Fall Fest 2011

Well here are some pictures from our Fall Fest. This is our Tina "Beana" Rosenkrans. Fall Fest is our semi annual gathering where Tina's downline gather. We go over new things that may be going on and in our stamping world, better ways to run our business and the best part, we make Inkcredible projects!

Tina Rosenkrans

 Here is my wonderful friend, Debbie Modrowsky, showing the double embossed, faux suede, leaves from a round punch, gathering ribbon, and coloring the silver glitter paper! WOW! Here is a sample of one of the cards she demonstrated. Isn't it beautiful?!

 Here are a few of my fellow demonstrator friends that I haven't seen in a while. Linda, Debbie, Patti, me, and Cathy. (L-R)

 This is my Tina. She is like my Shelli. Shelli is the co-founder of Stampin' Up! But she is the glue that holds us all together. We always have a great time when we get together.

 This is  a picture of some of my samples I made for my presentation. Tina asked if I would make the Advent Calendar, that is in the Holiday Mini and demonstrate how to use this fabulous new Bigz Die cut Peek A Boo.

 Here is what I demonstrated. I must say I didn't come up with this card myself. I got this idea from Dawn Griffith.

This is a sample of one of the projects we did on Friday. I thought I had more pictures of the projects we did, but I seemed to forget to do that. I was so busy making them and taking pictures of some great cards and have some wonderful ideas for so many classes, I'm bursting at the seems! No not really.

September Technique Class

Bat Treat

For September's Technique class. Doris had asked if we could make the bat that Shelli had posted on her site. So I had to check out this bat. I changed it a bit from what Shelli had done, but I think it turned out great. I brought this bat to our semi annual stamping event called Fall Fest and had lots of people asking how I did it. The bat is made from the Petal Cone and Pennant Parade Bigz Dies, large circle punch, spider embossing folder, 1/2" circle punch, red glitter brads, star punch, white gel pen, and smooch vanilla. We did a couple of other cards, but can't seem to get them uploaded. I'll have to try again later. Enjoy!

It Takes Two

Well here are the other two cards. On the "It Takes Two" cards I used Early Espresso, Not Quite Navy, & Always Artichoke Classic ink, Soft Suede, Not Quite Navy, River Rock, & Very Vanilla cardstock. I wanted an earthy feel to the card. Hope you like it too.

Colorful Silhouttes

On this third card, I used River Rock cardstock for the base and stamped the images on Whisper White.  This is a double embossed technique. I like how the black image pops off the card. I'll work on getting last month's techniques up later in the week.

Here is one of my sunflowers I planted this year. I had been wanting to plant these for a couple of years and finally got to plant them this year. The flowers are huge and most of the plants are at least 7 feet high. Most of them are lining the front of my garden. This one was an extra. I'm hoping that I'll be able to get the seeds and eat them! The garden has done so well this year. I've had so many green beans. This year I did pole beans and really didn't have the support in place for them soon enough and it has been difficult to pick. I have lots that have gotten way too big and hate to rid of them, I'm trying to figure out what to do with them. The corn I planted has done very well too. The first seeds I planted didn't come up, probably because they were a year or two old (I think). I then bought some plants and they did ok, but the second batch I planted came out great! Most of the ears are like half an ear but they taste so good and sweet!

This is another great picture my daughter got of the butterflies that enjoy the echinacea out my kitchen window. I don't know how she does it, but is able to get so close without them flying away. I love butterflies. I wish we would get more variety. Watching them is so peaceful. With all the rain we've had, a lot of the plants have fallen down.

This last photo is a sample of the banner project  I'll be teaching at Octoberfest next month. This is an annual event at Camp Hoover, on October 14-16. If you're an adult and would like to have a weekend away of fun, this is for you. I'll be holding two classes and there are a lot of other things to do or nothing at all. Also this Thursday is my Technique Class. We start at 7pm and do 3 techniques, usually cards, but you can use these techniques on your scrapbook pages as well.

Irene Effects & More!

