Off to Convention

If you are a Stampin' Up! regular, or you hop around a few Demo blogs, you won't have failed to notice that Convention fever is in the air. So as you read this,  I will be on my way to Paris for this years European Stampin' Up! Convention. Two days of Disneyland fun with fellow Demos from the UK, France and Germany. Stampin' Up! always know how to put on a good show and there is always a couple of fun crafting sessions too. But I'll share more on that on my return....

I've kept things a bit simpler on the swaps front this year and also had a great deal of assistance from my lovely Mum too. I just havent had the energy to do all the organised swaps like I did last year. I wanted to be involved in the swapping but also had to consider that I'll have to carry everything home on the plane ;0)  If you pop back tomorrow I'll share my Card Candy and general swaps. Todays project are the stamped candles I made for my two Convention roomies, Jenny and Anja. They havent turned out quite as perfect as I imagined (its been well over a year since i tried candle stamping) but I do love the embossed gold and silver against the red candle (which matches Stampin' Up!'s Cherry Cobbler ribbon and embossing powder perfectly).

So here are my Serene Snowflake candles.....

Thank you for stopping by today and come back tomorrow for more swapping and convention makes.

Happy Crafting ;0)
-X-

A Scrapbooking Sneaky Peak

I thought I would share a scrapbooking layout I designed for a Stampin' Up! competition for Demonstrators. Our brief was to only use current product (meaning it had to be products moving over into the new catalogue). So I chose the new In Colours as my focus for this page. The Lucky Limeade base colour matches the sunny photos of my Kala perfectly.

The embellishments were all stamped using Circle Circus and the In Colours (Pool Party, Island Indigo, Calypso Coral & Wisteria Wonder).

The title was stamped using my favourite Broadsheet Alpha stampset.

I have embellished with a Subtles Button and a large basic pearl.

 I have layered the Circle Circus images on top of each other and embellished with buttons from both the Brights and Subtles collections. All of these circles were punched with the coordinating sized circle punches (including the scalloped circle).

 The final embellishment was punched in Wisteria Wonder using the Tab punch. I then stamped the small heart from Tiny Tags and embellished with a line of basic pearls.

Hope you enjoyed this little sneak peak into the new catalogue and that you are loving the new In Colours as much as me (I cannot stop stamping using Pool Party- makes me want to pack up and take a sunny holiday somewhere). If you'd like to book a place at my Catalogue Launch Open House on October 1st, i still have spaces available for the 1-3pm session (£4 to include refreshments and a new catalogue). Just get in touch on poulton_sarah@yahoo.co.uk or 01983 609249.

Happy crafting ;0)

Wedding Acceptance

Here is a simple wedding acceptance card I have made for my friend who is getting married in August. I saw a similar card on Julie Kettlewell's blog and thought I would adapt it for my acceptance note. I had to add the hearts raised on dimensionals as I had an inkage issue (I somehow smudged the P down the white C/S). I am going to have a go later at making another version of this for a September wedding I am going to (I also made the wedding invitations for the September nuptuals so I am going to tie my acceptance in with the invite theme).

Uses:
Colour scheme: Poppy Parade & Not Quite Navy
In Colour DSP Paper Stack
Basic Rhinestones
Stamps: Broadsheet Alpha, Just Perfect Alpha
Punch: Heart To Heart
Other: Dimensionals

And to tie in with the Poppy Parade theme of this post here is a picture from my garden. These poppies started sprouting up in the gaps between my paving. I didn't have the heart to dig them out so left them to grow into these beautiful (if not massively huge and space taking up) flowers.

Happy Friday Crafting ;0)
-xxx-

Sisterly Birthday Greetings & My First Alteration.....

Fingers crossed this will be live come Monday morning. I am scheduling this in advance as I will be at Mum and Dad's celebrating my littlest sisters 21st birthday today as you read this.

I wanted to share a couple of birthday projects I have been working on for Sophie. The first was a joint project with my Mum. Mum had been inspired by the configuration boxes out there in blogland and that we had seen at a recent craft fair. So we decided to have a go. Mum had a perfect box for the job which had originally housed Waitrose dried fruit and nuts. To cover it we scoured the local charity bookshops for a book of Shakespeare quotations (Soph loves her Shakespeare). Mum tore the book into strips and vintaged the pages up a bit with daubers and antique-y ink and then used these strips (glued with PVA) to cover the box. And then here is where I took over. I poured through all of my embellishments and scrapping bits and bobs to find all the lovely little things to put into the compartments to make it a proper 21st birthday box.

