Masculin cards, CST challenge

Hi everybody.  Hope your week is going well. 

 I have been busy finishing my Christmas cards.  All done-woohoo.  I will try hard to get them in the mail before the end of the week.  I have turned over a new leaf.  I usually get my cards  into the mail about Dec 20 knowing that they will arrive late but with the thought that late is better than never and maybe.. people will appreciate them more because the Christmas rush is over and they are still getting mail.  Who am I trying to kid :-)?

Anyway, I am tired of Christmas cards so decided to add cards to the CST challenge that were not Christmas related.  This weeks challenge was to make cards that were for a man or boy.

This first card is one I made a while ago for my Dad.  It is a pretty simple card, but took a fair bit of time to create.  I think the card measures about 5 X 6.  The base card is white cs.  The whale silhouette  is one I had saved to my computer a long time ago.  Sorry, I so not know who made it and I lost the template  in a computer crash.

Anyways, I printd it out and then used that as a template and cut it out of black paper with my X-acto knife.

I glued the cut out to a dyed dryer sheet for the blue background and then cut around everything leaving the narrow border.  I think the finished card ended up looking quite dramatic.

This next card is one I just finished.  It has gone into my "for sale" stash (for Relay for Life).

It is pretty straight forward.  The image and sentiment are from a wonderful stamp set made by Sugarloaf Products.  I have done a search and can't find a link for them so I am not sure if they are still in business.  I used Nestabilities for the scallop and to cut the image out.  The twig is a real twig I got from my yard.

The inside of the card has a sentiment that says "You're HOW old?"  This is also from the same set.

Sorry,  the card is crooked.  I was not very careful when I scanned it.  Got to work on that.

Hope you liked my cards today.  Any questions...just email me.

Wishing you all a Happy Day

Theresa in Kitimat

Follow up to last post

Just as a quick follow up, I forgot to post that I never send a personal card to anyone that is not created completely by me.  I figure if I am selling or donating cards, anything goes, because the buyer/ or giver did not make the card in the first place, but if I am personally giving a card to someone, it should be something I have created (even if it is cased :-).

Theresa in Kitimat

SAS4K and a question

I got a dozen cards in the mail yesterday for this very wonderful cause, SAS4K.  You can learn about it by clicking the link in my sidebar.  I created some of these cards and some were repurposed from card fronts that my online friend, Sue Rapin sent me.  Thank you, Sue. 

These two were created by me.  Along with a couple others.

And so, here is my question.

Do people mind if we reuse the cards we have received in swaps or as Raks?

Here are my thoughts on this:

I have saved every card I have received over the last 14 years.  I have about 20  binders full of them, all tucked safely into photo sleeves.  I love looking back and seeing them and using them for inspiration.  But I now have a scanner and a digital camera and I digitally save all of the cards I get .  I have come to the point where I can comfortably reuse some of the card fronts that  I have received to extend their life and give joy to others.  I sell as many cards as I can to raise money for our local Relay for Life and now I am sending cards to SAS4K.

Don't get me wrong, there are some special cards from special people that I would never think to reuse, but will cherish always.

I know I would love to know that the cards I have sent to people would have a second life.  I often use a removable sheet on the inside for the sentiment with a little note at the bottom that says "Please reuse this  card".

When I reuse a card, I always give credit to the original stamper.  I have made a label that says:

Origainal art by:

(space to write the card maker's name)

Repurposed by:

Theresa in Kitimat

and I put this on the back of the cards. 

I would love to get some feedback on this subject.  Please leave me a comment and let me know what you think.

Happy week to you all.

Theresa in Kitimat

CST challenge and SAS4K

Hi everybody,

This is a card I made for our CST challenge this week (make a round card).  This card was fun to make and is pretty straight forward.  I used Nestabilities to cut the base out of white cs. Cut two, scored one at the top for the back and sealed together so it would open.  I then used my Fiscars circle cutter to cut out 2 yellow circles and sandwiched the ribbon between them.  The ribbon is equal all the way around even if it doesn't show up like that in the photo.  I think it was the angle I took the photo at that makes it look so uneven.  This was then adhered to the card base.

I then cut another smaller Nestabilitie scallop circle and embossed it and added that on top.  All that was left to do was add the little elfin girl image (digi stamp that was colored with prisma colors, sorry I could not find where I got the digi from, I am usually good about noting where I get digis, just not this time, my bad.) and add the sentiment (Inkadinkadoo) using nestabilities, once again.  The image is popped up and I inked the edges of all the white cs with yellow ink.

This card will be added to a bunch I will be sending to "Send a Smile 4 Kids".  This seems like a very worthy cause that donates cards to Sick Kids in Vancouver and Stollery in Edmonton so that families and staff can give cards to children that are in need of care.  If you would like to know more about this cause, here is the link.

I was told about this organization by Gail, a new blogging friend.  Gail has to be one of the busiest people I know.  She gets more done in a day than I do in two weeks.  And she is a great crafter.  You really should check out her blog.  It really is an inspiration.

