Best Wishes White With a Splash of Pink

This was a simple card made with some trial and error.  But once I got all the sizes and cuts figured out then it was easy.  So not one piece of paper for this card was cut with my Cricut.  Poor baby, it was neglected on this one!  LOL  Amazingly, all the cuts were made using Martha Stewart Punches!  I am pretty proud of this one!  I love the white on white look with the embossing and layers, all combined.  It gives it such depth and dimension.  Then with that little bit of pink, just makes it so elegant.  This card was made for a bridal shower, but really it could be made for just about any occasion, except for maybe a masculine card, of course.  As soon as the bride-to-be saw it, she was in love with it!  I know I sure was, of course I say that with almost every one of my cards.  LOL  I love to challenge myself to try something new and see if I can achieve a new look.  I have always admired the look of many layers and lots of fancy cuts weather they are cut on a machine or with a die and in this case cut with a punch.  Who knew! 

 

I used:

White Cardstock

Pink and Green Velum Paper for the flowers and leaves

Martha Stewart Around the Page Loop Punches

Martha Stewart Hydrangea Punches

Cuttlebug embossing folder set:  Loves in the Air

White Satin Ribbon from Hobby Lobby

Adhesive Pearls

Well thank you stopping in and I hope you have a

wonderful day!

 

Challenges Entered:

DL.ART THANKFUL THURSDAY MARCH LINKY CHALLENGE

Antique Truck Masculine Card

Hello again!  I hope everyone is doing great!  It has been sun shining here a lot more, lately!  That means that spring is here!  Yay!  Yes even I, the one who loves winter, is ready for some warmer days and more sun shine and flowers blooming.  The biggest two things I don't like about warmer weather is tornado weather and HOT weather.  Otherwise, give me 70-75 with very little humidity and I am happy.  LOL
Anyways, my BIL had a birthday here a while back, and I really just always struggle with coming up with masculine cards.  So when I saw this old truck image, I immediately thought of his old Model-T that he has and plans on restoring.  So this was naturally my choice or my jumping off point for his card.  Then it went from there.  I recently bought the brick embossing folder with intentions of using it on some more masculine cards.  I sure hope he liked it!  I think it turned out nice. 

I used:
DCWV The Formal Affair Stack
White Cardstock
Darice Brick Pattern embossing folder
Tim Holtz Distress Ink Black Soot
Online Image for the truck
I-Rock Gems
Stampin' Up! Celebrations for the Sentiment
Ribbon From my stash

Thank you so much for taking time to see what I have been doing!  I hope you have a day filled with many blessings!

Birthday Pop-Up Box Card

Hello again!  Like I said, I have been continually making cards even though I have not been posting.  I am just glad that I have remembered to grab pictures of these cards before they are give out or sent to their recipient.  One to many times I have forgotten to snap that picture until after I have either sealed the envelope or have already sent it.  I am sure no one else does that except me.  Very frustrating.  Well this one is fortunately not one of those. 

 

I made this card for my wonderful SIL,  she is such a special lady and a blessing to us all.  She has such a giving heart and always seems to have a smile on her face even when things get rough.  We all love her so very much and are so very proud of her and the changes she has made in her life, and are praying for her continually.  Either way the pop up box turned out really pretty and very elegant.  I love the contrast of the colors against each other.

 

I used:

Potpourri Basket Cricut Cartridge for the greenery/Ivy

Kate's ABCs Cricut Cartridge for the larger flowers

Making Memories Wedding Stack

Red and White Textured Cardstock

Black Cardstock

Small strips of acetate paper

Martha Stewart Hydrangea Punches for the smaller flowers

EK Success Butterfly punch

Brads for the center of the large flowers

Gold and Silver liquid pearls



 

Thank you so much for stopping in and seeing what all I have been up to! 

I hope you have a wonderful day!

Challenges Entered:

DL.ART THANKFUL THURSDAY MARCH LINKY CHALLENGE

 

Best Wishes Pop Up Present Card!

