B A B Y

Serendipity Stamps has the most BEAUTIFUL alphabet stamps and this week the Serendipity Stamps design team is presenting samples of how versatile these lovely letters are.

I decided to make a Twist Top Box with the letters spelling out BABY around it. This twist top box is very simple to create. One of my favorite blogs to read is Becca Feeken's Amazing Paper Grace and she posted an easy to follow tutorial on her blog HERE. Thank you Becca for the inspiration!
This sweet box could be used as packaging for a gift to enclose a baby onesie, a bib, rattles and teething rings and bonnets. Or perhaps you could use it at a baby shower as a centerpiece of gift/favor filled with sweets or treats. The top literally twists open so there is nothing to unfasten or untie to open it. And yet, the cardstock twist top does stay closed so if you tip it, it won't fall open. Isn't this a neat little box?

I want to give you a better view the letters.

Each letter of the alphabet is a different flower design.

I can imagine so many different card and project ideas using the alphabet set. Please be sure to check out the sets at Serendipity Stamps. You can find them HERE and HERE .


For more inspiration using Serendipity Stamps Floral Alphabet, be sure to check out the rest of the Serendipity Design Team members work:

Amy Cokley
Anya Schrier
Kathie Bailey
Lynda Benden

Cheers!

Jennifer

Three Graces

In Greek mythology the three graces are goddesses of such things as charm, beauty, and creativity. In art we see a number of paintings depicting the three graces and one in particular that comes to mind is by Raphael whose work portrays the three graces who are often considered to be the handmaidens of Venus.

The title of this stamp is Three Graces and is made by Coronado Island designs and stamps. This is a stamp that I've drooled over for years and I finally bit the bullet, wiped the drool from my chin and purchased it so that I could begin enjoying it myself.

I'm not sure if you can see it in this closeup but I used Glitter Ritz on sticky paper over the stamped image of the horses so they have quite a shimmer to them. It reminds me of seeing horses run in a fine snow or sleet.

Card Recipe:
Stamp: Three Graces SJ010 - L Coronado Island designs & stamps
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black and just a hint of Copic markers for shading
Paper: Bo Bunny
Accessories: Glitter Glitz, Martha Stewart Border Punch, Ribbon and Prima Flowers, Pearl Brad in the flower's center, and foam tape for mounting the image.

This is the first card I made using this stamp and it is a birthday card. One day soon I'd like to work up sets of notecards using this stamp as the focal image.

Cheers!

Jennifer

Scent with love

Serendipity Stamps has a new spring line of just released stamps that are just too, too sweet. The set I used for this Scent with love card is Serendipity Stamps set 1203QCL SKUNK. When I was a little girl I had a Pepe LePew stuffed skunk and this set brought back fond childhood memories.

This week the entire Serendipity Stamps design team is presenting new spring line cards using the sketch layout below. I love working with sketch layouts and had a lot of fun with this one.

Card Recipe:
Stamps: Serendipity Stamps 1203QCL
Papers: Stampin' Up! cardstock and design papers
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Stampin' Up! Brocade Blue and colored with Copic Markers
Accessories: Cuttle Bug Swiss Dots embossing folder, Foam dots, Prima Flowers, Pearls

For more inspiration of cards using Lynda's sketch layout and Serendipity Stamps check out the rest of the Serendipity Design Team members work:

Amy Cokley
Anya Schrier
Kathie Bailey
Lynda Benden

Cheers!

Jennifer

Lemon Drop Martini Cocktail Apron

The big and very exciting reveal took place yesterday when the apron from my secret partner in the Martini Madness apron swap arrived! Grace B ( aka: Katmom) from Spokane, Washington, thank you so much!! I've never had a Lemon Drop Martini before but I'm sure it is going to quickly become my favorite cocktail. ESPECIALLY since I can wear this OH SO ADORABLE lemon/lime apron.I just have to tell you, this apron is beautifully made and all of the details are sheer perfection! Can you tell how much I love this apron?

Oh wait, Grace not only created the apron but also filled the box to capacity with all types of wonderful treats. Just look!

Now in case you can't make out all of the wonderful extras she included let me list a few: laminated recipes for a variety of martini's (oh how smart you are to laminate them for me! *wink* Also there is the martini glass and shaker, a sachet filled with oh so wonderful scented lavender, a crocheted pot holder (too cute!) a hand beaded bracelet that I'll look so chic wearing along with my apron (they match!) and beaded glass ring/indentifier, and also a rubber stamp! Soooooo...you lurked my blog and discovered I'm a stamper! Oh how clever!

