Christmas cards Stampin Up style

I have two cards to share with you tonight. When I first saw the new Stampin Up catalog this past summer, I completely fell in love with the stamp set called "Gifts of Christmas". Despite the fact that I have at least a half a dozen Christmas stamp sets, I just had to buy it. I am sure you all know how that is, right? Then, I received my Holiday mini catalog, and was hooked once again on almost everything in it. So, I placed my order and one of the things I ordered was the new Sizzix Textured Impressions Embossing folder, called "Petals a Plenty". Oh and lets not forget the new shimmer paint. If you have been following my blog for awhile, you know that I simply adore anything that shines, shimmers, or sparkles. Love my bling! So, this card idea popped into my head and it has alot of shimmer on it. Shimmer paint, shimmer card stock, shiny embossing powder. Yep, gotta have some shimmer! Ok, I will quit blabbing and show you my stuff; so to speak.


The card base is Stampin Up's Handsome Hunter, the embossed panel is Real Red card stock, and is accented with the Platinum Shimmer Paint in the SU Holiday Mini catty. Basically, as you can see it is Silver Shimmer paint. It is hard to see, but the image is stamped on SU Shimmer White card stock, heat embossed with Silver embossing powder. I heat embossed the image a second time, and cut out the dove, so that I could pop it up with some dimensionals. It s hard to see in the photo, but I used different a thickness of dimensionals at different places on the dove, to give it a little different look. There are two ways to achieve this, either buy your dimensionals in two different thicknesses, or simply layer your stampin Dimensionals on top of each other. Layer two together where you want your image to be higher, and only one where you want it to be lower. I have an enlarged photo below to show this better. See how the center of the wings are higher than the tips of the wings. Trust me when I tell you that it looks way better in person.

The image is also matted on some Stampin Up Silver Shimmer card stock. The next card involves the smaller image of the same stamp set. I had cut my embossed Red piece into two different sections, so I put my thinking cap back on and decided on the card layout below to use the other red piece. It is basically the same layout, but inverted in the vertical direction. All of the supplies are the same except a couple of embellishments and cutting tools. I used my regular and scalloped Spellbinder's Rectangular Nestibilities to cut out my stamped image, which is popped up with some dimensionals. I added some Silver Faux pearls to each corner, and a white bow down at the bottom to balance out the card layout.

I hope you like what you see.

While I still have your attention, I have got to tell you about something that I ate at a wedding reception over the weekend. We were served a plate with a piece of roasted chicken stuffed with something, white rice cooked in chicken broth, and buttered cooked asparagus. Keep in mind that I am a plain ordinary food kind of person. This was my first time trying asparagus, and I am happy to report that I liked it. Now, this chicken stuffing stuff was pretty darn tasty, so I asked our server what ingredients were in it. She said she would ask the chef. After a few minutes, she came back and told me about some ingredients that I would have never guessed and certainly would not have purchased at the grocery store. They were: Spinach, Sweet Red Peppers, and the biggest surprise.....Goats Cheese! First, I hate spinach and sweet red peppers, and just the thought of trying Goats Cheese would have made me hurl had I known this before I ate it. So, now all I can do is laugh, because dog-gone it, that stuff was absolutely positively fabulous!!!!!! Broaden your horizons this week and try something out of the ordinary to eat, ya never know what you might like!

Keep Stamping...................Blessings, Lisa

Halloween Cards

Hello. I have a couple of Halloween cards to share with you today! I decided that I would stick to only 3 colors.........Whisper White, Basic Black, and Going Gray from Stampin Up for those of you who are new to my blog.


The first card features the Bat stamp from Stampin Up's "Halloween Frights" stamp set, the second features a Hero Arts Ghost stamp. So, here is the first card:


You will have to excuse my photography on this one, as I was in a huge hurry tonight. The bat border punch is by EK Success, I got it on a clearance shelf at Michael's for quite a bargain. The sentiment is from Stampin Up's Teeny Tiny Wishes Stamp set. That is a great stamp set, there is a short and sweet sentiment for every occasion you need to make a card for. It is a definite "must have". I used a 1-1/4" regular square punch to punch out my stamped bats, and they are mounted on scalloped squares made with the SU scallop square punch. The little gray bats in the squares were leftovers from punching the border, and the rest of the little gray batty leftovers, are on the inside of the card as you can see on the photo below. I hate to waste anything, if I can avoid it.




Now the next card I used the same color scheme, but different tools, stamps and design. The large ghost in the upper right hand corner is a small Hero arts stamp that I found in the "Hot Spot" at Archiver's, is he cute or what? He is punched with a 1-1/4" square punch and mounted on the SU scallop square punch. The sentiment is punched out with the Stampin Up Word Window punch, and mounted on the Stampin Up Modern Label punch. The very cute graveyard border at the bottom is a Martha Stewart border punch, and the also adorable flying ghosts above the border are some tiny little die-cuts that I can't remember the name of. They work in my Cuttlebug or the Big Shot, that is all that I care about. I hope you enjoy them.


