Washi Tape and Thank You Notes

One thing my collection always seems to be lacking are thank you cards. Whenever I'm feeling down, I make a thank you note and think about who I can mail it to. This accomplishes two things: 1) I get to have crafting therapy and 2) I get to reflect on all the good things that have happened so I can figure out who to send my card to. By the end of my taping and cutting frenzy, my smile has been restored. 

After being gone from the office for a conference for 3 days last week, today was particularly draining to play catch-up. Consequently TWO thank you notes will be mailed off tomorrow! Hooray!

The first will be going to the conference coordinator, who helped make my travel plans and took care of logistics - that job must be very stressful with all the little details to manage! Most likely much more stressful than mine.

These are the sketch challenges that gave me some much needed inspiration. The first is Mojo Monday and the second is Retro Sketches. 

I wanted to play along with the Mixed Media Card Challenge's theme  "Vintage". To me, there is a certain shade of pink that just screams vintage. Add a little pearl embellishment and you get the feeling of "Breakfast At Tiffany's" on a card. To create the polka dots near the sentiment, I sponged Distress Inks (Tattered Rose and Milled Lavender) through a stencil and then shaded the edges with Old Paper. I embossed the sentiment and flower in Pirate Gold.

This card is also going over to the following challenges:

Pile it On - "Cheerful/Uplifting Message"

Simon Says Stamp's Monday Challenge - "Anything Goes" 

The second card will be going to one of the foundations that helped to fund my presentation at the conference. For this card, I wanted to play along with Craft Hoarders Anonymous Challenge "Layer It". 

One thing I have been hoarding is washi tape - mostly because I just don't know how to use it very well. I was at an estate sale a couple months and scored an entire bag of it for $10 (which is a steal!) I haven't played around with it yet, and the Retro Sketches sketch inspired me to try to create a background with it. 

I began by splattering my card with shades of pink Distress Inks and then used a bunch of light and dark pink washi tape over that. I left the edges ragged because I liked the look of that best. For my next layer, I cut a couple of dies using my Cricut and then stamped over the center with a background stamp. I put the Thanks die over a piece of vellum, because otherwise it just faded into the background. Lastly, I added some enamel dots. 

I've only used a fraction of the washi tapes in my bag. Since they were purchased at an estate sale, I'm going to enter this into A Blog Named Hero's challenge - Recycle It.  Here are some of the pinks! I just can't wait to use more. 

And my smile is exactly where it should be.

If you'd like to give me another smile, leave a comment below! They make my day and then I can visit your blog, too!