RE-purposing store bought cards...

Hello everyone...
it's been quite  a while since I posted last in here!
Well, summer holidays are now over, work has restarted in full and
routine is (slowly) settling in....
(though I wish I was still in the Mayan Riviera..I sure loved it there!!)

On to the matter at hand: I recently partecipated in an unique swap where Lori, the hostess, was asking partecipants to recycle store bought received cards and make them new again..
Following, are Lori's (mybugandi) own swaps'words:

NEW...WHATS OLD IS NEW AGAIN SWAP

 (lets recycle our store-bought cards)

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"This idea came to me after receiving a very cute quilted Mother’s Day Card from my future MIL (maybe ). I thought, I could cut up the card and use parts as embellishments. I have hoarded several years of cards that I have loved throughout the years. Whether it is the image and/or the sentiment I think it would be fun to recreate our store-bought cards and make them better.I realize that most people do not have 5 identical store-bought cards so your cards do NOT need to be the same. Pick your favorite store-bought cards and redesign, recycle and recreate them into something fantastic for all of us to admire "

Here are my six recycled cards, the inside of each sports a 

re-purposed sentiment as well...

*click on any picture to enlarge*

                                           

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I love repurposing, recycling ,re-creating....I hope Lori and other recipients will enjoy receiving these cards.....

 

Thanks for stopping by....God's Bless! ♥

 

Calendar Girls: Christmas in July

 My dear friend Carol was our Calendar Girl's hostess last month, and she challenged us to make Christmas cards in July...well well...well...in the recent scorchy days we've been having, making cards with a Christmas theme sort of makes you think of 'cold' and 'snow'....wishful thinking I may add! Today we reached 37 C...which I believe it to be 99 F!! OH MY!!

 I love Christmas, and yet I always seem to fall short of cards and/or stamina to make them by the time the winter season approaches. For this challenge I made two cards but never uploaded them until now...yikesss.....I knew exactly what I wanted to do for my first card , and for my second one I really wanted to ink this set that I had for a long time but never used until three weeks ago...(unfortunatly I have many of such sets...*sigh* keep telling myself that,once retire I would brush off the cobwebs and ink them one by one....*wink*
Can YOU tell what both these cards have in common????
Take a close look at their golden dry embossed panels...
Does that remind ya of something??? mmm...need more hints? awww well..lemme tell ya...
I repurposed  the bottom of a nice large golden box of Lindt chocolates!!! yupppp!! et voila'!! ♥

For the first card (Lovely as a Tree by SU) I gold embossed the tree on black card stock then cut it out and mounted in the middle of the embossed golden frame, using dimentionals. Inside I used gold embossing too, to enhance both the sentiment and the snowflakes.

For my next card I finally inked 'Gifts of Christmas' and had it mounted on double oval nesties (white c/s and old olive c/s) reposing on a dry golden embossed poinsettia's panel (from repurposed Lindt's box!) I really love the crackling that the embossing produced...it created a beautiful and unexpected vintage looking ♥ I cut out the three lil red flowers and popped them on dimentionals and added red glitter to them... A pretty satin and organdy bow plus a wee sentiment in contrasting color complete this  card. I must admit I REALLY like it when I find ways to re use, repurpose, recycle good items and obtain beautiful results!

♥ Carol also asked us to share a special Christmas memory...

For me it's the day we get to open our stockings...

As a young child I was often spending 'Stocking Day' at either my Granparents' house,where we  celebrated La Befana on Jan 6th ending the last of the Christmas Holidays for our Italian roots.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Befana

In my house, we get together as close as to January 6th as possible (usually the closest week end)

We celebrate with a great big brunch altogether as a Family and then the opening of all of the stockings that La Befana brought for all....big and small,during the night.

I like to add also a few mandarine oranges as my grandmas did too during my childhood and my grandchildren now do expect them also...although they all still believe that La Befana comes to visit Canada each year , just for them!! ;o)

After the stocking reveal,we usually play board games, especially Tombola, which is the italian version of Bingo.

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And now my Friends, are YOU going to tell me which card YOU like best??

Ya know I am curious to know...*wink* ♥

Thank YOU Carol for a fun challenge...and for the memories!

BLESSINGS TO ALL OF YOU!!!

Dueling Darlings : Game's On!

