Hello stampers! If you know me at all you know that I love birds. I love watching them, I love feeding them and I love to take pictures of them at my feeders. Roosters are the exception. While they are a beautiful, proud bird they are also quite mean. I am sure we all have a rooster story. I grew up on a dairy farm and I helped milk the cows many early mornings and evenings. That wasn’t so bad except for the resident rooster. He was mean! He had a nasty disposition and found great joy in sneaking up on me while I was sitting between the cows either washing an udder or putting a milk machine on. In other words when he knew my hands were occupied and I was vulnerable. He would literally attack with wings flapping and beak pecking. Given the chance I would send him flying with a well-placed kick, but sometimes he won. I swear that bird gave me a nervous disorder! That being said, I do love the free stamp set Home to Roost. The rooster is oh so fun to colour with our Blends either accurately or whimsically. Why not colour that bird any which way you want? He also looks good in a monochromatic scheme. Let’s take a look at a few different cards. Who knew a rooster could be this cute?
Stamping on patterned paper is fantastic. Here the rooster is stamped in blueberry bushel on our Wood Textures paper. The stitched shape framelits give just the right “country” feel to this card as does the gingham gala paper and the burlap ribbon. This card was made for me by my team member Alison Reid. Thanks Alison!! Don’t you think that balmy blue looks great with blueberry bushel? And don’t you agree that anyone not in the stamping world would wonder what the heck we are talking about?
This card was a swap card made by another team member, Yvonne Macfadyen. Simply lovely. This clean and simple card has only one difficult aspect to it. You have to fussy cut the rooster unless you have a scan and cut machine, that is a great way to cut down on cutting time (pardon the pun). Our nasty bird was stamped in Memento black and coloured with Blends.
I keep looking at these cards and thinking how beautiful they are and how much I love the set but hate the bird!! I am sure there must be some nice roosters out there. What do you think? This one was stamped on a window sheet (otherwise known as acetate) using Stayzon ink since it will not smear. Flip it over and colour with Blends on the back side. I used three glue dots to adhere it to a glimmer paper circle. Both were cut out using the layering circles framelits. The card base is basic black layered with bermuda bay and accented with lovely lipstick and the lovely lace edgelits. The polka dot paper is from the neutrals 6×6 designer series paper (boring name right?) on page 191 of the annual catalog.
This last card was also made by my team member Alison Reid and she was inspired by Amanda Petersen. It has a very vanilla base and the Buffalo Check background stamp was used to create the “patterned paper” look using cajun craze and it measures 5″ by 3 1/2″. The rooster was stamped in Memento Black and coloured with Blends. Our stitched shape framelits once again come in handy for creating a simple but elegant focal point. The burlap ribbon adds just the right finishing touch don’t you think?
I decided to add one more card to this post. I saw it posted and made by Brenda Keenan and I just tweaked a wee little bit. I love how she stamped the rooster in black on crumb cake as background paper. I used my Stamparatus so that the images would all be nice and dark. I add the black and silver ribbon from the Garage suite and it works! Sometimes it’s nice to mix things up a bit.
He is definitely magnificent to colour with the Blends. I used just two colours, cherry cobbler and crumb cake on the rooster and then bronze for the ground under his feet.
Well what do you think about our resident rooster? He is safe on paper and he colours beautifully. He makes no noise at 5am so that is an added bonus. He is also free with a $60 purchase during sale-a-bration which is the annual, epic Stampin’Up! sale that goes until March 31. He is also a part of a package deal that Stampin’Up! puts together for you. The package is called Home to Roost Cards on page 11 of the sale-a-bration brochure. They put together a collection of products that they have used to make the card samples, so no guesswork. If you scroll to the bottom of the post you will see the link to this collection. The best part of it in my opinion is that you can get the bundle for half price if you host an epic workshop. At $550 in sales you get a half price item. Before I was a demonstrator I always hosted a big party during sale-a-bration and everyone would order at least $60 to qualify for a freebie so I would always get a half price item too. I truly do not understand why people are so reluctant these days to host a workshop. It was such fun for everyone! If you would like to gather a group of friends for a workshop at my studio and get free stuff, please contact me. It is one of my favourite things to do.
I thought I would end this post sharing a fun card that fellow Canadian demonstrator Lynsay Mahon made. I just had to case it. Another confession. I was using the tiny letter stamps from Make A Difference and I totally lost patience and I hand wrote the last two letters. Do you like how vivid the roosters are in the samples that have colouring? You might want to consider joining the Blends Club. Read the details here. If you live in Canada and don’t already have a demonstrator, I would love to have you order from me. Just click on any of the icons below and it will take you straight to my online store. If you could also use the host code 2HGCDSXE that would make me very happy. Keep smiling and have a super day.
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Super gorgeous cards!!
I had written a whole story about my sweet rooster..but something went wrong with placing the comment..sorry.
Feel so sorry for you you had such bad expiriences with that mean rooster!!
