Vintage-Inspired Baby Headband

Baby headbands have been trendy for a while now, and I have always loved them. So I bet you can imagine how excited I am to finally have a beautiful baby girl - who is, of course, very beautiful even without accessories - to wear headbands! :) I recently decided that I'm going to try my hand at making and selling headbands and highbrows for babies and little girls. I was able to execute one of my first ideas last night - which just so happens to use almost exclusively Stampin' Up! materials. 

I had so much fun making this headband for Lyla and I think it turned out so cute! She's not a huge fan of headbands, but I'm trying to have her wear them more often and I hope she'll come around. ;)

The Stampin' Up! supplies I used are Crumb Cake 1-1/4" Striped Grosgrain Ribbon, Tip Top Taupe 1" Dotted Lace Trim, Mint Macaron 1" Dotted Lace Trim, and a retired snowflake embellishment from last year's Holiday Catalog. But there are a lot of other buttons and things that would work, and there will be a new snowflake embellishment in this year's Holiday Catalog, starting on September 1st! :)

I also used champagne 5/8" fold over elastic from Elastic By The Yard, a marabou puff from Wholesale DeZigns on Etsy, and some felt from the fabric store. When I'm making my own flowers, I like to use Fabri-Tac from Beacon Adhesives, and I use hot glue to assemble the headband. 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have a great day! :)

Baby Thank You Cards

Hey all! Long time no see, huh? :) Sorry I've been MIA, and in fact it's been so long since I updated the old blog-o that I haven't shared some very big news with you all... I'm having a baby!! :-D It's a girl, and she'll be here around the end of May - 2 months to go! Hubby and I are very excited, and starting to get real preparations underway. My work colleagues have already thrown me a small but extremely thoughtful shower, and my "regular" shower is in a couple weeks, so I'm starting to think about designing thank you notes. Want to see what I've got so far?

This is the first one I made, and I was kind of playing around for a sketch challenge at the time. I will definitely not be making 30+ of this card! :-P We don't have a dedicated nursery space in our house, but for cohesion we're going for a yellow and gray color scheme with as many baby things as possible. And we've chosen elephant as Baby's signature animal. (Hope she likes them!) So for my cards I'm using Smoky Slate, So Saffron, and pops of Crisp Cantaloupe, seen here in the Sweet Dreams DSP and In Color Sequin. The adorable elephant stamp is from the Zoo Babies stamp set, and the sentiment is from Something to Say.

This card is way more mass-produce-able! :) So I think this is the idea I'll end up going with, but I want to rotate it to a horizontal card rather than vertical. Unfortunately, the Happy Heart embossing folder - which I adore - is vertical, so I'll have to choose a different embossing folder to add texture. Otherwise, the elements are really similar to the first card, but simplified. The elephant is matted onto some Dazzling Diamonds glimmer paper (love the redesign they did on the color of this stuff!) which is hard to see in the photo, but really pretty in real life. It adds some interest to what would otherwise be a lot of white space.

OK, well, that's it for me for today. Two cards, and some big news! :) I'll try to get some more posts up in the near future.

Happy Stampin'! :)

Baby Shower Gift Set

This afternoon I attended the baby shower of a dear friend from college who is expecting twin boys!! Even though she lives over an hour away and we really only see each other once a year, she's really the first of my close friends to start a family. I'm super excited and I've been working on her presents for a few weeks now.

She told me she was pregnant by telling me to get my knitting needles ready, so I knew I had to knit something! :) I was going to knit a pair of baby blankets, but at the time I was trying to decide what to make, that just seemed a little too overwhelming because I was working on a million other projects. So, hats it was! (I used the Easy and Basic Baby Hat pattern on Ravelry.) I already had this super cute variegated yarn in orange, aqua, brown, and white. So cute, so boy, and so different from most baby yarns! And then I remembered that I happened to have flannel in the same colors already cut and ready for a quilt I meant to make like three years ago! Perfect!

