Vroom! Vroom! Happy Birthday!

I made this card for my son for his birthday over the weekend.  He is 17 and of course like most 17 year olds he dreams of the day he will own a fast car.  Notice I don't share that dream but as long as it's a dream then I can live with it and indulge all the work he is doing to one day afford one!

I ran across this card contest on Clearly iStamp and thought it would make a great layout for a masculine birthday card.

Pretty much everything on this card IS Clear Dollar Stamps - The car image, the greeting, the background, and even those bolts; they are stamped in Memento Tuxedo black, cut out and then a clear glaze over them for some shine and texture.  This is one case where I started with the card sketch, the intended recipient (and chose the appropriate stamps from Clear Dollar Stamps) and ran with it.

So, do you think my card is running fast or running on empty?

Recipe

Card Sketch - CDC #22

Card size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah (base and image), Recollections (Blue), The Paper Source (Black)

Stamps -  Clear Dollar Stamps - bolt (Wrench & Bolt set), Metal plate (Heavy Metal), Happy Birthday (Cool Ride), Car (Corvette 1968)

Ink - Memento (Tuxedo Black, London Fog)

Color - Copics (sky - B0000, B000, B00; car - B23, B24, B29, B00, C1,C3, C5, W3,W5, E31; ground - C1, C3, C5)

Accessories - Cuttlebug embossing folder (gears), Spellbinders Nestabilities Oval

ETA - to answer the question - yes the diamond plate background is stamped.

2010 - Penguin sleigh party

The last of my last year's Christmas cards well not quite - would you believe I have a whole group of "winter cards sat here that haven't been mounted to send to some special people in my life? Yeah, I didn't think I was stretching your imagination too much with that one!  Maybe its something to do with publishing photos of my work 2-3 months after I have sent it out!  Still I love to share even if its only with a few people.

So here it is and a bit blurry too!  Bet you would believe that I take most of my pictures just as I'm stuffing that envelope to get my cards out the door too... hmmmm I think I might be giving away all my closely guarded secrets!

Anyway I like how this ended up and hope you do to.

Recipe

Card size -  8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock -  Neenah, Bazzill, Recollections

Stamps -  High Hopes (I think)

Ink - Memento

Color - Copics

Accessories - Grosgrain ribbon, Cuttlebug dots embossing folder.

2010 Ski bear Snow Wishes

I decided early on that I wanted this card to use non-traditional christmas colors. 

I think it works even though I didn't have quite the right color cardstock and ribbon to match the blues in the coloring.  Sometimes I think we can get too hung up on things matching.  When Helena Bonham Carter was questioned by Jay Leno recently about her oddly paired shoes at the Golden Globes she said perfection is overrated and she is happy being herself. 

I think she had a point.  I know many card makers that can drive themselves to distraction trying to perfectly match items rather than enjoying the "flaw" or even glorying in it - so here's a shout out for non-matching blues - don't let them get ya down!

Recipe

Card size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, Bazzill

Stamps -  High Hopes

Ink -  Memento

Color-  Copics

Accessories - Ribbon from Michaels, Spellbinders snowflake background die.

PS - the color matching police haven't found me yet!

2010 Merry Kiss Moose!

Maybe I should have published this warm little kiss earlier this winter!  Definitely a cute idea for a winter warmer.  I sent this little card kiss to my BIL and SIL.  I tried a few patterns and embossing folders for the background and I was happier with the less is more approach, almost like that old saying about taking off one piece of jewelry before you walk out the door, however as I normally only wear earrings I think I would look a bit odd with only one earring so maybe I will just stick with I planned this card to be clean and simple!  It will be a secret just between us right?

Recipe

Card size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, Bazzill

Stamps - High Hopes

Ink - Memento

Color - Copics

Accessories - ribbon from Michaels. Corner rounder.

Christmas elf wishes 2010

I honestly don't know if this worked.  I tried to make this look like a package but I think it probably just looks a bit top heavy.  I played and played with placement I just couldn't get it any better than this.

 

So basically its my same normal construction model.  I got this stamp as an extra when I ordered directly from High Hopes - I think they only deal with shops now so I don't know about availability.  I colored this stamp with copics and mat and layered to pop it a bit and added the green ribbon as an accent.  I'm thinking that is probably where I went wrong and got the proportions of the ribbon layout too far into the corner.  Still if we don't try these things how do we ever learn.

Recipe

Card size  8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock  Neenah, Archiver's open stock red

Stamps - High Hopes

Ink - Memento

Color - Copics

Accessories - ribbon from Michaels

Cricut Trees 2010

Shock horror I didn't stamp my "bulk" Christmas cards last year.  Oooo don't give me that evil look!  Truthfully I wanted to use up some patterned paper that just wasn't speaking to me and the copious amounts of dark green cardstock.  The only thing I actually purchased to make these was a Xyron creative station - oh my how did ever get on without that! Again this past year I went with the smaller card and kept it handmade and still sent them - my frugality came with the size and using up my supplies! We sent out around 90 of these cards.  I know several people that do individual cards for holidays but I always liked sending the same even before I started making them! 

