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This used one of the biggest stencils I could die cut and it would make a great, easy graduation card. This one uses my high school colors: Red & Gray (Actually I think I just cleaned off my black blending brush.)for the Duluth East Greyhounds. It’s only been 50 years!!! The waves are for the waterfront, near where our graduation ceremony was held. Of course any embossing folder or even none at all would work.
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.I did the card above for an Inspiration Challenge over on Splitcoaststampers. I was inspired by this dress on the Anthropologie site. It reminded me so much of the Beautiful Gallery designer series paper. You know. One of those pieces you can’t cut into until you really know what you are going to do with it. I used the other side for the main part of the card with just a bit of the print on the side. The white space – or in this case blue – makes the border and the single flower, fussy cut from the rest, stand out. The die cut words are subtle.
The bright one: Blends with a bit of pencil.
The subtle one…Blends.
The slightly less subtle one. Blends with a bit of white pencil.
A favorite color combination that goes back decades for me: Red, white and bright greens on Crumb Cake. The greetings for these last four cards are from Lovely Arrangements. The scallop is from the retired Hand Penned Petals Bundle.
These are reposted from my old Typepad blog. Can you tell I had a lot of fun playing with my first set of nested framelits and Big Shot? These label dies are much like Stampin’ Up!’s current Beautifully Celebrated Dies so you may find the ideas to be interchangeable. The Typepad blog noted on my watermark no longer exists.
DECEMBER 07, 2011 –
I splurged on Stampin’ Up!’s Occasions Mini pre-order, even express shipped it so I could play with it during my recent 3-day weekend. Needless to say I was impressed with what I saw in the catalog, but I’ve had even more fun than I expected playing with the new Big Shot “toys” and coordinating stamps.
Paper Player’s challenge this week is to make a Christmas card out of non-Christmas stamps and colors. That challenge combined with my new box of goodies led to this:
Apothecary Art is a new set of 6 stamps that I thought might be a little more coloring than even I enjoy, but it really does color up quickly. I had a whole page stamped on So Saffron, colored and ready to cut up with the new Framelit Labels Collection in no time. I used the same framelit to cut the label as I did to cut the opening into the front of the card. This gave me a sort of dry embossed frame on the card in which to set my colored label.The roses were colored with Regal Rose and Blushing Bride; the leaves with Pear Pizazz and Lucky Limeade. The picture may not have caught it but Dazzling Details adds shimmer to the roses and border on the ribbon.
The Pear Pizazz label cut out of the first card ended up as a background layer for my next label image, after running it through the Snow Burst embossing folder. Once again the label is stamped on So Saffron. Coloring is with the white gel pen and Pear Pizazz with Dazzling Details. Several of the Petite Pairs greetings will work on these labels if you offset them.
Stay tuned. I’ve got photos already of even more…
Take it to Heart stamp set(SU)
Pursuit of Happiness stamp set (SU)
Also uses Tiny Tags w/punch(SU) and Finial Press embossing folder(SU).
Also uses Loving Thoughts (SU)
This also uses a 2012 designer paper, Twitterpated.
This features white craft ink stamped on Night of Navy cardstock. Accent is a die cut (and embossed) butterfly.
Today I’m celebrating the Turtle-y Cute Collection and Designer Series Paper(DSP) with ideas and card making tips you can make work for many different kinds of characters.
This cute and kind of silly collection of turtles came out a little over a year ago and went on Stampin’ Up!’s Last Chance list this past April. I was first introduced to them at Onstage last March, when I attended an evening stamp party.
I did a post last year before the Typepad blogs ended and I am incorporated those cards plus a few more here to show a little of what you can do with this suite, particularly the DSP. As I write this the paper is discounted at $7.50 (US) for 12 sheets and the stamp and die bundle is also significantly discounted. The DSP pack alone will make many cards!
I suspect the paper will be gone by the time many read this but I hope you will find ideas that you can use for other character based papers and craft supplies that you might have or come across.
First off, a classic birthday card using one of my favorite DSP card sketches and techniques.
I love to create these cards with corner borders, especially when I have diagonal stripe or plaid. I’e also started keeping a stash of quarter front or slightly smaller pieces of card stock brushed slightly with a bit of blue, purple or green ink, whatever is ready to be cleaned from my brush. This simple little bit of background color can really make a fussy cut image seem a little more at home on the background.
This beachy turtle gets a background treated with a coordinating embossing folder.
