Got the Holiday Spirit Yet?

  

We’re delighted to bring you another Friday round of creations with the Senior Design Team at Flourishes! Today we’re getting in the cozy Christmas mood and showing off to you all that’s beautiful about the holidays at Flourishes.  You’ll see some of our beautiful newer offerings for the season and some of our equally lovely past sets too. Time to be inspired for one of our favorite times to create cards for others!

For today's Christmas inspiration, I wanted to keep it clean and simple so I stuck with the colours black and white and added a pop of green to "'fest it up"!

I began with a Classic White Cardstock card base and stamping layers using the "Trimmed With Love" stamp set and my favourite black ink, "Tuxedo Black" by Memento.  I used a variety of the stamps included in this stunning stamp set: the wreath of mistletoe, the word "Peace" and the large decorated Christmas tree.  I matted all of my simple layers using Flourishes' Classic Black Cardstock.

For my trim, I created a band and bow from the lush "Iced Lime" Seam Binding Ribbon. And if you look really closely, I used some Stickles and some Glossy Accents on all of the decorations and the ribbon in my tree.  This card has so much shine to it in real life.  To add the hue of green to my tree's back ground, I used some Ranger "Bundled Sage" Distress Ink and a my ink blending tool.

For the design of my card today, I used the latest sketch from The Paper Players:

I flipped the sketch on it's side and tilted the central rectangle and band a bit.  Had to make it my own ya know!

I also using this week's challenge #48 "Use Bows" from the Christmas Card Challenges.

Thanks for stopping by today. Now go on and check out the rest of the Design Team's cozy Christmas creations today!

• Allison Cope
• Christine Okken
• Cindy Lawrence
• Heather Jensen
• Julie Koerber
• Silke Ledlow
• Stacy Morgan
• Tosha Leyendekker

Start humming those Christmas tunes...  Happy hopping!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps: Flourishes (Trimmed With Love)
cardstock:  Flourishes (Classic White & Black)
die cut shapes:  Spellbinders
ink:   Memento, Ranger
ribbon: Flourishes
star pin:  Maya Road 
bling:  Queen & Co.
tools:  scallop punch & corner rounder by Fiskars, branch punch by M. Stewart 
other:   Stickles, Glossy Accents.

12 Weeks of Holiday Cards - Week 5

Welcome to Week 5 of my 12 Weeks of Holiday Cards! 

Each Wednesday until Christmas, I will be sharing with you a fun and simple holiday card fit for a quick assembly.  I will share tips, tricks and techniques along the way.  So join me...

CREATE A SCENE

There are so many fabulous holiday stamp sets out there to create amazing holiday or winter scenes and it's so easy to do so!

For my card this week, I chose to use the Flourishes "Holiday Sparkle" stamp set and create a scene that you might find on your holiday tree.

I first stamped the pine boughs from the retired "All That Glitters" stamp set in Memento "Pistachio" ink and then I stamped the bow onto patterned paper and cut it out.  Then I positioned the bow where I wanted it and marked the bottom of the knot so I'd know where to stamp my ornament.  I stamped the ornament and coloured using only 2 simple green Copic markers and added some Stickles for some sparkle.

Here's another previous card I made using the "Winter Scene" stamp set (perfect for creating scenes for holiday cards!)...

SOLD

You can review how I created my scene step by step from my tutorial seen HERE.

Thanks for stopping by!  If you have any questions about the materials I used on my cards, just leave a comment and I'll get back to you! 

~ Ally ~

No Tricks, Just Treats SALE at Flourishes!

 

The night of fright is drawing near. 

Instead of tricks, it's treats, you hear?

 Flourishes is having a SALE as sweet as can be

 With Sale Page items discounted 25%, you see?

 Just click HERE to see all goodies on SALE

 With TREATS in the coupon code box, simply buy and we'll mail! 

We hope you've enjoyed this sweet little rhyme

 Happy Halloween -- have a scary good time!

PLEASE NOTE: Sale will run for 24 hours on Halloween only and only on SALE page items.

Timeless Tuesday ~ Mad for Plaid or Houndstooth?

Howdy all!  With only a few more days until Halloween, I thought I'd share one last Halloween project with you today.  I hope you like it!

This week, our fabulous hostess Katie has chosen a very trendy challenge for us!  Check it out...

I had to hunt far and wide for some cool papers for my card today and ended up with a cool set of Graphic45 papers.  I cut the strips of paper to fit inside each ray on the die cut web shape while using a card base from Flourishes' Classic Black cardstock.

I stamped my greeting and my pumpkins from the "Witching You a Happy Halloween" stamp set on the light yellow patterned paper and fussy cut my pumpkins.  I used Memento "Black Tuxedo" ink fir my pumpkins.

