I've really had a fun time this year creating valentines. I originally bought this Spellbinder die, Parcel and Post, to create a valentine. I've used it for several occasions, but this might be the first time it's shown up as a valentine.

I already had a red mailbox in the folder that I had die cut earlier. Once I assembled it, I looked through my embossing folders for a good background and chose Taylored Expressions' Subway Tiles.  I used the smallest of The Greetery's Nordic Hearts for the front of the mailbox bordered with a gold metallic scalloped "frame." The sentiment embossed in gold is from The Greetery, Sentiment Suite: Love.

Then it was just a matter of diecutting hearts from a variety of papers, adding a bit of glitter to one, and assembling the letter going in the mailbox. 

This valentine is off to the Time Out Challenge. It's a pick two and I actually used three: layer, heart, love. It's my third, and last, entry into the Just Us Girls: Use a Heart Die–there are several here. 

Tracy gave me the Vintage Type die by The Greetery for Christmas. I thought it would be a good idea to use it to create my valentine for him. 

I had borrowed a friend's die a year or so again, so putting this together went pretty quickly. The sentiment is also from The Greetery, Just My Type. It's a great set, and there were several ways to combine sentiments. I'm a fan of this one. Here's a closer look:

I'm sending this off to Festive Friday where I used Red, Gold, and a Love Sentiment. It's also off to the Colorful Options Challenge. It's been awhile since I've played along with them. 

I definitely misspoke in my last post. I did, indeed, buy two other die sets in January–both from The Greetery. Nordic Hearts was part of their recent release. I'm using it today for another valentine, but it will be in rotation all year since it's perfect for anniversaries as well as thinking of you cards. The Cupid's Arrow die feels more like a valentine purchase, but elements of that die will also work for other occasions. I made a valentine for my grandson with Cupid's Arrow, but put it in the mail without taking a photo of it. 

This valentine (I made two of them) are off to friends, both of whom are wrestling with health issues. I chose the colors from The Color Throwdown Challenge: pink, brown, and white. I chose to use watercolor paper for texture on the card base. It's not a pure white but I hope it counts. 

I used the border die from the largest of the three hearts in the set to dry emboss the front of the card. Then I die cut the mid-size heart and border from kraft and pink cardstock. I love the delicate design on the heart. 

The sentiment is also from The Greetery, Sentiment Suite: Valentine, stamped in pink on kraft and die cut with My Favorite Things Itty Bitty Strips. 

In addition to The Color Throwdown, I'm sending this off to CAS on Friday: Valentine and a second entry to Just Us Girls: Use a Heart Die. 

The only purchase I made for valentines this year was Concord and 9th's Mix and Match Hearts. I started out die cutting many different colors of hearts which gave me a nice collection of not only hearts, but the frames for them as well. I played around with different layouts but ended up making three of the same design, but differing colors, for my three granddaughters here in Rochester. 

It takes awhile to inlay all the hearts, but it's worth the time. There is an accompanying stamp set which adds words to the hearts. I tried using multiple words, but ended up liking one heart with a word, layered with some dimensional tape. 

You might notice a few pink hearts with some ink blending. I found a panel I had ink blended some time ago, and used it as one of the panels, and of course, got an array of ink blended hearts as well. You can see that panel in the last of the three valentines.

The sentiment on all three cards is from Simon Says Love You Greetings which I die cut with My Favorite Things Itty Bitty Strips. 

Not surprisingly, there are multiple card challenges looking for hearts and valentines. These are off to four of them:

First up, Just Us Girls is looking for Heart Dies (plenty of those here!) I'm also sending these to Double D where the challenge is Hearts and to A Cut Above where Anything Goes with a Die Cut. And last, but certainly not least, it's off to Darnell's NBUS. For a change it didn't take me long to put this die to use.

Our next door neighbors have just have their first child, and they are, of course, overjoyed. I wanted to be sure to have a card and gift ready to take when they are up to a visit. I found the onesie in an envelope of die cuts I made when I borrowed Concord & 9th's Bitty Banners from a friend. I loved the patterned paper I used, and knew I had a wooden stamp that read "A Star is Born." The wooden stamp was too large, so I created the sentiment on the computer and die cut it with one of the dies in The Greetery's Pretext Banners.

The inspiration for the design came from a Clean and Simple challenge where they wanted a center focus. By the time I finished, I decided the card didn't meet the challenge requirements, but it does it does work for two other challenges which I'll link below.  I die cut several stitched shapes and ended up with one of the the Reverse Confetti Pierced Round Top dies. The stars were cut with Ellen Hutson's Essential Stars. I added dimension behind the Pierced Rounded die as well as behind the sentiment banner. It will be hand delivered so I don't need to worry about putting it in the mail. I do think this is a very Clean and Simple card, but I did lose the center focus in the end.

Here's a look at the inside of the card. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Tucked In: Baby stamp set which I stamped on a Simon Says Stitched Square.

I'm sending this off to A Cut Above Challenge–almost all die cuts, once again, and also to Addicted to Stamps and More: Any Occasion.

Once again, I'm coming to The Paper Players Challenge right at the end of the challenge. I had a terrific trip over the weekend, and our group flew home from Jacksonville Sunday just ahead of the big winter storm and snow. Being away, however, always throws me a bit off course. But I knew as soon as I saw this prompt I wanted to play along. 

I've had The Greetery's Sent With Love dies for well over a year, and although I have die cut and assembled many pieces of it, they've never made it onto a card. I knew this time exactly where I wanted to go, and I only needed to cut the liner for the open envelope. 

I die cut two panels from The Greetery's Postal Frames as well as the postmark die. The postmark is attached to a circle on the die. Once I had the part I wanted adhered to the card, I snipped off the circle. The envelopes and pen are from Sent With Love. I added a bit of dimensional tape to the back of the white envelope.

The sentiment from The Greetery's Tagged Elegance was stamped directly on the white panel in black. I added another tiny heart to the postmark and called it done.

In addition to The Paper Players, I'm adding this to the gallery at A Cut Above which always includes an Anything Goes Challenge, and NBUS since I finally have put the Sent With Love dies to use!

It is now a very unusual day as this is my third post. As I wrote in the previous post, I'm due at the airport tomorrow at 5:15 am, so there's no hope of posting it tomorrow. This is a card specifically created for two challenges: The Paper Players Color Challenge, and Seize the Birthday with the topping: Something New. 

I had some money to spend at Simon Says that needed to be spent by the end of last year. I could have purchased just one Penny Black die, but I ordered three. I'm quite sure all three will get regular use: All in One Hexagon, Flower Family, and Ascending. So that's the Something New for Seize the Birthday. The colors at The Paper Players were so bright and cheerful, I really wanted to play along. Fortunately, my to-do list didn't take as long as I expected, so I had a bit of crafting time. I ink blended the greenery and flowers, using two shades of all three colors. 

I love the texture in the Hexagon cover plate. The frame cuts at the same time, but separately, and I die cut three and stacked them for some dimension. After tucking the greenery and flowers in the frame, I carefully added some dimensional tape behind the flowers, and glued selected leaves. The sentiment is another of Memory Box's Black Greeting Tabs. They so often look just right.