Here’s how to get some extra mileage out of your DSP when making corners:
Choose a width for your border. I’m using 3/4″ here but sometimes I use a half inch. Start your cut 3/4″ down from the top edge and 3/4″ in from the right edge. Cut until you reach 3/4″ in from the bottom edge of your DSP.
Lift up your ruler/cutting blade and turn your paper 1 quarter turn to the right so that the placed you finished the cut is now at the top.
Repeat until you have cut out a square with a frame. This works wonderfully with the Turtle-y cute DSP because you will have pieces to trim your card and lots of turtles and their accessories for your cards.
I did a video on You Tube (several years ago that allowed me to get 13-14 corner borders from one 12×12 sheet.
Some time ago I did a video for the frame cut out technique . For some reason I can’t link it here but it’s not hard to find on my little YouTube channel. It’s got a little snowman with another corner border.
And, those partial images on the edge of your DSP? There are lots of uses for them.
I did a trio of the Nature themed turtles along the side of this card. You could punch or die cut them or create windows for them to peek through as I did here.
There was a little more image available for this banjo picking turtle so I put him on a circle with the same blending brush background.
Sometimes a simple border is enough.
Or play around with word banners. This card makes use of the stamp set for the turtle and dies for the hat and banjo.
I colored this turtle with my travel coloring kit: some pale green and yellow Blends Markers plus the watercolor pencils (without using any water. I find using pencils quite relaxing and I have so much more control over the shading.
I also like to pull out other products I have. This card incorporates some dies from Charming Duck Pond, a retired product. Maybe you have something similar that you can use to build a unique setting for your characters.
Arch Trifold: Maybe you can recognize die cuts from Sweet Bug? I tried a few of the greens found in the DSP for this and them figured out that I liked the way the new 2026-2027 In Color, Peaceful Pine, brings the different greens of the turtles together. I inked the (coordinating but since retired) embossing folder with Peaceful Pine before embossing the card stock in order to emphasize the texture.
One more that I made with one of the turtles that I colored while on Onstage 2025.
Here are a few more turtles in one of my favorite fun fold cards. Some call it a tunnel card, others refer to it as a theater card. Regardless, I think it’s a great way to use the roughly 4″x6″ background scenes that you find in some DSP packs.
Often when I do these tunnel cards I keep the card front very simple like I did with just a little paper and a greeting from Banner Sayings:
Here’s another with the grilling turtle using greetings from Relaxing Waterside.
Basically, a tunnel card is two cards, one layered inside of the other. Cutting the inside layer smaller to leave a border is optional. The inside layer is scored to divide it into 4ths and a shape is die cut into the middle two sections. Any scene that you want to appear inside the tunnel is stamped or adhered before attaching the inside card to the outside card. It’s always a fun card to try anytime you have characters. More details than this probably requires another post.
Can you believe it? I’m back hopping with the wonderfully talented Around the World on Wednesday Blog Hop group.
You’ve probably come here from our fearless leader, Angie MacKenzie’s blog. I’m Chris Smith and if you are relatively new to following this hop I haven’t been around much recently. I’ve had to rebuild my blog at the same time that I am re-envisioning my stamping as that of more of a hobby/”sort of but not exactly retired” demonstrator. From my view it’s kind of the best of both worlds. I still get to preview all the yummy new stuff but the old favorites are out of storage and back on my craft room shelves too!
Anyway, I really wanted to get in on this hop because the theme is Let’s Celebrate and one of my favorite things in the new catalog the Balloon Festoon Bundle. In particular, the dies! I actually shopped around before ordering to make sure I couldn’t find balloon dies I liked better. I wanted classic balloons, not gimmicks, and in many sizes and boy do these deliver!
I’ve been having so much fun playing and I want to share my favorite way – so far – of using the Balloon Festoon Dies, and bundle: creating masks or stencils and using them with the blending brushes.
My initial masks were just card from sized pieces of vellum each with one balloon cut out of each of them. I had a couple of problems. First, I quickly bent the area where the balloon tie is so I started adding a piece of regular or wash tape right under the tie part of the die cut so that this held up to my brush a little better. Second, I made each mask a full 6″x6″. My brush had strayed beyond the edge of the mask a few times and I needed to sure fire way to prevent that. Now they look like this:
As you can see they do get inky! Between colors I usually wipe off any excess ink with a tissue, just until the tissue doesn’t pick much up any more. Here is the card that I made with blue/green mask:
These balloons get along with SO many other sets! I used the little Birds from and Cutest Crew Bundle along with the new Words & Wishes. I used Azure Afternoon and Lemon Lime Twist on these balloons and the “Happy” die cut.
