April Fool's Day Joke Card and Father-In-Law's Birthday Card

OK, my body now has this 6am alarm clock, and I have no idea why. I used to just be able to sleep until late in the morning. Now, it seems like I wake up everyday at 6am. I didn't even have to wake up that early to go to work. Kind of stinks. Oh, well.

The challenge at FCCB this week was to make a card with a joke in it, in honor of April Fool's Day. At first I thought I would skip this week's challenge. I don't really do jokes and honestly, what do you do with a card that has a joke in it? I guess I will turn it into a birthday card or something later on down the road. But for now, this is what I have:

Sorry for the bad picture. My husband is still sleeping (lucky dog) and I didn't want to wake him by turning on the light's I usually use when taking pictures of my work.  Anyway, here is the punch line:

Again, sorry for the bad pic but also the bad print job. I ran out of black in, and am running out of color ink and really don't have the money to buy new ink cartridges. I don't understand why I can buy a basic printer for $30 but have to spend more than the printer is worth to replace ink. Seems a little crazy to me. And until I get back to work,  I'll have to make due.

On to my second card. My father-in-law's birthday is coming up soon and I have been working on a card for him. I am actually going to enter this card into the challenge at Die Cuttin' Divas. This weeks sketch is


I chose to turn this sketch into my father-in law's birthday card and have come up with this:
Front 

Inside 

Here are some close ups and a little bit of how to (sort of, I guess).

OK, the bottom picture is supposed to show a close up of the font that I used. I Googled carpenter font, and found this. I looks like planks of wood that have been nailed together and uses nails as the punctuation. I thought it very appropriate for the card.

Now for the screwdriver. I don't have a Cricut cartridge containing a screwdriver, so I pieced one together with shapes from the George and Basic Shapes cartridge and cut it out in a steely gray color. I then traces the handle onto some scrap acetate and glued it down with glossy accents. Then, I cut put pieces to emulate the stripes on some screwdriver handles. I used a shimmer paper. I got it at a garage sale and am not sure of the brand. Then, to make it look kind of like plastic, once I glued down the pieces I went over the pieces with glossy accents. No only does the hand look like plastic, it is also dimensional. It's actually really cool in person.

The card base is Kraft paper from a pack of paper I bought at Target. I have no idea what the brand is, but do remember that I had not heard of it before. I then ran the card base through the embosser with the wood grain embossing folder. I then went over the raised area with Stampin' Up Crumb Cake ink and an ink to paper technique to accentuate the raised area.

The sentiment is stamped on Stampin' Up marina mist paper with marina mist ink using the Feeling Sentimental set. The dark brown paper (early espresso also from Stampin' Up) was embossed with the wood grain embossing folder and adhered to the marina mist paper. I used glue stick to adhere them and used the staples just for show.

I didn't have screw brads so I made my own. I went over some brads that I have with gold paint pen and then added the Phillips Head markings with a gold sharpie. Then I punched very small holes in each corner and added the brads.

I found a measuring tape digital stamp for free on line, printed it on yellowish orange paper and adhered it down with glue stick.

I really am pleased with both cards, but really have fallen in love with the screwdriver card. I may be back later, who knows. Until next time.....


Miranda