RobinsCraftRoom.com

This Diva Loves Blueberries!

Aloha, all!

     This has been a week of using papers and stamp sets that I've not dragged out of their dusty little homes for quite awhile!  For today's project, I've dusted off some Blueberry Crisp Designer Series Paper and used it for this week's Divas Coffee Break Design Team challenge.  This week's challenge was a sketch challenge, and it was one that was right up my alley.  I just love using strips or blocks of Designer Series Papers to make card fronts!  Stampin' Up! does such a good job of coordinating colors in its paper sets and showing them off in one place is so much fun!

     For this card, I used 4 of the designs in the Blueberry Crisp Designer Series Paper set.  But, as with most Stampin' Up! Designer Paper collections, there are 12 designs in this set.  There are six sheets of paper with designs on both sides.  And the paper set comes with two of each sheet.  So there's plenty of paper to go around when you're making cards or scrapbook pages.  The two main colors featured in the papers that I used in today's project are Not Quite Navy and Pacific Point.  The accent colors are Very Vanilla and Sahara Sand.  Sahara Sand is the main color on a few of the sheets in this paper set, accented with the blues, and they're very soft and muted sheets.  Nice for backgrounds and central elements as well.

     The Circle Element is made by punching the stamped image from the Artistic Etchings Stamp Set with the 1-3/4" Circle Punch.  I stamped the image using the Rock and Roll Stamping Technique.  For this image, I first inked the image with Pacific Point and then "rolled" the edges in Not Quit Navy.  BUT before I rolled the image in the Navy, I stamped it once on a scrap piece of paper to lighten it up a bit.  Nice touch to go with the colors in the papers!

     The Greeting is stamped using one of the stamps from this year's Sale-A-Bration FREE Sets, So Happy For You!  I stamped it in VersaMark and then embossed it using White Embossing Powder.  The White Embossing Powder has a bit of a Vanilla Tint, so it goes perfectly with this color combination.

     And finally I tied the project together with a strip of Victoria Crochet Ribbon and topped it off with one of the gorgeous Vanilla Ribbon Rosettes found in the Stampin' Up! 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog.  Wow, three catalogs in one card!

     I hope you have some time to do something creative today, maybe even make a card for the Divas and enter it in their challenge!  And have fun with it!

     Oh, and here's the sketch for today's card!  I've got to get started on next year's eBook!

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Gotta Get Those Valentines in the Mail!

Aloha, all!

     Not much time left for me to get my valentine cards in the mail!  In fact, to be assured that mine get to the east coast by Valentine's Day, I'll have to mail them today!

     So today's card, a challenge by the Diva Coffee Break Design Team (of which I am one!), will be my last Valentine to be mailed out! 

     And is this one ever different from anything that I've shared with you in recent memory.  The images are made up entirely from Rub-Ons!  Yes, here sits a Stampin' Up! demonstrator who absolutely despises rub-ons.  Yes, I bought some when Stampin' Up! first came out with them.  But I had such a hard time with them that I decided that I could do without, thank you very much.   Now two recent events have brought change to that attitude.

     First, Stampin' Up! must have known that there are those of us who hesitate to buy and use rub-ons.  So they sent each and every demonstrator who placed on order in January a FREE sheet of the Love Impressions Rub-Ons from the 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog.  Um, let's see, that would have been back on January 4th when I placed my first Occasions Mini Catalog order.  And the pack of rub-ons has been sitting there on my craft table, being moved from one place to the next, ever since.

     Then on my online Stampin' Up! group, SUDSOL, a fellow demonstrator said that her secret was heating up her paper before she applied the rub-on.  OK, so I was game.  But I kept moving that sheet of rub-ons around to keep it out of the way, but still in sight. 

     Until today, when I saw that the color challenge from the Divas included the colors that are in this very set of rub-ons, and the game was "on."  Wow!  Was that easy!  I just got out my heat tool (the one I used for embossing), warmed up my paper just before applying the rub-on, and there was magic!  Woo-hoo!!  This card was not perfect by all means as I had not practiced on a scrap at all.  But I think it's quite good enough to show off both here and at the Diva Website.

