Birthday Card

Tomorrow is hubby's birthday and this is the birthday card I made him.  It's basically a tri-fold card with the ends cut into triangular points that fold in to make an envelope for the card to fit in.  I used a piece of yellow cardstock for the envelope and it's cut at 5 1/2" x 12" then scored at 4" and 8".  Then placing each end in my trimmer I cut from the score to the corner on each end section then folded them over each other.  My patterned papers are from the new DCWV Celebrations stack.  I just found it at the store the other day and fell in love with it.  I haven't bought a big 12 x 12 stack in a long time because I feel like it's a waste of paper when I'm mostly making cards.  I find the mat stacks to be much better for card making.  They didn't have this stack in the mat size at the store, but I loved the papers so much I went ahead and bought it.  It has some glitter and foil on some of the papers which I really liked.  The mat on the front of the card is 3 3/4" x 3".  The circle sentiment is from The Cutting Cafe and I placed it on a scalloped circle I cut from my Cricut Mini Monograms cartridge.  It's placed on foam tape in the center. 

2sketches4U/DutchDare/DareU2digistamp

2Sketches4U/DutchDare/DareU2Digistamp

I finally got around to making the birthday card for my other aunt. This is actually the first time I managed to get the cards made ahead of time instead of at the last minute. When I saw this sketch it looked very similar to the card I made for aunt #1 and I wanted different but similar. I added lace to this card for the Dutch Dare challenge and did some distressing for the Dare U 2 Digistamp challenge. The supplies I used for this card:

Beige and rusty red cardstock
Flower and striped paper-K&Company
Cricut-Mini Monograms and Wedding cartridges
Fiskars lace corner punch
Beige button
Colorbox chalk ink-Creamy Brown
Sentiment-The Cutting Café

The patterned paper for this card is two-sided so I used the flower side for the largest area and the stripe on the back for the other side. Before attaching them to my beige base card I punched the corners with the Fiskars lace corner punch and did a little distressing with ink and an emery board. I cut the scalloped circle from my Cricut Mini Monograms cartridge at 3 ½”. I attached the sentiment (http://thecuttingcafe.typepad.com/) after reducing the size to 75% to fit in my scalloped circle. I put the lace on the card before attaching the scalloped circle. The flower in the center of the sentiment is from the Cricut Wedding cartridge. I cut three layers using the beige (1 ½”) and rusty red (1 ¼”) cardstock and used a scrap of the print paper (1”) for the top layer. I added a beige button to the center.

Paper Play/Crafts 4 Eternity

Crafts4Eternity/Paper Play challenges

When I saw the Crafts4Eternity sketch this week I almost put it aside as too complicated. But then I came across the Paper Play 3-D challenge and thought, what could be better to make 3-D than a sketch with lots of layers. This is the design I came up with. The supplies I used:

White, light blue and medium blue cardstock
Blue print paper
Cuttlebug-Divine Swirls embossing folder
Cricut-Mini Monograms, Wedding, and Stretch Your Imagination cartridges
Clear Rhinestones
Sentiment-The Cutting Café

My base card is six inches square. For those of you who are great artists or have been at this a long time and have lots of patterns to use, this sketch may not have seemed too difficult. I’m not even sure what shape you would call the bottom two layers. There might be a Cricut cartridge with this shape but I don’t have it. My solution to get these shapes was to print the sketch twice, cut out each shape and trace the design onto my papers. I used the print paper for the bottom layer and the light blue for the layer on top of that. Then I cut my scalloped circle from the medium blue with my Cricut Mini Monograms cartridge at 4 ¼” and embossed it with my Cuttlebug. Since this is a birthday card I decided to use a present for my image. The Stretch Your Imagination cartridge had what I was looking for, the present and a nice fancy frame cut. The present is 1 ¼” from the print with the light blue paper as a shadow and the frame is 3” cut from the print paper. My sentiment came from The Cutting Café’s All Occasion scalloped circle set. I shrunk the one and a half inch stamp a little to be able to cut it with the scallop punch I have which measures 1 7/16”. Using the Cricut Wedding cartridge I cut one white cardstock flower at 1” with a ¾” blue center and two ¾” white cardstock with ½” blue centers putting rhinestones in the middle of each. Then I just started layering using foam squares. I really do enjoy making monochromatic cards. It’s a challenge to get papers that are close in color but different. That usually takes the most time—looking through my stacks and stacks of papers. Can you ever have too much paper? My husband thinks so!!!

Card Patterns Sketch 21 challenge

This card was made for the Card Patterns Sketch 21 challenge. Alright, I admit, I am totally hooked on these card challenge sites. I've only scrapped a few pages for my friend's baby album which was supposed to be my first order of business during summer vacation. Of course, I've spent too much time sick with a sinus and ear infection. My husband retired on June 19th and we took off to enjoy our new "retirement" 5th wheel and I have been sick the whole time. When he got sick too we had to leave our trailer at the campground and come home to go to the dr. We did that this morning, I hope the antibiotics kick in quickly.

Anyway, on to my card. The supplies I used for this card:

• White, purple and yellow cardstock
• Yellow print paper (a scrap from my stash)
• Stamp from Studio G
• Purple organdy ribbon
• Purple twill tape
• Purple flower
• Yellow brad
• Colorbox chalk-Wisteria
• Cricut-Stretch Your Imagination (scalloped frame)

This card is the standard 4 1/4" by 5 1/2". I cut the scalloped frame from the Cricut Stretch Your Imagination cartridge at 6" to make it fit on the front of the card. I cut the scallops off the short ends so it would conform to the sketch better. I topped the purple scallops with a yellow print from my scrap bin. The stamp I used on this card came from a birthday set by Studio G that I got from my local Michael's store. There were several images and several sayings. I don't have much of a stamp collection, yet. Although, I do notice that the prices seem to be coming down and it is less expensive to buy the unmounted stamps and put them on the acrylic blocks (good idea-whoever thought of that). I inked the edges of the stamped images with the Wisteria chalk ink before mounting them on yellow paper. Before putting the image on the card I added the purple twill tape. I popped the saying out with some foam squares and then added the bow with the flower in the center. I added a few dots with my black marker for a finishing touch. I'll be putting this card into my birthday card stash.