Tailor a card for anyone!

This is a card I made to thank Kyle at the Vortic Watch Company.  We were in Fort Collins, Colorado, and he kindly met with us and gave a tour of the shop.  This amazing group is saving American antique pocket watches and re-creating them into bespoke wrist watches!

Not only does this appeal to my love of good craftsmanship, I love the thought of saving these antiques.  Check out their site!

Marlayn Giron - Author, Inspiration, Friend

I recently met a dear lady named Marlayne and we hit it off immediately!  Her husband plays the guitar in the praise band at my church and we happened to sit next to each other at a church outing to a baseball game.  Marlayne and I talked the whole time!  Not only is she sweet and friendly and a light of Christ, she is an author of some really wonderful books! 

I made this card for her by printing out tiny book covers and gluing them onto the stamped books.  She has a new book coming out in the Fall so I'll make her another card to include that one too!  This set is really versatile as it has different types of shops.  "Let's Go Shopping" is a bundle on sale right now for 10% off if you get the stamps and dies.  You'll want both for sure.  It offers great variety and is a lot of fun to play with as you can create different scenes with the elements.

In Memory of John de Ruiter

John was a dear friend, world adventurer, amazing photographer, faithful servant of the Lord, wonderful husband-father-grandfather, and all around delightful man who made a big impact on all who met him.  He was a fixture of Community Lutheran Church and will be dearly missed.  We grieve for our loss here, but also appreciate that he truly lived life to the fullest and lived over 91 years up to the last moment.  He was on yet another adventure, this time snorkeling off of Panama when he joined his beloved wife in Heaven.

I needed to make a special card fitting of him.  The first one I made with the new Stampin' Up! Picturesque set and sent each to his daughter and son and the second was to his granddaughter whom I had met and I knew he was like a mighty oak in her life.  The beauty of card making is that you can tailor something special to reflect the person and occasion!  I know this isn't a typical sympathy card, but John really was bigger than life and travelled the world capturing beautiful photographs of wildlife and landscapes.  It was because of him that we started The Adventurers' Club!   I love to cook and entertain so we'd have a dinner party and then John would share his latest adventure in a slide show complete with his witty commentary.  He usually took special National Geographic Photography tours so we all felt we got smarter as we relived his adventure from the comfort of our family room. 

Inside the cards is a large gold cross I die cut using the Hold on to Hope set's large slender cross cut out of Stampin' Up! gold foil paper.  John was an avid servant of God with me and we often would be at church volunteering.  Sometimes it was just the two of us stacking chairs, which could be a chore, but he always had me laughing and made it fun.