Happy 60th Birthday

A great friend, from my last job before retirement, went unexpectedly quiet when I asked in an email if she was 60 this year. I was sure it was her 50th 10 years ago and there's a lesson to be learned there - don't put your year of birth onto Facebook if you don't want little Miss Marple to go searching :)

It all then fell into place why she zoomed off on holiday with her husband to The Maldives for a couple of weeks or more - about a week after we returned from Portugal. What a lovely way to celebrate!

So, this card is a bit late but it will be waiting for her return - just before the big fat man in the red suit arrives:

I used:

- white DL card, tent style

- backing paper from a 12" x 12" Studio Calico 'Snippets' paper pad - sent to me by a lovely blogging friend a while ago. So many designs to choose from, in the end I plumped for some pretty stripes (my friend isn't really a pretty, pretty flowers person)

- I cut the backing paper to just slightly smaller than the card front and kept it to one side

- next cut a strip of white card to the same width as the patterned layer, leaving space to trim it down above and below

- then, using the Misti, I stamped the fabulous Woodware 'Numbers' using Memento 'London Fog' - used the main numbers stamp plus one of the sentiments (just to let her know I'd discovered she is indeed 60 - me very bad!)

- the sentiment fit perfectly sideways but I did trim the top and bottom to suit

- coloured the numbers using two Pro markers, picking out a subtle colours for the majority of the numbers and bright red for the 60 :)

- trimmed the sentiment strip along the top and bottom then glued it onto the striped backing panel and then added the whole piece to the card front

A quick card, especially so as I skipped any paper piecing.

One tip about lining up the already cut to size (from one side to the other at least) strip of white card in the Misti. I use a home printed acetate grid for perfect placement in a straight line but was struggling to make sure it was evenly spaced at both sides of the strip of card. Then I realised another great thing about the Misti - once the stamp was adhered in a straight line in relation to the bottom of the Misti, I just needed to move the piece of white card slightly from side to side until I was happy. Then pop the magnets in place, stamp, and it worked like a charm!