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!!

HYCCT1408 My Hero, My Husband :-)

Hi Stampers!

Woohoo!!  It was alot of work (since I started on October 31st vs. October 1st) but I have finished all of the 35 of the Splitcoaststampers Hope You Can Cling To Challenges (HYCCT) to promote Breast Cancer Awareness and create cards to encourage those with cancer and their families. 

This card was created for bkfinlay aka Bridget’s HYCCT1408 “My Hero” Challenge - (see the gallery here and the details here) along with The Paper Players PP220 Vintage challenge.  

I have many “heroes” in my life- first and foremost for me is my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! I can never forget, or be thankful enough, for His sacrifice on the cross for my sins and the free gift of salvation.   I also feel that the men and women who serve our country in the armed forces are heroes along with our police, fire, doctors, pastors, nurses, teachers and others in public service.  Of course, I cannot forget my parents (my Mother has been with the Lord for over 20 years and I am fortunate that my Father is still alive), but I chose to make this card in honor of my "hero" husband, Dave. 

Dave and I have been together almost 32 years and he still loves me unconditionally (amazing, huh? :-))  He is the best husband in the world, faithful to the Lord, his wife and his job (he has been with the same company for 43 ½ years – through two mergers in the last nine years) and starting next week, he will have to undergo chemotherapy for a rare form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Dave loves sports, especially baseball (the Orioles and Nationals-he is a “hometown boy”) so I decided to pull out one of my favorite masculine retired sets, Take Me Out to the Ballgame along with paper from Graphic 45's Good Ol' Sport Collection to create this card in Dave’s honor.

Again, I hope you will find the time to check out the links above- the Splitcoaststampers HYCCT "Hope You Can Cling To" Challenge is a yearly one and next year, I hope I can start creating when the challenge starts on the 1st of the month (versus waiting until the end of the month- it could not be helped this year due to the tests, etc. that Dave had to have in October). 

To create this card:

Ink the batter image using Memento™ Tuxedo Black Ink onto a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock.   Color the image using Stampin’ Up! watercolor pencils and dilute using an AquaPainter™.

Use the Distressing Tool to distress the edges and use a Sponge Dauber to apply Baked Brown Sugar Classic Ink to “antique” the paper and edges.  Stamp the Gorgeous Grunge splatter stamp using Baked Brown Sugar to add additional distressing.

Mount the distressed panel onto a piece of Basic Black cardstock and use the Distressing Tool to distress the edges and “match” the stamped image.

Mount a piece of Graphic45 Good Ol’ Sport background paper (I used an Orange piece for the Orioles theme) to the Basic Black card base. 

Distress the edges of the Good Ol’ Sport newsprint paper with the Distressing Tool (be careful, the tool can tear the paper a bit too much) and use the Baked Brown Sugar Classic Ink in the same manner as the focal image to add a bit more distressing.  

Mount the distressed newsprint panel onto the card front and add the ticket stub strip (adhering the ticket stub strip on the ends only).

Stamp the sentiment from Service and Sacrifice using Memento™ Tuxedo Black Ink onto Very Vanilla cardstock, create the banner points using the Hexagon Punch and sponge the edges with Baked Brown Sugar Classic Ink .

Insert the Graphic45 cut-a-way along with the retired Antique Pewter Hodgepodge Hardware spiral clip (this comes out of the band and I adhered a little note on the back as well as milestones for us on the front:-)).

Add the focal image to the card front and mount the sentiment along with the Basic Black button (retired Neutrals Collection).

Stamp Sets: Take Me Out to the Ballgame, Courage and Sacrifice, Gorgeous Grunge

Ink:  Baked Brown Sugar, Memento™ Tuxedo Black Ink; Stampin’ Up! Watercolor Pencils

Paper: Very Vanilla, Basic Black; Graphic 45 Good Ol’ Sport

Accessories: Distressing Tool, Sponge Dauber, Hexagon; retired Basic Black button

In order to make the deadline for the HYCCT uploads to the Splitcoaststampers gallery, I will be posting the cards to my gallery at Splitcoaststampers (here) and will update my blog later this week/weekend (I have 27 more cards to post and describe:-)).

Thanks again for visiting- you are all a blessing to me!!   I hope you have a chance to  personally thank the "heroes" in your life!!