2007 Cards Once Again

For this card, I cut the front off an old card I'd received from someone and saved. I always save the cards I get. Old cards can be used for so many things! There are always art or craft projects with the children. They can be cut into gift tags or postcards or bookmarks. Or they can be recycled into new cards, as I did here. The three solid colored squares at the top of the card are cut from paint chips you get when deciding on new paint colors. Just as a FYI, at the Blain's Farm & Fleet store we shop at in Chippewa Falls, WI, they now carry paint chips that are about the size of a sheet of poster board. Each one costs about $3 but think of how many cards you could make with pieces from that! No, I haven't bought any, mostly because I have oodles of the freebie paint chip strips & cards saved already. You can punch paint chips or cut them into whatever shape & size you want. You can find some interesting projects using them at GoMakeSomething.com, which is a really cool website with a lot of neat projects and free printables.

This card also makes use of paint chips, in the small colored squares that frame the outside edges. The background paper is computer-printed, using an email background I had saved. The pumpkin is clipart from the good folks at pccrafter.com; I love their stuff and the prices are really good! I used my own calligraphy on the sentiment tag and colored the edges with crayon.

This card uses different shades of lavender cardstock, cut in diamond shapes. The floral design is cut from giftwrap paper. The sentiment tag was computer-printed and torn to size.

I hope you'll forgive me for not taking the time to edit this image. It's been a long day already and I'm tired. This card is another of my personal favorites. The background is a floral wallpaper sample. I machine-stitched the ric-rac to the card to simulate a stem, as well as using it as a frame around the flowers. The silk flowers are hand-stitched to the card, using embroidery floss, and button centers. I really should make another card like this!

A Few More From 2007

This sympathy card used wallpaper samples for the background and center strip. The sentiment was computer-printed, then torn to size.


This birthday card is one of my favorites. I used sticker paper for the rock frame around the lighthouse; this paper comes in printed sheets, with a peel-off backing, like Con-Tac paper. I picked it up at a liquidator store and like it a lot. The lighthouse picture is the front off a small pocket calendar. The sentiment is computer-printed and torn to size.

Another one of my favorites, using wallpaper samples and a floral motif cut from giftwrap paper. Very simple, actually, but also pleasing to the eye, I think.

Looking Back At Some Older Cards

This card uses wallpaper samples for the papers, a design cut from giftwrap paper (Holly Hobbie), and has a crocheted trim hot-glued around the design oval. I made this back in July 2007.


This card features a wallpaper background with a corner cut from a coordinating wallpaper. The design is cut from giftwrap paper. The sentiment tag is computer-printed. This card, also, was made in July 2007.

The Last Two To Date

This card was for Tim's cousin, one of the daughters of his Aunt Rose who recently passed away. I know this is going to be a difficult birthday for her, having just lost her mom, so I didn't want to get too bright with this card. I started with a white cardstock base, covering the front with the rose-patterned paper and the digital faux-corrugated paper at the bottom. The bottom digital print comes from ScrapbookScrapbook.com. I added a sticker ribbon strip across the card, added two little ribbon bows and a button, then stamped the sentiment in the lower corner. Then I inked the card edges--all rather simple, but still attractive, I think.

My daughter Holly's next-door neighbor generously offered to let me come dig up perennial flowers in her back yard. Pam is going to re-do her yard and wanted the extra perennials to go to someone who could use them. I never say no to free perennials, so I was more than happy to go dig up a bunch of them. I came home with daylilies, peonies, siberian iris, shasta daisies, and more. Now I just need to take the time to replant them in my yard! Guess what's on tomorrow's agenda?

Anyway, I wanted to send Pam a thank-you card. To make it, I started with a white cardstock base, covered the front with that green print I like so well (DCWV), then added an orange circle of cardstock, actually half of a circular card blank I got in one of those monthly cardmaking kits from the folks at Annie's Attic. On top of that is a white cardstock circle cut out with paper-edger scissors so I could get the scalloped effect. Then you have a floral print circle cut from giftwrap paper. I cut individual flowers out of that same giftwrap paper, mounted them on old index card and then adhered them along the edge of the circle, with the largest one having foam tape under it to "pop" it out. I stamped the sentiment down in the corner and just like that, there you have it...