Recipe

Card size - 4.25 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Georgia Pacific, Recollections, Rob & Bob paper stack (I don't know what number but I have had a few years!)

Accessories - Cricut Expression with Design Studio,  Xyron creative station, Christmas cart.

Fly by Birthday for future Fly boy.

I made this card expressly for my cousin, his heart's desire is to go to Naval Academy and fly as long as he doesn't get too tall!

So truthfully I bought this set from Clear Dollar Stamps specifically with him in mind because whether or not his dreams come true he will always love airplanes.

I made a tonal background using London Fog and Tuxedo Black in my Memento inks, alternating colors and stamps to get a masculine feel.  I colored the focal image with Copics and plenty of color to ensure it stood out.  I matted it on the black and put it to the background and it just seemed to swim on the page.  I decided I needed to break up the background so I adhered the black strip across.  That really made it much better.  I put the card together adding a bit of masculine bling with the silver brads on the corners of the main image.   It was still a bit blah.  So I decided to use the "Happy Birthday" stamp from another Clear Dollar Stamps set (I think Classic Cruisin) and round them so they were like little message clouds.  Hope you like.

Recipe

Card Size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, The Paper Source

Stamps - Clear Dollar Stamps

Ink - Memento - Tuxedo Black & London Fog

Color - Copics

Accessories - corner rounder, silver brads.

A little help for a Happy Birthday

Thanks Joan at Paperlicious for the inspiration to create this card.  Joan has been such an overall inspiration to me about exploring life as a daughter, mother and crafter so please visit her blog generally - she has decided to be an occasional blogger and that works for me!  Yeah.  I bet you hadn't guessed that.  Anyway the link is directly to the card that inspired my creation and I hope you enjoy my interpretation.

I was absolutely at wits end on what sort of card to send to my nephew's girlfriend and I hope she liked this.  I thought it was "young" and maybe even "modern" but what do I know! LOL! 

Recipe

Card size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, Recollections, K&Co paper

Stamps - Stampendous, Just Rite Stamps

Ink - Memento

Color - Copics, Sakura (glitter, metallic, souffle - yep all of them!), American Craft white pen.

Accessories - Circle nestabilities, rhinestones, punch (unknown ATM) 

A planted wagon of Birthday Cheer.

I'm still trying to decide what I think of this card.  It just seems to lack something but everything I tried to add went wrong so I went with the less is more approach.

So what do you think?  Over cooked it? Under cooked it? or just right?

I started by selecting the image for this card and then the cardstock I wanted to use for the background.  After that I chose Copics that matched the background cardstock.  I then colored some white brads with the copics to match the image and help with the bling factor.  I added glitter pen to the middle of the flowers to help pep up the image.

I wanted it to be bright and cheerful as I was creating this for our lovely Auntie in England who is in her 80s.  I know she has some sight issues so I hope the card was bold enough for her to enjoy it.

Recipe -

Card Size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, DCWV 

Stamps - Clear Dollar Stamps

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black

Color - Copics

Accessories - White & black brads, Martha Stewart punch, Sakura glitter pen

The bluebird of happy birthday

Wow I guess I really have been away from my blog for a while what with Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year and life in general.  Well hopefully this card will help you cheer up and inspire you to think warm thoughts!

This card was for my Sister in Law.  She loves gardening and although her birthday is at the end of October I thought it would make a change for her to get a card suited to her interests rather than the autumnal season.

What isn't obvious about this card was immediately after stamping "Sister in Law" I lost the stamps.  They are clear and I couldn't find them on my work table anywhere.  I looked and looked and nearly emailed the manufacturer about whether they make replacements after I had exhausted any idea of where they could have fallen when they just turned up right where I had previously looked.  I'm putting it down to pre Christmas stress!

I like the juxtaposition of the formal font for the greeting with the whimsical stamps.  Do you think it works?

I stamped the front panel wanting to keep all the stamping on one layer and make an impact with the white space.  The bird and birdhouse on the inside I did stamp and cut out and apply as I didn't want bleed through to the back of the card.  I also put some scrap cardstock inside an envelope and stamped and colored the envelope with that inside to prevent bleed through to the back of the envelope and to give my Sister in Law a glimpse of what her card was going to be about.

I really like this card - almost too much to send!

Recipe

Card Size - 8.5 x 5.5 in

Cardstock - Neenah, The Paper Source (black)

Stamps - Kitchen Sink Stamps, High Hopes Stamps

Ink - Memento tuxedo black and blue danube (?)

Color - Copics