Take Two Winners

WINNERS!!!

As promised, here are the winners:

Take Two, Day 1: Crappy Day

Take Two, Day 2: Pain & Pride

Take Two, Day 3: Shine, Shine, Shine

Take Two, Day 4: A Simple Christmas

Take Two, Day 5: Take Your Time

Dahlhouse Designs Watermarks

All winners, please email Lisa at dahlhousedesigns (at) yahoo (dot) com with your full name and mailing address to claim your prize. Please state in the subject line that it's for Take Two Week and the specific prize you've won. If any winners have not claimed their prize by 11:59 p.m. Saturday, March 31, 2012, we will re-draw and announce the new winner on Sunday, April 1, 2012.

Congratulations to all the winners! Winners for the Take Two kits were chosen from either Lisa's blog or my blog on the day the kit was featured. Winners for the Dahlhouse Designs watermarks were chosen from all of the comments on Lisa's blog or my blog. If you are on the Unity Stamp Company Facebook Page, please say hello to Angela Magnuson and send her a huge thanks for supporting this event!

Thank you, Lisa, for all your hard work this week and in the months prior to Take Two. You did an amazing job with your cards and with the badges and blinkies!! I love our friendship and your immense talent!

Thank you all so much for being a part of Take Two with me and Lisa! Everyone who came by and left comments on both our blogs made this week a huge success and we can't thank you enough!! We are thrilled that there are so many of you who asked that we continue this tradition. ;) Thank you for enjoying our creations and Unity!

We hope you'll be back to visit us often. Enjoy your week!

Take Two Week {Day 5} + Unity Friends With Flair {Mar 23rd}

Happy Friday!! Today is the conclusion of Take Two Week with Lisa Arana! It's been a very busy week for me creatively and personally so I'm really happy to have a chance to relax this weekend. In fact, I was so busy that I made all my projects the night before the posts went up. What, you say? That's completely insane! I know, that's why I'm relieved it's Friday. LOL So let's get to today's projects. Lisa and I chose to work with two images from the November 2011 Kit of the Month - Take Your Time. Only two of these stamps had seen ink previously which is why I really wanted to work with it.

My first card uses the clocks and I paired it up with one of several sentiments that work with it. I am always in need of thank you cards so it was logical that I chose this one. I love that Take Your Time is so great for girlfriends! Being the mother of a toddler, I don't get to spend as much time with my girlfriends as I used to and, when I do, it's a lot of effort on both our parts to get our schedules matched up. Cards like this tell my friends how much I appreciate them after we'd have our fun. I finally got some stamping markers and this was my first time using them. I don't know why I waited so long!

My second card uses the dress form and true friend sentiment. I used a black stamping marker to ink up one line at a time and stamp it on patterned paper. It took a lot of patience but I really like how it turned out and will definitely be trying this again. One other thing I did on this card was channel Lisa's ability to use faux stitching as the perfect finishing touch! I tried doing that here so you can be the judge. :)

I'd like to express a huge debt of gratitude to and admiration for both Lisa Arana and Angela Magnuson of Unity Stamp Company for making Take Two happen again this year! Don't forget, you have until 11:59 p.m. on Saturday, March 24th to leave comments on all the Take Two posts this week. The prizes are the five stamp sets featured this week and two of Lisa's fantastic watermarks. Lisa and I will announce all seven winners on both our blogs on Monday, March 26, 2012. Thank you so much for making this week a huge success!! Oh, and if you like the stamps we showcased, there's a big sale going on at Unity Stamp Company so you can head on over there right now and shop to your heart's content. ;)

Now head on over to Lisa's blog for her take on the clocks and dress form from Take Your Time!

Don't forget to play Friends With Flair today if you're creating with Unity!

