60th Birthday

A recent commission was a masculine 60th for my customer's husband. Knowing they are Essendon football supporters, I went with a red & black colour scheme.

Large Number dies cut the 60 from glimmer black paper, and the red glimmer paper provided lots of hearts. A lot of the stamps used here are no longer available, although I do hang on to some for quite a while. Itty Bitty Birthdays has 'awesome at any age' and that continues in the new annual catalogue.

Although Amazing Life is still available - "so happy to have you in my life" - it will be only until June 3rd. Although making a card yourself is a true expression of love, I am happy to make a card for your special person, on request.

BXM793PR

Product List

Amazing Life Photopolymer Bundle

[150624]

$85.50

Amazing Life Photopolymer Stamp Set

[148750]

$34.00

Itty Bitty Birthdays Cling Stamp Set

[148618]

$39.00

Be Mine Stitched Framelits Dies

[148527]

$61.00

Large Letters Framelits Dies

[141712]

$172.00

Number Of Years Photopolymer Stamp Set

[140653]

$47.00

Real Red A4 Card Stock

[106578]

$14.75

Basic Black A4 Card Stock

[121688]

$14.75

Whisper White A4 Card Stock

[106549]

$17.00

Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad

[132708]

$10.00

Liquid Multipurpose Glue

[110755]

$7.00

Stampin' Dimensionals

[104430]

$6.00

Red Glimmer Paper

[121790]

$8.75

Black Glimmer Paper

[139605]

$8.75

Special Celebrations

 I love making cards, and I love to make them for special occasions. This week was a busy one with some weekend birthdays coming up. I had the pleasure of making personalised cards for two little girls turning one. You might have seen the one I made for Grace last week, or two posts ago. Number of Years and the large number framelits won't be leaving my stash while there isn't an alternative available. I use those numbers so much.

I set up my Stamparatus with 'Happy Birthday' from Perennial Birthday for all four cards and just changed colours. For this order, my customer had suggested blue and I chose the new Blueberry Bushel. The sentiment has been stamped in two different ways, with a small image from Truly Tailored between the one where the words are spaced. It was very good luck for me that the same stamp worked perfectly, using the step process with the Stamparatus.

My customer ended up choosing the card above, so I have a spare 21st card in my stash at the moment.

Here is the card for Alexis. I hope she has a wonderful celebration on Sunday!

2BEUMMY3
until 4th July

8th Bird-day

The Occasions catalogue has gone live today and inside you'll find Bird Banter. One of the things I love about this set is that the budgie and cockatoo are Australian native animals, and its fun to feature something that is truly everyday Aussie.

I made this card for my grandson, and then decided to use Magical Day instead. Reason for that was, it was actually his dad (my son) who was mad for birds, and so far none of his boys have gone down that path. I wrote a post about the Magical Day card, but I've had a few computer issues the last few weeks and managed to totally lose that post, and the only photos left were the ones I shared on my Facebook page. So sad.

Number Of Years & Large Number Framelits always come in handy for these kids birthdays, and it helps me keep on top of what age they are!!! I purposely skewed the card layers, and repeated it on the inside.

I wasn't concerned about being too realistic with the colours, used the Stampin' Blends and was very happy with the range of colours.

Love the bold greeting inside, it comes with Picture Perfect Birthday. I'm making very good use of the full range of sentiments in that particular stamp set.

6HB9V4BS

30th Birthday Card

A week ago we celebrated a 30th birthday and Marquee Messages was my stamp of choice. This son is a challenging one to create for as his interests are not ones that are accommodated by the Stampin' Up!® range of stamps. He is a Parkour teacher, spends a lot of time glued to his computer, loves our cat and is a good son. Pretty Kitty is a bit too cute for a man, so as I said, Marquee Messages it was.

 It is a big dramatic stamp, easy to colour and cut out with a perfect spot to rest those Large Numbers. I wanted to use some of the Foil Frenzy Specialty Designer Series paper on page 77 of the Annual catalogue, because it seems so festive. I used the Stampin' Blend alcohol marker to colour the background of the birthday panel. It has come out really smooth, quite a thrill when something works out the way you want it to.

Originally I was making a standard size card, and only had Bermuda Bay and Lemon-Lime Twist picked out. You'll see I ended up using that last weekend to make a card with the sweet sunflower from Painted Harvest. After I'd decided I needed a larger card, it seemed a good idea to add another colour. With the photopolymer stamps, it is easy to place them just where you want and use different phrases to personalise the card.

Below is the card he received for his 29th birthday, similar but different! I hope I can come up with something DIFFERENT next year.

URYS3BV2

When you shop in my online shop, remember to use the host code, as I love to send you something from the current catalogues as a thank you gift. At the end of October there will be a special draw from all September/October online orders (minimum $50 before shipping) to win a special Christmas stamp set.

