A Happy New Year to all my dear readers.  I hope your year is filled with love, fun, creativity and peace.

I thought I’d start off the {31 Days of Cards} series with a Thank You card.  As I move into 2015, I’m overwhelmed with how much I have to be thankful for.  As I go through the year, I want to start and end my days thinking about all the things I’m grateful for; I really want to make this a habit.

So onto the card.  I realized I haven’t explained much about this series so here goes.  It’s pretty straightforward.

• Every day in January I will post a handmade card.
• I will make cards for all occasions.
• I will demonstrate different card making techniques.
• I will have a daily giveaway for the card I made that day. Winners announced the following day.
• I will have a Grand Giveaway for all 31 cards on February 1, 2015.

So how do you enter the Giveaway?  Glad you asked.  Just leave a comment on each days post.  Everyday I will randomly pick a winner from the day’s comments.  Additionally each commenter will be entered into the drawing for the Grand Giveaway for all 31 cards. Easy, peasy.

Card #1 – Thank You

I started by assembling all my supplies.

Then, cut out the paper.  I used a teal cardstock for my base and white cardstock for the background.  Additionally I put white cardstock on the inside because it’s hard to see pen ink on dark colored cardstock.

To highlight the border punch and to provide a place for the sentiment, I backed the front of the card with white cardstock.  I also trimmed a 1/2″ off the front flap of the card so the white would peek out.

I used my scallop border punch to create a nice decorative edge. Then, using my adhesive I attached the white card stock to the back of the front flap of the card.

Because I wanted to add some pizzazz to my card, I chose embossing powder for the sentiment and the butterfly.  Using embossing powder gives your cards depth and interest.  I chose black for the sentiment and glittered black for the butterfly.

I stamped my “Thank You” sentiment with Versamark Ink, poured on the embossing powder then embossed the image with my heat gun. (I didn’t take detail photos of this step, but you can see it in the final shots)

I moved onto cutting out the butterfly.  I used my Big Shot Die Cutter for this and a butterfly die from Simon Says Stamp.  I used washi tape to secure the die to the front of the card and cut out the piece.  This step achieved two things: 1.  It punched out a butterfly outline on the front of the card and 2. It gave me a beautiful die-cut delicate butterfly to emboss and then attach to the front of the card.

I used Versamark ink again to ink up the butterfly and then poured glittered black powder and heat set it.  The pictures really don’t do it justice – it looks awesome.

I then used my adhesive to just attach the middle section of the butterfly to the white cut out section.  Leaving the wings loose gives the card a nice 3 dimensional look.  I also added a gemstone.

I finished the card by tying ribbon around the card between the butterfly and the scalloped edge.  I wanted to tie a bow, but my bow-tying skills leave a lot to be desired so I just tied a double-knot and trimmed the ends.  I also glued down the extra piece of white card stock on the inside.

Here is the finished card.

This was a fun card to start the series off with.  Remember to leave a comment below and be entered to win this card today and possibly the Grand Giveaway of all 31 cards on February 1, 2015.

Until tomorrow,

I’m thankful for walks, food, comfy pillows, treats, a happy home, Woody, Ellie, mom and dad.