Three-color Challenge

In the cardmaking group I belong to, Crazy Card Makers, we had a challenge to use just 3 colors on a card. My youngest daughter, Thea, was here when I decided to make my card so I asked her to pick out three colors for me and I'd take it from there. She looked through my cardstock and picked out an orange, a red, and a bright blue. I knew she'd pick colors I'd never think to put together. She also offered ideas on how I should make the card, so this is the result of our joint effort.

I started with an orange cardstock base, adding a layer of a striped print scrapbooking paper that used all 3 of our colors. I cut a square from the red cardstock, mounted a square of the blue cardstock on top of it, then Thea punched the flower shapes in the reddish-orange print paper so that when I put it on top of the blue, we'd have blue flowers surrounding the little kitty in his flowerpot which is a stamped image I punched out with a 2" scallop punch and mounted on a red circle of cardstock in the center. Thea wanted orange brads in the corners of the square. I stamped the sentiment with blue pigment ink, sprinkled on holographic clear glitter and heat-embossed it. The stamped image was colored with markers, BIC Mark-It and Crayola (the flowerpot).



This black, white, and red card was my original idea for this challenge and I couldn't resist making it even though I really liked the card I made with my daughter's input. To make this, I started with a square of white cardstock, a size I don't often make, but I wanted to do something a little different. Then I covered the front with the patterned black & white print. From a coordinating print paper, I cut out the stripe with the medallions on it that I adhered across the card. From yet another coordinating print, I cut out the large flower and two smaller flowers, adhering them on top of the horizontal strip. The large flower is mounted with foam tape to make it pop out more. And there you have it...

With Sympathy

My sweetheart's Aunt Rose passed away a little over a week ago. She was a much-loved mother figure in my husband's life. She was predeceased by her husband, Tim's Uncle Jim, and leaves behind 3 daughters, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, as well as nieces and nephews who mourn her passing (my apologies to any other family members who may see this and who didn't get mentioned).

We weren't able to attend her funeral but we did send a card. I started with a piece of the light green parchment-looking cardstock for my base, added pieces of those blue/green prints I've been using a lot of lately (all this from scraps out of my scrap bag), and used a Dover clipart painting print in the center. The sentiment tag was printed on the computer and torn to size. All the edges were inked and I lightly sponged distress ink over the papers and print. And there you have it...

Two Birthdays & A Thinking of You

This card pleases me very much! I'm just really liking this color combination lately for some reason. Anyway, this card started with a light green cardstock, actually a parchment-look, if I remember correctly. I used two prints from my DCWV paper stack for the background, tearing the one on top and inking the torn edge. The graphic comes from a clip-art set I bought from pccrafter.com; I stamped the Happy Birthday sentiment in the center. The graphic is mounted on pink cardstock, then on blue, and lastly green, tilting the bottom two layers. I added 3 buttons and 1 flower brads along the torn edge. And I inked the edges of the card, a technique I am liking a lot lately also. I find the small inkpads work really well for this, using a corner of the pad and drawing it across the edge I'm inking.

This card was another quick and easy card to make, winging its way to an online friend overseas. I started with a white cardstock base, covered the front with a piece of scrapbooking paper (another corner of the same paper I used on Venetta's You're Special card a couple posts back) from DCWV. Then I added 4 dimensional flower stickers and a blue sentiment tag. The sentiment is stamped. It just doesn't get any easier than that! And I finally used some of those lovely stickers I have in my sticker file box.

This birthday card was for my sweetheart Tim. Why is it that cards you make for the person you love the most never seem to turn out quite the way you wanted? He liked it, though, so I guess that's what matters most. Again, I used the blues and greens that have been a favorite lately, mounting them on a green cardstock base, over a layer of darker green cardstock. I tore the edge of the top paper and inked it. Then I stamped the Happy Birthday design on in brown and a second time with green. The two stampings didn't line up as closely as I had wanted, though, so it looks kind of blurry. I went over the Happy Birthday letters with a gel pen. I added some brads to the design and a small gold heart brad to the lower right-hand corner of the card, inking the edges of the card. And there you have it...

