Birthday Cards and Christmas

Christmas?  I know what you are thinking, didn't I just finally put that last box in the attic?  Well, yeah, but I am working on having lots of cards on hand by next holiday season, so I am doing a few per month.  It's part of yet another SCS challenge.  I signed up for 8 per month.  I made 4 of this card this week (but all the same design so for this project I am counting it as only one card):

This uses a collage stamp from Inkadinkado that I have had for several years and haven't done nearly enough with.  I really like it.  You will be seeing it (or at least pieces of it) again, I am sure.  The designer papers are all from the Global Views pad by DCWV, which aren't Christmas papers but their designs and colors certainly lend themselves to holiday cards.  The bling bits are from the Target Dollar Spot Valentine assortment, which I have certainly been getting my money's worth from!

This card also is for this week's SCS sketch challenge:

I modified it slightly by making the circular piece smaller.  If I were to do this card over, I think I would make the center piece the part of the card that opens for a message inside, so that the little round piece becomes the tab to open it.

I made a stop at the dollar store this week, which is often bursting with useful stuff for cards.  I used some stickers I picked up there to make this birthday card:

It is hard to see but the cupcake and border stickers have glitter on them, and the heart has a silver swirl.  I added the rhinestone to bling up the cupcake a bit more.

I also found a packet of 4 Lisa Frank notepads shaped like t-shirts, which were meant as party favors for a girl's birthday party.  I got the idea to use the notepad as the focal piece of a birthday card, so that the recipient can use the notepad but leave the last piece in place so that the card stays intact too:

The designer papers are some of my older ones and I don't know where they came from.  I used tape runner to attach the last page of the notepad to the pad backing so that the rest of the pad could be removed for use, then attached the pad to a rectangle of violet paper, which was then layered onto some striped paper and backed with more of the violet.  I added pink flower eyelets at the corner of the piece, then used mounting tape to attach it to the rest of the card.  The "Happy Birthday" on this and the previous card are stamped in Vivid purple ink.  The stamp is from Stampendous, I think.  It was with a set of used stamps that didn't have any packaging with them.  I intend to use the other notepads to make more copies of this card--a good design for the 'tween girl in your life, or maybe the 30-something hipster chick who still likes rainbow and unicorn motifs, only ironically.

I have more cards to show you and more stuff to make today, but that is enough for now.  Thanks for looking, and have a great weekend!