My Top 10!

Happy Saturday everyone! Hope everyone had a safe & fun 4th of July! I am feeling better today, but still moving a little slower than normal. Tonight we're going to dinner and to see fireworks at our Club so hopefully the weather holds out. We went to see Wall-E last night, and if you haven't seen it--GO--its so cute and fun, I really liked it and so did my dh and kids. I am having quite a happy mail day today. I got all my new Magnolia stamps from Diana (thanks Diana), my Magnolia summer stamp club stamps, my new MFT stamps and last but not least I got all my new "Sarah Kay" stamps. Doesn't get better than that!! If you're interested in the Sarah Kay stamps you can check them out at Sweet 'n Sassy. If you want to order some Magnolias and can't wait for Diana's (from Scor-Pal) webshop to open, you can email her at magnolia.us@shaw.ca and she will tell you what she has in her inventory (she will also be carrying Copics--yippee).

I finally finished my card that I've been working on for the past 2 days--I won't even tell you how long it took me :) All stamped images (girl, clouds, house) are from Magnolia and the sentiment is from Verve Visual's "Wonderful Wishes Remixed". The lovely dp is from Heidi Grace called "daydream believer" and I lovee it, chocolate brown is my "new" black--lol! I paired it up with SU's choc. chip and ballet blue cs. Of course there are many layers in this one--I cut and stamped the girl, clouds & house separately and then restamped the stairs and door, cut them out & colored all w/ my Copics. The stairs, 1 cloud, girl and the house are popped up with dimensionals. The second door image( the cut-out one) I glued 2 paper door "hinges" to it and then glued it to the door on the house image--I then cut a piece of choc. chip cs to size and glued it over the hinges for the inside of the door so you don't see the inner workings-lol. If you have or have seen this house stamp you will know that over the door is a house number--I wanted my sentiment to be there instead so I stamped it out separately and popped it up there. The windows and door handle have Diamond Glaze on them for a nice glassy shine. There are stardust stickles on her wings, flowers and clouds for lots of sparkle! I added some design dots to the girls dress and highlights to her shoes, cheeks and windows with my Ranger Inkssentials pen. I am pleased as pie on how it turned out, hopefully you think so too!

Now for my Top 10 List--I have a lot of people email with questions concerning my favorite, can't live without products--so here goes (in no particular order):

1. my Carl RT-200 paper cutter from Staples

2. stickles (easy to use and under $2 a bottle)

3. Ranger Inkssentials white pen (the best)

4. Copics (love 'em-expensive but worth it)

5. Nestabilities by Spellbinders (use 'em everyday)

6. Cuttlebug (can't do w/o it)

7. Diamond Glaze (great for shine and as a clear adhesive)

8. Scotch's Quick-Dry Adhesive Glue (the only glue I use-I get mine at Michaels)

9. Ranger's Adirondack inkpads in Espresso & Pitch Black (quick dry & great w/ Copics)

10. Paper Trey Ink's White Cardstock (the best quality for stamping & coloring w/ Copics)

Of course I have other products I use regularly, but these are my most beloved and recommended!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my "long" post and have a great weekend!

Suzanne

Magnolia stamps (girl, house, clouds), Basic Grey brads, Heidi Grace dp (daydream believer), stardust stickles, Diamond Glaze, dimensionals, scalloped square nestabilities, Fiskars threading water border punch, Verve Visual "Wonderful Wishes Remixed" sentiment, SU cs in ballet blue & choc. chip, Ranger Inkssentials pen, Copics

Magnolia-licious Day

Happy Wednesday everyone! It's another beautiful day here in VA--hope it stays thru the weekend for the Fourth of July holiday! I am so happy to share some wonderful news with you--in fact I'm still twirling around the floor with glee (lol)!! Diana Crick from Scor-Pal, asked me to be on the Design Team for her new Magnolia-licious webstore--Yippee!! You know how much I adore these stamps and I look forward to sharing them with you both here on my blog and at the webstore. As you know, right now you can only get the Magnolia stamps overseas and Diana will be the first & only (as of right now) store here in the US to carry them!! Isn't that exciting--I'm over the moon :) So you'll be seeing more work on my blog with these cutie-pies! If you're interested in ordering from Diana she is shipping orders right now, please email her at magnolia.us@shaw.ca for info on her inventory.