Three More July Cards

This lovely card was made for my oldest daughter, Venetta. I had tried something a little different with this one. I started with a white cardstock base, then adhered a piece of scrapbook paper to cover the front. This paper comes from DCWV; the flourish and dragonfly are printed right on the paper. Then I cut out, very carefully with my X-Acto knife, a window around the flourish and dragonfly. Behind the window, I adhered a piece of floral giftwrap paper. To complete the front of the card, I stamped a sentiment in the lower right corner and added two mini-brads to the bottom of the flourish. On the inside, I adhered a liner of blue flecked paper. On the right side, I used a Martha Stewart edge punch to punch a border design. Under it, I adhered a strip of the floral giftwrap I used on the front. Usually I don't decorate the inside of my cards, as I print the sentiment right onto my cardstock base using the computer printer.

This card went to an online friend for her birthday. I started with a white cardstock base again, covering the front with a dark green cardstock. The background paper is a digital print I made on the computer using a background tile from KittyWompus.com. I added a strip of reddish print scrapbook paper from my scrap bag. Behind it I added a lattice-punched strip of white cardstock to mimic the gate in the painting. I used a print from a Thomas Kinkade page-a-day calendar (a gift from one of my daughters and you can be sure I saved every page!) for the design motif, matted on a reddish brown cardstock. To complete the card, I stamped the sentiment and added 3 white flower brads and a bronze dragonfly brad.

This bright, bold card went to an online friend who is laid up in the hospital, going through a rough time. I started with a white cardstock base, covering the front with the bright pinkish striped paper. Then I cut rectangles from two complimentary patterned prints--all 3 papers from DCWV, matting them on dark blue cardstock. I attached a strip of pink ribbon using staples and added a silk flower with a bright brad center to the ribbon. To finish, I stamped a sentiment in the bottom right corner.

And there you have it.

Two For The Guys

This card was for my son-in-law Jordon. I think it rates as one of the quickest cards I've ever made. It started with a piece of tannish cardstock. Then I added a layer of scrapbooking paper by DCWV which already had those cool white designs printed over the stripes. I added a computer-printed sentiment with torn & inked edges. I inked the edges of the card and it was done. It looks pretty good, too, if I do say so myself!

This card went to our son-in-law Bradley. It didn't take too long to make, either. I started with the olive green cardstock, then added a piece of printed scrapbooking paper by DCWV. On top of that I added a piece of wallpaper sample. Then I took a stamp I had from the American Wildlife Fund from years gone by (I don't throw things like that away!), matted it on another piece of the olve green cardstock, adhered it on top of the wallpaper sample, then stuck on 4 gold foil stickers and added a stamped sentiment. Voila! and there you have it...

Catching Up On July's Cards

It's amazing, isn't it, how quickly time can get away from us? July has been busy with gardening. In between planting and weeding (of which I still have more to do), I have managed to make some cards. So let me bring you up to date on the cards I've made...

This pretty card was made for an online friend. I used two different blue cardstocks. The dotted background paper and the plaid background paper are from ScrapbookScrapbook.com. I used my Martha Stewart border punch to make the white doily edging. The "hello Firiend" floral image is stamped and colored with markers; I'm liking the BIC Mark-It permanent markers a lot and just got a new set of 36 of them for less than $16 at Shopko. I rounded the corners of the layered stamped image and inked the edges. Floral brads add the finishing touch.


This card was also made for an online friend and is one of those cards that's a favorite of mine. I started with a light blue cardstock, added a layer of faux corrugated paper from ScrapbookScrapbook.com, then a layer of a digital paper I printed out using a background tile, with the edge torn and inked, a shaped layer of cardstock with edges inked, a shaped layer of scrapbooking paper from DCWV with edges inked, and in the center a butterfly print from a page of German decoupage designs. I added two square mini-brads set on point and a stamped sentiment in the lower right hand corner, then inked the card edges.


I like this card a lot, too, even though it was really quick and easy to make. I started with a brown cardstock, added a layer of scrapbooking paper, a Creating Keepsakes design from Sandy Lion, and a mauve shaped bit of cardstock matted behind a simple stamped sentiment plus the flower, both of which have inked edges. I rounded the corners with my corner-rounder punch and I colored the stamped flower with a colored pencil. I also lightly colored the sentiment piece with the side of a colored pencil to make it match the pink stripe in the background paper. This card went to another online friend.

And there you have it...