   Hello Friends,
yesterday was the official day to post our Dueling card for this month.
Jeanette (SCS:Forest Ranger)is the hostess for us Dazzler,
 and Kelly is the hostess for the Divas.
Both gals are behind the Dueling idea  right from the start...
This time around the theme is: 'ARE YOU GAME?'
Jeanette sent us Dazzlers an *AMAZING* kit from which we created our cards...
I absolutly LOVE the designer papers received and already put a lil stash away...lol

There were so many goodies in the kit's received, including a few embossed colored panels. I chose the blue embossed Bingo card to enhance the front of my card...

Isn't this image just too funny??...lol....

Indeed I sure have seen a few people react this way!! ;o) 

Jeanette's kit contained the following:
Image: Art Impressions UM3511 Bingo
DP: Tessa Collins Freestyle Collection
Embossed Paper: Tim Holtz Embossing Folders by Ellison (Mini Bingo Card on SU! Tempting Turquoise; Mini Rays on SU!
Pumpkin Pie and Mini Ticket on SU! Pixie Pink)Embellishments :Morex Corp. Organdy Ribbon
Prima Flowers
Studio 18 Rhinestones
Button & Brads (vendors unknow)
A Scrabble tile

The only items I added to create this card were the following: white card stock; really rust card stock;
Spellbinders sm. classic inverted scalloped circles. I also used Copics to color this fun image.

♥ THANK YOU JEANETTE FOR THE GENEROUS KIT YOU SENT!!! ♥

As part of the challenge we were supposed to try something new with our card...well....I create it in the middle of the night and only AFTER it was done I re read the request sent us from our group leader...My apologies ladies! :/

Regardless I hope that whomever decides to visit would like this fun card...I sure enjoyed making it!! ♥

*Blessings to all*

House Mouse Unidentified Mystery Solved ♥

Hello my friendly peeps,
this card was made for the Unidentified Mystery Swaps that I partcipate in.
Barb is the brain behind this bi-monthly idea .For more informations please check
her wonderful blog here:
http://inkingintoretirement.blogspot.ca/2012/08/unidentified-swap-happiness-house-mouse.html

                  The swap hostess for this round is Janet (aka JanetJ on SCS)

She's an adorable gal with strong likes

for ANYTHING that is coffee...LOL

Janet sent us partecipants some very sweet,cute House Mouse images.
This one is called  'Take Time to Smell the Flowers'.....quite appropriate eh?!♥

In addition to the images received, I added the followings:

Stamped Sentiment : Make It Count (SU)

Card Stock: Old Olive (SU) , Bazzil Basic Premium c/s (pink)

Designer Paper: 'Me and My Big Ideas'

Copics , Stickles, Liquid Pearls , Bella Baubles , Green Grosgrain ribbon ,

Spellbinders: Circles dies and Tags , LifeStyle Crafts : Nesting Eyelet Circles dies. 

Hopefully Janet will like my contribution and interpretation

of such fun image to work with ....THANK YOU JANET!!

 (raising my espresso demi-tasse to you my friend!!)

Wishing all of my peeps a wonderful , FUN week end!

♥ GOD BLESS !

Mystery Image (July 2012)

 Hello friendly peeps...
I am soooooo late with all of my posting and have LOTS of cards to blog but hardly time to do it all...
Well, at least I CAN blog again!
(I had a huge problem with my laptops for days that prevented me to
be able to upload ANY photos into my computer and I even had ALL
of my pictures files totaly disappearing!! Needless to say I was choked...

Anyways,things apear to be in the norm now- fingers crossing-
so here I am on blogland again...

The card I am posting today was made beginning of July and should have been posted at a much earlier date  but, as I said, my laptop decided to go wonky on me! :/

This sweet card is for a mystery group on SCS where all partecipants use the same image sent to them by a monthly hostess. Cards are then kept as a surprise until revealing day in blogland or SCS galleries.
 Kate was our hostess for this round and she sent us partecipants this cute image of a little pony from SU! (Stampin’ Up Pony Party)

To the inages received, which I colored with Copics, I added the following:
Card stock: certainly celery
D/P: DCWV 'Nana's Kids'
Sentiment: Birthday Counts (SU)
Stickles, crystal effect, glittery flower w/gem, Spellbinder dies.

