A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA is here!

Woohoo - Happy A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA! I'm so excited to have a card to share with you today! This weekend I'll be sharing ideas using the new A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA Elegant Winter kit. There will be news about it over on the A Muse News blog today, so check it out for the full scoop! (*grin*)

For this design, I used one of my favorite tricks for the snow - the EK Success 2-way glue in the "baby biggie tip" size. One swipe and I had a perfectly groomed area for my glitter snow! So easy and of course super sparkly IRL. I think these trees in the Elegant Winter clear set are just beautiful and I decided to color them a subtle green - to give it a cool wintery feeling. Stay tuned - I'll be back with another design for you tomorrow!

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Images and notecards by A Muse. Memento Rich Cocoa ink, Scor-Pal, EK Success 2way glue - baby biggie tip, Art Glitter - Polar Bear; Copic original marker in Mignonette.

Word play - Wave

I had such fun reading your responses to my first word play game! Thanks for playing!

The next word up for inspiration and discussion is WAVE. What does wave mean to you?

It's funny how our minds work, because I actually had a bunch of things race through my head when I thought of the word "wave". (So I knew it was the right word for our game!) I recently visited a friend whose baby is still at the age where he is waving backwards - so cute. So that was my most recent memory for wave, and then my next two thoughts were ocean waves (of course) and "doing the wave" at football games! I always loved it when everyone at OSU stadium participated in the wave - such an amazing thing to see!

Now it's your turn! What comes to mind for you with the word "WAVE"? Feel free to share your thoughts or if it inspires you to create (wave punch anyone?), that's great too!

July Calendar

Happy July! I just *love* the sparkler stamp, but I always want to make it into fireworks by omitting the stick. So I actually bought a second sparkler stamp and carefully used an xacto knife to trim the rubber and removed the stick permanently - LOL! Lots of glitter on this design, but of course you can't see it in the photo.
Stay tuned for another word play! It has been so fun reading your replies to the first one! And one of these days, I'm gonna have another card to share too! Thanks for hanging in there with me through the busy times! Lots of fun happening over on the A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA blog... have you figured out where Eddie is?
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Images and calendar by A Muse. White cardstock, SU cardstock, Bind-it-all and 3/4" wire. Memento Summer Sky and Danube Blue ink, Palette Lamour Red ink, Art Glitter.

July and August classes!

I'll be teaching at Paper Tales in July and at Crafter's Connection in August. Hope you can join me!

Paper Tales, San Diego CA
Saturday, July 18th Make it Merry 10:00am
619-222-2510
We'll create five festive holiday cards using stamps from the new A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA 2009 release!

Crafter's Connection, Canyon Country CA
Saturday, August 15th Make it Merry 10:30am
661-297-4005
We'll create five festive holiday cards using stamps from the new A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA 2009 release!

For all classes, please bring preferred adhesive, sharp detail scissors, and a pencil.

Word play - Spin

If you haven't read my post from earlier today, take a peek below to see what this is all about. The first featured word that I thought we could use as a starting point for inspiration and discussion is the word SPIN. What does spin mean to you?

A few thoughts come to mind for me when I think of "spin"... My first thought is "my mind is spinning with ideas". But I also think of "putting your spin on something to make it seem better or more interesting". For example, if I want my son to clean up his toys, I might put a positive spin on it somehow to make it seem fun. I can think of some fun stamping uses of the word spin too, but I will stop there and let you chime in!

So now it's your turn! What comes to mind for you with the word "SPIN"? Feel free to share your thoughts or if it inspires you to create, that's great too!

Something new - wanna play?

Hi Friends! I've been thinking about starting something new on my blog. Each week, I plan to post a word to focus on for discussion or inspiration. It could be as simple as "sunshine" and "summer" or more thought-provoking like "politics". I thought it would be fun if you'd like to chime in as to what that word means to you. What thoughts it brings to mind for you, etc. And I'll of course give my thoughts on it as well. And if it inspires you to create with your stamps too, then even better! What do you think? I thought we could try it at least. I have a whole list of words I've been jotting down the last few weeks. So I'll be back later today with the first one, stay tuned!

June calendar - alternate version

As promised, here is the other version of my June calendar! This was the first one I designed for June, but decided to use the flowers in the final versions that I gave to my son's teachers.

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In other news, schools out for my son this week. He had his preschool graduation, so he'll officially be a kindergartener!

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And I'm reading the Twilight books... I'm enjoying them, but they sure do eat up a bunch of time! I'm on the fourth book and decided to skim through a few sections - enough that I'm able to put it down now for a bit so I can go back and read it in detail when I have more time. For those of you who have read the series, which book was your fave?

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Oh - also I am finalizing my A Muse class schedule for July and August, so I'll be sharing my class dates with you soon too - so stay tuned! Hope you are having a great week!

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Images, Black Dye ink, and calendar by A Muse. White cardstock, SU cardstock, Bind-it-all and 3/4" wire, Copic markers, Summer Sky Memento ink.

The fun has begun!

It's A-MUSE-A-PALOOZA time! And the countdown has started over on the A Muse News blog. Today there is already a contest, winners, and a stamping challenge posted, so be sure to check it out!

