Stamp Club Road Trip!

Nanci and I had planned an overnight special at Lake View Lodge for February 19th.  Several members of Nanci's Stamp Club signed up, so we decided to have the February Club meeting at Lake View Lodge!  We had a blast!  We had planned to make this delicious cupcake card, but we forgot the Create a Cupcake stamp set!   

 

 What do you do when you are 125 miles from your sentiment?  You improvise! 

 

 Terry, the newest member of the Stamp Club, is modeling the re-design  with an extra cherry on her cheek!  We love the Red Glimmer paper--it makes the cherries on the cupcakes sparkle!  The Elegant Lines embossing folder really adds depth and swirl to the cupcake icing!  Nanci and I went to a Stampin' event at Carol Nee's home and she actually had the cutest cupcake stand and cupcakes that looked just like the one's on Nanci's card!  They were delicious too!

From cupcakes, we switched over to Ice Cream Parlor DSP from the sale-a-bration catalog!

The colors of this DSP are fun and fresh.  The Sew Suite stamp set is great!  I wish they had done sentiments to go with them!  Nanci and I want to suggest; Sew nice to meet you, Sew Sweet, Miss you sew much.  The possibilities are endless!  Share your sentiment ideas with us--leave us a comment at the end of this post!

 Puns from the Past stamp set does include--sew glad we're friends--I recently purchased that stamp set just because it had that sentiment in it! :)

 

The Sweet Stiches DSP paper and Pattern Pieces stamp are great too!  We used the coordinating fabric and buttons with a little bit of crochet trim to embellish our card.  Another great card using Sweet Stiches DSP and Designer Fabric! 

 Once we finished our club projects, we jumped right into full throttle crafting mode!  Michelle and Jessice were swapping pictures and the stories behind them!

 Have you ever made a diaper cake for a baby shower?  Becky's turned out so cute!

  Making sure that the stamp is inked thoroughly!

 Terry's very first scrapbook page!

A whole lot of scrapbooking is going on!

 Chris made her first Squash Book and has plans for a second one already!

These ladies are serious crafters!  Almost everyone was crafting until 2:30 AM, but I heard the first person head back to the craft room around 7:30 AM! 

 Jessica took several photos of our group before everyone left Sunday afternoon!  These two are my favorites. 

Which do you prefer the black and white or the color photo?  Please e-mail us at info@crafthavenretreats.com, if you would like to bring your group to Lake View Lodge for a crafting retreat!  We are running a Crazy 8 Special right now.  Bring your group of eight crafters and we will give you an additional $200 off our Spring 2011 Special of $199 per person!  Happy crafting!

Deck the Halls DSP Collection

We love Deck the Halls DSP Collection!  We designed these cards for Nanci's Stamp-a-stack, the November Stamp Club, and our Ladies Night Out Retreat in early December. 

Dasher was the favorite at our Ladies Night Out Retreat!  The sentiment and Dasher stamp are both stamped with VersaMark and heat embossed with gold embossing powder.  Don't forget to use your static pad or embossing buddy you want a really clean image when you're through.  We ran the Early Espresso card stock through the Big Shot using the Northern Flurry embossing folder.

 

We love the vintage look of the Deck the Halls DSP and fabric!  We frayed the edges of our fabric ribbon to add texture to the bow.  Nanci used colored pencils to decorate the bell stamp from Bells & Boughs.

Here's another vintage Christmas look!  I used markers to color in the stamp of the bough image and then I masked that stamp and stamped the bell in Early Espresso ink.  It looks like the bells are hanging from the bough.  The sentiment is from the Bells & Boughs stamp set also.  The Cherry Cobbler card stock was run through the Big Shot with the Petals-a-plenty embossing folder.  I think it makes the background look just like poinsettias.  We also finished this card off with a Deck the Halls fabric bow. 

We just love the Christmas Collage stamp!  Nanci inked it in VersaMark and Early Espresso and heat embossed the image with clear embossing powder on Crumb Cake card stock.  She used the same procedure for the sentiment and the "25, " but she used Cherry Cobbler for the ink.  She punched them out and used dimensionals to add depth to the card.  She used colored pencils to fill in some of the images of the stamp.  This picture doesn't do the card justice--it is really a show stopper when you see it in person.

I cased this card from Tiffany Bauer (www.mycraftyworld.blogspot.com) who made it for a Founder's Circle event.  We decided that it was a lovely card, but too expensive to make in bulk and mail--those buttons are heavy!  We tried to find a more cost effective design for mailing.

