Thomas the Tank Engine

My great-nephew Thomas is aptly named. At age two, he has developed a love for Thomas the Tank Engine. He pours through the Thomas catalog and books naming every engine and pushes the trains around the track with delight. When designing his birthday card, it was a no-brainer. I had to make a train card. Here it is:

I die cut the train using the Cricut Joys of the Season cartridge. I just love getting double duty out of my supplies and cutting a design for a birthday card from a Christmas cartridge made me feel like I was getting my moneys worth out of this cartridge. I cut the train twice so that I would have two extra cars -- one for each letter of his name. I then cut out letters and adhered them to punched circles. To finish off the cars, I die cut a flourish for the smoke coming out of the locomotive and used silver brads on the wheels. I cut out some clouds from the Graphically Speaking cartridge, stamped the sentiment and then dry embossed them with a Cuttlebug folder. Here is a close-up:

Since the track for this die cut was an oval and I wanted my track to go straight, I improvised and stamped my track using Papertrey Ink's Just the Ticket stamp set.

The card was a big hit with Thomas. Upon opening it, Thomas studied the card then surprised us all by reading the letters of his name. Here he is reading his name:

and posing with his card:

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Supplies

Cardstock: Papertrey Ink;

Patterned Paper: Imaginisce (Scooter's Vacation); Jilllibean Soup (Monster Stew); October Afternoon (Farm Fresh);

Stamps: Papertrey Ink (Just the TIcket)

Ink: Ranger (Jet Black):

Tools: Cricut by Provo Craft (Joys of the Season; George and Basic Shapes; Graphically Speaking); Cuttlebug (Swiss Dot Embossing folder);

Embelishments: brads by Making Memories.

Happy First Birthday!

My Grand Nephew just celebrated his first birthday. As I prepared to make his card, I was coming up with zero inspiration. You see, I have another Grand Nephew who celebrated his first birthday in February. I didn't want to make the same card yet I'm a little lacking in the juvenile boy stamp department. Anyway, two days before the party, my niece called and told me she was making a puppy cake. A light bulb went on in my head and this is the card I created:

To start, I cut out one of the adorable pups from a scrap of Basic Grey June Bug I had left over from a layout I created in a class designed by Kelly Goree. (I'll share that layout later this week.) Next, I cut a dog house out on my Cricut and stamped it with the Hero Arts Woodgrain stamp. (I think that is one of my favorite stamps because it is so versatile!) I added the banner and Happy Birthday sentiment from Papertrey Ink's Fly Away set. The banner is actually inverted so I had to affix the sentiment stamp to my block accordingly. I love how you can "mold" an acrylic stamp to fit your needs! After finishing the dog house I stamped the clouds on white card stock. For the grass, I scalloped two strips of patterned paper plus a strip of green card stock that I stamped with stripes.

When I put all of the pieces together on a 4.25 x 5.5 card, my scene seemed too crowded so I opted for a 5x7-inch card instead. To ground my scene, I stamped a scrap of kraft card stock with the dots and scalloped the top edge. For a finishing touch, I used the sun from the Elements Stickers. Since it was hanging off the edge, I adhered it to scrap cardstock and cut it out before putting it on the card. The "1" is actually a white Thickers that I inked red to match my card. I used craft ink for the best results.

Hope you enjoyed your day, Paul!

Supplies:

Card Stock: Stampi'n Up! (Kraft, Wild Wasabi); Papertrey Ink (Stamper's Select White, Pure Poppy, Enchanted Evening)

Stamps: Hero Arts (Clouds, Designer Woodgrain, Stripes; Technique Tuesday (Swiss Dot)

Ink: Versa Mark; Stampin' Up! (Brilliant Blue, Real Red); Ranger (Jet Black)

Patterned Paper: Basic Grey (June Bug)

Stickers: American Crafts (Thickers); Basic Grey (June Bug Elements)

Tools: Cricut (Puppy Love), Fiskars Border Punch (Scallop); EK Success (Corner Rounder)

Pomp and Circumstance

Pomp and Circumstance is the song of the day as Mark graduates middle school and Melissa graduates elementary school. In addition, my niece, Lisa, graduated high school earlier this month and my other niece, Sarah, graduated elementary school. So, in their honor, I have a graduation card to share.

I made this card for my niece, Lisa, so I personalized it by using her school colors. I can't take credit for the design. That goes to the fabulous Carla Percheff. Here's her card which I totally cased: http://moralia.wordpress.com/2009/05/19/good-morning-ladies-cps-116-a-couple-grad-cards/. I hope Carla believes in the old adage that imitation is a sincere form of flattery. If you have time, browse her blog. You will be totally inspired by all of the eye candy! You can also find a tutorial for the Spring Card at Splitcoaststampers.com. Here's the link: http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/resources/tutorials/spring_card/.

Congratulations to all of my graduates! I am so proud of each and every one of you.

Ingredients: Bazzill card stock, Basic Grey (Boxer) patterned paper; Making Memories tiny alphas; Cricut Graphically Speaking and Doodlecharms cartridges; Bazzill Polished Pebbles brad; Jolee's By You graduation tassel.

Project Twelve -- I'm All Caught Up!

I did two more layouts for Project Twelve (see original post here http://eterno-lyyours.blogspot.com/2009/04/project-twelve.html) and, for once, I'm all caught up. I knew this project was going to be something I could keep up with and, at the same time, enjoy. So here are my layouts. First February:

At the top of the photo pyramid is my beautiful new grand nephew. His birth was certainly THE highlight of February. And, yes, that is a picture of two bottles of Motrin. With Mark and Melissa sick with the flu for a combined total of 15 days, Motrin was a very big part of February 2009.

I used my Cricut Storybook cartridge to cut out the bottom border and I hand stitched the top embellishment. (I told you that I was hooked on sewing!)

For my March layout, I repeated the overall layout design with only slight variations. I layered two Basic Grey stickers to make a unique border for the top of the page and instead of stitching, I used the Cricut Storybook cartridge to cut out a corner embellishment.

I realized, after taking the picture, that I forgot to add my journaling to the bottom square of patterned paper. For this page, my journaling will read: Snow day...Trinity Church...Adventures in babysitting...Melissa's birthday...Mark's wrestling match. Hope it all fits! As a final touch, I added my favorite pearl bling to the flowery vine.

Ingredients February Layout: American Crafts card stock;Basic Grey Romani patterned paper; Heidi Swapp chipboard letters; Bazzill In Stitchz flourishes template, Bazzill piercing tool, DMC embroidary floss; Cricut Storybook cartridge.

Ingredients March Layout: American Crafts card stock; Basic Grey Boxer patterned paper, stickers and rub-ons; Heidi Swapp chipboard alphabet; Cricut Storybook cartridge; Michael's pearl bling.