So the kids are asking for Easter cards but I’m feeling a bit lazy today (lack of chocolate?) so I thought I’d make them some little Easter gift cards, they’re just 3″x3″ but sweet little things and oh so cute.

The Stampin’ Up! stamp set I used is called “A Good Egg” and has the cutest little chicky dude as shown in these cards.  There’s a few little background stamps in there and I used one one each of the three cards.  The chick was stamped in black on to the little gift card and then stamped again on So Saffron Textured cardstock, cut out (except for the feet and hair as that’s too tricky) and stuck over the original stamped image (so that the feet and hair show from underneath).  I then stamped the chick again onto various patterned paper and cut just the shell out and stuck it in place.  Some ribbon finished off the gift cards and they’re ready to be inserted into their matching envelopes.

In case you’re wondering about colours, here’s the products I’ve used:

A Good Egg stamp set
Love Notes (set of 20 3″x3″ note cards ready scored with envelopes)
Good Morning Sunshine Patterned Paper (the blue paper)
Bella Rose Patterned Paper (the green paper and chocolate paper)
So Saffron Textured cardstock
So Saffron Striped Ribbon
Taffeta ribbon (pink and blue)
Pirouette Pink inkpad (background of middle card)
So Saffron inkpad (background of third card)
Bashful Blue inkpad (background of first card)
StazOn Jet Black inkpad

Oh!  and guess what I’ve just noticed?  I missed colouring in the little beaks of two of the chicks! LOL.  Off to fix that up now.

Hope everyone is having a relaxing Good Friday.

My sweet little guys turn 9 today   I can’t believe it’s been nine years already since that panic filled morning when I realised I was giving birth to twins any minute and my obstetrician was away in Canberra playing golf with his friends.  Sure the midwife was there but she looked as panic-stricken as I did.  But here we all are now nine years later!  So I showed you Thomas’ card the other day, now here’s the card I made for Nicholas:

Nick is my little soccer dude so I made him in his soccer gear and gave him a party balloon.  The cute idea about the grass was stolen borrowed from one of my team members, Michelle Dyson who so sweetly made a card for Nicholas recently.

Here’s a list of products I’ve used to make this card: (all products by Stampin’ Up! and available for purchase through me at angelasargeant@gmail.com)

All In The Family stamp set
Family Favourites stamp set (the soccer ball and balloon)
Pacific Point Cardstock and inkpad (inkpad to ink up the chipboard ’9′)
Kiwi Kiss cardstock
Summer Sun cardstock
Good Morning Sunshine Designer Series paper (the dotty one, the green background and the balloon)
Watercolour Pencils
Blender Pen (to blend the pencil colouring)
On Board Lots of Letters (Chipboard 9)
1″ Circle Punch (behind the 9)
Designer Label Punch
Styled Silver Hodgepodge (fits perfectly over the Designer Label Punch)
Black Marker (to draw the string for the balloon)
Stamp-a-ma-jig (to get the stamping ‘just right’)

And now I’m off to think about Easter cards.  I wasn’t going to make any but the kids were asking me this morning if I’ve made them Easter cards as yet!?!  And here I was thinking they just wanted chocolate eggs!

Last month in my FAQ & Freebies post, I received this question from Suzanne: “What does Stampin’ Up! do with all the retired things that don’t sell?”.  I thought now would be a great time to answer this since I have lots of people ask me this question in April each year.  Stampin’ Up! are an extremely generous and big hearted company, and so they donate all products that have retired to various charities.  These charities are either ones that Stampin’ Up! choose or are nominated by others.  Occasionally Stampin’ Up! Demonstrators will ask Stampin’ Up! for product donations when they are doing Fund Raising and Stampin’ Up! will generously give them boxes of retired product to help raise money for charity.

Here’s something else that’s a fabulous idea… in Kanab in the US,  there is a park that Shelli Gardner, the CEO and Co-Founder of Stampin’ Up! had built.  The ground of the park (under the play equipment) is covered with pieces of rubber which is not only more soft to fall on than bark and other kid’s playground coverings but it’s also a fabulous use of excess rubber.  You can literally pick up the pieces of rubber and see if you can spot which stamp set it comes from!  Very very cool.

