Kelli at There’s No Place Like Home hosts Paper-Crafting Thursday where we can show cards, bookmarks, etc. that we have worked on. She has some really cute caramel apple cards up this week!

I needed to write some thank you notes and wanted to make the cards for them. A few weeks ago I had found these neat raised stickers at Michael’s in their sales bin for a dollar or two.

I used one on this card:

Many places that sell card crafting supplies sell what a friend of mine calls “cheater cards” — cards with a decorative background so all you have to do is add embellishments. That’s what the one above started from.

I had wanted to use some new stamps to stamp a “Thank you” that I could then cut out and use, but I was in a bit of a time crunch. So I typed “Thank you” in a couple of different fonts on the computer and cut out a piece of card stock 4″ x 6″ and placed it in the photo tray of our printer and printed the “thank yous” out on that — worked just fine! You could also write them out by hand if you have nice writing or printing — I’m sorry to say I don’t.

Then, to get them into a shape, you could either cut or punch the shape out first and write in the center or try to arrange a stamp centrally. Or you could take a paper punch like this…

…and then turn it upside down and center the words in the opening like this:

It takes a bit more pressure to punch it out upside down, but I like being able to center words or a design like that. You could also cut them out freehand…but I don’t really have a good eye or a steady hand for that, so I rely on tools.

I used that paper punched thank you here:

I apologize for the blurriness! I thought it came out clearer, but I have already sent it out, so I can’t retake the picture.

And finally this one uses already cut-out leaves with a thank you glued in the center along with a couple of stickers from the above package.

I enjoyed making these! I hope the recipients enjoy them, too.

You can find more card ideas at Kelli’s.

Kelli at There’s No Place Like Home has begun hosting a Paper Crafting Thursday. I’ve enjoyed Kelli’s card tutorials for some time and look forward to seeing what everyone does. And I was excited to learn that I won last week’s paper crafting giveaway!

Mine are still pretty amateurish compared to others, but I love the creativity!

These are from last year as well — I hope to make some new ones this week.

The verse was cut from a sheet of verses I printed out on the computer, and the heart was made with a paper punch.

The brown hearts remind me of chocolate candy. 🙂

This verse was also printed out. I used paper punches on the corners and the hearts. I think the hearts would have stood out more if I had backed them with a contrasting or solid paper. All of the papers for this one as well as the following two bookmarks and some of the pink and brown ones came from a booklets of coordinating papers which included the strip at the left and the picture at the bottom of the last bookmark.

More paper punches used here. I really love the one that rounds off corners.

Here is a little plaque I made:

Besides Kelli’s card tutorials, I’ve also bookmarked other card-making blogs for inspiration. I thought I’d share some with you all as well. Some of these post about other things besides cards as well, but they post cards regularly:

De Stampin’ Corner

Fresh & Fun

Wild Rose Stamper

Card Positioning Systems

Sentiments By Denise

And, as I mentioned last time, I created a Flickr Group called Creative Cards. If you upload pictures to Flickr, I’d love to have you add your cards to that group!