A Hello Card

This cheery card for an online friend starts with blue cardstock. Then I added a layer of bright dotted paper from one of those Stacks by DCWV. The purple cardstock rectangle was punched with that lattice punch and a piece of flowered & dotted paper, another DCWV piece from that Stack, was inserted into the punched corners. I added yellow flower brads on 3 of the corners. There's a pink dotted strip attached diagonally, a scrap from my bag of paper scraps. Lastly there's another smaller rectangle of the blue cardstock with a white piece on top of that, stamped with the Hello sentiment (one of those dollar stamps from Michaels) and a flower from another stamp set, popped with foam tape. I colored the flower with Sharpie markers and I added two sparkly hair pins as an underliner. In fact, it was a challenge to myself to use the hair pins (aka bobby pins) that pulled this card together. I picked a bunch of hair pins up at a liquidator store by us, thinking they'd make a neat embellishment on cards, then stashed them away. It was time to challenge myself to use them on a card. I like the way they look, too, so expect to use them again; after all, I have quite a few of them, in two different sizes and in different colors. And there you have it....

Three Birthday Cards

This card was made for Tim's Aunt Rose who lives in Pennsylvania. She's a very special lady; unfortunately, we live almost a thousand miles away so don't get to see her very often. In fact, the last time we saw her was about 3 years ago when Tim's dad passed away and we went out for his funeral. Miles do not stop affection, though.

To make this card, I used a background paper from one of those Stacks by DCWV I got recently. Then I added a silk flower sporting 3 layers and a brad center, as well as 4 chipboard embellishments and touches of ribbon. It didn't turn out quite like I had pictured it in my mind, but I hope Aunt Rose liked it all the same.


This pretty pink card went to an online friend, Tajuana. I did like the way this one turned out! I started with a pink cardstock base, then added a layer of Happy Birthday (Birthday Pink) paper by DCWV. I border-punched a strip of pink cardstock, on top of which is an oval cut from PL-267 by Me & My Big Ideas, then a shaped piece of light pink cardstock, a smaller pink oval, and in the center a stamped butterfly image which I colored with gel pens and colored pencils. I added faux stitching with a gel pen, inked edges, and brads. The stamped butterfly image is mounted with foam tape to "pop" it up above the oval under it.


That brings me to this birthday card made for Tim's brother Terry. I started here with a brown cardstock base, added pieces cut from a Paper Pizazz Vintage papers pack, as is the "ribbon" strip that runs down the center of the card. I also used brown and light blue cardstocks to cut the solid-colored pieces, rounding the corners of the two layers in the center. I stamped the Happy Birthday sentiment and heat-embossed it in copper. Then I added brads and inked the edges of the card and the one piece of brown shaped cardstock. (What DO you call that shape? I know there's a name for them!)

And just to let you know, I make my own stencils for these shapes. It's easy enough. I use a light piece of card, usually the reply cards that are stuck in all the magazines these days, fold it into quarters (that's why you want to use a LIGHT piece of card), then cut one-fourth of the shape you want, unfold it and see if it suits you; if not, refold and trim as desired or start over. Hey, the cards are free and just going in the trash anyway, right? Any symmetrical shape is easy to do this way, either cutting on the fold, as with a heart shape, or in quarters as with this shape. You can even do your own nesting shapes by cutting the smaller design first, then tracing one-fourth of it onto your next piece of folded card and cutting outside that line as close to the same distance away all the way around as you'd like to add. I did that to make the two nested shapes on this card. I save all the stencils I make and reuse them. And if you want them to be a little more permanent than the light card you used to make them out of, trace them onto a plastic lid, such as a whipped topping lid, and cut out with an old pair of scissors. I have oodles of stencils I made this way when my children were still small and we homeschooled. Greedy me, I still have them, too! I'm supposed to be copying them to make sets for the grandchildren--one of those rainy day projects I haven't gotten to yet, but I have plenty of plastic lids saved for when I do get around to it (ice cream pail lids, whipped topping, sour cream, yogurt, etc, but not the brittle plastic lids, only the softer, bendable plastic lids). Besides ovals and circles, hearts and shapes like I used on this card, you can trace cookie cutters, coloring book images, craft patterns, and other images to make stencils from. They won't be as intricate as your purchased brass stencils, but you can still do a lot of interesting things with them. And children love them!