One more picture of the apron. I am wearing it as I post today. Grace (Katmom) thank you so very much. This has been so much fun and I adore my new lemon drop cocktail apron.

Cheers!

Jennifer

Martini Madness - Flirty Apron Swap

For the past couple of years I've been participating in Sassy Apron Swaps and Flirty Apron swaps and they've really been a lot of fun. This month Shawnee hosted a swap called Martini Madness and all of the participants received a secret partner for whom we'd create a flirty cocktail apron. Did you notice the banner along the right column about Martini Madness and wonder what I was up to now?

First I want to show you the card I made to enclose with the apron I made for my secret partner:
This apron stamp is one of two delightful Lockhart apron stamps. Of COURSE I had to have both stamps in my collection since I'm an apronista too! I paper pieced the image trying to match the fabric similarly to the apron I made using BoBunny paper and ribbon as well as attaching the same buttons I used on the apron.

And here is my secret partner's 1954 Retro cocktail apron. I hope she'll enjoy it. Since it is nearly Valentine's Day I wanted to make her a sassy/flirty little cocktail apron. The points are actually small pockets.

Now, you might wonder where the "Martini Madness" part comes in. One of the requirements was to also include a martini glass that was decorated. I didn't think my partner should drink alone so I filled two martini glasses with Hershey Kisses and wrapped them up for her to share with a loved one or friend on Valentine's Day to enjoy.

Above is a closeup of the contents that was shipped off to my secret partner. I sure hope she'll enjoy it as much as I did putting the package together.

And now I'm eagerly checking the mail for the apron that a secret someone is creating for me. I'll be sure to post photos when it arrives.

Until then,
Cheers!

Jennifer

Let's put on a puppet show!

I've been having just the most fun making these hand puppets and I just had to share them today. Unfortunately a photographer I'm not, so the details aren't showing up very well in my pictures. Nevertheless, I thought some of you who have children and/or grandchildren might get a kick out of these.

These are my first three I've made. Meet my Dog puppet (who looks very much like my Landseers, Gabe and Paige), my funny Monkey and finally, the Blue Bear.
The blue bear doesn't have a tail but I wanted to show you the dog and monkey tails. The monkey has pipe cleaners inside the tail so you can bend it in any direction and shape you'd like.

My little dog puppet DOES have a nose but it is a black pompom and blends into the black muzzle in the photo.

I just have to giggle when I see this funny monkey. His misshaped head just adds to his whimsy, I think.

I do believe that the blue bear is actually a polar bear. Afterall, he's made from POLAR fleece and perhaps it just got too cold outside that he turned BLUE.

These are really quick to make and I used reminents of polar fleece for the bodies and the hands and muzzles (faces) are made from scraps of ultra suede. So these fun puppets are completely washable.

I'm hoping a special little girl will enjoy these for many years to come as she celebrates her first birthday today. Perhaps her Grandpa will build her a puppet stage to put on shows!

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers!

Jennifer

BLING it on

I have a birthday card to share today that I made for a special little someone who'll be celebrating her first birthday very soon. I wanted to pull out all of the stops and use as much color and accoutrement that I could from my blingy supplies. Afterall, a first birthday deserves lots of flare and fun, right?

Isn't this GRUFFIE just the cutest? When my children celebrated their first birthdays this was similar to the scene they shared as they sat in their highchair and enjoyed their cake.

I have been having a lot of fun lately using my FLOWER SOFT product on a variety of cards and for today's card it was sort of a last minute idea to use the Flower Soft for cake crumbs. I used ivory Flower Soft and mixed in a few flakes of yellow Flower Soft to give a cake-like color. I'm tickled with the outcome. Doesn't it look like the bear is getting crumbs all over?

This card has inspired me to start using Flower Soft in ways other than just for flowers.

Card Recipes:

Stamps: Stampabilities - Beary Nice Celebration OR1049 and Just Johanna sentiment stamps
Paper: K & Company
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Stazon Orange and the image is colored with Copic Markers
Accessories: Nestibilities label die, Ribbon, Yellow brads, a variety of different colors of Stickles, clear dimensional glaze on the candles, Machine stitching and Flower Soft (ivory mixed with a bit of yellow).

The card is finished and now I need to finish up making the gift to be given with the card. I'd better get back to my sewing machine now.

Enjoy your day!

Jennifer

LOVE in Lavender

The Friday Sketcher's challenge this week (shown above) was the inspiration for another non-traditional Valentine card. I really like the simplicity of this layout while allowing for some embellishment to be added to the card.

