March is for Birthday cards!

I have totally let myself down by taking so long to post these cards.  Do I have an excuse?  Not really.  Just procrastinated.  After really hating the first card I attempted for Lee's birthday, I set out to create some other cards for all the upcoming birthdays this month.

The first card layout is from the book "Originals".  It is a called "A Message Secured" and can be found on page 77. 

I have really fallen in love with this card.  It is beautiful but still masculine.  The paper isn't CTMH.  The kraft color is some random cardstock that I had saved from somewhere.  The blue cardstock is from Coredinations. It doesn't show up very well in my pictures but I sanded the cardstock so it has a distressed look to it.  The creamy cardstock is CTMH's Colonial White.  The chipboard letter is also from the stash. 

The stampset used for the birthday letters is Hodgepodge Alphabet and the sentiments are from the Something Special stampset.  I stamped everything using CTMH's Bamboo ink.  The metal ring is from Making Memories.  The yarn is Fiesta Yarn's La Boheme Goldrush (I think) from my yarn stash.  (Yes, I have a yarn stash too.  Have I mentioned my bead stash yet?)  Lee was the lucky recipient for this card and I kinda want to take it back and pet it some more.

Next card up was given to one of my favorite bartender's Lena!  This one is all CTMH.  It features February's stamp of the month, Piece of Cake, which is no longer available.  I LOVE this stampset.  I have such a fun time coloring all the images in and paper piecing it all together.  The images of the cakes are also pretty versatile.  You can use this stampset for weddings or birthdays.  Forgive the picture that is rotated but I can't make it behave and in the interest of getting this posted, I left it there to be fixed at a later time.

The cake has been colored using CTMH's awesome watercolor pencils.  I then used Liquid Glass on the flames and polka dots.  I then glittered the polka dots to bling it up (They look discolored in the image but are completely clear once it has dried).  I love how Liquid Glass makes the flames look so real.  It took quite a while to cut out the image so closely but I am really happy I did.  I don't think it would have looked as nice if I hadn't cut so detailed around the flames.  Pop dotting the image over a second stamped image really gives it a 3D appearance which is more apparent in person.

I used CTMH's Jingle paper for the background and blush cardstock.  All the edges were sponged with Blush ink to give it some dimension.  I finished it off with some grosgrain ribbon.

I recreated this card for my step-daughter's birthday too.  Only change was that I rotated it 90 degrees and the bow was under the cake image.

I hope you like the cards.  I haven't had much time to scrapbook for the last week or so but I hope to get some scrapping done this weekend!