Hopping for Heroes

Welcome to this stop on the Operation Write Home blog hop. You should have arrived here from Celeste's blog here. If you didn't start at the beginning of the hop, or you need an explanation of the purpose and goals of Operation Write Home, please click on the Own Home Front link. They welcome handmade cards of all types for our nation's heroes serving in our country's military and your cards are welcome too. For today's hop I have two cards for Any Hero, to thank them for their service to our country and a Valentine's Day card for a service member to use to send home to their favorite sweetheart. From my blog, you will travel to see Karen's creations, her link is at the bottom of this post.

For the top two cards, I made a sheet of polished stone, using gold craft, Brilliant Blue and Riding Hood Red dye ink. You can use just pieces of a polished stone sheet to accent a card.

The card on top uses Papertrey Ink's Quilter's Sampler. I like a versatile set that suits almost any occasion, depending on the colors and layout you choose. I alternated a white shimmery paper with the polished stone, punched out some stars using a cuttlebug die. The sentiment is from PTI's button bits set.

For the second card I traced a star and used it as a template to cut them out of the polished stone paper, mounted them on gold moire and pierced around them. The white swirly paper was just a fancy sheet I bought once at Archiver's and finally used.

The third card is for Valentine's Day. If you would like to make Valentine's Day cards for the service members to use to write home to loved ones, the deadline for receipt of these cards is January 8th. For that card I used a Crafty Secrets set called 'Cherish,' embossed in gold. Then I used some of the newer SU shimmer paint in champagne but mixed in a droplet of Pretty in Pink reinker to get a slightly pink tone, painted on vanilla cardstock. I embossed the Manhattan Die on vanilla, mounted the pieces on Pink Pirouette and paired it up with prima roses dipped in champagne shimmer paint, some PTI buttons and blush ribbon.

I don't know anyone personally that is serving in the military, however I am a first generation immigrant and heard enough stories from my dad about living in a repressive society to really appreciate the freedoms we have in this country. Freedom doesn't come without sacrifice, and a handmade card is such a small way to show our appreciation. Many thanks to all who serve and to their families.

Thanks for looking, enjoy hopping and Operation Write Home looks forward to receiving your cards for heroes.

For the next stop on this blog hop you will want to visit Karen's blog here. She has such a pretty smile and a fine stamping talent, check out her skills with Tombow markers.