Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Happy Birthday, Jenny

In my official capacity as official office card maker
I had the pleasure of making a birthday card for one of our co-workers, Jenny.

Jenny has been a friend to me since I arrived at this job 2 years ago. We both have 6 foot 5 inch (plus) skinny sons named Ryan.

So making a card for Jenny is NEVER a trial. This card is special to me, because I have NO idea where it came from. Talk about inspired.


I didn't plan for a monochrome card; it just happened that way.

I have gotten more comments on the cards where I have used this Happy Birthday sheet music from Flair Designs. It's a truly fun paper that sadly doesn't seem to be available anymore. (Thank goodness for stash!!!)

I distressed the edges of the sheet music paper, then edged with Tim Holtz distress ink (maybe, Tea dye). I distressed the edges of the cardstock before I matted the sheet music to it. Looking through the Die Cuts with a View fall paper pack I found the flourish paper with a cute pumpkin in the bottom corner. Judicious cutting got rid of the unwanted pumpkin. I pulled out my white/cream embellishments drawer and found the cream colored twill ribbon. But felt that the card still needed another embellishment.

Then I remembered the Cuttlebug embossing/die stamp with a birthday present. This was used to cut out a piece of Amaco ArtEmboss copper which was layered to another piece of the brown Bazzill cardstock. Done!!!

I printed a large (60 font) Happy Birthday on the inside of the card, assembled all the pieces on the outside and that was that. Probably one of my favoritist (can I use that word?) cards that I've made lately.


Materials: cardstock base (Georgia Pacific), brown mats (Bazzill); designer paper: sheet music (Flair Designs), flourish base (Die Cuts with a View); ink (Ranger distress ink); copper metal (Amaco); die cut (Cuttlebug); adhesives (Pioneer mounting tape), pop-dots.

Thanks for looking.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Baby shower gift card

One of the supervisor's at work is pregnant with her first child and one of the cards that I made in the last two weeks was a card for her baby shower.

My apologies for the interesting photo at the left. There's an orange shadow just to the right of the little envelope on the front of the card. It definitely WASN'T there in real life. (This card isn't my best work, but I definitely did NOT give a card with that orange on it!!!)

The envelope was made from a template found at this website. The template was enlarged 165% from the original template, so as to be large enough to hold a plastic credit card/gift card.

The envelope was cut from designer paper, assembled with double-sided tape and decorated with the sheer polka-dot ribbon running down the main seam. Just enough of the tape was left uncovered under the top flap of the envelope to slightly hold the flap down.

To make the card background the butterfly was stamped multiple times on the cardstock with Versamark and once with cranberry ink. The welcome baby sentiment was also stamped with the cranberry ink. (Don't look too carefully; it was not my best work stamping letters.)

Materials: cardstock (Bazzill); designer paper (Die Cuts with a View); butterfly stamp (Stampendous), letter stamps (Studio G); ink: watermark (Versamark), cranberry (Colorbox); adhesive (Pioneer mounting tape).

Thanks for looking.

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Welcome baby boy


Another week, another baby shower.

This card is for an acquaintance in one of the doctor's offices where I see patients.
Since she knows that she's having a baby boy, I knew my color scheme.

Plus, I seem to be in a rut with the coin change envelope card holders!

I kept this card a little simpler, since it is for a boy. No flighty butterflies for this young man.

Materials: base cardstock (Georgia Pacific); dark blue cardstock (Deja View); designer paper (MAMBI); stamp (Stamp Craft); distress embossing ink (Ranger); opaque white embossing powder (Stampendous); ribbon (Michaels).

Thanks for looking.

WSC #58: Autumn beauty

This is my first challenge card for Beate's Weekend Sketch challenge since she came back from her summer break.

This was a little hard for me. I wasn't quite sure WHAT to do with all those different blocks. But, obviously, it came together in the end.

All of the color blocks are embossed with Cuttlebug folders; all of that cardstock is from my stash. So this was nice in that it was frugal.

The main stamped image is from a new set of Inkadinkadoo stamps that I got this last week. I stamped it with bark ink, then clear embossed it. I inked the edges of the main panel with the bark ink, as well. The sentiment is from a Studio G (Michaels $1) clear stamp set; it was stamped with Versafine Sepia ink.

Materials: base cardstock (Bazzill); colored cardstocks (stash); designer paper (Die Cuts with a View); ink: bark (Versacolor), sepia (Versafine); embossing powder (Stampendous); embossing folders (divine swirls, pumpkin swirls, swiss dots); satin ribbon (Michaels); adhesive (Pioneer mounting tape & pop-dots).

Thanks for looking.

B-O-O to you

In one of the crafting magazines I saw a variation on this project, using a pre-made kit. I found the idea (maybe) in August, but can't find the magazine now to give credit for the inspiration.

I started gathering materials so that I could make at least 2 wallhangings, picking up the paper-mâché letters at Michaels.

(We interrupt this blog post for a brief moment of humor; at one point I was traveling in the car with 2 B's & 2 O's. You do the spelling on THAT one!)

Most of the other materials I already had on hand, including the black acrylic paint, the designer paper and most of the ribbon, though that also got supplemented with another Michaels run. The embellishment-die cuts were either cut out using Sizzix dies (ghosts & pumpkin) or Cricut (spider).

The completed letters were linked together using black grosgrain ribbon. And that was possibly the HARDEST part of this whole project. Paper-mâché doesn't take staples very well. Several of the staple points in the end had to be glued down with white craft glue, then stapled multiple times with the staple gun (loaded with 1/2 inch staples).



SO..... first the letters were painted black on 3 sides.

