God Bless You for Serving

Two posts in one day -- woot! woot!

The Any Hero card below was inspired by OWH Sketch #173.

Stamper's Best sentiment, heat embossed in Distress Ink black soot
Distress Ink core paper, green and black paper embossed with Sizzix folder
Paper Studio star punch; Stampin' Up neutral brads

For a change, I was pretty true to the sketch -- adding a few brads on the left and shifting the focal point rectangle a little to the right.

I went with black brads in the lower rectangle to balance the star(s), and add just a little more interest to the card, without detracting from the sentiment. And, the brad in the stars is much closer to the sentiment paper than it appears on screen.

A second source of inspiration was seeing Sandy's recently-posted Any Hero cards in non-traditional palettes.

Parting Thoughts

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday. We're headed to my father-in-law's for dinner.

As always, thanks for stopping and happy scrappin'!

Thinking about You All the Time

Hi, everyone! Happy weekend!

A quick post for this week's OWH Midweek Throwdown challenge to make a card related to time.

brown & green: Distress Ink core; black: Bazzill; cream: ???
Sizzix folder: heat embossed in Distress Ink vintage photo and sponged in peeled paint, tumbled glass, dusty concord
sentiment: computer-generated (Arial Black); Stampin' Up! brads
Creative Memories cutting system

The texture is FABULOUS! I also really like the way the inking came out. I dabbed a scrap of the paper with various inks until I decided to go with this combination. And, after applying peeled paint, I decided to use the green paper as the base -- with the layer of black in between. 

The card above is slightly different than the one linked at OWH. I felt like the sentiment needed a little something more, but I didn't want to add any extra bulk. Hmmm... When I couldn't find just the right embellishment in my stash, I added a little hand-drawn squiggle -- sketching it first in pencil. :)   Hope it looks okay. 

Just for fun, I thought I'd share the card at the right. I made it a year or so ago using the same embossing folder. It feels like I'm making some progress in this cardmaking journey. This new version has lots more texture, more depth, more layers -- and the shape of the sentiment's papers are more in keeping with the embossed image.

Parting Thoughts

It was a big week: went to a Stampin' Up! technique class and received several online cardmaking supply orders -- including some stamps from Our Daily Bread Designs. (ODBD is a great corporate partner/sponsor of OWH!) Hoping to find a little playtime this weekend. :)

Have a great weekend! Thanks for visiting and happy scrappin'!

OWH VCMP Challenges

Hi, everyone,

If you haven't checked out the challenges posted on OWH's Stars and Stamps blog in honor of OWH's cruise, make sure you take a look. There are some great challenges -- and lots of wonderful cards that have been linked to the blog posts.

It looks like my fellow party goers are publishing separate posts for each challenge -- and I know that short posts are preferable in the blogging community. So, I apologize in advance for going with one longer post for the sake of efficiency. That being said, I have 5 cards to share. :)


Card 1: Challenge 2 (Masculine Nautical) and Challenge 6 (Sand and Sea)

Yes, I confess that I posted the following card twice because it fits both challenges perfectly. I'm telling myself I'm really not cheating because I liked this first card so much that I made 3 more -- 2 more for OWH and 1 for my brother's birthday. :)

The most exciting thing about this card is that the sand dollars were cut and embossed using a Zip'e Mate that I purchased at a scrapbook garage sale!  I'd been able to use it for embossing, but this was my first success at getting it to die cut!!!

DMC floss, garage sale brads, background paper: DCWV Travel Pack,
blue netting: your guess is as good as mine -- just a great leftover in the scrap pile,
and a Zip'E Mate!!!!

Card 2: Challenge 7 (CAS)

This card actually came together quickly, which is not always the case for me.  I was pleased that the stamped sentiment blended in so perfectly with the aged look of the printed paper.


Bo Bunny Timepiece Collection from last year: 6 x 6 pad and card-making set


Card 3: Challenge 8 (Jungle Animals -- for a kid's card)

Well, it's a good thing a couple of the other cards came together quickly, because this one did not. I didn't have one blasted jungle animal in all my stash! So, I went online and found an adorable pattern/template for a lion at DLTK's Growing Together.

The mane, face, body, and tail tip are all created from punched-out hearts. The ears and nose are also supposed to be hearts. But, since I printed the pattern at 50%, the hearts were too tiny for my liking. Hope you like this one because I'm thinking it was well worth the effort. I'm also thinking I need to make more kid cards for OWH. :)

DLTK template, EK Success 3-heart punch,
Sizzix croc embossing folder, Kaiser rhinestones,
computer-generated font,

Card 4: Cut It Out! (punches and die cuts)

I started the following card for the Hot Tropics challenge, but the orange and green butterflies just didn't look quite right. The white butterflies with a light-blue grid pattern look so much better -- even though the pattern doesn't show up very well in the JPG.

Jillibean Blossom Soup paper pad and embellishment

Card 5: Vintage

This last card also came to me very quickly. When my hubby saw it, I think he was hoping it was his Valentine card. I must admit, it probably is more suited to him than the card he will be receiving. But, since I had already written in his card, it was too late to switch. Guess it will just have to be sent to one of our troop's loved ones... Oh, darn!  :)

Once again, Bo Bunny Timepiece 6 x 6 pad and card-making set -- perfect for a vintage look

This week's VCMP was great fun!  At first I wasn't going to participate because I had planned to get a jump on Mother's Day cards. But, the variety of the challenges have resulted in a nice assortment of cards for the "other half cards" for the half Mother's Day/half other cards challenge. Nice job, OWH blog team!

Thanks for visiting! Happy scrappin'!

My First OWH Shipment of the Year!!!

First of all, my thanks to everyone who has left such nice comments about Sketch #106 and my congratulations to everyone for posting such great cards! And, for folks who left blogging advice, my sincerest appreciation. A techie colleague at work is going to help me out during lunch. :)

I'm thrilled to say that I sent my first box of the year to Kris! I am really pleased by this shipment's assortment. It was a nice mix of feminine, masculine, and patriotic cards. And, it had 5 Any Hero cards!!! Woot! Woot!


Some of the cards have already been posted for OWH challenges or featured here. So, I will just share the ones that have not yet made a public appearance.


Building on my "Your Service Means the World to Me" Any Hero card, I included 11 cards along the lines of the following made from the DCWV Travel Stack. The sentiment is computer-generated.

It also included 11 of the following cards, which were made distressing Ranger Core Paper and embossing with Sizzix folders -- including one of Tim Holtz's folders. As with the previous cards, the sentiment is computer-generated. Although I would have preferred to attach the sentiment with a little more pizazz, I was at a day-long crop at a school and out of pop dots. But, in all honesty, the less-embellished cards are the ones my hubby prefers. Here's hoping there are some troops that feel the same way.  :)

Finally, for the females, there were 8 of the following made from Kaiser's Secret Bird Society paper. I used Creative Memories square punches, Martha Stewart's punch-around-the-page butterfly punch, and Dixie's ribbon technique. Thank you, Dixie!

Think that's it for tonight. Thanks for coming by. Happy scrappin'!