Back to the grind...

Happy New Year everyone! I did not fall off a cliff or disappear over the holidays, as some friends have suggested- I just got busy with the kids being home, holiday cooking and enjoying the parties, family and friends. Now that all that holiday goodness is over, it's back to the grind of school, homework and deadlines. I'm really not quite out of holiday mode and found it very difficult to motivate to get out to work today, as I'm sure everyone else did too! I did have two small events over the holiday break- the first was that I took care of Houston's first baby of the New Year in the NICU last week- somehow my picture did not make the paper, however! No credit for the docs!

The second was that my 7 year old son has finally lost his training wheels and started to fly solo (there is a higher power for sure!). His success this weekend prompted this little card to celebrate his success. I find masculine cards hard to make. I keep wanting to add a rhinestone or use a punch, but that slides me way too far to the girlie side fast! I think the key to guy cards, though, is simplicity.

For this card, I started by stamping some open circles in Old Olive on the card base to resemble wheels.  I punched a simple border with one of my MS edge punches and stitched some striped DP on top. Stripes are always good for guys and a little stitching is still OK (more to come on the stitching...). I inked the bicycle stamp with Old Olive and Basic Black markers, stamped on Whisper White and cut the image out with a nested die on my Sizzix machine, with a layer of Bashful Blue and Black to frame it. The greeting was stamped, cut out using a nested die and sponged with blue ink while the die was still in place to leave a neat white edge. A little orange ric rac and a black button and it's done! My little guy was so proud of his success and that he got a special card for it!

I don't usually sew on guy cards, but I needed to find a way to add some stitching so I could use my new present from Santa- my first real sewing machine! I have been sewing since I was 5 years old, made my wedding dress and train, drapes, baby bedding, etc, but this has all been done on the Kenmore machine my mom bought 2 years before I was born and I took with me to college. Let's just say that that machine is more than 40 years old, has about 6 built-in stitches and needs oil now and again!

It was easy to impress me with all the electronics out there, but in the end I decided on a Janome Memory Craft 6600 with 390+ built-in stitches, 4 alphabets, and so many great features- too fun! I can't wait to use some of the decorative stitches on cards- oh yeah, and fabric!

Hope you have a great day back at your regular grind!