Peek Of The Week - A Birthday Card For Kern...

Earlier this month it was my twin’s 22^nd birthday and my blog last Wednesday showed you the birthday card I’d made for my youngest daughter.  For today’s Peek Of The Week I thought I’d share with you the card I made for my son Kern’s 22^nd birthday.

On Wednesday on my blog I was lamenting the passing of the years, and I said then that I don’t know where the time has gone.  When I look at my son it seems like only yesterday that I was picking him up and winding him after he’d had some milk… but now he could pick me up, quite easily!

Even though his father is mad keen on rugby and football and fishing, Kern has never shown much interest in any sport.  Instead he prefers going to the theatre and going to concerts.  He has a girlfriend who shares his interests, and those interests perhaps explain why he chose to do a degree in English Literature.  He graduates in July and begins a Masters in Creative Writing in September… maybe I can get him to write this blog for me!

In making this card I set myself a challenge to make a clean and simple one.  I wanted the focus of the card to be the sentiment itself, and I didn’t want attention to be drawn away from the sentiment by any overly ornate decoration.

I must admit I was quite excited as this die popped through my letterbox just recently from Florartistry. I’d fallen in love with the dies when I saw them on Create & Craft last week.

Taking a piece of stamping card, I stamped the Rare Earth circles in clear ink which I heat embossed with a clear embossing powder, as I wanted to achieve a ‘resist’.

Next, I die cut the ‘Birthday’ sentiment in red four times and layered them up to give some added dimension.  I then chose my other two colours of card stock, of blue and mustard yellow, and then I matched up my inks.

Putting some ink on to my craft mat in each of the three colours I wet my largest Rare Earth blending brush and created the three bold strokes of colour – and I was really happy about the way the resist came through.

I then took a small ‘Happy’ die from the Tattered Lace ‘Love Is In The Air’ sentiment set, cut this out in red, and mounted it on to the yellow card.

Then it was just a case of putting the card together.  I used foam tape underneath the main white layer and also under the ‘Happy’ sentiment just to add a little interest.

The final detail was added by using pearl drops in various sizes quite randomly over the card front.  Actually, this was more difficult than you might think, just because it is hard to position items in ‘random’ locations – however hard I try I seem to create a pattern with them!

Overall, I was pleased with the finished result, and I hope Kern was too!