GIU Week Stamp Set Winner!

 

 

So I counted up all of the so sweet comments from everyone (thank you again!) and then entered the total number in random.org and had a number picked… counted out the comments and the winner of the drawing for the set of Unity Stamps is ……

 

 

Jen said...December 15, 2011 5:39 PM

Fabulous card! Great dimension using those elements!

 

 

 

Congratulations!!!

Please email me with your choice of stamp set and your mailing address!

Have a happy day everyone, I will see you soon!

Hugs,

Jes

Growing in Unity Week! Day 7

Last project for my Growing in Unity Week. This project is a thank you card for all of you and for Unity Stamp Co. for letting me participate. I hope that my projects showed just how great and versatile the stamps are!

For this project I used my favorite color pink on many elements! I started with paper from Basic Grey’s Hopscotch Line. Other textured cardstock used was from DCWV.



The stamps I used on this card are from Unity’s September KOM and November KOM.
The sentiment is stamped in pink, the corner is stamped in a redder pink on pink textured cardstock. The clocks are stamped in a silk green on pink polka dotted paper, then layered on additional cardstock circles.



The lace is a vintage from my stash, the pearls are Prima and the rose is Prima too! The flourishes are punched from cardstock and inked, as usual there is lots of foam adhesive and glue dots, inking on edges for aging and dimension.



There is no madness or words of wisdom for today. I just wanted to say, “Thank you!” for taking time out of your day to stop by my blog. It means a lot to me. The kind comments really helped me continue creating for the blog, and I know there are some great people out there who have not been able to comment because of technical difficulties… like my best friend, Arna. (I hope we can figure out why you are not able to comment hun!)


Even though my official posting for the GIU week is over, I am so happy to announce that I will be posting regularly from here on out. I’m back in the blog world, feels great and since I’m all about finding happiness and embracing creativity, here we go!


Thank you again, it was so nice to meet all of you!
Blessings,
Jes


P.S.
Drawing the winner of the stamp set tomorrow morning… the minute I get the kids off to school! : )

Growing in Unity Week! Day 6

Good evening! For my 6th Growing in Unity Project, I made a traditional type Christmas Card. 

1. For the base I used cream colored cardstock (from an unknown source, admittedly… hee hee) and added the awesome Basic Grey patterned paper. 


2. I used a velvety ribbon in burgundy to make a “gift” look to the card. 


3. For the sentiment and the tree, I used stamps from Unity Stamp Company’s September 2011 kit of the month. I think the designs match the Nordic background paper so well! I know I have covered up much of it with ribbon, flowers and such, but I know it’s there, I know it matches, so… I’m super happy with that. : ) 


4. I used Dew Drop ink in a metallic gold for the tree, and a green color of cat’s eye ink for the sentiment. I chalked the gift tag in a shimmery brown and inked the edges of the tree cardstock in the same gold as it was stamped. 


5. The flowers are Prima the bottom one I actually tore apart one of my budding roses and splayed out the petals and added a bow. 


6. There is also a little stamped edge accent on the side of the main image card with is brown with gold inking. 


7. Adhere parts of card together with foam adhesive and glue dots… and BAM! Christmas Card!

“Method to Madness” today is that I had to use some serious artificial light to get the shimmer ink on the tree to show up in a photo. The fine glitter in the ink, shows up to the naked eye differently depending on which direction you are looking at it. Sometimes it appears very light and hardly there, and sometimes it looks like, “wow!”. 


I find this perfect for my sentiment of “The Gift of Christmas” because with this card you might not see the main image unless you look at it a bit differently – it doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb in real life. So also, are many of the best gifts of Christmas not the ones with the shiny gold bows on them or all the yummy food. It may take looking at the season’s events and people who surround you in a different way than traditional, but once you find the hidden gift, that special something you may not have noticed before… it will be SO worth it! 

I have already had so many gifts this holiday season and they may not have meant a thing to anyone else, looking from outside of me, but I see them, I am enjoying them, and I am so thankful for them. One awesome gift this holiday season is all the super people I am meeting by participating in Growing in Unity week!


My hope for you today is that you receive (and see) some real Gifts of Christmas!


Thank you so much for stopping by and reading my blog!

