Clean and Simple Birthday card

I wanted to make a masculine birthday card that wasn't too fussy and this is what I came up with. I figured it was time to pull out the Lifestyles Letterpress because the images are clean and simple. I used Lifestyles Letterpress Celebrations to make this card: the circles plate and the sentiment are both from the set. The dark brown ink I used is also from Lifestyles. I added a chartreuse ribbon (a little color wouldn't hurt... right?) and Voila! Here's a close-up:

God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well. ~ Voltaire


Live well today! :)

Journey to Bethleham

 

I Used:
- New Testament (Mary, Joseph, palm trees)
- Art Philosophy (star - someone said it looked like the sun. Whoops! Maybe the color was too bright.)
- Stickles for the star
- Que Sera, Sera paper for background by K and Co.
- We r Memory Keepers Corner Chompers 1/2
- .20 Micron Pen

Here's How
I wanted to make a meaningful Christmas card for my mother. I waited impatiently for this cartridge to come out so I could use it right away :)

I cut the Mary and Joseph images out at about 3 inches. These images were supposed to be cut at 5.5 but rules are meant to be broken... at least, I really hoped at the time I was contemplating cutting them smaller. I had to be super careful taking the images off my mat after I cut because some of them were really fine like the walking stick Jospeh uses. I broke that by mistake when I took it off too fast.

I assembled the pieces and found that the faces (again, I know!) could not really be seen well. So out came my Micron pen and added details to the faces - eyes and mouths. I also did a little shading with my pencils. The palm trees came out just fine and needed no modifications.

I cut the star at an inch and half. I used the gypsy to manipulate the image a little by making the sides thinner so it was more like an oval than a circle. I used Stickles to make it glitter.

I tore some paper in three shades of brown for the small hills. Last, I added some cream colored twine on the side. It came together pretty quickly :) I think my mom will like it a lot.

Have a great day!

Rejoice! Christmas Card

 

I Used:
- Art Nouveau
- Inspired Heart
- CTMH Vanilla Cream ink pad
- Musical Flourish embossing folder (BEAUTIFUL!)
- Stickles
- Papertrey Ink Angeled Die and vintage cream paper (Wow! That stuff is thick!)
- Seam Binding
- .20 Micron Pen

Here's How:
I just received my Art Nouveau cartridge and thought the women in it were so beautiful they could be angels. Flipping thorugh the book, I started thinking about the wings. I didn't want butterfly wings - then she'd look like a fairy. They'd have to be wings from a bird. I didn't want them cartoonish, though. (As you can tell, I was thinking really hard.)Then I saw the swan in the Art Nouveau book. It was perfect.

I used my Gypsy and I cut the woman at a little more than 4 inches. The recommended size is 8 inches but that was too big for what I had in mind. I just crossed my fingers and hoped it would work.

I used the swan wings. Since they were only for the profile of the swan I had to flip the image on my Gypsy to get matching wings.

I used CTMH Vanilla Cream ink pad to color her face and arms. I just took the pieces and dabbed them on the pad. I don't make a lot of people for my cards so I don't need tons of flesh color paper. I thought I'd tried this out and it worked fine.

Putting my angel together was a bit of a challenge because there were so many pieces and they were tiny. Another challenge was that the layer for the hair still included the face part. I think that must be a glitch in the cartridge. (Trust me - I looked and looked for the piece and even in the book the hair layer still includes the face.) I looked at the picture in the book for reference and cut the fact part out. My estimation was pretty good so it fit. Whew! The eyes and the lips were too small to cut correctly so I used a .20 Micron Pen. (I love these pens for details! I bought a bunch more.) I used a finely sharpened red pencil for the lips and Voila! A face!

I added stickles to jazz up my angel on the wings and flowers. I also added a little on the top of her bodice. I used Musical Flourish to emboss the background. Pearl soft green mica was brushed on top for a soft glow. You can't really see it because it so subtle.

I used a Papertrey Ink (PTI) Angled Die for the tag and added the word "Rejoice" from Inspired Heart. I stickled that up, too. Last, I tied up seam binding and added it to the back of the tag.

Have a great day :)