Happy Father's Day!

I found out a while back that my dad kept all the handmade cards I made him when I stamped years ago. How sweet is that?! So now I feel a bit of pressure to come up with a "save-worthy" card for Father's Day and his birthday. This isn't the original card I wanted to make for my dad, but things don't always work out like you hope they will. When we got to the house today, he was more anxious to open the card than the gift I got him. He got a good chuckle out of this card, so all was well.

The "dad" part is chipboard letters from a huge pack I got at JoAnn's. I inked them with Sea Breeze VersaMagic chalk ink. I love that the chalk ink gives good solid coverage. Getting into the nooks along the edges was a challenge, but I managed. I printed the sentiment using my computer and cut it out, notching the corners with the ticket corner punch. I also roughed up the top and bottom edges of the orange strip using my Tim Holtz edge distresser.



Inside: Can I come out of my room now?


Paper: Pre-printed card, DCWV Extreme Card Pack; Neutrals Border Punch Strip, DCWV
Ink: Sea Breeze, VersaMagic
Accessories: Chipboard, JoAnn Essentials; Copper round brads, Making Memories; ticket corner punch, SU!; edge distresser, Tim Holtz

get well

My uncle's partner of 35 years is in the hospital. I believe he has cancer and underwent surgery last week. My mom called to ask me if I would make him a card. I can't say no to mom, but I was a bit surprised that I hadn't thought of it already.

I don't have many masculine stamp sets. I'm still growing my collection. I wasn't quite sure about doing something cute/funny as I don't really know my uncle and his partner. So I went for classic instead, using Carte Postale. Because I only had a short time to come up with this card, I perused the gallery for this set at Splitcoaststampers and found this card layout I really liked. I changed a few things, of course, using different papers and a lot fewer layers. I like how it came out.

When I showed the card to mom, she said he would love it, it's just his style. So I made a good choice.



Stamps: Carte Postale, SU!; Faux Ribbon, Papertrey Ink
Paper: Old World Stack, DCWV; Neutrals Carstock Stack, DCWV; Destiny, Lucky, Basic Grey; Very Vanilla, SU!
Ink: Purple hydrangea, VersaMagic
Accessories: Gold square brads, Making Memories; word window punch, SU!

37 years!

My parent's celebrate their 37th anniversary today. They are amazing people and wonderful parents. I'm grateful every day for them.

Here's a little card I put together for them. I finally quit hoarding this Foof-a-La paper from Autumn Leaves that I bought back in January. I like it so much, so who better than to use it on but my parents.

I've started using a Stamp-a-ma-jig to get better placement/alignment with my wood mounted stamps. It's so easy and gives a much more polished look then "eyeballing" it, so I think it's worth the extra few steps.


-Note, I'm not sure if it is just my monitor, but the image is looking a bit washed out. I might have overadjusted it in Photoshop, but the colors are much richer and the colored image matches the desginer paper more closely in real life.

Stamps: Love Matters, SU!
Paper: Jacobean Red and Black Stripe, Red, Black, & Cream, Foof-a-La; Old Flame & gray (name unknown), Bazzill; Black (scraps)
Ink: Palette Noir Black
Accessories: Red, Black, & Cream epoxy brads, Foof-a-La; 3/4" round punch, SU!; Tombow markers

Happy Birthday, J!

Every year I seem to miss my oldest brother's wife's birthday. I remembered it this year because I had it on the list, but I didn't get the card done earlier enough, so I sent this card a day late. Ah, well. Better late than never, right?

This card is pretty straight forward. I stamped the Doodle This flower onto white with Timber Brown StazOn and colored them in with my aquapainter and Tombow markers. Then I cut them both out and glued them together in the center. I cut the small piece of dark pink cardstock out and used my medium corner rounder without the guard to make the scallops on one end. I curled the blue petals under and the pink ones up and mounted it on the pink with pop dots for dimension.

I used a punch out from the SU! large oval punch as a guide to cut out my small scalloped oval in white. I stamped the sentiment from the Faux Ribbon Papertrey Ink set in coral.



Stamps: Doodle This, SU!; Faux Ribbon, Papertrey Ink
Paper: Preprinted base card, DCWV; Neutrals textured card stack, DCWV; Georgia Pacific white
Ink: StazOn Timber Brown; Cameo Coral, SU!
Accessories: Scalloped scissors; aquapainter & Tombow markers; medium corner rounder (for scallops); Aqua organdy ribbon, Joann

easter card image

I finally got around to asking my mom to borrow back the Easter card I sent her because it was easier than assembling another one. So here's a photo.



Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley, SU!
Paper: Joann Craft Essentials card pack, white; purple cardstock, Colorbök
Ink: Encore metallic purple
Accessories: Cuttlebug with Textile embossing folder; Giga Square punch, Marvy; word window punch, SU!; paper piercer; silver brads, Joann Essentials; ribbon, Michaels; font: TopHat