Father's Day Box Card

My husband loves the beach. Unfortunately, since he is still recovering from a heart attack, it will probably be a long time before we can even think about a beach trip. This card is as close as he is going to get.

I used the Heartfelt Creations Sea Breeze collection. Their paper pads often include colored images of the same design as their rubber stamps that can be cut out with their dies. 

The box card is my own design, cut with my Cameo and sized to fit the HC images of the Sea Breeze paper pad.

Birthday T-shirt for My Sister

My sister loves this quote. Someone said it was by Helen Keller, but I can't find a reliable source. My sister had a birthday recently, and she wanted this saying put on a t-shirt. She likes purple, and I happened to have a new, solid purple t-shirt of the right size in my craft closet. 

The design work took awhile, since finding fonts that looked good together proved a bit more time consuming than I expected. Yes, by now I should know that it always takes more time than I expect, but I'm an optimist. I also had some issues with the heat pressing. One letter got skewed, but thankfully I managed to fix the mistake, and it's hard to spot, even knowing where it is and what I am looking for.

Baby Box Card Exclusively with Queen & Co. Dies

I have made a lot of box cards over the years. When I first found out about them, everyone made them with a personal trimmer and a scoring tool. I started creating box card designs with my electronic cutter (I bought my first electronic cutter in 2005), because it was easier, but it's not required.

A lot of companies sell box card dies, and I took a look at them lately. I like dies. I like them a lot, but the price of box card dies was way beyond my budget right now. DH is on disability, and we're still getting medical bills, and probably will for awhile.

I have a lot of the Queen & Co. Foundation dies, so I decided to see if I could adapt a few of them to make a box card. I had to do a little trimming and scoring, but not much. It worked. I embellished the box card with baby dies, also from Queen & Co.

My electronic cutter is easier, but it was an interesting exercise, and I used what I had on hand.

Here is the result:

My only complaint is that the box card is a bit small. That is the advantage of an electronic cutter. You can adjust the size to your liking.

My Favorite Things Camping Box Card

I used stamps from a variety of My Favorite Things stamp sets, but the main set that I used for most of it is their BB Adorable Adventures set. I cut out the stamped images with my Scan N Cut, and colored them with Copic markers.

I created the box card cutting file on my Silhouette Cameo, then cut the back piece with a curved, stitched border die from a Queen & Co. Foundation border die set. The tag is also another one of their Foundation dies, from set 6.

The brown plaid patterned paper is from a pack that I got at Tuesday Morning years ago. I have no idea who made it. There is no identification on the paper, and I have had it in my stash for a very long time.

Beach Challenge from Queen & Co.

Yes, I know I said I was going to use a greater variety of products. I will. Seriously. However, I love the beach, and Demo Donna of Queen & Co. has a challenge going with a beach theme, and they are offering a $25 gift certificate to 2 people. With hospital bills and DH on disability, my spending money is limited these days, so I decided to give it a try. The chances of my winning are slim, but it's worth a try. There are some fabulous entries. I don't know if it's luck of the draw or whichever one they like best, but nothing ventured, nothing gained. I was itching to have a reason to get creative anyway.

I used a variety of kits to create this card, and in some cases, such as the Surfboard Rental booth, crab, clams, and bait bucket, I used dies that cut completely different items when used as they were originally designed.

My Favorite Companies and a Disclaimer

I haven't seen it recently, but the debate comes up on message boards from time to time, as to what bloggers and YouTubers are truly unbiased vs. those who are promoting companies and products because they receive freebies. I don"t represent any company. I never have. It's in the About Me section on my blog, but I don't know how many people read it.

I get nothing free from anyone. Because I purchase everything that I use on the cards and projects that I post, I do not feel obligated to use or praise any particular company's products. I have been using a lot of Queen & Co. products lately, because I have bought more from them over the last year, ever since the COVID shutdowns.

I started stamping about 34 years ago. I started scrapbooking 25 years ago. I have been collecting stamps, dies, and pretty papers for a long time. My current favorite companies (who get most of my spending money) are:

Queen & Co.

Heartfelt Creations

My Favorite Things

Lawn Fawn

Art Gone Wild

Karen Burniston

Hero Arts

Graphic 45

BoBunny

Paper Wizard

They are not listed in order of preference, although I did base my list somewhat on companies whose products I have purchased over the last couple of years. I have probably missed a few, so I may add to this list later. I found many of these companies at conventions, and I have continued to shop online when conventions weren't an option. 

I haven't had time to craft as much over the last several months due to my husband's health problems, but he is thankfully recovering, and I hope to be posting more frequently. I will also try to use a wider variety of products from various companies instead of focusing so much on Queen & Co., although you will probably continue to see me frequently using their Foundation dies.

Heartfelt Creations Card for 85th Birthday

I made this card for one of my neighbors, who is turning 85 this month. I got out my somewhat neglected Heartfelt Creations stamps, dies, and papers for this one. Their Lush Lilac collection has been my absolute favorite and most used out of all of their design collections. The bird cage die is part of the collection and is the largest bird cage on the card. I cut it from a metallic white card stock. The smaller bird cages are part of the paper. I used their lilac flower shaper and prills to add dimension to the flower cluster, and I popped the banner in a couple of places. I also added a subtle shimmer to the banner, flower cluster, and areas of the background with Wink of Stella. The birthday banner is also Heartfelt Creations, but was from their (now discontinued) Young at Heart Collection.