Stampin' Up! Art With Elizabeth in Michigan and anywhere in the USA

Friday, March 20, 2009

It's A Girl

I'm An Auntie!

I try not to post personal things here, but once in a while it is called for.

Tonight I got a call from my Baby Brother - He's now the proud Daddy of a beautiful baby girl.

Congratulations guys!

London Seminar

Under The Stars

Under The Stars Spinning Bear

I wish you could see this card in person, the bear actually spins around and his tummy and snout are popped out with dimensionals.

You'll find this fabulous stamp set on page 103 - Under The Starts - 111556 - it has a fabulous coordinating Skeeters Stampin' Around Wheel too. This is one of those timeless sets that you just know will come out time and again.

Wondering how to create such a perfect circle? Take a look on page 130 of the Spring Summer 2009 Idea Book and Catalog and you'll find a mini tutorial on how to use our fabulous new Circle Scissor Plus. It's unbelievably easy to use and has an attachment so that you can switch out the blade and actually draw circles too by inserting a pencil or one of our color coordinated Stampin' Write Markers.

Stay posted, I have lots of circle ideas to show you in the coming weeks and I know you won't be able to resist ordering the Circle Scissor Plus - Page 188 #112530.

Have a wonderful Friday and a Fabulous weekend.

London Seminar

Thursday, March 19, 2009

My March Stamp Club Swap

It's going to be busy around here until early next week and so just in case I don't get to post, I thought I'd give you some extra posts today.

At the London Stampin' Up! regional seminar last weekend, I was given a new stamp set. It's called Best Wishes And More - Page 55 #111602. If I am totally honest, it isn't a set that was on my wish lest and truthfully, I hadn't really noticed it, but something strange happened yesterday..........

This weekend is our stamp club meeting and so I decided to use my new set for my swaps. Half way through using this new set, I discovered that I was really, really enjoying it and just enjoying stamping with it. I spend a lot of time creating classes and make 'n takes for other people and I often forget to stop and enjoy stamping just for me.

Thank you "Best Wishes and More" - you reminded me why I absolutely love stamping.

I just know that this is one of those sets that will come out time and again, because it has something for every season - As I was creating, I was even planning how I could use it for a Fall and Holiday card later this year.

When I saw the bird image in this set, I just had to get out my big shot, because the bird reminded me of the bird I have in my Birds and Blooms Sizzlits and then I saw that there were leaves too and it all just came together. I used my new 1 3/4" circle punch for the large regal rose circle and who can't resist using our fabulous Sale-A-Bration FREE paper and ribbon when it's this pretty?

I had the best time making these swaps - can you tell? I feel like I took a mini stamping vacation, so refreshing.

Stay posted, I have a feeling there will be lots more examples with this set in the coming months.

I hope the ladies like them, you know me, I always worry about that kind of stuff.

FREE Sale-A-Bration Paper

Isn't Upsy Daisy a wonderful set?

I was using our FREE Sale-A-Bration double sided designer series paper and ribbon all day yesterday to create projects. I'll post some more in the next few days.
Don't forget that once Sale-A-Bration ends on March 31st the Sale-A-Bration items are gone forever, so now is a perfect time to stock up on anything you need and earn FREE Sale-A-Bration items at the same time.

Images © 1990-2009 Stampin' Up!

Have a wonderful day - come back soon, I have some great projects to share with you over the next few days!

London Regional

A Good Egg

A Good Egg, isn't new for this year, but did you ever think of stamping the shell on designer series paper before you cut it out? (this is the FREE Sale-A-Bration Designer Series Paper). I just love the word window punch, you can stamp the sentiment in a hurry and then punch it out by turning the punch upside down and lining it up over the words - strait every time and you can make the tag as long or as short as you like, just by moving the punch around - cooooool!

London Regional.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Gift Inspiration

A Birthday treat for a very special lady........

My ladies often ask me where I get my inspiration from. As you saw yesterday, it came from the need for my children to have a healthy snack and a celebration.

Monday was a special day two ladies close to my heart have the same Birthday - My Big Sister and the wonderful Principal at our school.

At the weekend I was out shopping for Easter gifts to send to my family in England and I came upon these fabulous chocolate flowers and just had to buy some to send. This is how I dreamed they would look when the arrived, however good our mail system is, it would be impossible for them to arrive looking like this, but they are on their way and the thought was there.

