Welcome back to the monthly hop where we share projects made with products we’ve ‘squirreled’ away using a monthly prompt and supply or technique. This month is a technique! Stitching!!! We’re wide open on interpretations in the Squirrel Gone Nutz group, so stitching could be cross stitching, machine sewing, faux stitching, die cuts with stitching marks around the edges, stamping that looks like stitching, or any other effect that looks like stitching. See, pretty wide ranging! The monthly prompt is Thank You cards, which is great as I needed a handful this month. With so many ways to achieve a stitched look, I’m sure you are going to see a wide assortment of thank you cards if you hop along with us. You should have arrived here from my sweet and sassy friend Marie Bingaman who has knocked it out of the park this month!!! Here is the full lineup in case you get lost along the way. There are only 6 of us, so the hop is something you can do in less than an hour and yet see so much inspiration!!!

• Anna Mahtani
• Boryana Yankova
• Marie Bingaman
• Karen Page – YOU ARE HERE
• Lounon Riviere
• Virginia Fairchild

I was super inspired by the technique this month and could have made dozens of cards if I had more time to get them done. Take a look at ALL the cards I made! 9 cards!!! Wowzers, right?!?

Let’s break down this big pile of cards into the different types so I can tell you how they were made.

This batch of 4 cards were the fastest to make. I used a set of dies from a company called Nellie’s and the set is called Star 3, which includes 6 dies… 3 that only cut holes and 3 that cut out coordinating star outlines so that if you used an outline and a hole die, you would have a star with holes along the edge. I only used the 3 hole making dies and I taped them together to make sure they stayed centered. I cut 4 panels and then proceeded to fill in the holes by backstitching with embroidery floss in 2 or 3 shades of a color family for an ombre effect. With only 3 stars per card front, these were fast to stitch up. I used a Thank You stamp from an old Inkadinkado called Thank You Words for the sentiment on each. I liked the CAS look to these and opted not to add any gems or embellishments as I felt it would throw off the clean and symmetrical look. But I did want to step this style of card up a bit and get a little funky with the design so next I made these:

This set of 4 were made with a die set from My Favorite Things called Stitchable Dot Circle Stax. This set includes 5 dies and they each only cut the holes and do not cut out any circle shapes. Once again I taped them together to keep them centered and created 4 card fronts by lining them up along the left side of the card front, hanging off for interest. For 3 of these cards I used the same ombre design idea using 5 colors each… which if I am being honest required a trip to the craft store as my floss collection was just not that robust… but it is now! As V said when I told her about my guilty shopping spree, I stocked up “in true squirrel fashion” which is absolutely true!!! 😆 LOL! It was so hard to not buy 1 of every color!!! Well, I now have enough floss squirreled away to cross stitch a bridge to heaven… let’s just hope I don’t need it soon cause I found out I don’t stitch too fast anymore! Where was I? … oh yes! As I was saying, I did several with the ombre design but I couldn’t resist making a rainbow version too!!! I added a stamped sentiment on each card front also from the Inkadinkado Thank You Words set. I really wanted to add epoxy dots or sequins to give the cards a little more sumpin’ sumpin’, (Someone please tell me where that expression came from… apparently Google has no idea either) but my embellishment collection isn’t that robust either and I struggled with where to add them anyway. In the end I decided to leave them as is or until I get to go embellishment shopping! 😉

I have owned this awesome Jumbo Stitch Alpha stamp set from Close to My Heart for years… like, from when I was still scrapbooking, cause I wanted to use it for titles on some of my scrapbook pages (which sadly hasn’t happened … yet). Once I got into card making, I couldn’t bear to part with the set even though I was no longer scrapbooking and the alpha’s were really too big for an A2 card. Then came along slimline cards and this set was PERFECT for this month’s technique!!! And THAT, my squirrel friends, is why crafters hoard supplies. Some day the perfect project will come along and that thing you saved for a decade or longer will finally have its day to shine!!! 😄 Using my MISTI I lined up the (frustratingly fiddly) alpha stamps to create my large THANK YOU sentiment. I stamped it using a light grey ink to make sure the dots would not be noticeable after stitching and then I used a paper piercing tool as there are no matching dies. While the sentiment makes a big visual impact, the card needed something else and I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to show that you don’t need special stamps or dies designed for stitching. I used a couple of solid flower stamps from an old MFT set called Large Desert Bouquet and leaves from a couple different sets that went well together. I used my paper piercer to make holes and used coordinating floss to stitch some details on the flowers and leaves, including a french knot on the center of the flower. I love how this card turned out! Solid stamps lend themselves really well to the technique, but if you colored a line image first you could totally add stitched details to many floral stamps! If I was doing it again, I would have stamped the flowers and leaves on the panel with the sentiment so the stitching would be directly on the panel rather than on die cuts, but I didn’t want to mess up the panel after all that stitching and this way adds dimension. Here is a close up of the stitched details on the stamped die cuts:

That’s it for me, but there is SO much more to see and be inspired by! Be sure to continue along the hop and visit the soon to be craft-famous, Lounon from Craft-Me-Craft-Moi. This girl pumps out the most amazing content so you don’t want to skip her stop on the hop because its guaranteed to be spectacular!

Thanks so much for visiting!