Muchas Gracias With Gift Card Holder

I made this masculine card and gift card holder for one of the hardest working people at school; our daytime custodian. 

He is a man of many talents. Anytime we need fruit cut for a fruit platter, he does it so well. He knows how to carve swans out of fruit! I've never tried doing that. Every Monday morning, he cooks a large pot of oatmeal for the staff to enjoy. For the awesome breakfast the school made us volunteers last month, he was the head chef making omelets-to-order. For the Latino Cultural Performance, he was one of the dancers. Any event the PTA organizes, he's there helping us. We couldn't do our job well without him.

I added a gift card holder to the inside of the card, similar to the one I posted yesterday. I gave him a gift card to Lowe's.


Thanks for stopping by!

Card Ingredients (All Stampin' Up except where noted)

Stamps: Agradecimiento

Paper: Always Artichoke, Very Vanilla, Chocolate Chip, To the Nines Speciality Designer Series Paper

Ink: Chocolate Chip, Always Artichoke

Tools: Crop-a-Dile, Word Window Punch

Other: brads (Michael's), Linen Thread, foam tape (3M)

Gracias - Dia de los Muertos

It's already Monday night again! Time flies too quickly. My Sweetie and I attended an amazing party yesterday to celebrate El Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead or All Souls' Day). Here's some info about the holiday. I've never celebrated this holiday before, but I look forward to next year's celebration. Here's a thank you card I made for our host.

Today, I found out one of my great uncles passed away yesterday in New Mexico. He had been living with bone cancer for over a year.

Card Ingredients

Stamps: skull (Imaginisce), Felicidades Siempre (SU!)

Paper: Old Olive, Cast-A-Spell Designer Series Paper (SU!), white paper (Papertrey Ink)

Ink: VersaMark, Basic Black

Tools: Corner Chomper (We R Memory Keepers), hole punch, tiny flower punch (Fiskars), stapler

Other: clear embossing powder, foam tape, silver brads (Making Memories), black stitched ribbon (American Crafts...I think)

Gracias - A Moxie Fab Challenge

Hi everyone! I hope you had a great weekend. I have a few cards to post. Tonight, I'll make it quick with this one. The deadline is in a few minutes for Cath's Moxie Fab Gradient is Radient Challenge.

I've had the SU! butterfly die for a while. I "had to have it". Well, I obviously have been neglecting it. My goodness! I've got some stamp sets that I also had to have. I haven't used them. I really want the We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper. I would've used it on this card and the cards I was working on yesterday. That's definitely a need, not a want.

I used some glossy paper and some die inks to brayer on the color for the gradient color look.

Thanks for stopping by!

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Palabras Maravillosas (SU! - retired), Distressed Circles (Cornish Heritage Farms)
Paper: white glossy kromekote, Bermuda Bay textured (SU!), patterned paper (Urban Prairie- BasicGrey), Kraft Cardstock Stickers (Hambly Studios)
Ink: Kaleidacolor Caribbean Sea, Chestnut Roan & Creamy Brown chalk ink (ColorBox), VersaMark
Tools: Big Shot, butterfly die (SU!), corner rounder (Fiskars), brayer
Other: wire (Making Memories), clear embossing powder, foam tape

Hola!

Hola! I had to participate in Nichole's 2nd World Card Making Day Challenge:

Your challenge is to create a project that is inspired by either the colors, designs or even themes that are prominent in the Mexican culture.

I'm married into a Mexican family and I'm of Hispanic descent myself, so it was easy to be inspired by the colors of Mexico. I wanted to make a card with a sentiment in Spanish, which is a common occurrence on my blog. I would LOVE if Papertrey Ink came out with a set of sentiments in Spanish. Nichole, hint, hint!

Thanks for stopping by!

Card Ingredients

Stamps: Remember & Polka Dot Basics (PTI), Tarjetas con Bordes Festoneados (SU!)

Paper: Pacific Point & Crush Curry (SU!), patterned paper (BasicGrey)

Ink: Pacific Point, Dusty Durango, VersaMark

Tools: stapler, scallop square punch (SU!)