Until next time...........................Blessings, Lisa

9-11-01 Never Forget!

9-11-01 Never forget!!!!

God Bless the USA

and those who lost their lives or loved ones in this terrible tragedy!

Charming Card

is what I have to show you today, because I used the new Stampin Up stamp set called "Charming" from the Holiday Mini catalog. I have been waiting for an idea to pop in my head using this stamp set, because it is so gorgeous. Last night I was browsing some blogs, and saw that someone (sorry I forget who) used the new Ornament punch to make a chubby flower vase. Sounds odd at first until you see it. So, here is my version of the chubby ornament punch vase thingy. instructions and photo to show you how will follow. First check out the finished card.

There is a tone-on-tone decoration (in Night of Navy) stamped on the vase that is hard to see in a photo, so the next photo shows it blown up and lightened so that it can be seen.

I love this set so much that i just had to take a photo of it to show you as well. Of course you can order one of these and many other things if you want. Info is on my sidebar.

Now, to show you how to make the chubby vase with the ornament punch. By the way, there is a stamp set that coordinates with the ornament punch in the holiday mini catalog. I will post a card or two using that stamp set soon. As you can see in the photo, you can simply line up the ornament punch at the edge of a piece of card stock or DSP, leaving out the point of the ornament, so that when you punch, you automatically get a straight edge for the vase bottom. Easy Peasy! If you have any questions, just leave a comment or contact me.


The flower stamp was colored with Stampin Up markers (Garden Green, Ballet Blue), stamped, then I added some Night of Navy highlights to the tips of the flowers and to the body of the butterfly. The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Phrases stamp set by Stampin Up also. The card base is SU Very Vanilla, and that sums it up. Until next time......Blessings, Lisa

Fall card

Hello. I have a Fall card to share with you today. If you have been following my blog for awhile, you will know that one of my favorite techniques is heat embossing a dry embossed image. This card is using that very technique:

I used a brass template that I bought years ago when I was first experimenting with dry embossing. So I apologize, but I don't know where I found this cute little pumpkin gem. So, I dry embossed the image onto some Stampin Up Whisper White Card Stock, colored the image with my Stampin Up Markers, then colored the raised image again with my Versamarker, and heat embossed with some clear embossing powder. I mounted it onto some Pumpkin Pie SU card stock. The other piece of card stock is simply a piece of Whisper White card stock sponged with Pumpkin Pie ink. I didn't have any DSP that I liked, so I created my own. I placed the whole thing onto Garden Green card base, and added a small sentiment and some DCWV buttons for embellishment. I hope you like it. Until next time..............Blessings, Lisa

Clean and Simple Birds

Today I have a couple of Clean and Simple cards to share that I made with the Stampin Up Level One Hostess set called "Of the Earth". I chose to use the bird stamp from that set today.

The first card as you can see is purple. Imagine that! Purple on my blog, what else? Anyways, the card base is Stampin Up's Almost Amethyst, the image is stamped on Whisper White with Elegant Eggplant ink; and it is layered on Elegant Eggplant card stock. The image was cut out with my 1-1/4" square punch, and the mat was cut with my 1-3/8" square punch. The embossed square around the bird was made by running one of my Spellbinder's square nestibilities through my cuttlebug with a tan embossing mat, instead of cutting plates only. This was my first try with this, but not my last, I love the result.

This one was actually even easier than the first, as I simply stamped the image 3 times with each color,and punched then out with the 1-1/4" square punch and their mats with my Stampin Up Scallop Square punch. The colors used for this card are Stampin Up Bermuda Bay, Crushed Curry, and Whisper White for the card base. I hope you liked them.

Until next time.............................. Blessings, Lisa

Wild Things from The Greeting Farm

Hello. I hope all is well with all of you! I have been suffering from headaches from the lovely weather changes here in Ohio. However, I am still stamping. I have a couple of cards that I made with stamps from The Greeting Farm stamp company. Click on their name for a link to their store. You will also see a link to their blog on my sidebar. They have the most adorable stamp images/sets. They are definitely one of my favorite stamp companies. Ok, on with the cards:




The first card above is the lion image from their "Wild Things" stamp set. I was playing along with a challenge to make a circus themed card, and I though the Lion would be perfect. So there he sits on the podium roaring to the crowd. The podium was made with my Stampin Up Round Tab punch cut in half. The balloon bundle was made with the bunny and balloon stamp from TGF Lucky bunnies stamp set. I simply inked only the balloon three times, colored them and cut them out. The rectangle that the lion is on was cut with a Spellbinder's Large Rectangles Nestibility. The little popcorn embellishment was from A Sandilion Sticker Circus set from my stash, and the little stars were punched with a small star punch from Michael's with foil card stock .