So there you go.  All of Stampin’ Up! retired products get put to very good use to help others.

Thank you for your great question Suzanne

It’s my twin sons’ birthday on Thursday so today I’m busy making birthday cards for them.  This is a card I made for Thomas, he has a great sense of humour and never fails to make me laugh, so I wanted to make a funny card for him.

When I looked at the stamp of the owl with his wings spread and then the balloon stamp, my first thoughts were of him being carried away by balloons so that’s how I came up with this idea.  I thought it would be nice though to give him a little friend so the winking owl was also stamped.  Now, not sure if the owl with the balloons is taking off because his friend tied balloons to his wings or if he’s landing on the branch to give his friend one of his balloons but I thought the whole scene was cute and I’ll let Thomas make up his own story to go with this card.

Here’s a list of products I’ve used to make the card: (all products by Stampin’ Up! and available for purchase from me at angelasargeant@gmail.com)

Owl Together Now stamp set
Whisper White cardstock
Kiwi Kiss Cardstock
Pacific Point Cardstock
Good Morning Sunshine Designer Series paper
StazOn Jet Black inkpad
Kiwi Kiss inkpad
Summer Sun inkpad
Pacific Point inkpad
Close to Cocoa inkpad
Blender Pen (for colouring with the inkpads)
Stamp-a-ma-jig (important for stamping in the exact position you want your image to be)
Designer Label Punch
1″ Circle Punch
Word Window Punch
Stampin’ Dimensionals
SNAIL Adhesive

Off now to make Nicholas’ card!  Please feel free to comment while I’m away stamping

The husband and I enjoy getting together with our neighbours for barbeques and dinners, we always have a lovely time and the kids enjoy running around until all hours of the night.  They’re a fun lot and last time they were over here we ended up playing the board game Music Scene-It which ended with a lot of laughs.  I’ve been thinking about having another fun night over here and toyed with the idea of this time doing an invitation and this is what I came up with.

Anyone see my inspiration for this?

So the squares are textured white cardstock which I cut up in 2cmx2cm squares.  The knight and pawn and the words “game night” are from Stampin’ Up!’s stamp set called Game Night.  The knight was stamped in Versamark on black cardstock then white embossed and mounted with Stampin’ Dimensionals to give it ‘lift’.  The pawn was stamped in Riding Hood Red ink on white cardstock then clear embossed several times and cut out.

I quite like the way this card turned out – different from the usual, fun yet serious.

So how many of you guessed where I got my layout/theme idea from?

Hi everyone,

About a month ago I did an FAQ and ran a competition.  I’m pleased to announce that I’ve drawn Karyn’s name out to win this competition.  Karyn, I’ve emailed you for your address to mail you your prize of a pack of sample Stampin’ Up! papers and ribbons.  Congratulations Karyn!

And now to answer Karyn’s question.  Karen asked if I sold my cards.

Actually I donate all my cards that I don’t give as gifts.  Each month I send my “top 10 sales” team members a ‘congratulations’ card for their efforts in their Stampin’ Up! businesses.  Other times I send cards to team members, customers and friends just as a ‘thank you’, ‘thinking of you’ or other such occasions.  Then any cards that I have left over I donate to The Ronald McDonald House.  I have thought of selling my cards but I get great pleasure in being able to pass them on to be given either to the families that are being supported by Ronald McDonald House, volunteers who give their time to help out at Ronald McDonald house or to sell to raise money to help the charity.  I also donate my Christmas cards that I have created to various other charities who particularly want Christmas cards.

Thank you Karyn for entering my competition.  I will be answering the other questions asked of me over the next week or so.

I was in Borders this week (okay so I’m in there multiple times every week) and I noticed they had a heap of owl stuff, pencil cases, notebooks and other cute stuff that I resisted.  So today when I was starting to make a birthday card for a friend of my daughter, I decided to make her an owl card for a bit of a change from my usual cupcake birthday cards.  So this is what I came up with.

