Apples for Favorite Teachers

Hi!  Glad you stopped by today.  Can you believe it's the end of another school year already?  Time seems to be just flying by and I'm still running to catch up with it!  Early tomorrow morning is the Awards Ceremony at our grandsons' school.  I made cards for them to give to their teachers to show their appreciation for a job well done in teaching the boys this year and helping them to acclimate here. There have been many changes with the move and new school, new ways of doing things, and new friends well-met too.  

To find something to make for both male and female teachers, I dug down deep into my retired stamps, punches, and papers to find the perfect items to put together.  Just look what I unearthed!  I  found the Harvest Hellos stamp set with the apples that I thought would be perfect for teachers.  It also had a wonderful sentiment that was just what I needed for these cards.

The base of the cards is Pear Pizzazz cardstock cut in half and then folded in half.  There is a layer of Real Red cardstock cut at 5 1/4" x 4".  On the first card, I didn't corner round this layer, only the crackle-look Designer Paper.  For the two women teachers, I corner rounded both layers.  For the ladies I also punched the fancy corner from the Detailed Trio Punch.  Just wanted to make the ladies cards a little bit fancier for them.  

After punching the Designer Paper, the seeds were stamped along the bottom edge with Early Espresso ink.  To color, I used a Light Soft Suede Stampin' Blends to look like apple seeds.  See, I had this thought of teaching as planting the 'seeds of the future' in our children.  

The apples were all stamped with Cherry Cobbler ink onto the Real Red cardstock and then punched out with the Apple Builder Punch.  The leaves were stamped with Mossy Meadow ink onto Old Olive cardstock and punched out also.  The stem was punched from Early Espresso cardstock.  These were arranged on the card front and one was attached with adhesive and the 2nd was up on Dimensionals.  

The smallest Stitched Rectangle Dies fit nicely around the sentiment so it was die-cut from Basic White cardstock.  For the Real Red layer, I used the 3rd smallest rectangle that just fit around the white layer, and then die-cut again on the end to make it smaller in width to fit.  The sentiment was stamped with Mossy Meadow ink.

The sentiments were each attached with Dimensionals to the card fronts.  For the man's card, I added a couple extra leaves to give it some extra interest.  But for the ladies, well, I thought they needed a little bling.  The three small Red Rhinestones were added to the sentiments on their cards.

The inside of each card has a layer of Basic White and a strip of the crackle DSP and a smaller strip of Real Red.  That left plenty of room for the boys to write their own notes to their teachers.  And that finished them!  Pretty quick to make up three of these this morning.  I love it when my family wants me to make some cards for them!

Hope you enjoyed a look to the past with retired Stampin'Up! stamps and accessories.  Just because they're retired doesn't mean they don't need some love and attention every once in awhile.  Some of my sets I'm just not ready to pass on to others yet.  Need to hold onto them for just a bit longer.  Never know when they'll be needed again.

If you're still thinking of ordering this month, please consider using the Host Code shown here.  It would be greatly appreciated.  

Thanks again for stopping by.  Be sure and leave a comment on what you think of my creations.  I love hearing from you and knowing you've been here. Keep making those cards and sharing with others.  It can really brightens someone's day to get one of your special creations in the mail.  It's so much nicer than bills!!

Blessings and hugs,

Sharon