     Just having the rub-ons, even with a few layers to make the card more interesting, didn't seem enough for me.  First I added some bling in the form of Stampin' Up! Basic Rhinestones, and then I added a bow, tied together with a Clear Rhinestone Brad.  Those are some other Stampin' Up! goodies you haven't seen me use in awhile, either!  So this is a Red Letter Day (and Pink Pirouette and Basic Gray Day, too) in Robin's Craft Room.

     If you haven't used the rub-ons, give them a try.  The little set in the Occasions Mini Catalog is probably too much in the way of a Valentine Design for ordering now.  But there are other rub-ons featured in the Stampin' Up! 2010-2011 Idea Book and Catalog on page 184 – I just may have to buy some of those Play Date Rub-ons for myself on my next order!

     Whether you use rub-ons or just stamp away, have fun with some paper crafting this week!

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A Pretty Sketch from the Divas!

Aloha, all!

     What a fun sketch the Diva Coffee Break Design Team has for you today!  I wasn't at all sidetracked by the four-petal "flowers" in this week's sketch.  It's February, and everything for me right now is Valentine's Day related (well, there's a birthday or two, and I'll be sharing those with you, too – but later).  So those "flowers" turned into hearts in my mind, and on my card share for today!

     Today I thought I'd share the actual sketch with you so that you can see how I interpreted it for my own card. 

The sketch:

     And my take on the sketch:

     What's fun about a sketch is that it's meant to inspire you, not something that you copy element for element.  You can still see that this has the same layout ideas as the sketch, but it's definitely not an exact copy. 

     The Designer Paper that I used on the top part of the card is one of the sheets from the Ice Cream Parlor Paper and Quick Accents pack in the 2011 Sale-A-Bration Catalog.  That means that you can get this paper and die cut set FOR FREE! with just a $50 purchase of Stampin' Up! products – from any current catalog, including the Occasions Mini and the Decor Elements catalog.  Nice!  And that's how I got this set, too.

     The Melon Mambo sheet has one edge with a scallop border print, and that punches up perfectly with Stampin' Up!'s Scallop Edge Border Punch.  To firm up that thin element across the middle of the sketch, I added a strip of Old Olive Card stock – also punched with the Scallop Edge Border Punch.  Then I placed the greeting (from the Stamp Set Teeny Tiny Wishes) in the lower right corner of the card and added two Old Olive brads to it which somewhat approximates the challenge for three brads down there.

     The hearts were fun to make!  I punched all three hearts with the Stampin' Up! Exclusive Sizzix Scalloped Heart of Hearts Embosslit, and then matted the middle heart with the Heart Element from the Punch Windows Set that goes with the Movers and Shapers Sizzix Die.  The lighter color throughout this card is Pretty in Pink.

     Fun card to make!  Why don't you head on over to the Diva Coffee Break Design Team Challenge page and upload one of your own cards using this sketch.  I just know you'll have fun with it!

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An Elegant Valentine Card

Aloha, all!

     It certainly is in the eye of the beholder whether a card is elegant – or not.  I felt that this card had a touch of elegance that is not typical in the kind of greeting card that I usually make.  Most of that feeling as far as I am concerned comes from the elegant products that Stampin' Up! has available for all of us as we get ready for Valentine's Day 2011.  And, of course, the design provided by the Diva Coffee Break Design Team added to the sense of elegance!

     Two of the products that I used in this card are new products in the Stampin' Up! 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog.  The first and most visible because of its sparkle is the brand new Red Glimmer Paper.  This paper comes in a pack of two 12" square sheets, and is a breeze to use with Stampin' Up!'s punches and Sizzix Dies.  The scallop trim border punch went right through this paper beautifully, as did the Sizzix Ovals Die, which I purchased from Stampin' Up!

     The main color in this card is Pink Pirouette, in the form of one of the embossed sheets in the new Love Impressions Specialty Designer Paper set.  This paper is card stock weight, and is filled with teeny embossed polka dots.  There is also a large motif of embossed hearts, and that is a part of the sheet that I also cut with the Sizzix Ovals Die.  I think it's so lovely with the embossed white hearts against the Pink Pirouette background!

