I’ve made more sympathy cards in the last few weeks than I’ve ever made in my life.  Here is a card that, at least in my eyes, has a more masculine feel.

I came across the Northwoods Rubber Stamp Solid Fern wood stamp when I was cleaning out some of my craft things the other day.  I have never used this stamp (it’s probably been in my stash for at least 5 years or so).  I decided to give it a try.

Rather than try to mask this image, I simply stamped it several times with different green Distress Oxide inks–Twisted Citron, Peeled Paint and Evergreen Bough.  The one thing about Distress Oxides, and Distress Inks for that matter, is that they take a bit of time to dry.  I know because I’ve ruined a good many cards with ink smearing.

While the fern images were drying, I focused on the card’s sentiment.  I didn’t want to use a black ink for the sentiment because I wanted the card to have a softer look.  I did something that I’ve never done before.  I stamped the sentiment from Reverse Confetti’s Lots to Say stamp set with Distress Oxide ink.  It actually worked beautifully.  I used my Tim Holtz Stamp Platform just to make sure that I would get good coverage.  It turns out that it didn’t even need a second stamping.

All that was left was to mat the card front.  I used Bazzill Tahitian Princess Swiss Dot card stock (I’m not sure that they even make this any more).

I think I need to make some happier cards next time 🙂