Two Thinking of You Cards

This pretty card was made for an online friend in my Yahoo group, The Potter's Garden. I started with white cardstock, added a layer of a pretty pastel stripe print called Wedding Stripes by SandyLion, then layers of colored cardstocks to match. I used a new punch I'd gotten at Jo-Ann's to punch the lattice corners on the light green cardstock. I rather like the look that punch gives. I also rounded the opposite corners with my corner-rounder punch. I added two pearlized mini-brads in the corners of the light green cardstock and a matted computer-printed sentiment tag, which I lightly colored with colored pencils to match the background paper. Not too difficult, but attractive, I thought.


This card was hard to part with, being made with my favorite color, blue. I started with a white cardstock base, but covered it completely with my other papers. The blue & green dotted paper at the bottom came from the big Summer Stack by DCWV that I got on sale recently at Jo-Ann's; I've picked up two different Stacks by DCWV now--love their papers! And sales help! (Right now Jo-Ann's has all the Stacks priced at 40% off through tomorrow, but I've determined to be good and NOT make the hour trip to town to pick up any more; my sweetheart thinks I already have WAY more than enough paper as it is, but those sales are really hard to resist and no one can ever have TOO much paper, can she?) The blue/green/white splattered print at the top is a digital background tile from EverydayIcons, another of my favorite prints. Then there's a strip of white cardstock border-punched with the Martha Stewart doily pattern punch and with blue gel pen dots. The solid blue layer is another digital print from ScrapbookScrapbook.com to which I added faux stitching with the gel pen. I stamped the "thinking of you" sentiment on a piece of matching blue cardstock (from my scrap bag), rounded off the two opposite corners with my corner-rounder punch and added some gel pen highlights to the image. And there you have it...

Playing Catch Up

Whoa! Where does the time go? I've been making cards, but with all the gardening that we've been attempting to accomplish, it seems that I haven't had time to post here. Today being the Sabbath, we've been resting and enjoying a quiet day at home--no Sabbath fellowship to attend today--and now I find myself with a bit of time to spend posting my latest cards. So to go back to the card I was making for my sweetheart, mentioned in my last post...

This is it! Done on brown cardstock, layered with wallpaper samples, black & brown cardstocks, and the oval cut from a pretty divider page out of one of my wallpaper sample books. I heat embossed the word Love in the senter, added gold heart brads, and there you have it. Oh yes, I lightly inked the edges of the brown shaped cardstock with copper pigment ink.

Tim really liked it and that's all that matters!

My Recent Cardmaking Results

Hi again! It's hard to believe that it's been a week since I last posted! The time sure does go by fast! Where've I been and what have I been up to? Well, we're still busy planting stuff here, trying to get the rest of our big vegetable garden in and back in shape. We have 14 beds, most 4 ft x 16 ft, in the garden, plus perennial borders all the way around it and odd bits of open area outside the beds, all of which need a great deal of work. I have 5 of the beds planted so far and another is given over to strawberries, so a third of the beds are done. There's still SO much more to do, though. I also have all sorts of container plantings outside our main garden, in my "outdoor living room" and my "garden room." So between rains and other things that have demanded my attention, I've been trying to get my gardening done. But not forgetting my cardmaking...

I'll show you my latest cards but am not going to go into detail about what I used to make them this time. If you have a question about something, I'll be happy to answer it however.

So picking up where I left off last time, here's the purple birthday card I made for my daughter Lois...




Next in line was a Thinking of You card for an online friend...




Then I redid the Purple Birthday card which I made for Valerie...I just didn't like that smudged sentiment and taking the advice of the ladies in the Crazy Card Makers group, I decided to restamp the sentiment, incorporating it in an overlay. I think the re-do looks MUCH better now...





Then I made another Thinking of You card for an online friend....




Then it was this simple birthday card for our stepgrandson Connor who turns 3 on Friday...




Next up is a birthday card I made for my friend Connie. I really like this one; the colors are my favorites.




And last but by no means least is this encouragement card I made for a young woman named Elisabeth, daughter of my online friend Kathy...




And there you have it...Next up will be my sweetheart's Father's Day card which is still laying on the cutting table, so til then, Happy Cardmaking!