Even though I stamped on coloured paper, I still added a bit of colour to them using the following Copic Collections:

To finish off the inside of my card, I add some of the same patterned papers and then stamped a variety of the silhouette images on the inside including another cute greeting from the "Witching You a Happy Halloween" stamp set again.

Thanks for checking out this week's Timeless Tuesday Challenge today!  Please be sure to check out some wonderful inspiration from our extremely talented team:

• Allison Cope -- you are here!
• Broni Holcombe
• Cheryl Lea
• Deborah Anton
• Jenny Gropp
• Judy Rozema
• Katie Sims
• Angel Rivera, our October guest designer

Happy stamping this week everyone!
~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps: Flourishes (Witching You a Happy Halloween)
cardstock:  Flourishes
patterned papers: Graphic45
die cut shapes: Spellbinders, Silhouette
ink: Memento, Stampin' Up!
other: thread.

SURPRISE!! Happy Birthday Christine!

IT'S A SURPRISE PARTY!!! Grab a handful of confetti, a bright balloon and come along for a fun birthday blog hop to celebrate a special birthday for our dear friend, Christine Okken!  One thing about birthdays, is that you always hope to spend time with those you care about and that's why we're here!  At Flourishes, we're just one big family... so we just wanted to celebrate a wonderful day with one of our loved ones.

Even though we're a day early, we'd like to say...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTINE!

Join along with members of the Flourishes family today and share some fabulous birthday inspirations, many happy celebratory birthday wishes and maybe even a slice of cyber cake.

I'd like to take a moment to say a few words to Christine...

Congrats Christine!  I hope you have a fabulous birthday. 

I can only hope that the next year is even better than the last

& that the love that you share with all the special people 

in your life continues to grow more and more!  

Many happy returns my friend!  Sending you the happiest of birthday wishes!

Hugs, Ally.

Here is the card I created for Christine.  I sent it off to her last week in the hopes that she might get it in time for her actual birthday tomorrow.

There is nothing I love doing more than playing with LOTS of different stamps sets on one project.  For Christine's card, I used Thank You for the script writing on my back ground, From the Heart for the banner shape for my sentiment, Vintage Postcard for the subtle back ground postage marks, Fanciful Flourishes for the delicate butterflies, Botanical Bookplates Vol. 1 for the birthday greeting, and the Antique Map for my teal background.  The inks I used were Memento's "Rich Cocoa", Ranger's "Vintage Photo", "Tumbled Glass", "Antique Linen" and "Peacock Feathers".  I used Flourishes Classic Ivory and Classic Kraft cardstock for my entire card.

Here's a close up of my back ground before I put my die cuts on the top of it...

 

In honor of Christine's birthday celebration, we're giving away a special birthday present or two of our own!  Hidden among the Design Team’s blogs today is a Mystery Blogger. Comment on her blog and you could be chosen as one of our birthday prize winners! The more you comment, the better your chances of winning.

As well as one lucky commenter, we're having a birthday challenge too!

THE OFFICIAL RULES:

• Simply create a NEW birthday themed card or project.
• Entries need to be in by Friday November 1st at 6 PM EST.
• Those entries using Flourishes stamps will be counted for 2 prize ballots!
• You must link your creation in our InLinkz Widgit to be counted.
• You must have a link to our challenge in your blog post or gallery post.  Please feel free to use our Birthday Graphic too!
• If you upload to SCS please use the keyword:  FLLCWISH
• We’ll announce the winners on Saturday on the blog on Saturday November 2nd, so check back then to find out if you are a winner!

Hop along with our Flourishes family today.  Don't forget to leave some love for our fabulous designers today for a chance to win...

Aleksandra Mihelič
Allison Cope
Cheryl Lea
Deborah Anton
Dina Kowal
Heather Jensen
Jenny Gropp
Julie Koerber
Kathy Jones
Maki Jones
Meredith MacRitchie
Naomi Gong
Stacy Morgan
Silke Ledlow
Tosha Leyendekker

Don't forget to stop by Christine's blog, HERE, and send her some birthday wishes too!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps:  Flourishes (Thank You, From the Heart, Vintage Postcard, Fanciful Flourishes, Botanical Bookplates Vol. 1, Antique Map)
cardstock:   Flourishes Classic Ivory & Kraft
die cut shapes:  Spellbinders
ink: Memento, Ranger Distress
pearls:  Recollections.

Sharing Sunday with Flourishes

Sharing a few of my cards that I made this week for Splitcoaststamper's and their "Hope You Can Cling To" challenges...

