Showing posts with label Close To My Heart. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Close To My Heart. Show all posts

5.15.2009

Glittery Graduation Card - Tutorial

Happy Friday!!! Yes, it is FINALLY here! Sometimes I swear they add a couple of extra days to the week because that is the ONLY way it could actually take as stinking long as it does! LOL!

This is an exciting weekend in my family! My little sister, well...turns out...she's not so little anymore and she is graduating with her Bachelor's degree in Theater from Providence College! Yup! That's pretty crazy, folks! No...really. It's a little nuts because there is NO WAY I am that old! LOL! It's just the two of us and there is a big 'ole span between us so when she hits milestones it totally weirds me out!

So, being that she is graduating and all, I figured I'd be nice and make her a card! LOL! As you know...the Use Your Stash theme for this month is GLITTER! Well, I have to be honest. This challenge was not so much 'challenging' in that 'make you use something in your stash you never use' sort of way for me, simply because I LOVE GLITTER! No, really. I love it. I could marry it. It sparkles and it's pretty and I just want to hug it and squeeze it and...

...okay. You get the point. I'm a fan.

So, I decided to find some fun ways to use it! You saw my layout at the first of the month and now here is my fun Congrats card!


Supplies:

White Cardstock card form. I made my own, but if you have some use 'em. Totally up to you!

Black Cardstock scraps

Patterned Papers from My Little Shoebox Who's There Collection - Wise Old Owl and Night Owl and the solid teal came from Tinkering Ink Perennial Parade collection - Bluebell

Ranger Stickles in Fruit Punch

Light Colored Ink - I used Vanilla Cream from Close To My Heart

Dotty Background Stamp - Mid is from the Close To My Heart Argyle Backgrounds set

White Alphabet Stickers - Doodlebug Designs

Juniper Ink - Close To My Heart (to ink letters)

Pink embroidery floss - DMC

Chocolate Ribbon - Close To My Heart

Tools: Fiskars Finger Knife, paper cutter, 1 inch circle punch, 1/8 inch circle punch, scissors, adhesives - both flat and foam


It takes a bit of time to make this card, but it is all way fun, so it is so worth it!

Step 1:

Stamp a dotted background onto your card using a light, but visible ink color. Versamark will work if you can see it clearly enough. I used Vanilla Cream from Close To My Heart because I was too lazy to look for my VersaMark. Hee-hee.


Step 2:

Use the dots as a guide to drop dots of Stickles Glitter Glue over the entire background of your card. Be sure to work from top to bottom so that you don't smear the glue with your hand and, therefore, glitter yourself, the dog, your husband, and your entire work space.

...not that I've ever done that. I'm just say'n. It's possible.

Allow to dry thoroughly. You can move on to the next few steps while this dries.

Step 3:

Punch colored circles for the fun large dot background behind the main image.



Step 4:

Using the same dotty background stamp (I {heart} dots!) stamp a tone on tone background onto the solid punched circles.


Step 5: AKA: The part where you laugh at me really loudly and tell me that I'm crazy and there is no way you are doing this. BUT WAIT!

Give it a shot! It's not that hard and it looks SO stinking cute when you are done! PLEEEEEASE! {insert cheesy, big-eyed grin here}

Step 5:

Cut out owl/bird/swirl pattern from your patterned paper with a craft knife. I chose my Fiskars Finger Knife for this and let me tell you that was the best $5 I've ever spent! That thing is magnificent! MAGNIFICENT, I tell you!


Step 6:

Since you already got through with Step 5, I'm assuming I'll here less whining about this step. It really is rather simple. Free hand cut a diamond and a small trapezoid for the top and bottom portions of your hat. Using a 1/8 inch hole punch, punch a small circle of black paper for the button on the top of the hat.

For the tassle take a length of embroidery floss about 8 inches or so...maybe shorter, I don't really remember and wrap it around your thumb tip. Leave some extra at the end. Carefully slide the wrapped floss off of your thumb and pinch the top and tie it tightly together close to the top with the remaining floss end. Use scissors to snip the 'loop' of the long end, creating a cute little tiny tassel!


I included the penny to give you an idea of how big these pieces need to be.

