Simple Thanks

Gosh, I had SO many cards made earlier and had blog posts for over a month scheduled. They are all done already!  I just haven't had time to play in my stamping room much at all. Here is a very simple thank you card that I made a couple days ago. I was sorting through my dies a little bit and came across this little die/embossing plate from Stampin' Up! I'm not even sure where I got it. But, I cut it out about four times and layered them, then dragged a blue ink pad across it to highlight the embossing. I found some patterned paper that worked and matted it. Done!

We got back a couple weeks ago from a river boat trip in The Netherlands and Belgium. It was supposed to be on the Rhine and mostly in Germany, but low water levels forced that trip to be canceled. It was a great trip, though, and we traveled with ten other friends. I still hope to do the Rhine River trip some time soon.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!

Happy 46th Birthday!

Our son's birthday was a few days ago, and here is the card we made for him. Tradition is for us to make a card with a photo of a professional athlete who wore the jersey number of our son's age. Well, as he gets older, that gets harder and harder! LOL! So this year, we used two superstars who wore #23 and used them both - hence 46! (That's our son in the middle. :-)) The sentiment uses letters and numbers from a die that I got awhile back and hadn't used yet. I thought it was cool that the photos had both athletes looking towards the middle.

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Patterned Paper Christmas Cards

A few weeks ago, I made these Christmas cards - I was thinking about how fast time is flying!! They all feature patterned paper, so I'm linking this post to the "Love Those Pretty Papers Challenge" blog.

Not much to say about any of them - pretty self-explanatory. I have duplicates of a few of them, so 14 more done. What I REALLY need to do is work on my calendars for next year!

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Old Punches #4

I used an old border punch on the bottom of this panel and matted with gold. The sentiment is from Gina K and is gold-embossed. The flowers and leaves are from an older set from Gina K. I stamped them on patterned paper and die-cut them. I added a little extra color on the leaves with a Copic marker, and also added color to the flower centers. The flowers are popped up.

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Old Punches #1

I have so many old punches that I haven't used for years!! I rearranged things in my stamping room (again!) and now they are visible. But first, I had to test them all. I had to toss a few of them that didn't work, but I still have lots. So, I now have several cards that are made with test pieces. Here is one of them. I punched the bottom border, then matted that piece with black. The sentiment is from Gina K. So are the flower and leaf stamps, stencils and dies. The flowers are popped up. I added three black nail heads to complete the card.

  
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Copying Gina K

Copying Gina K! I actually made this card while following along with one of her YouTube videos. I like the way it turned out. Not as nice as hers, of course, but very similar. LOL!

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Soft Sympathy

I needed a sympathy card a little bit ago for a sentiment, and went to this wood-mounted set from Stampin' Up! While I had it out, I decided to use the images from it, also. I used markers to color the images and then "huffed" on them before stamping. I added some tiny stickers to the flower centers. The background is shimmery cardstock that I embossed with a Cuttlebug folder.

This one is softer, because I didn't re-color the image. I just breathed on it again and there was enough ink left for this card. This one has a slight texture to the matting layer.

The other image in this set - done the same way. I embossed the background with a Cuttlebug/Anna Griffin embossed folder. I have SO SO many wood-mounted Stampin' Up! sets and I don't want to get rid of most of them. I would sell them if I could, but they are even hard to GIVE away! LOL!

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Patterned Paper

I came across this patterned paper that I've had forever, and made it into these two cards. (I had two sheets of it.) It came from Archiver's, so that says how old it is. LOL! The sentiment on each card is from Gina K and the metallic butterflies were already die cut and in my parts.

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Another Strawberry Card

I had this left-over piece of embossed paper and decided to make it into this card. I also had the die-cut, embossed and stenciled strawberry piece that I added on top. Everything is from Gina K.

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Patterned Paper Embossed and Sanded

Gina K did a video on this older technique a while back and I made these four cards. They all use the same embossing folder. They are mostly embossed on patterned paper, except the one that I messed up. :-) For this one, I embossed, sanded, added white ink lightly, and then gold ink on top of that. The sentiment is gold embossed, also.

These next two Just have the white ink on top of the sanded image.

