card share video for birthday cards

I've got a video for you today that shows you some of my more recent cards that I've made for the church and some for personal use.  They are all femine birthday cards and some of them are made using the Cricut creative cards cartridge.  I'm loving this cartridge for fast and easy simple cards that I can make in a hurry for the church to give out.  I love it so much I went and bought two more of the cricut card making cartridges. I hope I'm using them for a long time to come.  I hope you enjoy the video and as always, feel free to leave me a comment letting me know what you think of my creations and also you can let me know if there are any videos that you would like to see and I will see what I can do about getting a video made for you.  I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the week.  We're half way to the weekend now!  Only two more days to go!  I'll be back soon with some more cards.  Thanks for stopping by.

Christian birthday cards: Female designs

This first card just so happens to be for my mother in-law, Judy, or as I call her, Mama Judy.  Either way seems to be fine with her.  She's easy to get along with :)  So, No, you're not imagining things, this is the second card you've seen for her this month.  I made her a card from my Husband and I and then because she goes to my church I made another card to her from the church.  Brian and I go to church with several people that I will be making two cards for.  It's cool with me, I think of it as fun time because now I have an excuse to crafty play.  I love it so far, making cards for the church, that is.  I really thought that it would maybe be more than I could do and I didn't want crafting to start to feel like a chore.  I always want it to be fun and stay something that I love.  I have been doing this for nine years now and when I started out I honestly didn't know how long I would want to do it.  I do wish I had more time to scrapbook but there will be months like July where I don't have so many cards that I need to make for the church and I can use that time to scrapbook.  That's how I started paper crafting, in scrapbooking.  I saw a show on the DIY channel and I fell in love with it instantly.  I remember, back then we  used VHS tape and so I  recorded that show and when Brian, my husband, came home from work that day I showed him what I had recorded and I said, "I want to do that!"  I don't think he knew what to make of it.  He's always been supportive and he actually helped me get my first supplies.  My birthday was coming up and he had found a scrapbook store in the area where he worked and he went in and bought a gift certificate for me and then took me back up there and let me spend it.  I had a blast and the sales woman was so helpful in getting me the tools that I would need to get started.  I think when I started out all I had was a metal edged ruler,(that I borrowed from Brian) and a pencil. lol. I thought then, "I better stick with this hobby or Brian is going to kill me" after I had taken over a corner in our kitchen.   I started out keeping my supplies in a shoe box then moved to the kitchen table and eventually I moved into the spare room.  Thank goodness we   have a spare room. lol. I pretty much started out like everybody else.  But I always want to love it with the same energy and excitement that I felt during that first year of learning and buying supplies.  I still get excited over a new paper pad but I buy far less supplies and I am much more specific about what I buy.  I've learned what products and companies I like and I've learned who makes the best quality product.  One thing I've always liked it that so many scrapbooking companies are producing their product here in the USA.  I believe in supporting the local economy.  I like to buy from the smaller companies when I can.  I do alot of  shopping on Etsy and Zibbet.  If you are just starting out my advice to you when buying supplies is to try not to get too excited and think you have to buy it all.  There's no way.  Slow down, take a deep breath then take another, and slowly buy stuff that you love.  If you don't love it you are not likely to use it.  One piece of advice that I've gotten and still try to follow today is when you are thinking over buying something stop a minute and think to yourself, "what two projects will I use this on?"  If you can't name at least two then put it back.  It's not going to be worth your money.  I think there's one exception to that rule and that's if you can instead of naming two just be able to name one BIG project that you know you need this item for.  Okay, that's my spill, back to the cards.:)

I made this card for a woman, who I'm sorry to say, I don't really have the pleasure of knowing,  I find it difficult to make a card for someone I don't know.  I don't know why I'm like that but that's just me I guess.  I like to know the person I'm making it for, It helps me better capture their personality so to say.   It's true, even tho my church is a small town or better a small rural area, church, I still don't know everyone there.  I'm getting there tho and I do know that they all are very friendly.  It's a great church to belong to.  I love it there and look forward to going every Sunday.   I know that Katie is a younger woman and that's about all I know.  I know she's not a child, or at least I don't think so. Anyway, in such a case as this I just make something that I would love. lol.  I, of course, had to make it pink, then put on lace and flowers and a beautiful image and sentiment.  It's not a complicated card but I really like it and  I sure hope Katie does too.

