In The Christmas Spirit

Enjoying and savoring the moment I'm in has been instrumental in increasing my delight in life.  It also has caused my perception of time's passing to slow.  You'll probably never hear me say, "I can't believe it's December already" or a version of that.  This enjoying of the moment has not come easily to me - I've prayed my way to it for years - nor does it stay without a daily renewing of my mind.  But the joy is worth it!

All that to say, I'm ready to celebrate Christmas.  Yes, I've been making Christmas projects for over a month but that was out of necessity.  Whipping out 60 cards in a day or two isn't happening in my world!  But it's a week before Christmas, which is my signal to wrap gifts and that's what "kicks off" the holidays for me.  I'm all-in now!  Cue the carols!  This Friday, Caitlin and I start our annual 1000-piece Christmas puzzle and I'm really excited about it.  What "kicks off" Christmas for you?  Leave me a comment because I'd love to know.

  

Now that I'm in the Christmas spirit, I thought I'd make a birthday card!  That made no sense at all, except for the fact that each year, I gift my Grandma a stack of birthday cards with a roll of stamps.  She loves mailing out my cards and I love creating them for her.  I used this week's Splitcoaststampers Sketch to make today's project.

Two versatile, go-to sets on my stamp shelf are Birthday Backgrounds and Perennial Birthdays.  Birthday Backgrounds is perfect for creating backgrounds, adding a little something to balance out a card, or to draw the eye to the focal point (as I did in the card above).

Perennial Birthdays has birthday sentiments in my favorite font.  They're also the perfect size - not too big, not too little.  I used the Balloon Bouquet punch with Bird Ballad Designer Series Paper (the stripes are so fun!) to create a celebratory trio.  The strings are handdrawn with a journaling pen.  I love the shape of the Stitched Nested Labels dies - it's so different from the usual circle/square/rectangle.

You can find the supplies for this card in my online store:

Birthday Backgrounds

Perennial Birthdays

Balloon Bouquet Punch

Stitched Nested Labels dies

Bird Ballad Designer Series Paper

Journaling Pen

Also check out the Clearance Rack while you're at my online store.  It is filled to the brim with bargains!

I'm so excited about the January - June 2020 Mini Catalog that I'm devoting an entire day to showing off the stunning projects you can make with its new products!  January 3 is the day it goes live, along with the 2020 Sale-A-Bration catalog.  Follow my Facebook page and set your notifications to alert you when I go live so you don't miss it!

What is Sale-A-Bration? It's a special brochure with tons of fun product that you can earn for free.  Level 1 items are earned with every $50 order and Level 2 items are earned for every $100 order.  There are no limits to what you earn.  

• Order $50-->earn one Level 1 item
• Order $100-->earn two Level 1 items OR one Level 1 item
• Order $150-->earn three Level 1 items OR one Level 1 item plus one Level 2 item PLUS Stampin' Rewards (free product of your choosing)!
• And it just keeps going!

Need your own copy to follow along with during my Catalog Launch Party on January 3?  Request a catalog package here or email me at nicole @thejoyfulstamper.com with your mailing address.

Thank you for choosing me as your demonstrator and giving me the opportunity to earn your business!

Inspiration From A Store-Bought Card

Did you ever see something and think, "I have to make that into a card!"?  Was it a color combination you spied, or a home decor piece, or a magazine layout?  

Sometimes I get ideas from the graphics at church!  A peek into my sermon journal would show occasional sketches in the margins of those screen graphics that catch my eye. 



Recently my family received a thank you card from my cousin's daughter and I immediately thought, "I have to make this into a card!"  

The colors appealed to me as did the simple prettiness of the one-layer notecard.  I used Perennial Birthday to create my CASE.

The images in that set are SO fun to play with!  They are pretty, fresh, and light-hearted.  I love the font of that "Happy Birthday" on my card.

To apply Dazzling Diamonds glitter to the flowers, I applied a small dot of Tombow Liquid Glue and used my finger to lightly spread it around.  Then I shook the glitter over the flower and let the card sit to dry.  I applied glitter to all the flowers.  Look at them sparkle!