Sources for Thanks: SU Natural White, Tangerine Tango, Daffodil Delight, Wisteria Wonder & Tempting Turquoise cardstock; Unity Stamp Co. November 2011 Kit of the Month - Take Your Time; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; SU Tempting Turquoise & Tangerine Tango inks; SU Perfect Plum, Daffodil Delight & Basic Black Stampin' Write markers; We R Memory Keepers corner chomper; foam tape

Sources for A True Friend: SU Crumb Cake cardstock; Bazzill Basics textured black cardstock; My Mind's Eye Away We Go 6 x 6 paper pad; Unity Stamp Co. November 2011 Kit of the Month - Take Your Time; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; Tim Holtz for Ranger Wild Honey & Broken China distress inks; SU Basic Black Stampin' Write marker; Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels Five; Uniball Signo broad white gel pen

Take Two Week {Day 4}

Wow, can you believe it's already Thursday? I've had so much fun this week creating for Take Two with Lisa Arana and I hope you're enjoying it, too! Today, we've chosen A Simple Christmas (which happens to be on sale right now for only $11.25, down from $25.00 so it's a steal). I bought my set last year when it was released and never inked it up so we decided it needed some love. Today, I used it in a non-holiday way. The banner itself and the postal mark has a couple of holiday-themed images and words but I chose non-traditional holiday colours to transform the stamps. I also used a birthday sentiment from Happily Ever After to make this a masculine birthday card. I have a couple of friends who celebrate their birthdays close to the Christmas holiday so this will be stored in my stash for them! My favourite image in A Simple Christmas is the giant postcard because it's 3.75" x 5.5" and makes a full-size card. The banner is so pretty and you could easily paper piece your favourite patterns from the flags to make a completely unique one. I always love using non-holiday stamps in holiday ways and vice-versa. This set could certainly do that.

Lisa and I are giving away all five stamp sets showcased this week, thanks to the generosity of Angela Magnuson and Unity Stamp Company. Lisa is also giving away two of her incredible watermarks which we both use on our photos. You have until 11:59 p.m. on Saturday, March 24th to comment on all ten posts this week for your chance to win seven prizes! We will announce the winners on both of our blogs on Monday, March 26, 2012. Thank you for stopping by again and I'll see you tomorrow for the Take Two Finale. Now it's time to hop on over to Lisa's blog for her take on A Simple Christmas!

Sources: SU Natural White cardstock; SU Night of Navy, Kiwi Kiss & More Mustard inks; Unity Stamp Co. A Simple Christmas & Happily Ever After; foam tape

Take Two Week {Day 3}

Welcome to {Day 3} of Take Two with Lisa Arana! It's mid-week and we are thrilled with your reception of the inspiration we're providing this week using stamps from Unity Stamp Company and {ippity}. Yesterday, we shared an {ippity} set and today we are sharing another one of our favourites Shine, Shine, Shine. If I had to pick only one talent of Lisa's (and there are many) that I greatly admire, it would have to be her use of patterned paper. Wouldn't you agree? So here I'm channelling my inner Lisa. LOL I recently got addicted to buying 6x6 pads of patterned paper and I'm proud of myself for cutting into them pretty much right away instead of just hoarding them to admire! I love that this {ippity} set is full of encouragement. I made the pleated at the top of the card using the Lil' Inker Designs Fringe Flower die. This card would make a great pick-me-up for any friend who's feeling down. You have a chance to win Shine, Shine, Shine if you comment all week long on my blog and Lisa's blog!

Now head on over to Lisa's blog to see her take on Shine, Shine, Shine!

Sources: SU Natural White cardstock; My Mind's Eye Miss Caroline - Dilly Dally; {ippity} by Unity Stamp Co. Shine, Shine, Shine; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; Lil' Inker Designs Fringe Flower die; foam tape; We R Memory Keepers corner chomper

Take Two Week {Day 2}

Welcome to {Day 2} of Take Two with Lisa Arana! Thank you so much for all your feedback yesterday. We're thrilled to entertain you with rolls of toilet paper. LOL Hopefully you will get the same giggles from today's set which is Pain and Pride by {ippity} for Unity. It's definitely not winter anymore. In fact, we skipped spring and went straight to a hot blazing summer so this image makes me feel a little cooler. When I am shopping for stamp sets, the sentiments are just as important as the images. If the sentiments aren't interesting, the images don't matter. This is one of those complete sets where every single sentiment will see ink! All I could think of when making this window scene was, "And then you have to come inside." HAHA You can see another card I made with this set HERE.