I love using a bit of the Blends Alcohol Markers to give a quick wash of color and then do my shading with the watercolor pencils. Did you notice how sharp the pencils are – I’m taking a colored pencil class and I’m learning how much more you can do with really sharp pencils! Here are a few more birds on the inside of the card:
One more note about using these balloon masks or stencils – because I really want you to have fun using these. I know I mentioned wiping off excess ink between colors. While this IS important when you are trying to keep your colors crisp and distinct there are always times to break the rules when you are doing art, right? So if you don’t clean them off every time you still might get something you love.
This card is made from balloons I did with the smallest balloon stencil. I was cleaning off a bunch of brushes and I didn’t wipe the stencil between colors. Once I realized I forgot to wipe off the stencil I thought I was going to end up with a bunch of muddy balloons but it was quite the opposite. The colors seemed to take on each other and they became so harmonious.
I found a piece of Beach Boardwalk Designer Series Paper that set the balloons off perfectly, drew some strings and stamped a tiny birthday greeting from Lovely Arrangements. Ribbon is the new In Color, Barely Blush.
Enough from me. Next up is the uber talented, Jan Clothier.
Can you believe it’s November already?
This month’s Around the World on Wednesday Blog hop Theme is This or That: Wrapped in Gratitude taking special inspiration from the beautiful creations of team member, Sharon Burkert.
I chose to take inspiration from this colorful Halloween card of Sharon’s that features the Party Alphabet Dies:
The dies are new to me and I thought it would be fun to use the pumpkin and vine theme with them. Since I’m going for a fall gratefulness theme I worked with the big dies and Beautiful Pumpkin Bundle. I also used the Gathering Moments fall images and even pulled in a tag and greeting from the Layers of Beauty bundle. These are big dies, big enough to actually stamp on the die cuts. There are also so big that I knew my card would be a slim line card just to get the word “THANK” on it.
Here is a close up of the pumpkin:
This was a really fun first go at these alphabet dies and I look forward to playing with them again soon.
I’m trying to prep for two back to back trips amid the uncertainty of US air travel right now so I ended up skipping my planned second card. – I was going tweak the colors for a less shabby chic look. But that means you get to move on to see what you will see with the others on this hop. I can’t wait to see what Teri West has in store for us.
Jan Clothier – NZ
Leonie Stuart – AU
Rochelle Laird-Smith – AU
Cheryll Miller – AU
Danielle Kassing – NL
Marga Bultena – NL
Aurélie Fabre – FR
Kelly Taranto – US
Sharon Hashimoto Burkert
Chris Smith – US
Teri West – US
Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you enjoy the blog hop!
It’s Around the World on Wednesday time again. This month our theme is a sketch and I’m the featured team member.
The idea is to use a sketch and maybe other inspiration from my work. One of the sketches I’ve used quite a bit over the past few years is one that I first came up with while playing around with the retired set, Daisy Lane. I actually played with it a while before I figured out that the daisy in the lower right needed to go off the card.
Even though I started the second card first, the first card I finished was for a color challenge calling for Flirty Flamingo over at Splitcoaststampers, where I had recently begun participating on the design team. Once I got the partial daisy figured out the finishing up the second was pretty quick!
Since I did those back in 2019, I’ve done them with leaves, other daisies and even snowflakes. I thought since I was using a sketch I was already familiar with I should try it in a theme that stretched me a little so I decided to see what would happen if I tried it with Silly Safari:
It was pretty easy to decide which animals to use since I wanted them to face the center/greeting. These worked out perfectly to get the kind of weighted balance I previously achieved with the large and small daisies. The animals are all colored with blends, plus a little Cajun Craze watercolor pencil on the giraffe’s spots since I was afraid the blends would be TOO dark. I also toned down the white contrast on the cut edge by outlining them with Light Crumb Cake Blends, a trick I use even if I’m not cutting them out.
I initially planned to fussy cut the leaves too and researched safari sunsets and sunrises to see what kind of colors I might blend up for my background layer. Alas, they just weren’t playing well with the colors I used on the animals so I opted for a green stamped jungle and added some Pecan Pie accent stamps from the set and a little extra ink on the edges with a blending brush. Possibly simpler and oh, so much more fun. I can get a little lost in the ink blending. I really find it relaxing.