I know I live in BC and Sick Kids is a wonderful hospital, but I thinkI will send cards to Alberta for Stollery. I have a close connection to that hospital.  . I spent countless hours there a few

years ago when my young niece was diagnosed with a brain tumor.  Right after the diagnosis, I went to Alberta to help anyway I could.  I thought I would be caring for my sister's other children while she and my niece stayed in Edmonton for treatments.
Found out treatments were 15 minute bouts of radiation, 5 days a week.  So we decided to travel back and forth for 6 weeks of treatments.  They live a little over an hour out of Edmonton.  I became the designated driver.  My sis was not comfortable driving in the city, especially with so much on her mind.  Many of the trips included visits to Stollery for checkups and support.

Long story, short...sadly, my niece lost her fight at only 13 years old.  But I remember how much she enjoyed receiving hand crafted cards from some of my online friends.  And I remember how much support and caring she and the family received from Stollery.  I would like to pay some of that back and this is one way I can do that.

So that is about it for today.
I hope everyone is having a great weekend and keeping warm.  It is cold here.

Take care.
Theresa in Kitimat

CCAYR November Challenge

The challenge for November at Christmas Cards all Year Round is to make 5 cards following a sketch.  I finally got mine done this afternoon.  Sorry, the picture is not the best.

This is a pretty straight forward card without a lot of special techniques, except for the emboss resist of the medallion.  I used mainly Stampin Up images, ink and paper except for the sentiment which is one I have had forever made by Penny Black.

There were a lot of steps to go through to make this card.  All of the white edges were lightly inked and then I used a glue pen and added glitter. Gotta have bling, you know :-).

The most finicky part was punching out the snowflakes and snowballs, glittering them and then attaching with teeny weeny pieces of foam tape.  I think it was worth it though, to have them stand out.

I have been trying hard to make cards that don't have a lot of bulky embellishments so that they mail for regular postage.  This is hard for me because I love to use ribbon and paper flowers and charms etc.

These cards work because they go through the dreaded slot.  In Canada, the post office has a plastic template which has an opening that is 5mm (just shy of 1/4").  If your mail fits through the slot (and not too heavy), it can be mailed for regular postage.  I bought one of these templates so that I can be sure how much postage I need to use.

I hope you like my cards today.

I enjoy playing along with these challenges.  It is such a great way to get Christmas cards done early.  Maybe this year I will have them in the mail before December 20. 

Wishing you all great week.

Theresa in Kitimat

Finally, I'm back

Well, I took a long break from blogging.  Crazy as it is, life does get in the way sometimes.  I was away most of September.  Got home and decided to get a bunch of fall work done.  You know, clean up the yard, put all the gardening tools away, put the wood in for the winter...all that stuff.  Then I was called into work for a few weeks.  I know, I am retired, but my former boss (and friend) had someone quit unexpectedly and was swamped with work so gave me a call.  I was more than happy to help out and enjoyed it immensely.  I really miss the social interaction a person gets when they are working.  But not enough to come out of retirement :-).

Anyway, I was doing some card making over this time.  Just not blogging.  Now I would like to show you some of the stuff I was working on.

This first card is one I made for a sketch challenge on CST.

I had a few people inquire about how I made the frame so I made another card and took a few pics.  This is the next card I made and a mini tutorial on how I made it.

Although it does not show up well, the light layer is a light blue, not white.  I did bleach out the snowman and snowballs.

First, I used my nestabilities to cut out a rectangle from some thin foam rubber that I have.  If you don't have the foam rubber, you could use a thin fiber batting or even layers of paper towels. And if you don't have nestabilities, you can jsut cut the frame with scissors. 

The next size up of nestabilitie does not make an even frame, so I just cut the frame to the size I wanted.  I then laid the foam frame on the beautiful pliable paper from Paper Ya (a wonderful shop on Granville Island in Vancouver that specializes in paper) that I bought several years ago.  I must admit that I have been hoarding this paper for over seven years.  I know this because I bought it before my DH passed away. 

 

NO MORE HOARDING.

I am getting far to old to hoard.  One day I will die and all my beautiful STUFF would  be left, not especially appreciated by my children who would  have to decide what to do with it all.

Sorry about this rant, but I just wanted to give a heads up to everyone that keeps stuff, because it is just to beautiful to use.  What are you keeping it for?

I then used a smaller nestabilitie and cut out the center of the paper.  This step is important bcause you will want the center of the frame to lay flat.

 

I then cut a piece of cs the same size as the foam frame and glued the fame to the cs. I put a layer of double sided tape around the inside layer of the foam frame, but did not take off the top release layer just yet.  I centered the paper over the frame and taped it down on the back, mitering the corners to make sharp corners.

Then I clipped the inside corners of the paper, took off the top layer of the tape and taped the paper down to the cs.

All that was left to do was glue down my image that I stamped, colored and cut with the same nestabitlitie that I used to cut the foam.  I then added that to my base card and finished it off.

Here is another card that I did in the same way.

These cards are a lot of fun to make and really, they are simple to do.  One of the nice things about them is that they add a lot of dimention to a card, but squish down flat and can be mailed for regular postage.

I hope you enjoyed my post today. Please leave a comment or email me if you have any questions.

And now I am off to our local Rememberance Day Ceremony.  Please take a moment to remember.

Take care.

Theresa in Kitiamt