If you are new to Take Two, Lisa and I are featuring five different stamp sets, one each day this week. You have until 11:59 p.m. EST on Saturday, March 24th to comment on my blog and Lisa's blog for the week's posts. That gives you ten chances to win one of five stamp sets from Unity Stamp Company as well as two of Lisa's awesome watermarks! We will announce the winners on Monday, March 26th, 2012.

Now hop on over to Lisa's blog to see her take on Pain and Pride!

Sources: Gina K Designs pure luxury white cardstock; {ippity} for Unity Stamp Co. Pain & Pride; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; Tim Holtz for Ranger Tumbled Glass & Broken China distress inks; Copic markers; Papertrey Ink Alpha-Blocks die

Take Two Week {Day 1}

Hello, and welcome to Take Two! Lisa Arana and I are so thrilled you are joining us to celebrate the first anniversary of Take Two. A year ago, Lisa and I teamed up for a week of fun showcasing the same stamps from Unity Stamp Company in two different ways. This year, we decided we had to do it again and the über-awesome Angela Magnuson has once again generously donated all of the stamps sets we have chosen to feature. You will have all week to comment on ten posts, five on my blog and five on Lisa's, which means you have loads of chances to win one of five stamp sets. Lisa is also giving away two of her fabulous watermarks to two winners which makes a total of seven lucky winners for this week!

Today, Lisa and have chosen Crappy Day as our featured stamp set. As soon as I saw the toilet paper roll and the sentiments that went with it, I cracked up and knew it had to be mine! Of course, I could've just set the roll on a cupboard but that's not how I roll. ;) I like to look at my stamps at all angles to figure out how versatile they are and I knew what I was going to do when I turned the roll so it looked like it was hanging on the wall. The short sentiment didn't quite work with it but I had some Unity alphabets I could use to alter the sentence. Then I realized I had the perfect word from Note to Self that I could just mask off. The red hearts were initially masked off the original stamp and stamped afterwards in red since they would've been sideways with the roll in this position. The insert arrow was handwritten with a marker. I think it would be hilarious to frame this card and put it up as a piece of decor in the bathroom. It doesn't matter whether you prefer the flap to be under or over but my preference is over! LOL

Now head on over to Lisa's blog to see her take on Crappy Day!

Sources: SU Natural Ivory cardstock; Bazzill Basics textured black cardstock; My Mind's Eye Follow Your Heart - Be Amazing; Unity Stamp Co. Crappy Day & Note to Self; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; SU Real Red Stampin' Write Marker; foam tape

Take Two & Growing in Unity Winners

WINNERS!!!

As promised, here are the winners:

Take Two, Day 1: Cuppy Cakes

Take Two, Day 2: My Dear Take Two, Day 3: Birdie Duet Take Two, Day 4: Bella Fiori Take Two, Day 5: The Best is Yet To Be*Don't forget that My Dear, Bella Fiori and a lot of other Unity stamps are on sale right now. Click HERE to shop at the Unity Store!
Sunghee, Roslyn, Marilyn, Anne T. and Jing-Jing, please email Emily with your full name and mailing address to redeem your prize.
Growing in Unity: Choose from Along for the Ride, Berry Good Life, Grow Yourself Extraordinary or Margarita Moments
Toni, please email Andrea at andrea (at) unitystampco (dot) com to claim your prize. Let her know which of the four sets you've chosen as your GIU prize for my GIU week.
Dahlhouse Designs Watermark
Dahlhouse Designs Watermark Rachel and MC, please email Lisa at dahlhousedesigns (at) yahoo (d0t) com to claim your prize.

