I made this Red Hat Lady card for a certain Red Hatter I know.  I drew the hat shape on a piece of scrap paper, cut it out and made a template to trace onto read paper.  Then I traced it and cut out the hat shape.  I used a few red markers for the shading of the interior of the hat.  Then I added a purple “ribbon” I made with paper, ink and a sponge dauber.  The flower was made using my Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge from CTMH and after cutting it, I inked the edges of the petals and assembled the flower with my quilling tool and some glue.

Red Hat "She's All That" Card

I used some retired CTMH paper for the background and the red strip behind the “She’s All That” embellishment. Here is a close-up of the purple flower:

Purple Rose on a Red Hat

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I made this card for my hair-dresser (or is it hair stylist? hair designer? hair technician?) because she’s the only one who has ever cut my hair without leaving tiny hairs down my back.  I had always brought shirts to change into after my haircut because everyone in the past would leave me with an itchy back full of tiny snips of hair lodged into the fibers of my shirt.  I thought she’d get a kick out of this shirt card I made to say “thanks – you’re awesome!”

Front of my Buttoned Shirt Card

I started with a standard size card (4.25″ x 5.5″) and then snipped about an inch off the top of the card, leaving a chunk in the middle to attach the shirt collar.

Back of the Collar on my Shirt Card

Next, I adhered the main part of the shirt (approx. 4.25″ x 4.5″) to the front of the card and cut a strip for the collar.  I believe the strip was about 1″ x 6.5″.  I adhered the back of the collar to the tab I left at the top of the card and curved the collar pieces forward.  After snipping off the excess from one side, I gently laid them down to the shirt with double-sided foam tape.  I should have drawn he stitching on the collar BEFORE I attached it to the card, so if you’re making this card I hope you’ll learn from my mistake.  Drawing the stitching once it was in place was a little tricky.  Then I drew the stitching for the small buttons and attached them with mini glue dots.

Shirt Card: Detail of Collar and Flowers

I added a thinner strip of the same paper to run down the front of the shirt and drew the navy blue stitching and button holes and then used glue dots to add the buttons I’d threaded with floss.  Next I cut a pocket and added the stitching.  I glued only three sides down and bubbled up the top a little bit so it would stay open.  Then I grabbed some paper flowers, added stickers to the center that looked like brads and attached green crafting wire to them.  The crafting wire was one 5.5″ piece I snipped and folded like a “V.”  I attached a flower heard to each end, tucked the V into the pocket and adhered the flowers onto the shirt.

Shirt Card: Button & Faux-Stitching Detail

This shirt could easily be made to look like a Father’s Day card, a Tuxedo, or suit jacket, depending on the paper used.

Another view of My Shirt Card

Thanks for reading my blog – and here’s a picture of my favorite hair stylist opening her card.

Lisa loved her card! Photo by Dale Chumbley

The other day I shared a blog post about a star card I made with Masquepen Masking Fluid.  Here is another card I made with the same tool and technique.  After drawing my white design with the masking fluid, I inked over it with sponge daubers and a few different colored ink pads.  Using my Cuttlebug machine, I cut out a few butterfly shapes with a Stampin’ Up! Sizzix die and lightly inked over the embossed critters.  I stamped the corner edge with a flourish, rubbed away the masking fluid, attached the butterflies with glue dots and then bent their wings upwards.

Camo Colored Butterfly Swirl Card

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Dimensional Butterflies

When someone purchases a house with me, I like to thank them with gifts and a card personalized to loosely resembled the property they just bought.  Here are some of the cards I made, along with ornaments that match.  I even added Christmas tree inside the ornament that stands up and can be seen through the door and windows.

Collage of Making House Ornaments

First I started with one of my favorite Sizzix dies I bought from Stampin’ Up! It’s a milk carton die and I have only made houses from it (bird houses and house ornaments) and I meant to make little milk cartons of goodies for Easter, but I haven’t seen this die since I made these ornaments! That’s a sign that I need to get more organized in my craft room.

Making Paper House Ornaments

As you can see above, I hand cut the windows and doors with my craft knife. Here is what the ornaments looked like once they were complete.  Tip: do not use Copic alcohol markers as the “trim” because they bleed.  I knew better!

Paper House Ornaments

Here is a picture of the house ornaments with their coordinating cards. Thanks for reading my blog post!

House Cards and House Ornaments

I made this card back in September when I was experimenting with my Masquepen Masking Fluid.  The Masking fluid is a 1 fl. oz. bottle of liquid that turns rubbery when it dries.  A writing needle is attached to the bottle and then crisp white words and delicate designs can be created with this fluid.  It’s great for watercoloring when you want to keep parts of the image crisp and white.  It’s also great for cards because – like Versamark ink or embossed areas, it resists any coloring put over it.

After the blue liquid dries and turns rubbery, I dabbed my sponge daubers in different colored ink pads and tapped them onto my squiggle design to make a pretty rainbow effect on the card.  Once I was done, I wiped off any excess ink from the card with a Kleenex and then gently rubbed away the blue rubbery stuff.  It’s important to rub the dried masking fluid away very gently or the paper will tear and your pretty design will need some fixing.

I wanted a bright blue ribbon but didn’t have any, so I colored some regular white ribbon blue with a Copic alcohol marker.  Then I secured the ribbon with double-sided adhesive and brads that look like buttons (from Hobby Lobby – oh, how I wish I had one of those stores near where I live).  I cut the star shapes with my Cricut and lined them with glitter glue.

