Bright pink and orange Mother's Day

This card just makes me happy. I don't usually pair together hot pink and orange but I'm going to start doing it more often! I wanted to make a fun Mother's Day card for my mother-in-law this year.

The ribbon has been in my stash forever but it always seems to wide for me to use it. It worked perfectly here and I picked up the colors from it to use in the rest of the card. I've been trying to use my millions (OK, really dozens) of embossing folders more often so I used this one as the entire background panel. I think it's made my Darice as most of mine are. I used the Ranger Blending Tool to lightly blend Tangerine Colorbox Fluid Chalk ink to emphasize the flowers and circles. I rounded the corners with my Corner Chomper (I have the aqua one), ran it through my Xyron, wrapped a piece of ribbon around the edges and attached the panel to a hot pink card.

I stamped the sentiment (a little crookedly) on white cardstock with the tangerine ink then mounted it on hot pink cardstock. I sprayed a white Prima flower with Stephanie Barnard Colorbox dye spray ink in Guava, attached it to the card with a Zot glue dot after it dried, layered on a white flower and topped it with an orange gem. I added a gem to the other end of the sentiment strip after I glued it under the ribbon. Finally I tied a bow and adhered it over the ribbon with a glue dot. The bow would probably have been to lumpy to mail but thankfully we were delivering it by hand!

Kids' birthday cards

My daughter has also been invited to a lot of birthday parties lately and I've been trying to make a quick card for each kid. I've really been loving making strips of patterned paper into banners. It's fast, colorful and uses up those scraps that I always feel guilty about throwing away.

TIP: I used a square punch to make the triangular portion of the banner. You can use any size square punch as long as it's bigger than your paper strip. Just feed end of the strip through the punch, held diagonally, so you cut off a symmetrical triangle shape. So much easier than using scissors or a craft knife!


Please pardon my photography -- my scanner has been on the fritz so I photographed the cards and I don't have any kind of professional setup for card photography.

A cute first birthday card using primary colors:

I stamped the elephant directly onto the card using Charcoal Colorbox chalk ink, then drew the string of the balloon. The hat I cut freehand from patterned paper and for the balloon I used a circle punch, then inked the edges. I cut out the 1 using my Cricut and used that ever-popular Fiskars scallop sentiment punch to make the ground the elephant stands on. After cutting and assembling the banner strips, I stamped the birthday boy's name.

A horizontal variation, this one totally girlie. I'm sure you can see the influence of the first card on this one! Instead of the elephant I stamped with Charcoal chalk ink (as you can see, it's one of my favorite inks!) a large sentiment that I decorated with dots of clear Stickles. Instead of stamping directly on the card, I used a white panel and attached that to an aqua card base. I was able to wrap a piece of pink ribbon around the white panel this way (I hate for the ribbon ends to be seen in the inside of the card -- pet peeve). I stamped the birthday girl's name on white card stock and punched out the letters with a small circle punch, then attached them with pop dots. I added a Prima flower and of course a gem because this was for a very girlie two-year-old. I also embellished the designs on the patterned papers with additional Stickles, because you can never have too much glitter, right?!

Bubbe

So I'll say it again (yes, it's like Groundhogs Day -- have you ever seen the movie?) I have been creating but I haven't been blogging. We're attempting to finish our new house so we can finally move and I have huge work event and well there really is only so much time in the day. I guess I would rather make memories and capture them than detail my process.

Anyway, my husband's grandmother passed away two years ago yesterday. She really was a great woman -- smart, strong and opinionated, protective of her family and its traditions, but warm and welcoming. My husband saw this layout that I made of her and my daughter not too long before she died and kept asking to see it. So this one's for him.

The pink flowered and brown striped papers and the title stickers actually came from a kit, which I rarely buy. I believe it's Cloud 9 by Colorbok/Fiskars because that's what the stamps are. I looked at the flowered paper and thought, "That looks familiar!" and realized I had the coordinating stamps (Chocolate Chalet) so I used them to stamp the title block. I think it came out a little busy but it conveys the fun these two were having.

And here's another one also featuring my daughter and her great-grandma.

This one uses that brand of paper that Michaels sells, Reminisce I think (paisley), and a sheet from a new stack I just bought by My Minds Eye, Lime Twist. Yes I was supposed to be curtailing my craft purchases until after we move, but I just could not resist this stacks luscious colors and fun, versatile patterns! I was also happy to finally use the felt flower border that I've been hoarding in my stash for quite some time. I filled the flower centers in with tiny pearls and added larger pearls to the Prima flower centers.

Quick Girly Card

Today's card was such a rush job and I thought I was going to hate it but I think the Making Memories Glitter Glaze turned it around in the end! I read to a public school student once a week at lunchtime through the Everybody Wins! Power Lunch program. I had my session with her this morning and realized last night at like 8:00 that her birthday was yesterday. We are not supposed to buy the students presents as they are supposed to learn to value the time we spend together reading but we are encouraged to give them cards so I like to make her a little something pretty. I know I would have loved this when I was 10!

This card was an inexpensive endeavor for me since the white CS was leftover from my wedding invitations and the pink, lavender and flowered papers were from a scrapbook page that I am still finishing up. The flower center and sentiment embellishments are just a circle punch from the pink CS with one of the many purple gems I got at the Christmas Tree shop for like $1. The letters in the name aren't stickers as they appear but the same letter stamps I used on the last cards I made. The Glitter Glaze I brushed onto the cardstock was an after-thought but I love it! Really hard to see in the scan but it looks go nice and girly in person.

Directions: Trim cardstock to 4.25 by 5.5 inch bottom-opening card. Brush with glitter glaze and let dry. Scallop the edge of pp and pink strips. Trim pp to cover about 1/3 of the card and pink CS to matte underneath. Stamp letters on lavender CS with Wisteria ink and cut each one out. Glue top edges to back of bottom of layered papers. Adhere entire piece to card. Punch lavender CS with word tag punch and stamp top tag with birthday sentiment (save other tags for future project). Attach to card and trim excess. Layer flowers and attach to card with glue dots. Punch two 1/4 circles from hot pink CS. Layer with gems and attach to flower center and edge of sentiment tag.

Supplies: White & lavender cardstock, DCWV Spring Glitter Stack hot pink CS and flowered pp, Studio G birthday stamp, small alpha stamps, Prima flowers, adhesive gems, Fiskars Scallop Sentiment border punch, circle hole punch, McGill retro word tags punch, Wisteria chalk ink, Making Memories Glitter Glaze, Zots glue dots