This card was my cheaper to produce and mail alternative.  I tried to make it look like the ornament was hanging from the bough.  I used markers to color the stamp.  The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Wishes and is stamped in Early Espresso ink.  The Cherry Cobbler card sock was embossed using the Petals-a-plenty embossing folder.

We loved the gift tags from Tags till Christmas!  We used gold gel pen accents on some of the punches with natural twine for the ties.

 More chocolate--you can never have enough chocolate on hand for the holidays! Again, we used Deck the Halls Fabric  for our ribbon bows and natural twine ties.

  

 We loved this paper from Deck The Halls DSP for these Fancy Favor die-cut bags!  The poinsettias were so pretty on the outside of the bag.  We choose the fabric that matched the inside of the bags to make our bows out of.  Soft suede card stock accents finished them off nicely. 

We're from Illinois and the cardinal is our state bird.  We loved the look of these gift bags and mini-milk cartons with their Cherry Cobbler cardinals.  Our bags are tied with Deck the Halls fabric bows again, but our milk carton bows are the Cherry Cobbler seam binding.  The icy edge on our mini-milk carton roofs is Silver Glass Glitter which really looks fabulous in person!

The altered Scalloped Envelope die holds a regular size gift card and can easily fit inside any of our gift bags or cards.  It also would look nice just placed on a branch of your Christmas tree!

That's a quick overview of some our Deck The Halls DSP collection.  We have really enjoyed working with all the designer series papers this year and we hope you have too.

  Nanci and I wish you and your family a healthy and happy holiday season and Happy Crafting in 2011!

October Stamp Club

We celebrated the arrival of Fall at our October Stamp Club meeting by making 4 cards using Stampin' Up!'s gorgeous Day of Gratitude and French Foliage stamp sets.  Both of these beautiful sets are featured in the Holiday Mini Catalog.  Our DSP for the evening was Autumn Spice.  With all of the rich colors and texture, this specialty paper is the perfect choice for Fall and Thanksgiving projects.  Combined with card stock and inks in Early Espresso, Cajun Craze, More Mustard, Old Olive, Very Vanilla and Crumb Cake, our fall color palette was complete!

For our first card, we used the French Foliage stamp set. 

We used every stamp in this set to create our background paper and then inked the edges in Early Espresso.  We lightly sponged More Mustard throughout our image to give a more aged look.  Our sentiment from the Holiday Best set was stamped in Cajun Craze, layered on More Mustard and Cajun Craze card stock and popped up with Dimensionals.  For our simple embellishment we cut out a few more stamped leaves, inked the edges for a crisp look, added an antique brad and a twist of twine!  All of our ladies LOVED this card!

For our second card we used the awesome medallion stamp from Day of Gratitude.  This stamp is so bold and versatile!  It can be used for all seasons with  just a change of ink colors, and looks great stamped with multiple colors or in just one tone.  It's perfect as a background stamp using tone on tone, or embossed with Versamark.  It's hard to go wrong with this fantastic stamp!

For our project, we went for multiple colors using our Stampin' Write Markers.  We cut out our medallion and layered it on Early Espresso, More Mustard and Cajun Craze.  Our sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Wishes and punched out with Word Window and layed on a Modern Label punched out in Cajun Craze. 

For our next card we made a gate fold and featured a beautiful patterned paper from the Autumn Spice DSP on one panel and complimented it with a leaf image stamped in tone on tone on the other panel. We Ticket Corner punched our layered panel for added dimension.  Our Day of Gratitude sentiment was punched out using the Decorative Label and made for the perfect card closure!

For our last card we created a quick and easy background using the Bright Blessings Jumbo Wheel rolled twice across our paper in More Mustard ink.  Our three simple images were colored using our Regal markers and punched out using the 1 1/4" Square Punch and then layered on Early Espresso.  We used Crystal Effects on the center of our flowers and added 3 Rhinestones across the bottom for a little sparkle and shine!

We ended our evening by making our Turkey Treat Bags, which have become quite a hit!  You can view these cute little guys in our previous post! Thanks for looking at our projects and Happy Crafting!



Craft Show Recovery!

We survived the craft show!  Sunday, October 10, 2010, we participated in the 29th Oktoberfest at Marion Catholic High School.  What a great experience!  

The event is run as a fundraiser for the band.  The band members help the vendors with set up and tear down before and after the event.  They also bring coffee and donuts around in the morning and provide a lunch menu pick up and delivery service.  Everyone was so helpful!  We had a great time!

