Heart's Delight Cards: Hand Stamped

Showing posts with label Hand Stamped. Show all posts

Saturday, January 27, 2018

Happy Saturday - Let's Get Organized!

Sure Do Love You, Heart Happiness, Valentine, Occasions 2018, Stampin' Up!

This card is just to get your attention. Did it work? I'm not going to give the "How To", but there is a supply list at the bottom of this post, if you're interested.

The real reason I want your attention is because I want to help you organize your stamping ~~hoard~~ collection. If you are anything like me, when the clutter starts to takes over, the creative mojo has a hard time working. For me, clutter equals chaos in my brain, which means I can't focus on being creative. Periodically I go through my ~~hoard~~ collection of stamping stuff to purge some things, and better organize the things I want to keep. Let's start with Designer Series Paper.

I have a lot of it. I spent the last three days working on it. My local stamping friends and I joke about us being ready for the "Paperpocalypse" but it's not that funny if it's not getting used, and the stash keeps growing. Eventually I'm going to run out of room!

I need to finish listing the colors used for each.

So I decided to cut all the 12" x 12" sheets into 4" x 6" pieces, label them all, and place them neatly into these awesome containers. It serves two purposes - the first is that I've refreshed my memory about what, exactly, I have. And second, it's super convenient now to just grab a sheet that is already pre-cut. (The reason I didn't cut them to 4" x 5-1/4" - sized to fit a card - is because I didn't want to deal with leftover scraps which would have taken up more room in the bins. I can do that as I grab one to use.)

Color Collection stacks - wish they'd bring 'em back!

Yes, I filled TWO bins. And no, I'm not finished cutting up the retired DSP. I just ordered two more bins.....and we'll just leave it at that, okay?

Some observations:

Apparently I liked the English Garden and Pop of Pink Specialty DSP the most, because there wasn't much of them left to cut.
And apparently I forgot I had the Neutrals DSP stack, because I had duplicates of both the old and the new designs. That's 160 12" x 12" sheets, cut into 6 pieces each. Do the math. And that was just the Neutrals.

I could never have done all that cutting without my trusty Carl Cutter. Yes, it is pricey, but it is an absolute workhorse and worth every penny. It consistently gives crisp, clean cuts and I have not had to change the blade yet, after all that cutting! I use it to prepare card kits for my stamping classes, as well as ready-to-go card bases (more on that tomorrow). The one drawback is, it doesn't handle smaller cuts of less than 2". But that's where my Stampin' Trimmer shines! Between the two of them, I have all my cutting needs handled very well.

Be sure to check back tomorrow for more organization ideas. I know what works for me, and I'm happy to share it with you!

Product List

Monday, January 22, 2018

Long Weekend

NOT!

I took the weekend off - sorry for no notice ahead of time. It was one of those "life getting in the way of crafting" things, and I almost took today off, too. I really just wanted to sleep today, since I got no sleep last night. It's hard to sleep when you have skunk smell in your nose. Yep, our city dog finally got "christened" after almost 2-1/2 years of living in the country.

We let her out every night to do her business right before bed. So what did my darling husband do? Let her back in the house, while calling to me "I thing she got sprayed by a skunk!" Um, ya think?! Meanwhile, she's desperately trying to wipe the stink off her face on everything she can - the floor, the area rug, etc. We bathed her in the recommended formula, which really helped a lot, but the damage was done - the house reeked. And guess what?! You don't get "nose blind" to skunk smell. I couldn't sleep because it smelled so bad ALL. NIGHT. LONG.

Party Pandas, Sale-A-Bration, Stampin' Up!, Birthday

Soooo, I really thought about taking this day off, too, but I had such a cute card to share, I decided not to. Lookie!

This is a variation of the card we made in Saturday's stamp club, which thank heavens was before the fetid fiasco! I didn't make the ladies fussy-cut their pandas; on their cards the panda was stamped on a Whisper White stitched circle. I'm nice like that!

The Party Panda stamp set is one of the Sale-A-Bration freebies. I think it's totally adorable now, though I didn't think I would like it at first!

I have just informed the husband that we have a new "skunk protocol" on the homestead. Number 1 - we do not let the dog out unsupervised at night. Number 2 - if/when the dog gets sprayed again, DO NOT let her in the house saying "I think May got sprayed by a skunk" under penalty of death! Protocol is now: Grab the skunk emergency box & treat the dog outside *before* bringing her directly into the bath tub. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200, do not let her try to wipe the stank off on everything she touches while you scramble to figure out what to do. Lord, give me strength. Amen.

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Monday, January 15, 2018

Waterfront, CAS Thank You

Thanks, Thank You, Friend, Occasions 2018, Scenic, Stampin' Up!, Waterfront

This is the card I started to make when I was testing colors, which resulted in yesterday's card. I've seen some other really intriguing color combinations on Pinterest, too! Think "purple mountains majesty." There are lots more looks that I want to try!

The Pool Party textured cardstock is retired. It would be wonderful if that textured cardstock was brought back. It sure adds a nice, subtle bit of texture without using an embossing folder.

Measurements

Image panel: Very Vanilla 3-3/16" x 4-1/4"
Mat: Kraft (retired, can sun Crumb Cake) 3-3/8" x 4-7/16"
Background: Pool Party 2-3/4" x 3-1/2"
Card base: Very Vanilla 5-1/2" x 8-1/2" scored & folded at 4-1/4"

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