Belle Papier {pretty paper}

How do you like the real “me”?! LOL Check out my sidebar for my darling new Yahoo Avatar! I was surfing some blogs and came across a super-cute Yahoo Avatar on great blog by Taylor Usry.! I just had to try it out for myself.

Yahoo Avatars are free and so cute! All you need is to be registered with Yahoo which I already was for a usergroup. You can change the clothes, change the hair, face shape, skin tones, backgrounds etc. I tired to get as close to me as I could. LOL Obviously I didn’t succeed. There are no options for laugh lines and my love of chocolate. I was so excited to find a cute little Toronto Harbour background option. I’m not a big city girl but it’s pretty close in the scheme of things and it adds a little Canadian flavour, eh? CN Tower, Skydome, Sailboats, Centre Island Ferry…fun!

Try it out for yourself! It is like virtual paper dolls.:)

Edited to add….Some of you are having difficulty exporting your avatar. To do this, on your avatar page, there is a box on the top right side with Alerts, Postcard, Export, Message Board. Click on the export. From there you should be able to get the HTML code to paste into your blog. HTH!

Only one month left before the huge list of Stampin Up’s retirement sets is gone!  Lots of my faves are on that list…some really great sets. I’m sad to see them go but I just have to think, Stampin Up must have a really great upcoming line-up just waiting to be revealed! I’ve seen a sneak peek of the new hostess sets…way too cute!

This week the challenge is to find Way’s to Use the retiring sets. For those of you who are demos, get a little more use of them before they retire, add a little inspiration to the gallery, maybe even convince a few people that they really do need that set! If you would like to see the list of retiring stamp sets, here it is … Going Out in Style. If you dont’ have any of these sets, you may still play along by using another company’s retirement list sets. Sorry I don’t have any links for those! To play along, visit WT115. Everyone is welcome!

Spring Smile

Now for this card, I did get a little off track on the challenge! LOL For some strange reason, I though that Lovely as a Tree was on the retirement list! NOT! I had this card half made last night and there was a LOT going on. I just did not have time to start again. So I salvaged it and made it work! My favorite French Script Background stamp is retiring…sniff, sniff. Love that one. So versatile! Also retiring is Simple Sayings 2. Works for me! I squeezed them into my design and voila…a WT115 card! Not originally what I had intended but it works!

This card was inspired by the new gorgeous Primas I bought from Jacksonbelle. I had brought them upstairs to my desk. I still had this Tres Jolie paper on my desk and it looked perfect with the flower. Hmmm…off to find a stamp set. I came across Lovely as a Tree (which as I told you previously, thought was retiring) and thought it would be interesting to pair the cherry blossoms up with the trees and also make a more feminine card, giving it a fresh new look.

For the trees, I stamped them with Black Stazon on watercolor paper. I love how easy watercoloring is on the paper. I pulled out the cool Caribbean, Regal Rose and Old Olive colors from the print and worked them into the image. After allowing to dry, I distressed the edges with my Heidi Swapp Edge Distresser. Cute little inexpensive tool that bought last fall. So much more affordable than some tools I’ve seen.

Quick Tip: Speed up drying time when you are watercoloring by drying your image with a heat gun.

After matting the image with Chocolate Chip, I layered the background paper and adhered to a 5.25″ square card base of Old Olive. Now this is the point where I stopped and went downstairs to check on the kids. I saw my catalogue that I had inserted a couple print-outs of the retiring list into and took a peek. Yikes! No Lovely as a Tree! I frantically scanned the list. Oh! I found French Script…sentiment…Simple Sayings 2. OK..great…I’m good.

I worked the French Script into the design by stamping it in Black Stazon on a sheet of acetate. For the sentiment, I inked up just the smile part of the “you make me smile” stamp and added it to the bottom. Finally, I added on my Cherry Blossom Prima with Crystal Brad center and to tied it all together with a piece of gorgeous huge ivory ric rak. It is by Creative Impressions and I bought it at my local scrapbook store, The Scrapbook Studio.

It’s been a few weeks since our last Take Two Challenge and we’ve decided to give it another whirl. If you are new to my blog, my good friends Trudee, Michele & Lindsey have a Take Two Challenge every few weeks. It started out as an idea I had to take two products, usually a stamp set and a paper line, put them together and demonstrate how different ideas you can achieve with the same products. Lots of fun for us and every time, it is so interesting to see how different the designs are! I’m always so excited to see the other card designs. As I write this, I have no idea what the other designers have come up with and just can’t wait to see. It is so much fun when we all hit publish! This Challenge we’re decided to “Be Happy with Romani”. That means we’ve taken the Be Happy stamp set from Stampin Up and mixed it up with the Romani paper line from Basic Grey. A fun combo to be sure! To see the other designs in this Take Two challenge, check them out at Follow Your Bliss, Embellished By Jacksonbelle, & Paper Cuts. I know that is where I’m headed!

