Thank you with a Cherry On Top and some chocolate too!

Today I thought I'd share another project that I made recently, using the gorgeous Cherry On Top Designer Series Paper Stack: a pretty thank you card plus a small, wrapped and decorated bar of very delicious, lime and chilli dark chocolate. Come and take a look:

Here is the card and the envelope: (You may recognise the hearts from another couple of recent posts... I got a bit carried away with the stamping and punching that day, so, waste-not-want-not, hey?)

Here is a photograph of the decorated chocolate bar alongside the card and envelope:

The card was so easy and quick to make - just a few strips of Cherry On Top DSP glued onto a notecard; a stamped thank you sentiment; a few of the stamped and punched hearts on dimensionals and then 'Bob's your Uncle', as they say! I must confess now though, that the two strips along the bottom of the card were to cover a little accidental, inky finger-print mistake... Oops! I stand by the motto of "It's not a mistake, it's an opportunity for embellishment!" and I think that actually it adds a little extra something to the card (and shows off more of the paper stack designs at the same time too, don't you think?).

I do love all of the designs in the Cherry On Top DSP, they are so bright, cute and cheery! Talking of cute, here is a close up of the bow on the decorated chocolate bar:

I think that the mini heart, polka-dot style, patterned paper is one of my favourite designs from the Cherry On Top DSP stack. It is just so pretty. The Bow Builder Punch is such a fantastic way of making really cute and quick bows for your paper-crafted projects - I am so glad that it has carried over to the new Annual Stampin' Up! Catalogue. I use mine a lot!

The paper I used to wrap the chocolate bar with is the brand new, fabby Envelope Paper (in Watermelon Wonder) - as you can see, this new paper is not just for envelopes! It is a lighter weight than the regular DSP, but is still strong. It has a slight sheen to it too - which you can just see on the top of the above photograph. I love that it co-ordinates so well with the Cherry On Top papers and the In Color inks.

Here are the weekly deals for this week (24th -30th June 2015): Click here to go to my shop to see them in more detail.

I can highly recommend the fast fuse adhesive as I use it a LOT! It made covering my recent decorated notebooks a total breeze. I have both the Six-sided Sampler and the Work Of Art stamp sets and find them so useful for so many different projects. I think the "splodges" from Work Of Art are SO useful and I love how the Six-Sided Sampler matches the Hexagon Punch so beautifully... I don't have the Choose Happiness set though, but have seen some stunning cards made with it, so I am rather tempted to buy it for myself. It has been on my wish list for a while now, actually, so I might just choose to get a little happiness in my craft stash at that bargain price! I am definitely going to get another Fast Fuse (or two!) as I have a habit of losing things in my stash quite often and it's one of my crafting essentials, so I don't want to risk not finding some when I need it! Ooer! Better to be safe than sorry, eh?! 

Well, that's it for today, hope you like today's project and the Weekly Deals? Don't forget that time is running out if you want to get yourself TWO FREE STAMP SETS by joining my team! You only have until 30th June to take up this fantastic offer!

Until next time, happy crafting everyone!

Lucy x

Birthday candle tag card using Stampin' Up!'s Build A Birthday Stamp set.

Today I have a bright and cheery birthday card for you which was inspired by an image of a gift tag I saw in the new Stampin' Up! Annual Catalogue (on page 11), featuring the "Build A Birthday" photopolymer stamp set. I think it would be great for a teenager or a male birthday, or anyone, really - I think it would suit ANY birthday actually, don't you? 

The card base and envelope are from a pack of Crumb Cake Notecards and Envelopes. I dry embossed the front of the card with the Lucky Stars textured embossing folder. The colours I have used are Watermelon Wonder, Daffodil Delight, Cucumber Crush, Pool Party and Tip Top Taupe. The coloured stars are punched out using the little star punch from the Itty Bitty Accents Punch Pack and stuck on with mini glue dots and "blinged-up" with rhinestone gems:

The top of the tag was shaped with the fabby Scalloped Tag Topper Punch and I tied the bow using a doubled-up duo of Whisper White Baker's Twine and Natural Linen Thread:

I stamped the flames using my Daffodil Delight Ink Pad and then I drew over the stamped wicks with the fine end of my Tip Top Taupe Stampin' Write Marker, as they didn't look quite right in the yellow, plus, I wanted to tie-in the taupe "birthday wishes" greeting with the wicks and the card base.

In the photograph below, you can just see that I have decorated the flap of the envelope with a piece of Cherry On Top DSP Stack. I discovered by accident that the cute little candle paper matches my card perfectly! I do LOVE how Stampin' Up! products coordinate so perfectly with each other. Those clever people have done all the hard work for us and make choosing bits for our projects so much easier - so, thank you, lovely Stampin' Up! product design people for that! 

You can get enough paper to decorate three notecard-sized envelopes in this way and have an extra strip left over, out of just ONE sheet of the 6x6" designer paper stack - so a little does go a long way.

