Independence Day!

It's that time of year again. Time to celebrate the 4th of July with our dear friends, Lissette and Richard. No one knows how to throw a July 4th bash like them! And since Lissette is a dear scrapbooking, cardmaking, stamping friend, I had to make her a card and a gift bag for the hostess gift I got for her. Here's my latest stamping creations:

When I was looking through my stash for patterned paper for the card, the only patriotic paper I found was the star pattern which I used on the bag. That, however, was not the look I was going for on the card. Then I came across this paper from Making Memories Passport line. Even though it had some green in it, I knew it would work. I simply covered the green with the red striped ribbon from my stash and voila, the travel paper became patriotic!

To make the star, I followed the techniques outlined in Jennifer McGuire's Thinking Inking class over at Two Peas in a Bucket. First, I created a mask for my circle and star with the Cricut Graphically Speaking cartridge. Then I filled in the empty space with Ranger's Acrylic Paint Dabbers. I've always hesitated about painting on my craft projects but the Paint Dabbers offer a no mess solution. I also inked my small star stamp with the Paint Dabbers.

Since I used dark card stock, I added cream card stock to the inside of the card.

For the gift bag, I recycled a Hollister shopping bag by using my Leave it to Weaver border punch on patterned paper from my stash and adding ribbon.This gift bag was good for the environment and good for my pocketbook!

Now, if you want to see how much my style has developed and changed, here is a link to the July 4th card I made for Lissette last year: http://eterno-lyyours.blogspot.com/2008/07/4th-and-5th-of-july.html.

Card Ingredients: Stampin' Up! card stock (Night of Navy and Very Vanilla) and DCWV card stock (red); Making Memories patterned paper (Passport); Cricut cartridge (Graphically Speaking); Stampin' Up! ink (Night of Navy); Ranger Acrylic Paint Dabber (Silver); Studio G stamp (Series 12); Making Memories button (Noteworthy) ribbon and twine from my stash.

Bag Ingredients: Hollister shopping bag; paper scrap and ribbon from my stash; Fiskars border punch (Leave It to Weaver).