Stamp Club 6.6.09 car

Before I get into the cards we did at Stamp Club on June 6 - I wanted to share this rainbow picture taken in our backyard after that long period where it seemed like it rained every day for a month -- I'm pretty sure this is the last day of that seemingly unending rainy period. It has rained a little bit since then, but not like it was for a while there. The ponds are way up.

I had almost finished with this blog -- and somehow hit something and it ALL disappeared - I know not where! So, am starting over again ...

I need to go do some other things, so will come back in later and Edit with the places where cards cased from and the link to the directions to the dress favor. And I better publish this thing before I hit the wrong button again and lose it again!

This time at stamp club we had stations and people moved from station to station at their own speed and as spaces became available. It seems like all enjoyed that station set up, so I am thinking about doing that some more. It made the tools needed more easily and more quickly available to use I think. There were 12 of us and everybody had finished all the cards before lunch at 12:30 ish.

Card CASED from:

This card was made using a Blush Blossom card base - a color I don't use very often. But when I saw it used with this card on splitcoast -- I loved it! I've seen this card done with different card bases, so instead of everybody making a Blush Blossom based card, there were different colors of cardstock in the packets and each person picked a different color. I meant for everybody to show their cards at the end so we could see how the different colors looked -- but I forgot to do that! The flower is made with vellum cardstock and the Manhattan Flower die from Stampin' Up! The sentiment is stamped on Blush Blossom and then layered onto a vellum scalloped oval (the leftover vellum after cutting out the top part of the rose from the vellum card front). The ink used was Encore gold. Encore gold is a pigment ink and pigment ink usually has to be heat set, but for some reason this gold pad was drier and the gold ink didn't smear. My silver did though, so I stayed with the gold ink I had originally used. Just know that if you make this and use Encore gold ink, you will probably have to heat dry it with your heat gun (I think you can just dry it) or let it sit overnight to dry or you could use clear embossing powder and emboss it. The stamp set used is Oval All in the SU! mini catalog and the ribbon is the white organza ribbon in the regular SU! catalog that will end June 30. The vellum is adhered to the card base on the left side with vellum adhesive -- which still showed just a bit - but can and is hidden by the ribbon. I think the vellum adhesive shows less if you put it directly on the vellum rather than the card base, but it is kinda hard to get it to stick to the embossed parts - so we discovered Saturday that it was easier to put the adhesive on the case base (remember that vellum doesn't go all the way to the top) rather than on the vellum.

Card CASED from:

This card caught my eye because of the black and white and also it is a way to use those little bits of ribbon after you trim some off. The piece of ribbon is an inch or inch and a half long. You do not pierce the ribbon - you just scrunch it a little bit (or do one twist) and then fit the ribbon up between the prongs of the brad. I trimmed the ribbon after getting it on so that it was even on both sides. When you stamp and cut out the sentiment (from God's Blessings) leave enough white space at the top for the ribbon. Also, when piercing the hole for the brad, make sure you position it so that the prongs don't show when you open them up. Also -- put the brad on just the white piece - or the white piece with it's black under layer -- BEFORE you put them on the white card base. This is so the brad won't show on the inside of the card. The brad is a clear rhinestone brad.

This card is a variation of the one above with a wider and different colored ribbon, and the brad is a medium sized brad. The clear rhinestone brads from Stampin' Up! come in a container with 3 different size brads.

Card bases for above two cards was 8 1/2 by 11 sheet cut vertically and then scored at 5 1/2 so that it is a top folder vertical card.

The dress below is the "favor" for June. The dress was all made up and while each of us stamped the monogram cards below and had the stamp inked up, we each stamped our initial on the skirt of the dress.

