Simon Says Happy Birthday

This week at the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge, they are celebrating their 8th birthday as a Challenge Blog. Simon Says Stamp gets hundreds of entries to their challenges each week and they are one of the two main places that I go to for my one stop shopping. They have their own brand of exclusive stamps and dies plus inks, papers, sequins and much more. They carry a wide variety and full line of general crafting supplies including some of the most popular brands out there like Tim Holtz's Distress Line of Products which you know are some of my favorites. In fact, I can hardly wait for the next release of Distress Oxide Inks which I hope is not a whole year away.

I've mentioned in the past that when I get supplies out for Fresh Bouquet, that I stamp extras so they are ready to go when I need a quick card at the last minute. I just stamp them using color combinations that I like which is what this already stamped image is. This bouquet was stamped in Sweet Blush, Pale Peony and Berry Sorbet for the flowers with Vintage Jadeite for the leaves. The embossing is done in Simon Says Stamp Antique Gold Embossing Powder.  The Fancy Butterfly is from Impression Obsession and is my favorite of all the ones that I have. It was cut from Gold Foiled cardstock.  The banner is also cut from Stamper's Select White using the banner from Tag Sale: Quilted Dies.  The Happy Birthday Sentiment is from Botanical Blocks.  I really like the size of the sentiments in this set and they are among my most used.  This design would work for any number of occasions.

My card base was cut from Stamper's Select White Cardstock using the Noted: Scalloped A2 Die Set.  The Berry Sorbet colored panel is half of a WPLUS9 Sunshine Layers Die that has been cut to fit on the horizontal card.  I actually messed up a corner when I was die cutting the panel originally, but I saved the piece to see if I could use at least some of it later. I'm always happy when that works out, but I swear I need less paper scraps in my work area!  I used Thin 3D Foam Squares to assemble the card.



At some point every couple of months I go through the pile of scraps and eliminate pieces that I shouldn't have tried to salvage in the first place. But even after that, I still have a large amount of scraps. I use a 12 x 12 paper pocket and keep that folder right next to my desk so I can look there first when I start trying to pull colors together for a cards. I'm getting ready to play with some new dies and I'm going to start with the scraps since it is a multi layer design.  Wish me luck in using some of them up!

Thank you for stopping by today and I hope you'll come back soon.  I always appreciate it when you take time to leave me a comment or word of encouragement.