Anniversaries, Birthdays means Cardmaking Galore!

The other night we were discussing how there were so many kids birthdays this week which lead to the insight that these were probably to do with holiday celebrations leading up to New Year’s Eve. In glancing at my calendar I saw how far behind I am on cardmaking. My fastest solution? Use some ready made digitals or pull out some digi brushes to create fast, beautiful backgrounds in the colors of my choosing. With cooler temps promised this weekend in Florida, I chose a fall theme palette and my Au Naturale digital brushes as the basis for these designs. I also incorporated a fairly recent frame set called Frilly Frames that is so wonderful to add text and photos to. One of the birthday cards also incorporates svg diecuts from my Swirly QZs set.Here are some examples of my card creations...

Belated Anniversary Wishes

Frilly Framed Photo Anniversary Card

Masculine 40th Birthday Card

inside view of Masculine Birthday Card

70th Birthday Natural Swirls Card

inside view of 70th Birthday Card

Project 365 Challenge/Days 49-51 What’s Swirly, Sweet & Lovely?

What’s Swirly? Day 49 brings swirly flourishes. This is a collection that I have been working on of flourish brushes and svg files. It always seems that I can never find the right flourish element when creating a card or scrapbook page, so why not create a set of my own where I can have lots of fun ones to choose from. I can’t wait to use these large scale diecut elements on layouts and smaller size on cards. I already have plans to use them on my Glue Arts design team project later this week so be sure to keep an eye on their blog.

The end result of my designing is one of my latest releases on www.mygrafico.com called Swirly QZ’s. Just imagine pairing the svg files with patterned papers, digital or traditional or using the brush art to create flourishes of any color, texture or pattern. Pair these with florals, buttons, brads and more to create your own fun card and page embellishments!

What is Sweet? On Day 50 I paired hand-cut flowers from Crate Paper’s Restoration collection CS along with one of their coordinating chipboard designs and Stampin’ Up’s 5 petal flower punch for leaves to create this Sweet Cup of Friendship card. I chose to use this background patterned paper from Stampin’ Up’s Springtime Vintage collection to compliment the florals and add a soft vintage look to this card. I distressed the edges and dragged old olive ink over them. The verse is an old favorite of mine from a retired SU set. I stamped it in the same color ink, tore the soft vanilla CS and layered over Pear Pizazz seam binding with thin pink ribbon tied over the bow. I used a small chipboard flower over top of the verse and ribbon and finished off this card with a little rhinestone bling added to some of the flowers. I used my Glue Glider Pro with high tac adhesive for adhering most of the layers and used raise 'ns to pop up and add dimension to some of the flower bouquet.



What is lovely? On day 51, I created this Whole Lotta Love Card using paper leftovers from my keepsake box project featuring Fancy Pants Designs Love Birds cardstock. I used some diecut circle leftovers to create the layered paper flower with button. You may recognize the twine I threaded though the button on top of this card. It is from the Twinery. I tied a bow, then snipped the loops and trimmed the ends to create this feathery, bow. For fast card creations, you can use patterned papers like this one to cut out verses, phrases or to use as an overall background. Easy to create in a few minutes and perfect for any occasion you want to send someone you love a card.

Project 365/ Day 26 - Oh So Tweet Frame

Day 26  was spent working on my Frame Project for Glue Arts Design team utilizing their Accent-It-All vinyl with one of my digi collections, Lovey Dovey, that contains some bonus svg files. For those of you who don't know what an svg file is, it is a file format used with plotters and digital diecutting machines  such as Cricut, Silhouette, etc. You can use software that is meant for your cutter to scale, cut or print svg files for use on assorted projects. SCAL (Sure Cuts A Lot is a very popular one used with the Cricut).

Here are some photos of the frame project. For a list of the supplies I used on this and complete step-by-step instructions, you can go to Glue Art's blog post. The one thing on this project that I really enjoyed was creating the sugared flower. I made it from punched cardstock using a flower punch from Marvy. This technique was inspired by flowers I created with a friend using a technique she showed me with Stampin’ Up’s five petal flower punch. I applied the same steps and adding a few ideas of my own. Try it out...perfect for a Valentine's gift or card!