Hello, long time no post from me!  Sorry!  As usual, life tends to keep me busy from posting.  I am still busy in my little corner, making my cards, even when I don't post anything.  So this was made for my cousin who has always been really special to me since childhood.  We were and are like best friends.  We had many a sleepovers as kids.  When I got a little older my family moved away.  But even now as adults, when we do get together, it is like we were never apart and we just pick up where we left of and just really enjoy each others company.  What a blessing it is to have someone like that!  I love her and her beautiful family!  Now unfortunately she lives in another state, so I REALLY, don't get to see her except maybe once a year during the holiday season.  :-(    Anyways, her birthday is a funny one, because it lands on the one day that only happens once every 4 years, leap year!  So her birthday is an easy one to remember.  She used to always tell me that she would actually celebrate her birthday at midnight, when it is not a "leap year"!  LOL  Since she is so special to me and so easy to remember I wanted to get a card to her.  So this is what I came up with. Either way, I hope she liked it!

 

I Used:

DCWV The Mariposa Stack

Blue Textured Cardstock

Darice Dandelions embossing folder

Green and White Chalk to give it some color

Stickles:  Crystal

Stamped sentiment from Hobby Lobby

The Ribbons for both the inside and outside are from my stash

Also, the inside papers for the gifts are from my crazy stash of scraps

 

 

Thank you so much for stopping in and checking out what I have busy doing. May you have a day filled many blessings!

 

Challenges entered in:

DL.ART THANKFUL THURSDAY MARCH LINKY CHALLENGE

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Hi, I hope you all had a great Valentine's Day with your Valentine...weather it was with your spouse, or just you and your kids or even just friends.  No matter who you chose to be your Valentine, I hope it was special and fun!  My family chose to stay home and just have a nice evening home.  And for us that seems to be something rare.  LOL  So as tradition, that has been passed down from my parents, my kids woke up and came down to a heart shaped box of yummy chocolates, and it did not end there. My wonderful hubby surprised me with a box of yummy chocolates and a card, and then later he had a bouquet of flowers sent to me too.  Talk about feeling special and very spoiled.  At lunch then, I made grilled cheese sandwiches, with a heart cut out of the center of the bread and replaced with another kind of bread.  Mmmm, yummy and fun!   Then at dinner time, I made a very special meal, with heart shaped homemade pizzas and dessert was Black Forrest Cakes in individual servings all served with candle light and dinner music!  LOL  They had fun and really enjoyed it all!  Wow, everyone was stuffed too!   But is in the mix of it all, I made my hubby a quick Valentine card to go with the box of chocolates I gave him.  I think we have enough chocolates to last us quite a while!  LOL  Anyways, I wanted to share the card I made for my hubby!  I think he liked it!

I Used:
Cricut Craft Room Basics Cartridge for the Heart cuts, circle cut and the scalloped circle cut
Gypsy Font Cricut Cartridge for the Letters
DCWV Glittered Stack for the large center Heart
Authentique Paper, LLC Authentique Genuine Collection
DCWV The Shimmer Stack for the smaller hearts
Love's In the Air Cuttlebug Embossing Folder
Rhinestones from Michael's
The Sentiment was computer Generated

Thanks stopping by!  I hope you have a fantastic day!

Purple Butterfly Pop Up Box Card

Hello Blog friends!  It seems that many of the birthdays in my family happen to run in bunches.  Where I will have 3 or 4 of them all at once and then nothing...then again 3 or 4.  I wish they were more spread out so that my "creative juices" would be able to continue to flow.  LOL  Well, I had no problems with  this card for my sister.  I knew exactly what I wanted to make for her.  She loves the color purple and nature.  And because she lives so far away from me, I knew I wanted to make her a pop up box card.  Since she is so far, and sending her a "exploding box", or another handmade dimensional gift is not all that practical without paying extra shipping, this was the perfect solution.  I love how it lays flat to put into the envelope and yet when you open it, it is full of "WOW"!  Such an unexpected surprise!  I hope she will enjoy it!  Plus, I received a wonderful gift/toy for my birthday a while back, that helps in aiding with sending such great types of cards...the Envelope Punch Board!  Oh my, this thing is great!  I can make my own envelopes that fit my cards perfectly.  I love that thing!  It sure came in handy for this type of card.  So now I can use up a lot of my thinner scrapbook papers for custom envelopes!  Oh how perfect!  Anyways, this card style is very easy to make, it is up to you on how complicated or detailed you want to make it.  This was a little more embellished than the last one but it still did not take very long to do. 

