Stampin’ Up! offers two choices for most of it’s stamp sets: wood mount or clear mount. Each of the wood mount stamps come with a coordinating wood blocks. No work to switch between stamps. You just clean it off, put it back in the case and grab the next stamp. Clear mount stamps are stored in DVD cases and are easier to organize (and you can pack up more of them when you want to travel to my…
How many times have you stamped a myriad of Circle Circus images on scrap paper and then been stuck as to which punch you needed to finish the desired look? OK, so you might have a ring with all your punched out images so you can size everything up at a moment’s notice. You might have a chart in your drawer that lists them all out. Well, thanks to an idea from Allie Giel (one of my newest downlines…
Last week, I shared this card, a gorgeous stair step card I cased from Katy McGloin (why not get one last “ooh and ahh” out of this card?): Katy credits Splitcoast Stampers for the original tutorial for this card, but the original card design would not fit into a standard-sized envelope. Because Katy only accepts perfection, she worked tirelessly to reconfigure the design, and she succeeded! Last week, I shared Katy’s drawing of the cuts and scores to make…
I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again – this hobby of stamping is actually comprised of three very separate hobbies: collecting, creating and organizing. Today, I want to offer some organization tips for your sponges and sponge daubers. Stamping sponges and sponge daubers are two of the handiest (but most underutilized) tools in my craft room. Both are perfect for adding texture and color to projects. Just dip them into an ink pad and then smear or tap away! Stamping…
In yesterday’s post, I shared this Googly Ghouls Halloween card as a part of the Pals 2012 Holiday Catalog Blog Hop: I mounted the ghouls on a long, slender card that would easily fit in a standard business envelope – the Basic Black base measures 9″x7-1/2″ and is scored at 3-3/4″ to make a 9″x3-3/4″ card front. Rather than stick this beautiful card in a plain, legal envelope, I decided to make a coordinated, stylish…
Have you tried Stampin’ Up!’s new Stampin’ Scrub? From the minute it was released, I’ve heard nothing but WONDERFUL things. This new product grips to the table when it’s opened, so you can clean and dry your stamps with one hand. The surface is larger, so it’s really easy to clean and dry your largest stamps. The hinge that holds the two sides is stronger than the previous prototype. My new Stampin’ Scrub came in the mail…
I’ve recently written a few posts about ways to store and use clear mount stamps. Makes me feel bad for my wood mount sets, so I have created today’s post in honor of them. I absoultely love my clear mount sets, but I still order wood mounts for sets I expect to use in workshops or for sets with teeny tiny or repetitive images – I don’t like to mount, stamp, clean, unmount, repeat for…
I have collected quite a few clear mount stamp sets over the last couple of months. There’s something pretty wonderful about how they all fit so neatly in that little DVD case and stack so beautifully on my shelves. There’s even something kinda’ cool about the way the stamps loosely dance about the case. Until now… Katy introduced me to a new way of keeping my stamps inside the case, an even cleaner way to…
Yesterday’s project features the sentiment “Live in the Sunshine,” which was stamped on a piece of Whisper White card stock and then trimmed into a banner. With scissors, it is easy to mess up the two [seemingly simple] snips that would turn an ordinary slip of paper into a brilliant banner. Today I want to share a quick tip for easily making a banner out of a strip of paper. Here’s a close-up of yesterday’s project, followed…
It’s perfectly OK to re-work a project if you aren’t happy with it the first time. When I first designed the card I shared over the weekend, I used the beautiful Summer Starfruit pattern from the Patio Party Designer Series Paper as the centerpiece. After I applied the jar with Stampin’ Dimensionals and added the corner circles, I realized the design on the paper was too much for this layout. While I love the design…