Other: ribbon (BasicGrey), staples, rhinestones (Michael's), foam tape, clear embossing powder, foam tape

Feliz Navidad - Using the Medallion Stamp Again

Here's a second card for Cath's Moxie Fab Classy & Elegant Challenge. I started this card last week. I've been obsessed with the SU! Medallion stamp. Here's one more use for it. I took a large star chipboard piece and stamped the Medallion stamp on it. I embossed it with white embossing powder. I love how it looks. It felt "Christmas-y" to me, so I decided to post it on Cath's challenge.

I added small pearls to the star and continued with additional larger pearls. I used my Big Shot to emboss large dots with a Texturz plate.

Card Ingredients (all SU! except where noted)
Stamps: Medallion, Felicades Siempre
Paper: Whisper White, Kraft
Ink: Whisper White Craft Ink, VersaMark ink
Tools: Big Shot, Dots Texturz plate, corner rounder (Fiskars), Threading Water edge punch (Fiskars)
Other: Whisper White taffeta ribbon, white gelly roll pen (Sakura), pearls (Michael's), white embossing powder

Feliz Cumpleanos, Maria!

Happy Wednesday! I completed another card I started last week.

This card is for my mother-in-law. She's celebrating her birthday this weekend.

This is a hybrid card. The patterned paper is more digi-paper I won from Holly Jones. The pack is called Delicious Lemonade. I always love butterflies. I started out popping up just a few butterflies on foam tape, but I decided to go all out, since I had printed a wide strip of the digi-paper.



Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre (SU!)
Paper: Purely Pomegranate (I think?), Delicious Lemonade (Holly Jones)
Ink: Basic Black
Tools: Scalloped Scallop edge punch (EK Success), corner rounder (Fiskars)
Other: Silver metallic ribbon (Michael's), foam tape

Muchas Gracias

Hi everyone! I haven't posted anything new in over a week. I was busy this week helping out at school. I have many cards that are a work in progress, but I haven't completed anything until today. (Edited to Add: Re-took photos since I had better lighting.)

This card incorporates several new SU! goodies and some digi-paper I won from Holly Jones (owner of My Cute Stamps) back in June. The pack is called Delicious Lemonade.

Can I confess I'm still having a hard time embracing the new SU! in-colors? I ordered all 6 inks, but unlike previous years, I didn't order the re-inkers. I always buy the corresponding re-inker when I buy any ink pad (SU! and non-SU!). What about you? Do you do the same?

I loved the card on p. 194 of the latest SU! catalog (US version) and used it as inspiration for this card. I embossed the patterned paper with the the SU! dots Texturz Plate. I don't have the Curly Label punch, but I resized a design on my Silhouette to mimic the punch and cut it out of Bordering Blue paper.

Have a great weekend. I'm headed downstairs to make the guys an Açaí smoothie. It's so hot here; we don't feel like cooking dinner.

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Agradecimento (SU!)
Paper: Melon Mambo, Bordering Blue, Whisper White, Delicious Lemonade Digi-Kit (Holly Jones)
Ink: Melon Mambo
Tools: QuicKutz Silhouette, Big Shot w/Texturz Plate, Modern Label punch (SU!)
Other: button (Making Memories - Chloe's Closet), foam tape, twine, glue dot, Melon Mambo ribbon, white gel pen (Sakura)

Happy Father's Day & Feliz Dia de los Padres

Here are a couple of cards I made a few weeks ago for our school's auction. The second card (Spanish version) is going to my father-in-law. I don't have a stamp that says "Feliz Dia de los Padres," so I masked a stamp from the SU! set Felicidades Siempre and added alphabet stamps to spell out "Padres." I'm not sure I like these as Father's Day cards, but oh, well!

I couldn't resist using some Baja Breeze felt flowers on these cards. I love Felt Fusion flowers, but I forget to use them. The main image is designer paper. These were very easy cards to put together.


Card Ingredients
Stamps: Men of Life (PTI), Felicidades Siempre (SU!), Serendipity Letters & Numbers (Hero Arts)
Paper: Basic Grey, Baja Breeze - textured, & Urban Garden (all SU!)
Ink: Memories Black
Tools: Scallop Border punch (SU!), Crop-a-Dile
Other: Felt Fusion flower (SU!), grey ribbon (SU!-retired), foam tape, black brads (Bazzill)

Feliz Cumpleanos, Sweetie!

Happy Friday, my dear paper-crafting friends!