Then each letter was traced onto the backside of a sheet of designer paper.

The paper letters were glued to the front of each paper-mâché letter with a glue stick.





Next the edges of the letter paper were lightly sanded with the white sanding blocks you can get at the beauty supply store.

After deciding which embellishment die cuts were to be used, those were each cut out of cardstock and decorated as needed. (The ghosts got black cardstock behind the eyes and mouth; the spider got yellow cardstock behind the eye holes; the pumpkin was touched up a bit with dried marigold distress ink, using a cut'n'dry nib from Ranger.)



Finally everything was assembled.

Ribbons were tied onto each letter. Grosgrain ribbon was stapled and glued and stapled and stapled and stapled to each letter. The die cut embellishments were attached with pop-dots.

Materials: Paper-mâché letters (Michaels); black acrylic paint (Making Memories); designer paper (Die Cuts with a View); cardstock for embellishments (Bazzill); glue (Mono-multi); dried marigold distress ink (Ranger); ribbons (Michaels).

This was a fun project. I've sent the first completed BOO set to my daughter in Japan for her family to enjoy. The second set will probably NOT be assembled as a wall-hanging but rather as separate letters for a shelf decoration.

Thanks for looking.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

Last minute two-fer post - AFSS #35 & Monday Lunchtime Sketch #35

Well after 2 weeks of blog neglect..... I thought that I'd post something before charges were placed against me. I will say in my own defense that I HAVE been crafting and cardmaking, but just not posting. And (to admit the horror of it) I even asked myself in the last week if I just wanted to give the blog up. But I decided that I really do enjoy the community, so I just need to do it!!!

So, first of a couple of posts with recently complete projects. Since it's Saturday night, I thought it might be a good idea to post the two-fer card which I made for Allison's Silhouette challenge using MaryJo's sketch. I actually made this card on Thursday night, but wasn't able to get a photo of it until tonight.

I'd spent a couple of visits to Michaels looking longingly at the flower silhouette stamps, but in the end decided to be more frugal and use the tree silhouette stamp, which I already owned. I had originally punched the image out with a larger circle punch, but it ended up being too big for the front of the card. So I repositioned the larger circle inside a smaller punch to make a final image better suited to this particular sketch.

The trees and thankful sentiment were both stamped with Versafine sepia ink; after the edges of the kraft cardstock were distressed they were rubbed with Tea Dye distress ink. The dark brown cardstock below the thankful sentiment was embossed with the distressed stripes embossing folder in the Cuttlebug.

This was a fun challenge which I enjoyed as a way of getting myself back into a more productive mode.

Materials:
kraft cardstock (unknown from stash); brown cardstocks (Bazzill); designer paper (Basic Grey); ink (Versafine sepia & Tea dye distress ink); stamps: winter woods (Rubber Stampede) & thankful (Hero Arts); distressed stripes (Cuttlebug/ProvoCraft).

Thanks for looking.

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Monday Lunchtime Sketch Challenge #33


I just love MaryJo's sketch challenges. Occasionally she'll have a sketch that I just can't get my mind around. But for the most part they're so much fun.

This week's sketch looked like it would be a fun, easy one to complete. I just needed to figure out what squar-ish stamp image to use. When I found the boo! among a new set of stamps that I got in Utah, I knew that I had a Halloween-themed card in the making.

I was also excited (sounds silly, I know) to use the black background paper that I found at one of the Salt Lake valley stores where I shopped. I must confess that Halloween has always been a favorite holiday for myself and my children when they were little. I loved making their homemade costumes each year. (Sometimes even finishing them on Halloween day!!)

Materials: black cardstock (Bazzill); designer papers (Sandylion, ProvoCraft, Die Cuts with a View); stamp (Heidi Grace); ink (colorbox); die cut (Cricut); adhesive: Pioneer mounting tape, Scotch foam squares, pop-dot.

Thanks for looking.

Monday, September 1, 2008

back from vacation

Once again my poor blog has been terribly ignored.

We went out to Utah on August 16, returned on August 22. We stayed up in the mountains above Odgen; it was lovely. Except after having lived at sea level for 2 years I found that there's not enough oxygen at 8100 feet!

We did have a lovely time there; while it's hot in Utah this time of year, there's none of the Florida humidity to contend with.

We hiked in the valley at Antelope Island and at the Odgen Bay waterfowl management area. Additionally I got a day to shop at some of my favorite papercrafts/scrapbooking stores down in the Salt Lake valley. Ah.......so much paper, so little money!!!

This photo was taken at Powder Mountain (where our timeshare unit was located) looking down into the valley.

It was lovely being in Utah during the visit of Tropical Storm Fay. We missed all the fun.

When we returned to Florida, this photo shows the street in front of our house. We have a lovely pond in the backyard. We, also, briefly had a pond in the frontyard, as well.


The neighbors report that the frontyard pond was up the driveway about 10 feet, but no damage was done to the house or premises in general.


Coming back from Utah I brought a little cold. However last week it BLEW UP into a monster cold. I'm still not sure whether it was the original Utah virus or if one of my patients at work helped me along with a bigger, better virus, but...... it's been a rough week. Saturday night my son called the house and asked me if I was taking testerone!!! Not a good sign.

I did some papercrafting last week. I actually made a card for Allison's Suggestive Sunday with a large ribbon. But I was too tired to take a photo of it. Maybe this week I'll finally get around to it.

Unless, of course the next female in the Atlantic, Hanna comes our way. My goal is to post everyday this month. Unless.....

Look for papercrafts tomorrow; and as always, thanks for looking today.