June Calendar

Continuing in my monthly calendar series, here is June! Seems the blog timer wasn't set properly and since I just got back from Seattle last night, this is a few days late - sorry about that!
June was another month where I made two different calendar designs, so I will have to share my first version with you soon too! Stay tuned!
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Images, Black Dye ink, and calendar by A Muse. White cardstock, SU cardstock, Bind-it-all and 3/4" wire. Copic markers: Lipstick Red, Cadmium Yellow, Mallow, Celadon Green, and Raw Silk.

amuse-bouche - Pirate Gal!

Arrrr! Another Summer Fun sneak peek and I actually got it posted for you a little earlier today - lol! This one features the new Pirate Gal stamp along with the Open Palm tree! I've wanted to combine her with the treasure chest and "treasure your friendship" and finally got a chance to play this morning. Lots of fun coloring, glitter, and twinkles! To make the treasure chest look like it was buried in the sand, I just inked all but the bottom of it and then drew the sand line with a raw silk marker after stamping.

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Images, black dye ink, twinkle stickers, and notecards by A Muse. Copic markers in manganese blue, skin white, golden yellow, buttercup yellow, lipstick red, raw silk, yellow green, sepia, sand, and O; Art Glitter in Angel Dust, quickie glue pen, EK Success whale circle punch, foam tape, Smooch in moonlight white.

amuse-bouche - Alligator!

Chomp, chomp, chomp! The A Muse critters are some of my favorite stamps and it's so fun to have an alligator! Isn't he perfect with "let's do lunch"? This design is featured over on the A Muse News blog along with other fabulous sneak peeks from the "Summer Fun" release, so be sure to check them out!
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Images, black dye ink, and notecards by A Muse. Copic markers, 1"square punch, mini pinking shears, foam tape.

amuse-bouche - Submarine!

My next amuse-bouche (seen on the A Muse blog), features the new fun submarine! And simply sublime.... *love* this sentiment - it's perfect with the sub! The sand at the bottom of the ocean floor is a scrap of natural white cardstock which I ripped and then colored with a Raw Silk Copic marker. Then I swiped it with a wide tip 2-way glue pen and added some glitter for sparkle! I *love* my 2-way glue pens - they make glittering sooo easy. I have them in multiple sizes and the "Baby Biggie" tip is my fav for large areas like snow, water, and sand. One swipe over your paper is all you need! You can see them on this post on the Paper Tales blog... fourth photo down. Stay tuned for more amuse-bouche!
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Images, ribbon, black dye ink, and notecards by A Muse. Copic marker in raw silk. Art Glitter in Angel Dust, EK Success 2-way glue - baby biggie or jumbo tip.

*amuse-bouche* cabana

Woohoo - it's sneak peek time - or *amuse-bouche* as we like to call it! This cabana image reminded me of a photo from a friend's spring vacation. There were rows and rows of lounge chairs by the beach of course, but my friend's daughter wanted the cabana "bed", so they had to get to the beach at 5am! So here I stamped the cabana image first, then cleaned the stamp really well and inked only the chair - which I then stamped next to the cabana (using my trusty stamp positioner of course!). A little sand and waves with Copic markers and glitter - Life is Good!
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Images, black dye ink, and notecards by A Muse. Copic markers in Raw Silk, W2, and Cool Shadow. Art Glitter in Angel Dust; 2-way glue - EK Success fine tip; foam tape.

Altered Mini Notebook

I've had this little notebook in my stash of alterables for a while now, so I decided to pull it out and make it cute! The small oval in the Anniversary Classic Labels clear set was the perfect size and then I paired it with the "Notes" stamp from the Personal Stationery clear set. I didn't have the right Marvy plain oval punch, so instead I tried my CM oval cutter and was pleased to see that it fit just fine with the shape of the oval stamp - cool!
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Images, ribbon, and cardstock by A Muse. Versafine black and satin red ink, oval templates and CM cutting system.

Happy Anniversary A Muse!

It's A Muse's 8th anniversary! I'm a little late to the party (well actually I'm not, I've just been partying over on the A Muse blog instead - lol!) This card uses the special Anniversary clear set - Classic Labels - which A Muse created just for this event. This set has sooo many possibilities and I have another project to share with you soon too. This design was totally inspired (CASEd) based on Heather's awesome banner over on the A Muse lounge. Happy Anniversary A Muse!
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Images and notecards by A Muse. Versafine black ink, EK circle punch.

May Calendar

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Images and calendar by A Muse. White cardstock, SU cardstock, Bind-it-all and 3/4" wire. Memento Rich Cocoa ink, Fluid Chalk Rouge ink.

Crafter's Connection this Sat!

I'll be teaching at Crafter's Connection this Saturday - hope you can join me! Here is a peek of the A Muse Blooms cards we'll be creating. Seats are limited, so be sure to call the store in advance to sign-up.

Crafter's Connection, Canyon Country CA

May 2 A Muse Blooms 10:30am

661-297-4005

Please bring preferred adhesive, sharp detail scissors, and a pencil.

amuse-bouche - newly hatched!

One last amuse-bouche for you! This one uses three new stamps! I stamped the vine border with pink ink to give it a subtle watermarked effect behind the sentiment. Isn't this sentiment perfect for this new cutie baby? And as you can see I also took the opportunity to play with my first set of Spellbinders dies... which I had been eyeing for a while - just never got around to actually getting them!

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Images, black dye ink, and notecards by A Muse. Copic markers in Raw Silk, Skin White, Blush, and Cool Shadow. Angel pink Memento ink. Spellbinders Labels One Nestabilities dies, Cuttlebug machine, tan wizard embossing pad.