New Year, New Post

Two-for-One

The above photo is a card I made for my brother-in-law and his wife for their anniversary. I really like the Stampin' Up! set called "Fifth Avenue Floral" and used it here with some watercolor pencils to give it dimension.

The above card is a blank notecard I made. I have used my scalloped edge punch for a lot of cards and think it adds a nice touch.

Happy Punch Time

These cards were used for sympathy cards, but the outsides are pretty generic to be used for about anything. I was excited to use a "new" punch and churned these two cards out right away.

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(I called the punch "new" as it was new to me, but a retired punch from Stampin' Up! that one of my Stampin' Up! demonstrators found for me to complete me having the stamp set that matched. Did that long, long sentence make sense? Ha ha!!!)

Fun... but some work!

Stitching doen by hand after mapping out stitch placement with a template. Fun... but it did take a while... the results are very cool nontheless.

Variations on a Theme

Just a few cards that I made for church... my Hope Stampers group that I have mentioned here several times. (We make cards used to send to people on our church's prayer list.)

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I have to admit that this group is a fun one for me to be a part of. I love paper crafts and making pretty cards. It is an easy ministy to take part of... and, yes, we don't make nearly the number of cards we need for the entire prayer list and they fill in the need with store bought cards... and that those cards are just as good... well, I just want to say that I try to put my heart into making the cards that I do contribute. I consider it a part of how I worship... a part of how I can include God in on my everyday life.

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And I guess I am including these thoughts here to say that God can be as close to you as the air you breathe. Let Him in, use your gifts for Him, and I will promise you your life will change.

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1 Peter 1:8 For you love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him, you trust him; and even now you are happy with a glorious, inexpressible joy.

A Kind of a Glimpse

These two cards (the way that they are laid out? layed out? which one is it?) provide you with a glimpse into what my Christmas Cards will look like this year! (Love my new scallop punch from Stampin' Up!, too, by the way! Can't you tell?)

More Inspiration

The above photo shows a card made by my friend, Jaimie. She is also the greatly-mentioned-in-this-blog Stampin' Up! demonstrator that I know. From this card, I came up with the following cards.

My hand is in the photo here to hold the card flat. Otheriwse it would tip over because of the unique front "cover" of the card. (It is smaller than the back of the card... made by cutting off most of the original base and replacing it with a matted/layered piece.)

Here is another version of the same idea... but the flap of the card opens up (as you can see).

Sweet Stamp Set

Sweet in its design... and sweet for its price! I got it on a used stamp sale for more than half the price. Gotta like that!
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Made this with dye ink so that I could try out some old Heat 'n' Stick powder I had buried in amongst my glitters, re-inkers, and flocking. It did not work the best, but I kind of liked the antiqued effect I got with the leafing only sticking in certain areas. (Maybe you can see the leafing better by clicking on the image to "embiggen" it. ("Embiggen" is a term I adopted from Carmi.)
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My mom and pop should soon recognize this card (sent them a note in it!)
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Everyone have a wonderful weekend!

Variation

Variation on the color from THIS CARD.

Cool idea...

Was so excited about this new fold that I learned from Jaimie (thanks once again, girl!!!) that I just had to give it a go! It's a clever idea!
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So, she had a card made at one of our Stampers' 10 get togethers with this type of fold. I got my new stamps from my last order and ta-daa! Another Stampin' Up! success story! ;-)

I didn't realize...

I recently added a feature to this blog in the column at the right that has a slideshow of cards that I have posted here. Well, when I looked a couple of them up, I realized that I had not included them on the blog in the past after all. So, here they are.
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The top one is a Christmas card made long ago. I cannot remember how many I made that year this way, but I am sure that the coloring of the images took some time. (Maybe that was back when I was only making about 60 cards or so for the holidays! :-) I do remember that I was tickled to get the corner punch that made the cute frame and so then I found the rest to fit with it for the card.
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The bottom card, I believe, was one I made for my in-laws for their anniversary. I am going to label it as a "blank" card on the blog... mainly because it could be used for many purposes. I just love that tree stamp when embossed in gold (as seen here) or silver on a dark background... very dramatic!