Step 7:

Attach your background dots (the larger, punched ones) to the glittered background card. By this point your Stickles should be dry, but doule check before you make a big 'ole mess and stuff.

Use pop dots to attach the owl/bird/swirly cut out piece nicely over the dots. CUTENESS!

Using a small piece of adhesive foam at the very top of your trapezoid piece (the short end) and a small piece of flat adhesive on the bottom (the long end) attach the trapezoid to the head of the bird. The flat adhesive will adhere to the head of the bird and the foam will adhere to the card background. Then, using a foam dot, adhere the diamond piece to the top of the trapezoid giving it dimension. Use a drop of Stickles to adhere the tassel to the center of the hat and then a small drop of Stickles to add the 'button' to the top! ISN'T THAT THE CUTEST THING EVERRRR??? Yes, my friends, it most certianly is.


Step 8:

Cut a piece of patterned paper to fit across the top of the card (4 1/4 in.) Cut two pieces of brown ribbon to fit the same size. Ahere the brown ribbon and then adhere the patterned paper strip overlapping the ribbon to create your sentiment block. Use a dauber to ink white letters to match your card and adhere sentiment. (P.S. If you happen to have letters that match feel free to use them. I wanted this color and didn't have them, so I made 'em! Use'n my stash, folks! Use'n the stash!)





Step 9:

Admire the cuteness that is your card!

Step 10:

Give your card to your little Sitta who is Gradiat'n from college! WHOAH! (If you pronounced that 'whoah' correctly, you are probably very close to me in age. Just say'n.)

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial! If you make a card like this one I would love to see it so totally link me up, K! K. Thanks, peeps!

Be sure to check out the Use Your Stash blog today for more great card ideas using GLITTER!

5.08.2009

2 Sketches. 2 Cards. 2 Moms. Lotsa Happy!

Most of you can disregard this first part, but...

Mom, if you are reading please stop here! I don't want you to see your Mother's Day card! LOL! You can read this post on Monday, don't worry! ;-)

Okay...now...for the rest of you...moving on.

I decided to use two sketches for the two Mother's Day cards that I made this year. One for my wonderful Mom and one for The Hubbums wonderful Mom!

The first sketch is Laura's Sketch from 2 Sketches 4 You. I really like this sketch because it was a challenge for me. It made me go a different direction with my card and I really love the result.

Here is the sketch:



And here is the card for my Mom using the sketch:

A Mother's Love

I LOVE IT! I know...arrogant, but what can I tell you? Seriously? Isn't it awesome? No, really...I know, but I REALLY like this one! LOL! Here are some close up shots and such.

Prima on A Mother's Love

Glazed Sentiment

The supplies used:
Patterned Paper: Making Memories
Stamps: Hero Arts (bird cage) and Close To My Heart (sentiment)
Ink: Close To My Heart
Flower Accent: Prima
Glaze Pen: Sakura
Other: Ribbon and Die Cut

And here is the card that I made for The Hubbums Mom!

For this one I used the wonderful sketch from Card Positioning Systems! WAY fun blog, btw!

The Sketch:




I wanted something bright, cheery, and colorful and I think this fits the bill superbly! HA! I just said 'superbly!' That was fun! I should use that word more often. Sooo....yeah....here's the card and stuff.

Cheerful Tree Card

Okay, I'm going to say it again. LOVE IT! Really, I was kind of on a roll the day I made these suckers! I totally felt creative again and was actually REALLY happy with my work! That made me SUPERBLY PLEASED! (hee-hee - told you it was a good word!) I stamped the tree and then cut it out and popped it up with foam dots. I then used the tiny bird from the Hero Arts stamp that I used on the card above and cut that out and popped IT up from the tree! Fun stuff! The buttons just add the perfect playful touch!

Here are the closeups of this one:

Dimensional Tree Tag

Cheerful Tree Card

Supplies for this card:

Patterned Paper: Die Cuts With a View (Yes, I am anti stack, but the GREEN stack was WAY to awesome for me to not want it. At least I got it for free. I still cursed stacks as I pretty much managed to rip the whole 'deck' in half trying to get one sheet out. That's why I hate stacks. Love the paper, hate the binding.)
Tag: Emma's Paperie (I think?)
White Pen: Uniball Signo (if you don't have one stop reading blogs go to the store and buy one because you need it. That's all I'm say'n.)
Black pen: Zig Millennium by EK Success
Stamps: Pink Paislee (tree), Hero Arts (bird)
Buttons: I have no freaking clue. Sorry about that. I tried.