Since I suddenly had such a cute little coordinating set, I decided to roll with it. I pulled out a bunch of inks - Tangerine Tango, Pumpkin Pie, Soft Sky, Pool Party, Bermuda Bay, and Chocolate Chip - and a couple stamp sets and went to town! :) Here's what I came up with...

Card Details...

Stamps: Simply Stars (Stampin' Up! - retired), Cuddles and Kisses (Stampin' Up! - retiring, but still available and on sale!), Just Sayin' (Stampin' Up!)

Accessories: White Baker's Twine (Stampin' Up!)

Cardstock: Whisper White and Tangerine Tango (Stampin' Up!)

Inks: Tangerine Tango, Pumpkin Pie, Soft Sky, Pool Party, Bermuda Bay, Chocolate Chip (all Stampin' Up!)

Tag details...

Stamps: Simply Stars (Stampin' Up! - retired), Handle with Care and Purls of Wisdom (Papertrey Ink)

Accessories: Angled Tag Topper Punch (Stampin' Up!), Pool Party Baker's Twine (Stampin' Up! - retired)

Cardstock: Whisper White and Tangerine Tango (Stampin' Up!)

Inks: Tangerine Tango, Pumpkin Pie, Soft Sky, Pool Party, Bermuda Bay, Chocolate Chip (all Stampin' Up!)

Pretty cute, if I may say so myself! Unfortunately, I couldn't find wrapping paper that matched. But I did find some that has big polka dots like the one fabric in the quilts, and it has orange and aqua in it - along with a bunch of other colors, but oh well... I'm going to use orange and aqua ribbon. :)

Thanks for stopping by today. I really hope you enjoyed this project - even though it's a little different from what I usually share. Yup, I knit, and sometimes I sew... I've always got some sort of projects going on! :)

Happy Stampin'! :)

CCC#032: May 2014 Cards Challenge - Rock-a-Bye Baby

CCC#032: May 2014 Cards Challenge

Rock-a-Bye Baby

This month's card challenge is all about the bambinos! And let me tell you, the timing on this couldn't have been better! A friend of mine just had her third baby a couple days ago, a former colleague is having her first baby this summer, and a dear friend from college is expecting twins! Let's just say this card will be put to good use! :)

I've told you before how much I love this stamp set. It's called Baby, We've Grown and I think it's just super cute. I love that it's a little bit unique compared to a lot of of baby stamps. And guess what! This set is in the Occasions Catalog, but it will be returning for the 2014-2015 Catalog! :)

I stamped the "sweet baby" sentiment repeatedly on Pistachio Pudding cardstock in Pistachio Pudding ink. Isn't it cool how it sort of interlocks with itself? Of course, I used my trusty Stamp-A-Ma-Jig because I can't line things up! ;)

I love this little owl family because they're quirky and not cutesy. I colored them with a blender pen and Pistachio Pudding, Pool Party, and Summer Starfruit inks. (P.S. I used a few retiring products on this card. Summer Starfruit is a retiring color, and the DSP I used is from the 2012-2013 Catalog, I think.) 

So that's it from me! Go over to Catherine and Cathy Create to see what the other design team members have come up with. Then share your baby card and you might win a Stampin' Up! prize!

Happy Stampin'! :)

Without them, what would little boys do?

I fell in love with the Baby, We've Grown stamp set the minute I saw it in the new Occasions Catalog! It's one of the cutest and least cliche baby sets I've ever seen. I mean, we all have enough onesies and baby bottle stamps, right? How about a cute little family of owls, and the cutest little baby shoes? :) And those shoes just beg to be watercolored!

I chose the kind of funky DSP to modern-up the card a little bit, since I'm not really into super sweet baby stuff. The collection I used is called Sweet Sorbet, and it is a Sale-a-Bration exclusive that will be available starting January 28th. Remember, during Sale-a-Bration, you get to choose one exclusive product for free for every $50 you spend from Stampin' Up! Get your wish list ready - this year's exclusives are great! You can take a look at them here. The embossing folder I used on the Crisp Cantaloupe panel is also a Sale-a-Bration exclusive.