For my card I used another well loved stamp set from Stampin' Up! called "Long Time Friend." In my effort to make Valentine cards this year I wanted to step away from the traditional hearts and red, white and pink colors and still make cards that one could give to family and friends. This set also screamed for me to get out the FLOWER SOFT product and make the lavender become almost real.

On the sentiment portion of the card I added some hand made Lavender stems using Flower soft on the end of a wire and tying in a bow with a ribbon.

To the flowers on the main image I also added Flower Soft to give life to the otherwise one dimensional flowers.



Card Recipe:

Stamps: Stampin' Up! "Long Time Friend" and Papertrey Ink for the "Love" sentiment
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Whispers Archival Rio Purple and image colored with Copic markers
Paper: Craft cardstock for card base, Bazzill deep purple cardstock for mats and Nature's Garden (Marjolein Bastin) patterned paper
Accessories: Stampin' Up! Oval punches, Martha Stewart lace eyelet border punch, machine stitching, Flower Soft (Lavender), ribbon, stickles



It is a frigid, albeit sunny Saturday here in Eastern Ontario. I hope you are keeping warm and having a relaxing day.

Cheers!

Jennifer

Blueberry Delight

I got some new House Mouse stamps and I couldn't wait to ink them up and so you know you'll be seeing a lot of House Mouse and House Mouse friends cards in the next several weeks. I just love these little critters. And look! This one is eating a blueberry tart, very similar to the tart I made a couple of weeks ago. YUMMY!

The House Mouse and Friends Monday challenge site posts a new challenge every other Monday and the latest challenge is to create a faux grid background on your House Mouse card. I've never done this before but it was very easy and I think makes a super looking embossed background. The way I accomplished my grid background was using my scoring tool and my papercutter grid. If I had a scorepal or one of the new scoring boards that are out I'm sure the measuring would be faster, but I found this to work easily for me.


Card Recipe:

Stamps: Stampabilities Blueberry Delight HMUR1068 and Papertrey Ink Handwritten Notes for the sentiment
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black and Whispers Archival Starry Starry Night blue, imaged colored with Copic Markers
Cardstock: Stampin' Up! blue and Papertrey Ink white and craft
Accessories: Nestibilities Octagonal and scalloped octagonal dies, lace, ribbon and buttons from my sewing box stash, a little dimensional glaze on the blueberries to make them shine and a tad of pink stickles on the mouse's ears and nose.



Oops, our sun just went behind the clouds and it is snowing hard again. Perhaps I should get out the blueberries and lemons and make another tart.

Bon Appetit!

Jennifer

Gingersnap Creations Challenge: NUMBERS

It's the 4th Wednesday in January and that means the 4th January challenge at Gingersnap Creations blog is posted and the challenge this week is NUMBERS. Serendipity Stamps is this month's sponsor and is offering some great prizes so be sure to enter in on the challenge for your chance to play along and possibly win a great stamp set.

For my card for the NUMBERS challenge is a bit of a play on the words in the Serendipity Stamps sentiment stamp "It's not the Years in your life that count, it's the Life in your Years." You're only the NUMBER of years you feel rather than what your birth age number is. OK, I might have stretched the challenge a bit, but I really love this sentiment and the bicycle stamp and thoroughly enjoyed using it in this week's NUMBERS challenge.



Card Recipe:

Stamps: Serendipity Stamps stamps #219G Bicycle and 574E (sentiment)
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black and Stazon Orange. Image colored with copic markers
Paper: K & Company
Accessories: Nestibilites oval dies, Flower Soft, Machine stitching, Stickles (distressed orange), Ribbon (dashes and dots), Prima Flowers and brads.

For more inspiration of cards using the theme of NUMBERS check out the rest of the Gingersnap and Serendipity samples over at GINGERSNAP CREATIONS and of course my Serendipity Design Team members work:

Amy Cokley
Anya Schrier
Kathie Bailey
Lynda Benden

Cheers!

Jennifer

Round and Rectangle Valentines

This week's MOJO123 Layout Challenge was the layout inspiration for two more Valentine cards. The challenge layouts (pictured below) is to make cards either a round or square or one of each.


Making these fun little round cards reminds me a lot of the little Valentines we used to exchange in elementary school. Oh the excitement of decorating a white bakery sack and taping it to the corner of our desks. Then, on Valentine's Day, we would walk back and forth through the rows of desks and place a Valentine in each of our classmates Valentine sack. It wasn't until we went home from school that we could go through all of the valentines and see what each child wrote on them.

The Stampin' Up! Vintage Valentine set, which as I've mentioned in previous posts, is my favorite set to use each year when I make Valentines. I think it is probably mostly due to nastolgia in that they remind me so much of the Valentines we exchanged back in the 1950's and 1960's.


