Thank you card featuring a little stamped greeting, grosgrain ribbon and red and silver decorative paper

Our Christmas was very quiet at home. Our Christmas gifts for family were delivered with outside visits where appropriate and the others were mailed to arrive in time.  My Christmas cards went out earlier than ever in early December.  I am usually running behind but with less commitments this year they were out the door in good time! Yeah!!  We played a lot of games, watched some good movies, took a few walks and worked on projects.  Visited with Google Meet with family.  We have a new grandchild  - baby girl - born after Christmas.  Both Mom and baby are doing well.  

I am just getting to making the cards I want to send to those who blessed us over the season!!!  I usually use paper and trimmings from the season but this year there were very few as some gifts arrived wrapped in reuseable bags and wrappings like fabric!!!!!  

I have included brown gros grain ribbon from one of my gifts on this card.  I started with a red card base which I created to fit in a #6 - 3 5/8" x 6 1/2" - envelope.  I cut a piece of this beautiful red and silver gift wrap to size for my background.   I glued the ribbon to the top of my card before adding my background because its weight would otherwise overwhelm the light weight gift wrap.  Once the background was adhered in place I folded the ribbon down over my card front and secured it with a bit of double sided tape.  I found the stamped greeting (Taylored Expressions) in my stash, ran my pattern tracing wheel across the bottom edge, added a red layer before mounting it to my card front using 3D foam tape.  

The envelopes I used are sold locally and the packaging indicates they are no. 8.  The wide availability of these envelopes makes this card eminently reusable by simply removing the insert and buying new envelopes locally.  They are widely available so check your local stores.          Therese

Large all occasion cards featuring decorative paper, coordinating borders, aqua sanded & embossed white core cardstock and layered flower

Still working on large cards for donation!!  I am enjoying using fun new papers from my sister.  She has been destashing her decorative papers and I have been the beneficiary.  For these two cards I used a deep aqua/teal paper with yellow floral accents as the main paper and a coordinating yellow paper which has just a bit of texture.  For the card on the left, I added a border punched with the eyelet punch (SU) on both sides just above the middle of my card after applying a full piece of the aqua/teal paper.  I used a large rectangle of the aqua white core cardstock and embossed it with distressed line embossing folder (CB) than sanded. it.  I added small pieces of coordinating ribbon to the foil layer before layering it onto the aqua layer.  The flower is created using a large layered flower die (SX - red). I cut the largest layer and third layer from light yellow cardstock , the second from a coordinating aqua cardstock and the smallest from a dark yellow cardstock. I embossed all the layers using two different embossing folders  - Swiss Dots and another brocade background one.   I glued them together to create my flower and adhered this element to my foil layer with double sided tape.  It still needed a "bit of something" so I dug through my leaves stash and found these birch leaf punchies in green which worked perfectly!!  I added double sided tape and tucked them under the edge of the flower - done!!  

Pretty much a repeat of the first for my second one.  I changed the orientation from landscape to portrait, used D'vine swirl (CB) on the aqua white core layer and the yellow flower layers.  The brocade on on the light aqua and dark yellow center.  Just a strip of the yellow paper down the center of the background which was textured with my pattern tracing wheel before being adhered over the dark aqua teal paper.  I also rounded the corners of the aqua and foil pieces.    I have been enjoying the process and I have been reasonably productive!!         Therese