The top is from SU Brushed Gold cardstock. It matches perfectly with the Encore gold ink I thought! I absolutely love this alphabet set -- Lovely Letters -- I like the little curlicues. The set comes with blocks to be double mounted, but I didn't want to do that - so I ordered some more blocks from http://www.theblockguy.com. They didn't get here before Saturday, so I mounted just those letters for the people I knew were coming. Worked out well - had enough blocks for that. Some did ask about if not all letters came in the set -- they do - I just didn't have them all mounted. The blocks are here now and I'll get the rest of them mounted before too long. Then hopefully one of the extra large cases will hold all the blocks - I have yet to determine that.

When I saw this dress on splitcoast - it was made with the little handkerchiefs like our mothers or grandmothers used to carry -- and they were so pretty. I googled ladies handkerchiefs or something like that and found some beautiful ones, but buying hankies for the favor was not cost effective. So after pondering for a while, I came up with the napkin idea and bought some Vanity Fair napkins (nicer, prettier than the ones we use everyday). I also found the template and directions on how to make the dress, either from the splitcoast picture or when I was at the napkins site. The directions are here:

I did end up short cutting some and not making the shoulders at an angle (it was Saturday morning and I was running out of time); I also just folded the sides of the napkin in to make the point rather than opening it up and following the directions exactly.

This was the monogram card we made with the Lovely Letters set. SU! Brushed Gold cardstock, Basic Black Cardstock, and white card base folded at the top. The white circle was punched, after stamping the letter, with 1 1/4" circle punch (which is a tight for the M's we discovered, but I think the M people got all of the M in the circle); the black circle below it was punched with the 1 3/8" circle punch, and then the gold is with the scalloped circle punch - all SU!

Above is my first card draft using the Lovely Letters set to make a monogram card -- before I decided to add the black and the strip. The white circle here is punched with the 1 3/8" circle punch -- which would allow more room for the wide letters like the M.

I think I came up with these two cards on my own -- not directly CASED!

Card CASED from:

This card caught my eye because it uses two of my favorite colors -- yellow and orange. The card is a vertical top fold card; the base and the circle in the middle of the flower is So Saffron; the orange strip is Tangerine Tango, as is the ribbon - both of which will retire June 30 since Tangerine Tango is an in color. The brown square is from Chocolate Chip designer series patterned paper - you can't tell from the picture but it has a pattern on it - it is not solid chocolate chip. The circle in the middle was punched with 1" circle punch and then paper pierced using a circle plastic canvas and punching at same location in each of the little plastic canvas squares. The "{thank you}" is from All Holidays; the punch is the Curly Label punch which will be by itself (not in kit) in the new catalog.

Card CASED from:

Using Scraps #5 (methinks #5 - have lost count) ...

I've had the sheet I printed out with this card on it for months - floating around while I pondered how the original maker made those diamonds. After experimenting I figured out it is just a strip of paper (these strips were 1/2") and then just cut on a diagonal - holding the scissors at the same angle as you cut down the strip. One of these strips is from Kiwi Kiss Designer Series paper (but one could use Old Olive since Kiwi Kiss is retiring) and the other is Tempting Turquoise Designer Series paper. I just kinda worked my way down, back and forth. I did find when I tried another one that it worked better for me if I concentrated on the space between the diamonds and the points of the diamonds (like across from each other). Sally said she put all the Turquoise ones down the middle - over far enough -- and then when back and placed the Kiwi Kiss ones and that worked well for her. So --- if you do this, you might need to play with it. Try Sally's way...

Since the object for this card was "using scraps" rather than cutting out strips of DSP specifically for a card, I tried one with regular cardstock. This was my third card -- the second one I did with red and blue I was concentrating on something other than space between the diamonds and the points. It didn't come down the card straight but worked its way to the right. Anyway -- you know when you're layering and you cut 1/2" off two sides of your card -- you could use those strips to make these diamonds.

And its a card that could be used for a guy too - it's not flowery and feminine. The sentiment stamp is from a SU! set I used A LOT: Sincere Salutations.

Next Stamp Club will be July 11. Will let you know where later. We moved it from first Saturday to second Saturday since the first Saturday was July 4 - actual holiday day.