Not all the products in my NBUS box have been there for months. Some are more recent and the Grand Finale die and stencil set by The Greetery are a more recent purchase. When I look at purchasing new products I want to be sure I can use them for a variety of occasions and groups of people. These, like the Yay! product suite also by The Greetery will work for birthdays, all kinds of celebrations, and a wide age-range of recipients. I used the Yay! for two graduations this spring and summer, and expect to use Grand Finale multiple times as well. This card (the second one I created) went to a stamping buddy of mine who celebrated her birthday recently. 

The die etches a wonderful design on the card as well as openings on each of the fireworks. I backed the panel with silver holographic paper and then stenciled the pink and orange bursts. 

You can get a sense of the sparkle from the holographic paper in this photo. I also used it to die cut the sentiment from Papertrey Ink's Bold Borders: Wave. I stacked three white die cuts of the sentiment under the holographic paper for some dimension. I added Pinkfresh Studio's Clear Iridescent Drops for some added sparkle. 

The die set also includes some small pinwheels which you'll see in the next card. Here I added one on the inside. It also uses some of the holographic paper.

The inside sentiment is from an old set from Papertrey Ink. Several years ago, I decided to remove the stamps from the CD cases that Papertrey Ink used for their stamps. I put them on acetate and was sometimes able to peel off the label to add to the cardstock I backed them with. If not, I wrote the name of the set on the paper. Somehow neither of those happened so I have no idea what set this is from. I still have one box of Papertrey Ink stamps that remain in their CD cases. I lost all interest in repackaging the rest of them. 

Here's the first card I made. It uses all the same products, but I added some pinwheels to the front. I thought it was too busy, but ultimately my husband and I decided it was OK. Nonetheless, I much prefer the second, cleaner-looking card. 

I'm sending the first card to Seize the Birthday (anything goes) and to Darnell's NBUS.

 

 

I rarely am cutting it so close to a challenge as I am today. It's Theme Week at The Paper Players and the theme, chosen by Stef, my teammate at Color Hues, is Circles. I've been thinking about the challenge off and on all week. Last night, however, instead of crafting, I started sorting and purging my precut diecuts, card fronts, images to color, etc. As I was working through them I came upon an envelope filled with precut black and white circles from the Simon Says Geometric Circle Dies. There was also a group of circles cut with patterned paper, and the answer to the call for circles.

Instead of sitting right down and getting to it, I ended up watching the second installment of the Ken Burns documentary on Lewis & Clark. We're planning to drive that route in the fall, and it's a fascinating look at the perils and challenges of exploring the west in the early 1800's. 

So this morning, when we got home from the gym, I sat down and came up with a birthday card I'm quite pleased with. It's a good masculine card, and I have more circles to play with later.

It took awhile to figure out how to arrange the circles, but once I die cut some squares from Ellen Hutson's Essential Squares, the card came together pretty quickly. I attached the squares onto a panel die cut with Gina K's Masterlayout 1, and added the circles with dimensional tape. Two small red enamel dots provide a bit of color.

The sentiment is from Memory Box's Black Tabs series. Always a good choice when I need a premade sentiment. I still have a few hours before the challenge closes so it's off to The Paper Players!

I'm right on track with making my Christmas cards. I have a goal to make a set of 10 each month. So far, I've only missed one month so I'm halfway there. I do occasionally make a card for a challenge as well. As soon as I saw the Jingle Belles Challenge for Poinsettias, I knew I had the perfect die in my NBUS box to start. I also knew that one of my very old Poppy Stamps dies would work as well.

I recently purchased the Simon Says Hanging Leaf Ring. It comes with a set of floral dies, but I knew the Small Blooming Poinsettia die from Poppy Stamps would work beautifully here. I did cut the Ellen Hutson Lattice Background from black cardstock and added it to a black panel before adding both to a gold panel. The card base is Papertrey Ink's Vintage Cream which I also used for the circle inside the ring.

The sentiment is from Spellbinder's Wonderful Christmas stamp set which was one of the monthly offerings last year. I don't think I've used it before, but the font seemed just right for this design. At the last minute I added two gold leaves from the poinsettia dies and then some Gold Glitter Pearls from Pinkfresh Studio. 

This is also off to NBUS–one more product out of the NBUS box!

 

Today is my granddaughter, Maddy's, ninth birthday. She's celebrating her birthday on Nantucket–what could be better? Before she left on vacation we went on a birthday shopping trip. She turns out to be one great shopper. She knows where she wants to go, and when she gets there she makes good choices. She had the choice of opening her card that day. But she chose to take it to Nantucket to open today. Hopefully, she'll be pleased with it. All of my grandchildren are fans of The Greetery's Honeycomb products, and the ice cream cone seemed perfect for a July birthday. 

I finally have the dies for the What's the Scoop? stamp set, and they are so much fun–adding a chocolate topping that creates sprinkles. Also new for this card is the Frosted Frames die. The patterned papers were in a box with older papers from my scrapbooking days. 