Congratulations to all the winners! Winners for the Take Two kits were chosen from either Lisa's blog or my blog on the day the kit was featured. Winners for the remaining prizes were chosen from all of the comments on Lisa's blog or my blog. To those of you who won Take Two kits, I will send them out as soon as they arrive. I'll try to remember to let you know when I send them out but it probably won't be 'til the first or second week of April. If you are ever on the SCS Unity Forum, please say hello to Angela Magnuson and send her a huge thanks for supporting this event!

Thank you, Lisa, for all your hard work this week and in the months prior to Take Two. You did an amazing job with your cards and with the badges and blinkies!! I couldn't have done this without your support, encouragement and inspiration. You are so wonderful!

Thank you all so much for being a part of Take Two and Growing in Unity with me and Lisa! All of you who came by to leave comments on both our blogs throughout the week made it a huge success and we can't thank you enough!! We are thrilled that there are so many of you who asked that we do this again. ;) Thank you for enjoying our creations and Unity!

We hope you'll be back to visit us often. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Take Two, Growing in Unity & Friends With Flair {Friday}

Happy Friday!!! I hope you're comfortable because this is going to be a looong post! Are you ready? :D

Well, I told you we'd end Take Two Week with a bang and a couple of surprises. The first one is that we're featuring the February 2011 Kit of the Month - The Best is Yet To Be which means we're giving away one of these kits to one lucky winner! The other surprise is that Lisa and I have made three cards each to showcase this amazing set. I love this set!! As you all know, I've mentioned many times that the July 2010 Kit - Happily Ever After has been my most coveted set and then the January 2011 Kit - To the Moon & Back came along. However, after I played with The Best is Yet To Be, I think it deserves a spot in my stamping arsenal as the ultimate Unity set. Still, I love all my Unity for many different reasons! ;)

For this card, I applied the same technique shown in this video tutorial on the card base, most of the sentiment and the punched bird. I stamped the floral text border from To the Moon & Back before applying the ink pads directly to the cardstock. Then I stamped the bird image twice, die cut the left edge using a notebook edge and trimmed the edges. I also thought it was fitting to use my bird punch, which I've had for months, for the very first time here. The bird is 'becoming' and therefore 'growing' as a literal translation for the sentiment. I masked the text in the 'sky' part of the image using Giving It All Meaning and stamped Ippity's A Bit of Burlap on the wing.

Sometimes I just have to make a one-layer card! This bike stamp is just so amazing, I couldn't help but show it off on this beautiful lavender cardstock that I just got in the mail this week.

I centred both the sentiment and image on the card base, then created two masks for the balloons. I cut four balloons out of the first one and three out of the second. I stamped the corner of the blanket frame from The Best is Yet To Be on two of the ballons and used the tiny text from the floral text border from To the Moon & Back on two other balloons. The final three balloons were stamped with Ippity's A Bit of Burlap. Then I added some glitter to the edges of the balloons. Simple but intricate. ;)

My final Take Two card features the bee with text! Bees and 'you' seem to be a popular couple these days but I decided to put my own spin on it by combining 'Be you' with part of a sentiment from One of a Kind with an alphabet I received when I joined the Kit Club. I'm not sure why I never inked up these alphabets before but I absolutely love them! You'll probably be seeing them a lot more of them from here on in. Unfortunately, I don't know what set they came from but I'd appreciate you letting me know if you do.

To make this card, I used both parts of a frame mask to ink up the centre of the card base with Tea Time Toile and the outer edge with Giving It All Meaning. Then I cut out a black frame from cardstock and adhered that to the card. I stamped the bee in olive and the text in black, trimmed and mounted it with foam tape. As mentioned above, I created my own sentiment from three different stamps and finished the card with a little rhinestone coloured with an olive Copic marker.

