Happy St. Patty's Day!

I have green and blue socks on but I might get pinched before someone looks at my socks!  I haven't gone anywhere today though, other than to the mail box, the compost heap and the wood pile so nobody has tried to pinch me yet.  Here are a couple of the St Patrick's day projects I made, I had a couple of the leprechauns left over after the M&M's ran out so I put them on cards.  The punch art is the same as I made last year, he is just too cute to change it up or not make him again!

I also wanted to share a couple of more projects from the retreat I went to in Alabama. 
 I love this card, isn't it beautiful?  It was a CASE from somewhere but I can't remember who to give credit to for it.  It was stamped with the Gold Metallic Encore ink pad.  The sentiment was also embossed with gold embossing powder.  We used the new Scalloped Tag Topper Punch to punch the top of the tag.  It is a cool punch, you just cut your paper 2" wide and punch it to the length you want it.  I'm sure you are seeing a lot of projects done with this punch already.  I also made a card Saturday with this punch on either side of the card and then folded in and tied with a ribbon.  I'll post that one soon too.  The card is embellished with a lot of fun embellishments from the Occasions Mini catalog, Watercolor Wonder Washi Tape, Gold Sequin Trim and Gold Baker's Twine.  A half of a Tea Lace Paper Doily.  Small amounts of these items make a mighty big difference on this card, don't you think?

 This bouquet of flowers was easy to make with 2 new products.  The Spiral Flower die makes the rose quick to make, just run it through the Big Shot, rub the bone folder along the sides to quickly curve it some and adhere with a few glue dots or other favorite adhesive and you have a beautiful rose!  The other flowers were equally simple by cutting a strip of DSP, cutting the edge with the Fringe Scissors and twirling it around the dowel.  We used a circle punch to punch the leaves, punch a circle and then reinsert the circle partially in the punch to make the leaf shape.  We used the Fringe Scissors to make the "grass" at the mouth of the jar and the Scalloped Tag Topper Punch to make the ends of the belly band.  It didn't take very long to make this nice bouquet!

Retreat projects

I showed the swap I made for the retreat in Huntsville last time.  We did some great projects there too.  I'll share a couple of those tonight since I haven't created anything this week.  We got several inches of ice Sunday night/Monday morning and couldn't get out of the driveway so my husband hasn't gone to work and we have been doing fun stuff like washing windows and walls the past 2 days.  He plans to go to work tomorrow so I might find some time to play then.

 This is one of the cards we made.  The stamp set is from the set Perfect Pennants which we got with the price of the retreat.  You will be seeing the quotes from this set several times as I post the cards and projects we made.  It is a great set.  Did you notice the fringe on the bottom of the card?  We also got a pair of the new Fringe Scissors in our kit and you will notice them on a couple of the projects too.  It is a fun look and a big time saver.  it was so quick to make the fringe when the scissors have 5 blades!  Another new product used on this card is the Banner Framelits Die.  It is so easy to line up and creates a perfect  banner around any phrase that will fit within it.  It comes in a set of 6 so will make a wide range of sizes.

 Have you seen the new box cards?  At least I have seen more lately than ever so I guess it is kind of new.  We created one in Huntsville and they are pretty fun.  The card folds flat so you can mail it in a regular envelope.  What a fun surprise for someone to get in the mail!  These first 2 projects also used the Kaleidoscope DSP, one of the paper packs available in the Spring Mini Catalog which goes until June 1st. 

Here is one of the swaps, I haven't decided if this is upside right or upside down.  Without a sentiment it is hard to tell.  When I put a sentiment on it and decide which way is up I will post it again so you can see what I did.  I'm thinking it is probably upside down in this picture.  Isn't it a pretty card?   I like the embossed stripes she drew on with the Simply Scored board, it looks great with the Adorning Accents embossing folder used to accent the design stamped with the So Very Grateful stamp set.  It is a beautiful card!