ATC Club Has a New Name

The ATC Club that meets at Stamp Fever has a new name: OC Art Society. They gathered for their regular meeting yesterday to celebrate Trina's birthday. The group took advantage of the tea party setting on the patio to stage a celebration photo.

Looks like they had a great time. Stamp Fever sends happy birthday wishes to Trina!

Design Team Wednesday- Store Transformation

Today we are highlighting the work of the Stamp Fever Design Team in transforming our store into a beautiful garden setting. Kathy and Katie were tasked with planning and carrying out the design plans. I think you will agree they did a fabulous job! Gina designed the 6x6 page kits and the official Stamp Fever DT t-shirt! Nancy designed the Shop Hop logo.

Patio tablescape: 

The classic book, The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett 

was the inspiration for our holiday. Kathy created the delicious looking faux cakes.

Four views of the patio

Here's Linda modeling the T-shirt designed by Gina

Fabulous front window display by Kathy and Katie

The storage cabinet was repurposed beautifully to display

 the selection of Lockhart stamps and sample cards

Gina's 6x6 page samples, featuring Lawn Fawn's "My Cup of Tea" stamp set

Special store Make n Take: flower pin

Our official Shop Hop 2012 pin

One of the many garden themed vignette's you'll find throughout the store.

The store has been stocked with lots of wonderful products for the Shop Hop event.

Here's the sign that gives a warm welcome to all our shoppers.

Thanks for taking this little tour with us, we hope you will come in and see the beautiful work that the design team has done in person.

Tea Time in the Stamp Fever Garden!

The So Cal Shop Hop 2012 is underway and Stamp Fever has been transformed into a Secret Garden! Here's some pictures from the first weekend- happy shop hoppers in our Tea Party Photo Op.

We love it when groups come in wearing coordinating outfits like the next 2 photos:

So much fun!

And our Make n Take teapot/flower pin was even a hit with the younger shop hoppers!

The Shop Hop fun continues through August 5....come by and have your picture taken and enjoy our peaceful garden setting!

photos were edited using PicMonkey

Monday Mojo

Today we are going to take a look at some stamps that we haven't used in a while and apply a current technique.

I love the look of water coloring with Distress inks, it's quick and easy and always looks so good! This time I did some stamping and white embossing before adding some water coloring. The stamp set I used is a favorite flower set by Lawn Fawn called "Judy's Blooms".  This set is one of their first stamp sets and it's perfect for this water color look!

This technique was done on watercolor paper. Distress ink colors are from the various Seasonal Sets: Seedless Preserves, Ripe Persimmon, Mustard Seed, Picked Raspberries, Mowed Lawn, and Salty Ocean. To add a little bit of texture I stamped Hero Arts Old Letter Writing lightly over the top using Weathered Wood Distress ink. The sentiment is Lawn Fawn Grand Greetings.

Here's the stamps used in the sample card.

Do you have some favorite stamps or sets that have been to the back as you have acquired new sets? Now is the time to get them out and use them with a new technique, you will be surprised how versatile your stamp stash can be.

And for anyone not familiar with the Distress ink water color technique, I've linked a great Hero Arts video with Shari Carroll HERE

Happy Monday and Happy Stamping and Water Coloring!

Friday Quick Tip

Lynette has an awesome "green" solution for a pesky problem.

"Recently I was teaching a class and everyone commented on how they like my button storage, so I thought it would be nice to share this tip with our Stamp Fever followers. All my buttons are sorted out by color and placed in re-purposed Starbucks jars. This method keeps your buttons well organized, easy to find, and looks cute too. The picture below shows a few of the jars from my stash.  I hope you liked this tip and have fun collecting those buttons!"

Nancy says: Just a little hint for getting those cute jars ready for your buttons. The labels peel off really easy but sometimes they leave some sticky residue behind. I have used Goo Gone with great results. Saturate a cotton ball with the Goo Gone and apply to the sticky areas, you will need to go over it a number of times and use a bit of elbow grease to remove all traces of adhesive. Then follow up with a quick wash with dish soap and hot water and these little babies are good to go.
How great would these jars look all lined up on a shelve in your craft space?

Design Team Wednesday

Kathy's here with a quick but highly effective stamping tip.

