Thank you very much + an experiment with brads

This is one of the cards that we made at my Open House last weekend. I love its simple design and crisp palette. I made a bunch of these cards, and I just changed the sentiment at the bottom to "Birthday Hugs and Wishes" on a few.


This card was inspired by a few stampin' things I've learned on the web. First, I was hoping to use up my Vintage Violet cardstock, since it's no longer available. I discovered the Color Combinations Tool, a website that helps you coordinate Stampin' Up colors. I selected Vintage Violet, and then clicked "search". It gave me all sorts of color combinations that use vintage violet. I don't think I would've put these colors together on my own. There's a link to the Color Combinations tool in the Stampin' Links list on the sidebar of my blog.


Also, I have new favorite tool, thanks to this card. I'm really enjoying the paper piercing tool and the paper piercing template. Using the guide, I can punch evenly spaced holes in my cardstock. It makes a really cool effect, and I like how it looks with this stamp set that already has dots around the edges. I can punch holes wherever I like, which means that I can punch holes to put brads in the center of these flowers.


I got this stamp set for free when I signed up to be Stampin' Up Demonstrator. It's called "In the Spotlight" and it's a hostess set from the new Fall-Winter Collection 2007 which debuted July 1st. You can get it for free when you host a Stampin' Up workshop in your home. I got it in May, though, so I got a head start on making projects with it. (My stamping friends were jealous!) I'll be posting some other samples soon.



So I learned a lesson with brads while working on this card. I haven't worked with brads very much before. I was trying to use up my stash of non-Stampin' Up brads, while I was waiting for my SU brads to arrive. (It doesn't make sense to demonstrate products that I don't sell.) I discovered that these pewter mini circle brads (pictured on the left) are really hard to open. You know how the legs on brads are usually two different lengths, so you can open them up? Not so with these brads... so you have to try and pry them open with your fingernail, and they don't come open easily, let me tell you. I chipped my nail and risked sending a brad under the fingernail trying to get these open. When the Stampin' Up brads finally arrived, I discovered that not only do the brad-legs have different lengths, but that they're already slightly open, thus saving the fingernails. Only SU brads from now-on for me!

By the way, the other thing I learned online before making this card is that the dotted line in this stamp set can actually be used as a flower stem! It wasn't until looking through the In the Spotlight gallery on Splitcoaststampers.com that I connected the dots, so to speak.