This final card is made for Andy, and I also don't really know Andy but I do at least know of her and I do know her mom and if she's anything like her then she's going to be energetic and fun loving.  Andy is a young woman, a little younger than me (I still consider myself to be a young woman tee hee).  So for a fun gal I used a fun paper line.  I used some Hedi Swap "Sugar Chic" for this 5.5" sq. card.  I also used Hedi's color shine sprays to color the doily that wonderful blue you see here and I used the Cricut to cut out that square"ish" label shape and stamped the sentiment there.  I know it's a birthday card but I don't think every birthday card has to say "Happy Birthday" on the front.  They are little works of art to me and like all art, can tell a story and have a theme.  So used this Rejoice stamp here and finished it off with, of course, you guessed it, lace! And a flower and wonderful, beautiful Bling! See, I do still love my supplies.  

I am really enjoying making these cards for the church and my hope is that in hand making each of them the recipient will feel that the church thinks they ARE special, and as such a special person, deserving of someone taking the time to think of them on their birthday and take the time to sit down and make them a card with their own two hands.  It is my hope that these cards are special to the people who receive them. That is why I like to know a little about the person for whom the card is to be made.  I hope that I am able to keep making these cards for the church and that it allows me the time to still do the things that I want to do some along the way.  I pray I never see the day that I no longer find it exciting, fun, and fulfilling as I do today.  I maybe bringing you blog post and videos for a good long time yet to come, If the good Lord's willing:)  I hope you have a wonderful rest of your weekend, and I'll be back soon with another blog post as I have many to catch up on yet. Till then, much love and hugs, amy k

Masculine birthday card for the church

I made this card for John at church and I used one of my favorite corrugated card bases for this card.  I am not sure where this patterned paper comes from.  Sorry I don't have that information for you.  I do know that the rectangle die cuts are from Spellbinders.  I used some black seam binding to make the bow and the boarder was punched using a Fiskars boarder punch.  The keyhole and key are brads and the cross is actually a charm and has a hole in the top and also had a hole in the middle there and so I just added a blue rhinestone brad to that circle cut out and used it to attach it to the patterned paper.

That is all the cards for today.  Hope you caught both blog post.  I'll be back soon with more cards.  I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July and maybe got to spend it with someone you love. I hope you have a great weekend and I'll talk to you again soon.  Till then, much Love and hugs, amy k

Female Birthday cards for the Church

These are some of the birthday cards I made for the month of June.  These are some female birthday cards.  This card was made for Emily and I used some paper from Hobby Lobby and some flowers from Prima and Wild Orchid Crafts. A doily from Memory box dies with a little circle punch out and a stamp from Hot off the press.  I got those little crosses at Hobby Lobby too with the decorative craft buttons. (Not the buttons from the sewing dept.) I thought they added a nice touch sense the cards are to be coming from the church.

This next card was made for Emily's daughter, Olivia who just so happens to share her mother's birthday.  Isn't that great!  So to make this card I used some Teresa Collins paper and I used my cricut cartridges for this card and to make those labels shaped like that I used my Gypsy handheld design tool for the cricut to manipulate the image and stretch it to that long thin shape.  I also did the same thing to the shadow for that image and cut it out in blue.  I'm not sure where that sentiment stamp is from, sorry. Maybe I need to start keeping a supply list for these cards. lol.  I used a Sizzix die for the flourish and the flower is from The Paper Studio by Hobby Lobby.  I added some stickles glitter glue over the top of the flower to give it that shine then added a strip of the blue mesh bling trim across the bottom.  I also wrote in the date of her birthday on that little calendar cut out.  To finish it off I added a stick pin I made.

Okay, that's all for the girls cards and I'll be back with another post this morning to show you a Masculine birthday card so stay tuned!  I'll be right back.

Birthday card for Father in-law

Here's the card that I made for my Father in-law, Frank Owens from my husband and myself.  If you noticed, in my last blog post I also had a Birthday card published for Frank but that one was to be from the church.  Some of you may or may not know that the preacher at the church has asked me to make all the cards for the church.  That means that certain people, like my husbands Mom and step dad, who attend the church with us, will be getting two cards made by me from now on.  One from the church and one from us.  I don't mind at all in fact I'm enjoying the way making all these cards has forced me to flex my creative muscles.  I know that I could make all the birthday cards from the church the same and they would be happy with that but for right now, I'm having pretty good luck coming up with ideas for cards and I would like to continue making them all unique and different.  I enjoy that I know who my cards are going to and so I can make them according to how I perceive their personalities.  I like coming up with new ideas for cards and I will continue doing so for as long as the ideas will flow!. 