CARD RECIPE:
Stamps: Vintage Valentine set from Stampin' Up!
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, images colored with Copic Markers
Paper: Stampin' Up! Card stock and patterned paper
Accessories: Nestibilities circle and scalloped circle dies, buttons, ribbon, stickles.



These were great fun to create and I really think I may use the circle layout for more Valentines.

Until next time,
Cheers!
Jennifer

Sweet Wonderful You!

This week's Penny Black Saturday Challenge was to create something "sweet." This very sweet Penny Black stamp titled "furry embrace" suited the challenge perfectly for me. And, I love this sweet stamp so much that I made two cards (same design) just because it was so much fun to color and to have on hand with my stack of Valentine cards I've been making.

Card Recipe:
Stamps: Penny Black Furry embrace 2288K and the sentiment is Papertrey Ink handwritten notes.
Cardstock/paper: Stampin' Up! pink and rose cardstock, image stamped on Papertrey Ink white and the patterned Red Heart Vellum is from Michaels.
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black and Momento Rose Bud for the sentiment
Accessories: Martha Stewart Heart Border Punch, red crystals, foam mounting tape, 1/8th inch pink satin ribbon, and red and cotton candy pink Stickles.



Have a wonderful day!

Cheers!

Jennifer

Gingersnap Creations Week #3 Challenge: Metallics

This is week #3 for GINGERSNAP CREATIONS challenge and the challenge is to use METALLICS on your card or project. And once again the Serendipity Stamps design team is joining in with Gingersnap Creations design team to create some samples. Be sure to check out both GINGERSNAP CREATIONS Blog as well as SERENDIPITY STAMPS Blog for your chance to win some lovely prizes and see all of the samples.





For my card using Metallics I used Serendipity Stamps set 419QCL Heart with Words. I stamped the heart on pink cardstock in Versamark and then used Silver Metalic embossing powder. With the addition of shiney silver cardstock as the mats and adding a silver heart LOVE charm on silver cord I've created my version of the challenge to use Metallics.

CARD RECIPE:
Stamps: Serendipity Stamps 419QCL Heart with Words
Paper: Heart patterned paper from Michaels, shiney silver metalic cardstock
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: Nestibilities oval and scalloped oval dies, silver detail embossing powder, EK Success Heart corner punch, Pearls, Heart charm, silver coard and sheer pink ribbon.



For more inspiration of cards using the theme of METALLICS check out the rest of the Gingersnap and Serendipity samples over at GINGERSNAP CREATIONS and of course my Serendipity Design Team members work:
Amy Cokley
Anya Schrier
Kathie Bailey
Lynda Benden

Here's wishing you a wonderful day!
Cheers!

Jennifer

Puppy Love - Mojo122

Yesterday Julee posted this week's MOJO122 Sketch Challenge and as soon as I saw it I thought PUPPY LOVE! Anyone who knows me knows of my love of my Newfoundland Dogs and this sketch layout seemed to lend itself to a stamp I haven't used in ages but the comic expression makes me think of my own big dogs.

I can't give you too much detail for the card recipe details because the cute patterned paper with the dots and pawprints is a little scrap leftover in my scrap box and I have no idea of the manufacturer. The Stamp is one of my favorite Eat Cake Graphics stamps. Awww ... just look at that face. So without a lot of card discussion this morning, I present my Mojo122 card for this week's sketch layout which I've aptly named "Puppy Love".

But it would be impossible and not at all appropriate for me not to post some photos of my big puppy loves. These are my Newfoundland Dogs that have owned me in various stages of their lives.
This was my first Newfoundand, Bella. Bella carried her stuffed bear everywhere...even out in the snow.
From left to right is Gabe (Landseer Newfoundland), Paige as a Newborn (also a Landseer Newfoundland) and on the right is Willow, another black Newfoundland we got from a rescue.

Always an oldie but goodie...the day we brought Gabe home and introduced him to Bella. I'm not sure if Bella was as thrilled as Gabe was but they grew up to be best of buddies. I think Gabe still remembers and misses our Bella-bear.

No other words to describe other than BEAUTIFUL WILLOW!

Awww...what a face! This is Paige taken yesterday while I was trying to do something else but she wanted to be in my face! :)

Gabe must always receive loves and hugs if anyone else is getting them. He's first! ALWAYS first in line for lovin'.

So there is today's card and my big puppy loves.

Have a day filled with lots of happiness and love. And if you have a dog, give that pup a hug!

Cheers!

Jennifer