Archive for the ‘Digital Cards’ Category

I have to admit that it was a little difficult to find a digital scrapbook kit for creating valentines for a pre-schooler and second grader. But I narrowed it down to a few fun finds and this is what they both picked. I was glad because I really only wanted to design one valentine!

I love these photos with the valentines. Danielle has a pink wig and is in front of pink azaleas, oh so perfect for valentines! She thought her teacher would like the photo choice. And, Raeleigh is laying in some ground cover with a dandelion necklace, which kind of went with the jungle theme!

I could have done these with unaltered photos, but I decided I kind of liked applying the sketchy affect to the photos. This time I did it with Photoshop’s “photocopy” layer. I did one layer above the photo as a photocopy layer, then I duplicated that and made the next layer sepia tone. The black and white photocopy layer is set at the “overlay” blending mode and the sepia layer is set at “color burn.”

As you can see the main difference with the Mobile Monet HD effect using my ipad is that the photo itself looks less watercolor-like here. See posts from last week to decide which approach you like better. I think they each have a place in the digi-scrap toolset.

Tomorrow the girls are going to attach their little valentines to some fruit roll-ups!

Credits: A collaboration kit at Scrap Orchard by Lindsay Riches and Laura Banasiak.

My husband’s college buddy had a baby a couple of weeks ago. He is a basketball coach and high school Principal. And, just like my husband, a huge Michael Jordan fan. So, my husband went out and bought a cute set of Jordan infant clothes and he asked me to make a special tag with the baby’s name.

That day I happened to have seen a door hanger template….I’m sorry, I wish I could remember where. So, I thought I’d try and use it.

I gave the hanger a “stroke” and printed the stroke on the back of orange cardstock. After cutting it out by hand I ran it through the Cuttlebug to emboss the “basketball” texture. I put some orange distress ink on the embossing folder first, although it was almost the same color and you can’t really see it. I also cut a backing out of very heavy duty orange glitter paper.

The baby is from the Paper Dolls Cricut Cartridge, and his face is a stamp by Peachy King. I found another newborn Jordan outfit on the internet and messed around with warping it until it would fit my baby. I literally made my Photoshop screen show “actual size” and kept holding the baby up there to the screen to check and see if the outfit would “fit” him yet.

The “crib” is actually part of a “fence”, I think from New Life Dreams? I clipped a blue polka-dot paper over it and played with blending modes till it looked right. After making the name tag I adhered it with a cute button brad. Then covered the backside with the glitter card stock piece.

Finally I distressed the edges and tied bits of ribbon around the top. I think it turned out adorable, although the “real” Beau has a beautiful thick head of black hair!

I’d been wanting an excuse to buy this fabulous Alice in Wonderland kit from Tangie Baxter called “Impossible Things.” So, when I needed to make a quick card for a friend on the same day I got a coupon from Tangie I knew exactly what I was buying!

This card is for Elizabeth Montgomery, a sweet friend who has an amazing voice. She sings her own music in little church concerts around the country. She also turned a poem about our son Gabe, written by my Father In Law Jack Nester into a beautiful song about his life in Heaven.

The words to one of Elizabeth’s songs surround the image:
“Now is the time to worship the Lord. Gathered together in one accord. No other place we’d rather be than in the Father’s Sanctuary. If we don’t praise Him the rocks will cry out. Heaven and Earth will lift up our shout.”

Here it is assembled into a card:

You can listen to the song on her Facebook page.

I thought it was appropriate for Easter. I’m just now posting it because I wanted to give it time to reach her in the mail.

Credits: Kit-Tangie Baxter. The skinny frame is by Christina Renee and the flower/jewel are Prima. Ribbon is Michael’s dollar bin. Elizabeth’s face is used for “Alice” instead of the face in Tangie’s kit.

Tangie Baxter’s prompt was “Tickled Pink” for week 14 of the Art Journal Caravan. Of course my first thought was our girls. The journalling is on my heart, not evident in the “artwork.” It is about being tickled pink with my house full of girls. But, at the same time, I’ll never know what it would have been like to have my middle child, a boy, thrown into the daily craziness. His sixth birthday is tomorrow. He died during childbirth. He is on the other side of grace, and we are on the other side of grief. We have a happy household. But we do miss Gabe, he still shows up in most of the family portraits my girls draw. Right in the middle of them where he belongs.

