August Swaps

August was another productive month for me.  In addition to the Christmas cards previously posted, I also completed a bunch of swaps for the ATC group I belong to.  Without further ado, here they are.

Mystery Image, which was a moose - Yep, decades after the unique TV show concluded, I still can't see a moose without thinking of Northern Exposure!  The background I used is a printer copy of a painting I found online. 

Sketch Card #1 - We decided to try something new and work with a sketch every month.  Sketches are quite popular in the cardmaking and scrapbooking venues, but I've never seen this done for ATCs.  The top image is our starting sketch, and the four below are the cards I came up with using the idea.  I was surprised at how fast and how fun this swap was!

Quote of the Month - I used a quote from a Stampin' Up! set along with some SU! washi tape.  Easy peasy!

Artist's Choice - The photo just does not do this card justice.  I fussy cut the heat embossed flower into several layers and added some leaves that weren't in the original image.  The card base was dry embossed with a SU! embossing folder and then randomly painted with Gelatos.

Just Beachy - Of all the ATC series I've made so far, this is my favorite.  I love the collage effect and the colors I chose, and the focus is on the real sea oats I acquired a few years ago while visiting some friends in North Carolina.

Winner Take All - The winner this month chose the theme Trees, so it was a perfect excuse to pull out my Lovely as a Tree Stampin' Up! set... well, if I could have found it quickly.  Instead, I chose to use the Lovely as a Tree stamp brushes in My Digital Studio to create this card in Early Espresso and Bashful Blue.  I printed it out and used Stickles to make the trees shimmer.  This is another card that looks much better in real life than in the photo.

A2 Birthday Card - Just for fun, we decided to do a non-ATC swap, and this month it was an A2 sized birthday card.  This was my first time using the Circle Card Thinlit from Stampin' Up!, and I had fun with it. The card base is Summer Starfruit, and the other colors are Island Indigo, Tangerine Tango, and Bermuda Bay.

Celebrate You RAKs (Random Acts of Kindness) - These were both quick and fun to make, and I'm amazed at how well they turned out.  I resisted the urge to keep them for myself.  :)

I have just one more set of cards to blog, and then I can roll up my sleeves and get started on the next batch!  I do hope you're enjoying the pictures.

Smiles,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. Stamper Joyce)

           

Fifty Christmas Cards - Batch Two

I had two more cards to complete by September 1 in order to be on schedule with my 10 per month deadline, and I decided to use my brand new Circle Card Thinlit from Stampin' Up!  I've been fascinated with flip cards for as long as I can remember, but because I kept misplacing my template for it, I had to reinvent the wheel every time I wanted to make one -- and so didn't do it very often.  Now I have no excuse not to make them, as all it takes is a a few cranks through the Big Shot!  

These are basically the same card, with just the Designer Series Paper switched on each one.

Card 1:

Card 2: 

I enjoyed making these two cards with a combination of old and new -- retired DSP and new stamps -- and my favorite traditional Christmas color combination of Real Red and Gumball Green.  I just had to use Stickles on the red Christmas tree ornaments!

Twenty cards down, thirty to go!

Happy Smiles,

Joyce Spear, a.k.a. StamperJoyce

P.S.  Have you started on your own holiday cards yet?

Fifty Christmas Cards - Batch One

As I mentioned in a previous post, one of my neighbors has hired me to make 50 unique Christmas cards, 10 due on the first of the months of August through December.  Because I had nine cards in my "stash," I got a head start this month. I've made nine more cards, and still need to do two more to meet my September 1st deadline.  Below are the nine cards I've made so far.  If you'd like a larger view, just click on the photos.

Card 1:

Card 2:

Card 3:

Card 4:

Card 5:

Card 6:

Card 7:

Card 8:

Card 9:

I used Stampin' Up!'s retired Letters to Santa Designer Series paper as well as the coordinating self-adhesive die cuts.  I got both from the Clearance Rack in the Stampin' Up! store earlier this year, so this batch of cards was rather inexpensive to make.

I have lots of ideas for my next batches of cards, so stay tuned for the next installment.  I'll also have some ATCs to post soon, so I hope you'll enjoy all these creations!

Merry Christmas in August!

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. StamperJoyce)

  

Artist Trading Cards with a Pretty Bow

Last month was a busy month for ATCs for me, and I had a blast making these.

Swap:  Birds/birdcages (click on photo to enlarge)

Swap:  Pearls

Swap:  Mystery Image (corset on dress stand)

Swap:  Quote of the Month

Swap:  Buckaroos

I also downloaded a template from Stampin' Up!'s My Digital Studio to make these darling paper bows:

My goals this weekend are to finish up an embarrassingly overdue birthday card for my friend Margie, and hopefully have time left to work on Artist Trading Cards that are due September 1st.

Off to the stamping trenches,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. StamperJoyce)

           

A Birthday Card!

A very dear friend of mine -- and my Stampin' Up! downline, too -- had a birthday recently, which gave me the opportunity to pull out the SU! Best of Birthdays set. She is quite fond of this year's In Colors, so I used them all!

It's hard to see in the picture, but some of the presents in the background have Dazzling Details (Stampin' Up!'s version of Stickles) on them for added bling. The Happy Birthday to You oval is clear embossed, which is easy to do even if you don't have a particular color in Craft (pigment) ink; just tap your stamp in VersaMark ink before loading it with Classic (dye) ink, stamp, and heat emboss using clear embossing powder as usual.  Cool, eh?  Here's the inside of the card:

The cupcake has a bit of Dazzling Details on it, too.

Happy Birthday once again, Chris!  I hope you enjoyed your card, and I wish you many more years of happiness and friendship!

