Donna's Birthday Card

I am the hostess at the Mod Squad Challenge Blog this week.  One Happy Cuts is the sponsor and  one random entry will be chosen to receive a $15 gift certificate so go over the Mod Squad Challenge Blog and check out the challenge.  As those of you who visit my blog regularly know, I like to make cards, even those for challenges, for the special people in my life.  This card is no exception. I made this card for a very special lady whose birthday is December 25th.  Donna Phelan  is so talented and such a good friend and awesome cheerleader to all her crafting buddies. Her blog is fun to read because it reflects her positive attitude, sense of humor and creative imagination. If you have never seen her work, drop by her blog Donna's Blog  and say hello.  I wanted the card to reflect her tastes so I put this little paper flower garden of her favorite flower, hydrangeas, together for her.Then I used one of her favorite techniques, wood graining, for the background. I topped that panel with a beautiful frame from Spellbinders. It has so much detail and is both embossed and debossed. The center frame is from Sue Wilson's Vienna.   The sentiment. which describes how we all feel about Donna, is from Melanie Muenchinger's Buds and Vases. The hydrangeas are Spellbinders and the butterfly is Cheery Lynn.  

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Donna asked me how I made these flowers so here you go, Donna.  The flowers below are for a blue hydrangea for another special friend.  

Cut 4 large and 4 small stems  and 38 flowers

Ink the edges of the blossoms

Make a mark in the center with a green marker.

  

Use stylus in the center of each blossom so it curls up

Put one blossom on each of the stems.

Build your flower on the circle die cut that comes with the set.  Layer all the large ones making sure to offset each one.  Shape the flowers to face upwards. 

Finished flowers.

Flip Flops

My friend Judy Woodland is hosting the Mod Squad Challenge Blog this week and she asked for Anything but Christmas. Go over and check out Judy's fabulous card here. There is a $25 Kitchen Sink gift certificate for one random winner. Anyway, I think I accomplished Judy's challenge.  I designed this card for my college room mate.  I won't tell you how many years we have been friends, but it is more than ten. Sharon has a fetish for flip flops so I told her that I was going to send her some flip flop note cards.  I made ten cards using the same design but different colors that I will put into her birthday card box.  These were fun to make and I got all ten done in one afternoon.

I will enter this in the Mod Squad Challenge Blog

Christmas 2015

I make lots of different designs for my Christmas cards, but because I send so many cards I usually spend some time on one design that I like and make several duplicate cards.The only problem with this is that by the time I am done making cards I am not as fond of the design as I was in the beginning. 

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I started with this fabulous cover plate from Frantic Stamper.  Even though it is very intricate, it cut through with one pass.  Amazing!!!!  I knew I wanted a frame around it so I used my 5x7 Spellbinders Matting Stacks to create a frame.

 I wanted  the door of the church to be black and the windows yellow to imitate light.  I tried several methods but the one that I liked best is gluing small pieces of yellow and black paper in the appropriate spots.

I knew I wanted and evening scene so I used a circle mask for the moon and sponged blues and violets around it.

Next, I used and ink brayer and spotted  roller covered with versa mark over the panel and then heat embossed white embossing powder to imitate snow.

 Next I die cut my sentiment using an IO die.

I wanted snow for the bottom portion of the panel so I cut out some white glitter paper, and glued  the sponged panel and white glitter paper to the back of the cover plate. Next I glued the frame on top of the scene and then added the sentiment to the bottom of the frame. Then I decided to emboss the frame with a Swiss dot embossing folder.

This panel was layered on some lilac or blue card a then onto a white card base.

I added some deer, trees or snow flakes to finish the card.


                                         


I will enter the following challenges
Simon Says Die Crazy

Simon Says Winter Wonder Land

Simon Says Work It Wednesday Holiday Card

Dies R Us Winter Use Snowflakes

Snowman Side Step

I made a card similar to this last year for a challenge.  I liked it well enough to do it again for a few Christmas cards. Of course, I changed and added some things.  These darling snowmen are feebies from Beccy's Place.  You'll find a link to her blog on my side bar.  I printed and fuss cut them. See the snow ball in the snowman's hand and the pile of in front. He has been busy. I see some of these snow balls in a shaker card in the near future.  The picture does not show it well but there is some homemade snow on the trees fence and ground.

PTI  paper
IO  fir trees, fence trio, and bow from fancy ornament, cardinals from birch trees, and Merry Christmas sentiment
Tim Holtz  street  lantern


DRU Merry and Bright or White Here