Birthday Card - for Betsy

Yesterday was also Betsy's birthday - I work with her and am mentored a lot by her. I made a card, but the photos are not so good. Here are two images - only change is whether the flas was on or not. Neither captures the card very well.

Birthday Card - for Pam

Today my friend and Mexican train buddy, Pam, turns one year older =) No one needs to count the years anymore. I am sad because while I used to play Mexican Train with a great group of ladies from my Newcomers social club every month, I now work on game days =( Hopefully, we will be able to move game day and I can join the group once again!

Here is the card I sent to Pam:

Lois' Birthday

Today is my friend Lois' 48th birthday! I am now making these Tillandsia plant & crystal combinations --- love them. Tillandsias are also known as air plants - they do not need soil so are great to hot glue to things - such as this amethyst crystal:

I am using this card to send my birthday wishes:

This bow is made of a very shear blue ribbon.

Birthday Card - for Ashli

Ashli and I have been friends since about 10th grade, although I met her in 8th - in middle school when my life sucked. Ashli was a part of the in-crowd; she was a cheerleader and Homecoming Queen. I was not in that crowd but was friends with some of the people in it - Ashli being the one whom I knew the best and liked the most. The in-crowd at my high school was affectionately knows as the "Bitch Clique." When they were all together, they sort of terrorized the school. It was a group of about 9 girls - mostly the cheerleaders - who all stuck together to put down and intimidate the other girls in the class. The popular boys did not have nearly the power or influence as these girls!

Ashli turns 40 on the 23rd!

Birthday Card - for Scott

This is the year my school friends and I all turn 40! Oh my goodness - are we really THAT old????

I am sending this card to a good friend from high school who now lives in Florida - Scott. Scott and I have had a weird up and down relationship from the get go. I met him in 8th grade and we went to a summer science school program between 8th and 9th grades together. We worked on a mouse & maze project - and wound up with a dead mouse that we buried in the front yard of the junior high in Petaluma!

Then, we were in almost every class together in high school. We were "just" friends but he wanted a whole lot more.Scott worked at McDonalds and totally feed my obsession with and love of Happy Meals - back when a Happy Meal was only offered sometimes - usually in conjunction with a movie release. I actually spent most of high school dating his best friend, but it was Scott and I who went out on dates. We use to go get all dressed up and head to San Francisco for dinners at fancy restaurants.

He turns 40 on the 22nd - Happy Birthday, Scott!

Keris' Tabletop Birthday card

I made this for my niece as she is turning 11 soon. I send her a card in the mail for all holidays with a crisp, new dollar bill as a treat. This was her "mailed" card that I actually just handed to her because it was over 2 inches thick as I folded it into an envelope and the postage would have been high.

Mom Project - Card #15

This card does not show up very well - well it does not show up at all, really - but it is a white on white on white. Again, with a butterfly theme.

I got the idea for the shape of the edge of the card from Stampin' Up!'s new edgelits - but again I used my Cricut for the cutting.

There are pearls on the body of the butterflies and the white paper is shimmery in places.

"Sincere Good Wishes" was on a card I received recently and I really liked the sentiment.

Mom Project - Card #14

This birthday card is done with a lot of iridescence. The white paper is shimmery; the pink paper is shimmery and the solid butterflies are punched out of shimmery cardstock =)

The solid butterfly's are punches - I think it is a Martha Stewart punch. And I printed the background image on the paper (I do not buy stamps if I can just download the images and print them onto paper). The sentiment IS an actual stamp - a wooden block one with no indication of who made it.

Mom Project - Card #12

Finding cards that work for men is always hard - yet you do not need many of them usually, especially in my family --- there are very few men left! So, as I was cutting these shapes in brown for a masculine birthday card, I decided to make a set that were thank you cards, also. So that is what we have here.

Mom Project - Card #10

This is a really basic card that showcases Stampin' Up!'s products. I used their "Elegant Lines Textured Impressions Embossing Folder Die," the "Sincere Salutations" stamp set and even added some "Champagne Mist Shimmer Paint" sheen to the card (of course this is not visible in the picture).

To use the shimmer paint as a mist, I took an empty spray bottle, added a mixture of about 30% rubbing alcohol and 70% plain bottled water (maybe 1 Tbs of alcohol and 2 Tbs of water) then shook in about 5 drops of the shimmer paint. Once you shake it REALLY well, it works as a Glimmer Mist very well. Each time you use it you have to shake it - HARD - because the shimmer paint settles. But from one bottle of the shimmer paint, I have a lifetime supply of glimmer mist (unlike Tattered Angels really expensive mists). Any shimmer-y paint can work as a mist using this method --- even acrylic paints! Just remember to add the alcohol so the liquid evaporates on your paper more quickly.

Mom Project - Card #6

This is a simply birthday card - green and metallic silver. I used a border punch from Fiskars.

Birthday Cards - Janet and Anita

Two of my friends, Janet and Anita, had birthdays in the last couple of weeks and I made cards for them.

For Janet's card, I used a cool technique that I first saw on Becca Feeken's Amazing Paper Grace blog (***Spirit of Christmas***). I really liked the look of the woven ribbon through the frame. I do not have any Spellbinders' Nestabilities, but I do have a Cricut Expression and am armed with Paint.Net, Inkscape, and SureCutsALot and a whole of time. So I can pretty much make anything I want to cut. And I did! I created the half round scalloped frame, and the oval scallop frame with oval frame to layer on top. I also use MS Word and Excel to do some of my designing - with the PrtSc button (Print Screen) and Paint.Net, I can get those images into the creation process as well. I will make a post about all I do to make anything I want to cut.

Anywho--- I made the cutfiles and was able to create this card:

For Anita's card I had seen this card on a blog by ***Colien*** from Brabant in the Netherlands. While I have now seen them all over on ***SplitCoastStampers***, at the time I was just seeking them out on the European blogs that I follow. And I was really impressed with the look of the cards. I made up some ***directions*** for how to make them. I am still not sure how the Google Docs system works, but I have uploaded the directions --- they are a pdf file and include a diagram of your cardstock with measurements and folding directions. Good Luck! Here is her card:

I decorated the center diamond with the scalloped border punch by Martha Stewart - although this is usually a place where I would have used the Cricut and cut files! I was pleasantly surprised that I could use and *actual* punch that I had purchased with good old cash!

Corinne's Birthday Cards

How sad am I?

Didn't I mention just the other day that it was Corinne's birthday? Didn't I have her birthday card sitting on the counter waiting to be mailed? But, did I get it in the mail? ummm, that would be a no. It remained on my counter until I saw it this morning. So I added one of my belated cards and am planning to take it to the post office this morning. Ahhh, the pleasures of a drug-induced brain fog!

Here is the birthday card I made for her (it is a 5" x 7"):

And here are the images (front and inside) of my belated card (which is the smaller 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" size):

Hopefully they will get to her rather quickly. :)