"Ever have a day when you just couldn't get a full coverage on your silhouette stamps?  Here is what I do when that happens. See the close ups?....don't like that "pitted" look?  Grab your Fantastix coloring tool by Tsukineko and dab it in the ink.  I have one designated just for black ink.  Then carefully color over the area that needs more ink.  I have fixed many an image this way.  I've tried other coloring pens, but love this look the best."

Here's the problem- splotchy black color on your silhouette stamping.

Correct the problem with a Fantastix Ink Applicator Coloring Tool

Just dip the tip in the ink pad to pick up the ink 

and color over the uneven ink on your stamped image.

This technique will work great on large solid stamp images and more intricate designs.

Here's the wonderful result......

And here is this pretty silhouette image used on one of Kathy's signature vintage style cards.

The Tsukineko Fantastix Coloring tools come in sets of 6, each with a cap so you can reuse them.  They come in Brush Point, Bullet Point and a Combo Set. They retail for $5.00 per set.

The silhouette stamp is part of the set  "so blessed" by Penny Black

Thanks Kathy, for another great "insider" tip!

Monday Mojo

It's that time again for a little nudge in the inspiration direction. Are you in need of some mojo today? Try this:

Think about the best card you ever made, the one that got all the ooohs and aaaahs when it was pulled from the envelope. The one that just came together so perfectly that you knew you were on the way to being the queen of card-making. Got the picture in your mind? Or better yet look it up in your photo gallery or on your blog. Now head to your desk and make it again. That's all, remake a favorite card and you will be surprised how quickly your mojo returns.

Here's a favorite card of mine:

Lawn Fawn stamps: Sunny Skies, Smitty's ABCs. Lawn Fawn Bright Side 6x6 Petite Paper Pack.

Hero Arts Envelope Pattern background stamp

And here's the remake with only a few little changes- the sentiment, the background stamping and  the stamped pieces are trimmed right on the outline:

Lawn Fawn stamps: Sunny Skies, Belinda's Borders. Lawn Fawn Bright Side 6x6 Petite Paper Pack

Try this little trick to jump start your creativity this week.

Happy Stamping!

Quick Tip Friday

Today's Quick Tip brings with it a little challenge. If you are like me you save all those stamped bits and pieces that just didn't quite make the cut on the original project. Maybe you stamped more than you needed or you changed your mind half way to the finish. Sometimes I have bits and pieces leftover from die cutting or punching shapes for a card. Whatever the reason, the problem is that now you are stuck with baskets, boxes, baggies and maybe even drawers full of leftover bits.

I've never been able to part with a piece that is in good shape and isn't overly horrendous. I've had some pieces like that, you know what I'm talking about, the ones that make you rethink your chosen hobby because you must not be very good if you can make something like that!

Any way, here's a peek into just one of my scrap piles:

So I challenged myself to choose 3 items at random from the basket and create a card with them. The kicker is that I have to use it this week. So this will be winging its way somewhere by Friday.

Straight from the scrap pile came the kissed background, the white embossed wood grain label and the butterfly punched from patterned paper. The only things I added were a kraft card base, a sentiment stamped on a scrap, a random button that was sitting on my desk (if you don't move fast enough you will get a glue dot on your backside and stuck to a card!). 

All stamps are Hero Arts. Twine is Lawn Fawn, the butterfly punch is EK Success. 

The sentiment is stamped with Jenni Bowlin Spice Tin ink dye.

The little bit of twine was from another of my collections....the bits of ribbon jar!

Now here's your assignment....go through your scraps, leftovers, bits and pieces, whatever you call them and select 3 at random. Now make a card with them and send it off to a special friend.

Happy Stamping!

Happy Fourth of July!!

Image courtesy VintageHolidayCrafts.com

Although Stamp Fever is closed today we thought it would be nice to do a post about a wonderful organization called, Operation Write Home! OWH receives hundreds of thousands of hand made cards each year from paper crafters and stampers and sends them to our military personnel serving overseas. As a past Marine mom who didn't get much mail when my son was deployed I can truly appreciate the concept of supplying our troops with greeting cards of all types for them to send home to family and friends. Keeping in touch with their support system is so important and as you know there are no Hallmark stores in the deserts of the Middle East.

To learn more about Operation Write Home, please visit their website HERE. And make to watch THIS inspiring video too!

Stamp Fever will be having an OWH card making event later this summer, more information to come!

Have a happy and safe Independence Day from your friends at Stamp Fever!