Here's a pic of the inside of the card:

 I don't know why I decided to cover both sides of the card. lol. I guess I just got used to doing that with the churches cards and just got carried away. lol. That's funny.  I hadn't even noticed that I'd done that till just now.  I used that same stamp of the glasses from the front of the card here on the inside and I stamped both it and the sentiment in navy ink from Hero arts.  I really like those childhood quotes and I have a few of them in my collection.  I get them out and use them every chance I get.  It's a nice change from having to search for a sentiment to go on the inside of the card and type it up and print it out from my computer.  I think they are fun and cute for anyone of any age. 

Well, that's all for today.  I hope to be back tomorrow with a few more cards.  I've got some more that I've done for the church that need to be posted so I will try and get that up for you tomorrow.  Till then, I hope you all are having a wonderful day. Much love and hugs, Amy k

Birthday cards made for various members of my church

These cards that I'm making for the church are for people of all age groups and for men and women, boys and girls so I'm sorry that I can't lead off with the title telling you who exactly the card was made for.  As of right now I'm grouping all the cards that I make for the week together into one blog post.  As I get caught up on my blogging then maybe I can post them daily as I get them made and then you will get better search results when you are looking for a specific type of card. Please bear with me and I promise we will get there. 

This first card was made for a young man who has just graduated high school.  I think he's about 18 years old.  I didn't want to make him a teen card, I wanted it to be more masculine as he is entering into adulthood now and will be leaving those childish notions behind. Or so I've heard. lol.

Here's a picture of the card.  I hope it is masculine enough for him.  He said that he liked it anyway but that may have just been because I asked him at the same time I told him I was the one making them lol. I'm pretty happy with it and I hate people who brag about their own work but i do think it's good to like something that you've made for someone else.

This is the second card for the week and it was made for a, well I guess you would call her middle aged, she's probably in her 30's, woman.  I used lots of bling on this card.  I tell you its addicting. once you start putting it on you just want to keep adding more. lol

This last card of the week for the church was made for my step father in law.  Love him to death! Such a good man.  I made this one a little on the funny side.  On the front  it says, "age is just a number..." and on the inside it reads, " and yours will remain unlisted". lol  I knew he would appreciate the humor even if its coming to him from the church. lol.  You will see another card for Frank coming up.  It will be his card from Brian and I for his birthday.  Yeah, some of the people who are in our immediate family will be getting two cards from me if the attend church with us at Fishers Chapel.  You are all welcome to come and join us for Sunday service. Sunday school starts at 10 am and preaching at 11.  We are located on Dry Creek Rd. in Summerville ga. You all have a standing open invitation to come worship with us on the Lords day. You can just come as you are, no one will judge you here.

Anniversary card for inlaws

This is an Anniversary card that I made for my mother in law, Judy and husband, Frank.  I used another of the corrugated card bases from Micheals and papers from Prima.  I also used some new Spellbinders dies that I recently purchased.  I used some stamps from Hampton Art.  The flower is handmade using a Cherry Lynn Designs die along with the leaf cut out.  I hand dyed the large lace using some Lindy's Stamp Gang sprays.  I had a fun time making this card.  I think it turned out great and is something different.  I hope they liked it too. :)

Here's a shot of the inside of the card.  I used some more of that Prima patterned paper and then added the bird cage, bird and the fly away from the Hampton Art stamp set. The trick to using these 6x6 patterned papers on a 5.5 x 5.5" card base and keeping the design centered is to not cut down just one side, instead half the amount that you need to cut the paper down by and take it off each side.  So for this card instead of taking a 1/2" off one side, I took 1/4" off each side.  That allowed me to keep the design centered and looking like it was just made that way.

Here's a shot of the front of the envelope. I just used another stamp from that same Hampton Art stamp set.  It had a bird theme.   That's all for today.  Thank you for stopping by today.  I hope you all are having a wonderful day.  The weekend is almost here and then we can all relax for a minute. lol,.  I hope to be back tomorrow with another card.  It will be a few birthday cards that I made for members of the church.  So I'll see you all back here then.  Till then have a great day.  Much love and hugs, Amy K.

