More VSN Challenges

My photo could be better, but I'm still not a pro at Adobe Photoship so extend grace to me please!

Here is the challenge and there on the left you see my answer to it. When this challenge was first posted, I was so excited. I'd never stamped on candles before and I'd been thinking of including them as one of my Christmas Gifts Class projects. I was so excited and then...I realized I did not have a proper colored candle in the house!

I decided to search anyways and, buried deep underneath a pile of votives, I found this vanilla one we'd received for free years ago when we bought a rocking chair at a local furniture store. Ok, I was so excited again!

And how fun was this! It was like magic watching my stamped images transfer to the candle. Sort of like the first time I learned heat embossing and saw the powder turn to liquid gold. I used Stampin' UP's Natural Beauty stamp set (retired) with Chocolate Chip ink. I colored the images in with markers. I just love this set and I don't care if it is retired and I'm a demo. I'm still using it! It has so many beautiful, soft images that just beg to be colored. What really drew me to this set is the word collage image (see card below). I finished the candle off with some gold cord. This will make a pretty gift, don't you think?

This next card was for this challenge. I already knew I wanted to use the bleached background I'd made several days ago with the French Script background stamp (also retired). (Speaking of bleaching, I need to upload the October Technique Tuesdays class projects... this week, I promise...). I found the perfect leaf almost immediately when I dashed outside to search.

I used my brayer to roll Green Galore ink over the leaf, then pressed it to Whisper White cardstock. I rolled over it with a clean brayer to make sure all the ink transferred to the cardstock. I then cut it out with my paper snips (super sharp and very good at cutting into small places) and glued it to the background.

I then used Elegant Eggplant ink to stamp the word collage from Natural Beauty (the same set I used on the candle above) on vellum. I stitched the piece to the card with linen thread.

I then glued the whole thing to Lavendar Lace cardstock and edged it with a Uniball Signo White Gel Pen. Even though I had 45 minutes to complete this challenge, this card came together in under 30 minutes. I told you in my last post, once I get going with a stamping or two, the ideas really start to flow.

If you've never stamped with nature's wonders, head outside for a hike and see what you can find! Pretty much anything goes...I've seen scrapbook pages with twigs stitched on! S-t-r-e-t-c-h your creativity!

Now go create!
- Nicole

Back to school in style

Emma had her first day of first grade today. SO much was new for her (new school, new teacher, new friends, full day, etc.) that I wanted to make her something fun. Something that would make her smile and think of home when she pulled it out of her backpack.

Her school supply list included a composition book, spiral notebook, and pencils (among countless other little things..I still haven't figured out what the bag of candy and ziploc bags are for!). I'd seen so many cool and funky supplies at Target and I thought, "Surely with my considerable stash I can come up with something similar."

Stampin' UP's demonstrator magazine had a super cute pencil holder and I immediately sat down to create it. Since the pattern is online on the demonstrator side of Stampin' UP's web site, I just had to print it out right on cardstock and then cut and score. How easy is that?! I stamped the polka dots from Polka Dots & Paisley in Purely Pomegranate ink on the same color cardstock. I used Big Deal Alphabet with Whisper White craft ink to stamp out Emma's name, then heat embossed it with White Detail Embossing powder. I then took a scrap of Very Vanilla cardstock and used my spiral punch along the edge. I glued this to the top inside edge of the pencil holder. I tied some bright and fun ribbon (from Wal-Mart - I was there for rubber cement and saw their entire ribbon section was being clearanced out for pennies!) around it to finish it off.


This next notebook is the spiral bound one-subject kind. I took a sheet of patterned paper (Creative Memories) cut to the dimensions of the cover plus a 1/2 inch on 3 sides (to wrap to the inside for a cleaner look) and ran it through my Xyron 900 (thanks, Mom! I love this gift :) ).

I cut a scrap of Pumpkin Pie cardstock into 4 pieces and rounded the corners with my corner rounder punch. I used Certainly Celery and Cameo Coral ink to stamp Emma's name (Big Deal Alphabet again) on a scrap of Apricot Appeal, of which I also rounded the corners.

I had two triangular scraps of the patterned paper left, so I glued them above the "m"s in her name. That's it!

I pretty much followed the same process with this composition book. I stamped some of the animals from the Wild About You set on the paper, using More Mustard, Soft Sky, and Ruby Red ink.

I *heart* this set! When I picked it out for my free set a few months ago, I did so reluctantly. But I knew I needed a set with solid images and one that could be used for kids and babies. I didn't have anything like that in my collection (*gasp* out of 50+ sets, nothing? No, nothing). I'm SO glad I got it! I've used it on multiple techniques (kissing and faux shaving cream to name just a couple), created numerous baby cards with it (read my last post for more about that), and stamped my kids some fun things. Again, I *heart* this set!

I didn't embellish these projects much because anything lumpy would have just been knocked off. After all, these are school supplies that one would hope are going to be used for the purposes of learning LOL!

Emma was very excited about her gifts and told me she had the "coolest school stuff in the class". Take THAT, Target LOL!

Now go create!
- Nicole

God's Little Blessings

Once you read far enough into this post, you may be scratching your head at what, exactly, is God's blessing in all this. But you'll see at the end!

We had MAJOR rain all morning - several inches in just a couple hours. In the past, our basement would have flooded but since waterproofing it 15 months ago, we'd had no problems. Well, we'd spent the time and money turning it into a family room and now we were waiting for the carpet to be installed.

I suddenly remembered I'd left the phone downstairs and as I dashed down to get it, that's when I saw a trickle of water coming in under the baseboards. While I'm panicking, two more trickles stream out and it soon becomes a puddle. I look up and see our window wells filled with about 8 inches of water. Now the water is seeping in through the sill and streaming down the brand new walls!

To further complicate matters, I had to pick up Caitlin and Alaina from Mother's Morning Out.

Here's where God's blessings come in - Melissa, the woman in charge of MMO, was so very sweet and kind enough to offer to drive the girls home. I felt very thankful for the relationships I'd formed at St. Stephen's Church over the past three years. Here's another of God's blessings - I didn't really need to go downstairs to get the phone, yet God sent me there so that I would catch the water coming in just as it started, preventing costly damage and more hours of remodeling. And here's yet another blessing - yes, I spent an hour in the midst of the heaviest downpours, using a bucket to bail out our window wells, butEmma, my oldest, was a HUGE help and when the heavy rains ended, so did our water leakage. Praise the Lord!

Did you all have a great Fourth of July? We had a cookout at our home with friends and it was so fun, I wished it wouldn't end! Here's a layout I did about a Fourth of July from 3 years ago.

If you have Stampn' Pastels, they are a great coloring medium for highlighting text, journaling, and titles.

And don't discount the beauty of your own handwriting! I see so much computer-generated journaling and it's far less interesting than handwritten words. If a total stranger is enthralled with your handwriting, imagine how treasured your own words would be to your family!

Now go get creative!