Thank You for Your Service and Sacrifice

Hi Stampers! 

Memorial Day is upon us once more and I am so thankful for the men and women who have served our country and given the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom- may we never forget their service and sacrifice!

I wanted to create one more patriotic card with Memorial Day in mind and chose to find inspiration from the As You See It AYSI088 Sketch Challenge as well as the Splitcoaststampers’ Free For All FA274 “Oh My Stars” (see details here and gallery here). 

If you have not had a chance to do so, I hope you will find the time to visit the challenge sites- they all have wonderful Design Team samples as well as inspiration from their galleries!

To create this card:

Use Stampin’ Write Markers to carefully color the eagle image from the Our Daily Bread Designs (ODBD) Land of the Free stamp set... Basic Black for the white part of the feathers, Night of Navy for the star area and retired Riding Hood Red for the stripes on the feathers.  

Add additional color to the stripes with a Cajun Craze marker, Daffodil Delight for the beak and Sahara Sand over the entire image.  Add Ranger® Tim Holtz® Antique Linen Distress Stain over the entire image to “antique” a bit more.

Fussy-cut the eagle image and mount onto Vary Vanilla cardstock, fussy-cut again allowing a bit of the Very Vanilla cardstock to show and set aside (I decided to add this step since the eagle seemed to blend a bit too well with the background paper I chose- you could of course, omit this step :-)). 

Mount the Authentique® Price Collection paper onto Very Vanilla cardstock, trim and mount onto Riding Hood Red cardstock, trim and mount onto the Night of Navy card base.

Create the vertical strip for the sketch leaving a portion of Very Vanilla in the center for the sentiment.

Create the banners using the new Banner Triple  Punch for the banners (they are not as thick as the ones that the punch would normally make, just insert the banners and flip the punch over so you can see the end of the paper to punch the banner points) and mount onto the vertical strip. 

Add the Antique Brass brads and mount the layered vertical strip to the card front.

Ink the sentiment from the retired Stampin’ Up! Service and Sacrifice set using the Riding Hood Red marker, stamp onto a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock (I used a piece in my scraps that had been previously punched with the Note Tag Punch), trim the edges and mount onto a piece of Riding Hood Red cardstock (again, I used the Note Tag Punch to create the curve on the left hand side).

Mount the sentiment onto the card front and add the eagle with Stampin’ Dimensionals®.

Ink the star from the ODBD Land of the Free set with the Night of Navy and Riding Hood Red Stampin’ Up! markers and stamp onto a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock that had been distressed with Ranger® Tim Holtz® Antique Linen Distress Stain.

Fussy-cut the star, add the Antique Brass brad to the center and mount the star to the star to the card front with Stampin’ Dimensionals®.

To finish off the card, repeat the same steps as above with the flag (from the Stampin’ Up! Service and Sacrifice set).

Stamps:  Service and Sacrifice (retired SU!), Land of the Free (ODBD)

Ink: Stampin’ Write Markers- Basic Black, Cajun Craze, Cherry Cobbler, Daffodil Delight, Night of Navy, Sahara Sand, retired Riding Hood Red; Ranger® Tim Holtz® Antique Linen Distress Stain

Paper: Very Vanilla, Night of Navy, retired Riding Hood Red; Authentique® Pride Collection

Accessories: Banner Triple Punch, Note Punch; Antique Brass brads

Thanks again for stopping by- my husband is on vacation today and we will be reflecting on the lives that were sacrificed for our freedom today as we take a day to remember.  

I hope all of you will have the time to take a moment today to think about those that have gone before you to keep our country free!!    I am so thankful that the Lord has allowed the United States of America to remain free and that He sent His Son to give the Ultimate Sacrifice for all of us- may we never forget!!