Card Making day for MOPS

All of these designs, just for the record, are not mine- I used the basic layout of everything based on pictures of cards I'd saved to my computer from the Internet.... The cards themselves were made by me, and I picked out the papers and ribbon, etc. On the first card- I used a punch to make the little flowers and used self adhesive bling to go in the middle of them.

The stamped image on this card was a Stampin Up stamp- with the two images that work together. ( I don't know what the 'official' term for it is). I normally would have added some inking around the edges ( and I actually did on the first card- I pre inked all of them because I couldn't handle it), but since this is a project being done by over 50 ladies, adding a step like that means adding a lot of ink pads and such, and I didn't want to go that route this time with this craft. Not everyone likes that look anyway, so, they got the basic.

This one is my favorite, I think. I love the aqua color, and the stamp, and the embossing, and and and.... I used my Cuttlebug to emboss the basic white card, and then all the ladies had to do was put it together. It amazed me how many different ways they changed things up, and they all looked great! Again, I used the same small punch and bling for the flower. I definitely want to make more cards like this one. If you have a Cuttlebug, I highly recommend using it if you like to make cards, it adds such a nice look to it every time.

Cards made with the Cricut Damask cartridge

I borrowed the Cricut Damask cartridge from a friend and played around the other night- trying to come up with some easy cards for teacher gifts. There were some designs that I liked better than others, and if I'd had more time I would have embellished them more. I added stick on rhinestones and pearls to add a bit more to them. Anyhow, you can use any combination of colors that you like that complement each other. I wish that I'd had wider organza ribbon to tie around them, but like I said, they were quick gifts and I didn't have time to go get more. Anyhow, I took a quick picture of them all together, no great close ups.. but it's enough to prove that I did something.... :)

Cards for the Women's Retreat: Pictures

So here are the cards we came up with for the kits for the Women's Retreat. They're not embellished as much as I'd like, but we were faced with a tight budget and not a lot of time, also not wanting to overwhelm people who may not have made cards before... I hope people will want to them, and hopefully it's mostly self-explanatory so that I don't make something difficult that shouldn't be.

The latest card...

I saw the original version of this card in a stamp shop in Poulsbo, WA while spending a weekend with my best buddy. I needed a card ( the other one of two) for a card craft I am heading up for my mother in law's ladies evening out at her church in Tillamook, OR on Friday. Anhow, we each bought the stamp that was used. The original had a script stamp for the background of the paper that the flower was stamped on. I didn't want to buy another stamp just for script, so we came up with the idea of using the Cuttlebug Script embossing folder for the paper covering the card base instead. In an ideal world, I'd probably be inclined to ink around the edges of the all the pieces, but since this is for a group of up to 20 women, who mostly haven't any experience with cards (haha.. like I have much either!!! :) ) and inking and techniques used often in scrapbooking and cardmaking, I was trying to keep things as simple as possible. I will be stamping all the images ahead of time, and making kits for the cards, and my best buddy helped cut out the paper - the mat was cut with a die from Quickutz, most excellent layering I would say!! :) I used pop up foam dots to pop the white paper up from the rest, I like how it adds another element to the card. I used organza ribbon to complement the colors of the card with the color of the flower- also added another element to the card which I liked The original had this tiny little bow which was so perfect, but I don't want to try and get a bunch of women (pardon the pun) all up in knots over trying to make bows for the cards. A simple double tie worked great for me. I think I will be using the Script embossing folder a lot, I really like how it looks.

Card Day for MOPS service project

This last Saturday, ladies from our MOPS group got together to make cards to go in kits for families of deployed military. These kits have cards for various occasions during the year- birthday, Mothers/Fathers Day, 4th of July, Holiday, First Day of School, and blank (just for fun), along with postcards for the recipient to send back to their child/family, and stamps. Our group's card efforts will be going to Fort Lewis. Despite not being much of a card-maker, I made some efforts to create some cards too. Here are some of the results- I ended up making a set of the green cards for our MOPS auction- from a suggestion of one of our fellow MOPS members and card maker that day. I used a couple of card sketches to jumpstart me- I still struggled, but I'm satisfied enough with the results. My category was "just for fun".

Trying my hand at cards

So I've been toying with the idea of trying to make some cards, and when I decorated the tin that I did recently, I thought cards would go nicely inside as a gift. These didn't end up going in that tin, but I made them for my sister, who really liked them- but I say she's my sister so she has to. :) I used my Cuttlebug that my best buddy gave me so generously, and used the Swiss Dot, Paisley, and a flower/vine (don't know the official name of it) embossing folders on store bought plain cards. I was inspired to do this by Maria from her blog Maria's Craft Room. She has so many cards that she used her Cuttlebug, and I thought it looks so nice without having to be a ton of work. I used an acrylic monogram stamp that my best buddy (again :)) gave me a set of, and stamped on the embossed card and then on some plain white cardstock. I then cut around the image on the cardstock and used foam pop up dots to pop it up over the image on the card. I attached the ribbon in the middle of the stamped image on the card before I attached the second one over it by wrapping ribbon around the card then gluing the ends in the middle of the image to hide it. I just tied a little extra bit of ribbon on the side to add a bit more visual interest, and added self stick half pearls in the middle of the stamped letter to make it a little prettier too. Very basic looking, but nice enough I think. Thanks Maria for the inspiration!