Smile & Be Happy

This card is a little different from my usual style. It has been a long time since I pulled out my Be Happy set! It is really cute and just worked so well with this Romani paper from Basic Grey. I first came up with my color combo by picking out the white, light teal and pumpkin colors from the designer paper. I love the funky look. I decided to go with a 5″ square card base format as I find the squares, so easy to design with and it gives me more room to add goodies. You know I like goodies! LOL

Quick Tip: For fun and easy color combos, pick colors out of some designer paper for inspirations. It can be amazing to see all the interesting color combos you can find in the patterned paper…some that I would NEVER think of on my own.

The white cardstock base is layered with pumpkin pie cardstock and then my light teal color that I picked up at Michael’s. I was looking for an alternative for my much loved Cool Caribbean. While definitely not a match, I loved its fresh look. On the light teal layer, I stamped my retired Dots and Daisies background in white craft ink and added little dots to the centers with my Signo white gel pen.

Next came the Romani layer. I used the 6×6 paper pad of Romani that I purchased from Jacksonbelle’s ebay store. I love the size and ease of use for cardmaking not to mention the price. After dotting all the little flower centers with a glue pen, I sprinkled them with glitter and allowed to dry. Along the left side of the paper, I added a row of eyelets and then tried out my Paper Tagger in one of the holes.

I’ve had my Paper Tagger from Around the Block for a few months. I bought it at my local store, the Scrapbook Studio. I was having problems with it and finally I phoned Around the Block. They were SO helpful! Fabulous customer service. So now I’m loving my Paper Tagger! It was an extra bonus that I received these darling little metal tags from Around the Block in my Cards magazine goodie box this month. This little burnt orange flower works perfectly with this paper. Fun!

For the flowers, I stamped the flower stamp twice, cut them out and layered them. It may be hard to see in the photo but I stitched little zig zag stems on the card as well. For final little touches of bling, I added small rhinestone stickers from Hero Arts to the center of the metal flower tag and to the dot of the i on “smile”.

Wishing you all a very happy day with lots of smiles! I’ve decided I’d like to give this card away as a RAK. If you need a little cheering up and would like this card…send me an e-mail, or leave a comment below saying you would like it and it’s yours. First come, first serve! Sorry…it is now claimed!

Supply List:

Cardstock: Whisper White, Pumpkin Pie - Stampin Up, light teal - Michael’s

Patterned Paper: Romani - Basic Grey

Stamps: Dots and Daisies, Be Happy - Stampin Up

Ink: Pumpkin Pie, White Craft, Ruby Red - Stampin Up

Other: white eyelets - Making Memories, Crop-a-dile - We R Memory Keepers, Signo White Gel Pen, glitter - Stampin Up, Glue pen -

I just can’t believe how fast the past two years have flown by. Joshua will be TWO on Thursday the 31st. He is such a little darling, but such a little rascal too! His dad gave him a haircut last week and he looks so much older…sniff, sniff. Super cute but I know my baby is growing up.

 This is a card I made for his birthday. He and Benjamin love reading Curious George together, climbing and getting into mischief too! When I saw this darling monkey paper and sticker line…I just had to make a card for him with it. I know he’ll love it. He loves cards for some reason. I have to be quite careful not to leave any design work where  he can get his hands on it as he likes to inspect my work!

Celebrate Little Monkey

Inside: Happy Birthday to my Little [Wild One]

For this card, I was focusing on the patterned paper….lots of inking and I sanded the stickers, but very little stamping. I found the darling little sentiment from Love Ya Bunches and thought it would work perfectly with this card. I added it to the inside sentiment which I printed off on my computer.

Quick Tip: Sand or ink stickers to add interest and texture to them. I am not a huge sticker fan but they can be fun and easy, and with a little altering, work really well.

There were so many circular and rounded shapes on the patterned paper that I played off that feature for my layout. For some fun texture, I layered the elements over some frayed twill and attached it with eyelets set with my Crop-a-dile.

Supply List:

Cardstock: Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla, Bashful Blue - Stampin Up

Patterned Paper: Monkey Business line - Reminisce

Stamps: Love Ya Bunches - Stampin Up

Ink: Chocolate Chip - Stampin Up

Other: Monkey Business stickers - Reminesce, eyelets - Making Memories, circle punches - EK Success, twill tape - Stampin Up, Crop-a-dile - We R Memory Keepers

I needed a chuckle this morning and Benjamin just provided me with one. Don’t you just love the things that kids come out with?! I love the way they think, the way they view the world, their innocence.

Mom….why do killer whales eat seals?

Well, I guess they get hungry and need something to eat too.

Oh.        I like seals…                  Can’t they eat bananas?

This is probably one of those “had to be there” things but I thought I’d share as it brightened my day. It is always a good thing to take a few moments out of the business of life and enjoy a child or look at the world with their sense of wonder and joy. Take the time today to lie on the grass, watch a butterfly, eat a popsicle, blow some bubbles, smell the flowers. I’d love to hear back from you here if you did!