60th Birthday Cards - Handmade With Love

My husband celebrated a big birthday last week, which gave me excuses to make special cards and do some crafting with the grandkids.We kept the party low-key as we are a large family and rather noisy when we all get together. Unfortunately, I didn't get pictures with all the grandkids and their cards, some had also made a card at home.One d-i-l had put together an enormous card with a photo board inside of many significant family times featuring my husband. Our family definitely love the handcrafted cards!

 I really enjoyed making this Double-Z card using Marquee Messages, stamped on different coloured card, then cut and pieced. It isn't particularly difficult to do and makes an easier way of adding some colour. I have a class making this card on Friday 18th November, at my studio in South Morang, Victoria.

 This version of the Double-Z has an extra piece added to the front to accommodate the larger size of the stamp from Marquee Messages. The patterned paper is two different types of black & white spots, just for fun.

When a stamp retires, I don't neccesarily sell it, if the sentiment is significant to me. Going Global was in a mini catalogue in the last year or so, but didn't make the cut into the Annual catalogue. It still sits on my shelves, because of the sweet sentiments included.




Our sons bought a massive state of the art barbecue for my husband, and just because I was feeling creative, and really wanted to use the Sliding Star Framelit to cut the track around for a star from Superstar, I made them a group card too. The boys are mainly tradesmen, an electrician, plumber and carpenter, while my husband has worked in many trades over the years. Guy Greetings has some marvellous sentiments, very suitable for those tradie types.

In This World and Ghoulish Grunge helped to ink up the inside of the card too, with all sorts of architectural stamps. Both sides on the inside of the card were layered, which gave the 5 sons plenty of room to write messages to their dad.

 We used props for some funny photos and the youngsters really got on board with it, as did a couple of the adults. We always do this at Christmas, but we've had an early practice run this year. Below is our little group of grandies, ranging in age from 2½ - 8 years.

We know how blessed we are to have these wonderful people in our lives, and I treasure gatherings like this celebration.

Cheers everyone,
Rachel

Beautiful Bears

You can have so much fun with Bear Hug stamps and framelits. The first card has a turquoise Sunburst layed on top of the soft sky base.  The bear was stamped on one side of the card, before cutting out with the framelit, and stamping again on the back. This is so her arms can be folded to hold onto the four, from Number of Years. Yes, there was a lot of die cutting on this card, but once it was done, it was quite easy to put it all together. These balloons are from Balloon Builders, and they are actually punched out with the Balloon Bouquet Punch.

The bear painting his self-portrait also uses the easel from Painters Palette, a tree from Sheltering Tree and clouds and grass are also from Painters Palette. It is just a fun idea I had, and I haven't added a sentiment or posted it off to anyone yet.

Don't forget, if you're making an order through my online shop, it will ask for the HOSTESS Code before you check out. August 21st - Spetember 20th it is P2KYFUU9

Cheers, Rachel

Sunburst 40th - Artistic Expressions - CTC 87

Thanks for joining me on the CASE-ing The Catty Blog Hop again. This weeks CASE is from the Artistic Expressions section of the catalogue.This covers pages 92 - 157, another HUGE section of the catalogue. This card on page 99 caught my eye, with the stitching, plus the faux stitching on the card base.

I had to get my sewing machine out to take in a skirt, and I'd been putting it off for months, so I was rather pleased that this was going to 'kill two birds with the one stone.' At the moment, I'm up to date with all the 40ths my son and daughter-in-law are going to, but I decided to make it a 40th card in more masculine tones anyway, for when they spring the next one on me.

Island Indigo and Crushed Curry are my picks this time. My feeling was the Island Indigo was more masculine, but of course we needed the 'sunny' yellow. It was speckled with one of the stamps from Timeless Textures, and I stamped with white Craft ink onto black card, just like in the catalogue sample, using Sunburst Sayings. I cut 40 from the Little Numbers Thinlets (retired now, unfortunately) and then stamped in black above the numbers with 'Look who's turning' from Number of Years.
Actually, I did the sewing before I proceeded too far with all the other steps, in case I had to begin again. Luckily it worked out beautifully. There is no doiley on mine, but a few Bermuda Bay sequins made an appearance.





The inside has been layered and decorated very lightly with a stamp from Sunburst Sayings, again, the one that looks a bit like stitched lines.

Cheers, Rachel

Don't forget, Stampin' Up!® has a Bonus Days promotion happening through this month. For every $90 you spend with Stampin' Up!® in July, you will be emailed a $9 discount code to use in August. That's like a 10% discount! You can shop in my Online Store if you have a shipping address in Australia, and if you use the Hostess Code, YM3FDRCM you'll receive something extra from me in the post.

You should head over to see Tricia Raineri next

If you'd like to join in with CASE-ing The Catty, this is the link to post your entry