I added a few enamel dots for embellishment, and it was done.

I made two other ice cream cards with the Hey, Honeycomb Ice Cream Cone. They're all similar, but all three have different backgrounds. 

This one has a foiled background with The Greetery's Ticker Tape, and die cut with The Stitched Scallop, also by The Greetery. You can see the foiling better in this photo:

And finally with the honeycomb opened up.

The background for the next card was stamped with Concord and 9th's Celebration Turnabout stamp, and die cut once again with the Stitched Scallop die.

I don't often enter more than two or maybe three challenges at a time, but this is an exception.The AAA Birthday Challenge and The Four Seasons Challenge are looking for Summer cards. Festive Friday's current theme is National Ice Cream Day. Maddy's card has sprinkles, a cone, and ice cream for the Festive Friday Challenge. And at Just Us Girls, it's Die Cut Week with Summer Things as the theme.

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I hardly need another die cut flower set, but my resolve was broken when I saw the new Concord and 9th Paper Posies. I haven't let them sit in the NBUS box very long. In an unusual move for me, I chose a range of Concord and 9th papers, and then just started die cutting away. When I had a nice selection I embossed some of the petals and leaves with the accompanying embossing folder which is quite a nice addition to the set. After putting together a variety of florals, I selected some for two cards. The first is a thank you card to a friend who brought me some treats from Paris. The second is for a woman in my book club who is scheduled for a knee replacement this week. I still have enough flowers left over a couple more cards.

I arranged these on a Soft Stone (PTI) card base, and stamped one of my favorite sentiments from The Greetery's Tagged Elegance set.

You can see the lovely embossing here. I'm not sure which side of the petals are intended to be used, but it's clear to me that either side would be great.

The next card is more CAS. I started with a white woodgrain card base, and made a simple floral arrangement. Using the rule of 3, I tried adding another floral, but it just didn't work! I did add three gold pearls from Pinkfresh Studio. The sentiment is from Spellbinder's You Are Everything. 

The Paper Players have a TicTacToe board this week. I'm sending the first card off to them, using the middle row across: flowers, die cuts, embossing. And both are off to the Wednesday Simon Says Challenge: Sending Flowers. I used to play along with Simon Says regularly, but seem to forget this challenge when I'm creating. And always with a NBUS, off to Darnell's challenge as well.

Just Us Girls Challenge is asking for Stencils as is Inkspirational. Geometric stencils are the optional element at Inkspirational and this works perfectly for that as well. I've challenged myself this month to create 31 cards using a NBUS product. I'd like to say a card-a-day. but I know there are days when it's impossible to get to the craft room for very long. I pulled out a stencil that's been languishing for months in the NBUS box. Somewhat to my surprise, it's a coloring stencil for a Spellbinder's hot foil plate, which I do not own. As you can see, it works perfectly well on its own.

I pulled out three Catherine Pooler inks that I've had for a long time and never used. I love the summer vibe they give to the card. I used just three of the four stencils since I liked the design with the white areas. After stenciling, I die cut the panel with a Hero Arts Rounded Rectangles Infinity die and added a white border before adhering to a lime green card base.

I tried a variety of sentiment styles, but liked this preprinted and foiled one from Pinkfresh Studios. I added a few Pinkfresh gold pearls as well.

These are off to Just Us Girls and Inkspirational. Both challenges end this week, so it was a timely make.

Hope your summer is off to a great start. We've had some much needed rain, but today is clear, sunny, and not too hot. 

The concept behind the Festive Friday Challenge is an interesting one. Each challenge focuses on an individual festivity or holiday. Recent challenges have been World Pet Memorial Day and Father's Day. The challenge team then lists a variety of elements inspired by the event. I follow the challenge, but don't often have a great idea that would incorporate three of the elements (the minimum). The current challenge, however, spoke to me right away. It is World Chocolate Day! What could be better? And Altenew's Chocolate Flowers kit was just what I needed.

I finished this card a few days ago, but have held off posting it until the last minute of the challenge because the card is on it's way to a fellow card maker. I hope she opens the card before she sees it on the blog. The three elements I incorporated in the card are: chocolate (the background), brown, and a sweet sentiment.

I die cut all the flowers and leaves from white cardstock and ink blended them with a varieety of Simon Says Pawsitively Saturated Inks. I love pink and brown together and wanted a bright vibe to the card so used some vibrant pinks and greens.

The sentiment strip from Spellbinder's Always and Forever sentiment set was hot foiled in gold. Not sure why I got such a blue tint to the sentiment strip in this photograph but it's too late to fuss with it. I added a few of Pinkfresh Studio's gold pearls as an embellishment and to accent the gold foiled sentiment. 

I am a huge fan of chocolate as is my husband. We have three granddaughters who live near us and two of the three don't like chocolate at all! We just can't understand it.