I didn't have a Magnolia card finished today to share, it's not finished yet, but I wanted to share a card/gift set I made with my new MFT stamps. Tonight, as you've heard me say a bagillion times, is the release party over on SCS for all of MFT's new July stamps. Come on over tonight (9-11 EST) and I'll see ya there--lots of contests and prizes to be won! This particular card is made with one of last month's stamps by Annie LaPointe "Chamomile". The layout on the card is with this week's MFT sketch #37 on SCS. There are 3 of these stamps by Annie and more to be released tonight--I think they're all quite elegant myself. I have a "ton" of Anna Griffin paper that I hoard (cuz' I love it so much) and I really wanted to use some with this stamp. I liked the combination of sunny yellow and sage green paired with PTI's new vintage cream cs. The corners are punched with my retired SU corner punch and then the damask dp is tucked into them. I used yellow pearls from Ellen Hutson (love these because they have adhesive on the back already--you just pop them on) and the silk flower is from Prima called "Belle Fleur". The sentiment is from another MFT stamp set called "Can Ya Dig It" and I added only a few stickles to the flower centers.

The little gift is a flower seed packet (mine doesn't have a seed packet inside yet cuz' I still have to get one). This template/idea came from over at Lisa Johnson's Poppy Paperie (you can find all the details here). Really simple and quick to make--I used my Scor-Pal (if you don't have one of these--it is a must have--I use it everyday) to score the fold lines and punched a hole in top panel for ribbon. I used the same papers, but the stamps are from Verve Visual's "Filigree Fantasy". I stamped the smaller filigree on the cs with Brilliance "moonlight white" ink and the main image is stamped with the larger filigree with SU's certainly celery. I added more stickles and pearls to the front image and popped it on dimensionals so the ribbon could slide behind it. On the inside I stamped the same "Chamomile" image lightly with PTI's "lemon tart" inkpad and this is where I'll attach the seed packet. You could also enclose tea or some other drink mix inside if you wanted. I think these would be cute party favors at a tea party or even a kid's party invite with kool-aid mix in it--lots of things you could do with it!!

Thanks to Lisa for the template and cool idea!! :)

Ok, I have other things to finish up today because we are going out to dinner at 6 pm with friends tonight and I still need a shower (last of my priorities today :)). You'll see me over at the MFT release party tonight too--so don't forget to visit and say "hi"!!

See ya tomorrow--

Suzanne

Alone Time

I'm back ladies, better late than never I guess! I've been working on a few projects that I hope to share in the next couple of days and in between had to run the kids to activities. I'm so happy to see that people are entering for my blog candy! I'm so glad that the winner will be picked randomly, because I wouldn't want to pick a favorite out of all the responses:-) I'd have to be totally selfish and say I'd want to be deserted on an island for a few days by myself just to read a great book & eat some good food (hopefully my island would have a resort just a hop, skip & away-lol). I like my alone time too much. Don't get me wrong though I love my dh & kids dearly and love to be around people. I'm a very social person and I love to have get togethers and all that, but I also like "me time" when the kids are at school and the house is all quiet. I love that time--I can get so much done and I love to pop open the windows and just have the outside sounds as my music--its very calming. Anyway, I'm having such good fun reading everyone's responses that I might have to ask a random question once a week just to see the answers--LOL!!

Ok, onto my cards for the day. I have a mountain of thank-you cards to make for all the kindness sent my way last week while I was sick and I thought I'd get a good jump on them. Both of these are thank-you gate fold cards that I will be sending out. They are so easy to make and so much fun for the recipient to open. The dimensions for these cards can be found on the Scor-Pal website (under the April/May edition, Mothers Day gatefold). You of course can change the sizes of these to fit your needs. The red card's dp is from Me&MyBig Ideas and the polkadots are from PTI's "Polka Dot Basics" set which I adore almost as much as my "swiss dots" cuttlebug folder--lots of uses for this stamp set! The flower is from Verve Visual's "petal & stems" collection which is one of four of their new stamp sets (I of course had to had all four)--I love that this set has plain images and then the same image but with polkadots (love em).

The second card is with Crate Paper dp which I've been hoarding (do you hoard supplies too?--more on that tomorrow). I love the colors and designs of all their papers. I paired it up with PTI's "spring moss" cardstock. The stamps on the front and the inside are from Inque Boutique's Savoir Faire collection--this is the "Nightingale set "(mine are from A Cherry On Top, one of my favorite online stores). I have a few of their stamp sets here that I haven't opened, so this was my first time inking one up. I'm really impressed with the quality of stamp and their beautiful designs--I will definitely be using these some more. I colored the stamps with SU markers and the inside sentiment is SU too. The front flower has a dewdrop in the middle and just a little bling on the leaves (stickles ya know, come on you know that's my favorite kind) & its popped up w/ dimensionals.

Well, hope you liked everything! Remember if you haven't entered for the blog candy-please do so before 11 pm on Thursday nite so we can get a winner on Friday. See ya tomorrow!

Suzanne

**CC Designs** new stamp sets are being released at midnite tonight on All That Scraps -- I will be first in line to order both sets!! Make sure to check them out--really,really cute!