     I'd also like to highlight the stamp on this card, which is from the stamp set, Filled with Love, that was featured in the 2010 Holiday Mini Catalog.  And, yes, it's still available!  But it's only availalble as part of the Filled With Love Bundle, which is only available until next Monday, January 24th!  There is more information about this bundle here.  This bundle includes papers and buttons as well as this fun Valentine Stamp set.  So don't delay purchasing it if you've been thinking about it!

     The final touches are the bow based on a tutorial by fellow Stampin' Up! demonstrator, Mary Brown, on which I still need lots of practice!  It's held together and down onto the card with a Real Red Glimmer Brad.  The Glimmer Brads were also featured in the 2010 Holiday Mini Catalog, but they, too, are still available as part of the 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog.  The only expiration of which I'm aware at this point is the expiration date for the Occasions Mini, which is April 30, 2011.  I'm waiting to see if these become a part of the Stampin' Up! regular line up of products!

     Today's card is based on a sketch at the Diva Coffee Break Design Team blog.  But I'm providing the measurements for my card to help make it easier for you to copy if you'd like to be a part of this week's challenge.  Or even if you just want to make a card!  If you'd like a whole book full of all the sketch layouts I provided for you in 2010, it's now for sale as an eBook on CD.  Just click on the picture at the top of the column to the right for more information!

     And whether you decide to join us at the Diva Coffee Break sketch challenge, or decide just to make a card for yourself – have fun with it!

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The 1st Diva Color Challenge of 2011!

Aloha, all!

     As I write this on 1/11/11, it's 1/12/11 in much of the snow covered mainland.  When I first saw this Diva Coffee Break Design Team Color Challenge, my imagination went right to snow and snowflakes.  But I am so over snowy, wintery, designs that I had to banish that thought from my little creative brain.  Unfortunately, with the thought went the creativity.  So, as I usually do, I struggled with the color challenge. 

     This week the challenge colors are:  Night of Navy (can't you just see those white snowflakes against that dark blue sky?); Bashful Blue (ah, the hint of blue in the snow drifts); and Sahara Sand (now that sounds warm, but what I saw were the dead grasses of summer peeking up through the snow).  No, no, no!  No more snow!!!  But then – what?

     My first stop was at the Stampin' Up! 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog.  After all, it's new and I should be showing off some of the products that are in this fun little mini catalog.  But there was little Night of Navy to be seen, and not a trace of Bashful Blue or Sahara Sand.  But there were buttons!  And buttons come in all colors.  There was my solution!

     OK, so I got carried away.  There are even buttons on this card that you can't see, mostly because I was designing as I went along.  But all the required colors are there, and there are three 2011 Occasions Mini Catalog products right there for everyone to see.  To begin, there are the new 3-dimensional buttons made with the Sweet Buttons Embosslit (page 36 of the mini).  Then I stamped quite a few buttons from the Stamp Set, Button, Button.  I stamped both Bashful Blue and Sahara Sand Card Stock with several of the buttons that can be punched out cleanly with the 3/4" Circle Punch.

     Now where's that 3rd product from the mini?  It's the larger of the two circles – the new Stampin' Up! exclusive Sizzix 3" Circle Die.  The smaller circle is the 2-1/2" Punch.  Both of these are embedded into the top layer of the card using the Inlaid Embossing technique.  Special note:  I have a new one-page tutorial for the Inlaid Embossing technique.  BUT it's only available at this time to those who are on my eNewsletter mailing list!  If you'd like to have access to it, just sign up for my newsletter (there's a link over to the left) and I'll send a copy right out to you!  The project that I used to illustrate this tutorial is a fun Valentine card – well worth your time to try!

     As there's nothing at all complicated about this card, I'm not going to include a layout for it.  What would be fun for this kind of card is to punch your circles and then just slide them around your card until they're at a spot that appeals to you.  Then just glue them down and create from there!

     I hope you have fun with whatever you do today!

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More Paper Dolls for the Divas!

Aloha, all!

     A couple of weeks back, I told you how much I used to love playing with paper dolls when I was a little girl, and I shared a card made with some Build-A-Bear Workshop stamps.  So when I saw this color challenge from the Diva Coffee Break Design Team, my heart went back to that little girl bear from the Beary Best Friends Stamp Set.  So here she is again, with her neatly cut out dress, made from Designer Series Paper.  This time I even added the shoes!

