A Bear Card

Summer weather has finally decided to come to Ontario! Why did it wait until September though? Our grass needed cutting again and it looks as green as it does in June. Beautiful, beautiful days right now.

I didn’t sleep well Tuesday night so I was very tired yesterday. So I spent the entire day down in the lower studio (aka the basement) making some Get Well and Thinking of You cards…and the weekly challenge card. A quilting friend of mine called to say one of her long time friends was going to be in the hospital for over 30 days and she wanted to send her many cards during her stay…and she wanted some funny ones and some nice ones…. and could I make some for her. Sure no problem! I had so much fun making them and I’ll post them another day.

A couple weeks ago another quilting friend called to ask me if I could make a personal card for her brother-in-law’s birthday. We discussed what his hobbies, etc. were so I would know what kind of a card to make when she mentioned that she had made him a gift bag with bears on it and she had a piece left over and could I use the bear on the card. Sure, no problem! I love a challenge. Here’s what I came up with.

Apparently Barry is the outdoorsy type; hence the bear. I started out with a piece of white cardstock and sponged Tumbled Glass Distress ink around the top half of the card and brown and green along the bottom half. Then I stamped the trees along the horizon line, adding small brushes by just using a paint brush and dabbing on Distress inks. I added some brown limbs on the tree the same way. The fabric with the bear was ironed onto fusible web, cut out and then ironed onto the card. The top left corner looked bare and the bear looked like he was watching something so I stamped some birds (Tim Holtz) in the corner.

The sentiment was stamped and then cut out using a Spellbinder die. It needed another layer but the next die was too large so I just traced the outside of the same die and then hand cut it. The Happy Birthday was from one stamp set and then Barry was stamped using small individual dies which were placed properly using my Stamp-A-MA- Jig. It looked “okay” at the point but I wasn’t all that happy with it. “Okay” just doesn’t do it for me! So, I hand cut some small leaves, painted them with various inks and arranged them around the bear and added some ferns punched out from a Martha Stewart punch. Whenever I have small bits of earth coloured green/brownish/reddish paper left over I just punch a few ferns and put them in a small drawer so I always have some on hand. Once they were added it was good to go. My friend loved the card and she is sure Barry will as well. Whew!

And that is all for a Thursday,

           

Cheers

Violet