I seriously cannot believe this fun week has come to an end already! I really hope that Lisa and I have inspired all of you to use your Unity stamps in many different ways. Here's a recap of the stamp sets we showcased this week and the eight prizes everyone is eligible to win:

Take Two, Day 1: Cuppy Cakes
Take Two, Day 2: My Dear*
Take Two, Day 3: Birdie Duet
Take Two, Day 4: Bella Fiori*
Take Two, Day 5: The Best is Yet To Be
Growing in Unity: Choose from Along for the Ride, Berry Good Life, Grow Yourself Extraordinary or Margarita Moments
Dahlhouse Designs Watermark
Dahlhouse Designs Watermark
*If you don't want to hedge your bets on winning these sets, grab them now while they're on sale! ;)

Thank you, Lisa, for organizing Take Two with me and for all your creative efforts! Lisa, you are such a pleasure to work with and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Okay, maybe not for several months because this was a lot of work but you know I would love to work with you again! LOL We owe a huge thanks to the amazing Angela Magnuson for this incredible giveaway, as well as Lisa for offering her fabulous watermarks!! Remember, the cut-off times for prize-eligible comments this week will be tonight 11:59 p.m. PST (Saturday 2:59 a.m. EST). Lisa and I will be choosing all the winners from both our blogs on Saturday and the winners will be announced together on both our blogs on Sunday. Best of luck to everyone and thank you all so much for making Take Two Week such a huge success!!

Lisa's blog awaits with her takes on these same three pairings from The Best is Yet To Be!!!

For the FWF Blog Hop, head on over to Cindy's blog!

Sources for The Best is Yet To Be: Gina K Designs pure luxury kraft & 120lb pure luxury white cardstock; Unity February 2011 Kit of the Month - The Best is Yet To Be; Unity January 2011 Kit of the Month - To the Moon & Back; Unity Giving It All Meaning; Ippity A Bit of Burlap; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; SU Summer Sun, Tangerine Tango, Pink Passion, Tempting Turquoise & Lavender Lace inks; SU Two-Step Bird punch; SU 3/4" circle punch; MFT Notebook Edge die; QuicKutz Epic Six; The Twinery Lilac baker's twine; Stampin' Dimensionals

Sources for Bicycle Balloons: Gina K Designs pure luxury Lovely Lavender cardstock; Unity February 2011 Kit of the Month - The Best is Yet To Be; Unity January 2011 Kit of the Month - To the Moon & Back; Ippity A Bit of Burlap; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; SU Lavender Lace ink; Ranger Diamond Stickles; We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper

Sources for You are 'Be You'-tiful: Gina K Designs pure luxury kraft, Black Onyx & 120lb pure luxury white cardstock; Unity February 2011 Kit of the Month - The Best is Yet To Be; Unity Tea Time Toile; Unity Giving It All Meaning; Unity+Melody Ross One of a Kind; Unity Alphabet; Memento Tuxedo Black ink; SU Old Olive ink; SU 3/4" circle punch; Stampin' Dimensionals; SU Basic Rhinestone; Copic marker

Take Two & Growing in Unity {Thursday}

Welcome to Day Four of Take Two and Growing in Unity! I hope everyone is having a great week so far. So much excitement in one week is almost too much for me. LOL At least it's half over! Only half over, you say? But it's Thursday! Well, we've got a few surprises planned for tomorrow and not like the big snowstorm we had yesterday. ;) I hope the snow melts away quickly so the outdoors can start looking like my card!

Any guesses as to what set Lisa and I are featuring today? It's Bella Fiori! This set is actually half price right now for only $10 and even less if you're a Kit Club member. Of course, one of you is going to win this set but I think it's too great of a deal to pass up! Yesterday, I told you I rarely use patterned paper so I thought I would surprise you today. LOL I just couldn't resist using Bella BLVD paper to paper piece one of the flowers, cut out some clouds and put everything on a texty background. I can't live without this frame from With Love and I'll pretty much always use it like this, fussy cut and mounted with foam tape. I did angle it on purpose. ;) The sentiment is from Favorite Things/Rockin' It Unity Style.

I hope you're loving Lisa's cards this week 'cause I sure am! She has such a great eye for colour and works magic with patterned paper. In fact, you should head over to her blog right now to see her take with Bella Fiori!

