Romantic Mailbox by The Paper Shelter

Operation Write Home is having a Spring Thaw card drive!  OWH is challenging card makers to send in a box of half spring holiday cards along with the other half to be general cards.  As of today we only have 30 days to get those cards to our shippers.  You can read all the details here.

You know how much I like a challenge and you also know how much I love Operation Write Home so I'm accepting the challenge!

 Before I got started on this project yesterday I noticed that my scrap pile beside my paper trimmer was getting a little out of control.

Maybe that's not the best view but you get the idea!

I decided I needed to use some of my scraps for my cards so I thought it would be fun to show you the process.  It's not the only way to make cards using your scraps but it's my process.  

I sorted through the pile and came up with smaller piles of papers and card stock that would go well together.  All the patterned papers you see here are digital papers that I've printed and have left overs of.

This is the pile I decided to work with first.  This cute digital image is from The Paper Shelter, I thought it would be perfect for cards for Operation Write Home.

I also decided on a sketch to make this project easy to mass produce.  This one is from Splitcoast Stampers SC314.

All my panels are cut along with the matting layers and I have one laid out but nothing is fasten down yet.  I put the white panel through the Cuttlebug with the Swirls embossing folder.

I thought this might be an important step to show you.  I use a piece of Stampin' Up! grid paper that I had laminated and then cut to fit in my Scor-Pal to work on at the table.  I have the Scor-Pal mat but sometimes it's color is a problem for me.  

Anyway, you'll notice that the right side and bottom of this card front are lined up with the grid lines.  I then added the strip with the hearts and used the third line from the bottom of the card to keep that strip straight.  After I fasten the strip down I'll trim off the edges.  

Here are the three cards I was working on "in the process".

Getting pieces and parts fastened down in the process.  You'll see some of the supplies I've used.  I stamped "missing you" under the mailbox using a Papertrey Ink clear set.  I also wanted to point out the white half sheets of card stock under the blue on top of the roll of foam tape.  Those are the card bases.  I like to make card fronts and attach them to a nice 80# cover weight card stock so our heroes have plenty of room to write a letter home on.  

The quality and weight of the card stock we use is important for our Operation Write Home cards too.  When I think of how far my cards for Operation Write Home travel it boggles my mind.  

Here's a travel itinerary for you.  Starting point my house in Arizona, next stop Sandy in Washington, next stop Iraq or Afghanistan, next stop back to the United States to a soldiers loved one.  

I'm sure you can see why using good quality supplies is so important.  Our cards do a lot of traveling and need to be well made because I'm sure they'll be a treasure to someone back home.  

Here's my three finished cards, I hope you enjoyed the "process" as much as I did!  I hope you'll join in the "Spring Thaw" card drive for Operation Write Home too.

Challenges:
Craft Your Days Away - Love
Miami Doodles - The Magic of Love