My sentiment sits on an extra layer of Whisper White cardstock because I needed to cut it in half to make it fit the space.  You could cut the stamp itself in half to give yourself more flexibility in using it.  I have done that with other sets.  

To add color to the flowers and leaves, I used sponge daubers to apply color.  It gives such a beautiful, soft look and it's so easy to do!  Just put the sponge dauber on your finger, pick up some ink with it from your ink pad, then gently rub in a circular motion on your cardstock.  So pretty!!

These are the colors I used to create my CASE.  Make sure to click on it to Pin It so you can be inspired next time you make a project!  Matching Stampin' Up! colors to what I want to CASE is easy thanks to all the choices they give us.  I also love that their products coordinate - creating is fun and I know what I make will look nice.  I have other color combinations I'd like to try, so come back to see what those will be!

I'd love for you to subscribe to my weekly email newsletter!  You'll always know about upcoming Stampin' Up! promotions (like the Clearance Rack update that happened yesterday), read tips that make your creating session more productive, and more.  I have a free Class To Go pdf for you as a thank you when you subscribe.  Just click below! 

Using Up DSP Scraps To Make Birthday Cards

Stampin' Up!'s DSP packs are beautiful and fun and a joy to use.  I happily cut into the sheets and create cards, scrapbook pages, and 3D projects.  Then I look at the small mountain of various scraps leftover and they are just too gorgeous to throw away, but what to do with them?  Do you have this problem, too?  These two birthday cards show a way to creatively use them.

Both birthday cards use scraps from the Bird Ballad DSP pack.  In the first card, I used them to create a cake, complete with candles on the top.  The candles from the Birthday Backgrounds set got their dual colors from using markers to color directly on the stamp.  The stamp is actually longer but I wanted just three candles for my cake topper.  

The second card uses scraps to make a present, complete with whisper white baker's twine and a hand-cut tagged stamped with a flower from the Perennial Birthday set.  The large sentiment on both cards is also from that set.  Isn't the font FUN?

The DSP scraps idea and card layouts come from my amazing upline's Cheat Sheets Collections (a great design resource for cardmakers that offers layouts, instructions, and measurements).  

Think of all the fun combinations you could create with your DSP scraps!  I know you have them, so don't let them languish and go to waste.

You Can Make It:

• Stamps: Perennial Birthday, Birthday Backgrounds
• Cardstock: Bermuda Bay, Pool Party, Whisper White
• Bird Ballad DSP
• Ink: Pool Party
• Bermuda Bay marker
• Calypso Coral marker
• Solid White Baker's Twine

Don't forget to order my Bird Ballad Class To Go by June 18!

Use Host Code VTFXMJVH

Details found here.

Fun with Retiring Stampin' Up! In Colors

The color combination of Tranquil Tide, Powder Pink, and Berry Burst is so bright and fun, in an understated way.

My monthly Stamp Group meets this Wednesday and this is one of the three cards we'll be creating.  The group always loves making birthday cards and this color trio will be a hit, I know!  

I used the Perennial Birthdays stamp set.  This set has a great variety of birthday greetings for both the outsides and insides of cards and the images are just plain FUN.

There is a bit of fussy cutting with the main image.  I wanted it to stand out.

Tips and Tricks:

• Use markers to color right on your stamp's rubber image, like I did for the flower that is the main image.  Gently "huff" on the stamp to rewet the ink just before pressing the stamp to your paper.
• Immediately after stamping your image, use your blender pen to pull that ink throughout the image to color it.  This creates a soft look that I adore!
• Don't have certain ink colors?  No problem!  Use a Versamark ink pad to stamp on your cardstock to create a subtle background, like I did on the Powder Pink and Tranquil Tide pieces.

You Can Make This!

• Perennial Birthday stamp set
• Versamark Ink Pad
• Berry Burst marker and cardstock
• Tranquil Tide marker and cardstock
• Powder Pink cardstock
• Whisper White cardstock
• Stitched Shapes Dies
• Blender Pen
• rhinestones