When I arrived home I kicked myself because I remembered the Monday Birthdays. I'd seen some lovely Spring mugs in a magazine and I was itching for an excuse to buy one, so I jumped in the car, dashed to the first store and found the mug, raced to the next store, praying they still had the flowers and then discovered that Hershey's now make orange cream candy.... and here it all is together.

Of course no gift is complete without a little Stampin' personalization and so I used my punches and the fabulous set "Lovely Letters" to create the little monogram and because Stampin' Up! has the very best colors in the world, I was even able to coordinate it with the mug.

The CD is filled with school pictures for our principal - actually there were too many to fit on a CD, so it's a DVD.

The icing on the cake was that Spring came early and I was able to deliver it on a perfect Spring like day!

Do you think she enjoyed her gift? I sure hope so, she's a very special lady and if my Big Sister hadn't been 3,000 miles away, this is how her gift would have looked too.

Monday, March 16, 2009

Easter Preview - Sets Now Available

Easter is just a few short weeks away - don't forget that you can pre-order your Easter sets from the upcoming Occasions Mini.

Sorry the images didn't come out as clear as normal, the light wasn't good, but I wanted you to at least see some samples made with the fabulous NEW Easter sets for this year!

From London

Sunday, March 15, 2009

What Was London Like?

FANTASTIC!

Do you recognize the lady on the left? Yes, it's Linda Hansen - she's visited my kitchen so many times in her fabulous video tutorials that she presents for Stampin' Up! and there she was at the door when I arrived at the London Convention Center (Centre in Canada), ready to great me with a wonderful warm smile and the warmest hug in the world. Linda, you ROCK!

This picture doesn't even begin to show how huge the room was and how many Stampin' Up! demonstrators were there.

Big Shots as far as the eye could see - I was standing about half way down the line of Big Shots when I took this picture and we got to play, play, play - If you didn't own a Big Shot before you went, it would for sure be on your list by the end of the day.

TV Screen Saver

And at the end of the day, Linda was there for a farewell hug. I wish you could all have met Linda, she's as lovely in real life as she is on the videos she creates for us.

Thank You! Stampin' Up! This was awesome!!!

Thank you Terri and Christy for going with me, it wouldn't have been the same without you.

Thank you "Technical Idvisor" for driving us all that way!

Lots Of Cool Things

You would not believe how inexpensive it was to make this personalized gift. Take a wooden block, paint it with acrylic paint, drill a couple of holes in the top and add ribbon to hang and then just add one of our fabulous decor elements monograms - they are only $3.95 net. for an upper and lower case letter......

........aaaand if you think they are difficult do apply, just watch the video tutorial at elizabethreeve.stampinup.net and be stunned at just how easy they are to apply.

Did you know that you can now earn some of our fabulous Decor Elements as hostess benefits too. See our current decor elements catalog for details.

The beautiful images on this frame were created using the big shot - you would be amazed at the number of different materials that you cut using the Big Shot!

Below is another example of an inexpensive project using Decor Elements. Here "Welcome" has been used and it's available in three different sizes and starts at just $2.95 net - WOW! You'll find it on page 20 of our Decor Elements catalog.

I actually have friends who drink Diet.C. for breakfast - wouldn't this jewelry be perfect for them? By the way, the edges aren't sharp. Have you ever thought of using our Full Heart and other punches to make a jewelry statement?

Images © 1990-2009 Stampin' Up!

I can't believe how stunning Decor Elements look on glass!

From London Regional

Some Wow Projects

Soooo you think these circles were just cut, put on a mat and stuck on? ......

.....Look a little closer and you'll notice that each piece of designer series paper has not only been punched, but then punched again once or twice so that it nests into the neighboring circle.

Wayyyyyy cooooool!

Images © 1990-2009 Stampin' Up!

Will you ever just give someone a CD or DVD again? I love this as a beautiful way to give a collection of photos or events.

From London Regional

Glitter Cards

There's nothing quite like glitter to step your cards up and there are sooooo many ways to apply it, here are just a few.

There are sooooo many ways to apply glitter, but one of my new favorites and least sticky on your fingers is to use are sticky cuts - you'll find all the glitter and glitter products you'll ever need on page 180 of the Spring Summer 2009 Idea Book and Catalog.