Smiles,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. StamperJoyce)

Language of Friendship

I just finished up a card that I'm entering in a challenge on the Paper Seedlings blog.  (Check it out, Linda does some pretty cards!)  For this challenge we were to use the Stampin' Up! colors of Island Indigo, Wild Wasabi, and So Saffron along with any neutral we'd like.  The theme of the card was "Friendship."  I decided it would be fitting to use the SU! set Language of Friendship.  Working with these colors was a challenge -- the neutral saved me! -- but I think I did okay:

And the inside:

A couple of my friends also participated in the challenge, so I can't wait to see the results.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I've taken on the job of making 50 unique Christmas cards for one of my neighbors.  He plans to give one card to each of the people in our senior community, his philosophy being "everybody should know what it feels like to own a piece of art made just for them."  My goal is to have at least 10 cards done by the first of each month August through December.  I'm currently two cards shy of my September 1 goal, but I'm using some of the cards I made earlier this year.  I'm going to have to work my butt off to keep up, but I am so very excited about this project.

'Tis also the season of birthdays, so I'll be posting some of the birthday cards I'll be sending soon.  I have some artist trading cards (ATCs) to post, too.  I hope you'll stick around to enjoy the ride!

Happy smiles,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. StamperJoyce)

  

Welcome Baby Mason!

This week I had the rare pleasure of making a "congratulations on your new baby" card!  One of my best friends' daughter had a little boy named Mason, and is he ever a cutie!  

I used the Stampin' Up! set Henry Says to make the card because I think the elephant has so much personality.  I also experimented for the first time with washi tape and candy dots.  Here are the card and envelope:

In other news, I made a TON of ATCs this month; I even got to work ahead on swaps for next month!  I'll be posting photos as soon as the recipients all have their cards in hand -- don't want to ruin the surprise for anyone who might be reading this.

One of my neighbors has hired me to make 10 Christmas cards a month for him to deliver to the roughly 50 tenants we have living in our apartment complex this holiday season, so you'll be seeing pics of those cards soon, too. This same gentleman is helping me with some projects and chores around the house, so I plan to make him a doozy of an appreciation card.

Time for me to head to bed since I hope to roll up my sleeves and get stamping early tomorrow!  Oh, and I have dishes to do... yee haw!

Big smiles,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. StamperJoyce)

   

Custom-Made Special Occasion Cards

I had a request for some extra-special cards last week.  One was for a 60th wedding anniversary, and another for a 99th birthday.  Can you imagine accomplishing either?  I sure can't!  So, I rolled up my sleeves to see if I could out-do myself with these cards.

I worked on the birthday card first, and decided I wanted to do something with a vintage feel to it.  I'm not sure I succeeded, but the cards turned out okay anyway.  I ended up making two because I wasn't happy with the ink color I chose -- early espresso on Blushing Bride cardstock -- because the ink seemed way too dark.  With encouragement from my friend Chris, I went ahead and finished the card and then proceeded to make another similar card, this time with Baked Brown Sugar for background images and Soft Suede for the sentiments.  I also experimented with two different bows on the cards.  Which do you like best?

Early Espresso ink:

Baked Brown Sugar and Soft Suede:

The flowers are from Stampin' Up!'s Elements of Style set.

When my friend Cathy arrived to pick up the cards, she asked if this one could be personalized with "99" for the years, so I pulled out my Sizzix alpha/number sizzlits and added it to the inside left side.  The first card went to the designated recipient, and the second was personalized with "75" and went to another birthday person.  It turned out to be a good thing that I had made two cards!

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I was much more pleased with the anniversary card.  Due to the short deadline, I chose to CASE (Copy And Selectively Edit) a beautiful card, originally made by Diana Gibbs, which you can see here.  I again made two cards, one with pink flowers and one with blue, this time because I couldn't make up my mind.  I knew both would be good cards, so I figured I'd keep the extra for myself!  Here's how the first card turned out:

Before I finished it, I knew it'd be the one I'd keep, so instead of an anniversary sentiment, I simply left room for a sentiment to be added later.  The flowers are from the Stampin' Up! two-step stamping set Stippled Blossoms, and I used Regal Rose on top of Pretty in Pink for the blooms and Old Olive on top of Pear Pizzazz for the leaves.  The card base is Very Vanilla, and the background is stamped in Crumb Cake with the stamps Hello Doily, Script, and the splatter from French Foliage.  Yep, I fussy-cutted the flowers, which makes me appreciate sets like Secret Garden that have coordinating framelits that do the cutting much more easily.  The flowers are carefully layered with thin foam squares (thinner than Stampin' Dimensionals), but the cards still fit comfortably into the matching envelopes (not shown, but simply stamped with a corner of Hello Doily on the front).  The butterfly on this first one is a Martha Stewart punch.

I decided (with Chris' help) that the blue flowers would be more striking for an anniversary card:

I stamped the flowers in Bashful Blue and Not Quite Navy, and all the sentiments in NQN as well.  I added "60" to the front with some punched hearts in Real Red, and topped it off with a bow made with Crumb Cake seam binding.  I really am quite pleased with how the card turned out, and to my relief so was Cathy. I really want to thank Diana and Chris for their help with this project!

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So what's next? you ask.  I have a whole lot of ATCs due on both August 1 and September 1, and a ton of birthdays and other occasions coming up fast that require cards.  I will do my best to stay on top of posting things as they are made or received, so stay tuned for more stamping goodness!

Inky smiles,

(wait, that sounds like I've been licking my stamp pads, doesn't it?)

Umm...

Happy smiles,

Joyce Spear (a.k.a. Stamper Joyce)