Star Framelits | The Maui Stamper

I only signed up for one organized swap this year at Convention. If you’re only going to do one, you think it through pretty carefully – and when I thought it through, I made the decision to go Manly. Manly cards are a challenge, especially with a catalog full of flowers and butterflies. Don’t get me wrong – I love flowers and butterflies – but sometimes a girl needs a Manly card, and I was looking for inspiration.

Stamps: World Map, Happy Birthday Everyone, Be the Star
Color Palette: Whisper White, Basic Black, Cucumber Crush
Accessories: Star framelits, Black Baker’s Twine, Stampin’ Dimensionals, White Craft Ink, White Embossing Powder, Embossing Buddy, Heat Tool, Rhinestone Jewels

I wanted to incorporate one of our 2015-2017 In Colors, and was pleased to find that Cucumber Crush would work. I’ll be honest: that’s the In Color I am having the greatest challenge using. When Christmas comes, it will get better, I’m sure.

I used the embossing buddy like mad, yet some of the cards still had some tiny white flecks. I think my embossing powder is suffering from life in the tropics – humidity is not a friend to embossing powder! If you’re having “stray bit” problems, try a new batch of EP and see if that helps. You can get some HERE!

Love this Bright and Beautiful set of stars:

Stamps: Bright and Beautiful
Color Palette: Whisper White, Tempting Turquoise, Silver
Accessories: Big Shot and Star framelits, Silver 1/8″ taffeta ribbon, Silver Glimmer paper, Stampin’ Dimensionals, Envelope Punch Board, 1/8″ hand held circle punch

The inspiration for this card came from Sandy MacIver. I had initially hoped to make the card with the top point of the star a continuous piece of paper front to back (rather than punching a hole to secure the front to the back) but I learned that the point is too narrow to make that work. I don’t like to add bows with glue dots, so I needed to figure out a way to make this one go through the card stock and still “tie pretty”.

This is the back of the card. I put the Silver Taffeta Ribbon through a hole punched at the top of the stars and tied it once in front, then wrapped it around the back and tied it once again (when I say tied, I mean like the first step in tying a shoelace – what’s that called? an overhand knot?) Those two “overhand knots” stabilize the ribbon so that when you bring it back around to the front the bow is straight, not catty-wompus. (Which IS a word, despite spell check trying to tell me it is not.)

I stamped a single word inside and added a few small stars to the envelope. The envelope itself was made with the Envelope Punch board to fit a 5×5 card. This card looks a lot more time-consuming than it is – give it a try and tell me what you think.

Stop by the Maui Masonic Lodge this Saturday, November 22 for the Maui Stamper and Friends Craft Fair! Paper crafts, jewelry, baked goods, embroidered linens, loads of gift items – we’d love to see you! 9am til 2pm