Hello everyone! Firstly I want to apologize for my absence. I have been struggling with my chronic migraines for the last 5 weeks or so. My normal daily pain is usually a 1-3 on a pain scale of 10 with frequent spikes, but recently I have been stuck in a pain cycle with daily pain of 5-6. This level of pain makes it very hard to feel creative, and fighting this level consistently for 5 weeks is very exhausting, frustrating and depressing – which also leads to lack of creativity. My neurologist has put me on a 12 day course of steroids to try and break the cycle of pain – fingers crossed!
Ok, enough of that nonsense. In between pain and dog sitting at non crafty homes, I have been working on two projects. I can’t work long enough to complete anything in a day but I am plugging along. One project is a wedding travelers notebook for my soon to be step niece. It’s almost done and I hope to post it soon. The other project is a July 4th sampler for my mother. If you follow me you remember my Mothers Day sampler. Click here if you haven’t seen it and want to check it out. Well, I told you Mom was practical and would probably want to use the frame for other celebrations too – sure enough, she asked for a July 4th sampler.
I had fun creating this while cat sitting for my lovely friend Fern (who, by the way has the cleanest and most organized craft room ever! It puts mine to shame for sure!). She had a few pieces of loose sheets of patriotic paper that were perfect. Then I used real red and night of navy cardstock from Stampin Up as accents.
The only thing I knew I wanted was to cut out the July 4 letters with the large letters dies from Stampin Up. I cut them from the patriotic paper and from night of navy – then I glued them together offset for a shadow affect. I added some candles to the top of that panel because, after all, it is the birthday of our independence and what’s a birthday without candles?
Then I looked through Ferns Stampin Up stamps and dies for things I could use to symbolize Independence Day. I wanted to make a sparkler using the starburst swirl from the Star of Light set that I used in the background of this card. I thought it would be perfect in embossed silver as the trail of sparkles from the sparkler. Unfortunately I could not find any silver embossing powder. 😕
So I turned to the Swirly Scribbles dies. I used the wavy one to make the flag. I love how it looks like the flag is blowing in the wind. I punched a few stars and helped them pop with some white gel pen around the edges. I used the round swirl dies to symbolize fireworks. I added a few silver stars to further the affect.
The word “Celebrate” was a perfect choice of course. And then I saw the T-shirt builder set! Who doesn’t have a patriotic shirt to wear for the holiday?
The ballon punch was an obvious choice. I added stars and some bakers twine for a great look. The Call Me Cupcake framelits made a great patriotic sweet treat.
Lastly, I had to wait til I got home because I had the perfect supplies to make rockets to finish off my sampler!! I used red & white paper straws for the body and I had gotten a box of decorative toothpicks at a yard sale (you know, the kind you put in sandwiches or maybe fruit or cheese). I had red, blue and gold but I went with the red for “The rockets red glare”. Then I punched some circles, cut out a wedge and used a ball stylus on a foam pad to start the curl and glued them into a cone shape. I glued them together with tacky glue and got fabulous rockets!! I am so pleased with how they came out.
My favorite part of the project was giving it to my mom! She was so pleased and excited she was almost dancing. I loved the smile on her face. That is why I like crafting and creating – I love to make people happy, or feel good, or cared about. Mom was so excited, we had to move the frame. We had hung it in the entryway at the front door so guests would see it, now she wanted it where WE could see it all the time! Now it has an honored place in the dining room. Not sure yet what I will create for the next sampler for our shadow box frame – any suggestions? I know I have to create a Halloween one and a Christmas one but there must be something I should do before then……… I really would appreciate any suggestions.
I hope you like my project today, and if you did please give it a like and share it with someone else who might enjoy it. Maybe I inspired you to create your own sampler – if I did, I would love to see what you create – share it on my Facebook page. Please leave me a comment if you have any questions about my project or if you need a referral to a Stampin Up demonstrator.
Thank you for stopping by today and sharing a few moments with me. If you haven’t already done so, don’t forget to click the follow button or sign up for e-mail notification so you don’t miss any of my projects. A special thank you to Fern for allowing me to use her scrap room and supplies to create this great sampler. Fern, I can’t wait to sit for your cats again!
Til next time, happy crafting everyone!
Jeanette
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