Birthday monkey

I love the images by Dustin Pike especially his happy looking monkeys!  He offers freebies that you can download and here is one of them!  I opened it in Word, added a text box and voila. A really easy way to make personal invitations!

My kids had a combination birthday party at a gymnastics studio.  I thought jungle gym... monkeys climbing... monkeys on the invitation...

I printed the image directly on the paper.  Added a strip of brown jungled themed paper at the bottom.  Rubbed ink along the edges.  And added the little dots with a marker.  I used the lime green paper so the invite would stand out.

I wrote a little poem on the inside:

Lance will be four.
Vienna will be six.

The Newmans invite you
to celebrate this birthday mix.

On March 19^th we’ll have

a combo party at a gym.

Join us from 2:30 to 4 to

celebrate her and celebrate him!

The favors were Vienna finger cookies and Lance brand crackers after my kids' names.  I packaged them in green bags with this little tag:

For the thank you cards, I used the monkey again after changing the text.  Then I stamped green leaves around.  That was it!  

Dustin has tons of images for sale.  He offers them in black and white and in color.  I actually don't like coloring so these were his originals but it's nice to have the option of matching all the colors if you wanted to.

So that's about it for my kids' birthday set.  Thanks for swinging by!

Happy Bird-day in purple, pink, black & white

I made a card for my friend's upcoming birthday.  I'm entering it in 3 challenges.

Paper Crafts Connection is what first inspired me with their color theme. These colors are so pretty!

Do You Stack Up - wanted us to use a bow.

Sentimental Sundays - it's all about the sentiment... and this is a clever one.  hehe

The purple paper is very shiny!  I embossed the background with my Big Shot.  (love love!)

The I used my nestabilities to create the layers after I stamped the birds and text (Stampin Up!)

I colored the birds and balloon with colored pencils and dabbed a little glitter on the balloon.

Finished it off with the ribbon.

Thanks for looking!

Green!

Well a whole lotta blogs are talking about green and St.Patrick's day so it was great to have a starting point for a birthday card I had to make for a MAN!  They are challenging for me so I decided to play with my new toy, the Big Shot and my first and one and only Nestabilities set!
The HB Happy Bday stamp is from Stampin' Up and I used their Old Olive ink.
The strips of black and cream paper were cut with funky scissors.
Just keeping it about shapes for this one.

I'm joining Allsorts and Sentimental Sunday for their green inspiration!
Thanks for stopping by.
And thank you for your comments.  I'm surprised by how much feedback I've been getting!  LOVE IT since I work alone over here.  :o)

Baby's 1st birthday invitation

My baby boy is turning one next month and we're having family over to celebrate.  I'm doing a nautical/beach theme (bring on summer!).  I made these invitations today and wasn't planning to enter them in any challenges but there were two that I couldn't resist.  

Annabelle Stamps is hosting a challenge using red, white and blue!  Oh how PERFECT!  haha!  Sometimes I need these challenges for inspiration but I had already designed my card with these colors!  I remembered their post from Friday so I smiled to myself as I worked away today knowing I could enter!

The top of the lighthouse is stamped on the front and then the whole lighthouse is on the inside along with the party details.  I'll spare you the date, time and my address and just show you the inside left side:

I also love the blog Less Is More.  They are all about clean and simple cards and again I didn't make this card with the intention of entering but their theme is "off the edge".  I absolutely couldn't resist because of my lighthouse!!!  I designed this card a couple weeks ago and just made it today.  I decided to do one with lots of white space and one layer to qualify for their contest, but I am mailing the one above to our invitees. 

(Less Is More DT - Per your recent post about your comments, I appreciate the critique and reminders of your rules and take no offense if I don't qualify.  I love your blog and just like sharing with fellow card makers.  Thank you for coming by!)

HOW I MADE IT:

Printed the text from my computer directly onto white cardstock.  The baby is a Close To My Heart stamp that I colored with Crayola colored pencils.  The lighthouse was a random stamp I got from a friend!  I used a fine-tip pen for the black balloon but the red one above is a punch.  For the blue sky, I dipped a cosmetic sponge in a blue ink pad and rubbed it all over.  

Brown, tan, blue, lace and pearls

How can a girl have so much luck?  I wanted to make a card for my friend's upcoming birthday.  She lives in a historic home and I was thinking of doing a vintage style card for her.  Then I saw a challenge on one of my fav card blogs Sentimental Sundays to use pearls and lace.  I knew that would be perfect for this friend!  Stampin Sisters in Christ posted a challenge using stamped flowers.  Flowers, lace and pearls... easy!  I tied it all together with the color theme at Pals and Paper Arts.  

Links to the challenges:

Sentimental Sundays Challenge #45 use pearls and lace.

Stampin Sisters in Christ Challenge #79 use a stamped flower.

Pals Paper Arts challenge PPA83 using three specific colors (see previous post)

I looked through my paper for inspiration.  I built the card around that.  I have a Fiskars lace border punch which I love and was happy to use here.  I stamped the flower "for you" that I just received from Stampin Up! for hosting a party.  I especially love how it matches the paper (which is not SU!).  Square scallop punches are from SU!.  Added SU! pearls, inked the edges and that was it.  Another simple card.

Shower card for baby boy

This card will be submitted to:

Pals Paper Arts challenge PPA83 asking us to use 3 colors:  

I didn't have those exact colors but came up with something rather close.  Now that I see my card and the Baja Breeze so close, I realize the blue should be more turquoise than baby blue.  Oh well... it's about what inspired me too!  I saw the challenge before I started and loved the browns with the blue so went with it.

I am also submitting my card to the Less is More challenge for week 5.  It's a color challenge using pastels and since baby blue is my main color - voila.  I love when things just work out.  :o)  I love the Less Is More challenge because C&S (clean and simple) is my style.  

I layered the white, brown and the foot print paper.  The puppy and buttons are stickers.  I love how the buttons match the ones on the puppy.  I stamped congratulations in Stampin Up! Whisper White and inked the edge of the brown layer.  That's it.  Thanks for stopping by.

Green Thomas birthday card

Playing along with Do You Stack Up challenge #9 "Just Green It".

I made this card tonight for a little guy's birthday.  Can you guess the party theme?  

He's turning 3 hence the 3 balloons.

(click to enlarge)

I used my NEW Big Shot *giddy with excitement* to emboss the lighter green background paper.
Thomas, the balloons and his name are all stickers.

I printed "Happy Birthday" from my computer.  Punched out with Stampin Up! punches.

That's about it. Simple but personal.