After an amazing week last week at convention, then coming home and being a single mommy for the week while my hubby is off on a business trip, it’s been busy to say the least. I have had grand plans to get lots and lots done in the evenings after the kids went to bed but turns out I’m still recovering from the lack of sleep at convention (turns out your mid-30s body doesn’t bounce back as fast as your mid-20’s body… who knew?! 
) and so I’m still catching up. But one thing that I learned at convention and really took home with me is balance – figuring out how to make sure you make time for the important people and things in your life (like family and sleep) and then doing the rest (like photographing my cards from swap). They make the good point, if I’m rested and my family isn’t crabby they haven’t seen me in a while, everyone is going to be happier!
That said, I finally started photographing my pile of swaps from Convention… you see, I have a lot:
After over an hour of photographing cards, I almost have them all done! I’ll be sharing some of my favorites here on the blog over the next week. If you come to my classes and events, I’ll have many of them with me. And if you are a member of my Fun n’ Crafty Stampers demonstrator group, I’ll upload all of the pictures this weekend!
But while I finish working on that, I thought I’d share a card I made with the cute Endless Thanks stamp set:
I was playing with this stamp set and trying to come up with something that only uses the new In Colors when I ended up with this design. It shows a fun way you can use your stamps to make your own background paper.
Tips for making this card:
- Use the larger flower from the Endless Thanks stamp set to stamp randomly around the front of your card – I used Watermelon Wonder because I was using the new 2015-2017 In Colors, but use whichever color you love.
- Make sure you go off the edge of your card front with some flowers, if you try to keep them all inside the edges it ends with a strange border around your card.
- Use the little leaf stamp from the set and stamp 2 overlapping leaves on the side of each flower. They don’t have to be on the same side, just keep them together.
- Fill in the white spaces with the smaller flower from the set in a complementary color – like the Delightful Dijon I used here.
- Break up the busy-ness of the card by creating a layer over the center. I matted in Watermelon Wonder to tie in to the flowers, and then kept it simple with a few flowers and the sentiment in the center.
- I still only used Watermelon Wonder for my ink for the flowers in the middle of the card, just stamp one in the middle and then WITHOUT reinking your stamp, stamp to the left and to the right of the first flower to get the lighter shades.
- Wrap a piece of the new dotted lace trim around your matted cardstock and then use one more piece of the lace trim to tie a bow in the middle of your piece of lace. Isn’t it so fun and fluffy??
You can try this idea of creating you own background with any stamps you own, so grab a stamp and give it a whirl!
And if you love any of the products I used in my card, you can find them in my online store by clicking any of the pictures below! And look, you don’t need many supplies to make this fun card!
![NWstamper signature_thumb[9]](https://i0.wp.com/www.nwstamper.com/wp-content/uploads/ad87b4046c1e_C9F6/NWstamper-signature_thumb9.png "NWstamper signature_thumb[9]")
![order online button for sig 3_thumb[4]](https://i0.wp.com/www.nwstamper.com/wp-content/uploads/ad87b4046c1e_C9F6/order-online-button-for-sig-3_thumb4_thumb.png?resize=307%2C45 "order online button for sig 3_thumb[4]"){kind=small}
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This year was worse than normal for me as my team had a blast staying up and having in-room “happy hour” as we chatted and some people had some wine. But after coming home at midnight on Saturday and then spending time with the family before the hubby turned around for his turn to go on a business trip) I rested and am finally catching up on the last bit of sharing! 
But we were happy to be on our way!
(If you are a demo, don’t forget, you can watch the general sessions live streaming and see the catalog online tomorrow!)![NWstamper signature_thumb[9]](https://i0.wp.com/www.nwstamper.com/wp-content/uploads/ad87b4046c1e_C9F6/NWstamper-signature_thumb9_thumb.png?resize=322%2C118 "NWstamper signature_thumb[9]")
They aren’t hard to make just time consuming when you are trying to make 60+. I expect I’ll be still assembling on the plane tomorrow, but that is half the fun, right? ha ha ha
Today’s card was one that I saw during the new catalog preorder and I LOVED the use of the new lace trim that I had to make it myself. Isn’t it cute?
That is because it is embossed paper that is inked! You can either stamp an image with versamark ink and then heat emboss with clear embossing powder…. or do it the easy way and get pre-embossed paper! 
But that is not my life these days! Good thing I love what I do, right?!
There is still plenty of time and I’d love to have you be a part of the Fun n’ Crafty stampers and join us at one of the events! Email me for more details at 
) I wanted to make sure you had the latest on the newest Weekly Deals as well as I just heard word about the Watercolor Wishes card kit too!
I know, crazy, right? Here is one of the cards I created:
