Rubber Stamping & Card Making with Yapha

My brother and his wife are expecting their first child in about a month. I am super excited about the imminent arrival of my new nephew, and almost as excited that they picked some super fun Decor Elements with which to decorate the baby’s room! One of the great things about using these here in Southern California, is that you can decorate above the crib and the changing table without the fear of anything falling down in an earthquake. I showed you the super cute robot they put up a few weeks ago. Well, they had time to put up the rest, so I went over to take some pictures.

You can see the robot over the changing table. They also added some monkeys swinging on a vine. (Don’t forget, you can click on the pictures to enlarge them.)

Here’s a close up of the monkeys. I just love how they are going around the corner!

Moving on around the room, they added four animals from the now retired stamp set, Wild About You. These are done in multiple steps, since each of the colors are applied to the wall separately.  My brother said it was not as difficult as he thought it would be. He actually had a lot fun putting them up!

Here are all four of the animals. (The bird is not up yet.)

Isn’t the room adorable? I have to tell you, though, these adorable creatures are all on the Decor Elements Last Chance List, and will not be available after June 30th. The good news is that right now they are all 25% off! If you want to see a visual list, go to my website, then click on Last Chance, and then Home Decor.

My brother and his wife are expecting their first baby in about seven weeks. They were really excited about the decorating possibilities when I showed them the Decor Elements catalog. They picked out a few they wanted to put up to decorate the baby’s room. I went over today to show them how the Decor Elements work, and to help put up the first one. Together we put up this adorable Chocolate colored Robot, right over the changing table.

They also have some monkeys and the animals from Wild About You to put up as well. I’ll be sure to post pictures of their finished nursery.

My friend Krystal just started a new stamping challenge blog, Stampin’ Celebration. It’s a weekly party themed inspiration challenge. This week’s challenge features super cute robots. Check it out if you are looking for new ways to stretch your creativity!

This week’s Pals Paper Arts challenge is “Anything but a Card,” so I figured it would be the perfect time to show you how my library has been transformed for spring! I am truly blessed this year to have most amazing library assistant! Karen is not only incredibly competent, but she is artistic as well. She has done an amazing job decorating the library for the different seasons and holidays throughout the year. After the St. Patrick’s Leprechaun hunt was over, she began decorating the library for spring. She used a variety of Stampin’ Up! papers and Big Shot dies to turn the library into a Springtime wonderland! Take a look (supplies listed at the very end). Click on any picture to enlarge it.

This is the display area behind the circulation desk:

These are the two sides of the circulation desk:

There are also a large number of butterflies and birds hanging from the ceiling. (She used paper clips and dental floss to hang them up.)

Supplies: Kaleidoscope Designer Series Paper, Tea Party Designer Series Paper, Big Shot, Beautiful Butterflies Bigz Die, Bird with Leaves & Flowers Bigz Die, Flower Folds Bigz XL Die, On Board Bird Book

The paper was all laminated before being cut. The large butterflies, rabbits, and some of the other items are Karen’s own designs. Thank you, Karen, for your incredible contribution to the library!

When we moved into our new apartment last summer, I told Eve that she could pick whichever Decor Elements she wanted for her new room. (You might remember that she used to have butterflies on her wall.) She picked the princess, carriage, and castle — all in pink. No real shock there. But when we went to put them up, they just looked strange, floating on her wall with nothing grounding them. So I while I was looking around for some better way to put them up — maybe frames, maybe canvas — Stampin’ Up announced that they would be selling some of the raw vinyl. People could use their Big Shots to make their own Decor Elements! I bought some of the raw vinyl in Certainly Celery, but instead of die cutting it, I used it to create more of a scene with the Decor Elements that Eve had chosen.

It took us less than hour to put all of it up. Steve helped with the castle, since even standing on the bed I can’t reach that high. Most important of all, Eve loves it!

Each package of the raw Decor Elements vinyl comes with two sheets of vinyl (approximately 14-1/4″ x 24″ ), along with two sheets of transfer tape, for $12.95. It is available in the following colors:

118801 Bashful Blue
118814 Basic Gray
118804 Black
118806 Certainly Celery
114337 Chocolate
118808 Clear
114334 Dark Gray
118813 Gable Green
114336 Kraft
118805 Night of Navy
118803 Old Olive
118810 Pixie Pink
118800 Pretty in Pink
118809 Pumpkin Pie
118802 Real Red
118798 Rose Red
118812 Sahara Sand
118797 So Saffron
118799 Taken with Teal
118807 Tempting Turquoise
114335 White

Chalkboard Decor Elements Vinyl Sheets (118815) are also available for $14.95.
You can purchase any of these through my website. Just click on Shop Now.