This card was for a challenge that had to have a 3D item appearing from a window in your card...

Air Mail

Flourishes stamps:  Joy is in the Air

This card was made using pink camo paper.  It's under the snowflake stamped vellum.

Pink Camo Snowflakes

Flourishes stamps:  Handmade Snowflakes

This card challenge was where we had to use a phrase or a mantra of ours...

Horsey Ride

Flourishes stamps:  Enjoy the Ride

This card was for a challenge where we used the colours orange and red...

Autumn Glamour Girl

Flourishes stamps:  Glamour Girls, Autumn Blossoms, Chrysanthemum

If you have any questions about supplies, just leave me a comment!  Thanks for stopping by!  I hope this inspires you to get out your stamps and create some cards today.

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

If the Shoe Fits...

Hello and welcome to Free for all Friday at Flourishes!

Today the Flourishes Senior Design Team is pulling out some of our sets that are on the overstock or retiring list and giving them a new spin! We always love when we can do that, because it makes you fall in love with those sets all over again! We know you’ll think so too, so we invite you to take a trip on over to the rest of the Design Team to see what they have up their creative sleeves today:

I was on the hunt to create a simple girlie card for this week's project. I needed something simple and I knew I wanted to use the "Make a Wish" stamp set.  Needless to say, two trashed cards later, this is what I created...

I began by die cutting a piece of Classic White Cardstock and stamped the cute little shoes on to the die cut using Memento "Rich Cocoa" ink.  I inked up the edges with Ranger "Tattered Roses" & "Walnut Stain" Distress ink.  Then I coloured my image using the following Copic Collections:

I made each layer of the patterned papers using stamps included in the stamp set; the pretty twinkly star and the word "Dream".  I used Memento "Rich Cocoa" ink and Ranger "Tattered Roses" Distress ink for the stamping and then I distressed the edges with Ranger "Walnut Stain" Distress ink.  I also added some Stickles to make the stars shine...

 Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you enjoyed my little girly card.

 Check out what my fellow designers have done with some of our gorgeous retiring and overstock stamps...

• • Allison Cope ~ you are here!
  • Christine Okken
  • Cindy Lawrence
  • Heather Jensen
  • Julie Koerber
  • Maki Jones
  • Silke Ledlow
  • Stacy Morgan
  • Tosha Leyendekker

Please be sure to give some extra love for our lovely Designer Maki Jones…Maki is taking a break from the design team and we’ll miss her very much while she’s gone! She’s such a talented lady who has treated us to some amazing and creative designs these last few years on the Timeless Tuesday Team and the Senior Design Team. We send big hugs out to Maki!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps:  Flourishes (Make a Wish)
cardstock:  Flourishes, Bazzill
die cut shapes: Spellbinders
ink:  Memento, Ranger Distress
ribbon: Flourishes, American Crafts
other: thread.

12 Weeks of Holiday Cards - Week 4

Welcome to Week 4 of my 12 Weeks of Holiday Cards!  

Each Wednesday until Christmas, I will be sharing with you a fun and simple holiday card fit for a quick assembly.  I will share tips, tricks and techniques along the way.  So join me...

STAMP ON PATTERNED PAPER

Stamping on patterned paper can save you time because the patterned paper can add some simple detail to your image so you don't have to colour it.  But be careful of the patterned paper you use. You don't want to over power your image with something too bright or too bold of a pattern.. Keep the paper on the neutral side with subtle pattern to it.

For my examples today I stamped my images onto a printable patterned paper I found on the internet. There are all kinds of cool free patterned papers that you can print at home.  I used a black and white lazer printer for my paper so my ink wouldn't smear.

Stamps used from Flourishes:  Snow Scenes

Here's another card where I added a hint of colour to my image using chalk.  I just blended some reddish-pink chalk to highlight Santa's cheeks!

Stamps used from Flourishes:  Santa, I Believe

Don't forget to decorate the inside too!!!

If you have any questions about the materials I used on my cards, just leave a comment and I'll get back to you!  Thanks for stopping by!

~ Ally ~

Timeless Tuesday ~ Fussy Cutting Fun!

Hey hey hey stampers!  Welcome to another fabulous Timeless Tuesday Challenge with Flourishes!

This week our lovely hostess Jenny has a cool challenge for us!  This week's challenge is to...

For me there is nothing better than sitting down with scissors in hand cutting out detailed stamped images - it's like therapy - but today... I cheated!!  LOL!  Today, for my card creation, I used the new stamp set "Star of Bethlehem" stamp set and I used it's accompanying silhouette cut file! Yup... having cut files for all my gorgeous stamp sets is awesome and makes it SO EASY to put together a new card.  