  For all you eagle eyed Stampin' Up! lovers you'll spot all  the SU touches I've managed to get in to these compartments (the key is stamped from Artistic Etchings, a filigree brad, the chipboard birds and a couple of brights buttons). I can't make such a lovely pressie for my sister without a little bit of Stampin' Up! ;0)

This second project is my card for my sister. I picked purple, gold and vanilla as my colour scheme (Soph loves purple). So for this card i combined Concord Crush DSP, Elegant Eggplant & Very Vanilla cardstock, gold and silver embossing powders, basic rhinestones and metallic brads.

I heat embossed 'Sophie' using my Stampin' Up! Broadsheet Alphabet stamp set, Versamark, silver embossing powders (and of course my trusted Embossing Buddy).  I wanted a more higgledy piggledy effect so guesstimated where to stamp without my Stamp-A-Ma-Jig or a ruler. I layered the embossed lettering onto Vanilla which I'd already edged with a gold pen. I punched holes into the four corners and poked gold brads through. I then raised this whole layer onto the main card with dimensionals.


I created my corners by clear embossing the circle pattern stamp from Artistic Etchings onto Elegant Eggplant. I then punched two of the medium sized hearts from the embossed design using my Heart to Heart Punch. I finished off with one of the big sparkly Stampin' Up! rhinestones.  I also gold embossed 4 of the Artistic Etchings keys (I hadnt even mounted this stamp until this week. I never thought I would use it and then my sis turned 21 and boom I've used it 5 times in a few days!) and cut round them carefully to create this corner design.

I even managed to vaguely tie this card into my previous project (purely by accident). I hadn't realised the text on this years Stampin' Up Designer Series Paper is Shakespeare. I typed in a section of the text into Google and it brought up the sonnet that the quote is from. So once again Sophie has a Shakespearian birthday card ;0)

One final photo for more of an artsy angle of the embossed Broadsheet Alphabet.

What a huge photo heavy post! As you can see I have been busy recently.

Hope you are all enjoying your long weekend (and thank goodness for 4 day weeks too....).

Happy crafting ;0)
-X-

Mini Catalogue Blog Hop- April 2nd 2011

Good morning and welcome to my little part of the 2011 In Love With Stamping Mini Catalogue Blog Hop organised by the lovely Erika. Hello to all that have hopped here from Laura's Blog. I am looking forward to checking out all the lovely projects my fellow Demo's have created.

My apologies to begin with. I did have a lovely big scrapbooking LO planned for this Blog Hop. However life has taken over a bit recently. I start a new job on Monday and have been helping my Dad wind up his business over the past couple of weeks. So preparation and Mini Catalogue playing time has had to take a bit of a backseat. So instead I have a few smaller projects that I have been working on.

Project one:

I created this 4x4inch mini card for a Demonstrator Swap I joined in with through In Love With Stamping. I wanted to have a go at creating a masculine type card using the single Sail Away stamp which can be found on the last pages of the Mini Catalogue.  For this it was time to dust off my brayer and break open my Stampin' Up! glossy paper. I used Peach Parfait and So Saffron to brayer the sunset  (with a 1 inch Pumpkin Pie circle punched to create the sun). I then tore strips of Bashful Blue and Marina Mist and sponge daubered White Craft ink onto the edges to create the crests of the waves. I finally stamped the Sail Away boat in Basic Black onto Stampin' Up! Vellum and attached over the image with 4 complimentary coloured brads.

Project Two:

This was a beautiful project I cased from the samples board at the recent Stampin' Up! training tour. The moment I saw it I fell in love with the Springtime Vintage DSP, seam binding ribbon, Four Frames set and the gorgeous Decorative Label Punch. This card sums up ALL the things I love the most about the Mini Catalogue.

The colour combination for this card is Rose Red and Pear Pizzazz on a Very Vanilla Cardstock base. It is such a great card for showing off the designs of the Springtime Vintage Designer Series Paper.

Project 3:

I probably shouldnt be posting this one just yet. But I've made my Mum promise not to come online till tomorrow. So I might get away with it. This is my Mum's Mother's Day card which I have created using my shiny new Big Shot and the Elegant Bouquet Embossing Folder. I've used Soft Suede and Marina Mist Card Stock with a strip of Springtime Vintage and Basic Pearls. I've created the spiral flowers using Elegant Soiree offcuts (which beautifully compliment the Springtime Vintage DSP). The 'Mum' is stamped using the Broadsheet Alphabet in Marina Mist.

Thank you for stopping by my blog on todays Hop. Now jump on over to Natalie's blog to continue with the Mini Catalogue creativity....

Happy Crafting all ;0)

-XXX-