I used:
Me & My Big Ideas Specialty Cardstock
DCWV The Shimmer Stack
Dark Green and purple Cardstock
Potpourri Basket Cricut Cartridge for the "Ivy leaves" cut
EK Success Butterfly Punch
Stickles
Celebrate stamped Sentiment from Stampin' Up!
Happy Birthday Sentiment from my stash
Paper flowers from my stash
Glue Dots

Due to many requests of how to make this kind of card, I figured I would share the link to where I got a really great tutorial.  Very clear and simple!  Have fun! 
Pop Up Box Card Tutorial

Here is what it looks like closed!

Thanks for stopping by to see what I have been up to!

I hope you all stay warm!

May you have a wonderful day!

 

Hoppy Birthday!

My sweet little baby girl just turned 12 this week!  Where does the time go!  She is growing up way to fast, yet there are moments where I still see little glimpses of that little girl in her.  She is always ready to smile or giggle at something or with you.  I am truly blessed that God chose me to be her momma.  If you could know her, she always has some kind of insect or frog in her hand or in a jar, through out the spring/summer months.  Even last summer, she cried when one of her many caterpillars died.  Last summer we ordered a butterfly kit where we got to see the caterpillars turn into butterflies and then released them back into the wild.  That was so cool!  She really enjoyed that a lot.  Actually, I think we all enjoyed it.  She brings so much joy and adventure to our little family! So naturally, this is where my inspiration came from for her card!  It made her giggle a little, especially with the frog being on an action wobble.  When it wobbles, the goggle eyes rattle!  What fun!

I used:
Create A Critter Cricut Cartridge for the Frog
Kate's ABC's Cricut Cartridge for the Jar and grass cuts
Sweet Treats Cricut Cartridge for the party hat
Elegant Edges Cricut Cartridge for the Background cuts
The Paper Studio Persnickety paper pack
Action Wobble behind the frog
Goggle eyes from my stash
Martha Stewart Butterfly boarder punch for the butterflies
Paper flowers from my stash
"Hoppy Birthday" sentiment made using alpha bet stamp set from my stash
Stickles
Butterfly Ribbon from my stash

 

Here is what it looks like with the Action Wobble in action!  Fun!

 

Thank you for Hopping by!

I hope you have a day filled with many blessings!

A Little Bit of Summer Pop Up Box Card!

Hello dear bloggy friends!  I hope you all are staying thawed out this cold winter.  It has been unusually cold here.  I love winter, but not when the temperatures are this cold.  I would like to be able to send my kids outside to play in the snow, but with it being this cold, they can't.  Anyways, knowing that spring and summer are just around the corner, I decided to bring a little bit of that into my card making.  My sweet SIL's birthday was just here and I know she loves being outside in her flower beds and garden and I am sure she is getting antsy to be able to do that again.  So I thought I would send her a little bit of summer to warm up her birthday a little for her.  Plus, I have been enjoying seeing the "Card in a Box" technique and I decided that I wanted to try my hand at it.  If you know me, I am always trying a new card technique.  Pushing myself to try something new, is something I really enjoy doing, especially when it comes to using my papers and glue!  I love how this turned out!

I Used:
DCWV  Lemon Flower Stack
Yellow textured cardstock
DCWV Glitter Stack for the Star Cuts on my Cricut
The Daisy were stickers that were given to me years ago,from Walmart
Cupcake and "Celebrate" stamps from Hobby Lobby and hand cut out
Stickles
Rhinestones from Michael's dollar bin 
"Happy Birthday" Stamp from my stash

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Stay warm!

 

Simple Birthday Card

Hello, I hope your new year is treating you well.  I know things have been going great here.  My son is playing on his first basketball teams this year, and he is doing great!  He is actually between age groups, so he is playing on 2 teams.  So when we have games, he finishes one game and goes right into the next one.  Which leads to a very busy schedule for us all, with all the practices and games. We are all so proud of him and enjoying something new for us all.  Besides, that is kinda how my wonderful hubby and I met, 23years ago, through basketball games.  LOL 

Anyway, this card was made for my Brother in Law.  Simple but quick is what I needed, due to his birthday being right after Christmas.  And with Christmas being so CRAZY this year for me, I needed a card that was easy and quick.  And that is just what this is!

  I sure hope he liked it!

 

I used:

Red/White/Blue cardstock

Polka Dot Cuttlebug embossing folder

Stars Cuttlebug embossing folder

Ribbon from my stash

HB Stamped Sentiment from my stash(I honestly can say that I have no idea where it came from)

Stickles Blue and Silver 

 

Thank you so much for coming by

and seeing what I have been doing!

