Spring Has Sprung! (Which means more butterflies)

The weather here today was GORGEOUS! I could hardly stand being inside while the sun was so bright and warm, so I called up my girlfriend and we went out. Loved it!

A week or so ago, I made a great spring-inspired card from the color challenge over at Fab Friday, and today seemed like the perfect day to share it.

I love how this card turned out! It's got so many great details. The Honeycomb Textured Embossing Folder with little hexagons of DSP in it? LOVE! I also pulled in the same DSP along the edge to give the card some cohesion. The pink butterfly is simply punched out of a different piece of DSP (from the same pack) with some Basic Pearls down the middle. The small butterfly was stamped in that lovely Island Indigo and then punched out, and then I added pearls for the body.

There's a lovely Sahara Sand floral background along the right side of the card, and I like the way it "grounds" the butterflies.

Then, of course, to tie it all together, is the fun Baker's Twine along the bottom. I just wrapped it around a few times and tied a knot (since I really suck at little tiny bows! haha). The tag below the knot was the very last thing I added to the card, and I just love how well it brings everything together. Like it's tied up in a neat little gift package or something.

And like I said earlier, this card was inspired by Fab Friday's FabFri14 color challenge, though I did "cheat" a little and use Island Indigo instead of the second pink color.  ;)

Sketch & Colors: Masculine Birthday Card

Please forgive the complete lack of posts lately. It's been, shall we say, a stressful month here in the Stoll household. With any luck, things will be somewhat back to normal soon and I won't randomly disappear for weeks at a time.

Anyway, on to the point: I stamped! It was my father-in-law's birthday, and I needed a masculine birthday card -- which, as you may know, is NOT my strong suit! But with a little (okay, a LOT of) help from some of my favorite stamp challenges, I was able to get the ball rolling and came up with a great card.

Please forgive the (possibly) poor-quality photos. I forgot to take a picture before I actually gave it to my father-in-law, so these were snapped with my phone's camera.

I love how clean and simple this card is. That seems to be the key to masculine cards -- clean and simple, no frills needed. The little touch of embellishment at the bottom was partially inspired by the challenges, and partially inspired by Julie, who I was stamping with that night (she suggested the button, which I LOVE!).

And here's the info for the challenges I pulled from:

Create With Connie and Mary (CCMC244) gave us a color challenge this week, which is really when this whole card came together for me.

And Sketch Frenzy Friday (SFF032213) gave us the layout, which I will most likely be using again -- it's just fantastic!

Farewell Gifts

Last week, I had the sad occasion of saying good-bye to some absolutely fantastic coworkers. See, I left my editing job (which is why the last few weeks have been so quiet -- tons of changes going on in my personal life!) and have switched over to an office manager job. But I'll always be an editor (and a book nerd!) at heart, and so I came up with some fitting "farewell gifts" for the wonderful people I was privileged to work with for so long. And what better gifts for book nerds than bookmarks?!

My friend Jessica made this one.
Isn't it adorable?!

This was my favorite. It just turned out so elegant!

Vintage birds & flowers 

That shiny blob thing? Yeah, that's what happens
when the pearls go through the Big Shot. . . Oops!

This one was for Heather. She loves pink and sparkles.
So why not throw in some butterflies too?

This was my attempt at a non-girly bookmark.

For my Whovian coworkers - a TARDIS one!

"Guest Post" (of sorts) and FM99

Around Christmas, my mother-in-law, Jolene, decided she wanted to get into stamping as a fun hobby. So I sat down with her, pored over the catalogs and seasonal offerings, and helped her create her first order. Since then, she's built up her stamping "stock" and has been really excited to create with it all. She sent me an email a few days ago with a picture of the card she made for a friend's baby shower, and it was SO stinkin' adorable that I just had to ask if I could share it here, since she doesn't have a blog of her own to show off on.

At first, she wasn't sure, since she had pulled the ideas from other cards she found online. But after explaining to her that we have a "CASE" mindset at Stampin' Up! -- "Create And Share Everything" -- and that copying or taking inspiration from other stampers' projects is what most of the SU community does all the time (I've just given away my secret!), she said I could share the card on here with you guys. 

Isn't it so cute! I love the color combination!

Here's what Jolene had to say about her card (after insisting that she's "not creative") --

I combined the "Congratulations Box" from page 41 of the 2013 catalog with a card I saw on another Stampin' Up website. I raised the duck (like the catalog pic) and cut around it so the duck would have a small white frame, and I decided using a So Saffron frame around the white backing, used the polka dot folder to made the entire background polka dotted (instead of only half like the website pic), set the framed duck towards to top right corner, put some curve in the "Congratulations" flag, and came up with my card. I had so much fun figuring it all out!

I love it! And it also happens to coincide perfectly with this week's Friday Mashup challenge (FM99)! They want "Baby" cards and/or projects using their color challenge - which includes So Saffron! Here's the challenge info:

1. Make a project for a "Baby Shower or a Baby."
2. Or Make a project using the Colors "Pool Party, Real Red, So Saffron & a Neutral."
3. Or "Mash it Up" and create a project for a "Baby/Shower using the Colors listed above."

Perfect! So, Jolene, I've entered your card in this week's challenge. Good luck! I'm sure they'll love your card!

Colors of Spring Blog Hop! (Plus challenges!)

Is anyone else ready for Winter to be over?

I know I sure am! So creating cute, Spring-themed projects for this month's Blog Hop was a fun "escape" from the fact that it's not quite done being winter yet. Welcome to our Colors of Spring Blog Hop! We've added a few wonderful new ladies to our hop this time, to be sure to check out all the fun posts!

As I've mentioned a few times recently, I'm trying to find ways to use the same elements to create fresh new cards. So today I've put together a mini-showcase of some fabulous Spring cards.

Make sure to stop by the other blogs in our hop to see what Spring inspiration they've created for you, too!

Hop Forward: Kris Kilkenny

I created this simple, one-layer card a while ago to give out with my business card when people asked about my Stampin' Up! business. (Of course, I was too shy to actually talk to people, so I have a lot of these cards hanging around in my apartment!)

Using that first card and a Retro Sketches sketch (for their choose-your-own adventure sketch challenge) as inspiration, I created this second Spring card. I used the same stamp set and same colors, but ended up with a completely different card. I love it! I added some of the Basic Pearls to the center of the Subtles Designer Buttons to give them that extra "something special" (and to tie in with the pearls in the upper right -- remember my whole thing about liking pairs? Yeah. That.)

But two cards just wasn't enough! (Did I mention how sick I am of winter? Cute spring cards help dispel "winter blues" - at least temporarily.) And so I created another card! Same colors, same stamps. But yet another completely different look! This one was inspired by the Create with Connie & Mary sketch -- CCMC241 (down below). And as an added bonus, the fun Silver Glimmer Paper behind the sentiment qualifies this card for CAS-ual Fridays CFC91! I love the sparkle it adds. Here's a close-up so you can fully appreciate its happiness:

So those are my projects! What do you guys think? Ready for Spring yet?? Be sure to check out the rest of the blog hop for even more Spring-themed crafting inspiration! (You can check out our other blog hops here and here and here.)

Hop Forward: Kris Kilkenny

And here's the challenge info:

For the "Choose your own sketch" challenge, I chose RS#3

Isn't this an adorable sketch? Love Create with Connie & Mary!

CFC91: The object of this game? Simple! Add silver to your CAS project.