Nanci's son-in-law and husband built this great display for us!  It folds in half and we can change all the  shelving around to fit the display each time we exhibit.  At the craft show we were invited to three other events.  We will be participating in two other craft shows in November, Miss Nikki's Craft Fair and Ladies Night Out 2010 at the Chicago Height's Country Club! 

We sold out of one item at the craft show--our Thanksgiving hostess gift wrapped chocolates.  Luckily we took pictures of them before the show.  We love the Autumn Spice DSP.  It really has the flavor and feel of Thanksgiving! :)

Nanci's Turkey Treat Bags were popular also!

Nanci's stamp club is meeting on Tuesday, so we will have some sneak peeks for you tomorrow! :) 

August Stamp Club Projects

Hi Crafters!

We had a really late night tonight!  Our August Stamp Club met tonight, so we could get the order in before midnight!  Here is our parade of projects!

Card #1--who doesn't love Play Date DSP and the Owl punch?

Card #2--Flower Pot Card--fast, fun, and fabulous! :)

Pick the flowers to reveal the sentiment!  The hardest part is deciding where you want to adhere your Old Olive leaves!

Card #3--Who doesn't like ice cream?  Design your own sundae!

Does anyone know what the wood grain looking square stamp is in this stamp set?  We cannot figure it out!

Card #4--is the Gala Greenhouse DSP sneak peek from our post on Tuesday 8-24-10.

Are you dazzled by our Dazzling Diamonds?

Card #5--Is a card we cased right out of the Stampin' Success.

Do you like this card?  Circle Yes  Circle No   . . . Circle Circus stamp set--we love it!  Hmmm, I wonder how many circles there are on this card?

Thanks for stopping by!  Happy Crafting!

Sneak Peek - August Stamp Club

Oh--you peeked!  Well, it's to be expected--we did provide a photograph!

This is a lovely example of one of the projects we will be making at Stamp Club this month!  If you live in the South Suburban area of Cook County, IL and you are interested in joining Nanci's Stamp Club, please add a comment to this post and she will contact you!  If you are a Demonstrator who is interested in our Demonstrator Special and would like to offer classes and/or workshops at Lake View Lodge in Dowagiac, MI, please comment to this post also.

Paper: Greenhouse Gala DSP, Baja Breeze, Daffodil Delight, and Chocolate Chip cardstock
Punches: Modern Label, Word Window, Boho Blossoms, and Ornament Extra-large
Stampset: Awash with Flowers and Teeny Tiny Wishes
Misc: Dazzling Diamonds and Dimensionals

June Stamp Club

Craft Haven Retreats Stamp Club held its very first meeting this past week!  We made lots of fun summer cards featuring Stampin' Up!'s  Tropical Pary Stamp Set and the Island Oasis DSP.  Our theme for the evening was totally tropical, right down to the delicious Key Lime cookie bars provided by our June Hostess - Melannie! 

We started out with a quick and easy card inspired by Laura Barto at her May Stamp-a-Stack Buffet.  Be sure to check out all of Laura's great projects at http://www.papercraftingtrends.com/.

Our next card was CASE'd from Gretchen Barron.  Gretchen's  Flirty Little Sundress and Matching Purse was the perfect project for our tropical theme, and everyone LOVED it!  Thanks Gretchen for the dress pattern and directions, available here http://gretchenbarron.typepad.com/my_weblog/2010/05/a-flirty-little-sundress-and-a-matching-purse.html . 

Our version of the Monkey Hut card came straight from the June 2010 Stampin' Success magazine.  How fun is this!!  Our Joy Fold tropical flower card was inspired by Oregon Stamper on Splitcoast Stampers SU Gallery and can be viewed here http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/1710919?&cat=19175 .

All supplies are Stampin' Up!, unless otherwise noted

Stamp Sets:  Tropical Party, One of a Kind, Warm Words

Paper: Island Oasis DPS, Tempting Turquise CS, Pumpkin Pie CS, So Saffron CS,

Rose Red CS, Old Olive CS

Ink:  Tempting Turquise, Pumpkin Pie, So Saffron, Rose Red, Old Olive 

Tools: Scallop Circle punch, Scallop Circle Bigz XL die, Round Tab punch, various size

Circle punches, Small Oval punch, Baskets and Blooms Bigz XL die, Big Shot,

Cuttlebug Herringbone Enbossing Folder

Accessories: Misc. buttons, twine, ribbons, brads, Stampin' Dimensionals