Soooo...what do you think? Do you love it? Because I totally do! HA! The good thing is that I know they will both appreciate them! I love it when people actually LIKE the fact that I take the time to make them a card! It makes me happy. Kinda like cupcakes only without the calories!

So, there you have it! Mother's Day Cards x 2! I hope all you Mom's out there have a fabulous Mother's Day with your families! I will be spending some time with my Mom and making fun crafts with my Kindergarten Sunday School class, so it should be a good day. I don't think the puppies bought me a Cuttlebug. Oh, well. What can I expect from kids with no thumbs? ;-)

Have an awesome weekend! See ya' on the Flip Side!




4.15.2009

Rhymes With Orange and Stuff

First of all, don't forget to check out the AWESOME giveaway posted here.


Now...onto today's ramblings.

Seriously?

Nothing?

Not ONE WORD?

Seriously, folks.

It's true and there is nothing we can do about it.

Nothing. I repeat, NOTHING rhymes with orange.

Yes, I do understand that this is probably not news to you, nor is it a new thing to me. HOWEVER...it has brought to mind something that may be new to you. Do you realize the implications of a basic word in the English language not having ANY other words that rhyme with it? Have you ever stopped to think about this? For REAL, folks! It is simple, straight forward PROOF that our language is none other than inadequate, to say the least. You know how we often struggle to find the right words...we are left speechless...(okay...so I've heard that happens to some people, although, I can't say I've experienced that one myself...), we are left wanting - even NEEDING a better word.

In most cases we blame our own lack of vocabularic knowledge. No...that SO isn't a word, but I figured I'd toss it in there to add to your own personal vocabularic treatise. HOWEVER, the thing of it is...it's not our fault! Okay...so for some people it is totally their fault because they are just dumb and don't value education, but that's a whole other post. For most of us...it is simply because the English language is severely lacking and for NO reason.

Thus, bringing back to Orange. Here we have a collection of letters in the English alphabet that come together to form sounds. Not hard. We all learned that in first grade. HOWEVER; unlike time, prime, crime, and slime; there is not ONE other word in the language that has utilized this grouping. How very wasteful! We SO could be using this combination in other ways!

In Greek there are at least FIVE different words to describe what we call 'love.' FIVE! And we get one. No agape, no eros, no philia, no storge, no thelema (look that one up! It's the fun one! LOL!)...nope! We don't get ANY of that. We just get love. And perhaps the text version 'luv,' but I'm pretty sure that doesn't really count. WHY???? We could have Borange and Sorange, and Quorange, and Zeptorange. We aren't using any of those. So WHY the HECK don't we have words that rhyme with orange. We need them.

That's all I'm say'n.

Oh...here are a couple of cards that I made!

CPS Challenge Card

This one is a sympathy card that I made for a friend who lost her Mom. It's been a long struggle, so the Peace theme really fit the situation well. It is really shimmery in real life because I dusted it with Glimmer Mist!

CPS Peace Card Close Up

This one is for the Use Your Stash Tag Challenge. You still have a couple more days to get your layouts in, so head over and check it out! Our Design Team cards are going up today!

Thank you Tag Card

Tags Close Up

I used October Afternoon papers on this and stamped the images directly on the tags with Close To My Heart stamps and ink. It was really a rather quick card to pull together, but I like it! It's fun!

Have a happy Wednesday!

What are your thoughts on orange?

2.19.2009

From the Archives

I decided to dig into the archives to share a couple of older projects with you today. Just some stuff I loved then and turns out...I still love! LOL!

Enjoy!

i {heart} u

Thinking of You Butterflies

Best Ever.

Artsy.Licious Dress

And with this, I encourage you to glance at some stuff you've done in the past year or so. Isn't it fun to fall in love with it all over again? Link me up to some of your old faves! I'd love to see them! Just add a link in the comments section! (Which...if you want to see others comments, just highlight the area and they show up...I don't know how to make it so that they aren't black on black! LOL!)

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