I would love to hear your rooster story, especially since I am guessing it is a positive one. I could use a happy rooster story to change my opinion of them.
these cards are all so different & absolutely fantastic! I’m so glad you shared them.
Thanks so much Susan for taking the time to comment. Have a super day!
Please don’t hate this handsome and confident bird! He rules the roost, remember. Our Granddaughters raised 4 chickens from eggs given to them by a farmer in Petawawa. They were not allowed to keep chickens, so they brought them down to us. As it turned out, 2 were hens and 2 were roosters. The roosters were making our neighbours crazy because the crowed ALL day long. One of them died of natural causes and we, very reluctantly, killed the second. He was abusive to the hens, so it wasn’t difficult to hate him. Getting him ready for the soup pot was one of the most difficult things we had to do. We’ll never do it again. I will say that our Girls, the original two along with a dozen more, were happy little hens. 🙂
Great story Charlene. I am also not a fan of killing chickens to eat. I simply don’t have the stomach for it, but it is good to know where our food comes from!
I think I’ve always just loved the colours of a rooster!
I have to agree with you on that one Kathy. That is one positive thing!
I was raised on a farm and we had a rooster who would chase after me. One day he was chasing me and my brother picked up a large clump of dirt and hit it in the head knocking him out , my Mother grabbed him, chopped off his head and he became supper. I was young and ate him with delight.
Oh Jean, I love that story!! Thanks for sharing.
I wasn’t going to choose the rooster for my SAB freebie, but our cards ma make me change my mind. When my oldest son was young, he was attacked by a mean rooster, so I’ve never been fond of them.
I’m glad I’m not the only one that had a vicious rooster. Thanks for sharing!
Great post. Love all your videos. Shame I’m in Scotland or i would love to come to your classes. X
That’s so nice Debbie! Maybe the rooster will fly the coop all the way to Scotland!
Never had any experience with roosters but have decorated with them in my younger years in the kitchen. I love your colorful set that you did!
thanks so much Marcia! I guess they are coming back in style.
Love the rooster ! My girlfriend has a collection of roosters !
thanks Dani- the collections of inanimate roosters are very trustworthy!
I love pictures and stamped images of roosters, but live ones scare me!
Love your rooster cards!
Thanks so much for commenting Nancy!
Love your blog and your creativity the rooster is cute but they are mean
Thanks Kari, and I totally agree.
Love your cards. You sure can’t tell you don’t like roosters by looking at these cards. I am kicking myself in the bottom that I didn’t order this set, but maybe on my next order.
Thanks Pam, maybe you will be the lucky winner!
like reading your blogs but I have no rooster story to tell…the cards are very creative…
Thanks so much Cathy! Glad you were never traumatized by a rooster.
I love roosters! My kitchen calendar is all roosters. It’s a proud bird and symbolizes good fortune. While in Key West, I noticed them roaming around. That’s what they’re allowed to do down there. Really cool!
Well isn’t that interesting Sue, thanks for sharing!
Living in Mt Isa in far North Queensland years ago we had a large chicken run. Ruling the roost was Horace (aka Horace the Horrible!). My older children had a plan when feeding the ‘chooks’ – one would hold the hose, keeping it trained on Horace while the other fed the hens. Then they would come hurtling up the back yard yelling “Mum, Open the back door!!!” with Horace hot on their heels. Our next rooster was Rufus, son of Horace. Rufus was a magnificent bird with gorgeous luminescent tail feathers. Unlike his Dad, Rufus was a gentleman and eventually died defending his harem from vicious hawks. I have so many stories of Horace & Rufus but I’ll let that be enough for now. I totally understand your rooster feelings Jackie
Oh Deb, what a fantastic story. I’m so glad you shared.
We had a rooster that out lived 3 hen flocks. He was such a beautiful rooster. He taught the Hens to play in the shop. He also would let us pick him up, and pet him. He was such a nice rooster!
So nice to hear a positive rooster story, thanks Sarah!
I don’t have a rooster story, but I sure love this one! And had a giggle at your story 🙂
Thanks for commenting Janet!
Such a cute rooster stamp! We have a couple of roosters now…they both have good dispositions but I still don’t trust them (the spurs on their legs are big…I definitely don’t want to get on the wrong side of them). We have had roosters in the past that we let free range…well, when they go after you for no reason at all, the free ranging stopped and the not trusting of any rooster began.
Oh Sarah, I just love your story, thanks for sharing!
If roosters are that mean, happy I don’t have one. I do love the rooster stamp set. Your cards are so pretty.
Thanks so much Nana!
Such beautiful cards! Even with the subject being a rooster lol!
Thanks so much Cherie! He does make a good subject.
Your cards are all lovely and very fitting for both genders of recipients. I’ve only made one card with this set. I especially like the first one and the one colored on the window sheet. Thank you for sharing all of these.
You are welcome Karen. I love taking a set out and playing with it for a bit to try out different possibilities. Very addictive! He is a lot of fun to colour and he looks great in lots of different colours, not all of them realistic! I’m so glad you commented.