Live 'n Learn

Were I not such a faithful blogger, there most likely would not have been a card tonight. Talk about a calamity of errors. Before telling you about them, however, I'll give credit where credit is due.

My card was inspired by one by Jennifer Stevenson that appears in the March/April issue of Papercrafts. Pretty, isn't it?

Featured near the back of the magazine, this one didn't include directions (not that I would have read them anyway), just a photo of the card and the supplies list. My first mistake: I stamped the reeds first and heat set the ink with my embossing gun. That should have worked. Right? Not. After stamping the flowers with VersaMark, I poured on the white embossing powder, which stuck not only to the flowers but the reeds as well. Thinking the powder wouldn't be "stuck" stuck to the reeds, I attempted to blow it off - not a smart thing to do when the sheet holding the excess powder is laying underneath it. The embossing powder flew everywhere - on the stamp, the open VersaMark pad, my clothes, desk, etc. A colossal mess.

My next idea was to brush the misplaced powder off with a flat paintbrush. Had I had the patience for it, it might have worked even though I probably would have ended up removing powder from places where I wanted it. Card front #1 was gingerly tossed in the wastebasket. My second attempt was a piece of cake. I embossed the flowers first and then stamped the reeds, wiping the ink from the embossed flowers with a tissue. In my pre-blog days, I would have tossed by first try and then stayed away from my corner for a while.

Materials & Tools: White Daisy, Desert Sand, and Chocolate cardstock; Chocolate ink pad; VersaMark ink pad; White embossing powder; Stampin' Up Inspired by Nature stamp set; Ribbon from Wal-Mart; Embossing gun.

After that long stamping saga, I'll keep the rest of this short. The little people are here again tonight, only because it didn't make any sense to take them home tonight only to return in the morning, particularly when it is supposed to be bitterly cold again. Daddy had supper with us and spent some time with them. Uncle Dusty was here, too, so it was a house full of boys . . . for about as long as I could stand it. LOL. Tomorrow is Friday. Hooray! It has been an interesting week at work. With the economy in the tank, a lot of people are getting nervous. Not me. Not now. Not yet. Hopefully, not at all. I hope you had a good day. I'm going to go finish cleaning up my embossing powder mess and hit the hay. Enjoy your Friday, and take care!