Christmas 2014 - the main card

Extreme Close UP!!!!  Yeah, because that entire image is very small.  I tried to make this card last year and wasn't happy with it.  I only revisited it after failing with my first choice card this year.  Sometimes you just can't force it.

And here is the load I made - I forgot to take the photograph before I had addressed them to go out, but wanted this photo for prosperity!

In the end I made around 80 nearly identical cards for my mass production.  Even streamlining as much as possible, I guesstimate that each card took around 30 minutes to complete from scoring, cutting, stamping, coloring, embossing, masking, stamping, embossing.  All those little steps take time.  I think I timed the coloring taking me about 7 mins per card.  That's why I had to do the extreme close up to appreciate the little bit of shading and texture I did in that image.  Even using warm grays for the fur and cool grays for his beard.  Then coloring the whole Santa image with Versamark to emboss it.

I did some test runs before I decided on the final finish of the card and although to be honest the embossing was a pain in the bum, it definitely needed it to give that final finish to the card.
Ingredients
Card size -  4 1/4" x 5 1/2";
Cardstock - Recollections 110lb white;
Stamps - Whispers;
Ink - Memento: tuxedo black, cottage ivy; Versamark pen;
Color - Copics (warm gray, cool gray, skin tone, blush tone, green, 2 reds (one for shadow), gold tone, darker gray)
Accessories - Clear embossing powder, Stamp-a-ma-jig, small T square.

We're birds of a feather...

I made this card for my darling and long suffering husband.  He loves birds.  I decided I wanted to be very clean and simple and focused.  And yeah, that is ribbon on a guy card - that is how I roll (so 2008! Bwahaha)... ok I think I need less caffeine when I blog because it is getting a bit random in here... so I will just list the supplies as I think it is pretty self explanatory and yeah he liked his card *wink*

And yeah, I have the Memento markers and used them on the image and sentiment and the pad to stamp the texture on the row and the heart to ensure it "matched" the rest of the card.

Ingredients
Card size 8.5 x 5.5 inches
Cardstock - Neenah Classic Crest Solar White Smooth, Recollections Red;
Stamps - Gina K Designs: Heartily Yours, You Say Goodbye, and I Say Ello;
Ink - Memento: Tuxedo Black; Lady Bug Red; Cottage Ivy; Angel Pink; Dandelion;
Accessories - Spellbinders: Hearts Nestabilities; Brads; Dimensional tape; Ribbon;

The card that sparked a conversation AKA Procrastination, CAS and Masculine cards.

 
So if you follow my blog (or wish to take a quick look) you can see I do a wide variety of cards.  Lately I have been coveting (there really is no other word) white space and CAS.  I was even thinking these are the "Perfect Masculine" cards.  So imagine my surprise when I collected my eldest from university (which is a 3 day event, two of those being travel) and the conversation goes a bit like this...

"Petal, have you been really busy?"

"a bit, why?"

"I can tell"

"How?" (me racking my brains to wonder how he can tell when he is so far away and I know I have dropped everything at a moment's notice like every supermom is supposed to in order to ensure he would have a relatively uneventful run into finals and no worries about home... oh my... my insecurities are running rampant... how did I fail this time... and yes this is a stream of conscious run on sentence in my brain)...

"well, its your cards"

"what?!"

"they are really plain"

well knock me over with a feather...."oh I thought you would like them really clean"

all is quiet queue tumbleweed..."I like every card from you"

Nice save there kid, cancel the tumbleweed, you know who is still funding your life! *wink*

So what does this have to do with procrastination - it really isn't that obvious except that I didn't want to blog about the card until I knew he received it and then life got in the way etc.  So procrastination meant I wrote a completely different post about this card than I would have written even just a week ago.

So CAS and Masculine - I love both.  I love CAS and Masculine because I do masculine all the time and I adore the white space of CAS.  I think however, I have to find a comfort level so my son doesn't read anything into my one layer stamped card with few embellishments and doesn't take that to mean that that card took me less time to make than one dripping with embellishments.
 

Oh and BTW I was completely inspired by this post Taheerah for the inside image- however unlike her I just colored the flag in on the stamp itself rather than using a kissing technique.  With all the empty space of the phone box it was pretty forgiving to just wing it.

 
Ingredients
Card size - 4.25 x 5.5 in
Cardstock - Neenah Classic Crest Solar White;
Stamps - Gina K Designs: You Say Goodbye. and I say Ello;
Ink - Memento: Lady Bug Red, Danube Blue, Bahama Blue, Summer Sky;
Color - Marvy Le Plume Markers

"Hello"

I'm doing a two for one today which considering I have trouble doing a one for one challenge I'm somewhat pleased with myself.  So I am doing the CASology cue card - Word AND the OLW A-OK

I will be totally honest, I stamped this card and then saw both of these challenges.  Shhhh that's just between you and me right?   I'm just glad to be cranking out some cards again and posting them.

Second confession - I changed this card after I took this picture.  To be honest I was quite happy with the plain black on white but I just kept niggling that I wanted another step to it... some color. So I got out a modern square border and inked it up and UGH!  It pretty much obliterated the sign language!  I will be honest, I sent it anyway as I had already written the note on the inside and my son won't care it is a note from home.  Of course I *cough* accidentally *cough, cough* forgot to take that picture!!

Part of the inspiration for this is that my eldest attends Rochester Institute of Technology which is also the National Technical Institute for the Deaf with 10% of the student body being deaf, so he has learnt his alphabet so far and a few choice words that I'm probably not going to share in polite company.  It really does add an extra, unique dynamic to an already great school.  So that is my "A" = American Sign Language for the OLW challenge.

ETA - and yes it does say "hello"

Ingredients
Card Size - 4.25 in x 5.5 in
Cardstock - Neenah Classic Crest Smooth Solar White
Stamps - Viva LasVegastamps: Sign Language Alphabet
Ink - Archival Ink: Black

Flowery Mother's Day

Another Mother's Day card that could easily be translated to a flowery birthday card.  There really isn't much to say except even though I know when US Mother's Day is every year I was still scrambling around at the last minute trying to get this made!

Pretty straightforward with a bit of masking.

Ingredients

Card Size - 8.5 in x 5.5 in

Card Stock - Neenah Classic Crest

Stamps - Kitchen Sink Stamps: 3 Step Daisy, Whole Family

Ink - Memento: Canteloupe, Tangelo, Bamboo Leaves, Pear Tart, Cottage Ivy