How sweet it is!

How sweet it is... nap time that is! I'm a SAHM (stamp-at-home-mom) on an extended maternity leave from my job. Nap time is one of my favourite times of day when I can steal a few moments of creativity for myself.

When I don't have a lot of time to stamp, I like to jump-start the ideas, usually with one of the daily challenges from splitcoaststampers or by using a new stamp set or something I've gotten recently. For this card, I went with today's sketch challenge on a Valentine's theme. I started off by making the pink background layer by wanding shades of pink from my fluid chalk queue (how nice to have various shades in one easy spot!) and adding the small swirl from Priceless, which I just got, in three shades of pigment ink. I heat set it with the iron and then moved on to the focal image. I wanted a horizontal image, but nothing was jumping off my shelf. Then my eye lit upon my jumbo outline alphabet and I thought that would do the trick. I used my stamp-a-majig to get the letters (mostly) straight and coloured them with the lid of my purely pomegranate ink pad and my aquapainter. These panels were mounted on a sheet of rose red designer prints, on a pomegranate card base. The accent is a flower and brad from my Pretties kit, which I have vowed to stop hoarding. I tinted the flower to match with more pomegranate ink and my aquapainter. Isn't that nice to have perfectly matching embellishments!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies Stamps: Jumbo Outline Alphabet, Priceless (both Stampin' Up!); Ink: Palette black noir, purely pomegranate, fluid chalk rose petal queue, color box pigment ink (velvet, pink, peony); Paper: papertrey ink white cardstock, purely pomegranate, rose red designer prints (SU); Accessories: stylus and foam tip, Pretties kit (SU)

French Flair "Merci"

Today's Limited Supplies Challenge on splitcoast was to focus on background stamps. The limitations were 1-2 background stamps, no designer paper, no dry embossing, limited embellishments, 2 colours plus a neutral.

I took a look at my background stamps and chose French Flair. I love how it coordinates with my Carte Postale set too. I wanted a soft colour scheme and I haven't used plum in a while, so I went with Pale Plum (the lighter shade) and Perfect Plum (the darker shade). French Flair was stamped in Perfect Plum and the swallow from Carte Postale was stamped in white pigment ink and heat embossed. I thought the card needed a sentiment, so I stamped "Merci", also from the Carte Postale set, in Perfect Plum and punched it out with my word window punch. I accented it with a mini rhinestone brad from my Pretties kit. The final touch to this card was a length of white taffeta ribbon, tied with a simple knot. Easy-peasy!

This card didn't take more than about 15 minutes from start to finish. What a great warm-up for VSN tonight! (VSN is Virtual Stamp Night on splitcoast, with different stamping challenges every hour, on the hour, and only 45 minutes to complete each one. It's a blast!)

Thanks for looking!

You're So Sweet

I made this card for today's Ways To Use It Challenge (149) on splitcoast. The challenge was to incorporate heat embossing creatively. I chose to emboss one of my new stamps from my Valentine cube from Sunshine Designs. These were part of my prize package for the contest I won in November {thank you Sunshine Designs!!!}.

I started off by making the heart background using the emboss-resist technique. I embossed the hearts on Naturals White using clear embossing powder and then added various shades of pink from my new fluid chalk queue (rose petals). It's nice to have various shades of the same colour. I find it gives the background more interest and depth. I matted the background on a piece of whisper white, with just a narrow border showing.

For the focal image, I embossed the candy dish with black embossing powder and coloured the candies with my Tombow markers, and a bit of the chalk ink to tie in the colours. The sentiment, another one from Sunshine Designs, was embossed on pomegranate paper with white embossing powder. The sentiment panel seemed to need a little something so I trimmed the bottom with my scallop-edged scissors. The ribbon accents are from the Flirty Ribbon Originals package that's been mostly hoarded until now. The last little bit of embellishment was some Fruit Punch stickles on the pink hearts. I just love how the stickles draw the eye to the focal image and give it that extra pop.

I think this will make a nice valentine card. My DH has been known to grumble that he doesn't get cards, which is actually true. It's a bit of a case of the shoemaker's children not being shod around here.... Maybe I'll make this for him. On the other hand, I bought several valentine stamps when I was in Edmonton with a view to making him a valentine and this card doesn't use any of them! I'll just have to make a few cards and see which one I like best. This one is a bit pink for a guy-card.....

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies Stamps: Sunshine Designs; Ink: versamark, black pigment ink, fluid chalk ink (rose coral, rouge, warm red, warm violet); Paper: watercolour, Purely Pomegranate, Whisper White, Naturals White; Accessories: clear embossing powder, black embossing powder, white embossing powder, Flirty Ribbon Originals (Stampin' Up!), Tombow markers, scallop-edge scissors (Fiskars), stickles (fruit punch).

Button Snowman

Here's a card I made just before Christmas. I needed some cards to go with gift subscriptions and I just love this little button snowman from Sunshine Designs. The snowman is stamped with Palette ink and painted with twinkling H20's, and the buttons are highlighted with diamond glaze. I finished it off with some Stickles here and there for some extra shine. The sparkly snowflakes in the background were created with a snowflake stamp (no maker's identification), a glue pad, and glitter.

Supplies Stamps: snowman from Sunshine Designs, The Stamp Barn, "celebrate" from Old Island Stamps, snowflake unknown; Paper: watercolour paper, soft sky, blue bayou; Ink: Palette black noir; Accessories: glue pad, diamond glaze, dazzling diamonds glitter, twinkling H20's, stickles

Welcome to my new blog!

Hello! Welcome to my new blog! I called it The Daley Stamper because I love to stamp and I stamp almost every day. And, being a Daley (as well as someone who can't resist a pun) I thought that would be a good name.

I've been thinking about starting a blog for a long time now, and have finally decided to take the plunge. It's taken me a while for a couple of reasons. First off, it always takes me a while to catch up with the trends, whatever they are. I'm much more of a trailing-edge person than a cutting-edge person, but I'm ok with that. Second, the whole technical aspect of blogging didn't really appeal to me. However, my mother is a very tech-savvy person and has really helped me out with all the behind-the-scenes stuff. (Thanks Mum! :D)

So here I am, another voice in the stamping-blog world. I hope you enjoy what you see here and I hope it inspires you to make something special for a special someone in your life.

For my first post, I thought I'd share something I made on my visit out west. My mother and I took a class at Western Educational Activities Ltd. (stamping swoon!!!) in Edmonton, taught by the amazing Cathie Allan (yes, it's true! I got to take a class from Cathie Allan and it was fantastic, another stamping swoon!!!).

In the "Back to Basics" class, Cathie taught us how to make gorgeous backgrounds using fluid chalk and pigment inks. The trick to the pigment inks is heat setting them with an iron. Who knew! I will definitely be using this technique in the future. Not only is it a lot of fun, you can really get some gorgeous colour combinations.

I love this card - I don't usually make them so big (it's 5.5x7"), but it was fun to try something new and this technique really works well on a large palette. I made it a pocket card, with a tag insert that's big enough to be a book mark.

Notes on the card: I won't go into a lot of detail about the technique since it was from a class and I don't have permission from the store or instructor to share. Basically, the panel is created by layering colours and uses pigment and chalk ink, and resist techniques.

Supplies Stamps: Daisy - Old Island Stamp Company, "Magic Happens" and dandelion - Serendipity Stamps, "Life is the flower" - Paper Inspirations; Paper: whisper white, basic black, taken with teal; Ink: colorbox fluid chalk (lavender, aquamarine, blue lagoon), colorbox pigment ink; Accessories: clear and black embossing powder, Dove blender pen, flower brads, Tombow and Marvy markers, eyelash yarn