet, but I'm expecting them soon. Regardless, I got everything organized enough to actually make a card.

The talented Jaydee is the hostess this week at the Paper Players with a fun theme challenge. I was in the mood to color and reached for a spring themed Pure Innocence set to work with. The sketch is based on last week's Paper Players sketch.

The images are stamped with Memento tuxedo black on X-Press It Blending card stock, colored with Copics, and cut out with the set dies. The pink flower patterned paper is SU and the top layer is some random that I have in my stash and perfect for the Spring theme.

The inside:

I'll share a few pictures when the room is completely finished. For now, I'm off to pack as I'm heading to Colorado for the week for work.

Thanks for stopping in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Pure Innocence Spring Friends and My Basket of Eggs sets by My Favorite Things
Paper: SU Pixie Pink, X-Press It Blending card stock and SU DSP
Ink: Memento tuxedo black and Copics
Other: Spring Friends dies, Die-namics Stitched Rounded Rectangle dies, Gemini Jr, dimensionals