Wedding Invitations

My partner teacher is getting married in July and asked me to make her 100 invitations for their special day! We spent about a week choosing styles, stamp sets and colour schemes and finally decided on one. I placed the order for all the cardstock and ribbon and almost a week later it arrived. 3 weeks later 100 cards were all finished. I don't honestly believe I've ever made so many cards in such a short amount of time, but doing them conveyor belt style really helped. I cut all the cardstock first for the bases and the inside, then scored them all. I then punched the scalloped border on 50 of them (my hands killed me after that amount). And slowly, bit by bit, I kept making 10 here and 10 there and soon enough they were all done. She absolutely loved them, thank goodness!


Wanna see them?



Closed view


Open View


Natalie is getting the inserts printed and will be gluing them in over the Easter holidays and then I'm going to re-tie all the bows as she couldn't do them LOL. I'm also going to make matching name cards and table plans nearer to the date. The Close To Cocoa was almost a perfect match for her bridesmaid dresses as well. She didn't want anything on the front to indicate it was a wedding invitation so that when the recipients opened the cards it was a surprise!


Recipe:


Stamps: Baroque Motifs


Papers: Close To Cocoa, Pretty in Pink, both from Stampin' Up

Inks: Close To Cocoa, Regal Rose (the Pretty in Pink didn't show up very well on the Cocoa cardstock so we had to change colours at the last minute)

Accessories: Pretty in Pink taffeta ribbon, scallop edge punch

Homework's all done!

I managed to complete my homework for Amanda's team training on Saturday but only just managed to get it photographed and emailed to her about 5:45pm on Sunday (the deadline was 6pm!).


Anyway here it is...



As we were allowed to add another cardstock colour I chose to use Cameo Coral (although it does look a lot pinkier here than IRL). I used the new Very Versatile stamp set which will be available to order from April 1st (that's this Wednesday!). I also punched the end with my scallop edge punch and added a strip of scalloped So Saffron and Cameo Coral to continue the colour scheme. I love this edging! Just hope Paula over at SU likes it enough for me to win, but I doubt it as there's so many talented stampers in my team that I'm sure their creations will be so much better!


Inside I stamped a greeting from the same set and mounted it on the same colours and I know just the right person to send this to.


Recipe


Stamps: Very Versatile


Papers: Certainly Celery, So Saffron, Cameo Coral and Whisper White all from Stampin' Up


Inks: Certainly Celery, So Saffron and Cameo Coral all from Stampin' Up


Accessories: So Saffron striped grosgrain ribbon, scallop edge punch

Team Training

On Saturday 21st March I attended my very first team meeting hosted by the lovely Amanda down in Fareham. It took me 3 hours in my mini tank courtesy car to get there and was a fairly easy drive.


There were 10 of us altogether and all of the ladies there were really lovely. I had only ever met Amanda before but they all made me feel very welcome (thank you lovely ladies!)


The first thing we did was exchange our swaps. Everyone had such a fantastic range of ideas and I loved all of them.



Inside this cute little handbag that Sue made were two cute little charms.




As you can see a beautiful collection of card fronts, full cards and 3D items.


Amanda had made us all little gift packs containing a notebook with some of the silver elastic cord and die cut flowers on. I've never used either of these before but they both really added that special something to what was originally a plain notebook. We also got a test tube of M & Ms using the new Oval All stamp set and 2 new oval punches - straight edged and scalloped. All of these can be found in the new mini catalogue which is released officially on 1st April.



I can now finish eating the M & Ms as I've finally had the time to photograph them!


Our first activity was to make a cute origami box using Very Vanilla and Pink Passion cardstock, the new Playful Petals stamp set (another mini catalogue preview for you!) and Pixie Pink, Pink Passion and Orchid Opulence (I think) inks.


Side View


Top View


Open View

This box will be perfect for a gift box and can obviously be made in so many different colours and styles to suit any occasion.


In the afternoon we had a teaching session on using reinkers. I have a couple of these but have never as yet used them so I was keen to see what we could do with them. Amanda showed us how to reink ink pads and wheel cartridges. OK fine...that's what I knew you could use them for.


But then she showed us so many more things that I never knew you could do with them!


She showed us how to dye ribbon and the flowers from the Pretties kit in a matter of seconds! This was fantastic - I can now make ribbon and flowers in ANY of the Stampin' Up colours. How cool is that! No more worrying about not having a ribbon to match - simply make your own instead! She also showed us how to dye the Dazzling Diamonds glitter in any of the SU colours as well. My next order is going to definately include a box of reinkers, lots of glitter and white ribbon to start building up my collection of other SU colours!


