I wanted to make a get well card for the lady with breast cancer that was discovered by her dog.  I had this idea of making a barn wood background, then laying the dog over the barn wood in some type of die cut design.  I thought the sentiment should be customized for the card, talking about the miracle that is her dog.  I finished the card tonight and I have to say, I’m a little bit disappointed in the end result.  I’m not sure what I was hoping for, but it’s just a little bit blah.  I think I need to put something on the front to offset the dog, but am not sure what that would be.

I was going to give the dog a pink collar for breast cancer awareness, but I have a girlfriend with breast cancer and she said she’s really gotten tired of the whole pink initiative, and feels like she’s almost branded with it.  That made me rethink the color of the collar.  Maybe my girlfriend is the only person who feels like that about the pink ribbon, but I didn’t want to take a chance.  I even talked about it on the video, but now I’m thinking I should have Rich edit it out, because I wouldn’t want to offend anyone or hurt their feelings by discussing something so personal.

So even though I think the card is finished, I really think I need to add something.  Maybe a one word die cut sentiment, but I’m not sure what would be appropriate.  Get well soon doesn’t seem right, but I do have the die for it.  I guess I’ll think about it a little bit more and hopefully I’ll be inspired to think of something that will make the card better than blah.  I don’t want to send her this card as it is, so I’m going to get serious about a way to make it frisky.  Frisky is definitely what I’m going for.

I wanted to send a card to one of my viewers, and she likes the color blue. When I started, I really didn’t know where I was going with it, so I’ve done a lot of different techniques. I started with the background, and used Distress Inks to create the background. I demonstrated with Fabriano hot press watercolor paper. I used Blueprint Sketch, Wilted Violet, Salty Ocean and Shaded Lilac and rubbed the ink pads directly onto the watercolor paper. You can use a waterbrush or a regular brush with some water, and smear the inks around to blend them. You need to make sure that you really dry the paper well before the next step. You can let them set overnight, or use a heat tool to do this.

I used the stamp set Peony Bouquet from Altenew and my sentiment came from Essentials by Ellen and was called Spread the Sparkle.

The next step involves embossing, so I used the corn starch filled pouch to rub over the front of the card and used Versafine Onyx Black ink to stamp all of the flowers then Ranger clear embossing powder and heat set the images. I laid my flowers inside the MISTI, but you can easily stamp these where you want them with an acrylic block.
After stamping the entire card, I used my Touch Five Alcohol markers in shades of purples and reds to accent the flowers, then took Distress Oxides with the next layers of the stamp set to give the flowers real dimension. I used Candied Apples, Seedless Preserves, Picked Raspberry and Abandoned Coral Distress Oxides to do this.
I used a micro-brush that I bought from Aliexpress in the make up area to fill in small dots on the berries.To find the brushes, I typed in micro brush make up and found these for around $2 for 50 of them.
I used a black Recollections heavyweight card stock for my card base that was 8 1/2″ x 5 1/2″ scored on the 8 1/2″ width at 4 1/4″, to make a 4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″ card. My card front was trimmed to 4 1/8″ by 5 3/8″ so there’s a very small border of black around the card. I lined the inside of the card with a piece of white card stock that was 4″ x 5 1/4″. I used fun foam to line the back of the floral card front and showed how to trim it to fit and used my ATG to attach the foam to the front of the card base.
I used Spectrum Noir Shimmer Pen to color all of the flowers, leaves and berries so the cared was very sparkly.

Sometimes I just lose track of days.  I think I’ve written in the blog in the last couple of days, only to find that I’ve not written in three or four days.  Where does time go?  I haven’t felt very motivated to make a card or go into my craft room.  I don’t normally watch much television, but I’ve been watching the Olympics and reading more.  I guess we all need a vacation sometime, and maybe in the future, I should tell viewers that I’m going to take a week off.  So that’s my future plan, but right now I’ll just apologize for missing a few days with the blog and not putting any videos up.  Rich is editing the most recent video I made right now, but it’s a long one, so I don’t anticipate it going live until tomorrow.  I’m hoping I’ll feel motivated to make another video soon so that Rich always has a video that he needs to edit.

The best part about having a YouTube channel, is the relationships I’ve developed with people from all over the globe.  I made friends with a lady in England, and hadn’t heard from her since before Christmas, and I was starting to worry about her.  Her husband had a heart attack last year, so I was dreading something bad when I emailed her to see how she was doing.  She told me a story that’s inspired me to make a card and to make sure other people don’t ignore the signs they are being given from an unlikely source.