Hope the recipient will like it...cute simple cards for young children...♥

*Have  a wonderful day everyone*

*Hot Diggity Dog Dueling* ~~~July 2012~~~

Hello my dear friendly peeps....
I am finally able to post my Dueling Darlings' card -one day late-
Life has been full of bumps and curbs lately and then there is summer too -
with lots different activities ie: camping in the works as well....♥
Plus I am also partecipating in a wellness program four hours a day -everyday-
to help with my back problems. It is slow and sometimes painful even to do
stretching but it does help! I just need to grin and bear it and, hopefully,
 it will get easier too.

And now, on to this month's dueling! ♥
Darlene was our awesome dueling hostess for us Dazzlers ,while Tami is the Diva's hostess. Together they came up with a FABULOUS theme involving a backyard BBQ.

Here is a listing of the contents of the AMAZING kit Darlene sent to us:
Image is from Art Impression's "Golden Oldies series, entitled BBQ
Couple (isn't it fun?!)
DP: Karen Foster Designs: Food & Family Collage; Ants on Parade;
Barbecue Bash
DP: Reminisce: Picnic Parade; Grill Master
Stickers: Reminisce: Backyard Bash
Other misc. embellishments are from her stash , no particular vendor.

♥ THANK YOU DARLENE!! YOU ROCK GIRL! ♥

I absolutly LOVED working with Darlene's VERY generous kit! ♥
I added some of her designer papers on two of the wooden oval tags she provided and hd them placed on topof each others with a cut out sentiment from some of the stickers she provided as well.The ketch up bottle from another piece of d/p was cut out and   popped up w/dimentionals on the card front while the cut out ant image was added ,flatly, on the inside of the card.
The twine included in the kit was added on the side of the card and the fun couple was
cut out and popped up on dimentionals too. Crystal effect was used on part of the image also. I wanted to showcase the large words from one of the b/ground d/p ,hence I used it boldly and sideways in here.
For the inside of the card I used two d/p combo and some of the many fabby stickers provided as well. I wanted the twine to show on the inside too, therefore I chose not
to cover it up...
The ONLY things I provided for this card was my SU real red card stock as my base and dimentionals.

Both Darlene and Tami also asked us to post a favorite barbecue recipe, or a salad or side dish recipe that is a hit with our family when getting together for summer's cookouts.  

Well, I am usually asked to bring an appetizers or my pasta salad...
(which varies each time...lol)
One of my best and quickest appetizer involves smoked salmon and is as follow:
*one piece of smoked salmon fillet
*spreadable Philadelphia cheese
*chopped fresh parsley
*capers
*Triscuit crackers (or any crackers of choice)
Spread each cracker w/ cheese, add a chunk of smoked salmon, add a few capers and chopped parsley to decorate.
***If you like sweet pickled onions, add those as well, halved.***
Easy peasy yet pleasing to both the eyes and palate ♥
(picture below is from one of last year camping trip)

Hope you like my interpreation for this paper duel and, if you get to try my easy appy
please do let me know how you liked it (or not!) :o)

♥ Blessings to you and a happy summer too....
thanks for visiting! ♥

         Paola

Ladybugs and Butterflies

Hello everyone,

I am finally uploading some of the cards made recently.

My stamping friend Taryn (SCS: littledadybug3)

was recently hosting a ladubug/btterfly/dragonfly swap (s).

I took two spots in ladybugs and butterflies cards and here are the results:

For my butterfly cards I used a new (to me) tecnique- thanks to the link

my friend Kathy sent me via e-mail....(she does ENABLES me a LOT with the many

beautiful cards she pins....and now she's got ME hooked on pinning too!!

Kathy is ALL your fault...lol) I DO love this tecnique but I did tweeked it

a wee bit: instead of using sponges I dusted off my brayer and it worked just fine :o)

See the original 'Double Sponging Tecnique' tutorial here:

                 http://cardz.wordpress.com/2012/05/18/double-sponging-tutorial/

I absolutly LOVE the results obtained with this fun to do tecnique...

thanks so much for sharing that link Kathy ♥

For this card I used:Stamping Up Night of Navy c/s ,and organdy ribbon,
glitter dust, 'jewels' , MS border punch, clear embossing powder,brayer,lime green c/s (from Michaels).
Inks: Night of Navy,So Saffron,Bashful Blue, Gren Galore,Old Olive.
Stamps: Florentine Scroll Background (from Hero Arts)
Large butterfly is from clear set from Inkadinkado
Sentiment ( embossed inside) says:
 'Thank you for touching my life with your caring"
Tecnique: wet embossing, brayering

And here's my other cards...

more simplistic yet fun and colorful on its own merit...