The vintage dolls are a freebie stamp I found. But they looked a little scary, even for a bittersweet subject. So, I gave them Manga eyes from another free brush set I found. There are a lot of blending effects here with the four papers used, so most of them don’t look like the original. I love the black and white curtains, they are from Tangie Baxter’s Impossible Things kit. And Anne DeJong’s paper feather was the perfect finishing touch!

Credits: Tangie Baxter, Dianne Rigdon, Anne De Jong, http://visionofviolet.deviantart.com/art/Manga-eyes-for-Newbies-77930122, http://brushes.500ml.org/list2.php (vintage toy brushes)

This past Valentines day we went to the church my FIL pastors. We stayed for their monthly fellowship dinner. There is a woman that is part of his congregation that blew me away with her talent and generosity. Her name is Chris. A year or so ago she lost her only son, still a boy, after dealing with life long health issues which kept her from being active at church for most of his life. It is very sad. It is heartwarming to see her love for children shine so brightly.

On Valentines day she volunteered not only to cook lunch for the entire church, but she was in charge of games, and all of the prizes. She brought enough prizes for a church twenty times the size of our little community church. She made a table full of lamps from parts she had picked up here an there. They were beautiful. And, she made dozens of little jean purses lined with taffeta. Plus she brought a table full of toys for the children. All of this and she was still a relaxed hostess. I’d never met her before, and was happy to meet such a gracious woman.

I decided she needed a very special Thank-you card. The verse is 1Peter 4:10– “Each of you has been blessed with one of God’s many wonderful gifts to be used in the service of others. So use your gift well.”

I hear she framed it, and that made me smile. Then she sent me a whole bag of ribbons and trim so I could make more cards. I guess she is in for another pretty Thank-you card now!

I hope to get to spend more time getting to know Chris, I feel a connection with her since we both lost our only sons and we both love crafty things. Anyway, she is a beautiful reminder of how all talents, even of a craft nature, can be used to bless others. I love it when we find ways to use our crafty talents to fulfill God’s purpose!

Credits: Tangie Baxter and her equally talented Mother (the Illustrator) Rebecca McMeen, Tracy Ann (paper), Maya (book “nook”), New Life Dreams (lantern), and the edges were distressed with purple/yellow/green cat-eye chalk ink

P.S. Sorry about the photo quality, I’d lost my camera charger and had to use our video camera to take a picture before I gave the card away.

My Wordpress blog got a virus last July and I spent two months working with my then hosting provider to resolve the situation. They finally washed their hands of the situation and said I needed to get help from the Wordpress forum. Well that did not go anywhere either. So, my blog sat stagnant for the fourth quarter of 2009 while I mustered the energy to rebuild.

From September through December I was working on a contract basis doing strategic marketing for GoAnyware which left me with very little spare time. They are giving me a break in January and I expect it to pick back up in February. So, I decided January would be the month to rebuild my blog (post by post and picture by picture…ugh) and launch my website. I’ll also go ahead and backdate some posts with work I shared on Facebook during my technical difficulties.

I used a great little application called “Artisteer” to create my Wordpress theme. It was very easy. I’d highly recommend it.

I also decided to try using Joomla for my main site. Call me brave or call me naive. It has been a bit more challenging so if you go to my main domain (please don’t) then you will see a mess right now. I’ll be getting back to that next. I might even get started this afternoon!

I’m thrilled to be able to get back to blogging in 2010….Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from our house to yours…these are just mailing today!

The kit is a collaboration between Catherine Designs and Bisontine.

My daughter’s Kindergarten class is called the “Giraffes.” Their mascot is George the Giraffe. Last fall they all took turns being the “Star Student”, and got to take him home for the weekend. We had a great time with George, and this year with her teacher.

This is Teacher Appreciation week and today they were supposed to take a flower with a Thank-You card. I suppose I should have let her make a card, but I forgot about it until after her bedtime! So, I stayed up until 1:00 working on it, and then she forgot to put it in her backpack after proudly carrying it around all morning!