See you tomorrow for the big finale of Take Two and Growing in Unity!!

An Italian grammar lesson: For those of you who are interested, the phrase bella fiori is supposed to mean beautiful flowers but it's grammatically incorrect. In Italian, the phrase should read bei fiori (pronounced bay'-ee fee-or'-ee). {Hubby corrected me this morning. :)}

Sources: Gina K Designs pure luxury kraft & 120lb pure luxury white cardstock; Bella BLVD Bookin' on the Beach, Creamsicle Clouds, Love is in the Air, Magic in the Sky & Stardust paper coordinates; Unity+Bella BLVD Bella Fiori; Unity+Echo Park With Love; Unity March 2010 Kit of the Month - Favorite Things/Rockin' It Unity Style; Memento Rich Cocoa & Tuxedo Black inks; Stampin' Dimensionals

Take Two & Growing in Unity {Wednesday}

Welcome to Day Three of Take Two and Growing in Unity! Lisa and I are delighted with the amazing response to this event and our individual projects. We can't thank you all enough! It's great to see both old friends and new ones. If you are new to my blog, I thought you might like to know a few things about my crafting style. My cards are mostly clean and simple but occasionally I will get fancy. I love to cut out images and pop them with foam tape. I rarely use designer paper but I love to create my own backgrounds using stamps. I'm also featured on the Unity Blog today so hop over there a bit later for more about me and how I craft with Unity!

Today's card uses Birdie Duet! Lisa and I both purchased this set ages ago and never inked it up. We thought this would be the perfect opportunity to finally use it. I was drawn to this set mainly because of the musical notes. Bicycles may be my greatest weakness but music notes are my second. Throw in the stunning bird cage, plus the wonderful fonts of the sentiments, and I was sold. I had no clue how I would use this set but I just had to buy it! Now that I've finally inked it up, I have quite a few more ideas.

This card is very simple but with several layers of overlapped stamping. First, I stamped the entire image in light blue on white cardstock. Then I stamped the image again with green ink and cut out just the birdcage and one of the birds. Using a grid line acrylic block, I stamped the sentiment on the white base and then again on the cut out birdcage, ensuring they would line up. I punched a hole at the top of the birdcage and looped two strands of honeydew baker's twine. I popped the birdcage with foam tape and, after twisting all four strands together, attached the twine to the back of the white mat which is also popped with foam tape. I added clear rhinestones and coloured them with a light blue Copic marker.

Since it's the middle of the week, here's a quick recap of the prizes that have been revealed thus far:

Take Two, Day 1: Cuppy Cakes
Take Two, Day 2: My Dear*
Take Two, Day 3: Birdie Duet
*If you don't want to hedge your bets on winning this set, grab it now while it's on sale! ;)

Be sure to stop by Lisa's blog to see her take on Birdie Duet, as well as the Unity Blog to see another card of mine using Birdie Duet but in a completely different style!

See you tomorrow for Take Two and Growing in Unity, Day Four!

Sources for The Odds: Gina K Designs 120lb pure luxury white cardstock; SU Bashful Blue & Chocolate Chip cardstock; Unity Birdie Duet; SU Bashful Blue & Old Olive inks; Memento Rich Cocoa ink; Marvy-Uchida 1/8" long reach circle punch; The Twinery Honeydew baker's twine; SU Basic Rhinestones coloured with Copic marker; Stampin' Dimensionals

Sources for Two Birds (shown on the Unity Blog): SU Naturals Ivory, So Saffron, Tempting Turquoise, Wild Wasabi & Early Espresso cardstock; Unity Birdie Duet; Unity October 2011 Kit of the Month - Take Time To Laugh; Unity November 2011 Kit of the Month - Picture Perfect; SU Summer Sun, Tempting Turquoise & Wild Wasabi inks; Memento Rich Cocoa ink; The Twinery Pink Sorbet baker's twine; Stampin' Dimensionals