Looking For Rainbows

Everyone needs a little cheering up sometimes, right? I made this card to send to a friend who was going through a rough patch in her life about the same time that I too was going through sadness from having to put a beloved furbaby to rest. Focusing on making a card to help cheer someone else up seemed to help ease some of my own sadness.

My friend is a fan of all things kawaii and Hello Kitty, so I decided to use this Hello Kitty with umbrella image from the Hello Kitty Greetings Cricut cartridge. Cutting file for clouds and raindrops were created in Make the Cut and the grassy background border was cut using Lawn Fawn's Stitched Hillside die.

On the inside, I used Karen Burniston's Katherine Label Pop Up mechanism to animate my card. As the card is opened, a rainbow and Hello Kitty pop up and rise up to the top of the card.

Paper pieced rainbow and clouds cut file comes from Cricut's Once Upon A Princess cartridge. Cutting files for Hello Kitty with balloons and blue birds were created in Make the Cut design program from coloring book images. I hope that this simple card brought even just a little bit of sunshine into my friend's day!

Have a "GROOT" Birthday!

Every year I try my best to come up with a birthday card that will amuse my son in law. It's challenging but fun because I find myself learning a lot about things he enjoys. For example, this year I decided to use  baby Groot on his birthday card.

Do you know Groot? Any Marvel Comics fan would know him as the tree character in Guardians of the Galaxy. Groot's vocabulary is limited to just three words, "I am Groot", but depending on the tone of his voice, those three words can translate to many different things, and it's usually something unexpected and funny.

 

I was happy to find several cute coloring page images of baby Groot which were rendered into cutting files in Make the Cut Design program. 

Then for a fun surprise, I used Karen Burniston's Flower Pot Pop Up die and planted a baby Groot inside. 

I used one of the stitched balloon dies from Craft Emporium's Balloons Galore set to add festive birthday balloons.

Just for laughs I added the translation for "I am Groot" in the sentiment box and a print and cut image of adolescent Groot's cassette tape of rock music. Birthday cupcake was cut and pieced from Cottage Cutz' Tiered Cupcake die set. It was fun putting this card together while watching and laughing at Groot video clips from old Guardian of the Galaxy movies on You Tube. Hope my son in law enjoyed his card as much as I enjoyed making it!

Golf Shutter Card

I'm always looking for new ideas for golf themed cards to make for hubby so  I was excited when I came across this Golf Shutter Card designed by Cyndy Gustashaw of My Scrap Chick. 

Shutter or Magic Iris cards are probably one of the funnest interactive cards to receive. As the lever on the right side of the card is pulled down...

The center shutter or iris of the golf ball opens up to reveal a message.

Although the interactive element of  this type of card is fascinating, admittedly it was a bit fiddly to assemble. After a few practice runs I knew I would have to add some strength by using a double layer of cardstock for all the working pieces of the mechanism to ensure the iris would open and close smoothly. I should also mention that I used Cuttlebug's Tiny Bubbles embossing folder on the pieces of the iris to give the golf ball a cool dimpled texture but that may have created some of the resistance causing the need for the extra reinforcement of the mechanism.

I kept the inside of the card simple by using a golf course background printed at 60% tint and adding the birthday sentiment, using Aloha Summer font. 

This was my first time working with this style of shutter/magic iris card. Although initially I ran into some difficulty getting the mechanism on this card to work smoothly, hubby loved his birthday card so much that I guess I will be playing around with it a bit more so I can get better at putting this together. I am hoping to one day try this with a camera shaped card,