Finally- Cards From the Prize Pack

Earlier this year I was surprised and pleased to find my name on the Paper Crafts Connections blog as having won a random drawing to receive a prize package.  You can see the prize package in this previous post.  It took me a while, but I finally finished some cards from the supplies provided.  I tried to vary the uses just to play around and see what I could do.   

 

The first pair of cards



The You Always Lift My Spirits card combined a coordinating teal cardstock card with a paper from the American Crafts City Park paper line.  This checkered print was one of my favorite, so I quickly pulled it out first to create a card. 

The hot air balloons are stamped using the smaller of the two different Practicing Creativity Designs stamp.  The stamp was made on a coordinating piece of the City Park paper- teal pooka dots!  I used (by this I mean borrowed) the Sakura Gelly Roll Glaze pens to add color and dimension to the image.  It's tough to get a good picture of the dimension, but really provides a nice effect in person.  I combined three different colors of the bakers twine from the handouts at our Boxer Palooza class at the Mesa CK Scrapbook convention.  A piece of netting found on one of my packages from the convention was tied to create a visual accent.

The Thank You card was made using the Thickers cardstock letters.  The original color of the Thickers was too bright and created too much contrast for the paper I selected.  So I covered them with

pieces of the Sweet Threads paper from Basic Grey.  I first glued the Thicker to a small piece of the patterned paper and then used my file to shape the patterened paper around the edge of the Thicker.  

The efffect is quite lovely, though it does take a bit of time.  If you haven't found or used a scrapbooking filing set, I would recommend Basic Grey's Precision Filing Set.  Especially for this purpose, the small round file works well.  I just poke my file into the rounded edges and pull across the extra paper back and forth until the edge is defined.  This job is messy as small paper dust is liberally generated, but the finished work is very satisfying.  The little butterfly came from the 7 Gypsies rub on set.  I adhered it to a scrap piece of the yellow cardstock used for the card and fussy cut the image to create the embellishment which I adhered with a pop dot.    The frame was cut using the Cricut cart.  The cut was made from solid green cardstock and the Sweet Threads paper to combine and make the frame for my sentiment.  I did ink the edges of the frames and the card to add a little dimension. 

My final creation was very simple.  I wanted to play with craft paper and color.  I used the same balloon stamp and a green Glaze pen.  The stitching and the dots on the stamped image are also the green Glaze pen.

The 3-D effect of the Glaze pen is better demonstrated in this close up.  A couple of the button brads in the American Crafts coordinating set provides a focal point on a piece of ribbon adhered to the green cardstock frame.  I can't say that I am overly pleased with the result- not my best outing.  However, I thought that I would share it just as an example of how I'm not always successful in my execution, but inspired by the attempt.  I definately won't use that green Glaze pen in the same way again.  Live and learn.  Maybe I'll give this card to our St. Bernard, Abby.  See, the sound of the hot air balloons firing to lift and stear the balloon carries a great distance.  We regularly have hot air balloons drift over our house as a popular landing space is a couple miles South of where we live.  Abby is very vocal- barking and hopping and generally alarming us- when the "danger from the skies" float over our house firing and stearing toward their descent.  One thing is for sure, I am thankful that I will never die unknowingly from a hot air balloon attack.  Thanking Abby might be a very good use for this card!

Andie