She then showed us how to do the baby wipe technique. This is simply folding an alcohol free baby wipe and adding a few drops of 3 different coloured reinkers to make a multi-coloured ink pad (a bit like the Kaleidoscope ones). We made this cute little triangular box using this technique. Look closely and you can see all the different colours on the dots.



Amanda also showed us how to make a shaving foam and reinker background - very messy but fun! And then a very odd technique I've never heard of before using reinkers, glitter and floor polish on a sheet of acetate with tissue paper. It looked really effective and I wish I had taken my camera to take a picture!


After this I learnt yet another new technique - smooching! Not the kissing kind mind you! Basically using a plastic wallet cut open you wipe 2 contrasting shades of the same colour on the plastic wallet, one on each side. We used 2 greens and 2 blues to create a grass/sky or sea/sky background. You squish (very technical term here) the plastic wallet together creating lots of air bubbles and create a wonderful background. So as not to waste all the ink we put 2 pieces of card in back to back. For the first card I used the Something Fishy wheel using Night of Navy ink and cardstock and Taken with Teal ink and cardstock. I also added some Night of Navy ribbon over the top.


This next one uses the new Choo Choo set and coordinating Track wheel, both in the new Mini out next week. I still need to mount this one but haven't had time yet.




Later on in the afternoon we played a game called Bunco. We had all been dying to know what the tins of dice were for and it was all revealed.






And just as we were getting ready to leave Amanda gave us all our homework assignment! Homework from team meeting?!! She has set all of us who attended a challenge. We had this bag of cardstock and the new So Saffron striped ribbon on our tables all day and never got to use them! We were all wondering if Amanda had forgotten something but she hadn't! We are to make a card using the contents in the bag (a large piece of Certainly Celery, a square of So Saffron, some Whisper White and Very Vanilla). We are allowed to add one more colour of cardstock if we wish, can use any punches and stamp sets and inks, but we can't add any more accessories - that means no glitter, no brads, no eyelets, no flowers, no more ribbon etc etc. I'm going to do mine on Saturday but have to have it emailed to Amanda by Sunday. She is going to get Paula from SU to judge and the winner gets a lovely prize - one of the Level 1 hostess sets, Hung Up on the Holidays or £15 worth of goodies from the catalogue! Definately worth doing THIS homework!!



I finally got home about 8pm (I left at 6:30 in the morning), so it was a long day but I thoroughly enjoyed it and can't wait for the next one in June.


A big thank you to Amanda for organising such a fantastic day! I learnt so much in such a short space of time!

A Passion For Papertrey Challenge #2

This challenge calls for a single layer card. I can't do these at all and usually find them really difficult as I want to add more! However I saw a fantastic video on You Tube showing how to leave a blank space in the middle of a piece of card when embossing with a cuttlebug folder and nestabilities. I tried and tried following the instructions but it just didn't work. My chipboard was too thick to go through my cuttlebug so I tried layering lots of pieces of card but it still didn't work so I gave up :(


And on a side note, my car is still in the garage a month after some stupid idiot rammed into it whilst it was parked and has given me a £2500 bill. He (I'm presuming it was a he!) hit my wheel, shunted it back, broke the suspension, drive shaft and buckled my wing so I need a ton of work done on it and am now driving a horrible Nissan Micra that sounds like a tank. I need my 206cc back!!


What's all this got to do with this challenge I hear you ask? Well....using this video for inspiration helped me create a single-layer card that I love!!







I embossed the centre of the card with an oval nestability and then cut the same size oval out and used it as a mask so I would be left with a blank space in the middle! I stamped the smallest dots from Polka Dot Basics in Real Red using the mask to cover the embossed area and leave it blank. I then stamped my Little Lady and greeting (love the fact that you can bend the clear PTI stamps to make them curved) in the clear oval. Added a bit of contrasting ribbon and voila a single-layer card that is so pretty even if I do say so myself!


Recipe


Stamps: Polka Dot Basics and Little Lady from Papertrey Ink


Paper: white cardstock from Papertrey Ink (thanks Kate for this, I'm definately going to order some next time I order from PTI, it's lush!)


Ink: Real Red from Stampin' Up, Versafine Onyx Black


Accessories: Oval nestabilities, Red dotty Ribbon from Handy Hippo

All Swapped Out!!

I absolutely love doing card swaps and challenges and managed to get myself involved in 5 - yes count them 5 - swaps all happening at the same time.


