Rainbows Everywhere

Some more 'empty bin' projects. Both very simple and visually striking, I think!  For the birthday card, I used a Technique Tuesday set with all the handwritten words and snipped up an old Papertrey sentiment that said "Wishing you a day as special as you are".

For this thank you card, I used two circle nestabilities to cut a ring out of the white panel and then sponged it and placed it back in (couldn't decide if it was easier or harder than masking! lol!) I added a Hero Arts sentiment cut with a Papertrey label die. I call this the rainbow ipod card.

For this card I used MFT's monogram alpha and a flower snipped off of a Michael's thank you stamp to fill up the space (for my English one, thanks went right across the card).

I've made a ton of thank you cards in the last few days - I'll try not to overload you and show you only the ones I think are new and fun!

OLW141 - Thank you!

This is for this week's One Layer Wednesday hosted by Karen. It's called Repeat After Me (such a cute name!) The idea is to use one stamp repeatedly to create a background.

I have this little stamp of 3 dots and I thought it was fun to use it in this way to make another thank you card. I started by stamping the sentiment and then branched out from there.

CFC101 - Thank You!

This is for this week's CASual Friday challenge to Stamp on DP. You know I don't use patterned paper very often  and the thought of stamping on it and making it very busy didn't initially appeal to me. But then I found this photo on Pinterest:

I thought it would make for an interesting card - almost an optical illusion. I found this old Stampin' Up striped DP from the Neutrals pack and went to town. I stamped the Stampin' Up sentiment and embossed it in clear and added a little pink gem for colour and sparkle.

Muse 18

I'm in stage two of  'empty bin' mode - I got quite a lot of cards finished on the weekend, after meeting up with my friend who basically cleaned me out of all the cards I made during stage one (thank you, my dear friend!!).

I decided to be efficient and make one of the thank you cards my submission for this week's Muse challenge. Here's Marion's beautiful inspiration card:

I focused on the rainbow of colours in the outlined flowers and used one of my old favourites, from Unity, along with a new favourite, the Inkadinkado sentiment. BTW, originally that wooden sentiment had "my way of saying" above the thanks. I popped the stamp into the microwave for 15 seconds, to loosen the glue and then just snipped off the extra words, knowing that I would get so much use from this simple, clean 'thanks'.

CASology 45 - Royal

Today's CASology Cue Card is Royal



Here in Canada, we've just had a long weekend to celebrate Queen Victoria's birthday. She's long gone, but Canadians love any reason to party - it's traditionally our first 'fireworks' night of the season. Perfect timing for a Royal challenge!

This is a birthday card, based on lyrics from an old David Bowie song, Heroes. The song starts with "I will be King" and ends with "just for one day".


For today's card I cut the gold mirror crown using my Silhouette Portrait, and used a plain, masculine font.  This will be perfect for my Bowie-loving brother-in-law! My card base (and  computer generated font) is royal purple (otherwise known as Elegant Eggplant).

I actually used a variation on this idea couple of  years ago, when my sister turned 40 (fortunately, the lyrics also include "You will be Queen"). It wouldn't qualify as CAS, though:

Outside

Inside

So now it's your turn to be Queen for the day. Or princess, or whatever royal means to you! Don't forget to link up before the deadline on Sunday at 4:00 CST.

Tracey McNeely
 Rosemary Dennis
Melissa Chipperfield
Meghan McMillan
Maureen Merritt
Judy Marino
Jen Wills

and this week's Guest Designer: Kim

OLW140 - Border Card

This week's One Layer Wednesday challenge is hosted by Heather. The challenge is to stamp on the border of your one-layer card. In honour of Heather (the Queen of Sponging), I stamped, masked and sponged.

You may notice that this long Papertrey sentiment seems to have worked out perfectly. (If you look at the end of the each line of text and the beginning of the next, you'll see that they match up). One of you will think that I planned this. I wish I could say that I did. Or maybe I just have a super-subconscious mind that can do amazing things even when I'm not thinking about it. But I only noticed it after I uploaded the photo to the blog, so I'm pretty sure it was just plain luck! That's ok, I'll take it!

The Empty Bin

Last Saturday night, we had a fundraiser concert and silent auction at my church.  My card sales had been pretty slow since Christmas, so I pretty much cleaned out my bin of cards. I took almost all of the birthday, blank and thank you cards I had on hand, grouped them as 7 sets of 10 cards and put them into clear boxes with pretty ribbons around them and donated them to the silent auction. They all sold for decent prices and I was happy to start with a proverbial 'clean slate'. Or empty bin!

Then my mom called to remind me that I had promised to make her 30 bell cards for her Handbell Symposium next weekend. I dropped everything and got them done. (I have photos - I'll show you one day!)

Then one of the teachers at school asked me to make her 40 thank you cards.

Then I made plans to meet up with a girlfriend this weekend. She asked me to bring my card bin because she's desperately low on birthday cards and needs to stock up (she often buys 30 at a time since we don't see each other very often).

Then one of my long-term Christmas card clients emailed me to ask that I make her a 'box' of assorted cards for her personal use.

Oh, the irony is not lost on me! But I'm not complaining!

All this week, I've been busy looking back at my designs to see what I can reuse to whip up a bunch of cards quickly. But I also like to try something new. And it's amazing how just 'having to get it done' gets the creative juices flowing! Love that productive feeling!

This is the first new design I was really pleased with - a simple graphic card using a Michael's sentiment and a Paper Smooches (Sugar Rush) candle. Bold, high contrast colours, simple shapes, a little sparkle and done!

And this is an old design (see here) revamped:

It reminds me of Billboard magazine. And I've entered it into this year's Papercrafter's Gallery Idol contest. If I get chosen by the PC staff to be in the top 20, then I'll be needing some votes for future rounds. Hint, hint! ;-)