This one is patterned paper on the back. LOL! I used an ink pad to lightly go over the whole panel. I made this one into a gate-fold card.

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Wedding for Our Nephew

My nephew got married out in Oregon at the end of July. We weren't able to attend the wedding, but we wish them well!! Here is the card that I made for them. It's a book-binder card with a surprise inside. The sentiment doesn't show up very well, but it's die cut (and many-layered!) from gold textured foil. The patterned paper had plain flowers (which you can see on the inside) but I colored the front ones with Copic markers.

The left side is blank for me to add our message to them.

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Strawberry Birthday and Anniversary

Two more cards made with Gina K's strawberries folder, stencils and dies. This sentiment is die-cut from gold.

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Warm Wishes

I made two cards almost identical to this one (one had a different sentiment) and two cards just like the second one. The stencil and the stamps and dies are all from Gina K. I colored with Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol. The image and sentiment are popped up, of course. :-)

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Elegant Birthday

Can you tell that I brought almost exclusively Gina K products with me on my retreat. :-) The elegant frame (die-cut from gold metallic cardstock), the flower and leaf (from the newest kit) and the sentiment are all Gina K. The sentiment is embossed in gold.

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Sunny Days

I made this card on my retreat, but colored it after I came home so that I could use my Copic markers. The flip-flops and hat are mounted on foam squares. The stamps are all from one set from Gina K's newest kit. (The colors look much better together in person!)

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Bird Birthdays in Black and White

Well, here are the bird die-cuts and embossed vellum on colored cardstock that I was talking about the other day - made into cards. I think the dies are from Spellbinders. The sentiments on each card are from the new card kit from Gina K. I love them both! I added black nail heads to each bird. This bird is popped up on foam squares.

I used an ancient tool on this one. I'm guessing no one would spot it. I cut the small square of black cardstock and then I used a decorative scissors on it! This bird is attached directly to the black square and then I popped up the square.

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Four Christmas Cards

I have several things going on in my stamping room. I was playing with crinkled and ironed wax paper. I also played with vellum over cardstock and then embossed. And I dug out some bird dies that I had. (Thanks, Leslie, for two of those!) I also got a new kit from Gina K and I really want to get started on using all the new stuff! Lucky for me I'm going away for a few days with a friend and her friends on a scrapbooking retreat. But, I will be making cards instead. Hopefully it will be very productive. I've also been messing around with rearranging my stamping room a bit. It's always something. :-)

Anyway, here are four cards I've made. I'm going to save my ironed, wrinkled wax paper for another time. I have eight card fronts that I've used that technique on, just waiting to be used.

This first card uses a Sizzix embossing folder. I used white mulberry paper over cardstock for the base for this embossed and die-cut bird, which I believe is from Spellbinders. The sentiment is from Impression Obsession.

This one also uses a Spellbinders die. The sentiment is from Hero Arts. The background is vellum over a mottled light green cardstock and then embossed with a Cuttlebug folder, I believe.

The dies for these ornaments are from Spellbinders. I used one to cut the bottom of the cardfront, too, so the bottom of the card that you see is actually on the inside.

The texture on this card is the wax paper that was left over from the pieces that I used as a resist on my as-yet-unused card panels.

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Birthday and Sympathy

Here are two more cards that I made using marker-to-rubber-stamp method. I used gold on this first birthday card, and black on the sympathy card.  The sentiment is five layers of die-cuts.

The sentiment on this card is from Papertrey Ink.

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More Marker-to Rubber Stamp

Marker on rubber stamp, then mist and stamp. The sentiment on this one is from Gina K.

The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink.

Sentiment from Papertrey Ink.

Sentiment from Papertrey Ink.

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More Paint Samples

I love the color of this patterned paper, and it matched so nicely with some of our paint samples. I have four more backgrounds ready to finish into cards, but this is what I have for now. This first one features a die-cut paint sample and a Gina K stamp.

The butterfly is another paint sample die-cut. The sentiment is from My Favorite Things.

These last two are nearly identical - just different flower dies and slightly different color paint samples. The sentiment is from Gina K. I also added a few sequins.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and I hope you'll come back and visit again soon!