Well Irene is past and more hurricanes are on their way. We finally got our power back on Saturday. Seven days of no power. We did have a generator which helped a great deal, but we were very limited as to what we could have on. We also lost our phone service for three days! Once we got that back there has been a lot of static and now no phone again! This is driving me crazy! I spent at least 30 minutes trying different things to see if I could get the phones to work. Then I spent about 45 minutes on the phone with Verizon and still nothing! Someone can't come out until Wednesday and then they want you to be home all day! Well at least we have internet. We had some flooding in our field and several trees came down on our fence line, but all in all we've made out much better then others. Here is a picture of my garden before the hurricane. It looks pretty much the same. We tied up the sunflowers and glad we did, they're still looking great.

July Projects

Here are some cards I did in July. I didn't have a chance to post back then, so I figured I get them posted now. This first card I made for my son to take to his girlfriends grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. Since I couldn't see him going with just a card, I made a "bag" using the fancy favor bigz die and the Elizabeth stamp and put chocolates in it. Everything is better with chocolate!


This next card, I made for my mil birthday. I used the greenhouse garden stamp set. I love this set. I cased this from Kathy Schweinfurth. I changed the colors around a bit. I also made this a pop up. Here's the inside.

August Technique Class

Here are my samples from August technique class. We had a fun time making these. I just couldn't wait to use some the new products in the upcoming Holiday Mini (starts September 1). The first card uses the Gently Falling 2 step stamp set. We only used the outline portion of the set and daubers to color the leaf. Then used the 2-way glue and added gold glitter to the edge of the leaf. I embossed the main base of the card with the dot embossing folder and used the white gel pen to make the dots pop more. The DSP is also from this "suite". I got this idea from Erika Clark.

The next card is my spooky Halloween card. We used a brayer to color this card. We started with Whisper White cardstock. I punched a 1 3/4" circle and attched it to the card and brayered pumpkin pie ink first. After a pass or 2 with the brayer I removed the circle and had a light touch of the pumpkin pie fill in the moon. I then replaced the circle and used tango tangerine to add a bit more color. I then stamped the trees (from Lovely as a Tree), tore a piece of scratch paper and brayered basic black on the bottom. I then used the web embossing folder and embossed the spider's web onto the cardstock and then sanded the color off the raised area to let the white show through. This idea came from Charlotte Hollingsworth. These two are also Stampin' Up! demonstrators. Thanks for sharing!

This last project, seemed to just come to me. I've seen this die used similarly. I used the petal cone Bigz die. I also wanted to use the new Simply Score tool and the new big buttons worked perfectly with this project. I thought this would make a perfect table setting! To make the rosette, I started with a 1.5"x12" piece of DSP and then punched the scallop border punch on one side. I then scored every other scallop using the simply score board. Flipped it over and scored the opposite scallops. Doing this, it made it much easier to accordion fold the paper. I also used the multi purpose liquid glue to attach the ends. I also used the 1 3/4" punch to punch a piece of scrap card stock for a base and also used the same glue to attach the rosette. I layered the button on another piece of coordinating piece of cardstock. I found the multi purpose glue seemed to work the best in adhering everything. I tried the glue dots and sticky strip, but they would come apart after awhile.

Well I hope you enjoyed these projects. Maybe you'll make it to the next technique class and make the projects in person!

Happy Mother's Day

Well I hope all the moms out there had a nice Mother's Day. I was busy this morning making my mother-in-law a card for today. I wanted to do something special and this is what I came up with (card on left). I used a retired set called Toile Blossoms. I got the idea from several different cards and combined them. The DSP was in the last mini, Occasions. I got this gorgeous card from a friend of mine for my birthday and used a few of her ideas here too.

The tissue box I made for my physical therapist. She is getting married and moving to OK. I thought this would be something she could use at the wedding or in her new home. I love the way it turned out. The directions are on splitcoaststampers.com. I lifted ideas from several different boxes and came up with this. I used Shimmery White for the base.

Well I wanted to get this post out on Mother's Day. I'll have to get a picture of the birthday card and put her blog link on the site. She does beautiful work. Cyndy