Enjoy Your Day

Hi friends! How has life been treating you? I've been staying busy, but not creating very much lately. First off, I decided to start the much overdue reorganization of my studio. My first stage was just to get the things I use most or want to use most within reach and get myself a clean area to create in by my birthday. I managed to finish up the first stage the day before my birthday. Woohoo! It's actually so clean I don't want to get it dirty!  LOL  There's still a lot to go as the closet in that room is filled to the brim with craft supplies, as well as the extra closet in the boys' bathroom and part of the closet in my old office. But for now, I'm happy to pretend those closets aren't there and create in my newly organized space.

For my birthday and a delayed 20th anniversary trip, Mark and I took a little vacation to Park City, Utah without the boys last week. It was fun to unwind and sleep when I wanted to! {grin} In preparation for the trip, I had picked up a few magazines at Barnes & Noble when they had a 33% off magazines promotion. I've never purchased a magazine that includes free stamps before, and didn't have high expectations, but was curious so picked up the Simply Cards & Papercraft 178 edition with The Best of Cardmaking Magic by Christina Griffiths set as the free gift. Pretty cute stamps and a fun magazine to flip through on a road trip.

So yesterday, I pulled the set out, wanting to give it a try. The stamps were INCREDIBLY hard to peel off the backing, and the bases are so thin that I envisioned having to ink and reink on the MISTI about 500 times to get a good impression. I was pretty shocked when the stamps inked beautifully the first time and I didn't have to reink any of the images. I also tried Versafine Clair nocturne ink with them, so the magic might have been due to the ink pad. I've never tried this ink before, but I'm totally smitten!

I stamped the leaves a few times and two of the flower images on smooth bristol and then colored with Arteza real brush pens and a wink of stella clear glitter pen.  I cut just the flower center from one of the flowers and popped it up on dimensionals in the center of the other flower, then fussy cut the large flower and all the leaves.

The pink strip in the background is done with distress oxides in spun sugar and worn lipstick.  For accent, I added two strips of black cardstock across the bottom, adding some white gel pen lines to the bottom one.  The sentiment is stamped on white cardstock, then framed with a chipboard piece I made by taping two pierced square dies together and die cutting the frame. I glued layers of the diecut chipboard frames together and then embossed the frame with Versamark ink and white embossing powder.

I finished off with a few pink pearls and some white gel pen accents on the flower. All in all, a super fun return to my studio!

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I hope you have a fabulous day!

Enabler's List 


Stamps: The Best of Cardmaking Magic by Christina Griffiths (Simply Cards & Papercraft)
Paper: Smooth Bristol (Canson), lightweight chipboard
Ink: worn lipstick and spun sugar distress oxide (Ranger), Versafine Clair Nocturne, Versamark (Tsukineko), Wink of Stella Clear Glitter Pen (Zig), White gel pen (Signo), Real Brush Pens (Arteza),
Accessories: Pierced Squares Stax Dienamics (My Favorite Things - they don't seem to be in their store anywhere, so might be discontinued, but I did find them on Amazon), white embossing powder (Judikins), adhesive pearls