Sunny Studio Retirement Card

Good morning, everyone, Amy Copeland here with a bright and happy retirement card featuring products from Sunny Studio Stamps and my go-to favorite, Lawn Fawn.  :)

 

 

I have worked for a spine surgeon for the past five years as a surgery scheduler/administrative assistant.  His last clinic day is tomorrow and he is retiring.  My mom has actually worked for him for the past 12 years, first as his radiologic technologist and then, in later years, his scribe for Epic (our computer program).  She is also retiring as of tomorrow.  I made this card for her for all of us to sign in the office and we took up a collection for a gift for her.  I started this card by using the largest Stitched Rectangle Stackable die by Lawn Fawn to cut a panel from smooth white cardstock.  You can't really see it in the photo, but I used the Cloud Stencil by MFT stamps and my Mini Ink Blending Tool to put a really light layer of light blue ink (Distress Ink--Tumbled Glass) down onto the panel.  I then used my MISTI to line up my "Happy" stamp from the Happy Happy Happy stamp set by Lawn Fawn and stamped that with Deep Sea ink by Lawn Fawn (Lawn Fawn's inks are my absolute favorite).  I took two stamps from Lawn Fawn's Simply Sentiments stamp set and used Lawn Fawn's Blue Jay ink to stamp those about 1/2" to 3/4" down from the Happy stamp.

 

 

For the word "retirement," I actually used an old-school Dymo label maker that embosses your letters onto the plastic tape, because I didn't have a stamp that said "retirement" and because I was being a little lazy and didn't want to use alpha stamps to individually stamp each letter.  You can get the same effect, if you don't have a Dymo label maker (or equivalent), by using VersaMark ink on black cardstock and heat embossing with white powder (if you have a "retirement" stamp or want to take the time to use individual alpha letters).  My only regret on this card is that I didn't center the word retirement very well underneath the word Happy.  :(  I guess that's how you know it's handmade-- haha.

 

 

After I got the sentiments down, I got to work on the GORGEOUS balloons by Sunny Studio Stamps--the set is called Birthday Balloon.  This is such an inexpensive, yet WOW stamp set.  It's a layering stamp set and I have discovered the key to making these balloons look super awesome is to go really, really light on the bottom ink color.  The only one that I don't think looks as good as the rest of them is the aqua balloon and I think that's because my bottom layer isn't light enough.

 

Here are the colors I used for each balloon, using all Lawn Fawn ink pads:

 

Red--Ballet Slippers (bottom layer); Lobster (middle layer); Chili Pepper (top layer)

Orange--Sunflower (BL); Carrot (ML); Fake Tan (TL)

Blue--Moonstone (BL); Fish Tank (ML); Blue Jay (TL)

Purple--Fresh Lavender (BL); Grape Soda (ML); Juice Box (TL)

Green--Minty Fresh (BL); Jalapeno (ML); Noble Fir (TL)

Aqua--Mermaid (BL--like I said, I would use a lighter ink for the bottom layer--maybe Minty Fresh); Merman (ML); Peacock (TL)

Yellow--Butter (BL); Sunflower (ML); Carrot (TL)

 



 

Finally, I used the Coordinating Birthday Balloon Die to cut out all the balloons and arranged them on my card until I was happy with the placement.  I used Lawn Fawn Manatee ink to stamp the balloon strings and attached all of the balloons with Glue Dots.  I cut off any pieces of the balloons that were overhanging the main panel with scissors, then used Mono Multi Liquid Glue to secure my panel to the card base (larger than standard size, approximately 5.5 x 6.5)--made from Lawn Fawn Mermaid card stock.

 

Thanks so much for joining me today--hope this card inspires you to create your own.  :)