Thank you Mickey!

 I was looking for a simple design to repeat on several thank you cards to send out to our family and friends after our wedding, and really liked the circular patterns on this button mask by Creative Expressions.

which I felt matched well with the roundness of the Mickey shape (our wedding was at Disneyworld so the invites also had this shape on them).  I sponged Poppy Red Impress ink onto the card through the mask and punched out circles of black card in two different sizes for the Mickey shape.

When I also found a curved 'thank you' stamp in my stash I loved the way it seemed to curve around Mickey's ear!  I stamped the words using black StazOn.

I added some gold Stickles to the buttonholes to give it some sparkle and I'm ready to go!  It was easy to do a batch of these to send off quite quickly and I just had to leave the Stickles to dry.  Now I just have to pick a nice picture of the wedding to pop in the card for our guests that weren't able to share our special day - that'll be the hard part! :)

Happy scrapping

Gayle xx

Ssh! Can you keep a secret?

I hope you don't mind, but my project to share with you today is... my wedding invitations! I know that with summer coming there will be a lot of weddings coming up, and mine is no exception! Ours will be more towards the end of the summer (beginning of September) but as we'll be going to Disneyworld in Florida I've got my fingers crossed for some great weather (in the morning at least!).

I've been working on these off and on for some time now, and although they may look quite simple I can guarantee you that it was suggested several times by my nearest and dearest that they should have been simpler!

I'll start with the invites themselves (I also made RSVP cards although at this point I already know most of my guests will be coming!).

I chose cream for the background card as it seemed more bridal (and less stark than the white) and embossed with a Tim Holtz/Sizzix swirls embossing folder. I cut out a background shape in red cardstock, and the words 'Happily Ever After' on plain cardstock, using the Storybook Cricut cartridge. I wanted the words 'Happily Ever After' to be written in gold but couldn't find card or paper that I was happy with the colour of, so ended up painting each one twice in gold acrylic paint (with the help of a very generous friend!). I cut out one big circle and two smaller ones from black cardstock using hole punches, and stuck these together into the shape of Mickey Mouse, with a trail of gold Stickles to make it look like a balloon. I tied the inner sheets into the card using red ribbon and tied a bow to make it look more decorative. If you like Disney, there are lots of Disney fonts available to download for free on the internet (I wrote mine in red and black ink!).

And here's the finished article!

The RSVP cards were much simpler! I had a circular RSVP stamp which was about the same size as one of Mickey's 'ears' so decided it would be just perfect to use this as the other 'ear'! I stamped the RSVP in black StazOn ink and then added a larger black cardstock circle and a smaller one to make it look like Mickey. I used small scalloped cards in the same cream colour as the main invitations.

And here are the two together! If you're tempted to try making your own my advice would be to play with a few designs until you find something simple that you really love! On reflection it would have been easier to theme the invites along the design of my RSVP cards, but I didn't start working on them until after I completed the invites, so maybe start there! Also, enlist the help of friends if you can - it was taking me forever to paint things in the shade of gold that I wanted and it was no end of help when a friend offered to help me out ;)

I'm hoping to get as many hand delivered as possible but will certainly be enlisting the groom's help as I'm doing some long shifts at the moment ;) hope you like them! Please excuse the photos, I haven't managed to be home much during daylight hours(!) but I hope you can see the idea :)

Happy Friday and happy scrapping ;)

Gayle xx