Two Birds. One Card.

Recently, a good friend of mine, Christina, asked me to take part in an event her organization is hosting. She and her husband, Nehme, own Chadra Mezza & Grill in Fort Worth, Texas. If you are ever in the area, you must stop by. Just tell Nehme "Drunk Girl" sent you. Long story.

As if owning a restaurant wasn't enough, Christina is also the president of the Fort Worth Chapter of the Hispanic Women's Network of Texas. Every year they host the HWNT Latina Art Show as a fundraiser that goes toward college scholarships for Latina students. This year, Christina asked me to make some birthday cards for the event. I, of course, accepted but was hesitant because what on earth would I make??

That brings to me Mr. Bean's cousin. She and her two sisters are the only girl cousins Mr. Bean has on that side of his family. She just finished her undergrad and is on her way to get her masters with the PPA program at her university. She's sweet, stylish, beautiful and extremely talented (there is one painting she did that I am tempted to carry out with me every time I go to her house) and she loves crafts. My sister and I always lived far away from our girl cousins until we were much older. But, I don't actually have too many girl cousins to begin with, so the fact that Mr. Bean's only girl cousins have welcomed me with open arms means more to me than they'll ever realize. So, I wanted to make something special for her.

I have a bookmark of Stonehenge that I brought back from our India/London trip in January. I have it at work on my cork board, so everyday I see it and wish I could be anywhere else than at work. While daydreaming, I've been sort of inspired by the shapes of Stonehenge and how, even though each piece is unique, they all fit together to form a cohesive pattern.

This isn't the bookmark. It is a pic I took while we were there, but you get the idea. I used this as inspiration for Mr. Bean's cousin's graduation card.

I basically randomly cut out the shapes I wanted and put them back together so the wood grain pattern was pieced back together.

Here's a close up. I added the butterfly for some more dimension and color.


The "congratulations" is written on the inside of the card, so I cut out the dark brown metallic cardstock and the front side of the kraft cardstock so it would peer out. I love looking at demolition drawings at work with all the dashed lines, so I added a faux stitch so it looked like that one piece of patterned paper had been demo'd.

This shows the layers. I used foam pop up dots for each layer. The kraft cardstock is Bazzill. The brown metallic cardstock is similar to one sold at Paper Source. The patterned paper is Hambly.

I ended up liking the results so much that I am also going to make it again and use it as one of the birthday cards I am submitting for the Latina Art Show. I have one more card to make for the art show, which I am still trying to work out in my head, but I will post that as soon as I get it done. Until then!