It was too cute not to share.

The giraffe painting is from a very old book. A couple of months ago I found it on a website where people shared art that is now copyright free. I didn’t know what I’d do with it at the time but I figured I would make something for Mrs. Green before the year was over.

The picture on the front of the card was taken on Easter. I loved the way the wind caught her hair, and figured it was a cute picture for Mrs. Green to remember our favorite Kindergartner by!

I created it digitally in Photoshop CS3 with materials from the following:

• White and Brown “Kraft” Papers: Amanda Rockwell
• Watercolor landscape paper, heart, and roses: Tracy Ann Graphics
• Pink photo wraps: Katie Pertiet
• Starry sky bling: Christina Renee
• Star frame: Ruth Davis
• Flourish: Rhonna Farrer
• Frame mask: Lynn Grieveson

I printed the front side on a piece of white card stock and ran the paper back through to print the back. The tricky part is positioning the 5 x 7 card on an 8.5 x 11 canvas in Photoshop and then turning the paper the correct way while printing the second side!

For my IRL (In Real Life) friends that have already sent us Christmas cards….we are LOVING seeing new pictures of your family and hearing what you’ve been up to in 2008. Ours has not been sent yet because we wanted to have a professional photo taken on the slopes at Angel Fire. We went with Neal’s whole family this past week and drove home on Christmas Eve.

I ended up using a photo taken with my camera because it was just too far for me to drag an uncooperative Raeleigh and for Danielle and Neal to walk in their snow boots. Thanks to Brandy for getting Raeleigh to smile, this was the best shot we could manage. I’m sure those who have been through the three year old stage can relate!

The paper and design elements are mostly from Designer Digitals, except for the tag which is from Two Peas in a Bucket. The green polka dot paper was a freebie at Designer Digitals.

• Festive Song Solids Paperie
• Posted Santa Postage Stamps
• Crystalized Postage Frames
• Postmarked Holidays Brushes and Stamps No. 02
• Chance of Flurries: Glittered
• Glitter Thread Stitches No. 02
• Tia Bennet Holiday Journalling (tag)

I really enjoyed digitally designing our card this year! It was all done in Photoshop. It was nice to not be limited to the designs that Moto Photo had to choose from. I actually designed our card in 2005 when Raeleigh was born because Moto Photo didn’t have a “Pink Christmas” birth announcement/Christmas combo. But I didn’t know about the whole world of online digital scrapbook shopping and scanned in my paper choices! This was much easier!

Kudos to those of you that actually handcraft your cards! I’d never finish that many of them and am happy to be sending these off to WalMart to be printed today!

Oh, and by the way, in case you didn’t know it, Santa snowboards and Mrs. Claus skis! Danielle met Santa while she was skiing, he gave her a candy cane!

I designed this invitation for my In-Law’s 45th wedding anniversary party with a lot of input from my creative husband. Since it is their “Sapphire” anniversary we wanted to use papers with blue accents. I chose the “Pink Chablish Digital Kit.” My favorite picture from their wedding album is this one where they are walking out of the church. I read in an article recently on Jenna Bush’s wedding that more casual pictures are in vogue right now. I think that is a wonderful trend because I always favor them over the posed shots. My favorite pictures of my husband and I are of us walking out of the reception towards the car.

I used Creative Memories Storybook Creator “Plus” software to create this invitation. The software is fabulously intuitive. I went to bed at about 2:00 the night I designed this and my husband got up early, while I was still sleeping, and typed in the information. He had never used the software and did not have any problem making his tweaks.

One of the things I think Creative Memories may have hotly debated, was how open to make the software. I think they made the right decision to allow people to use digital kits from other companies. I purchased elements from two other artists at the Two Peas In a Bucket store. The “stamp” for the 45 years element was from the “Circles Make Me Dizzy-2? kit and I typed “love still stands” along the flourish element from Rhonna Farrer.

Lastly, the “inked” edge was achieved with an overlay from a free kit at Shabby Princess called “Vintage Florals.” I think it will add the perfect finish to the invitations, which will be printed on 5 x 7 photo paper for less than a dollar each.