I hope you have a wonderful day filled

with lots of blessings!

Merry Christmas/Happy Thanksgiving Letter Blocks Tutorial

Well Hello again!  At Thanksgiving time I made a craft for my family.  It was Letter Blocks that were reversible for two different holidays, Thanksgiving and Christmas.  One side said, "Happy Thanksgiving" and the other side said, "Merry Christmas".  Complete with vinyl lettering and decoupage papers in the background.  As in the previous post, I had to make about 30 of them.  Whew, it was A LOT of work and due to the layers of paints, it took a lot of time.
 
Anyways, some have asked me for more details on how to make them.  The funny thing is that as I was making these little letter blocks, I thought to myself, "I should take pictures of each stage and prepare a tutorial."  Well, in my hastiness, I failed to do so.  So I won't have pictures of it all except for the finished product.  Sorry!  So if you do use my tutorial and have a great success with it, please leave credit where credit is due. 
That would be greatly appreciated. 

 

So here is what I can give you to do them.

 

Supplies that you will need:
Blocks of wood, of your desired sizes: 
(All of the single lettered blocks were approximately all about 3/4" thick)
For the Outside blocks, I had them cut at 1 and 1/2" wide by 3 and 1/2" tall
For the smaller center blocks, I had them cut at 1 and 1/2" wide by 2 and 1/8" tall
For the base block, I had them cut at 4 and 3/4" long by 1 and 1/8" deep by 3/4" thick
Primer
Paint color of your choice (I choose black for the letter blocks and burgundy for the Base/word block)
Seasonal styled scrapbook papers (*Hint:  the smaller the print the better, so that you can see it more)
Stain of your choice of color
Vinyl, colors of your choice (I used black and White)
A way to cut or have the vinyl letters:  I used my Cricut Expression and the Cricut Winter Woodland Cartridge, for all the letters and my Gypsy to design it all on, but you could use the Cricut Craft Room to do the same. 
Decoupage, some of the block sets, were done in a matte finish and others in a glossy finish (I liked the glossy the best because I like shinny things!) 
 
Step 1: 
Cut and sand off rough edges, blocks of wood to desired sizes
 
Step 2:
Prime with a coat of primer paint
 
Step 3: 
Paint at least 2 coats of your desired paint colors for all your blocks, letting them completely dry between each coat.
(*Hint, only paint the one side and then wait for it to dry, then paint the other side/edges also, focus your best painting on the edges where they will be seen)
 
Step 4:
Sand around the edges to give them a bit of a distressed look
 
Step 5: 
Rub stain on the exposed edges to give them a darker more distressed/aged look
 
Step 6: 
Put on your desired paper on one side using the decoupage glue, then put decoupage over top of the paper to seal it down on the blocks.
 
Step 7: 
Cut and adhere your vinyl letters to each block, I just "eye balled" in trying to figure out where the center was and the perfect level for each.  You may find a better way to getting them centered.  I did not have the time/patience to do that.  Besides, it is supposed to look homemade, right?  Each letter was cut on my Cricut Expression with the Gypsy, using the Winter Woodland Cricut Cartridge, at about 3" wide, but the Larger letters were cut at about 2 and 1/2" tall and the smaller letters were cut about 1 and 1/2" tall.  The words were cut at about 1/2" tall and the length varied on the word and the "welding" that I did in the designing.  "Christmas" was cut at a length of 3 and 3/4" long and "Thanksgiving" was cut at about 4 and 1/2" long.  (*Hint:  If the vinyl seems to not want to stick to your decoupaged papers, try placing them into the position that you want them to be in, and heat them up just a little bit with a heat/embossing tool or a blow dryer and while it is still warm rub them down where you want it to stick.  It does not take a lot of heat to make them stick quickly.
 
Step 8: 
Put another coat of decoupage over top of everything, just to seal the vinyl onto the blocks.
(*Hint:  Another step that I did not have time to do that probably would help keep the blocks from sticking together, would to put a coat or two of clear coat on everything.)  I did not have the time to let all the layers completely dry/cure in between each coat, so that may have been part of the problem, too.   

 

 

I hope this little step by step tutorial is enough for you to understand and to make your own little letter set! 

 If you do have any questions,

 I will do my best to answer them. 

Thanks for stopping in and good luck!