For those of you that do not know, I am an elementary school librarian. When I saw the new Decor Element that said “Do Good. Be Kind” it really resonated with me. Of all of things we teach children, this is the most important. If they can learn these two items, then our job is well done. It is a theme that runs through most of the stories I read to them, and also what I hope they see in my daily interactions as well.

Directly opposite the door to my office is a wall that is a lovely shade of blue. It was calling out for something, and I think I found it!

Do Good. Be Kind. If only we could all follow this simple advice every day.

I love the Thoughts & Prayers Tree. I love it as a stamp and I love it even more as a Decor Element vinyl design! I have put up three of these trees so far — one at Applewild School Library, one at Paula’s house, and one at my parents’ house. But I’ve never had one of my very own. And now I do! We put up one in our living room, and I have to tell you, it looks fantastic! And it’s great for California, because you don’t have to worry about a huge piece of art falling down in an earthquake.

Remember, this comes in 6 pieces, so we started out slowly. Here’s a look at it partially up:

Here is the finished tree, right behind our couch:

My husband really liked the quote that was with it in the catalog, so added that too. We separated the birds from the quote for a more balanced look. Here’s a close-up of our end result:

I love seeing this in the living room! Here’s what it looks like:

We’ll take a little break from Valentines today. I want to show you one of the Decor Elements that my husband and I put up this week. We had this space above the stove, and were looking for something that would fit there. We decided on this saying, “Our attitude toward Life determines life’s attitude toward us.” It’s the perfect thing to read all day, from making coffee in the morning to cleaning up after dinner!

You can see all of the Decor Elements in the July brochure and the January supplement. We put up a few more as well, so be sure to check back to see them!

I love this tree! Have I mentioned that I love this tree? It is a fabulous tree, and I was so excited when Paula wanted to put one up at her house! It looks so great on her wall. Actually, I’ve never seen a wall that it looks bad on! Here are some of the highlights as we put it up:

And the final out come! It looks so gorgeous in real life!

So, when are you getting YOUR tree?

Every since I showed my mom the Definitely Decorative catalog with the beautiful Thoughts & Prayers Tree, she had been tossing around the idea of putting it up in the dining room. But it wasn’t until she saw the tree up on the wall in my library that she knew she had to get it! My mom custom designs Judaic needlepoint and has many beautiful pieces on her own walls. She decided that the tree would look beautiful in the dining room behind this piece:

But we didn’t want to just put the picture on top of the tree, so we decided to leave a blank spot on the wall where the picture would go, with the trunk below it and the branches above. This was easy to do, since the tree comes in six pieces. The first thing we did was to mark off the corners of the pictures with Post-It notes.

Then we removed the picture and began to put up the branches of the tree.

Eve was my handy dandy helper throughout!

Finally, we re-hung the picture.

When we were satisfied with where it was hung, we added the trunk below it.

Here is the end result.

Don’t you love it? My parents were so happy with how their dining room wall came out! And it took less than hour to put up! You can download the new Definitely Decorative brochure and see all of the amazing Decor Elements available.

Now Available! Stampin’ Up and Country Living have joined together to bring you the cutest BBQ kit ever!

For just $24.95, you’ll have what you need to throw a fabulous summer barbecue, including

• Dig In stamp set
• Die-cut table tents (two each of four colors)
• Die-cut components, bamboo skewers, and envelopes to create eight shish kabob invitations
• Die-cut coasters (three each of four colors)
• Die-cut tags (four each of four colors)
• 12″ x 12″ printed food wrapper sheets (12 each of two colors)
• Printed recipe cards (four)
• Linen thread (five yards)
• Ruby Red Classic Stampin’ Spot
• Night of Navy Classic Stampin’ Spot

(Tofu Dogs and Veggie Burgers not included…)

Here’s another look at the compononants:

You can see some other great ideas with this kit on Shelli Gardner’s blog. Contact me to order yours today!