Bella Cosa

Thank goodness for the weekly Papercraft Crew Challenge . . .it “forces” me to create cards on my own! I can easily get caught up in wanting to make all the wonderful cards I find online, made by others . . . .I know that CASEing is a wonderful and accepted part of stamping, but I do like to challenge myself to come up with some of my own creations, too! Loved this week’s sketch again . . . why don’t you play along?

The last two girlfriends weekends in Oregon, instead of making each other little gift items, we’ve made recipe cards to exchange with everyone. Often these are recipes for dishes that we now traditionally make during girlfriends weekends; sometimes they are other favorite recipes we want to share. The fun is in decorating our cards, which we do on 6″ x 6″ pages, so that everyone can save them in a 6″ x 6″ scrapbook. Here are the cards from this last weekend in April.

Denise recipe for several yummy sandwiches – is that a cute idea, or what!!??

Donna makes yummy butternut squash lasagna . . and this card so aptly reflects her love of fall colors!

We all had a chance to sample Francine’s “Breakfast Cookies” . .. yummo!!

Gail is a seamstress as well as a stamper. . . and we love her shares that include sewing! And her Lazy Daisy Cake has become a staple for girlfriends weekend!

Jillibling made us all “cover pages” for our recipe books, with our initial on them . .. in true “bling style”!! I’ll show you the rest of the recipes tomorrow!

Haven’t shown you the April pages from Saturday Scrappers yet! Someday, I’ll conquer the “getting behind” issue! (yeah, right!) Here are the pages from April. Kat chose two different Easter layouts, one with a fun “Easter egg” theme and one with a more subdued spiritual theme (altho’ I didn’t put the Easter cross on mine!) Loved them both!

Ok – this was a really fun sketch to do . .. and, best of all, I got to use up more Designer Paper scraps!! LOL!  I’m trying hard to do that right now . . . as well as putting quite a bit of it into the huge Craft Yard Sale several friends and I are having next Saturday! And do you notice the cute little button by the Thank You? This is a “sneak peek” of NEW Stampin’ Up products! My favorite new thing (you’ll be hearing that a lot in the next few weeks!) . . . .two rubber molds: one with flowers and one with buttons . . .and white “mooshy clay” to put in them, let dry, and pop out!! SOOOOOO much fun! You can color them with a drop of re-inker and “knead” the dough; or you can make them and “paint” them with markers or aqua painters and ink.

Catalogs are in . .. . and those who attended May workshops will get theirs in their stamp order sacks, which I’ll be delivering the next couple of days. New catalog “goes live” June 1st . . . . you’re gonna love it!!

Papercraft Crew Challenges are fun and easy to do! We’d love to have you join in, and post your creation!

I love to share the neat cards I get from friends . . .. and my friend Marty just sent me the CUTEST card a couple of weeks ago! Isn’t this darling!!?? I love the colors . .. .the design . . .the flowers! Thanks Marty!

I had some “computer issues” last week . . .well, it was ME, not the computer .. . but being the “techno idiot” that I am, I had to get some help from my “guru” Mark (Binary Arts . .. he’s the BEST!!) I haven’t yet shown you my swap group’s March swaps . .. yep, just a tad behind! But here they are, in all their glory! The BEST swap group yet!!
Donna’s pretty flowers!
Diane’s adorable pinwheels!
Jill’s “rich” yymmy brown burlap!
Kat’s crazy, fun blue jeans!
Nancy’s beautiful vintage bicycle.

Shannon’s adorable chalkboard!! Isn’t this the cutest idea!!??

Here are the last two projects from Oregon Girlfriends Weekend.

Isn’t this an adorable baby card? This was Kathy’s card .. .soooo cute!

And Nancy always has wonderfully elegant cards for us to do . . . love this whole design and colors!
A wonderful weekend. . . . can’t wait to do it all over again come October!

Stampin’ Up really makes a strong effort to stay current on color trends. Our last major color renovation was three years ago, so there’s a “small” renovation coming next month. Attached is the flyer that shows the new “In Colors” for the next two years (remember this year’s In Colors will be around for another year, too) as well as a few colors that are retiring, and some new ones. Included in the new colors are some colors that were once In Colors . .. .so there’s a really fun mix now! LOTS more new stuff coming along, of course, with the new catalog coming out. I’ll be bringing you many of these here on my blog . . . or through email sometimes.

Color_Refresh_flyer_NA

Another great sketch from the Papercraft Crew Challenge! Check it out . . .play along!! I’m trying to use up designer paper that’s going to retire, so that’s where my color scheme and paper came from! I do like the results …. thanks for looking!

Jilli had us create a beautiful easel card . .. in several different color schemes.

A close up of the card front . . .

Ruth’s beautiful white and gray card . ..soooo classy!

And my card . . which could also be done in Crumb Cake . . pretty much “CASEd” from Anne Schach.