Happy Anniversary ....

... Morning! I'm here with a quick post today to share an anniversary card that my mum asked me to make for her. Friends of hers will be celebrating their Ruby Wedding anniversary soon, so I had fun making the card for mum. 

Stamps: Concord & 9th - Heart Turnabout; MFT - Birthday Sentiments, Essential Sentiments, Journal It - Pocket Calculator; Lawn Fawn - Milo's ABCs; Visible Image - Follow Your Heart

Inks: Gina K - Lipstick, Soft Stone; Versafine Clair - Nocturne; Hero Arts - Unicorn

Dies: Concord & 9th - Heartstrings

Accessories: White & Black Card; Red Satin Mirri Card; Holographic Heart Card; White Embossing Powder

I'm submitting this card to Happy Little Stampers Anything Goes with Dies - HLSAGD#05 and to Never-Before-Used-Schtuff - NBUS#26 - I've had the Heatstrings die for ages, but this is the first time it's been out to play!!

As it's a Ruby anniversary I had to use red, and I combined the red with grey and black (sadly I missed the deadline for Paper Players - PP#540). I started by cutting a piece of white card 5½" square. I used my MISTI to stamp the Heart turnabout stamp. I stamped the first and third impression with bright red ink and the second and fourth in soft grey which gives a complete background. I edged the panel with a black marker and adhered it to the front of a 5¾" white square card. The heartstring die set consists of three parts - a tiny heart, a solid heart and the heartstrings die which cuts out the string sections. I used the solid heart and heartstrings die to cut out the red satin mirri layer. I used the solid heart to cut out a silver heart holographic layer as well as two white hearts. I adhered the two white hearts together, adhered the silver heart layer on top of them and finished by adding the red heartstring layer on top. Next, I die cut a small black heart onto which I stamped the number 40 in white ink and heat embossed with white powder. I adhered the black number heart on top of the heart panel and glued this to the card. I finished the front by stamping a simple 'happy anniversary' message in black.

Inside the card, I cut a piece of red mirri card for the mat layer. On the white panel, I stamped a beautiful graffiti style heart in soft grey ink. I stamped a scripty 'happy' in black in and a clean, crisp 'anniversary' in red ink.

I'm very pleased how this turned out. And I'm so pleased how the heartstring die looks, I can see it working for a shaker card!! I took a close-up photo of the holographic heart card - it's so pretty in real-life as the shimmer moves:

Jonathan and I travelled down to the University of Nottingham to see Kat yesterday. It was a wet and dull day, but it was great to see Kat. It's the first time that I've been down to see her room since she started last September. She made the place beautiful and so homely. Kat's course has almost finished and she'll be coming back home in three weeks'. The year has flown by. I asked Kat if she'd had a good year despite all the difficulties with Covid and the various restrictions. She said yes, and she's loves her course and she's made some very good friends.

Well, that's all from me for today. See you soon.

TMR - Theme ....

..... Good afternoon, I really am running late! I hope that everyone has recovered from their New Year celebrations. A change in my holiday plans meant that I didn't get back to the States until 2nd January and I was so jet-lagged that I couldn't stay awake, never mind make a project for our new challenge at The Male Room - TMR#51 where the theme is ANYTHING GOES. I did manage to pull myself together late yesterday afternoon and make a card but am only now posting it! This is not the way I meant to start the year!!! Here's the card:

Stamps: My Favourite Things - Stars Above, Essential Sentiments
Inks: Stampin' Up! - Cherry Cobbler; Memento - Tuxedo Black
Dies: Die-namics - Stars Above
Accessories: White Lustre Card; SU Card - Basic Grey, Smoky Slate; Copics; Spectrum Noir Sparkle - Clear

I used the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches - FMS#269 but I turned it to make a horizontal card. The challenge over at House of Cards - HOC01 is to add a house and/or be inspired by the colours; well I decided to play with the colours as I think they are great for a masculine style card. I'm also submitting this card to Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - SSWC04/01 where they want us to see New Something - mine is new stamps!

I started by cutting two strips of card, light and dark and adhering them to the card. I used a dark burgundy Copic marker to add an extra line on the thick dark grey strip of card. I stamped the simple sentiment in burgundy ink and then stamped the stars falling towards the sentiment. I used Copic markers to colour areas of the stars and added some sparkle with a clear Spectrum Noir brush. The two largest stars were stamped again on scrap card, coloured in and cut out with the matching die. I adhered them both with dimensional tape. On the inside I cut a mat layer of pale grey card. On the white panel I added a message and some more stars.

I took a close-up photo of the sparkle on the big star - the shimmer in the Spectrum Noir brushes is much more frosty/silver than the Wink of Stella brushes. So it's the perfect excuse to have both sets :)

I'm sending this card to my son Ben - he had a rough time at the end of last year, which is why I went to visit him. He's moved house and it's tough to get going again, particularly as it's been so grey and dull. I know that he loves getting cards from us, so this one is on its way today.

Do visit The Male Room to see more inspirational projects for the men in our lives. That's all for now - but I'm feeling much more awake today so you never know, I might be back later!!