Valentine Cards -- Part Two

I was showing the Valentine cards recently posted here to a co-worker.  She liked one of the sentiments on one of the cards and asked me to make her a card for her sweetie for Valentine's Day.  The sentiment is simple enough...You Complete Me...simple, straightforward, a little funny (think Austin Powers), but powerful in those three words.  My mind started whirling around how I could create this card using that sentiment and create something different and unique that would communicate the thought.  The co-worker's other request was that the card have their two favorite colors, blue and deep purple.  On this first one I used the dark blue as the background, mounted on white card stock.  I added a graphic of purple puzzle pieces, put together.  I printed the exact same puzzle pieces on the blue card stock but cut out one of the pieces to create a 3D effect on one of the purple base pieces.  I misted the larger blue piece with Perfect Pearls to give it some shimmer and pop dots under the 3D puzzle piece to make it pop.  I stamped the sentiment on one of the tag dies out of white and threaded with a purple ribbon threaded with silver and then offset it across the upper left corner of the card. 

The second card was simple, two hearts one in each color mounted on white card stock embossed with Swiss dots and brushed with purple ink.  That was mounted on a light lavender card stock.  Then I added another tag with sentiment in the middle of the hearts on the bottom with three little purple bling to give a little pop.

And third was an idea inspired by a stamped image I saw somewhere on the Internet in my surfing...a heart that had smaller hearts punched out of it cascading from the bottom.  I took that idea and did it in reverse...with a graphic image of a pitcher with small hearts cascading into the big heart.  I also punched a few small hearts out of the larger heart to give the idea of filling up those spaces.  The heart is done in purple the smaller hearts in blue.  All of it was mounted on a white Gemstones piece of card stock.  The sentiment tag mounted to the bottom right on the cardstock.  With this one I cut an opening in the fold of the card and threaded the ribbon through that.  It is affixed behind the sentiment so no knots or bows anywhere.

There is another idea or two circling around in the brain...we'll see what comes of them...in the meantime, Imagine, Create, Enjoy!

Anniversary Cards

Needed some anniversary cards this month.  I had some papers from Valentine's Day so set about making a card for my BFF.  Becky and Ed celebrate their 35th anniversary this year.  I had picked up a Martha Stewart butterfly border punch and had not yet tried it out.  I started playing with it and decided that the border turned out so well that I wanted to use it on the anniversary card.  I used some pearly white card stock by Gemstones and cut it to a 6 x 9 size, scored at 4.5 inches and folded in half.  I cut the patterned paper from Little Yellow Bicycle called Love Story to fit on the 6 x 4.5 front of the card stock.  The paper had come out around Valentine's Day.  I punched the beautiful butterfly border using a pearly pink from the Gemstones paper.  I cut the tag from the Spellbinder's Nestabilities die and used my little stamp about true love stories...I added pink pearls at the top and bottom of the sentiment.  I mounted the sentiment using pop dots then cut more pop dots to mount on the butterfly border to make it stand up over the edge of the sentiment block.  To finish it off I stamped Happy Anniversary in the inside of the card and added a pretty matching pink bow with some satin edged organza ribbon from the dollar bin at Michael's.

Next up I worked on an anniversary card for my sweetie.  I used embossed craft paper from my Recollections Love Letters pad previously mentioned in my blog. I cut another 6 x 9 inch size card scored at 4.5 inches and folded in half.  I then cut one of the embossed papers from the collection to fit inside the 6 x 4.5 front of the card.  I used the Spellbinder's Nestabilities die mentioned above and stamped in horizontally with another one of my love stamps.  Since I was working with red embossing on the craft paper, I stamped the sentiment in red and then inked around the edges of the sentiment tag; at the top of the sentiment I added light grey pearls.  I used a pearly grey Gemstones paper and cut a butterfly border for the bottom of the sentiment.  I used pop dots to lift it over the bottom edge of the sentiment.  To finish it off, I added a sparkly red ribbon bow to the front and stamped Happy Anniversary inside the card.  Happy 30th Anniversary dear!

I think they both turned out very nicely.  Until next time, Imagine, Create, Enjoy.

Romantic Kraft Cards

A few weekends ago I was browsing Michael's aisles and found this wonderful kraft card paper pad from Michael's Recollections line of supplies.  It is called Love Letters.  It has some beautifully embossed papers that are wonderful for making Valentine's cards or love notes for your spouse, girlfriend, boyfriend, well you get the idea.  I decided to make this as a gift for someone so will only share a couple of them here.  I'll share the rest once I've sent them off...so stay tuned.  This paper for the first card was patterned with writing and flowers, music, etc.  Additionally it had these two pretty birds perched on the front and they were overlaid with a burnished copper embossing.  I found the beautiful matching ribbon in the Thanksgiving decorations at Michaels on sale and knew it was a perfect match.  The other nice thing about the paper pad is it had two page of tags/embellishments in it.  The tag across the bottom is one of them.  It is kind of hard to see, but it is raised with foam stickies, it says For My Love in the same burnished copper and I stamped a love sentiment next to it in copper.

For the second card, I chose to highlight the perfect block on the left side of the page and use it as my sentiment location.  In the lower left corner there are two flowers that are embossed with a glittery red as is the word Love and the No. 206.  I used my Martha Stewart embossed heart punch and punched a small red glitter embossed heart for the upper right corner of the box and used the Butterflies Sizzlet from SU! to add a butterfly in the lower right corner.  Then to finish it off, I stamped the love sentiment you see in the box in red and added a glittery red ribbon from my Christmas ribbon stash.

I can't say enough about this paper pack.  It is really wonderful and has some beautiful patterns and embossing on it.  Check it out the next time you're in Michael's!  Great for making Love Notes for your sweetie!

See you next time.  Imagine, Create, Enjoy.