Floral Card for Friend

This lovely floral card was made for a friend and went out in today's mail. To make this card, I started with a base of Medium Spring Green ColorMates cardstock from World Win, topped with a layer of Dark Spring Green Colormates cardstock. The printed layer is a pattern that I got in a 12" x 12" scrapbooking pack at Dollar Tree a while back,; I only have a small piece of it left now. Then I used the Dark Spring Green cardstock to matte the floral motifs. Those are from another giftwrap paper that I've had for a really long time. Under each of the floral squares, I ran a strip of ribbon and then attached bronze butterfly brads on each ribbon strip. The card measures 4" x 6 7/8", not my usual size, but I had some envelopes this size so decided to do something a little different. This is one of those cards I was tempted to keep because I liked it so much.

And there you have it....

Thinking of You card for Friend

Yesterday was a busy cardmaking day. I got 4 cards finished! This is the first one.

To make this card, I started with a 12" x 6 5/8" strip of light blue textured cardstock from Colorbok, purchased at WalMart. This is a tri-fold card, with the right flap being folded at 4" and the left flap being folded at 3", leaving a card width of 5". I cut half of an oval out of the left flap, to make a "frame" for the oval motif I put on the right flap. The solid blue on both flaps is cardstock from one of those value paks you can buy at Michaels or Jo-Anns. The colored stripe is another bit of the sheet from DCWV; there's not much left of it now. The floral design with the bluebirds is from giftwrap paper that I've had in my stash for over 20 years. To complete the look, I added three floral eyelets on the left flap. Unfortunately, the paint chipped off on the purple one, which I tried to fill in with a Sharpie marker, but it didn't quite cover.

And there you have it....

Wedding Congratulations Card for Nephew

My nephew Everett, my brother's youngest, is getting married to Tasha on Saturday. Their wedding colors are black & white, so I challenged myself to make a black & white card for them. I'd found the silvery striped paper at Amy's Cheese Emporium in Stanley, WI and thought it would be perfect so picked that up awhile ago. Then it was a matter of pulling together all the other bits and pieces.

To make their card, I started with a 12" x 12" sheet of textured cardstock from a Colorbok pack I picked up at WalMart. I cut the cardstock 12" x 6 5/8", then made three folds in it, so that I had a card 5" x 6 5/8", with a 2" flap on the inside in which to tuck the money gift we are giving them. To complete the inside of the card, I used Microsoft Word to type up my sentiment and then printed it out on a mottled black/white sheet of paper, which I hand-tore to size and adhered to the inside. I then used a sparkly silver gel pen to sign the card.

On the front of the card, I added a layer of gray cardstock which I corner-punched with my Fiskars Heritage corner punch. The next layer is a lovely white vinyl wallpaper sample with the corners rounded off. The "ribbon" strip is cut from a piece of wallpaper border and threaded through a sentiment tag which I picked up in an embellishment pack at Dollar Tree. On the left side of the card, the black triangular piece is cut from a divider page from one of my wallpaper sample books. It was just too elegant to resist! To that, I added a piece of that silvery striped paper I'd picked up some time ago, Wedding Stripes by www.pebblesinc.com. Along the top edge of the silvery paper, I attached white silk flowers (cut off a flower pik I found somewhere) and attached with silver mini-brads. To complete the card, I stuck two "diamond" gems on the right-side corners.

I'm quite pleased with this card. I like the elegant look of it. I did have to use a little Gorilla Glue to make sure the black triangular piece stayed stuck down to the white vinyl wallpaper, though. That black piece is glossy cardstock on both sides and the double-sided carpet tape just wasn't holding like I wanted it to. It's stuck tight now, though. And there you have it....

One More Birthday Card From Last Week

I made this card for a gal in one of the online groups I belong to whose favorite color is purple and favorite flowers are roses of any color. Unfortunately, she hasn't received this card because I couldn't confirm her mailing address, so I still have it and will send it to someone else.

I started with a speckled white cardstock for this card, one of those sheets that I got at Office Depot's store closing clearance sale. I added a layer of purple scrapbooking paper, designer unknown. Then I made a rectangle from a scrap of the same digital purple crimped paper I used on Paige's card, topped with a rectangle of that lovely floral giftwrap paper that I used on my 2nd hinged card. I tied a piece of raffia ribbon around this. The ribbon had arrived on a giftbag at some time and ended up in my stash of stuff. To complete, I stamped Happy Birthday along the side, using a clear stamp from the Happy Birthday set made by So Close To My Heart. Sentiment stamps are a great value! Unfortunately, I didn't do the greatest job of stamping and got too much ink on the B in Birthday, but it'll pass. It's a good thing I've learned to live with imperfection.