Growing in Unity Week! Day 5

Today I have a tag that I made using Unity Stamps! Reminder there will be a drawing held on Monday from all of the comments during this week on Growing in Unity Posts – Monday through Sunday this week. On Monday morning, I will have random.org pick a winner for a free stamp set from Unity Stamp Co.! It will be their choice of one of the following:

Sending My Love

Bitty Backgrounds

Little Me

Bella Fiori

Homegrown

Hugs & Kittens

Handmade Holiday

Bella Trees

Imagine It

For this tag I started with a pre cut tag from Basic Grey, and cut it a bit shorter. I stamped these flowers and the rocking chair from Unity’s July 2011 Kit of the Month. 

 The flowers, I stamped and then colored and cut out, adhered to the card and then stamped, colored and cut out extra buttons from the same flower stamps. Then put them together with adhesive foam and put on the tag.  


The lace is a great off white and I think helps with the feel of the tag and the ribbon is a vintage pink ribbon. 

 For the middle I stamped the rocking chair on cardstock and then folded the top over (square like a matchbook), of course using my fav chalk to age the edges of the “matchbook” and edges of the tag too. 

 I think it would look great on a baby girl page, I wish I had time today to make a baby girl page for you, but as it was… my original planned project, sunk into the dark depths of the scrap box, and my second attempt did so as well. I persisted and kept trying and here is the result. I suppose, I could have used different stamps, or chose something else to showcase today that may have been easier… but I had stamped these flowers and really wanted to use them on a project today. I feel great about keeping with it until something worked! : ) 

 So, today… as with every other day… my hope for you is that you do not give up. Take a deep breath, and maybe a chocolate chip cookie break, and try one more time. You can do it! 

 Thank you for stopping by! 

 Scrap box: noun – the bin in our home that I keep scraps and misfit items that the boys (and I) are allowed to repurpose for projects at their (or my) free will. So hard to throw things away! Reduce, reuse, recycle!! :D

Growing in Unity Week! Day 4

Good morning! Today I have a snowman card featuring Unity Stamps!



The snowman stamp is from the November Kit of the Month and the sentiment, “a smile is the beginning of peace – Mother Teresa” is another stamp I am not sure the name of the kit it is from.

1. To make this card, I started with American Crafts Cardstock in a pretty purple cut to size and then folded for the card base.
2.  I stamped the snowman with black Staz On ink and then attempted to color with my small collection of Copics added glitter “snow” to the snow piles at the bottom of the image and let dry. Then cut out the stamped image and matted with a pretty patterned paper.

3. I added the ribbon to the card, then added the snowman on mat.

4. Stamped the sentiment on patterned paper, and distressed the top edge.

5. Took my Prima SIIC flourish and cut it apart and added it to where I wanted it on the card.

6. Then I cut the stems off of the Prima miniature roses and glued them to the card. Then I played with the petals a bit to make a few of the roses a bit fuller than they were to start with. It’s great that these are so easy to manage, if you want a full flower, or a smaller flower..the paper with let you mess with it by squeezing the sides in for a smaller flower or gently pulling the petals down for a fuller look.

Thank you so much for stopping by today! I appreciate your comments :)
Today I hope that you find a moment to just smile, maybe for no good reason at all other than in about 5 seconds after starting to smile, you start to feel all the good vibes that come with happiness, and maybe someone who sees you will start to feel like smiling too!

Growing in Unity Week! Day 3

Project number 3 already! : ) Today, I have a card to share with you made with Unity Stamp Co. stamps, and I have to say…I really like this one. I think I may just put it on my own card wall for keeps.



Now there is always a method to my madness here at Layouts from the Heart and with this card, I purposely chose muted colors to signify and represent the “quiet” the sentiment speaks of.

The stamped “flower” with the sentiment on it is really two different stamps from Unity, and I do not know which collection they are from because I used just a grab bag set I had purchased from them for this project. But I used cat’s eye ink pads for the outer muted teal color, and then I used Brilliance ink for the sentiment. The stamped butterfly is in a pink color and then stamped with a pink red and hand cut out so I could bend the wings over the rose flower as if it were landing on the flower.

I chose the butterfly with the music notes to represent all the beautiful things we can hear if we are to be quiet enough to listen… to really listen. I know it is hard most days with all of the crazy things in life we have to do, places we have to go, demands put upon us by ourselves or others, but if somehow we could carve out a few moments of the rush to quiet ourselves, maybe something beautiful will pop out at us just as much as the butterfly pops out of this card! Obvious that it is there, right? But had I chose louder colors that competed with the butterfly it might not have been so visible. : ) That’s the thought behind it anyway.

