I know you probably thought I was tired of Sock Monkey.  Nope.  I was playing around tonight and came up with this idea for a "Monkey Magnet."

I have a bunch of metal edge frames – and they keep retiring.  I have brass and copper (retired) as well as silver.  And I have vellum (retired) as well as white.  So I figured before the silver/white ones retire, I'd better dig them out and do something with them!

I know a lot of zealous stampers pull out the white paper from the tag, open the frame, insert other colors of card stock, then close the frame again, but I'm not one of those stampers.  I cut a square of Kiwi Kiss about the same size as the frame and adhered it to the white paper already there.   Of course, he's eating a Mocha Java Chip ice cream cone.  The cone is one of the Sock Monkey Accessories.

We had a great time at the Technique class today, and added 3 more pages to our books.  Mom brought her cheese ball, and Sandy brought these awesome cookies – which I hid.  (I did offer them to the others later, though.)  Unfortunately, I did not hide them when I got home.  I just went up to get one and there were 4 left.  I'm thinking someone big and hairy (and I'm not talking about the dog!) found them.  Oh, well.  He's been working crazy hours and running in several directions at once (what's new?), so he deserved a treat.  But next time, I'm hiding them.

Be sure to check my calendar for September and October events.  I'm having a technique class as well as a "Big Shot" class in September, and a Christmas stamp-a-stack in October.  Check out dates and times, and let me know which ones you'd like to attend.

Ok – back to my creative day!

There was a card on the Stampin' Up! demonstrator web site the other day, and someone asked how it was done.  Another demo answered and suggested lots of things, like masking and reverse masking.  I thought that was a lot of bother, so I wanted to see if I could do it easier. 

This was about a 5-minute card!  I stamped the trees on Glossy White with StazOn.  Then I sponged color around the trees – More Mustard in the center, Kiwi Kiss at the bottom, Baja Breeze at the top and a little Not Quite Navy around the edges.

The tag is "handmade."  I stamped Birthday Wishes from "Sincere Salutations," then trimmed it to the size I wanted and used the tag corner punch to finish.  The bottom layer is just 1/4" larger.  The DSP is from Bella Rose, and the dry embossing on the Old Olive strip was done with the Crop-a-dile.  I don't like the brad in the tag, though.  I'll have to figure out something else to do there.

Of course, there's a story behind this next one.  (Isn't there always?)  I wanted to do a VersaMark resist, since that's one of the techniques for the September technique club. 

I stamped the flowers from Upsy Daisy (15% off until September 30!) in versamark, then sponged Baja Breeze and Kiwi Kiss over them.   The other colors are Not Quite Navy, Riding Hood Red and Old Olive.  I got all the colors together, stamped and assembled the card (I love the pretties kit stickpin!  That's Mellow Moss taffeta ribbon tied to it.  Not loving that, but that's all I had) – then realized it was upside down.  The Riding Hood Red was intended to the be card base.  So – I cut the card front off, trimmed 1/4" off both sides, and layered it to an Old Olive card.  I actually like that better!  (I'm not sure why the link for the third project always turns out wonky with the new system at Typepad.  I'm going to have to figure this out!)

That's it for today.  Look for Holiday mini catalogs next month (ordering starts October 1), and new decor elements as well.  Have a great day!