Joy-ful Color & Sketch Mash-up

Some punny jokes begin with “What do you get when you mix a ____ with a ____?” but in paper crafting, MAGIC happens when you are given two different starting points, like a color palette and a sketch!

This card was born by marrying the Global Design Project Color Challenge #gdp517 with the Freshly Made Sketch Challenge #FMS707 …AND combining the Abundant Joy Paper Pumpkin Add-On dies with with the Traditions of Christmas Specialty Designer Series Paper! No stamping required for this project 😉

Hang in there…even though the Traditions of Christmas DSP is backordered right now, Stampin’ Up!®️ is rushing to have it re-printed and re-stocked mid-November. Meanwhile, get your Christmas Cards started by subscribing TODAY for the October Cozy Christmas Paper Pumpkin kit AND remember to include the optional Abundant Joy Add-On Dies (which coordinate with the October/November/December kits) to your next order!

October 10th is the last day to subscribe for the Cozy Christmas card kit, and the dies are darling on their own, with just a bit of pretty paper, and using a bit of glimmer paper for the JOY makes the season sparkle:

Next time you are needing some creative inspiration to strike, pick a color palette and card sketch and make your own mash-up!

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Keep your creative juices flowing! 🍊🧡– Loni Spendlove


Dino-Mite Card (and a Secret to Quick Cards)

Today’s creation is proof that you don’t need a craft room full of supplies (or a time machine to the Cretaceous period) to make something “dino-mite.” This cheerful congratulations card came together in minutes using the Celebrations Expressions Memories & More card pack from Stampin’ Up! and the adorable Darling Dinos stamp & die bundle.

If you’ve been around my blog for a while, you know I love a good sketch challenge to get the creative juices flowing. This design was inspired by Freshly Made Sketches #698. When you’ve got a great sketch, half the work is already done for you!

The Recipe for Easy Cardmaking

Card Base: Balmy Blue cardstock, because the white background of the cards need a contrasting color to stand out.

Panels: I cut down three different cards from the Celebrations Expressions pack to fit the sketch—two with fun, hand-painted patterns and one with bright, festive banners. Pre-printed designs are the secret sauce for fast crafting: no stamping, coloring, or choosing a color palette required – it’s done for you!

Focal Point: That sweet brontosaurus is stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black ink directly onto Balmy Blue card stock and simply colored with Stampin’ Blends.

Finishing Touches: A few Starburst Sequins add sparkle, and a simple “CONGRATULATIONS” sentiment was trimmed from the card pack itself. Easy-peasy.

Leftover 1″ squares of the pre-printed cards pull the party all the way to the inside of the card:

Why Memories & More Packs Are a Game-Changer

If you’ve never crafted with Memories & More cards, think of them as your personal cardmaking shortcut. They’re designed for pocket scrapbooking, but their patterns, colors, and ready-to-use sentiments make them perfect for quick cards, too. In this project, I didn’t have to stamp the sentiment or create background layers from scratch—they were already there, waiting to be trimmed and glued in place.

Because I also have team members whose promotions I want to recognize, I created a second set of cards from the same card pack:

No stamping on this one! Just the Memories & More cards and coordinating card stock paired together so the celebration can get started quickly.

Give yourself the tools to create happy mail whenever the occasion pops up—because a handmade card always makes the celebration a little brighter.

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Keep your creative juices flowing! 🍊🧡– Loni Spendlove


Sketch for a New Year Party

I got all my paperwork caught up, so I’m rewarding myself with some stamping time and the Freshly Made Sketch 602 tempted me to give it a try:

Before I show you my card, let me ask a question: Do you look for a sketch to match the stamps you want to use -OR- do you find stamps to put into a sketch you found?

I’ve done both, but today it was sketch first, stamps next.

Wouldn’t this be a fun invitation for a New Year’s Eve Party? You can see how Amy O’Neill used the same sketch & stamps to make a birthday version here!

