Having Fun with some CUTE FRUIT

Have you seen the CUTE FRUIT STAMP SET?  It's adorable.  If you looked in the annual catalog, you'd never find it.  It's in this great new publication, called The Beginner's Brochure.  It's a small catalog that was created for beginning stampers or stampers just looking for a quick and easy project.

The images are so cute and fun and it's so easy to make a colorful, happy card.  The best part is that there are little faces that you can stamp on your fruit.  How else would they be so cute? They also sell the stamps as part of a set that also includes an acrylic block, Whisper White cardstock and an assortment of Classic Stampin' Spots.  A perfect set for a beginner to have great success with their very first project.

For my card, I pulled out many of my favorite BRIGHTS.  I used a GRANNY APPLE GREEN card base cut at 8-1/2in by 5-1/2in, scored at 4-1/4in.  I used a fun technique to make the panel on the front of the card.  I cut a piece of Whisper White at 3in by 4in. I then took an acrylic block just a bit larger than the panel and covered the face of it with GRANNY APPLE GREEN INK.  I then took a mister and sprayed water on the block to make some water droplets.  I then placed it down on the cardstock panel. I let it rest a minute until the panel was covered in ink. Then I dried it using my HEAT TOOL.  For the splatters, I used my GRANNY APPLE GREEN BLEND and flicked the ink using the cap on the brush tip side. I "roughed up" the edges a bit with my bone folder to give it more dimension.  Using TOMBOW, I adhered the panel to the front of my card as shown.  I then stamped the fruit and fussy cut them out with my PAPER SNIPS.  The colors I used were MAGENTA MADNESS and GRANNY APPLE GREEN for the watermelon, CRUSHED CURRY and GRANNY APPLE GREEN for the pineapple and DAFFODIL DELIGHT and SOFT SUEDE for the banana.  Don't forget the little smiley face using TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK. For the sentiment, I used a strip of WHISPER WHITE cardstock cut at 3in by 1/4in.

For my 3D item, I made a cute little hand sanitizer box.  As you all know, hand sanitizer has become a hot commodity due to the pandemic.  For a while, I couldn't even find any.  Now that things have settled a bit, I was able to by some Watermelon Lemonade mini hand sanitizer from Bath and Body Works ONLINE. 

 

To start, you will need a piece of MELON MAMBO cardstock cut at 3-3/4in by 6in. On the LONG side, score at 1in, 2-3/4in, 3-3/4in and 5-1/2in.  On the SHORT side score at 1in. I then take my 2in CIRCLE PUNCH and cut a curved section out of the large panel that is between the two 1in-wide panels.  After trimming, your box should look like this template below.

To decorate the box, I took an 8in by 11-1/2in piece of WHISPER WHITE card stock and make my own "CUTE FRUIT DSP."  I used MELON MAMBO and GRANNY APPLE GREEN ink for the watermelons.  I used DAFFODIL DELIGHT and SOFT SUEDE for the bananas and lemons and CALYPSO CORAL for the oranges.  I stamped the SMILE sentiment using TUXEDO BLACK MEMENTO INK. I randomly stamped the images all over the cardstock.  It's really fun making your own designer series paper.  Here's what mine ended up looking like.  I cut the cardstock into 2in strips to use on my boxes.

After wrapping the 2in strip around the box, I finished the product with a 1in circle for a tag with the "you're one in a melon" sentiment in MELON MAMBO ink.  The tag was tied on using the POLKA DOT TULLE RIBBON.

The video tutorial below shows how the card and the box comes together.

Thanks as always for visiting my blog.  If you have any questions about the products or the tutorial, please email me at blreed@comcast.net.  

Happy Stamping,

Barb Reed 

The Wexford Stamper

EMBOSS LIKE A BOSS with the Lovely Inside and Out Stamp Set

As a card maker, I've always LOVED to use embossing to take my cards to the next level.  Friends who get my cards are always amazed by the effect but for a long time I rarely embossed. I thought it took too long, getting the extra products out and going through the process itself. BOY, WAS I WRONG!  After years of embossing, I have found some tricks that make it quick and easy.  This card project was made using the stamp set LOVELY INSIDE AND OUT (144011) in the new Stampin' Up 2017-18 Annual Catalog.  I added embossing to the sentiment to help it stand out.

I used a BASIC BLACK card base cut at 8 1/2 in by 5 1/2 in, scored at 4 1/4 in on the long side.  I started my stamping on the 4 3/4 in by 3 1/2 in piece of WHISPER WHITE card stock.  I randomly stamped the STARBURST image in three different inks, LEMON LIME TWIST, EMERALD ENVY, AND SOFT SLATE.  I adhered that piece to a 4 7/8 in by 3 5/8 in piece of EMERALD ENVY card stock using my TOMBOW adhesive.  I then adhered that to a piece of SMOKY SLATE card stock measuring 5 1/4 in by 4 in before adhering it to the BASIC BLACK card base.  The colors look so beautiful together. 

Then it was time for EMBOSSING. I have found that keeping all your embossing tools together in one place helps to make the job go more smoothly.  I purchased a plastic bin at WALMART and everything fits in it perfectly.

The items I keep in the bin are the Stampin Up HEAT TOOL (129053), a VERSAMARK PAD (102283), the EMBOSSING BUDDY (103083), a paint brush and a plastic spoon.

I took the 1 1/4 in by 4 1/4 in strip of EMERALD ENVY card stock and lightly rubbed it with my EMBOSSING BUDDY to remove static and allow for a clear embossed image.  Then I stamped the FRIEND sentiment on the right end using VERSAMARK.

I find it helpful to buy a small plastic container for each color of embossing powder you have to avoid big messes and make clean up fast and easy.  For this card I used my WHITE EMBOSSING POWDER (109132).

After removing the lid from the container, I placed the strip inside and scooped embossing powder on it with the plastic spoon then gently tapped on the back side of the strip.  If powder sticks in unwanted places, I take the paint brush and carefully remove it from the strip.

Now using my HEAT TOOL, I heated the image, moving carefully across the strip and watching for the sentiment to become shiny.

Finally I stamped the 1/2 in by 2 1/2 in strip of LEMON LIME TWIST with the TO A GREAT sentiment using SMOKY SLATE ink.  Then it was time to assemble

I used DIMENSIONALS to adhere the FRIEND sentiment and glued the LEMON LIME TWIST strip to it.  I did put a DIMENSIONAL behind the right end of the small strip to keep it in its place.  Such an easy card to make but so clean and modern looking.  This card could be for a man or a women.  Experiment with other color combinations just for FUN.

All these products are available on my online store.  Click the link below to go shopping.

The Wexford Stamper's Online Store

Thank you as always for visiting my blog.  Please LIKE, COMMENT and SHARE with others who may love paper crafting.

Happy Stamping,

Barb Reed- The Wexford Stamper

blreed@comcast.net