The added cut out white die on the red c/s really makes it pop ♥

                                                          

  For my ladybug cards I used a SU wheel, MS border punch, a bit of glitter ,

SU markers , real red c/s and yo yo yellow c/s ,

Memory box die (Fauntleroy Crest) and sentiment from Tailored Tins Paper Salon

Here you go folks...I hope Taryn's and her peeps like them....

Hubby is calling...dinner is ready....I am famished....lol

*CIAO FOR NOW and GOD'S BLESS!*

Cookie Monster and Elmo

Surprisee!! Today I am featuring my oldest grandson.

Erik is 10 years old, and last night when he visited he saw

some of my latest cards made for swaps and wanted to case one set of mine

as he loves the fun look of it and immediatly got in a casing mode.

/.

What a busy boy, he knew the background colors he wanted to  use for hit two cards project (he wanted to make them for his teachers) Erik is sooo totally focused and enjoying every moment, and his face totally lit up when he checked his end results. Of course he had to sign the back of his paper creations too, just like his proud nonna.He decided on his initials only (ET 2012) I like that. ♥

Look how happy and proud he is!!

I am sure his two teachers would totally enjoy Erik's

hand made punch art cards! ♥ Who wouldn't? ♥

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And here is my take. I recently made these cards for a kid's swap

hosted by Libby. {{I totally cased the idea from Debbie (lil dj)

when I received her own swap cards for a 'Male Mail' swap I hosted quite a while back. FINALLY I seized the perfect occasion for casing her cards ♥}}

Here they are folks...simple cards, but ohhh so much fun to make

for kids and kids at heart! ♥

Hope you enjoyed this post....I didn't tell Erik I was going to

dedicate this post to him, I want to surprise him with your

comments....sooo pleeeaazzz leave him some!! LOL ehhe

Have a GREAT and BLESSED day everyoneeee!!!

Thanks for visiting!! ♥

Father's Day Duel

Hello my Darlin Peeps...it is Dueling time again!! ♥
Each month,on the 15th to be exact, we Dueling Dazzlers 'battle' with the Dueling Divas to compare ideas, learn new tecniques and creating DAZZLING cards together.

This month our darling hostesses are April (for the Dazzlers) and Jamie (for the Divas)

April sent us an awesome masculine kit from which to create a Father's Day card .

I {{{ ♥ }}} everything from the kit, especially the burlap!

With my kit, I decided to make an easel card ..I actually started making a sideways easel first, but truly preferred the more 'regular' kind and stuck with it.

Incredibly, I made my card ten days ago...way ahead of time for once...lol...

woott meee...love it when I can receive kits a bit early! ;o)

♥ < Thanks April ! > ♥

April's kit contained the following items:

 Krafty Dots by Recollections, Out of Print/Storyteller by Basic Grey and Go Fish/Mini Fish by Carolyn Holt Designs
Burlap and Pearls by Recollections
Ribbon and Bakers Twine from my stash
Clothespin from SU!
Stamps: Favorite Occasions by JustRite and Totally Tool set from SU!

As I was creating this card my mind went to all the happy times I spent with my amazing father....
my memories of him are in sharp contrast with the man he is today....unfortunatly Alzhaimer is NEVER kind to anyone afflicted by it or their families. I am mourning my father's brilliant mind...
but when I hug him and I still receive his warm hugs back (most of the times...) I thank God he is still in my life...       
***I love you Dad, for ever and always...♥ ***




Hope you like this month's contribution   to our  friendly  monthly duel... ♥                                                  I'd love it if you could leave a sign  of  your sweet visit, I so appreciate reading all comments ...               *THANK  YOU*                           BLESSINGS TO YOU ALL!!  