Swaps 1 & 2


The first one was a Papertrey Ink swap over on SCS. I love this range of stamps, cardstock and ribbon and is a wonderful addition to my current SU selection. I had 2 spots on this swap - might as well make the postage worth it! I chose to do the card on this post for one slot and then had to wait a while for my new stamps to come from PTI before deciding on what to do for the other one. I very rarely make mens cards so went for a masculine theme for my other spot.



This one uses the new New Leaf cardstock and ink and the Wise Owl set which has so many sentiments and images that can be combined for so many different occasions.


Recipe


Stamps: Wise Owl from Papertrey Ink


Paper: New Leaf cardstock from PTI, Creamy Caramel from Stampin' Up, non SU white cs, DP from Dovecraft's Masculine Paper Pack


Ink: Chocolate Chip, Creamy Caramel marker and Really Rust marker all from Stampin' Up, New Leaf from PTI


Accessories: Spellbinder's Ribbon Tag Trio Dies, Linen Thread from SU, Grass baubles from Stamping Bella, Cuttlebug Distressed Stripes Embossing Folder


Swap 3
My next swap was for a Stampin' Up only swap for demos over on the ILWS forum. I have been dying to use the Seeing Spots and Spot On wheel together for ages and haven't gotten round to it before. I also wanted to make a bright card to bring on the summer sun so chose this gorgeous colour combo.




This card is an unusual size (4 1/8 x 7 inches) simply because I haven't got a wheel cartridge in Tempting Turquoise so used my ink pad to ink the Spot On wheel up and this was as far as the ink would stamp before it ran out. I do like the size though!


Recipe
Stamps: Seeing Spots and Spot On wheel from Stampin' Up


Paper: Tempting Turquoise, So Saffron, Rose Red and Whisper White all from Stampin' Up


Ink: Tempting Turquoise, So Saffron, Rose Red all from Stampin' Up, white gel pen


Accessories: Tempting Turquoise 1/4" grosgrain ribbon, scallop edge punch, scallop circle punch and 1 3/8" circle punch all from Stampin' Up




Swap 4
My fourth swap was another Stampin' Up demo only swap using the new stamps in the mini catalogue which becomes available to customers on April 1st so a little sneak-a-peek here! Again I was in a bright colour mode and love this colour combo. I really like yellow, all shades, at the minute and that's very unlike me. I hardly use yellow other than for blonde hair. I have 1 lemon t-shirt that I have no idea how it ended up in my wardrobe and I very rarely wear it, but I think I'm craving some sun after the miserable winter we had.




The flowers are popped up on foam pads and also stamped on the Pink Passion using the same ink to make a quick background.


Recipe


Stamps: Petal Pizzazz and sentiment from Fresh Cuts by Stampin' Up


Paper: Green Galore, Yoyo Yellow, Pink Passion and Whisper White all from Stampin' Up


Ink: Green Galore, Yoyo Yellow and Pink Passion all from Stampin' Up


Accessories: none for a change, usually I have to have a little bit of ribbon but I didn't think this needed any.




Swap 5


My last swap was for my upline meeting on Saturday 21st March. It's the first one I've ever been to as I couldn't make the December meeting. I'm really excited about going even though it's a 2 1/2 - 3 hour drive there and back! Amanda, my lovely upline, has organised for us to all do a swap and rather than make a card, I chose to make a cute little gift box. It uses the instructions from SCS here and was so simple to make. Tying the bows was probably the most time consuming part of making these boxes. I hate trying to get the bows even.




The butterfly was inked up using Pretty in Pink and then using the Rose Red marker I added some ink just to the tips of each wing and coloured the body and antennae. I think that added bit of colour really makes the butterfly pop! I just hope everyone likes them as much as I do...


Recipe


Stamps: Garden Whimsy and Whimsy wheel


Paper: Mellow Moss, Pretty in Pink, Rose Red and Very Vanilla all from Stampin' Up


Ink: Pretty in Pink, Rose Red marker and ink all from Stampin' Up


Accessories: Pretty in Pink taffeta ribbon, scallop edge punch




Hope you like my swaps as much I as enjoyed making them!

Bye Bye Sale-A-Bration, Hello Chipboard!

I'm sad to say the first ever UK Sale-A-Bration ended on February 28th. However something new and exciting has arrived for March instead.


GET ON BOARD WITH CHIPBOARD!!


During the month of March, you will get 25 percent off our On Board chipboard assortments.

Stampin' Up!’s On Board chipboard is designed to coordinate with many of our stamps and accessories, and is perfect for adding depth and colour to cards, scrapbook pages, or any other project you can think of.