Her sister had rescued a one-eyed chihuahua who never really liked her, and spent his time with her husband.  Lately, when she has been lying in bed, the dog would lay on her chest and cry.  It happened several times, and she had no idea why.  She wasn’t feeling well and went to her doctor.  She told the doctor about the dog and the doctor took the dog seriously and did tests on her.  The diagnosis was breast cancer, and the doctor said it was an aggressive variety, but because her dog caught it early, she would be able to get treatment that could stop it.

I wonder how many people ignore their animals when they give them a warning?  The only story I can relay is about my Mother and her cat.  Her cat was a rescue and never left my mother’s side.  When my Mother went into assisted living, the cat went with her.  She was in assisted living for several years and her cat was always on my Mother’s lap.  The day before my Mother passed away, her cat was laying on Mom’s chest, smelled Mom’s face, jumped down and hid behind a chair until she died.  My sister and I were surprised when the cat jumped down, but as time passed, we realized that the cat knew my Mother was going.  Maybe he didn’t want to see it happen, or maybe he was afraid for his future, but he never looked back.

Animals seem to have a sixth sense about these things, and I for one, will definitely take notice if either of our dogs lays on me repeatedly and cries.  I’m allowed to share this lady’s story on YouTube, and I hope if someone else has a similar situation with their animal, that they too will take their pet seriously, and contact their physician.  It will really be something if her story can save someone else’s life.

I inked the wrong side of the embossing folder on my first attempt to do a double inking technique, so decided to make a single inked embossing folder card insteadl Hey, why waste the card stock when it’s so easy to do this technique.
I used Couture Creations Magical embossing folder and Hero Arts Charcoal ink, then rubbed the ink pad gently over the top of the embossed card stock. I used a water brush and dabbed it into my gray ink to add ink on places that needed more ink. I used Canson XL watercolor paper cut to 4″ by 5 1/4″ and the sentiment came from a Stampin’ Up set called Another Thank You. The card stock I used was a deep gray color from Gina K. and it came from her neutral collection. The card base is 5 1/2 x 4 1/4″ . I used a black layer that was 5 3/8 x 4 1/8″ and I adhered it with ATG tape to a black fun foam layer, then tear taped it to the card base.
The sentiment I put on a strip of the same Canson XL paper with Versafine Onyx Black ink that I added clear embossing powder over it and heat set it.  I ran the edges of the sentiment on the gray ink pad, then adhered it to the front of the card with ATG tape.
I cut four 1/4″ strips and put them on either side of my sentiment on the front of the card. I stamped the back with the Made for you by Sandy Parker stamp.
I used peg stamps http://www.pegstamps.com, the grass sprigs and a leaf from the Autumn Glory set with the same gray ink to decorate the envelope.

I wanted to make a card for a friend who likes the color blue.  I started by using four different blue Distress inks and rubbed them across a piece of watercolor paper.  Then I wet it and blurred the lines so you couldn’t tell where one ink stopped and another started.  I dried it with my heat gun then stamped a floral pattern all over it with black ink, then embossed it and heat set that.  The floral stamps were layered, so I used the outline stamp first and colored that with alcohol markers.  Then for the next layers, I used Distress Oxides.  And in the end, I painted everything with Wink of Stella.  I’m not sure if people will like it or not, but Rich gave it a 10 out of 10, and he’s a pretty tough critic.  I always know when a project isn’t good enough to go on YouTube, because I’ll show it to him and he won’t say anything.  That’s never a good sign.

I don’t know what I’m going to call that video, as I used so many techniques and showed so many different products, it’s like a garbage can full of ideas and products.  Do you think people would watch a video if I called it “This Card is a Garbage Can of Ideas and Products?”  I think I’d get a few people wondering what the heck I was talking about, but probably not my regular viewers, they’d know it’s another off-beat Sandy moment.  That’s why I love my viewers so much…They get me.

I wanted to try this technique where you put ink inside an embossing folder, run it through a die cutting machine, then rub another color over the raised part of the card. I advise you to run card stock inside your embossing folder through your die cutting machine first, to see which side is raised and which side is depressed. You will want to rub the ink pad over the side that has the depressed image then holding the paper in place in the center of the folder, close the folder and run it through your die cutting machine.

