Love

One of last week's posts showed a stamp of a vintage couple I received from Inkadinkado for submitting a card for their on-line gallery as well as some paper lace and pearl embellishments I found at the dollar store. I've been wanting to create something with them and finally got to it today. This card's flowered background paper is from Crafty Secrets. I know I've said how much I like this paper before so I won't say it again. The embossed flowers were a RAK from Jacki because I admired some I saw on her blog. Thanks, Jacki, that was so sweet. I also used some rub-ons for the sentiments, but think that was a mistake. I've learned my lesson before with these, but I thought I could get away with it: Don't bother with cheap rub-ons. You'll only end up aggravated. Using name brand ones makes all the difference. Also, you can't really see it on this card unless you click on the picture and look closely, but after I stamped my couple on vellum I overstamped it with a crackled background stamp. It looks like cracked glass .

On this card you can definitely see my crackled background. I stamped my couple directly on the paper, then masked the image so I could stamp all around it with my crackle background stamp from PSX. I used red and a tiny bit of black for this effect. I stamped the word LOVE from Art Impressions on the bottom. My chipboard heart is from Heidi Swapp and I stamped over it with Staz-On and a PSX love stamp. More paper lace as well as some stamped stitches from Inkadinkado clear stamps.

This card I created for a challenge over at StampinD'Amour's message board -- two stamps and some lace. Easy enough. I used two vintage images from Inkadinkado. I used real lace this time as well as some self-adhesive brads from Colorbok. To get my oval I used a template from C-Thru Ruler, cut it out and then distressed the edges. I placed it on a turquoise panel and them stamped some decorative corners from PSX on that panel.

One of the hidden treasures I found in my locked file cabinet the other day was a folder full of templates. Totally forgot I even had them. Thought they were outdated even before that. But recently somebody was talking about templates and how much lighter, easier to store and less expensive they are than the punches everyone is so crazy for. Now, I wouldn't want to be cutting out a scalloped oval, but I would certainly cut this oval pattern out and then cut around it with my scalloped scissors. If I had to have 50 ovals or circles for a project I am sure a punch would make sense, but for my purposes these templates are just fine.