I used this as one of my recent class projects and I think everyone really enjoyed making it. I was having such a great time teaching and chatting, that I totally forgot to take photos of everyone's cards to show you though! Doh! There were some lovely variations too, as I gave the ladies different options for the coloured card behind the whisper white sentiment banner; also some people chose to add more stars and upped the 'bling' on their cards. I love how everyone's cards come out a little different each time we make a project together! The classes are always nice and sociable too. I love our classes (thanks, ladies)! We all had quite a chuckle over a joke about there being only three, not "fork-handles", on the card, well, that is we were laughing until we realised that we were maybe showing our ages and if there had been anyone younger at the class, then they would not have got the "Two Ronnies" reference at all! Eek! Hehe!

On a brighter note: we also agreed that the above card would make a great Christmas card with just a few tweaks to the sentiment,  the addition of narrow gold ribbon instead of the twine, some gold heat embossed or glitter paper stars and maybe a bit of Dazzling Details glitter on the card base too... Hmm... Must remember to try that soon!  - I make no apology for mentioning Christmas, by the way, afterall, we are only six months away from it now, so I don't consider it swearing anymore! hehe!

Anyway, moving swiftly along... that is it for today. I do hope you liked today's project? Come back soon to see what else I have been making.

Until next time - happy crafting everyone!

Lucy x

P.S. There is only one more week left to get TWO FREE STAMP SETS with your Starter Kit if you join my team. This fabulous offer ends on 30th June 2015, so don't delay if you want to take advantage of it. You can choose any two stamp sets from Stampin' Up!'s current Annual Catalogue! I think that this is such a good offer, so don't miss it, order your starter kit today! Click on the image below to go to the joining page, or, feel free to contact me for more information.

Watercolor Wings decorated notebooks for another Pinkies Blog Hop!

Thank you for joining us on another Pinkies Blog Hop! We're showcasing lots of gorgeous projects using products from the new Stampin' Up!® Annual Catalogue. Simply use the buttons at the end of each post to keep hopping!

Thank you if you have joined me from Sarah's blog - what lovely ideas!

I have totally fallen head over heels with the Watercolor Wings stamp set - I am a huge fan of butterflies and the two-step layered butterflies in this set are just beautiful. I love their slightly sketchy, textured look and have discovered that there are endless ways of combining ink colours to produce a myriad of designs.

Today, however, I am keeping it simple and using just two colours in my projects: Perfect Plum and the new Mint Macaron. I adore how these two colours go so beautifully together. Come and see what I have done with them:

I decided to decorate two hardback notebooks by covering them with some of the Mint Macaron Envelope Paper, stuck down with Fast Fuse (so quick and easy to do!). I then stamped a large butterfly directly onto the larger book's cover with the larger butterfly layer pieces from the stamp set. I cut out a filigree butterfly from Perfect Plum cardstock with the Butterfly Thinlits using my trusty Bigshot (and a bit of wax paper to release it easily) and applied tiny dots of Tombow glue to the back of it to stick it down securely:

For the smaller notebook I used my Chalk Talk Framelits to make a double-layered label, wrapped a little of the gorgeous Mint Macaron 1" (2.5cm) Dotted Lace Trim around it, overlapping two pieces ever so slightly to make it appear wider. I then stamped one of the smaller butterflies from Watercolor Wings onto Whisper White cardstock, cut it out with the Butterflies Thinlits' smallest butterfly shape and then adhered it to the ribbon with Stampin' Dimensionals:

I think it looks really pretty, don't you? A good mix of vintage and feminine whilst still being clean and simple.

This last photograph shows the inside of the larger notebook. I decided to stamp the inside cover with the words "There is nothing in the caterpillar that tells you it is going to be a butterfly" taken from the Butterfly Basics Stamp Set. I also stamped some of the stylised flowers from that set onto the first page of the book and the front cover too, to keep it from being too plain! I love how these two stamp sets and the two butterfly thinlits sets coordinate so beautifully. Even better is that they are available in bundles with a 15% saving - thank you Stampin' Up! for that!

That's it for today, don't forget that you can get two FREE stamp sets if you join my team before the end of June 2015, I welcome both hobbyists and business-minded stampers and am happy to help answer any questions you may have about how to join and what to expect. If you join my team you will also come under the umbrella of the Pinkies team and together we offer a huge pool of knowledge, experience, inspiration, ideas  and friendship. I love being a demo and being a Pinkie too is the cherry on top of that!

Thank you for taking the time to view my post today, please click on the images below to hop onwards to the next person, Christa's, blog, or, back towards Sarah's.

Hope you come back to see me again soon:  next week I will have another project to show you, using the same colours and stamps that I have used today' to make a pretty gift set of cards which would make an ideal teacher thank you present! 

Until next time, happy crafting everyone!

Lucy x