Beverly's Stamping Beehive

OK, thanks for stopping by to read about my card-making, hope it helps you with ideas! If you've read my earlier holiday posts this year, you'll know I purchased: Tim Holtz's   a)  ASSEMBLED SNOWMAN Bigz Die   b) FESTIVE GREENERY Decorative Strip Die .   Martha Stewart's   c)   BRANCH Punch - as in a pine branch ...surprising that it took me that long to buy this punch!!!!   You know how it is sometimes?  Impression Obsession's  d)  LARGE SNOWFLAKE and   e) MERRY TREE thin Dies - awesome!   Last year's purchases:   f) a small branch punch from a company 'unknown'  (found it in a discount bin)   g)  SNOWMAN PAIR -  the cute Stampendous Jumbo Stamp (snow much fun to colour!)   . 1) So!  First up - my friend Jane's card, featuring Assembled Snowman !!!! Again, so much fun putting the snowman together!  I created several 'blanks' of the white head and body, arms {in various neutrals},

Here's some of my final offerings for card ideas....probably for doing these for someone close by as time is ticking, but hope you're all doing good and enjoying the lead-up to the holidays!   Here is a sample of cards that feature SNOWMEN  and PINE BRANCHES/TREES.   I will cover the supplies and techniques separately following this post, so enjoy :)

The festive mood was been in full swing yesterday in our household....having done a few domestic acts , oh, like decorating and baking, we woke up in a slow fuzzy sort-of-way and then within the hour were busting our butts for a full day!  First we were going out with 'the girls', awesome friends, and my daughter had to bring along her party dress to go to her staff Holiday Party, and I was doing more shopping and ending with my stopping in to a local (and very nice) bar to 'cheer-a- beer' while waiting to meet my daughter on her return around midnight!  12 hours of festivity - whew! Sooooooo... moi wanted my outfit to reflect the festive vibe and decided to shock my daughter by doing my "own" NAIL ART!  She does it all the time and is crazy-good at it!!!  But me?  Not so good! But beginning with the very cheap, green nail polish I had just purchased - by Pure Ice called Free Spirit - (its a perfect 'pine' green) and my sparkly Essie white n

See this?   Stampendous's JUMBO POINSETTIA  Now see this......! Here is another card made from Stampendous's Jumbo Poinsettia Stamp [shown above].  Their "over-sized" stamps are the best for embossing purposes as well as for colouring! So, my daughter combined the two methods and created with this lovely card for her grandma!   I especially love the soft palette.  {ignore my name on photo - i label them this way for my blog purposes}  The stamp was embossed in Martha Stewart's SILVER Embossing Powder, and the image coloured with Copic BG72 ice Ocean and G21 Lime Green; and Stampin' Up's Tempting Turquoise Marker. A Colourless Blender was used to make some texturing effects - looks a bit like raindrops.   Using Stampin' Up's Label Framelits was also a stroke of genius on her part - they provided a background setting, a mini-label greeting - AND - a stencil for sponging inky accent colour. A Spellbinders Ac

You know that point where its time to crunch down and finish card-making for the holidays?  Yep, that is about now....maybe a few last-minute cards to go, or one big fabulous one for your significant other or child, but its ' Do or Die ' now for me! So, I have been making multiples of some designs to make cards for the people in the neighbourhood who serve my coffee, or bag my items at the counter...all those indispensable people in my life! In fact, my cards are my little peace offerings in a way, because I can be a bore at times - well, probably a lot of times, lol! Yes, those wonderful people are too terrific at times - always anticipating my needs, so I hope they like the fact that my time and effort into handmade cards are my way of saying thanks for putting up with me during the year, ha ha! If you saw my Hot Drink Card post - that's for the staff at my corner coffee place.  But somehow I have made a lot of bird cards for everyone else - go figure! Here are so

Holiday Greetings! Today I am sharing how I make templates for my card projects. HERE IS THE PROJECT I MADE WITH MY "HOT DRINK" TEMPLATE.... Hot Drink Christmas Card with Tree Motif Sleeve.  Red, White, Kraft and Patterned Cardstock, Hot Drink DIY Template, Tree and Snowflake Punches. Glitter and Gems, Pop Dots. ************* DIY TEMPLATES Depending what "idea" pops into my head for a project, there will always be a gap between what I own or what I do not own to help me create my masterpiece!  I might not own a popular die or perhaps one does not exist to make what I have in mind. Right now, I do not possess one of the many hot drink dies currently available and until I do, my remedy is to make a template. Now templates are a well-known resource - there are tons of free ones online. But I have this habit of wanting to create my own templates out of cereal boxes, lol.  Much like an old school tailor and his plethora of custom suit templates han