And others done recently...

Before and After 2

This top image is how it was left...
... and this shows that I added a simple layering piece and one more stamped image to spruce it up a bit.

French Curve

I usually don't post cards that I might yet use sometime, but here is one and it shows something new that I tried... stitching. I know, this is nothing new to everyone, but I thought I would give it a go. I have seen templates you can buy, but I opted to grab my ol' French curve tool, drew my design on the back of the cardstock and plotted my own stitching pattern.

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This here is my second attempt. On the first try I got the holes spaced too close together and the cardstock tore. So, on this one I pierced the paper with enough space to get a needle through with the floss without tearing.

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I know there are incredible things people do with sewing machines, too. I will need to wait and see if that is something I actually want to invest in. I just can't use my regular sewing machine for this as the paper tends to dirty/jam up a machine. I will have to look into those cheap-ie little craft machines if I want to pursue more stitching.

Eh...

I am not totally in love with this one, but I was glad that I tried to do something different with the recycled cards other than just the square, cropped format (as seen in the previous posts here recently). I just really like the Priceless stamp set from Stampin' Up! and pushed myself to use it in conjunction with punchouts of the scene from the recycled card. Ribbon and vellum paper rounded out the idea a bit.

No-tie, Bowtie

Just a layer of the recycled card and an elegant no-tie bow at the bottom. (The no-tie bow is so clever and I had not heard of it until this past Monday night... you fashion the bow by passing ribbon through two holes punched into the cardstock... back and forth until you get a sweet little bow. Who whudda thunk it?)

Recycled

A woman who is part of our Hope Stampers** group has been bringing old, unused cards that she collected from her mother-in-law's place (she passed away) and we have been having fun using the cards. We transform them by cropping them or using punches to crop part of the original card... and wah-lah! New cards emerge to use for our ministry!

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This one is a basic layering of cardstock and then the scene from the other card. Then I just added a "no-tie" bow and it turned out pretty and cute! (Jaimie, Michaelle said that she couldn't believe that you had not taught us the "no-tie" bow yet at Stampers 10!!! Ha ha!!!)

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Anyway... I think it is a great idea to recycle these cards for new life and shaing Jesus' love.

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**Hope Stampers is a group of stampers who make cards to use in our caring ministry at church. We make the cards and then another group uses them to send out to those in need of contact this way. I am hoping that if there is not already a group like this at my new church in South Carolina that, perhaps, I could start one there.

Birds of a Feather...

Yeah... the title of this post has really nothing with what I am going to say here... I love birds, but here is about the card.

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I took a layout from my trusty Stampin' Up! catalog and idea book. The card really looked nothing like this one... using brighter colors and larger format than what I did here... but I think you can get ideas from anywhere (I am learning this, actually) and here is what I came up with.

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The basic idea was a blank cardstock backdrop... next was a textured or textured look layer with an image stamped on it... then the added image in the upper left corner with the raffia accent... and the finishing touch was adding the brads... they really balance out the dark color of the matted feather, don't you think?

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Anyway... have fun with what you see everywhere, I guess, as ideas can come from there.

Silvery Simplicity

Easy layering... silver embossing... simple, yet beautiful stamp... done.

Scrap-a-doo!

Another card made from scraps found... (Sorry, photo not in focus.)

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I found these 4 little hearts in the bottom of the scrap bucket. Where I cut them out from, I have no recollection. I just put them with a couple of background pieces and the card base. Wah-lah! (Jaimie, does this remind you of Michaelle's Kleenex boxes or what?!?! For others who might happen to check out this blog, I will explain... I have a friend who recycles a lot of paper scraps and other items with the inspiration to someday use them in a card. One day she -Michaelle- showed up to our Hope Stampers group with the pretty floral designs cut from leftover Kleenex boxes. We thought, at first, that she was silly... but then saw the remarkable cards she turned out using the bits... it was inspiring... and Michaelle is, too.)

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Let the scraps continue!!!