Here you can see how I used scrap vinyl to add the Crystal Effects to the flower with a small paint brush. This is step one of the sugaring process.

I held the flower in my hands while brushing on the clear laquer, then I lightly sprinkled iridescent glitter on top to make it look sugary and sparkly.

This photo shows the finished flower attached to the frame.

TGIF...come on and do the Glue Arts Blog Hop!

Welcome new visitors to my lilypad! As you hop from blog to blog on the Glue Arts blog hop,  you increase your chances to win a Glue Glider™ Pro and a cartridge of your choice by leaving a comment on each one of the design team members’ blogs. Be sure to sign up as a follower of these great blogs for tips and inspiration using your favorite adhesives and craft products.

If you would like to start at the beginning of the hop, click here to visit Kris Swain’s blog. From there, you can follow the links to visit each of our blogs. Get inspired by the talented ladies on the New Glue Arts Design Team and keep track of who the 4 new design team members are. You can have an added chance to win a Pro, cartridge and some Extreme Adhesive squares by emailing those 4 names to gluegirl@gluearts.com. Be sure to leave your comments by Sunday, Sept. 12, 2010. All winners will be announced on Monday.

Now for a little bit of creativity using my Glue Arts adhesives... 

You may remember my Glue Arts Wall Display layout for CHA. Well, I had one of the embossed canvas squares left over and used it as inspiration for this get well card for a friend.  For most of the layers, I used my Glue Glider™ Pro with high tac adhesive. I even used that on the leafy diecut. Here’s a Tip: place a piece of scrap paper under the diecut, run glue glider with high tac adhesive cartridge over top and apply to project. Throw away scrap sheet so you don’t transfer excess adhesive to project.
Butterfly stamps are from K&Co Que Sera Sera clear stamp set. Corner rounder & oval scallop punches and leaves and floral fusion dies are all from Stampin’ Up!®. Embossed image is an embossing folder from Cuttlebug. Adhesive pearls are Recollections line from Michaels.

Be sure to sign up to follow my blog for more exciting project inspirations and crafty goodness! Thanks for visiting and leaving a comment.
Hop on over to the talented Linda Albrecht's blog,
the final stop on the Glue Arts blog hop.

A Growing Appreciation

Summer time, I love creating projects with flowers. This is a card/gift set I made before the end of the last school year for the school nurse who took such extra good care of Kylie. We were sad to see her retire. Hopefully, it is a cheerful reminder at home of the lives she touched with her nurturing.

The mini flowerpot was something I picked up at JoAnn's and added some accents of my own. And the card was made from a shared embellishment of floral punched patterned papers that my SU demonstrator friend, Ree, gave to me. I made an uneven bi-fold card and used Glue Art's adhesive squares on all of the 3-D accents on the card and flower pot. For the rest, I used my trusty companion, the Glue Glider™ Pro with perma tac adhesive.The beautiful butteflies were diecut using the Sizzlit Beautiful Wings die from Stampin’ Up!® and I also used the Floral Fusion die to create my own stacked flower which was added onto a Heidi Grace stick pin. The scallop border punch and verse used on the card are also from Stampin’ Up!. Try out using your favorite diecuts an punches with both solid and patterned papers for a bit of variety. And if you have a growing appreciation for someone in your life, I encourage you to create a simple car and gift set like this! All it takes is some ribbon, some paper, a few punches and your own creative touch!

It’s Still Spring, Isn’t It?

With temps expected to reach 90’s this weekend, I had to check that it is still Springtime!???

This card was created using some beautiful papers from Karen Foster Design. I love the muted tones on this, which made it extra fun to use with my new Stampin’ Up!® Sizzlits die. It is so fun to use to create mini butterflies, and since it is also an embossing die, I love the textures, too. Don’t you? I used a scrap of white card stock embossed with my mini dot cuttlebug die and used my scallop border punch in succession to create the bottom detail. I often forget to use my little clips from SU, but I paired with a ribbon on this Thank You card. To assemble this card, I used my Glue Glider Pro with high tac adhesive and some mini adhesive squares to attach the smaller items to my card. Here is close shot to show you more detail on the layered elements...

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