And there you have it....

Purple Birthday Card For Stepdaughter Paige

My stepdaughter Paige loves the color purple. So does my daughter Lois. It's always a challenge to make purple-themed cards for them. I liked the way this one turned out and hope Paige liked it at well. Her birthday is today.

To make Paige's card, I started with a purple cardstock base, just a generic piece of cardstock. Then I added a layer of digital paper from ScrapbookScrapbook.com (kind of like that crimped look a lot). The rectangular focal point has three different scrapbooking papers on it. The light lavendar floral is Forget-Me-Not Daisies from Doodlebug Designs. I only have scraps left of the other two prints, the paisley and the stripe, so I can't tell you whose designs they are. I added a bit of dotted ribbon to the lower portion of the rectangle, trimmed the corners with a corner punch, added two purple silk flowers with a white brad center, and stamped Happy Birthday along the edge of the card with white ink. I had to go over it with a silver gel pen, though, as the ink didn't show up as nice as I wanted it to.

And there you have it...

A Bright Birthday Card

I made this birthday card for a gal in one of the online groups I belong to. Her favorite colors are bright green, orange and bright pink. I enjoy challenges like that!

To make her card, I started with a base of orange cardstock, just a generic sheet. I attached a piece of Citrus Squeeze paper from Doodlebug Designs. Then I cut out circles from bright cardstock sheets that I had, all generic. I punched the middle circles using my new Marvy punch. I added bright green brads to the centers of two of the circle groups and an orange brad to the third. Then I stamped "Celebrate" on the front, using a clear stamp from the Happy Birthday set from So Close To My Heart.

And there you have it...

My Trip Today to JoAnn's

Today I got to take my 3 yr old granddaughter Kaylina shopping with me. Our first stop was JoAnn's Fabrics & Crafts. In an email from them, I knew that they had all of their punches on sale this week at 30% off, as well as sales on papers and lots of other papercrafting fun stuff. I got an unemployment check yesterday, my first one, so had a little extra money and decided to GO FOR IT. I picked up three Fiskars punches, their circle Vine & Dandy punch, their Heritage 3-in-1 corner punch, and their 2" scalloped square squeeze punch. The only thing that I've come to realize about square punches is that no one measures them from side to side, like I think a square should be measured. They basically measure them from corner to corner, as they fit inside of a circle. I was quite disappointed on my last shopping trip to find out that the Martha Stewart 1" scalloped square punch I bought results in a square that is only 7/8" from side to side. Today I measured the die on the punch to make sure of what I was getting, regardless of how the manufacturer measures the square opening. I don't know about you, but when I was learning math in school, circles were always measured in diameter, but squares were measured by the length of the sides. Just one of those little annoyances that I guess I have to live with. Sort of like the way they measure the size of your television or computer screen, from corner to corner; it doesn't make any sense to me at all to do it that way when you're talking about squares or rectangles. Enough about that, huh?

Besides the punches, I picked up a Fun In The Sun Summer Stack of 180 sheets of 12" x 12" cardstock for $9.99; what a deal! I got some single 12" x 12" sheets of scrapbooking paper, two packs of the 8 1/2" x 11" colored value packs of cardstock (50 sheets for $3.99), a black pigment ink pad (hope this one is nice & juicy), and a bunch of stuff out of their $1 bins: glitter pens, ribbons, chalks, and pigment ink pads.

Later, after my sweetheart and I dropped off our granddaughter at her home, we stopped at a little cheese emporium near her home where there's a corner of scrapbooking stuff. I got three new packs of brads and a 12" x 12" sheet of scrapbooking paper there.

All in all, it was a profitable day where adding to my cardmaking supplies go. It's probably a good thing, though, that I can't afford to do this frequently. And now to get back to cardmaking...

Birthday Card for Friend Kim

This bright and cheerful card went to a dear sister in the LORD, Kim, for her birthday. I hope she liked it. I know it made me feel good when I looked at it.

I started with a basically white cardstock. I got it on clearance at the Office Depot store in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, when they were supposed to be closing that store. Since then, they've changed their minds about closing the store entirely and have it open as an outlet store. This cardstock has little flecks of colors in it, which I love. I haven't seen it anywhere else, though, and have used most of it up, as I used it for the digital Passover cards I made this year.