Happy Anniversary card made for my Friend, Robin and husband, Denny

This is the anniversary card I made for my good friend, Robin and her husband, Denny.  They are great people and are truly happy together.  They have a wonderful family who are all very close to one another.  I hope I have the kind of success in my marriage that they have experienced.  I won't go into great detail about how the card was made but I will say that it was very easy to put together in no time at all.  I used printable papers from Kitty's Scrap Post on etsy, and just added some flowers and a little bling and a stamped sentiment.   It really did go together fast.  I think that the papers are so beautiful that you don't have to add alot to the projects you use them on because the papers stand alone.  I really love her printables and the best thing is if you run out of one pattern you can just reprint it again and in any size you like.  I think I really like this card and I hope Robin and Denny enjoyed it as well.  I wish them both all the best in a long happy marriage. 

That's all for today, hope you enjoyed the card share.  I hope to be back tomorrow with another anniversary card.  Till then, I hope you all are having a wonderful day and at least the week is halfway over. Yeah for that!  Right now my Hubbs is working 4, 10 hr shifts at work and that means Friday thru Sunday I have him here will me all to my self.  It's good to have him around so much lately, even though I know the long hours are hard on him.  At least he gets 3 days to relax and recharge, (that is if he didn't have so much around here that needs to be done while he's home).  So my weekend starts on Thursday night. so I just have one more day till my weekend starts. Yeah. I live for the weekends. lol. I hope you all are blessed in some way today and everyday do something nice for someone else. You never know when you may be a blessing to someone who really needs it.  Talk to you tomorrow., till then, Hugs, and lots of love, AmyK

Card made for my good friend, Robin

My good friend, Robin, had a birthday last month and I want to show you the card I made and sent to her.  She and I have never met in person, oddly enough, but that hasn't stopped us from becoming good friends over the past few years.  We enjoy talking on the phone and swapping crafty ideas and we always keep up with hand made cards made for each other during birthdays and anniversaries and sometimes just to say hello.  She really has come to mean a great deal to me and I can't imagine life without her.  I wouldn't want to.  She's smart and funny and very sweet.  We met thru a swap done on You tube.  We just happened to be partners for that swap and it was the first swap I had ever done all tho she was a seasoned veteran. So I'll quit running my mouth and show you the card now. 

Here's what the front of the card looks like. I finally got to use some of that wonderful mesh bling I got.  (which I was happy to share with Robin cause that''s just how we roll lol).  

And here's the inside of the card.

you can see I used the same punch for the sentiment both on the front and the inside and all that gold is from my Krylon gold leaf pen.  Love that pen and it has lasted a long time.  I also used those 5.5x5.5" corrugated card bases that I get at Micheal. Another one of my favorite products right now.  In fact, I'm starting on my second box right now.  Hope they don't discontinue them anytime soon.

Okay, that's my card share for today.  Hope you all enjoyed it.  Also, I hope you are liking the new shorter blog post.  I will keep it up unless I start getting alot of questions about products used.  Remember I will be happy to share that information with you if you will just leave me a comment.  I will see you all back here tomorrow for another card share. Till then I hope you have a wonderful and crafty day.  Much love and hugs, AmyK

More cards for the church

From now on I'll be trying to keep my blog post shorter with the hopes that people may actually read it and not just look at the pictures lol.  I know it's alot of information for me to tell you the process so from now on I'll give that information out to anyone who wants to leave me a comment and ask.  Feel free to ask me anything you would like to know about products used or techniques used.  If I do a special technique I'll probably explain the process or tell you where to find that information.  So, I hope that you like this style much better and please feel free to leave me a comment and let me know what you think.

This is one of the Thank You for Visiting cards.  It's to give to first time visitors of the church.  We'll have another/different postcard type card to give to second time visitors and so on.  It's up to the preacher who will be getting these cards and how many they will give.  I just make however many he tells me he needs that week.  This week he needed two so that's the two cards I'm showing today.  I don't make many one layer cards so this was a little bit of a challenge but like I've said before, It's good to flex those creative muscles.  I will admit this one took a couple of trys to get it just right but I'm happy with the outcome. 

Here's a shot of the inside of the card with the quote on one side and a place for the preacher to sign on the other side.

This is the second Thank you for Visiting card I made this week.  I will tell you one thing about how I did this:  I used an actual page from a hymnal and just photocopied it and used the copy to make the card.  When I do something like that I almost always print onto card stock instead of printer paper.

This is the inside of that card and it's laid out in the same format as the first card and I believe it uses the same quote and then has room for him to sign on the right. 

Okay, that's the two cards for today.  Hope you enjoyed the shorter post.  I know I did lol.  I hope you all are having a wonderful Monday.  I'll be back tomorrow with another card for you.  Till then, much love and hugs, Amy K.