Usually I use a white or plain left border but this time I changed it up with a piece of DSP from the Need for Tweed Designer Series Papers.
Now for the best part. I can’t wait to continue on the hop and see what the others have created. Next up is Bree Renwick:
Leonie Stuart – AU
Rochelle Laird-Smith – AU
Cheryll Miller – AU
Marga Bultena – NL
Aurélie Fabre – FR
Annette Ball – CA
Kelly Taranto – US
Chris Smith – US
Bree Renwick – US
Lori Willcox – CA
Teri West – US
Cheryl Hamilton – US
Thanks so much for stopping by!
This is a repost from my old Typepad blog. Please check the end for an updated version from 2025.
From: NOVEMBER 20, 2023
One of my favorite sketches to use over the past few months is one I refer to as the “Daisy Sketch”. I originally started using this in 2019 with the Daisy Lane Stamp Set along with a large and medium sized daisy punch.
This is my initial “perfected” version, after playing with a few different colors, etc.
It basically has:
It was easy to adapt for a specific occasion request, for example these cards which were created n honor of November employment anniversaries for a couple of treasured church staff:
I shared this one earlier this fall (2023) with altered colors and objects but the same basic arrangement.
Last month, I brought it out again for when I hosted a color challenge:
This is one that I did on a Facebook Live video earlier this month. After the video I decided to add a tiny bit of Balmy Blue Blends brushed just outside the yellow centers, along with a few more leaves…
Here is the video.
from my ink pad with Chris Smith
A Favorite Card Sketch with Stampin’ Up!’s Cheerful Daisies.
Many of these products have retired since I first posted this almost two years ago but I think the sketch still works for many themes and seasons. Plus, I think they were really great products and would be so happy if you have them and pull them off your shelf for a little love! (And, I’m trying to learn how to bring forward some of my favorite old posts from my now discontinued Typepad blog.)
Here is a much more recent card I made with some of the Beautiful Gallery Suite products from Stampin’ Up!’s current catalog.
I used the Damask Designs embossing folder to add texture to the Beautiful Gallery DSP. By lightly sanding the raised areas I revealed the white core of the paper for a little extra contrast. I love the painterly look of this paper so much I feel like I’ve been hoarding it for months.
Here’s another I did – different sketch – with just the Beautiful Gallery papers, with a little help from Peaceful Days stamp set for the greeting.
Such a simple card, I almost forgot to pack it when we went away for our anniversary…
Thanks for stopping by. Please come back again to check what’s been on my crafting table!
Here we are. Day 2 on the new blogging site and it’s time for our Around the World on Wednesday blog hop. I’m delighted if everything worked and you found me here. For those who are new to me, I’m Chris Smith, from the Twin Cities in Minnesota, US.
This month we are continuing the celebration of our 5th year as a blog hop and taking inspiration from one of our Artisan members, Bree Renwick. Aside from that we have a theme of “Remember When”.
I fully expected to take full advantage of Bree’s inspiring scrapbook pages and ordered some of our latest scrapbook stamps and “stickers” to use for this month’s hop. But then, late last month I received notice that Typepad, the blogging platform I’ve used since early 2007, was ending the platform and my 999 blog posts plus galleries would disappear after September 30. Needless to say I’ve been preoccupied evaluating what to do about it AND looking back at the posts themselves to help inform my decision making. I will save my work and find ways to bring back what I think still has relevance. And, you know what? It has been fun looking back to Remember When I first started blogging about 18 years ago.
One of my first posts was a brief remembrance of my Grandma Edith:
January 18, 2007
“Memory is the power to gather roses in winter.” I designed this card in tribute to my grandmother who died last month, a few weeks before Christmas. She would have turned 100 next week. Edith was a loving and generous grandmother…and she used to grow beautiful roses!
I drew upon one of my all time favorite SCS color challenge entries for this special card. (SCS referred to SPlitcoaststampers.)
I loved using these colors (Orchid Opulence, Rose Red, Old Olive and So Saffron) together and thought I would update this idea with current colors and stamps and borrow a sketch idea from Bree.
This is a genius little sketch, especially in Bree’s crisply styled and “magical” message. It works with so many images and the layer measurements don’t have to be exact. Great for beginners or busy, preoccupied stampers like me…
My original card used an old product called Iridescent Ice, a sparkly embossing powder. After substituting Petunia Pop Glimmer paper for the skinny borders, I realized this pretty paper has gone from Stampin’ Up!”s Last Chance List to also being discontinued. But it is pretty.