Today is my birthday and my Sweetie's birthday. We share the same date (not the year, though). I use an uppercase on the "s" of Sweetie because that's one of the names I call him. I don't call him (or my son) by their actual names. I call them my other terms of endearment.

Today is also Taylor's (Taylored Expressions) birthday.

This card started with the Heidi Swapp damask sticker. Love these! I put it on white cardstock and then trimmed around the sticker. I added a few rhinestones and did not faux stitching around the edge. Voila!

I may make my Sweetie a different card later if I have time, because he already saw this one. I made it for the school auction a few weeks ago.


Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre (SU!)
Paper: Basic Black, Whisper White, Soft Sky
Ink: Basic Black
Tools: corner rounder (Fiskars)
Other: Damask sticker (Heidi Swapp), rhinestone brad (Making Memories), rhinestones (Michael's), foam tape, Sakura white pen

Lollipop Flower & Adventures at the Mall

I loved the color inspiration challenge (#43) this week from Kristina (I always love her challenges). I've been wanting to make some lollipop flowers, like the ones that Prima makes, so this was a perfect opportunity. The colors this week are:
Chocolate Chip, Ruby Red, Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive, Brocade Blue


Thanks for looking!

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Flores Llamativas
Paper: Chocolate Chip & the following SU! designer paper: Ghostly Greetings, Holiday Treasures, Haiku, Prestwick
Ink: Chocolate Chip, Brocade Blue (rubbed on the edges of the lollipop flower)
Tools: Martha Stewart Circle Cutter. 2"circle punch, corner rounder, and paper crimper (Fiskars). Small oval, 1" circle, and 1 3/8" circle punch (SU!). 1 1/4" circle punch (All Night Media)
Other: Old Olive Polytwill ribbon, rhinestone brad (Making Memories), mini rhinestone (Michael's), foam tape

My Adventures at the Mall (Should Be Called Who Do I Think I Am...
Paul Blart: Mall Cop?)
Last night we went to the mall. I was craving a grilled chicken salad from Chipotle. After eating we went shopping. We went into Wilson's Leather because I noticed they had a lot of items 70% off. My husband and son left me and went to another store. That's when my adventures started. I was looking at handbags and wallets. They had handbags in several locations, so I moved to the edge of the store. I saw a woman looking at a jacket. She quickly got it off the hanger and started rolling it up like a towel. She put it in her tote bag. Without thinking I said, "Excuse me, take that out of your bag". I startled her and I shocked myself. I couldn't believe I was being so bold! She removed it from her bag. I then said "What you are doing is wrong"...again I couldn't believe my own ears. She then looked over at another young woman and said something I can't repeat, but then she said "This is none of your business" as she put the jacket back in her bag. I then realized that it was two women shoplifting together. As soon as they headed to the door, I ran to the cashier to tell him. We watched helplessly and they ran out the mall entrance. He thanked me for telling him. It was very surreal. They didn't leave their Styrofoam food container from the food court in all this hoopla.
The good news..they left one of the jackets. The bad news...items get shoplifted, even when they are 70% off.

Cards for International Students

I've been working on these cards for a few days. I saw Jen del Muro's (i{heart}2stamp) call for cards for the international students at Dallas Baptist University. The deadline is tonight, so I better post the pictures of what I mailed today. One lucky person will win a huge "blog tart".

Gracias Card Ingredients
Stamps: none
Paper: Certainly Celery, So Saffron, Blue Bayou
Ink: none
Tools: Cuttlebug Thank You Embossing Folder (Provo Craft), Big Shot, Fiskars Corner Rounder
Other: stripped ribbon (American Crafts), star brad (SU!), foam tape
Gracias Card Ingredients
Stamps: none
Paper: Kraft, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip
Ink: none
Tools: Cuttlebug Thank You Embossing Folder (Provo Craft), Big Shot, Fiskars Corner Rounder
Other: stripped ribbon (Costco), star brad (SU!), foam tape

Happy Birthday Card Ingredients
Stamps: none
Paper: Green Galore, Basic Black, Baja Breeze, Rose Red
Ink: none
Tools: Cuttlebug Happy Birthday Embossing Folder (Provo Craft), Big Shot, Scallop Edge Punch
Other: foam tape, rhinestone flowers (Kaiser), rhinestones (Michael's)


Feliz Cumpleanos Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre, Tarjetas con Bordes Festoneados
Paper: Tangerine Tango, So Saffron, & Haiku DSP (SU!), white (JudiKins)
Ink: VersaMark, Tangerine Tango
Tools: Scallop Edge Punch, Fiskars Corner Rounder, piercing tool & template
Other: foam tape, Felt Fusion, brad (Making Memories), white embossing powder

Muchas Gracias, Burberry

I'm glad it's Friday! It was a busier than normal week. I volunteered several days at our school's book fair. This is week 12 (the last week) of Theresa's Designer Handbag Inspiration Challenge. This week's handbag was the Mini Warrior by Burberry.