 

 

 

 

Unidentified Image # 2

Hello blogging friends...
here's the second reveal of the fairly new Unidentified Image (closed) swap started by Barb on SCS as a spin off from the original 'mystery' image swap originally created by Jeanette (Forest Ranger on SCS)

For this second round of the swap, Kelly (SCS: MiamyKell4) was the hostess with the mostest and sent all of us partecipants the cutest images of this adorable beach beauty  'Florence' from Karftin Kimmie .
Kelly also had a fabulous idea how to implement our paper creations for this swap, with her crusade to save  some specific area close to where she lives, in dangers of being destroyed in name of 'progress'...mmm :/
Please check her wonderful blog here for more explicit informations and details:

http://sandcastlestamper.blogspot.ca/

For my card, I truly wanted to capture some wonderful tropical colors and, lucky me, found what I considered a perfect background of color combos to show off  the  sky at sunset or in the middle of the afternoon ,thus, in my own mind I saw a myriad of tropical goodness possibilites...:o) Added some hand cut waves for the water ,and hand torn sand paper to depict part of the beach where this suntanning beauty is laid upon...Florence was colored with Copic (it was my very first attempt using them last week end at a friends' house...need much more pactice I'm afraid...) I also gave her some glam by using stickles around her sunglasses rim and on her belt buckle. Crystal effect was used on her 'lenses'...A couple of added button shells completed my visual of  a day spent on  a beautiful sunny Miami beach surrounded by nature's beauty...

Speaking of sunny...
this is how I made the sun...
I wanted it 3-D and wanted to use felts...
however, my very limited supply of felt
material does not include either yellow or orange...mmm what to do??Well.. some felt flowers from my stash came to my rescue...yes I was soooo determined to make the sun MY way....lol
I used part of the yellow felt flower as the sun rays and with the smallest plain circle nestie I cut out the center of the orange flower....et voila'!
I had the sun (almost) as I had envisioned creating it in my head....LOL

Oh yeahh..and for the wee sun-umbrella...wellllll...I really wanted to add one to my scene...thus I added a lil tropical looking umbrellas from the dollar store... sure came useful too...NOT only for a beverage embellish eh?!!LOL *wink*

 This is the inside part of my cards.
I like that both sentiments (front and inside) compliment each other so well...
This card could easily be read as:

    "Life is a matter of moments.....because nice matters!"

There you have it...I had fun creating these beach~scene cards for such

wonderful challenge with a cause to boot....hopefully their recipients will enjoy

receiving such labour of paper love...♥

Have a GREAT, blessed  Day you all...thanks for visiting!!

xoxox

Con~GRAD~ulations Chickee!

Hello my dear friends in blogland!

Today I'm submitting a graduation card I created last night for one of my students'

sister who just graduated from high school -in fact she had her Commencement last night as I was creating....lol... talk about perfect timing...:o)

For this cute chick card I used a Whipper Snapper stamp I had for  a while and

finally got it inked. It is aptly called 'Chick with Brain' -MY822-

I totally love this adorable image and so easy to color as well....

I chose to use  layers of yellow card stock for this card as I saw Emma's gorgeous dress on her Mom's FB page and she had striking yellow accessories too ie: yellow purse, flower wristlet etc...      I think this color goes very well with the gray and black combo too.       (I forgot my camera at work yesterday, so I had to take these pictures at school this morning, just before handing over this card to Emma's Mom when she dropped  off her younger daughter ....thus my writing was already on the inside part of the card...*sigh*....)

also whipped up a quick envelope for it, use some sizzlits for the newly graduate's name and shaped up an oval with my beloved spellbinders...et voila'...a quick personalized envie to go w/a cutie patootie feathery chick... :o)

 

♥ I hope Emma liked receiving this one of  a kind chick!! ♥

Wishing you all a great weekend full of wonderful surprises!

Thnaks for visiting, I sure appreciate your valuable comments too! ♥

Card Deets:
Stamp : Whipper Snapper / Spring Pictogram (SU)
Ink: Archival Onix Black ; SU markers
Card Stock : Ging Gray, Summer Sun
Designer Paper: Class Act Phrases, TPC Studio -Class of 2012
Accessories: Spellbinders-Labels Three; Swiss Dots E/F , Alphabet Sizzlets ,
MS border punch, dimentionals, Crystal effect, yellow gingham ribbon
Tecnique: distressing