Bold stamps always appeal to me (no coloring required) and I thought the way you could “build” different party blowouts with the Year to Celebrate stamp set (NEW in the Sept-Dec mini catalog) was super cool:

I also love that the back side of many of the holiday Designer Series Papers are NON-HOLIDAY patterns, so they can be used all year long. The patterned paper I used on my card is the BACK SIDE of the Merry, Bold & Bright DSP that I GUARANTEE you are going to see a LOT of in the next few months!

Hope your weekend includes STAMPING TIME too!

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Something Old, New & Blue for a Sketch

This is the great clean-out week in the Creative Juice Stampin’ Studio as I prepare for my New Catalog Carnival & BOGO Sale on May 6th!

As I was sorting through things, I found a few items that were retiring which I wanted to combine with a new bundle coming in the 2023-2025 Catalog: A piece of By the Bay Designer Series Paper and the Seashells 3-Dembossing folder. So when I saw the Freshly Made Sketch #FMS582 for the week, I knew exactly what to do!

Using a sponge dauber and my Whisper White Craft ink pad, I made the embossed background stand out a bit by rubbing the ink over the shells and seaweed, then pulled colors from the Designer Series Paper (Balmy Blue, Crumb Cake, Night of Navy and Soft Sea Foam) to use as my color palette.

If I had a “spirit shape” it would be a circle (I don’t like corners), so the Circle Saying stamp set – which coordinates with a new 2-3/8″ circle punch – was part of my first demonstrator pre-order from the new catalog, which you will be able to shop from starting May 2nd. HOWEVER, if you want to combine them with the embossing folder or pretty paper, you’ll need to snag them now in the LAST CHANCE SALE:

The Circle Sayings Bundle (photopolymer stamp set + 2-3/8″ circle punch) will be available on May 2nd, and here are the other supplies to collect NOW for this card:

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Radiating Stitches In Color Birthday Card

Have you taken the time to explore the new Online Exclusives in my Stampin’ Up! Store? Some things have been so popular, they are already backordered and we are waiting for more!

One new item I wanted to share with you is the Radiating Stitches Dies…these cutting tools will take ANY stamps you already have and give them a pretty frame or add a bit of whimsy with a layer of “stitching” around the edges of your layers:

I chose to follow the Freshly Made Sketch #576 during my Live Crafting today and used two In Color Combinations to demonstrate the versatility of starting with a sketch, and the ease of using a combination of colors curated in a color “family”.

It happens that from today through Mid-April, I have 10 family birthdays (and about 15 friend and team birthdays) to celebrate, so this was an opportunity to get prepared!

This version I turned sideways and used the 2022-2024 In Colors as my palette. A sketch can be turned any which-way!

And this card followed the portrait layout of the original sketch, plus I used a base of Very Vanilla with my colors from the (retiring) 2021-2023 In Colors. All supplies listed below to make it easy to add to your cart!

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Birth-Date Color: A Thai-Tradition!

At convention Stampin’ Up! announced that the 2017 Grand Vacation demonstrators can earn will be to Phuket, Thailand! Now I have a goal 🙂

Did you know that according to Thai tradition, each day of the week is assigned a color and the color for the day you were born is supposed to be your lucky color?! Find out your lucky Stampin’ Up! color by finding out which day of the week you were born on and then click here for your SU! Birthdate Hue.

In honor of the birthday I recently celebrated, I created this monochromatic card in MY color (Melon Mambo) and used this week’s Freshly Made Sketch:

What is your birth date color? Leave a comment below! 
Order supplies in YOUR lucky color from my Stampin’ Store!