I wasn't familiar with Burberry. I'll all knew about Burberry is that it's expensive. This purse retails for $1600! Looking at the Neiman Marcus website, it was clear to see that Burberry uses a very distinct plaid pattern. That was definitely my inspiration this week. I knew it would be hard to recreate, so I did the same trick of creating my own cardstock that I did last week. I found this purse. I saved the picture on my computer. Using Picasa, I cropped a good deal of the plaid design and printed it on cream-colored cardstock. I used a paper punch to punch out the tiny squares.

I used my oval Coluzzle to create an oval shaped card. I trimmed the bottom of the oval off to create a flat bottom.

The voting for this challenge will start tomorrow morning and go through Sunday evening on Theresa's blog. Thanks for looking!

Card Ingredients

Stamps: Flores Llamativas

Paper: Crimson paper (Only the Best Los Gatos), cream (CA Paper Goods)

Ink: VersaMark

Other: silver embossing powder (PSX), Making Memories silver eyelets, Sakura silver gel pen, 5/8" square punch, 1 3/8" square punch, Riding Hood Red Taffeta ribbon (SU), corner rounder, silver cording

Sinceramente Gracias

We are down to the home stretch for Theresa's Designer Handbag Inspiration Challenge. This is week 11 of 12. This week's bag is the Kate Spade Oaxaca Reyna Raffia Tote.

I barely started this card at 6 PM this evening! I volunteered at my son's school most of the day. Talk about cutting it close! I liked textured cardstock, so I choose to stamp and emboss my images on textured Tangerine Tango. I only had one bird, but I wanted a mirror image. I stamped the bird onto my Pivot Palette and then placed the cardstock on top. I used a brayer to transfer the mirror image to my cardstock. Everything was embossed with clear embossing powder. I also just rubbed VersaMark onto cardstock and embossed a large area. I cut some of the vines out by hand and some of the leaves instead of only using the small leaf stamp in the Vive con Proposito set.

The hardest part of this card was figuring out how to get the woven raffia look. I tried to find digital scrapping sources for this, but I couldn't. I got the bright idea to use the image from the Nordstrom website. They always show the back side of their products. Yes! They had the back of this handbag. I saved the image to my computer and then enlarged it and printed it out on cardstock. I like how it came out.

The voting will start tomorrow morning and go through Sunday evening on Theresa's blog. Thanks for looking!

Card Ingredients

Stamps: bird (Inkadinkado - bought in a large pack of stamps from Costco), Vive con Proposito, Tarjetas Con Bordes Festoneados

Paper: Textured and regular Tangerine Tango, I downloaded the back picture of the handbag and enlarged it and printed it out on cream colored cardstock

Ink: VersaMark

Other: Clear embossing powder, Pivot Palette (Alextamping), Tombo glue, dimensionals, silver mini beads (Michael's)

Feliz Cumpleanos, Violet!

I miss my best friend, Violet. She moved to the D.C. area a few years ago. Her birthday is next week, so Kristina's Color Inspiration Challenge #25 was a perfect excuse to make Violet's card. I used part of Kristina's curved template for this card.

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre, Eastern Blooms
Paper: Ruby Red, Certainly Celery, So Saffron, Certainly Celery DSP
Ink: Ruby Red, VersaMark
Other: Clear embossing powder, 3/4" circle punch, Jolee's By You flowers (EK Success), Kristina's template (outer shape only), American Crafts ric rac ribbon, Making Memories large flower brad, dimensionals

Gracias

Hi everyone! I started this card for Kristina's Color Inspiration Challenge #23 with the persistent desire to use this thick pumpkin pie ribbon. I decided to use it like cardstock. The colors for this week's challenge are:

Bravo Burgundy, Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie, So Saffron, Old Olive, (and I choose white as my last color)

I got this basic layout idea from the SU Spring Summer '08 catalog (p. 19). I also used the 1/4" Bravo Burgundy ribbon like cardstock too. I stitched it and gathered it. On the upper background of the circle I used one of the stamps from Pocket Silhouettes with VersaMark ink and embossed with clear embossing powder. On the bottom part of the circle, I stamped the Gracias stamp from Felicidades Siempre a few times (also with VersaMark ink...and again embossed with clear embossing powder).

