It’s RemARKably…Succulent!

Posted on February 19, 2017 by mauistamper

Welcome to the February 2017 RemARKable Blog tour. Our primary focus this month is succulents – and it seems everyone is just a little succulent-crazy these days! What’s not to like about these diversely shaped, easy to grow, low-water-use beauties? Especially when they’re made out of paper – talk about easy care!!

I used the Oh So Succulent bundle to create a generous little heap of die cuts in a variety of greens and began to layer them. I used the Woodgrain TIEF to suggest a log and to give them a neutral base without overwhelming them.

The fun for me was not just in the placement of the die cuts, but in adding the textures from different stamps, the gold thread, and ultimately, diamond jewels. Imagine them as drops of water on the canvas and you’ll see what I saw!

When I finished the traditional card, I had some leftovers and realized how easily the same layout would adapt to a 3×3 note card. It would certainly work with a larger square format, but I’m quite fond of this size.

Enjoy the rest of the tour! Click HERE to move forward to Audra Monk – the full tour is below.

Anne Matasci – you are HERE!!

Punching out the Angry Birds

Posted on August 15, 2015 by mauistamper

Recently, one of my regular stampers requested projects for kids. I looked at what I had on my shelf and found stamps suitable for feminine or baby cards, but not really for KIDS.

Off to Pinterest, the Black Hole of the Internet!

I found some great ideas and they weren’t even in mason jars!! Score.

This was inspired by THIS great card, and I CASED it pretty liberally. The Red Bird is punched from the 1 3/4″ circle, and the Yellow Bird is the old style Heart Punch. I think you could get that shape using a square and a corner rounder.

The white body portions are 1 3/4″ circles punched twice. The orange beak is the Itty Bitty Heart (trimmed) and the head and tail feathers are from the retired Boho punch. I think you could get the same look from the Flower Fair framelits.

The eyebrows are the end of the stem from the bird punch. The birds aren’t angry until you add those eyebrows, so work them!! The eyes are from the Owl punch, and I used the 1″ square for the yellow beak.

The Word Window and the Woodgrain TIEF make up the slingshot, and the linen thread finishes it off. I trimmed a strip of Garden Green with Fringe Scissors, and the embellishment at the top is from Amazing Birthday. We had to stamp SOMETHING!

These are last year’s bags – the current bags are plain, so you could even add some clouds as Sarah-Jane Rae did to her card.

Everyone loved the end result – but we agreed that these birds take a lot of little pieces!

It’s RemARKably hard to say GOODBYE

Posted on May 14, 2015 by mauistamper

Welcome to the May 2015 RemARKable Blog tour, where we explore all things GOODBYE. I’ve chosen to focus on the Stampin’ Up! 2014-2015 catalog retiring list, and I’ve based my projects around one of my favorite all-around stamp sets, For the Birds:

This is a (sort of) Clean and Simple card. There’s just one image, and there are no sentiments, but there are multiple layers. It’s a very quick card to assemble and employs one of my favorite card-making tricks: have plenty of cards on hand with NO SENTIMENT.

I could add Miss You, Sorry, Love You, Thinking of You, even Happy Birthday – or Happy New Baby in a real pinch! (It’s a nest – get it?)

If you’re lucky enough to have Blendbilities, For the Birds is a great choice because of the detail and variety, but today I chose to use colored pencils. If you’ve ever had a kid in grade school, you more than likely have colored pencils in your house. Even if there are no kids, colored pencils are inexpensive and working with them is easy and generally trouble free.

With this much magnification, you can see the shading, but the general effect is much more subtle. If you see a few fuzzy bits in that top left corner, your birdie-eye has spotted bits of the white jute ribbon cut apart and tucked behind the image.

For the Birds Clear #126407 $24.95 Wood #132001 $32.95

I must confess that when I spotted this DSP from the Back to Black (retiring) collection I did a little happy dance around my studio. FEATHERS. Need I say more?

Look closely and you’ll realize that I am no rock-star-pencil-colorist. But I do find it relaxing and enjoyable to play with shading and color, and this stamp set is a great all-around addition to your stamping birdhouse!

Enjoy the tour – I love the unique manner with which everyone interprets the theme – and I’ll see you here next month. Head over to see what Heather Mathiesen has created!

I would gladly pay you Tuesday…

Posted on April 26, 2013 by mauistamper

For a hamburger today!

ALMOST looks good enough to eat, eh?

You can do this with just a few punches and some paper. I’m generally not a big fan of punch art but this was too perfect for a Dad card. Here you go:

Birthday or Father’s Day, either way this card is a winner! We’re making this one at the Manly Cards class on May 5. There are still a few spots – let me know if you would like to join us.

And I am very sorry to report that not only is the First Editions dsp retiring, but it is sold out. We can only cross our fingers and hope that Stampin’ Up! Has something better in store in the new catalog. 😉

The Maui Stamper

papercrafts, my stories, and the occasional insight

Tag Archives: Woodgrain TIEF

It’s RemARKably…Succulent!

Punching out the Angry Birds

It’s RemARKably hard to say GOODBYE

I would gladly pay you Tuesday…

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