A simple card but fun to make.  The only trick to this card is using a Stamp-a-ma-jig (stamp positioner) to get the owl sitting on the branch right and to get the balloon in proper position too.  And if you’re not going to mount the party hat as I did then you’ll also need it for that.  So I just stamped everything up on some Whisper white cardstock, coloured it in then stamped the party hat onto some patterned paper, cut it out then mounted it with Stampin’ Dimensionals (foam dots only cut into tiny pieces to fit behind the hat).  The sentiment as stamped then punched out with a 1″ circle punch then layered onto some patterned paper (same as the party hat paper and the strip behind the main image) which was punched out with a 1 1/4″ punch then layered onto some pink cardstock – the whole thing was then mounted onto the card using Stampin’ Dimensionals.  To keep with the whole circle theme I added some round rhinestone brads, a scalloped edged and also rounded the corners of the bottom of the card.  Hope you like!

Here’s a list of products I’ve used – if there’s something here you’d like or if you have any questions then drop me a line at angelasargeant@gmail.com.  In the meantime please feel free to leave me a comment.

All products by Stampin’ Up!

Owl Together Now stamp set
Good Morning Sunshine Designer Series Patterned Paper
Regal Rose Textured cardstock (base card)
Kiwi Kiss cardstock
Whisper White cardstock
Close to Cocoa textured cardstock
Close to Cocoa inkpad (for colouring)
Kiwi Kiss inkpad (for colouring)
Regal Rose inkpad (for colouring)
StazOn Jet Black inkpad
Blender Pen
1″, 1 1/4″ and 1 3/8″ circle punches
Green rhinestone brads (medium)
Scallop border punch
Corner Rounder punch (for the bottom of the base card)
SNAIL Adhesive
Stampin’ Dimensionals

From mid-February Stampin’ Up! launched their Bushfire Appeal by pledging to donate money from sales of a group of ‘Bushfire Appeal’ stamp sets.  I am enormously proud to announce that due to the efforts of Stampin’ Up! demonstrators and the kindness of our customers to purchase the nominated Bushfire Appeal stamp sets, Stampin’ Up! will now be donating a total of $77,889.63 to the Victorial Bushfire Appeal.

A big thank you to my customers and to Stampin’ Up!, a company who I am constantly proud to represent.

I was in fits of laughter making this card, I had so much fun.  So this card is for a friend and now that she’s received it I can reveal it on my blog.  You’re probably wondering why I’d say ‘Bite Me’ on a card to a friend… well she’s been teasing me unmercifully about my Twilight Addiction and she also happens to be a Buffy fan, so I knew she’d appreciate the humour in my card.

The ribbon in the centre of the card (for those few people not into Twilight) is a play on the cover from Eclipse.  The quote “Bite Me” is from (the yet to be published book) Midnight Sun and was said by Edward (hot Vampire) to Emmett (his brother).  There’s also a ‘bite’ mark on the bottom left made by the Scallop Circle punch and to add more to the theme I lined the inside of the card with red cardstock so you can see the red peeking through the bite mark.

Hope this gave you a bit of a giggle… I know I was in fits making it. LOL

Products used to make this card: (all products by Stampin’ Up! and available for purchase through me at angelasargeant@gmail.com)

Lovely Letters Alphabet stamp set
Basic Black textured cardstock
Whisper White cardstock
Real Red cardstock
Real Red inkpad
Real Red Grosgrain Ribbon
Scallop Circle Punch
1 1/4″ Square Punch
1 3/8″ Square Punch

Here it is, the gorgeous 2009-2010 Idea Book & Catalogue.

If you don’t have your own copy as yet then email me right away at angelasargeant@gmail.com.  Catalogues are mailed Australia-wide so contact me now for your own 160 pages of stunning papercraft products and beautiful stamping ideas to copy and be inspired by.