Simple to Stepped Up - Open Sea

Good morning stampers!

I'm a little later posting this morning (sorry Laura!) but can you believe it? I slept in until 7:45! That never happens and folks, I enjoyed every minute of it!

We had a pretty full weekend and yesterday was no exception - we are finally painting the laundry room! Now that might not sound exciting to you, but lemme tell ya - if you had almost the entire contents of your laundry room sitting in the middle of your dining room, you'd be dancing a jig that it's getting done!
The night before my end of the year clearance sale and $2 Card Night, the large 3 door cabinet that's been hanging on my laundry room wall for 10 YEARS fell off the wall! Yep, just pulled away from the braces and fell off. At least we had time to get everything out of it before it came completely off, but all that stuff, plus everything else has been sitting in my dining room ever since.
Between travel and mine and Mark's work schedules, we haven't had time to mess with it - but I finally reached my breaking point of "I can't stand it anymore, get it done!" So, I say we are painting the laundry room, but actually Mark did all that - the room is too small to turn around in, it's more like a laundry closet! The WE part comes in tonight when we head to IKEA and buy a new cabinet and a few other organizing things to make this room/closet really work for us.
Aren't you excited for me! That means that I've gotten 2 rooms in my house re-done within a space of a month! That's pretty exciting folks and I've got just one thing to say - what's next?!

Hmmm....what's next here is the card I have to show you. Actually, it's two cards - Bonus! :)
Here's the first one:

Nice, masculine, very clean and simple! We did this card at my last $2 Card night and it was a favorite. We used The Open Sea stamp set for all of the stamping except for the greeting, which came from Teeny Tiny Wishes. The color palette was Not Quite Navy, Crumb Cake and Very Vanilla. There's no dimensionals on this one, just straight layering - perfect for flat mailing.

Now, as you know, Mark's birthday was on Saturday, so I decided to make his card from this design - hey, why mess with a good design? - but I stepped it up a bit to make his more special. Here's his card:

There's actually only three things I did to step it up, but the difference is astonishing. Remember, it's the simple things!
I used my Color Spritzer Tool and a Soft Suede Stampin' Write Marker to add subtle flecks to the background - you can actually see it really well in this photo.

I wrapped a length of Hemp Twine around the left side of the top two layers, knotted it and frayed the ends. And lastly, I popped up those layers, along with the focal point layers on Stampin' Dimensionals.
So, you have a card that is still clean and simple, still masculine, but definitely stepped up!

Needless to say, Mark loved his card, which makes me happy!

Here's a few of the items I used to create these cards:

#123032 - The Open Sea stamp set $18.95 clear mount
(this one is in the Summer Mini and did not carry over into the NEW Idea Book and Catalog, so if it's on your list, you need to get it by August 31st!)

#100982 - Hemp Twine $2.95 (12 yards)

#107066 - Color Spritzer Tool $12.95

To add these or any other items to your stamping tool box, you can visit my Online Store anytime 24/7 and shop there at your leisure.
Here's the link to use: Robin's Online Store
Simply click the SHOP NOW button at the top right!

Have a wonderful Tuesday everyone!
Blessings,
~~Robin