Thinking of You

Obviously, I need a little push to blog. ;) A group of online friends felt the same way and came up with a monthly challenge. The theme this month is Thinking of You cards. I had high hopes of getting several done. There are several kinds of thinking of you cards, after all. January is highly saturated with birthdays, though, and one is all I managed. Today. Yep, that's right. Laaaast minute.

Like I said, there is more than one kind of Thinking of You. Some are almost Sympathy cards, others are more like Hello. I think this one could go either way. If I just wanted to pop one in the mail to say hey, I'd probably add a few rhinestones. If it's for a death, illness, or other trauma I'd probably leave it be. I've seen some beautiful and tasteful sympathy cards with rhinestones, but I always feel awkward when I add them.

Thanks for looking!

Supplies:
Stamps - (These are from a muse studio. I'm not certain of the sets because they were given to me individually, but I love them!)
Ink - a muse studio Fern, Versafine Onyx
Paper - PTI Stamper's Select White
Other - PTI Woodgrain impression plate, pop dots

PTI Blog Hop

Oh goodness. First time to blog since September? I'm not even going to bother with excuses, just go straight on to the post.

It's the 25th of the month so it's PTI blog hop time. The challenge this month is a black card base. Perfect, since I was already planning on making some black cards.

I have been a birthday card making fool this month. (As opposed to just a regular fool like normal.) January has about nineteen birthdays. Eight are this week alone. It's a little crazy.

 

The first one is for my very dear friend, Alyssa. She is a rocking crafter and she is a die cut queen. I wanted to do something fun for her card. I cut the lowercase script alpha dies out of different bright cardstock scraps and adhered them with Ranger Glossy Accents. The glue got a little squishy on the edges. I've since learned it's better to glue the word together carefully, then glue the whole word to the card at once, rather than letter by letter which is what I did here. It needed something else so I made a frame with quarter-inch scortape and Martha Stewart glitter. (I have one of those 24 bottle sample sets so I figure I should use them!) Final step was a bit of stickles over all the letters. Since this is a birthday card and not at all fancy, instead of putting a white base inside for her note I just used a silver Sharpie.

 

 

This card is for my sweet boy. I intended to blog a whole post for him. He's the light of my life, after all. But AT&T had other ideas and today is the first day our internet has been working all week. This card is a mish mash of products. The number is one of  PTI's By the Number dies. The wood veneers and arrow stamps are Studio Calico. The washi I found on etsy. He needed some action for his card so inside I used the coil die from the Movers and Shakers Poppers collection and added five green stars to it. He said "COOL!" when he opened it. Thanks Nichole, for helping me impress my five year old. ;) Also, thank you Betsy Veldman for all the awesome chalkboard tutorials. I used that on the arrows here. My embossing powder has gotten more use in the last four months than the last four years!

 

Thanks for looking! See an amazing array of talent at the PTI blog.

 

Supplies

 

Party On:

Paper - various scraps, Recollections black

Other - PTI Lowercase Script Alpha dies, 1/4 inch Scor-tape, Ranger Glossy Accents, Martha Stewart Crystal glitter, Stardust Stickles

 

5:

Stamps - Studio Calico Oh Snap!

Ink - Versamark, PTI Fresh Snow

Paper - Recollections black, PTI New Leaf

Other - Studio Calico Star wood veneers, washi, Zing white embossing powder, pop dots, glue dots, Stampin Up star punches (for the inside, not pictured), PTI Movers and Shakers Poppers die (for the inside, not pictured)