     The Stampin' Up! 2010 Holiday Mini Catalog is just the best mini catalog of the year.  I know, I probably said that about the last couple of minis.  But really, when you can get Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and even some Valentine's Day products all in one catalog, how can it get any better?!

     Before I start describing what I did to make this cute little card (one of my granddaughters will certainly be the recipient of it!), I should tell you about the color challenge for this week's Diva Coffee Break Design Team.  Yup, them's definitely fall colors.  I just can't get away from it now that September is not only here but half-way done!

     For our little girl Build a Bear stamp from the stamp set, Beary Best Friends, I first decided to use Crumb Cake as her little bear skin color.  Not too bad, actually!  I think that's the color I'll use for the bears for awhile at least.  To bring in the other colors, I chose a basket of fruit that nicely used the other three colors in the challenge.  Of course, there was the rest of the card to create.  So I layered up with the Wasabi, Cajun, and Peach colors, and added a Taffeta Bow in the Pumpkin Pie color.  The taffeta ribbons are really very light renditions of their colors, and I think that the bow accents the Peach Parfait color quite nicely, thank you!

     I made the sign using the brand new Oval Medium Punch, also featured in the 2010 Holiday Mini Catalog.  To mat it, I traced the punched image and then trimmed just outside of the line that I traced.  The central stamped motif is all mounted on a piece of Peach Parfait card stock that I embossed using the Perfect Details Texturz Plate.  Perfect, I think!

     This is a really nice color challenge this week.  I hope you'll visit the Diva blog and add your own creation!  If you have any questions about how to do this, please just let me know, either by e-mail or by phone (808.854.6145).

     Have fun with it!

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Diva Fun With the Stampin’ Up! Summer Mini

Aloha, all!

     Oh, no!  Stampin' Up!'s 2010 Summer Mini Catalog is almost at its end!!!  The good news is that there are a lot of products that will continue to be around until at least next summer!  Tons of great stamp sets and embellishments that are in the 2010 Summer Mini are already in the new 2010-2011 Stampin' Up! Idea Book and Catalog.

     Today's featured stamp set WON'T be around, though!  I just love this set, and haven't used it nearly enough.  The set is called Bouquet Bunch and makes such a nice greeting card and is perfect for accents for small scrapbook page elements. 

     Now you may be interested in how I came to use this stamp set with this delicious set of colors!  Of course it's Wednesday, and that means it's time for a Diva Coffee Break Design Team challenge!  This week the challenge was a color challenge:

     I have to tell you that, when I saw this color grouping, I thought "Autumn."  Nope, I'm not doing Autumn yet!!  Too early for that, even though we're getting an evening chill in the air here on Hawaii's Big Island.  Nope, it's still summer, gosh durn it!!!  So where do I turn?  To the Stampin' Up 2010 Summer Mini Catalog, of course!  And that's how I chose this stamp set with which to work, and it was a blast to put together!

     Not everything in this card is from the Summer Mini, though.  A favorite product from this year's new 2010-2011 Stampin' Up! Idea Book and Catalog is the Patterns Designer Series Paper Stack.  With each paper stack you get an assortment of ALL the colors in a particular family in four different patterns on two 2-sided papers.  How cool is that?  All four of these colors are in the Brights Collection of colors, and I almost ended up making a card showing off just the Designer Series Papers.  But rubber and ink called out to me, so I relented.

     There are so many different elements to this card that I thought I'd just make a set of bullet points so you can check them out:

