3 Day Christmas Sale begins today!

Wanna fill your stocking with some digital wonderfulness? Check out the 3-day 20% off Christmas sale at http://www.mygrafico.com. Everything is on sale so have fun stuffing your shopping cart!

For some inspiration for making some after the holidays Thank You's, 

here is a hybrid card created with my Elegant Name Plates set, gorgeous papers 

from K&Company along with a butterfly stamp from their Que Sera Sera clear stamp set. 

Designer tip: I printed the plum colored frame with the word thanks typeset in black 

onto a high quality sheet of white Epson paper. Sponged over the frame with ink, spattered 

with teal and purple markers, trimmed around the frame with scissors and layered over 

top of a ribbon. I used Glue Arts high tac adhesive with my Glue Glider Pro for 

assembly and a small strip of ribbon adhesive to attach the body of the 3D butterfly. 

And using my Vintage Pines set along with some artistic papers from Lil Ellaboudy, 

another mygrafico designer, I created this years Christmas card, digitally.

Be sure to add these 2 Brand NEW Released sets to your wish list!

For those of you who love to work in Photoshop with brushes, you will love the Mod Labels 1 set.

And for those of you who want to work with eps, jpeg or png files, try these pre-colorized labels and verses. 72 files in all....what a deal for $5.50. And if you buy during the sale they are even less!

You can use the png files to colorize or editable eps to colorize or even add multiple colors to these designs. Perfect for handmade tags, gift labels...think wine bottles, baked goods, gifts and more!

These can also be used to create monogrammed note cards or embroidered items. Check out this sample using a background border from the Lovey Dovey Brushes set and Mod Color Labels.

Merry, merry Christmas to all! Live Life Creativley in 2011!

You Must Always Say “Thanks”!

Maybe it just was how I was raised, but it is just an unspoken rule for me that if someone does something nice for you or helps you in any way, that you must thank them. When I started as a Stampin’ Up!® demonstrator years ago, I knew this was something that I would incorporate into my business practice. So with every order, I always include a handwritten note of thanks. Sometimes it is a tag attached to the bag; sometimes a card showing a technique we learned at my workshop or maybe even a small note card enclosed with the order thanking my customer for their select purchases. This is a great way to show off  new stamp sets, patterned papers and ribbons. I suggest to my customers that they recycle these on cards/projects of their own, but many keep them for later inspiration and ideas.

Creating multiples of a card design or idea is simple to do and makes good use of your time and energy. You have the concept and supplies out so why not make a whole bunch? You can use this idea for creating a stash of thank you’s, birthday or even personal note cards. And of course this works well for Christmas cards. Cut your cardstock, ribbons and layers at the same time, then stamp, embellish and assemble.

You will see in the photo, above, an example of how you can mix it up a bit and change out one of the layers of paper or alter the layout slightly to create other variations of the original design. That comes in handy if you run out of cardstock or need to change things up. For this “Hint of Mint” group of thank you’s, I also made a full size card and smaller tag for my neighbor, Elaine while I was busy making my customer bag tags. Sorry that these aren’t some of my better project photos, but you get the idea!  

Need to make room for new papers and products? Try using up some of your retired cardstock or older supply stashes. For this, I used some retired Mint cardstock, a retired ink, wheel and a verse stamp along with some current supplies. It feels good to not keep hoarding all your supplies or forgetting to use some “oldies but goodies” sets! Try it!

Stamps: Doodle wheel (recently retired), Warmest Regards (06-07 hostess set, retired);  Wow Flowers; A Beautiful Thing (solid flower stamp)

Cardstock: Mint, Chocolate Chip, Creamy Carmel

Inks: Chocolate Chip and Baha Breeze, retired  (For the wheeled pattern, I cut cardstock first, inked up wheel by rolling on top of Baja Breeze ink pad, then rolled onto cardstock with scrap sheet below).

Adhesive: Glue Arts® Glue Glider™ Pro with your choice of adhesive: High Tac*; Perma Tac or Perma Square  (*used for this project)

Other: Stamping sponge (distress edges); corner rounder (for small tag); dimensionals (to pop up center piece on thank you card); extended reach 1/8" punch (to punch center holes for brads); rectangle punch (for tag); gold mini brads and brown organza ribbon.