Hello and Happy Mother's Day!

Hi friends!  I wanted to wish all the Mom's out there a very Happy Mother's Day! In honor of Mom, I wanted to share the card I created for my Mom.  This is the pretty Blended Bloom stamp that I colored in with the awesome new Blendabilities Markers in Rich Razzleberry.  It's amazing how real the flower looks in person.  I'll share more on this tomorrow....

Now, for a bit of nostalgia - here's a pic of my mom and I circa the early 70's....

This was taken in the Philippines when I was just a wee one!  Oh how time flies, huh?

Thanks for stopping by today.  Enjoy spending time with your Mom and/or getting pampered by your kids and hubbies!!  Bye for now.  :)

My favorite cards from 2010

Hi all!  As we reflect back on 2010, I thought I'd share my favorite cards and projects from this year with you:

Hope you enjoyed the look back!  Thanks again to each of you for visiting and letting me share a part of my world with you.  Wish you all a very happy New Year!

{Mother's Day} SWAP parade

Hi there!  How was your weekend? Hope you had a good one.  I had a fantastic weekend!  We went down to San Diego for a quick weekend trip to celebrate one of my good friend's birthdays and just got back today.  It was so nice to catch up, hang out, and celebrate!  We don't get to see our friends as often as we'd like because with everyone's busy schedules, it's hard to carve out the time to travel - even if it's just a few hours away!  But what's great about good friends is that you realize no matter the distance, your friendship never skips a beat.  That's what I've come away with, and it's a wonderful feeling. 

For today's post, I thought I'd share the Mother's Day Cards I received from my swap group for our April swaps.  Lots of great ideas here!  I think you'll enjoy them as much as I did receiving them!  Here we go:

First up, we have Carole'Anne, who is a super talented stamper from Canada.  I love this color combo, and what an cool technique she did!  This card is just gorgeous.

Then we have Krista, from the Netherlands, who's got an awesome clean and crisp style!

Our next creatively talented stamper is Lee, who made this pretty and happy card using the Fifth Avenue Floral stamp set.  I love how she made her lovely bow:

This next card by Liane  has gorgeous detailed hydrangeas that literally pop off the page!:

Now how amazing is this card by Sandi MacIver!  Love how she used the lattice background.  Very delicate and beautiful card!

And last, but definitely not least, we have a lovely and sweet card by Sharon.  I love the soft colors of this card!

Now, wasn't that card parade fun?!!! Aren't these stampers amazing?  Hope you got some great Mother's Day ideas from these!  I know I did. Enjoy the rest of your weekend! 

Thanks for coming by!

Island Flower Mother's Day Card

I think I'm on a roll with the new Island Flower Bigz die!  Or maybe it's just my fascination with 3-dimensional flowers on cards these days.  Here's a card I created using both the Island Flower and the Stampin'Up! Exclusive Blossom Party Bigz die as well.  I even threw in the Extra Large Fancy Flower punch, which layers nicely with the big flower in the Island party die.  Doesn't this have summer written all over it?  Here's a look at the full card:

I think my current new favorite background is the Impressions Square Lattice embossing folder - it gives such a fun, almost canvas-like texture to the cardstock.  Did you happen to notice the pink circles peeking out behind the flower on the top note die?  Well, I also incorporated the stencil technique by making my own polka dot pattern on cardstock.  How'd I do that?  Well, I created a top note template and then punched random circles of different sizes on it.  Then I layered it over my clean Whisper White Top Note die and sponged in my circles.  After that, I put the top note piece of cardstock in the embossing folder.  My end result -  a fun pattered and textured top note die!  Hope you like it!

Have a great day and I'll catch you guys later!

butterfly for Mom's Day

Hey there blog peeps!  Soooo glad the weekend is here!  Today, I'm sharing my second swap card that I created for my SWAP Team group, which was a Mother's Day themed card.  I know you've probably figured out that I'm pretty infatuated with my Beautiful Butterflies Bigz die since I've rediscovered it a couple of weeks ago.  I can't seem to get enough of the butterflies!  Here's a look at the Mother's day card I made:

I do love the Melon Mambo and Apricot Appeal color combo!  It's such a bright and happy palette. Now that we'll be saying goodbye to Apricot Appeal at the end of June, I definitely want to show how pretty it looks, especially in the Springy and Summertime cards you can create!  I sure will miss it personally (of course, I will probably order a few packs of cardstock and hoard it for my own personal use!)  What's unexpected in the color combo is the little bit of Bashful Blue.  I was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked my trio flowers with the soft blue centers!  Here's the recipe for you:

{Butterfly for Mom's Day}

All Supplies Stampin'Up!

*Stamp Set: Messages for Mom

*Cardstock: Melon Mambo, Kaleidoscope DSP, Bashful Blue, Whisper White

*Inks: Melon Mambo Classic Pad

*Accessories: Beautiful Butterflies Bigz Die, Perfect Details Texturz plate, Scallop Trim Border, Trio Flower punch, 1/4" Circle Punch, Sherbet Button, Pretties half pearl

Hope you like it!  Enjoy your weekend!  Bye for now :)

Double the challenge, double the fun!

Let's just say that I was inspired to stamp today that I got to make cards for 2 challenges! I did Taylor's Cupcake Challenge 64 and I am participating in my first Weekend Sketch Challenge 77. Part of it is actually because I wanted to go into my craft room and straighten it up a bit, so you know what happens after that...I get preoccupied and come up with ideas as I'm picking up and trying to put stuff away! That's exactly what happened with my card for the Taylored Expressions Cupcake Challenge 64. The card I created uses some of the scraps that had come up from last week's Kwernerdesign Color challenge card I had made, so I couldn't let the extra flowers I had go to waste, right? So here they are, repurposed for this sketch, along with all that Raspberry Tart designer series paper goodness that I can't get enough of:All materials are Stampin'Up!, except for this card, I did use the square scallop nestabilites to frame my flowers in :)

Here's the recipe:
*Flower Layers Originals Dies
*Central Park and Great Friend stamp sets
*Rose Red and Kiwi Kiss Stampin'Up! Classic Ink pads
*Rose Red, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White, Pacific Point cardstock, and Raspberry Tart Designer Series Paper
*Double stitched rose red grosgrain ribbon, old olive grosgrain ribbon, jumbo brads, scallop border punch
*Square Scallop die from Nestabilities

Now this next card I created was for the Weekend Sketch Challenge, which I came across in my internet "blurfing" this morning. I came across it on Beate's blog, and followed the linke to Lori Craig's blog, who happens to be hosting the card challenge for the weekend. I was inspired by a few cards I've seen that have made a background out of a gerber daisy stamp, so I decided to pseudo-case that using the daisy-like stamp from the Fifth Avenue Florals stamp set. I also wanted to do another monochromatic card, this time in Baja Breeze. Here it is:Here's the recipe:

*Fifth Avenue Florals and All Holidays stamp set
*Baja Breeze and Whisper White cardstock, and Walk in the Park Designer Series Paper
*Scallop Border punch, Rhinestone brad and Filigree flower

I had fun making these cards! Hope you like them. Enjoy the rest of your weekend and have a great week!