A Trio of Man Cards

Why oh why do I insist on waiting to start my Christmas cards right about...now...ok tomorrow...or maybe on Friday. I have the supplies...so that is something right? Seriously I tell myself every year I am going to get started early and then I NEVER do! Oh well...I see some Christmas movie marathons while making Christmas cards in my future!

In my continual attempt to make up for all of the November (and now some in December) events that I missed sending cards for, I went for the Verve Project Parade Triple Play Challenge again, but this time in the form of a trio of "Man" cards! It felt good to get these done...I always find "man" cards to be one of the hardest to make!

Like last time I went through my stash of saved sketches and found some that would work (shown below). The main design elements that I kept between the cards were the colors and paper, the star image, the copper embossing and brads, the Labels 14 die shape, and almost the black cording (didn't quite make it in the last one).

The paper I used was from the Granola Paper Pad by Basic Grey plus Always Artichoke and Bordering Blue cardstock from Stampin' Up!. I of course didn't have any copper brads, so I made my own! Yup I took some pewter ones, pressed them to the Versamark pad, dipped it in copper embossing powder, and heated it (in case you want to try it, make sure you are holding the brad with some tweezers so you don't burn yourself!). Not sure there is much more to say on the cards...or maybe I am just tired and thinking about those darn Christmas cards!

So while I check out, let me thank you for checking out my kind of engineering!

The Engineering Details

Stamps - Seeing Stars, Starlight Starbright (Verve Stamps); Paper - Always Artichoke, Bordering Blue (SU!), Granola Paper Pad (Basic Grey); Ink - Versamark; Accessories - Labels 14 Die (Spellbinders), Pewter Brads (SU!), Copper Embossing Powder (I forget!), Word Window Punch (SU!), Edge Distresser (Tim Holtz), black cording, dimensionals

A Trio of Anniversaries

I am finally getting the chance to be crafty again. Had to get through Thanksgiving and a 90th Birthday party (not mine of course) and finally (hopefully!) getting over a sickness and getting Christmas decorations up (almost done!).

My cards-to-be-made list is very long and covers a lot of missed occasions, so I was pretty happy to knock three of them out with the latest Verve Challenge. The Verve Project Parade Triple Play Challenge is to create a trio of coordinating projects...whether that be a combination of a card, bag, and tag or three cards, boxes, etc. Since I was very behind on my November cards, I was in need of three Anniversary cards...so I went for a trio of cards using the same supplies, but with different looks. To help me out even more, I grabbed three of the Mojo Monday Sketch Challenges from past weeks to give me three different layouts to work with....love me some sketches!

I used The Most Beautiful Thing Wordart by Paper Makeup Stamps...inked it up with markers and stamped it on Whisper White paper. I cut it and a black mat out with Oval Nestabilities. The Black mat was then distressed. The pattern paper is from the Olivia Collection by BoBunny. Each card has some Old Olive 5/8" grosgrain ribbon from Stampin' Up! and some black rhinestones from Bazzill Basics.

This was a great challenge for me and I love how the cards turned out...similar but definitely not the same! And since I need 3 masculine birthday cards, you will probably be seeing this again!

In other news...and this is awesome, so listen up...Paper Makeup Stamps is having an incredible sale during December. Since I don't want to get anything wrong, I am basically copying this from the PMS Blog:

For the first time ever, PMS is having a grab bag sale! Whats a grab bag? Well a grab bag is filled with goodies... you just dont know whats going to be in it!

There are lots of different types of grab bags available!

The Fairy Grab Bag - $10

For only $10, you'll get 3 fairy stamps! That makes them each only $3.33!!

The Moody Grab Bag - $10

For only $10, you'll get 3 stamps from the Moody Girls collection! That makes them each only $3.33!!

The Monster Grab Bag - $7.50

For only $7.50 you'll get 3 of our beloved monster stamps! That makes them only $2.50 each!

Sentiments and Wordart Grab Bag - $10

For only $10, you will get a mixture of wordart and simple sentiments at a minimum value of $20!!!!!

The Cutie Critter Grab Bag - $8.50

For only $8.50, you will get 3 stamps from our Cutie Critter collection, makign them $2.83 each!

The PMS lover & newbie grabbag - $40

This grab bag was designed for someone who either loves PMS and wants to beef up their collection OR want to share their love of PMS with someone who might not yet have much in their stamp collection. This grab bag will include a mixture of stamps and/or sets from the entire PMS inventory. This grab bag is sure to please having goodies retailing over $80!!!!!

Oh wait, and we're not done! We are also GIVING AWAY SHIPPING this month! Thats right, free shipping to anyone in the US and a reduction of $3 to shipping outside of the US. Please use USDECEMBER as your voucher if you are in the US or 3OFF for those outside of the US.

And the even better bonus, this voucher will work with all other vouchers!!!!

Quantities of grab bags may be limited to stock on hand. Free Shipping will last the entire month. No requests on the grab bags, please.

So make sure you quickly take advantage of this awesome sale! I already ordered three grab bags myself...so excited to see what I get! Until I can come back with some more card eye candy, thanks for checking out my kind of engineering!

The Engineering Details

Stamps - The Most Beautiful Thing Wordart (Paper Makeup Stamps); Paper - Old Olive, Basic Black, Really Rust, Whisper White (SU!), Olivia Ambrosia and Olivia Stripe from the Olivia Collection (BoBunny); Ink - Old Olive marker, Really Rust marker, Bravo Burgundy marker; Accessories - 5/8" Old Olive Grosgrain Ribbon (SU!), Upper Crest Border Punch (Friskars), Black Rhinestones (Bazzill Basics), Oval Nestabilities (Spellbinders), distresser (Tim Holtz), dimensionals