From London Regional March 2009

Stimulus Package

"Stimulus Package"......

Hmmm, We are hearing about “stimulus packages” all over the news and so I wanted to remind you that we still have a couple more weeks of our very own Stampin’ Up! “Stimulus Package” – Yes, Sale-A-Bration is almost over, but you still have until March 31st to earn FREE Stamp Sets – there are four to choose from – FREE Double Sided Designer Series Paper or FREE Double Ribbon Spool with every $50 net. in merchandise you purchase.

Also, if you place an order for $150 Net. remember you'll earn 3 Sale-A-Bration choices, plus a FREE hostess exclusive stamp set and FREE dollars to spend on anything in the catalog - the benefits increase depending on the net. total of your order.

Sooooo, Don’t forget to email me or go to my web page and take advantage of this very special once a year “Stimulus Package” from Stampin’ Up!

Best Ever Bookmarks - I'm Still Using The Same Kit

Hi Everyone - Well, I bet you thought my first post back from the London regional would be about that, it should be, but first I have to show you what I created just as I was leaving.

I went to create a few extra swaps - thinking bookmarks and found that I still had some parts of my Best Ever Simply Scrappin' Kit left over and so I thought I'd post them for you to see. Even after creating all of these, I still have double sided paper and self adhesive strips left over. It's insane how much you can create from one Simply Scrappin' Kit - 4 Scrapbook pages 12x12, 20 cards, 13 bookmark size cards and still more to make.

Sorry, I didn't create directions or dimensions for these, I was just rushing to get a few extra swaps made before we set off.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

I Made Lots Of Swaps For The London Regional Seminar

Soooo, what have I been up to this week? Making swaps for London, lots and lots of swaps.

When you swap with other demonstrators, you normally swap just card fronts. I’ve known for a while what I wanted to do.

The moment I saw the new Stampin’ Up! Full Heart Punch, I didn’t see just a heart, I saw a butterfly and I wanted to share this with my fellow demonstrators. Not every demonstrator has samples of our fabulous designer series paper and so I decided to create my butterflies from two of my favorite designer series papers and I also wanted to showcase the fabulous Big Shot dry embossing technique, which I used for the white background.

Many of my cards aren’t the big kind that I normally make, they are 3x3 love note size, just because the butterfly fits perfectly on the love note, which again showcases another one of our fabulous products that has coordinating envelopes too. I popped up the wings with dimensional to give the butterfly an illusion of flight and used a Stampin’ Write Marker for the antenna.

I liked the idea of a 3x3 card because if a demonstrator doesn’t want to showcase our love notes, she can attach it to a larger size card base and use it as the focal point – you know I love flexibility and simplicity.

I've added glitter to the wings of these now, to make the two sets different. The white backgrounds have been dry embossed too.

I’m always nervous when creating swaps for anyone because I know how much thought and work other folks put into their own swaps too.

I’ve taken my swap supplies all over the place this week – whenever there was a moment, I made a few more. (yep, our dimensional stick, even in a freezing cold ice arena).

You know how when you go to your first dance and you wonder if anyone will actually ask you to dance? This is how I feel when I go to these gatherings, I just hope and pray someone likes my swap enough to ask me to swap with them. I’ll let you know when I get back if anyone asked me to dance.

Have a wonderful few days everyone and I promise to post again early next week!

My 3d London Regional Swap

Big Shot Texturz #1

This weekend I’ll be attending the Stampin’ Up! London Regional Conference. One of my favorite things about attending events like this, is that I get to swap with fellow demonstrators – that means you make a pile of card fronts and or 3d items – they can all be the same and then you exchange them with fellow stampers who have done the same.

In my last post I talked about the card stock sample ring I made for myself and it was that idea that gave me the inspiration for my 3d swap.

Not every demonstrator is lucky enough to own a Big Shot and so I created little sample booklets so that demonstrators can showcase the current in colors and the exclusive Stampin’ Up #1 Texturz dry embossed images. I also ran one image through on white card stock, so that they could showcase that too.

I hope my fellow demonstrators like them. They were quite time intensive to make, but I think it was worth it.

On my personal sample, I chose to hold it together with a special brad to showcase that Stampin’ Up! now offers some fabulous new brads.