Anyway, on top of the white, I adhered a piece of this great blue patterned cardstock. This came in one of those co-ordinated cardstock packs for scrapbooking. I think I bought the pack at Big Lots for $7; it's a big pack and will take me awhile to use up the cardstock that came in it. I have 4 different patterned packs like this. Then there's another strip of that striped scrapbooking paper that I used on the hinged cards. Under the edges I added border punched white cardstock; I used a Fiskars border punch for this border. The focal design consists of a bright pink circle of cardstock, topped by another circle of orange patterned cardstock (from the same pack as the blue) which I cut into "petal" edges, with a pretty circular sticker from a K & Company embellishment pack in the very center.

And there you have it....

Another Hinged Card

This is my second hinged card. I made this for the birthday of one of the gals in the cardmaking group I belong to, Crazy Card Makers. Red isn't one of my favorite colors, but I wanted to use the floral paper on the bottom so it seemed to come together that way; actually, it's more of a deep red orange than a true red. I wanted the card to be bright, bold, and cheerful; I think I succeeded.

I started with a white cardstock base. The paper on the bottom section is giftwrap paper that I bought at a local discount store; you might be able to find this design at Dollar Tree, too, I can't remember. I know I paid no more than $1.49 for a whole big roll of this paper, so it'll probably show up on a lot more cards. Unfortunately, it isn't a very heavy-weight paper so it needs to be backed with something to give it "body." On the top edge of this paper, I attached a strip of white cardstock that I border punched with my Martha Stewart lattice punch. I ran a strip of 1/4" silk ribbon across this white strip. The top section uses the same striped scrapbooking paper that I used on my first hinged card. It's a DCWV design. I don't have much of the original 12" x 12" sheet left now, so hope I run across it again. I didn't see it at JoAnn's Fabrics & Crafts when I was there today (more about that in another post). I may have picked it up at Michael's or at the florist shop in the town near us that has a small scrapbooking department. I like the colors in that striped design so will definitely want to get more of it. For my focal point on the top, I cut a circle from Deep Graceful Geranium ColorMates cardstock from World Win. To that, I adhered a stamped and heat-embossed scalloped circle; the stamp comes from Inkadinkado's Round Frames clear stamp set. I colored in the center of the design with a Crayola pencil color. The flower is a stamped design from the Autumn Leaves clear stamp set Mindy's Flowers by Mindy Terasawa. I colored it with Crayola pencil colors and attached it with foam tape to the center of the stamped circle. I added a red silk ribbon bow to the front and used a silver brad. On the inside, I used a stamp from the Stampendous clear set, Two You, again colored in with Crayola pencil colors.

And there you have it...Now to make another--and another--and another...I like this design!

My First Hinged Card

In the cardmaking group that I belong to, Crazy Card Makers (see link section), a couple of the ladies have been making these cool hinged cards. I thought it was a neat idea so had to try my hand at it. I know there are directions out there, but on dial-up I don't watch online videos because it's just too slow and takes too long, so I figured it out on my own. I may not be doing it exactly the same way that the originators of the technique are, but it works and I liked the final results.

I started with a base of white cardstock. On the top section, I used a scrap of background paper I had made using a digital background tile from Everyday Icons. The bottom striped paper is cut from a purchased piece of 12" x 12" scrapbooking paper. I also used some light blue cardstock and an olive green cardstock. The floral stamped image on the front is colored with Sharpie markers and Crayola pencil colors, then inked with light blue and a green, and jazzed up with Stickles Waterfall glitter glue. The image is from the Autumn Leaves Flowers (by Rhonna Farrer) clear stamp set. The Happy Birthday stamped image on the inside is from the Stampendous clear stamp set, Two You. The punched lattice border is made using a Martha Stewart border punch. The striped paper was cut using a scalloped-edge scissors. The light blue cardstock was a scrap generic cardstock. The green was World Win's Colormates Dark Spring Green.

And there you have it...I have a couple more cards made in the past few days that I will be posting as soon as I have time. Gardening tasks are claiming most of my time and attention right now. Tomorrow I'll be enjoying some quality time with my 3 yr old granddaughter, Kaylina, and then Saturday is Shabbat which will be a quiet, restful day here at home this week. I'll be back with more of my cards as soon as I can, though, you can count on it!