Father's Day 1

Well, I had planned on posting fairly regularly while on vacation, but connectivity issues and sheer family fun have gotten in the way. We're having a blast on this amazing Hawaiian island of Kauai. Wish you all were here!

I'll post all about our trip on my other blog next week (with lots of photos, including underwater photos of snorkeling with sea turtles!), but for now, here's one of the cards I had ready for posting.

I love my punches but haven't been using them as often as I should. So I made this ribbon for my father-in-law.



I hope you all are having a lovely summer (or winter if you're down under). We sure are!

Supplies
stamps: Hero Arts
ink: Memento
paper: SU brilliant blue, real red; PTI white
accessories: circle punches, scallop circle punch, scissors, dimensionals

I'm Alive!

In fact, I'm better than alive. I'm on Paradise Island ("de plane, de plane!"), a.k.a. Kauai, but my plan to post while here has run into connectivity issues. I'm sorry if anyone has been worried while I've been cruising the Nepali Coast and snorkeling with sea turtles and eating tasty fish I didn't know existed!

Mahalo!

Inspired by Angeline Yong Jeet Leen

Today's card is inspired by this card from Angeline Yong Jeet Leen in Card Creations Volume 10.



Isnt' that FABULOUS?!?!?! LOVE the fun dots (on washi tape, no less!) she used to create her grid. Angeline's card begged for me to CASE it, so I did...with two very different versions.





First, I went textual, repeatedly stamping a scrap of white card with Papertrey's Text Style, but I ran into a little problem. You see, I cheated and used my 3/4" square punch, which gave me larger squares than Angeline used, meaning I couldn't quite get as many rows of squares on my grid. As you can see, this meant a bit of an awkward placement of the third rhinestone to get that visual triangle to work.

While I loved the black-and-white riff on Angeline's colorful card, I knew I had to ditch the rhinestones if I kept using my punch.




So I stamped a piece of scrap paper with Papertrey's Grunge Me and punched out the squares. Then, after arranging them in a pleasingly random way, I added the orange birds to the first and last squares. THIS version ended up more balanced with fewer--and larger--squares on the grid.


If you want a little tip on getting a grid glued down perfectly, get thee a quilting ruler. Here's a little photo to help. Line it up (I'd obviously knocked it a bit off line before I shot the photo, but you get the idea), and position the squares with ease!






Also, to stamp the sentiment, I stamped the top and bottom ones in line with the square to the left using a gridded acrylic block, and then eyeballed the middle one.

Many thanks to Angeline for inspiring such a fun layout!

Supplies
stamps: Papertrey
ink: Memento
paper: Papertrey
accessories: 3/4" square punch, glue, quilting ruler, rhinestones

For my Friend Ann

One side-effect of looking at stamping magazines is a desire to use all sorts of lumpy, bumpy embellishments on cards. Lumpy bumpy stuff is everywhere in the mags. Every. Where.

Generally speaking, I'm happiest with a single layer of card stock and maybe a little bling. But I actually do own lumpy bumpy embellishments. Some I have bought for myself in fits of delusional conspicuous consumption, and some have been given to me by stamping friends who like to laugh diabolically as they pack their generous boxes of goodies to me. Audrie, yes, I'm talking about you.

So here's my lumpy bumpy card using pom-pom trim and lace, sent to me by Audrie. I chose the color combo for my friend Ann, who is back to stamping and blogging now that school is out. She's an English teacher. Love that. And this color combo always makes me think of her.

Can't imagine why.

I don't know when Ann's birthday is, but I'll find out and send her this, probably late since it won't be a surprise at all so what's the point of rushing things?

Anyway, Ann, I'm glad you're back. And happy summer to all the teachers out there. You deserve a break.




Supplies
stamps: Hero Arts
paper: PTI white, SU tempting turquoise
ink: SU tempting turquoise
accessories: pom-pom trim, lace, Scor-Tape

Inspired by Michelle Bertuzzi

Michelle Bertuzzi had a card published in Card Creations Volume 10 that inspired me so much. Her brilliant use of distressed handwritten text as a background for a sentiment and a sprinkle of butterflies--balanced with a fabulous black bow--resulted in this lovely sympathy card.



Here's my CASification riff on her lovely card....



Obviously, I changed the theme and color scheme. For my handwritten text, I punched a mask using a scalloped circle...that kept the edges from being too regular. I stamped the text background in light pink and then the sentiment in hot pink.

As you can see, there is no ribbon. I tried. Truly I did. It was hot pink gingham and so lovely in my hand. But my bow looked so sad.

So, so sad.

No matter how I tweaked and fussed, it just looked pathetic. I ditched it and added a third butterfly for balance. Then I decided to play with the bling colors...clear on the pink butterflies and hot pink on the white.

And if you don't have that Martha Stewart butterfly punch, go buy it. Right now. It's sublime, and it's so cool that I had the same one Michelle used!

Many thanks to Michelle for creating her masterpiece and inspiring my take on it. I never could have come up with this on my own, and I'm just tickled pink!

Supplies
stamps: text background (unknown), sentiment (Hero Arts typwriter cling set)
ink: Memento
paper: PTI white, SU passion pink
accessories: dimensionals, Martha Stewart butterfly punches, rhinestones

Thank you, Teacher

I needed some quick teacher gifts last week, so I made these cards and gave them with some wonderful iced sugar cookies from a local bakery. Jack signed each card and wrote a personal sentiment for all five of his teachers and therapists. Without my telling him, he made each message different. It was so sweet!

Jack, who has autism, had fewer teachers and therapists in third grade than ever before: a special education teacher, inclusion teacher, aide, speech therapist, and occupational therapist. In years past, there were more aides and a physical therapist, too. In preschool and kindergarten, he went to two schools...requiring as many as 12 end-of-year teacher gifts. I'd say he's moving in the right direction. Yippy!

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Supplies
stamps: Papertrey Ink (Happy Trails)
ink: various Memento
paper: Papertrey Ink
accessories: none

Congrats to the Grad!

In response to yesterday's post...

1. To get the two colors of polka dots, ink the first color and stamp. Clean the stamp, ink with the second color, and stamp so that the dots are in the empty spaces between the already-stamped dots. If you've never two-step stamped before, this isn't necessarily intuitive. Once you do it, you'll slap your forehead and wonder why you never thought of it before. At least, I did.

2. My kids came up with a plan to stop the bickering. Every time they bicker, I give them a point. If they get three points in a day, they lose screen privileges the next day. They decided they can get points for bickering, not doing what I ask of them cheerfully, or pitching fits. We shall see if it works. Today's behavior was already much better than yesterday's!

3. If you want to know why it's so cool to own an Oxford English Dictionary of your very own, click on over to my other blog, where I posted about the word grandeur this morning.

And now for today's post.

It's graduation weekend in my town, and I needed three cards for high-school graduates...one young man and two young women. Same idea, different looks!

Dude doesn't get flowers and bling, but then, I think all three young people will be far more interested in the checks than the cards, anyway, LOL!

Since all these will be delivered by hand, I felt comfortable getting bulky with them. Those buttons and paper clips might be problematic in the post, though.

Have a lovely weekend!



Supplies
stamps: StampinUp (library card is from either Office Accoutrements or Stamp of Authenticity, not sure which), Papertrey Ink (sentiment from Mega Mixed Messages, flowers from Paper Tray), date stamp from office supply store
ink: Memento and SU mixed up
paper: PTI kraft, vintage cream, and white
accessories: paper clips, buttons, floss, rhinestones, dimensionals