As far as supplies go, the flower is from Prima and is from the Treasure Rae Georgia set and the papers are from DCWV, the ribbon is a satin edged organza, the stamps are (of course) from Unity.

Thank you again for stopping by!
I hope that today, you hear or see something special and meaningful when you take the time to have a quiet moment!

Growing In Unity Week! Day 2

Today, for my Growing in Unity Day 2 project, I have a set of small and simple tags that I made with a love theme – great for Valentine’s Day coming up or any day coming up, as I just love hearts and the love themed stuff!

Here’s how I did it:

1. I stamped the images on different shades of pink cardstock tags and chalked the edges with Pebbles Inc. Pearlescent chalks (I seem to reach for those frequently!).

 

2. The rubber stamps I used were from Unity Stamp Company – Samantha Walker, With all My Heart kit, I really like the quality of images they produce! The set contains 20 different images, I chose the smaller ones for these tags. The one tag on the far left is a border stamp and also one little flourished heart stamped twice.

 

3. For the ink I used Dew Drop Brilliance ink (because I like the slight shimmer to it and fast drying time)

 

4. Lastly I punched a hole in the top and tied with some cotton twine.

 

The tags measure about 2.25” long and 1.5” wide. A great way to dress up little gifts as the back side is blank, or to add to a larger project :)

 

Thank you again for stopping by today! I hope you feel joy and satisfaction in everything you do today!

Jessica

Growing In Unity Week! Day 1

Today is the first of many projects that will be posted featuring Unity Stamp Co.’s wonderful stamps! This week is special because there will be a Giveaway!!! From all of the comments on my Growing in Unity posts at the end of the week I will randomly pick one winner and that randomly picked winner has a choice of one Unity Stamp Co. kit from the following list:

Sending My Love

Bitty Backgrounds

Little Me

Bella Fiori

Homegrown

Hugs & Kittens

Handmade Holiday

Bella Trees

Imagine It

 

Yay!!! So here is project number one!

A simple card with a simple, yet not so simple sentiment. “Smile and forget Everything” is great advice for anyone! At least for a short amount of time, if we an somehow not worry, and just smile, things will seem so much more livable and enjoyable. I love this sentiment and the shabby way my inking smeared! I just smiled and thought it added to the distressing of the main embellishment :) The cardstock is DCWV, the Stamped edges of the layered sentiment was cut from my Silhouette, and the ribbons on the bottom are all May Arts. I used ribbon to make the flower accent and cut a butterfly from another ribbon to use as a center.

 

It was amazing the experience of being able to participate in the Growing In Unity program. I already have learned so much about myself and my crafting, from the email last week saying that this was my week, to today (and I’m sure beyond today) I have grown as a crafter and a person. I have grown as a crafter, because of the challenge of coming up with 7 projects to share with the world, in a week and also because of the challenge of not having any limitations on these projects. I’m so indecisive, looking through crates of papers, sets and sets of Unity stamps, the variety of inks, searching for inspiration from my supplies was something else! lol, I found out about myself that I have grown used to being given directions for projects… i.e. “I need a baby boy page, I need a wedding page with this color and that color in a modern style, or say… a birthday card needs to be made for an aunt, and I know the aunt likes purple and angels. Then I whip up the project with the “qualifications” and I’m happy with it! However, when left to my own devices, my own infinite choices… I tended to become paralyzed with the options, and felt that I would talk myself out of most ideas that I had! How silly is that?! I hope that I have made progress in getting over that, it may be a long road ahead of me to totally squash the voice inside me that says, “nope..that’s too boring, nope…that’s been done before, nope…those are obvious color choices, everyone uses that sentiment with that picture, etc, etc.” I am explaining all of this because I hope I’m not the only one out there and maybe we can find strength together in the fact that creating anything with such wonderful supplies as are available to us, whether they be similar or not to anyone else’s projects, is really an accomplishment in itself. A piece of my heart and time goes into every project, I do my best, and well… maybe it will inspire someone else out there… and that would make me smile!

 

Thank you so much for stopping by today!

Blessings and have a joyful, creative day!