For my cut file cardstock, I used Classic White cardstock.  This cardstock "cuts like buttah" on my Silhouette Cameo! *Sigh!*

I used my new favourite neutral cardstock, "Cinder" from the "Cool Neutrals" Color Made Easy cardstock collection.  It matched perfectly to my holiday themed patterned papers!

My card today is a Surprise Pop-Up style card.  You can find a quick written and video tutorial on this card style HERE at Splitcoaststampers.  Here is the inside of my card front with the tag pulled up... 

I stamped my greeting in "Black Tuxedo" ink from Memento with a green inked floral too.  And at the top of my tag, for my "Merry Christmas", I used Versamark ink with white embossing powder.  All of these images and sentiments are included in the "Star of Bethlehem" stamp set!

I even decorated the inside of my card too...

I also created my card for this week's Christmas Card Challenges: #47 - use flowers and for the Splitcoaststampers Hope You Can Cling To challenge: HYCCT1308 - "It's a Cover Up!"; a hidden message challenge. 

Thanks for checking out this week's Timeless Tuesday Challenge today!  Please be sure to check out some wonderful inspiration from our extremely talented team:

• Allison Cope -- you are here!
• Broni Holcombe
• Cheryl Lea
• Jenny Gropp
• Judy Rozema
• Katie Sims
• Angel Rivera, our October guest designer

Happy stamping this week everyone!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps:  Flourishes (Star of Bethlehem)
cardstock:   Flourishes Classic White, "Cool Neutrals" Collection, Bazzill 
patterned papers, stickers:  Echo Park ('Tis the Season)
die cut shapes:  Spellbinders
ink:   Memento, Stampin' Up!
cut files:  Flourishes
tools:  Silhouette
ribbon:  misc.
silver string:  Flourishes
silver pearls:  Recollections.

Stamps & Scraps ~ Mini Album Fun!

Hey everyone!  The leaves have turned their bright yellow here on the prairies and most have blown away.  The nights are cold and we've officially had our first frost here.  It's truly Autumn!

So with Autumn upon us, I decided to make an Autumn inspired mini album to share with you today and incorporate some stamping into it!  I mean... it wouldn't be an Ally creation if it didn't involve stamping!!!  Right?!?

So I started off decorating my mini album cover using the gorgeous stamps from the "Sunflowers" collection.  I coloured them using Copic Markers and then fussy cut them out and adhered to the cover.

Here's a close up of my flowers.  I used an ornate die from Spellbinders to use as a back drop for my focal flowers.  It's die cut from Flourishes Classic Ivory Cardstock.

Inside of my front cover, I die cut a circle and stamped my cute little rooster weather vein from the "Country Road" stamp collection.  Below that I added a Copic coloured swag of flowers from the "Autumn Blossoms" stamp set.

I created numerous pockets and pull outs in my album, including this simple tag where I stamped the sunflower images (one coloured at the bottom of the pocket too) using the "Sunflowers" stamp collection.

Here's another tag I created using the gorgeous floral swags form the "Autumn Blossoms" stamp set.

This is one of my favourite places in my mini!  I stamped the large sunflower image onto Flourishes Classic Ivory Cardstock using Memento's "Tuxedo Black" ink and then...

I fussy cut only the part of the tag showing out of the pocket!  I coloured the remaining hidden tag using Copic Markers...

I added some cute image to the flaps of my removable tags too, like this farm image stamped in Memento "Desert Sand" ink from the "Country Road" stamp collection.

Another image from the "Country Road" stamp collection stamped onto patterned paper...

I even stamped image at the bottom of some of my larger tag pull outs...

And for my final page and pull tag, I used the "Autumn Blossoms" and "Sunflowers" stamp sets to stamp an image at the bottoms.

I hope you have enjoyed my little Autumn inspired mini album project today.  So the next time you create a fun altered art project, don't forget to include your stamps!  It's fun!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC

Supplies:
stamps: Flourishes (Autumn Blessings (not shown), Autumn Blossoms, Country Road, Sunflowers)
cardstock: Flourishes Classic Black, Ivory & White, Bazzill
patterned papers: Graphic45
die cut shapes: Spellbinders
ink: Memento, Ranger, Copic Markers
ribbon:  American Crafts
other: thread.

Sharing Sunday with Flourishes

Here are some of my other Flourishes' card creations for the last couple of weeks...

Stamps used:  Witching You a Happy Halloween, Moments in Time

Stamp used:  Handmade Snowflakes

Stamps used:  Lenten Rose, Calla Lilies

Stamps used: Winter Berries, Inside & Out: "You"

Thanks for stopping by today!

~ Ally ~

Sponsored by:  Flourishes LLC