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Candy Corn & Paper Piecing Mashup

A sure sign of fall isn’t the falling leaves or cooler temperatures…it’s the CANDY! Remember when you could ONLY get candy corn in Autumn and Peeps at Easter? That was before they started making pastel corn for Easter and Peeps ghosts for Halloween…ah, the good old days…

I’ve been thinking about tags lately, so this popped into my head when I saw the Friday Mashup challenge (mashing up a fall food theme and paper piercing, FM128) and the Freshly Made Sketch (FMS104) this week:

The paper piercing was inspired by Patty B (but on a smaller version of hers). Here’s how I made the candy corn:

So there’s a sweet treat double whammy (or is it a triple?) for you today! 
Project Recipe (all supplies from Stampin’ Up! unless noted):
Stamps: Sweets for the Sweet stamp set 
Ink: Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie, Crushed Curry
Paper: Sweater Weather Designer Series Paper (132184), card stock: Pumpkin Pie, Crushed Curry, Very Vanilla, Whisper White
Accessories: Stampin’ Sponge, Crushed Curry 3/4″ Chevron Ribbon (130019),  Early Espresso Baker’s Twine (123124),  4×6 Cellophane bag (102757).  Punches: 1/2″ circle (119869), 1″ circle (119868), 1-3/8″ circle (119860), Artisan Label (130920). OTHER: CANDY CORN

Update 9/30/13: My project was voted as ROCKSTAR at the Friday Mashup! Wahoo!

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All Ears

This trio of bunnies are too adorable for words and I’ve been looking for an excuse to use them, so I combined sketch #78 from the Freshly Made Sketches blog and the color inspiration on my Creative Juice by Loni Facebook page…and it turned out so sweet! Of course, I had to add the bunny tails, so it’s really NOT JUST all ears…

Card Recipe: **All supplies from Stampin’ Up! of course!**

  • Stamps: Ears to You single stamp (Item 132659…only available through March 31, 2013!)
  • Ink: Bashful Blue, So Saffron, Lucky Limeade & Crumb Cake Stampin’ Write Markers
  • Paper: Crumb Cake, Very Vanilla, Whisper White & Bashful Blue card stock. Tea for Two Designer Series Paper (129311)
  • Accessories: Lucky Limeade Ruffled Ribbon (122977), Labels Collection Framelits (125598), Big Shot (113439), Honeycomb embossing folder (119378), Scallop Edge Border punch (119882), Itty Bitty Shapes punch pack (118309), Pearls Basic Jewels (119247), sanding block, Stampin’ Dimensionals

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Happy Anniversary, Baby!

September is filled with milestones: 20 years with Stampin’ Up!, my 24th Wedding Anniversary is TODAY (love ya, sweetheart!!) and over at Freshly Made Sketches, they are celebrating their first year, too. So in honor of all of the above, I made this card (and an anniversary copy for my husband, because we are the perfect “pair/pear”):

This card uses the Perfectly Preserved stamp set and coordinating Cannery Set Framelits (127822) as well as the Orchard Harvest Designer Series Paper (126895) from the Holiday Catalog (page 29) which I am head-over-heels IN LOVE with! It makes it easy to create perfect 3-D pears because they are all cut the same 🙂 And see that double stitched satin ribbon? You can get some FREE with your $40 in September! I followed Sketch 13 from FMS, since we could choose any sketch from the past year:

In keeping with the celebration, I will mail this card (with a Re-Smile note inside so you can share the love!) to someone who leaves a comment below! 
UPDATE 9/20/12: Congrats Jenn! I’m mailing this card to you…thanks for commenting!

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Fresh Sketch and My Color Phase

Do you go through color phases? Meaning you are really drawn to a certain color palette for a while, then something else catches your eye and everything you create for a period is variations on a theme? Yep, that’s me. I found this color combination and pinned it to my Color Palette board on Pinterest, and I keep coming back to it because it makes me so happy:

In Stampin’ Up! colors, they are Basic Gray, Very Vanilla, Sahara Sand and Baja Breeze. Thus, my submission for the Freshly Made Sketch at the top stamped with the Blooming with Kindness stamp set (page 87 of current catalog), another one of my current favorites. In fact, I’m teaching a class with this stamp set in September and would love to have you there!

So what is your current (Stampin’ Up!) color obsession? Do you have one color you are always drawn to or a set that you love to use? Share with me in the comments and one lucky person will get this card from me in the mail! It’s even prettier in person 🙂

(P.S. Today–August 31– is the last day to join my Stampin’ Family and get the Halloween Printer’s Tray FREE)

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