I used Fresh Freesia, Petunia Pop, a bit of Melon Mambo along with Old Olive and Crushed Curry.
The flower stem is stamped with Fresh Freesia on Fresh Freesia and colored with the Light Fresh Freesia, Petunia Pop and Melon Mambo Blends.
I blended Crushed Curry and Old Olive ink on a piece of white card stock embossed with the Damask Embossing Folder and trimmed to 3 3/4″ x 5″.
I thought the greeting from The Right Words stamp set followed the theme of the original greeting which I always loved: Memory is the power to gather roses in winter
I really like the skinny strip of glimmer at the edges. While I think Bree layered her piece I’m stingy with my (now unavailable) Glimmer paper and just used strips.
Before I sign off I have to share one more card inspired by Bree and I think it fits with Remember When. My husband and I will celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary in a few days and I wanted to see if I could make some white roses (my wedding bouquet) look a little masculine. We’ve grown a lot of white roses together over the past 40 years so I thought it could be appropriate. Here is Bree’s:
and here is mine:
I made this a top fold card with a Basic Beige base. Both the fussy cut roses and the brushstroke pecan Pie layer are from the Beautiful Gallery designer series paper. I kept the layering to a minimum. The greeting is from the Peaceful Days stamp set in Stampin’ Up!’s scrapbooking line. Perfect anniversary greeting!
Now you get to move on to Bree’s blog! I can’t wait to see how she did this month’s theme.
Jan Clothier – NZ
Leonie Stuart – AU
Rochelle Laird-Smith – AU
Cheryll Miller – AU
Danielle Kassing – NL
Marga Bultena – NL
Kelly Taranto – US
Chris Smith – US
Bree Renwick – US
Teri West – US
Cheryl Hamilton – US
Since early 2007 I’ve had a Typepad hosted blog – inkpad.typepad.com – which will be disappear on September 30, 2025 when Typepad closes operations. To date I have 999 posts over there. While it’s truly disappointing after so many years, when you consider that other atrocities people in our country and world are currently experiencing, I guess it’s really just small potatoes. I’ll save what I can and re-introduce some of my favorites here though I’m afraid the original links will be lost.
In a way this kind of jives with where my stamping is heading anyway. I’m starting to refocus on old favorites in my stash and trying to resist trying every new thing. Don’t get me wrong, the new things tempt me but there are SO many older images and tools that I have loved and still want to explore. Let me know if you would like to see more ideas with old favorites too. This is really a practice post for me to get to know WordPress and see how this will all come together. Here is my very first blog post from January 3 2007: … and then a little more chatter
Some hints: I used my brayer to apply Ruby Red ink evenly to the blossom stamp. You can’t see it but I stamped “happy joyful birthday” from Small Sayings inside the card in Very Vanilla craft ink. When the card is closed the message is hidden by the petal. I’m really efficient at the dots around the petals now that I’ve made 38 cards to swap with WOWswappers, a monthly swap group I’ve been in for several years.
I knew Big Blossom was going to be fun almost as soon as I saw it. This is a card that was developing in my mind while I waited for my demonstrator Sell-a-Bration preorder to arrive.
Look how short it was and I even used “Bib” instead of “Big”. What a rookie!
Here are some other Big Blossom cards I posted that first month. It looks like I did have a little fun with it.
I called the technique I developed for the first two cards Shady Layers. It used some tools that have been discontinued such as the Perfect Layers tool but it’s possible some may still find it helpful so I have converted that post to a PDF file if you would like to see it. I didn’t have the heart to delete the kind comments so be aware. If you choose to print you may want to do select pages.
I don’t have any recent work with large background sized stamps to share with you today but I have been playing with some pretty big leaf dies from the Gathering Moments Bundle/Gathering Together Suite.
These two cards make use “nesting” dies that include an outline die and another large die with holes that fits into the middle. These holes can be used to make stitches OR just show through to another color.
Or, you can use the outline dies alone. In the next photo I used it with an embossing folder and then blended a bit of Basic Beige ink around the edges. In the second card I used the “negative” of the die cut as a stencil to brush in layers of leaf prints, such as you see when leaves bleed into a city sidewalk.
Let me know if you want to know more about any of these.
From Chris Smith's Ink Pad 
