Playful Polka Dots

Aloha, all!

     You're probably not going to believe this , but none of the projects in today's blog post have any stamping on them!  Not a word nor a flower.  With the exception of a piece of ribbon on each item, simply everything that you see in these first three photos is from a Simply Scrappin' Kit that's in the Stampin' Up! 2011 Summer Mini Catalog.  The kit is called Playful Polka Dots, and it certainly is lots of fun – which of course is what "playful" is all about!

     My project for you today is a set of four greeting cards and a box that's made to hold all of them and their envelopes.  And just look at those colors!  I was immediately taken with the color combination – certainly one that I would not have thought up myself.  There are Pumpkin Pie, Rose Red, Daffodil Delight and Old Olive.  The kit comes with two pieces of 12" square textured card stock of each of these colors.  Then there are 3 sheets each of two different Designer Series Papers – double sided, of course.  For this particular project, I just used one side of each piece of the Designer Series paper set.  Finally in this kit are three 12" square sheets of Self-Adhesive Die Cuts including borders, flowers, floral elements and lots and lots of labels.  For this card set I stuck mostly to the flowers, adding in some of the borders and a few of the floral elements such as leaves and stems.  With all of that, there is a TON of stuff left in this kit to make quite a few scrapbook pages and even more cards and boxes!

     I found the pattern for this box in the SUDSOL (Simply Unique Demonstrators Sharing On Line – a group for Stampin' Up! demonstrators) patterns library.  What a fun place that is to look around when you're looking for project ideas!  I was glad I did that because I've never made this box before – but I'll be making it again for sure.  If you're a Stampin' Up! Demonstrator, you can join SUDSOL free for two weeks – and check it all out for yourself!  I am just amazed what I've learned from this group and the inspiration that I get from all of the samples posted every day!  (If you're not a Demonstrator and you'd like some instructions for how to make this box and layouts for the cards, check back here during June when I'll have my own set of instructions and card layouts for you to use.)

     Now back to those cards.  The SUDSOL projects library also has ideas for cards to go with the box (click here for the layouts), but the papers are no longer current.  On the other hand, I really liked the layouts, so I tried to copy them as much as possible with the products in this Simply Scrappin' Kit.  You can do the very same thing with any of the projects in the SUDSOL library!  In fact, I'll be adding this set of cards to the library this week to help anyone on SUDSOL with ideas for using the layouts.

     HINT FOR WORKING WITH THE DIE CUTS!!!  Remove the adhesive!  This is so simple to do and it really helps when you are trying to figure out a layout and want to just skootch (that's a stamping technical term) a flower or a leaf just a tiny bit to get it just where you want it.  So how do I do it?  I keep a bowl of Corn Starch on my work table.  For multiple items such as with these flowers, I put out a piece of scrap paper and lay the die-cuts face down.  Then I sprinkle on the corn starch and rub it all over the backs.  Once each back is covered, I pick up the piece and wipe all the remaining corn starch off with a tissue until the back of the die-cut is totally smooth.  Not a whole lot of muss and not a whole lot of fuss.  And you can reapply adhesive such as Stampin' Up! SNAIL or Sticky Strip whenever you want to.  I've heard from others that they use the Stampin' Up! Embossing Buddy for this.  I've tried this and really like the Corn Starch better.

     As I explained earlier, for the first batch of everything, I used only some ribbon and what was in the Simply Scrappin' Kit.  But just to show you how well other Stampin' Up! Embellishments can look with this kit, for this photo op for my cards, I added buttons to the centers of several of the flowers.  Just a little bit of shine really starts to make these cards pop beyond what those fab colors do for them!  The only thing that I think I'll add from here are perhaps some greetings.  As it stands now, I'll be keeping this set of cards to show off to people who come to the craft room.  But some day I'll need a Get Well card or a Thinking of You card – and I can just pull out a greetings stamp set and add something right on the spur of the moment!

     You should try one of these kits!  If you like one that's in the Stampin' Up! Catalog this year, now's the time to buy one – because they're very likely to be retired at the end of June!  For sure, check back here on June 1st and I'll let you know which ones you might want to get right away! 

     As always, whatever you do, whether it's with paper and ink or a Simply Scrappin' Kit, have fun with it!