• I stamped the flower pots on Rich Razzleberry Textured Card Stock using Rich Razzleberry Ink, then cut them out for adhering to the Very Vanilla Card Stock.
• Before I adhered each flower pot, I tied some Linen Thread around each of them.
• I stamped three flower images on Very Vanilla Card Stock, then colored each in (Tangerine Tango, Daffodil Delight, and Old Olive) before cutting them out loosely around the end of the flowers.
• I added a Razzleberry center to each flower in the Daffodil and Tangerine bunches.  For the Olive bunch, I colored in the flowers in Old Olive, then used a blender pen to add a lighter color of the Old Olive for the background.
• I'm having a 3 x 3 brad fit this week!  In Monday's post , I added three brads in a vertical row in the upper left corner, and in a horizontal row in the lower right corner.  No explanation – I just felt like it.  Then today I added these new Basic Rhinestones in the same layout.  Hey, that's what creativity's all about, isn't it!  Artistic license gives us all the right to do stuff like this!  Then I added just a little touch of rhinestones in the center bouquet.
• And knots are in in Robin's Craft Room this week, too!  For this card, as well as for Monday's, I took a length of ribbon a bit larger than the width of the card and tied a knot in the middle.  Remember that this is a textile, and you can twist and turn it within an inch of its little life until it looks JUST like you want it to.  Perfect knots if I say so myself – that ribbon behaved itself quite nicely, thank you!  And then I just taped the ends of the ribbon behind the layers it covers before adhering the group to the greeting card base.
• The final touch with this card is the border punched with the Scallop Trim Border Punch.

     And here's the sketch for today's card:  This is a very versatile layout and I'll probably use it again before long!

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New Challenges – Hooray!

Aloha, all!

     Today I am officially a new member of the Diva Coffee Break Design Team!  I have been playing with their designs off and on for awhile, and was thrilled to be accepted as a new member of the official team!  Of course, this now means that you'll be seeing at least one design from each week's challenge here – and I hope that you'll go visit their website to see how all of the other Design Team Members worked the challenge.

     Why is this good for you?  Because you'll be reminded about how different we all are in the way that we approach the same project.  Once you see all the different tastes and techniques on display on a site such as Diva Coffee Break, you might just have that "ah ha!" moment where you realize that you, too, have a unique idea on how to create using the sketch or color combo on display.

     OK – what do you do then?  Well, you go create your own take on the challenge AND you pop your card up on the Internet somewhere and post a link to it using the link system at the end of each week's challenge post.  Don't have a public place to "park" your creation?  Oh, yes, you do!  It's on Split Coast Stampers!  Call me (808.854.6145) or e-mail me if you need help with this.  I'd LOVE to see YOUR creations posted on the Diva Coffee Break website!

     OK – now onto my very first official card for the group!

     Yes, this paper and this stamp set are still available to Stampin' Up! customers, because they're in the 2010 Summer Mini Catalog, and it's still Summer 2010!  If you love all things Hawaiian (as I definitely do), then you won't want to miss out on the opportunity to order this before the catalog expires at the end of August. 

     But enough of the commercial.  Let's get down to the design.  Here's the sketch provided to the design team members, so you can see that I pretty much followed it to the letter (well, that's what newbies in any venture are supposed to do, isn't it?)

     Oooh, that color combo (not the challenge, believe me!) made me wince.  So I had to squint a bit and try to see what in my stash of current Stampin' Up! stuff would work.  The first thing that I thought was that the small rectangle at the top should have the sentiment or greeting.  Easy that one because the Level 3 Hostess Set, Occasional Quotes, has several that would work.  That left all that other space for images of one kind or another.  Maybe some Designer Series Paper with a large print – ooooh, Island Oasis (now who would have thought that someone from Hawaii would have that pop into her head?)  Now we're getting somewhere!  There is that "party" quote in Occasional Quotes and there is a stamp set that coordinates with the paper that's called Tropical Party.  How coincidental is that?  And that diagonal?  Screams for ribbon – and I just happen to have a large stash of Pumpkin Pie 5/8" Satin Ribbon that would fit the bill perfectly.  And the design was done.

     Actually, the design was NOT done.  This is the FIRST card that I decided on.  Do you see my "problem"?  There was this very uninteresting spot towards the lower left corner of the quote element that just looked too, well, too much like a corner out in the middle of nowhere.  Yes, I had the picture all ready to post, and I just couldn't do it.  So back to the craft table (much more interesting than a drawing board) for the little flower that I popped onto that corner.  And, just for good measure, another flower in the lower right corner of the card.  Now THAT made a difference.

     Lessons from today:  Use a challenge to get your creative juices going.  And if you don't quite like the end result, well then it isn't the end result!  Spiff it up a bit!

     Challenge for today:  Make a card and link it to the Diva Coffee Break Design Team web page!  Don't forget to call/e-mail me if you need help with the technical stuff.

     Oh, and here are the exact measurements for the various layers on my card.  Have fun with it!!

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