On the first card, I used Hero Arts Hello Stamp Set and the Cuttlebug folder called Pomegranate Paisley. I used Gina K Sweet Corn ink for the yellow ink and Hero Arts Pale Tomato for the redder ink.
On the second card, I used Couture Creations Magical embossing folder and the inks used were Simon Says Stamp Willow and Hero Arts Forever Green. The paper I used was Canson XL watercolor paper cut to 5 1/2″ x 4 1/4″. I used the Willow ink on the depressed side of my embossing folder, which is the front of mine, and ran it through the die cutting machine. Once it was removed, I took it out of the embossing folder and rubbed the Forever Green ink pad over the entire card front.   If you miss some spots on your coloring, you can use microbrushes that I found on Aliexpress.
Here are links to some I found for them.
Fuzzy Brush: https://tinyurl.com/fuzzybrush
Foam Brush: https://tinyurl.com/foambrush

I used the sentiment from Impression Obsession stamp set called Wishes. I stamped it in the MISTI on the same Canson XL watercolor paper. The strip was 4″ tall and 4 1/4″ wide so it fit on the card. I knew I’d have to cut it thinner after stamping on it. I stamped Willow ink on it and stamped it three times to ensure a dark image. I then used NUVO clear embossing powder to cover the sentiment and heat set it. I rubbed the Forever Green ink pad over the entire paper to make it as dark as the background. Once the whole sentiment paper was Forever Green, I wiped the words with a clean cloth to remove any ink that was on it.
I used Gina K cardstock in a dark green color and cut it in half on the 11″ length, then used my scoreboard to score it at 4 1/4″ to make a 5 1/2″ x 4 1/4″ card.
I trimmed the embossed background to 5 1/4″ x 4″ and trimmed the sentiment to as narrow as possible and 4″ wide. I had a thin strip of the sentiment colored paper left over and decided to run it through the Xyron to make the back of it sticky.
I used my pink ATG tape and wet glue called Easy Paper Glue to glue the embossed image to my card base, then put ATG tape on the back of the sentiment as well as the wet glue and adhered it to the embossed image. Then I took one of the strips of paper I’d run through the Xyron and placed it below the sentiment.
I stamped the back with Made for you by Sandy Parker and stamped the envelope with a peg stamp from http://www.pegstamps.com with a stamp called a little Pumpkin leaf
and here’s the link to it. https://pegstamps.com/little-pumpkin-leaf-tiny-peg-stamp.html

The stamp I used on the back of the card came from Stampanda. I went through Groupon to get a discount code for Stampanda, then went to the Stampanda site and found their square self inking address stamps, and looked for the one that I liked, and changed it from an address to “Made for you by Sandy Parker”… Hope that helps if you want to make one for yourself. I think it ended up being around $20 to make it.

I get emails from Gina K from Stamp TV when she puts up a new video and she’s releasing new products.  Today’s email talked about a video from her daughter.  She did it in her dorm room, and shows her craft room which includes a tripod made from an old text book, and a peanut butter jar.  I have to say I loved her video.  She made so many mistakes that we’ve all made, and I think she’s a great addition to Gina K.’s site, where Gina comes off as very formal.  Having her daughter show the flip side of crafting, really made me happy.  Sadly, I can relate more to her daughter and her crafting techniques, than I can to Gina.  Gina’s very put together and her videos are professionally done (at least they look like they are.)  I felt so much more comfortable knowing her daughter’s tripod looked like something I would have used.  I know that Gina has been making videos for several years and owns a card making supply online store.  Maybe someday I’ll grow up, and relate to Gina more than her daughter, but in the meantime, I’ll remember that peanut butter jar trick, as I might need it sometime in the near future.

I made a couple of inked embossed cards, but put one piece of cardstock in the embossing folder backwards.  That gave me an inked back, and a white embossed front to the white cardstock.  Instead of throwing it out, I decided I should come up with a plan for it.  Why not just color over the top of the cardstock?  So I decided it should be in neutrals, whites, grays and blacks.  In the end, it came out fine and I ended up with two videos.  It’s one thing to make the mistake, but it’s another to explain how to fix it.  I think we all have made mistakes like that at least once.  In the first video I told people to make sure they practice with their embossing folders so they know which side is embossed and which side is debossed.  Of course I only knew how to do that because I’d already screwed it up.  If people did try it, then every crafter had the extra cardstock with no ink on it.  So in the end it was a win-win for everyone.  It’s not very often that a plan comes together for me, but this one did.  I can’t wait until you see them.  Rich is putting the video up and it should be online tomorrow.

I spent some time working in the craft room today and came up with a great idea for a card.  I decided to try coloring on embossing folders….I’ll let you know how that goes when I do it tomorrow.

On the flip side of that, I got an email from a nice lady that I had sent a card to.  I’d sent several that day, including one to France.  Of course I put them in the wrong envelopes, so the one that should have gone to France, went to a lady in the US, and I’m hoping I only messed up those two…I could have put all of them in the wrong envelopes.  How do I manage to do things like this?  In this case, I think it had to do with using two cards that I just made that look very similar to each other.  I probably made sure I was putting them in their matching envelopes and never thought about if I used the wrong card…The lady in the US that got the wrong card was really gracious about it, and I’m hoping the lady in France has the same sense of humor.  It’s definitely a good lesson for me to be more careful when sending cards.  I’m pretty sure I won’t do this again for a least a few weeks…