Hey - back with my crazy project I mentioned!  Its a small canvas that I recycled {former life: an Easter bunny painting}into a colourful holiday decoration which now hangs in our bathroom!  We have a really bright bathroom in a turquoise and white colour scheme, so I thought an upbeat decoration could go in there to perk us up first thing in the morning, right? I slapped a very bright pink patterned paper over the canvas, and then had a ton of fun trying to stick a plastic mesh over top of that - I liked the mesh because it would add texture, and it is a bright sparkly white which is pretty. But it was dreadful trying to get it to stick down,...I managed with jots of sticky tape and a final brad to make double sure it stays in place. Where ever the sticky tape showed through the wide weave of the mesh, I sprinkled glitter, so it looks just fine. Next, I used my Big Shot and dies to assembled one of my Tim Holtz "ASSEMBLED SNOWMAN" and cut a sparkly turquoise Fleur-de-lis

Here is a bright young thing - having fun with my latest and greatest die, Tim's ASSEMBLED SNOWMAN! This is such a fun die - I love the whole ability to pick and choose the colours and I know that is true of any die, but its just more fun when your creating a snowman!! I want bright - bright - bright this year!  I have had years of traditional colours and beautiful prints, but I never really had those candy-coloured materials for my Xmas projects. Just wait till you see what else I did with this die for a home project - crazy!!!   Tim Holtz ASSEMBLED SNOWMAN, 2013 Cuttlebug SWISS DOTS Embossing Folder Michaels Scrapbooking Paper Stacks, assorted. Flourishes, Classic White Cardstock [110 lb]

Greetings Everybody!!!   Gosh I can't believe how long its been since I've posted anything - at all!!!  But I am having a nice Sunday morning - sunshine is out, its bit chilly here in Toronto but no snow, so that's okay with me, he he.  Anyone with snow knows that the routine of getting out the door is tedious when its "put on coat, button/zip, wrap the scarf, throw on the hat, bend down to gather the boots on, mitts, grab your bag-pet-significant other.....its like that several times a day, SO you can imagine how we feel when there is no snow on the ground - yet! Of course, we all want it on Dec 24 and 25th, lol. Then we want it!!!   Not sure if we will have it this year, looking a little too warm-ish. But there has been more than one year when it literally snows on Christmas eve - but you just can't tell, its one day at a time around here. OK - yap-yap-yap........let's get on with Christmas CARDS yeah! Here is one of the earliest I had to mail - all the

Hi guys! Thought I'd better do another animal post today as its been awhile :)   Today I came across a message about tips regarding pet dogs and attending a fireworks event.  I have to admit that this is not something I have ever thought about, but discovering that some family pets have been lost as a result of running away from fireworks, I thought I would share what I learned. SUMMER HOLIDAY FIREWORKS - its LOUD, its CROWDED - so the advice is to NOT take them along as the noise really scares them. If you have and they are not on a leash or confined, they can bolt and continue to run, run, run away! Here's what they're saying:       1) Do NOT take pets along to July 1rst or 4th firework festivities       2) Leave your pets at home in a quiet, secured, escape-proof area       3) Do not leave them outside        4) Indoors - drown out the sounds of fireworks by turning up the tv volume        5) If you have gone away, leave them with someone who kno

Hey crafters - hope you enjoyed your week-end! We are having a super hot summer day today. Ok, my " summer season " collection of tools and supplies has grown again!  Every year its my tradition to buy a punch or die  with an ocean theme. I even buy the occasional stamp with the same purpose in mind, but I do tend to buy punches and dies more.  I love those two tools - and if there is a matching stamp set, I'm "swimmingly" thrilled, lol! The summer is for our fun colours, but this year I gave myself a challenge- well, two challenges. ..1) buy a die that was really over the top ' seaside' and 2) use a sleek gold card base as my starting point.  The first was made easy when I saw CHEERY LYNN's Seahorse Family Die which I purchase as fast as I could from Scrapbooking Online Cafe . The second challenge was merely because of a personal challenge - how could I use a non-traditional colour for an ocean theme?  I usually delve into my bluesy, gree

Oh my gosh, SHE DID IT!  I am such a proud mom, I can’t stand it!  I am still pinching myself…pinch. Happy sigh *  AWESOME CONVOCATION  DAY at Kerr Hall, Ryerson University June 14, 2013 IT was such a beautiful day – we couldn’t have asked for better! The convocation took place with interest and at a pleasing pace so the many attending plus undergraduates never felt bored and then afterward we had a very pretty gathering for refreshments on the lawns outside complete with white tents. The doting families including us stood outdoors with the beaming graduates in pretty royal blue gowns with a few black gowns dotted amongst us – the Masters graduates.  It was simply lovely day for everyone. Its always been limited seating {always is} for ceremonies with students throughout their education. We had the allowed 2 tickets per student which meant myself and only one of my daughter’s Grandmothers could be there. This grandmother was married to the only Grandfather my daughter had known, an

As we close the doors on our church next Sunday, many of us will bid each other a sentimental good-bye. Farewell cards for several key figures in our church were needed, and I opted to help with the one for our minister, Rev. Ellen Redcliffe.    From experience, I reckoned that the card should have multiple pages to accommodate the many signatures of the congregation, and this one has: a front, a sentiment page, a photo page and then 6 pages for signatures - hope that does it!   Here then are several photos of many but not all the features of this card {tempted to call it a booklet!}  All in all, there is 20 man-hours into this project - a good portion of that is making decisions!  Hope you can tell that I put my heart into this one - enjoy!