No Posts For A Few Days

Hi Everyone,

I try to post as often as I can here, however I know that there are a busy few days coming up and I'm not sure what access I'll have to the Internet and so above are some extra posts to keep you going.

Be sure to check back early next week, as I'm sure I'll have a lot to share.

By the way, if you are enjoying my blog, please drop me an email some times, I'd love to hear from you.

When I first discovered Stampin’ Up! one of the first things that impressed me were the color families. I loved that I could mix and match any color in a color family and I couldn’t go wrong.

One of my first goals was to see each beautiful color of card stock with my own eyes, because while the catalog is fabulous, there is nothing quite like seeing the real thing.

It took about six months before I achieved my goal and when I became a demonstrator I decided that everyone deserved to see these beautiful colors and so I created a binder with a sheet of each color card stock – It was big and heavy, and I loved it …..

….Then after four years of carting the binder round, I got smart and created a color ring with a smaller sample of each color and I’ve been using it ever since. You wouldn’t believe how often I pull it out to help my ladies with their color inspiration. I loved it so much, I made one each for my stamp club members.

Here it is, yum, delicious all those beautiful colors in one place.

Now when the new In Colors come out each summer, I punch a piece of each and just because the ink is new too, I stamp a sample of each color on a small circle and put it in the center of the sample, open up the ring, and add it to make my collection current. It's such an easy tool to use and keep up to date.

Ooops I almost forgot to give a big shout out to "Mr Crop-A-Dile" without whom I couldn't have punched through so many layers of card at once to create the hole for the ring -

- If you'd like to know more about "Mr Crop-A-Dile", you'll find him on page 189 of the Spring Summer 2009 Catalog and if you'd like to meet him, his number is 108362 - he's very creative, he'll punch extra holes in your leather belt, punch holes in the top of tin buckets so you can add eyelets and ribbon, he cuts through thick and hard items like a hot knife through butter - just ask my ladies, they are a huge fan of his.

I know this is just the beginning, so watch out for similar items in the future.

Kristin's Card Inspired Me

As you know, I make cards all the time and come up with ideas, but yesterday I had a lovely surprise.

Kristin (a fellow demonstrator from Seattle) sent me a check in this cute card. What inspired me was of course her beautiful art, but mostly the cool way she'd folded the card so that her check (cheque in UK & Canada) slotted beautifully into the special fold she'd made.

I just had to share Kristin's art. Thank you Kristin - You Rock!

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Tips For The Seeing Spots Scrapbook Pages

Because the ladies were left to their own devices to create these pages any time over the retreat weekend as their FREE make 'n take, here are a few tips to help. There were full instructions on the make 'n take table, along with picture tutorials for each project.

Don't forget to clean your stamp before changing colors
When stamping the background on the whisper white, stamp off the edges of the paper to give a more finished look to the edges and vary how far in the stamps go.
Rotate your stamp or the paper to give a more random pattern.
This one is huge - Stamp your letters for the words and then punch them out. It's really hard to stamp an image on a small circle once it is punched.
I used the rule of three - in other words, I used three colors of ink and three colors of card. Because I used white card as my third color, I made my third ink color chocolate chip to make the page pop. The rule of three works for most things, even flower arranging (my Mom taught me that - Thanks Mom - Miss you)
To punch the boarder with the scallop edge punch is easy once you know how. There were step by step instructions and photos for the ladies to use. I will post a mini tutorial here later or tomorrow.

Now I'm off to make 100 swaps for the fabulous Stampin' Up! London regional I'm attending. I'm soooo excited I can't wait, especially since Christy and Terri are joining me.

Eastern Michigan Retreat Make 'n Take

Seeing Sponts and Lovely Letters Stamp Sets with Chocolate Chip, Certainly Celery and Pixie Pink on Whisper White and Scallop and Circle punches.

Fifty ladies made these pages last Friday and Saturday as one of three make 'n takes I provided for the 1st annual Eastern Michigan Retreat.

It took almost a week to cut and prepare the projects and because they were independent FREE make 'n takes and not a class, I created step by step instructions with images, but it was well worth it to see so many ladies enjoying the projects.

Pam used her own supplies to make a second one and switched out the pink with blue and that looked awesome.

I can't wait for the retreat next year - Hope to see you there.