As I said in a previous post, when I began planning the kids birthday party, I scoured the internet for ideas. The first thing I looked for was ideas for the invitations. There are definitely a lot out there and the majority use the Acceptance Letter Harry received in the first book, informing him that he had been accepted to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But I knew I wanted to do something a little different and incorporate the Hogwarts Coat of Arms.

So, naturally I turned to my Stampin’ Up stash of goodies and had the kids help me pick out the perfect colours to represent each of the four Houses. They picked Cherry Cobbler for Gryffindor, Garden Green for Slytherin, Daffodil Delight for Hufflepuff and Pacific Point for Ravenclaw.

The next hurdle was creating the shield itself – really wish the Big Shot had a die for this one! I downloaded a shield from the internet and shrunk it to the size I needed for the card and made a template. I then cut out, by hand, each colour that makes up the shield.

Then I used the Big Shot and the Top Note Bigz Die for the inside of the card and the Stripes Embossing Folder to emboss the background for the shield.  This is what everything looks like before it was assembled.

Once I had all the pieces of the shield cut out, I reassembled them into a shield, using adhesive onto an Early Espresso sheet of cardstock.

I then cut out each shield, leaving a little outline of the Espresso as a shadow. I attached everything to a Cherry Cobbler base, representing Gryffindor (my kids favourite house), and cut the You’re Invited ribbon free hand.  You can’t tell from this picture, but I sponged the Crumb Cake layer and the You’re Invited ribbon, with my Crumb Cake Stampin’ Pad, to give it more of an aged look.

It was a lot of work but I love the result and so do my kids. Just one problem. They informed me, after the invites were all done of course, that I reversed the order of the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff Houses on the Coat of Arms! Oh well, I think they still look great.

The details:

Card Stock: Cherry Cobbler, Garden Green, Pacific Point, Daffodil Delight, Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake, Early Espresso

Ink: Crumb Cake and Early Espresso

Stamp Sets: Inviting, Broadsheet Alphabet

Tools: Big Shot, Top Note Bigz Die, Stripes Embossing Folder

Yesterday, I had one of those typical Mondays where if something could go wrong, it did.  So at the end of the day, I was super happy to sit down and create a card, using this weeks Mojo Monday sketch.

Normally, when I sit down in my little craft corner, to create, my 5 year old daughter joins me with her own card making supplies – I am creating a little mini-me!  However, her birthday is coming up and I wanted to use this week’s sketch to create her birthday card, so I did this while she was in bed.

Her favourite colour is purple, so I knew I had to include that colour in her card.  She also has had her eye on the new Sweet Shop Jelly Bean Brads, so I wanted to incorporate those as well.  And ice cream and birthdays always go together, so the Sweet Shop DSP was perfect. I think it turned out pretty cute!

Here’s what I used (all Stampin’ UP Products):

Card Stock: Whisper White, Calypso Coral, Pool Party Textured, Sweet Shop DSP, Calypso Coral Patterns DSP

Ink: Soft Suede

Stamp Set: Happiest Birthday Wishes

Tools and Embellishments: 3/16 Corner Punch, 1 3/4 Scallop Circle Punch, Sweet Shop Jelly Bean Brad, Calypso Coral Ruffled Ribbon, Stampin’ Dimensionals

The one thing that doing all these challenges has taught me, is that I really need to expand my stamp and punch collections, so I’m not always using the same ones!!  Oh well, at least my photography skills seem to be improving each week.

Until next time, thanks for looking!

Aside from all of the cake orders I have received over the past couple of weeks (awesome stuff!!), I am also in the throes of party planning for my own two kids.

Their birthdays are three weeks apart, one near the end of February and one on St. Patrick’s Day, and normally they would each have their own party. The two of them live and breathe anything Harry Potter – my son reads the books, they listen to the books, watch some of the movies, have most of the Lego and of course they both have wands. My daughter even does a great impression of Hermione complete with British accent. So this year they decided they wanted to have a joint Harry Potter themed birthday party. Plan one party instead of two, I can do that.

I am also a huge Harry Potter fan, so I am having a great time planning this party and have scoured the Internet for inspiring ideas. In fact, the other night I was so overwhelmed with all that I want to accomplish for this party, that I actually sat down and typed everything out on a spreadsheet! I just don’t want to over look anything.

The party is slated for March 10th, so over the next few weeks, I am going to share the planning and ideas with you. First up will be the invitations.

But for now let me leave you with one of the banners I created for their shared bedroom, which is slowly being turned into the Gryffindor Common Room.  This will give you a hint as to what I am doing with the invites.

Thanks for taking a look.