I had a blast making this card too. I was looking at the monkey image that I had previously water colored, and the sentiment "swing at it" from the same "Wild Things" stamp set, and thought to myself that this monkey just had to be hanging from something. The vine that he is hanging on was cut with my SU Little Leaves die, and the other vines were made with my Creative Memories 12" curvy trimmer. I was going for a Clean and Simple Card on this one, so swinging monkey and his jungle vines were as far as I decide to take this. The leaves on the other vines were cut off of the die that the monkey is hanging on. The circle and its scallop layer are once again Spellbinder's Nestibilities.

Have a great Monday and until next time............... Blessings, Lisa

Birthday in Blue for Lydia!

Hello crafters! I have a friend named Lydia Fiedler that I have mentioned many times before, her blog is called Understand Blue. She is a fabulous person, she helped me set up my blog when she barely knew me. How many people would do that? So without Lydia, InspiredbyPurple would not be in existence. Today is Lydia's birthday, so like many other of her friends, I am wishing her a happy birthday with a card, and probably at the end of my post, a white furball. I'll keep you wondering on that one. Here is the card:

I wanted to make the card with one of Lydia's favorite colors, Stampin Up Pacific Point Blue. I had a heck of a time getting a good photo of this. I finally put it on my window ledge and snapped it with nothing but natural light. Then, the little Gremlins in my Picasa photo editing software, kept messing up my watermark as you can see on the bottom. Sometimes you just have to give up and post the darn thing! So, Lydia, sorry about all of the quality control issues on my end, but I meant well. I decided that I was going to try a new crafting toy called Glimmer Mist. It looked so easy when they demonstrated it at Archivers! I used Gold here and for the first time. So, if there are gold blotches here and there, oops. I went all out, and sprayed the flower petals, and the card background. The flower petals are actually leftovers from cutting out Stampin Up's Lattice Dies for my previous post. Yep, that is me never wasting a good thing, especially paper crafting leftovers. The flower centers are faux gold pearls from Michael's, and the sentiment is from the Stampin Up set called Great Friend, and was heat embossed with SU Detail Gold embossing powder.

Happy Birthday Lydia!!!!!!

Ok, I promised a white furball earlier. Are you all wondering what the heck I am talking about? Well, here it is.

Please excuse the bad attitude on this furball, she hates to have her picture taken. Enjoy.

Until next time................................Blessings, Lisa

Forest Friends meets the Woodgrain Background

I had to make 20 card swaps for a Stampin Up meeting with my uplines, etc. I had just gotten the new Woodgrain background stamp from the new catalog, and was so anxious to use it. Plus, I had to come up with something that I could repeat 20 times quickly. So, this is what I came up with:

I stamped the Woodgrain stamp onto three different card stock colors with their coordinating inks: Dusty Durango, Soft Suede, Crushed Curry. I covered the whole sheet for each color. Then I punched them out with various sized circle punches. Then I stamped the deer and the owl on some whisper white card stock with Soft Suede ink and punched the images out. Next I stamped my sentiment (from Pocket Silhouettes) with Crushed Curry ink on Whisper White card stock, and punched it out with the small oval punch, layered over top of crushed curry punched with the large oval punch. Then I assembled all of my circles in a random style, and voila.......all done! I hope you like it!

Until next time.............................Blessings, Lisa

A Scrapbook Page Layout?

Yes, you read that correctly, I am sharing a scrapbook page that I threw together the other day! This is the first time that I have ever posted a scrapbook page on my blog, so I want to know what you think! Should I post more scrapbook pages from time to time, or are you more interested in the cards and stuff? You will not hurt my feelings either way. Truth be told, I make way more cards than I do scrapbook pages these days. The reason for this is that 90% of my Stampin Up customers are card makers only. So, I spend more time card making to give them ideas and inspiration. I realize however, that not all of my blog visitors are my customers, so I need their opinion on this too. So, if you have a couple of minutes, leave me a comment. All comments are greatly appreciated every time.



OK, now onto the scrapbook page. I hold my breath as I upload this, because I want you to like it. Here it is:



I first placed three and a half Lattice Bigz die cut shapes (Stampin Up - Whisper White card stock) along the edge of the page. The page base is Stampin Up 12X12 Night of Navy card stock. Next, I laid out the Little Leaves Die-cut shapes (Stampin Up Garden Green card stock), then I placed the flowers with each of the leaves. The sunflowers were made up a while back, and I posted a card using them. You can click here to see that post and instructions on how the sunflowers were made. I left the rest of the page blank, because I don't know yet what pictures and title that I will put on it.

Until next time.................................Blessings, Lisa