Merry Monday - Warm Wishes Card

Sometimes it seems strange to be making and posting Christmas cards in June but I will enjoy having them all done by November. I even designed and finished three scrapbook pages about my daughter and her husband and two grandsons enjoying the snowy weather last January. Once I'm down in my "studio" I forget about the weather outside and get right into the project.

Before I post the card I have to tell you about the birdhouses we have. We've had one for a few years (a rustic looking one made from old barn boards) and we had a family of wrens raise their young in it a couple of times, but not last year. I had been checking out the thrift stores for the last couple of years because I wanted another one but they never had any. So, last fall we were at the bird/nature store just outside Point Pelee Park and Joe spotted a real nice birdhouse and he was sure the birds would love it so we bought it - $24.99. The very next week I saw a birdhouse at the thrift store for $3.99. Never fails. This one was just a rough one, and not professionally done at all but for $3.99 who cares. So, I painted it light blue and green and added some burgundy and yellow flowers all over it. Joe laughed and shook his head and said it was pretty but no bird was going to go into anyway so it didn't matter how bright it was. It's been up for about a month, and no bird has gone into it or the other two. So, this week I painted the other two as well, but no flowers, one is just brown with a red door and the other is green....blah but he likes them. This morning we heard the wrens in our backyard but I couldn't see them around the two birdhouses in the back garden but tonight as I was watering the flowers I noticed twigs sticking out of the birdhouse with the flowers painted on it. It's closer to the house and we can't see it from our back door. Too funny! Time will tell if they actually use it to raise another brood but I had to tease Joe that the birds enjoy brightly coloured houses too.

So, on with the real post now - This is the card I made for Merry Monday as it's called on http://www.alwaysplayingwithpaper.com/

I decided to make this card pretty much monochromatic. The stamps are another .99 ones from Hot off the Press (Paper Wishes). The bird, the birdhouse, and the sentiment are all one one sheet, (as well as a snowflake and a small heart). The bird and the house was coloured in with TomBow markers. This circles were cut from Spellbinders and the tags from Quickutz. The background piece is a left over piece of pre-embossed paper from Paper Wishes that I sponged Broken China Distress ink over. The bird is popped up for some extra dimension. The little bow is just from the shoe factory and just happened to match. I really like how this card came together and I'm thinking of making a few more using my other small stamp sets.