I stitched around the circle with my sewing machine and used dimensionals to mount it on a large Chocolate Chip circle.

Thanks for looking!

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre, Pocket Silhouettes
Paper: Chocolate Chip, So Saffron, white, white textured cardstock (for the card base)
Ink: Old Olive, Baroque Burgundy (I don't have Bravo Burgundy), VersaMark
Other: Flower Fusion, Making Memories rhinestone brad, SU District Pumpkin Pie ribbon (Thanks Theresa for the blog candy!), Bravo Burgundy 1/4" grosgrain ribbon, clear embossing powder, foam tape, dimensionals

Para Ti

I hope everyone had a great weekend. I love the crayon resist technique. I just had to use it for Beate's Weekend Sketch #57. The crayon resist challenge was for the CCEE Stampers Blog.

I used an old (about 10 years old!) Kaleidacolor rainbow ink pad for this card. I'm surprised it still worked. I stamped the Priceless stamps with Memories black ink on glossy paper a while back. I used a white Crayola crayon and highlighted different areas. Using a brayer, I rolled ink onto the image. I love the effect. I used the same rainbow pad to ink up Para Ti.

Thanks for looking!

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Priceless, Tarjetas con Bordes Festoneados
Paper: textured Tangerin Tango, glossy white, Basic Black
Ink: Kaleidacolor Desert Heat, Memories Black
Other: scallop square punch, 1 9/16" square punch, foam tape, corner rounder, ribbon (Michael's), mini rhinestones (Michael's), Crayola white crayon, paper piercer

Hola

I love Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge #56. I hadn't used my new stamp from SU. I love it in Spanish. Oops, I just realized I didn't taper off the edges of the ribbon. Oh well. Thanks for looking! Have a great week.

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Tarjetas con Bordes Festoneados
Paper: textured Baja Breeze, Kiwi Kiss, white, unknown DSP
Ink: Baja Breeze, VersaMark
Other: Clear embossing powder, Sakura white Gelly Roll, foam tape, dimensionals, ribbon (Taylored Expressions)

Dos Tarjetas de Feliz Cumpleanos (Two Birthday Cards)

I made two birthday cards. The first card for my mother-in-law was already in the mail box when I realized I hadn't photographed it yet. I had to run outside and get it back into the house. Her birthday is at the end of the week. I used Provo Craft designer paper on the front of the card. I cut out four flowers from leftover paper and mounted them on dimensionals. I added Stickles to the middle of the four flowers for some bling. The scalloped layer is white textured paper that I brayered with Rose Red ink. I don't have my SU scallop border punch yet, so this was made using a Slot Punch by Making Memories.
This second Feliz Cumpleanos card is for my friend, Rosa Elena. Her birthday is tomorrow. I used the same designer paper to make a slightly different card.

Card Ingredients (for both)
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre (SU)
Paper: white textured cardstock for the card base and scalloped edge, designer paper (Provo Craft), dot-textured paper (can remember where I got that)
Ink: ColorBox Black
Other: Stickles, Making Memories rhinestone brad, rhinestones (Michael's), black embossing powder, both ribbons (Target $ Spot), dimensionals (Jody's Sticky Sale)

Felicidades Siempre - AVS03

I'm a bit of a hoarder (OK...more than a bit) when it comes to supplies. I've had this Making Memories metal tag for a couple of years. I finally used it for Julee's Anni-VERVE-sary sketch #3.

Card Ingredients
Stamps: Felicidades Siempre
Paper: Sage Shadow, Certainly Celery, white, Spring Fling DSP
Ink: Basic Black
Other: Wedding Cake charm (Making Memories), white ribbon (Taylored Expressions), foam tape, Fiskars scissors, 15/16" & 1 3/8" circle punches, Prima flowers, Making Memories brads, Zots