I am way behind on my blog posts.  I like to post pictures of the cards within a week or two of making them so that I can get them ready for donation – which includes stamping the charity information on the back of the cards and sealing each card/envelope in a cellophane bag.  This can be quite time consuming so I try and stay caught up.

I typically post in the order that I make the cards and have several drafts just waiting to be posted.  To get caught up I’ll need to do a couple posts a week and will start with the post I had intended before I got completely side-tracked with Christmas cards.

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After watching a Valentine card making video, I was inspired to make a couple Valentine cards.  I don’t usually make cards “out of season” and I didn’t want to make all of the Valentine cards I plan to donate, just take a short break and work on something different.

To get started I pulled out a paper pad I’ve been working on for the past few years.  It’s a 48 sheet 12×12 paper pad so there’s a lot of paper.  I’ve used up several of the patterned papers but there are still a few sheets with cute puppies and ice cream prints.  There are also several sheets of tiny prints and tone-on-tone papers that worked well for backgrounds.

To keep it simple I pulled out a favorite go-to card sketch.  It’s a great sketch for featuring a cute print as the focal panel.  Also, since there’s only 3 pieces besides any matting, it’s quick and easy to cut out and assemble multiple cards.  Keeping with the simple theme I used coordinating stickers (a nice surprise from a Michaels’s mystery box) for the sentiments and embellishments.

By making just a few cards I didn’t get tired of the paper or the theme and managed to use up a couple more sheets of paper.  I’ve still got several sheets left but I’ll eventually get through most of the paper pad.  It’s hard to use up an entire 12×12 paper pad.  LOL.