I chose the sentiment from Cuddles & Kisses, which is a super awesome baby sentiment set. It's very versatile - unlike most baby sets, it includes sentiments for twins, grandparents, and adoption! I'm a big fan of Maurice Chevalier - especially in the movie Gigi, which is where that song is from. :)

This adorable little shoe image was very simple, quick, and enjoyable to color. So cute! And I created a fun little polaroid-style frame with the Squares Collection Framelits to draw focus to the image. (You can check out my video tutorial on creating your own faux-Polaroids on YouTube.)

Thanks for stopping by today. Have a great weekend!

Happy Stampin'! :)



Little Girl Shoes Card Supplies

InLinkz.com

More Little Additions

How cute are these little 3x3 cards? While I had the Little Additions set and all these pastel inks and cardstocks on my desk, I thought I'd get as much out of them as I could! :) These little cuties came together so quickly and easily. The most time-consuming part was cutting out the little onesies, but I think the final product was worth it!

These little cards would be so cute on a present for a baby shower. I also love the idea of giving a handmade 3x3 card with a gift of flowers, instead of the generic cards they have at the florist. Or tied to a big bunch of balloons when visiting a new baby for the first time - that would be so fun! :)

Retirement Party No. 1: Little Additions and Tiny Tags

Welcome to the first post of my Retirement Party! Stampin' Up!'s new catalog will be available as of May 30, but before that, we have to say good bye to some favorites. But it doesn't have to be goodbye! The retiring stamps will be available through June 3rd! (Retiring accessories - ribbon, cardstock, DSP, dies, punches, etc. - are only available while supplies last, though, so check those out ASAP!) So to celebrate the retiring stamps, I'll be featuring some of them on my blog through the month of May. Today's celebrated retiree: Little Additions.

I really love this set, and I'm quite sad to see it go. I don't normally like sets designed to make "scenes" like this, but these images are just too cute! And actually this is the first card I've made with this set where I did create a scene. But I love how it turned out!

I paired this set with another retiring set: Tiny Tags. Also retiring is the coordinating Jewelry Tag Punch. I adore this pair, and I'm really not sure what I'm going to do without them! Whenever I'm not sure where to put a sentiment, or I just need a simple little embellishment, this duo never fails!

Oh! And those fun dots in the background on this card? That's the Distressed Dots stamp - one of my favorite background stamps. It's so great for a little tone-on-tone texture!


Retiring items used in this project:

InLinkz.com

Start-to-Finish Sunday #15 - Gender Neutral Baby Card with Window

This card came about in a rather interesting way. I was on Pinterest and I saw that somebody had pinned a pair of adorable handmade loafers from etsy. They were super cute, so naturally I repinned them. :) But then I kept thinking about that picture, not for the shoes, but for the color combination. I really liked it a lot and tried to figure out how to interpret it in Stampin' Up! colors. Here's that inspiration photo...

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Totally cute, right? :) So for my project I chose Sahara Sand, Basic Gray, Pool Party, Cajun Craze, and Very Vanilla. Then I had to mull over it for a few days to decide what kind of card to make. Well, friends of ours are expecting their second baby this spring, and they're not finding out the gender. I think that's totally awesome, but would never do it myself because then everything people give you for the baby is yellow and green! (Seriously people, baby girls can wear blue and baby boys can wear purple. It's ok.) So I decided on a gender-neutral baby card.

For a little added interest, I decided to cut a window out of the front of the card and do my stamping on the inside so that it shows through. Love this technique!

The video came out a little long because I goofed up and had to fix it. But I decided to keep that part in because I always appreciate when other cardmakers show how they fix their mistakes. I hope you do to! Anyway, you can watch the video below, or over on my YouTube channel.

Happy Stampin'! :)



Gender Neutral Baby Card Supplies

InLinkz.com