With Sympathy

It's hard to make a sympathy card.  Actually, it's hard to buy a sympathy card, too.  You want it to say exactly the right thing.  You want it to be right, not only for the recipient but also as a tribute of sorts to the one who is gone.

Our uncle died last month and his celebration of life was held last weekend.  He was an amazing man, full of vitality, who loved his family and the great outdoors.  I wanted my card to express some of that and also to be just right for our aunt who will, of course, be the recipient.  In the end I believe my card wound up being more for her than for him.  All I know is that it was hard to make.  Memories just kept flooding my mind as I worked on the card.  He will be missed.

I settled on a base of Naturals White cardstock.  The next layer was Baked Brown Sugar and then I added a layer from the Sale-a-bration Designer Paper, Sweet Sorbet.  I really loved the Pool Party, Basic Black and Whisper White in the piece I chose.  I added the strip of film from the On Film framelits which I cut in Baked Brown Sugar.  Once I had the bird image from Simply Sketched Hostess stamp set attached to the cut-out, I mounted them onto a piece of Basic Black cardstock and trimmed it leaving a small frame of black.

My sentiment also comes from that stamp set.  I kept it simple by stamping the words in black using my StazOn ink.  Having the sentiment on Pool Party cardstock cut out with my large Oval Punch and then mounting it on Basic Black cardstock cut out with my Scalloped Oval Punch really made it "pop".  A simple bow tied with my Pool Party Seam Binding ribbon added the perfect touch, don't you agree?