Superstar Card

Here’s another angle.  Umm yeah, I won’t be using that kind of glitter glue again.

Superstar card made with Masking Fluid

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I was inspired by a card that graced the cover of a popular Cricut card-making magazine. The adorable card on the cover looked nothing like this, so I think I will still try to re-create that card I was looking at.

Rosy "Hi" Card

I used only one Cricut cartridge for this project – the Cricut Art Philosophy Collection from Close to My Heart. I started with the grey paper and cut the card shape and then nipped the top of the card with scissors to mimic the swoopy design on the other edges. Next, I cut the DCWV Tradewinds paper in the same shape, only smaller, and then I cut a matching border to cover the edges of the map paper. I cut a 2″ rose and when I completed the rose I realized it was too small, so I cut 4″ and 3″ roses and nestled them all together. They each have a little dusting of orange on the edges – I just swiped my Copic marker over the edges before I rolled up the paper into the flowers. Then I cut the “hi” and grabbed some sticky gems; added shading to card by distressing it with ink and it was done!

CTMH yellow roses from the AP cartridge

Before I had this cartridge, I’d go shopping in my Cricut cartridge stash for several different shapes to cut. What I love about this Art Philosophy cartridge is that it has everything you need to make numerous adorable projects.

Close-up of CTMH yellow roses

Here’s one last shot of the card from the other angle.

Yellow and Grey "hi" Card, made with the Cricut

This card is another one I made with the Stella Workshop on the Go paper kit from Close to My Heart.  I just love the adorable stamp set that came exclusively with this kit!  When I created this card and the one I shared with you yesterday, I made them my own and didn’t follow the directions exactly but it’s pretty close.  That’s the thing – you can use these kits for inspiration and then enhance it from there.

You Are the Light of My Life

The lamp shade was pretty tricky because I created it with four different petal shaped stamps. The only way I could get them nestled so close together was because Close to My Heart makes high quality acrylic stamps that are clear. I can see through the clear My Acrylix stamp block to line up my stamp next to the last image I stamped.

Light of My Life - up close

If you liked this card, check out the one I blogged about yesterday: I Chairish You. Thanks for reading my blog!

I love Close to My Heart’s Workshop on the Go Kits because it’s a fun way to get a whole paper pack plus some embellishments and exclusive acrylic stamps that are not found in the catalog. One of the best things about these kits is the instructions and pictures of finished scrapbook pages and cards made with the paper pack.

Here is one of the cards I made from the Stella Workshop on the Go. For nearly all of my life I’d ignored stamps with sweet sentiments like this because they weren’t “me” and I didn’t feel that way about anyone. I feel very thankful to have someone in my life to “chairish” now!

If you look closely at the lacy orange part of the card, that’s actually the top of the chair I stamped repeatedly and then hand cut in a scallop shape.

I Chairish You

I worked with what I had and followed the instructions and created this card. I used some clear rhinestones from my stash and used a Copic marker to shade them the right color for my card. I enjoyed making this card and I love the color scheme of the Stella paper pack. Here is a close up on the sentiment:

CTMH - I "Chairish" You

Thanks for reading my blog, and if you have any questions about this kit or how to make the card, just let me know.

I have a friend who is one half of the dynamic, techno-savvy, always-engaging real estate duo, the Geeky Girls! Both girls are dear to me, but it was Lisa‘s birthday last month and Dale and I wanted to make something special for her. Dale and Lisa are huge fans of Chucks/Cons/Converse All Stars, those uncomfortable flat high-top tennis shoes, so when Dale saw shoe charms that looked like Chucks, he had to get them for her! He started making earrings in December and they’ve become a huge hit with friends and anyone who has seen his creations. Check out Designs by Dale on Facebook.

Here is the picture Lisa shared when she received our package:

Geeky Gifts - photo by Lisa Archer

This is the card I made for her using my Cricut Expression machine for the “geeky” letters and DCWV paper for the card itself. I also used a Fiskars edge punch, silver shimmery paper and a white pen for the greeting.

Have a Geeky Birthday

This shows another angle of Lisa’s geeky card:

Geeky Girl Birthday

Thanks for reading my geeky blog post!

I love the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge from Close to My Heart because it’s so versatile and it has fabulous three-dimensional options like this vintage rose!  I made this card using a vintage 1957, beautifully aged electronics magazine.  A word of caution: old paper like this doesn’t cut well with the Cricut and it sticks to the sticky mat something fierce.  After cutting the rose shape out with the AP Cartridge on the Cricut, I had to scrape it off and re-cut the delicate paper with my scissors, so this is definitely a one-of-a-kind card that I have not replicated.

After cutting the vintage paper into a rose shape, it looked empty so I cut a smaller rose out of some gorgeous Tulip cardstock from the Roxie paper pack from CTMH.  I spritzed the assembled rose with Smooch spray, in a glittery brown color called Log Cabin and attached a crystal to the center of the rose.  The card came together with brown cardstock, beautiful patterned Roxie paper,  a stamped sentiment, and my favorite label punch.

Vintage Rose Card

Here are a few views of that vintage rose.  I drove three hours from home and hand delivered this birthday card to the birthday girl who was at work.  I could not risk this card getting crushed and damaged in the mail!

Vintage Rose with the Art Philosophy Cricut Cartridge

If you are interested in buying this Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge, please contact me or click the link to shop on my site. Thanks for reading my blog!