National Stamping Month, A tribute

Saturday night, I had a whole group of friends and family over to celebrate National Stamping Month...I provided snacks, setting and supplies for this fun night. I took a few pics before it got started, but I totally forgot about my camera once everyone got here as I was busy being the hostess with the mostess.







I love stamping, scrapping, and card making. I want to get my friends involved and active....most of them do not do this on their own time, and they claim that they are not creative, but they do love to do the 'crafty' type stuff. Here are the cards that I created for the event. I pre-cut the supplies for each one and had everything they would need placed in a box. I also had a station for embossing and a scrap box in case anyone wanted to play around with my new supplies and Christmas stamp sets or learn something new. I had drawings for free giveaways throughout the night. All of the supplies used are from Close to My Heart.






In addition to the free drawings, I had a box with a stamp set, ribbon, paper and buttons. My guests were challenged to make a card using only the supplies in that box. The stamp set is Shining Star....Like I said, I forgot all about my camera so I did not get a shot of their attempts...but here is mine:

Color Inspiration # 21 and SKITTLES BEADS

Here is my card for the KWernerDesign Blog Color Inspiration Challenge! I have recently been experimenting with stamping on acetate using StazOn ink and coloring it with permanent markers. It is really fun!! I used skittle beads for the background.











My friend Bonnie surprised me last week at work with a really cool new find. She calls these 'skittles'....they are like beads, but they don't have a hole in the center.




They are the perfect accent for cards and she brought me a whole stash...all sorts of beautiful colors!! These little beads are cheap and super versatile. You could buy a pack of clear and use permanent markers to change them to any color you need for a project....(metallic markers look cool too!) Check out these bugs created with the 'skittle' beads!

I am a crafter.

So I have decided that I don't care what people think of my habits. I am a crafter. As an art teacher, I have been through a liberal university art program and I understand the difference between crafts and conceptually based art. Conceptual art is amazing, I love to go to galleries and climb inside people's emotions and ideas....I love visual art, it is amazing to see what people do with artistic techniques and I love to share those things with my students. I believe that in order to teach art, I must indulge in some sort of creative outlet or else I am a hippocrate. I believe that eventually I will need to express my self in a more conceptual way...but for right now....I can achieve artistic satisfaction with my card making and scrapbooking endeavors. For the time being, I don't need canvases and clay nearly as much as I need acrylic, ink and paper. I don't think that cards and scrapbook pages are nearly as respected as watercolor paintings or sculptures in the eyes of my college professors, friends, and other artistic patrons, but I am okay with that. Adhesive, stickers, scissors, embossing, punches, chipboard, ribbon, glitter, eyelets, embellishments!!!! These are some of my favorite things right now. Following a layout or a color scheme are really great exercises and online contests force me to flex my creative boundaries. I enjoy limits and boundaries. I love taking pictures, but I am an amature photographer. My photos aren't taken to be shown in galleries or to win prizes on a grand scale. My needs are met whenever I take a shot with perfect lighting and a little bit of artistic vision. I literally spend hours a day reading blogs, looking at supplies, trying out techniques....and I love it....