On Board chipboard assortments:


*Quantities for retired items are limited to stock on hand and are available only while supplies last.
There is no minimum purchase and postage and packing starts at just £3.95 per order.
So do you wanna order some chipboard? Email me today with your order at saffivort@yahoo.com

SUO Cards

I've been on a real Stampin' Up kick recently. I love how the cardstock matches the ink and the ribbon and the brads and the designer papers. I love how the designer papers match some of the stamp sets and die cuts and chipboard and rub ons too. The quality of Stampin' Up products really is worth the investment. OK they're not the cheapest, but in my opinion they are the best. I've tried a huge range of different cardstock companies from various stores and only occasionally does another company compare! Most other cardstock is too thin and doesn't really match anything else!


Anyway...here's some SUO (Stampin' Up Only) cards I've been making recently.


A spring coloured Z-fold card using one of my favourite colour combinations. The matching punch for the three flowers stamp saves so much time cutting out.


Recipe


Stamps: One of a Kind


Cardstock: Certainly Celery, Pretty in Pink, Barely Banana, Whisper White


Ink: Certainly Celery, Pretty in Pink, Barely Banana


Accessories: Certainly Celery grosgrain ribbon, Pretty in Pink taffeta ribbon, Boho flowers punch



For this one I went for a colour I don't use too often - Blush Blossom. It makes a really soft base that makes the rest of the colours really pop! Stampin' Up has a ton of wheel stamps that create fantastic background patterns when designer papers just won't do. You can use these in all the ink colours by running the wheel over an ink pad several times. To get an even background all across the card I used the Stampin' Around Guide which is a clear ruler that lines up the wheel with the previously printed pattern perfectly.


Recipe


Stamps: Garden Whimsy and Whimsy jumbo wheel


Cardstock: Blush Blossom, Pixie Pink and Certainly Celery


Ink: Blush Blossom, Pixie Pink and Certainly Celery


Accessories: Certainly Celery grosgrain ribbon, Dazzling Diamonds



This is probably my favourite card out of this small collection. Again I used a background wheel which matched the stamp set and it just made the whole card come together so perfectly. And yes before you ask the main image and sentiment are meant to be offset to one side - it just shows the background stamp a little bit more.


Recipe


Stamps: A Beautiful Thing and It's Beautiful jumbo wheel, Happy Everything


Cardstock: Elegant Eggplant, Pale Plum and Very Vanilla


Ink: Elegant Eggplant, Pale Plum


Accessories: Elegant Eggplant grosgrain ribbon



The next two cards use the same stamp set, but with different colour combinations to show the versatility of this stamp set. Obviously this applies to all of Stampin' Up sets, but I do tend to use my favourite colours with certain sets. This Designer Paper set has been designed to coordinate with this stamp set and lots of the images are the actual stamps themselves - how cool is that?! The flowers are one of the stamps that I cut out - they should have a ring of dots round each one but I liked the actual flower by itself.


Recipe


Stamps: True Friend


Cardstock: Spiced Cider Designer Papers, Close To Cocoa, Really Rust and Sahara Sand (these colours are in the DP pack too - the SU catalogue tells you which colours match as well)


Ink: Close To Cocoa, Really Rust


Accessories: Old Olive grosgrain ribbon (this is another colour in the Spiced Cider pack, but I ddn't use it for this colour combo)





This is the second card using the same stamp set and I attempted another unused colour combo here. This time instead of using the wheel stamp as a background I used one of the stamps from the set repeatedly on the background using the same ink colour as the cardstock. The matching wheel was used to create the border pattern on the middle panel.


Recipe


Stamps: True Friend and Boho Friend wheel


Cardstock: Gable Green, Orchid Opulence, Cameo Coral and Whisper White


Ink: Gable Green, Orchid Opulence and Cameo Coral


Accessories: Circle Ice brad



I wanted to make a man's card as I always go for girly cards in girly colours and thought I'd push myself to try something new. The ribbon is also the new Striped Grosgrain ribbon that SU are bringing out soon (I was lucky enough to have an American friend get me some last year when it was released in the US). I added some paper piercing to the blue panel and it really made it stand out - just shows how something small can make a difference to a simple card.


Recipe


Stamps: Cheers To You


Cardstock: Bashful Blue, Chocolate Chip and Chocolate Chip Designer Papers


Ink: Chocolate Chip


Accessories: Bashful Blue brads, Bashful Blue Striped Grosgrain ribbon, Silver Hodgepodge Hardware, Paper Piercing template from the Mat pack

Scene It Sunday #180 Featuring Fore You from Di's Digi Stamps

Good morning and welcome to this week's Scene It Sunday. This week I have used this cute golfing mice image from Di's Digi Stamps, ...