Blue Skies Ahead Ship Easel Card...

A wonderful day everyone.  Last Saturday, I was asked by a friend to make her a card for her Boss that just lost a son-in-law while serving at Iraq.  He was the son that his boss never had so, she wanted me to make him an encouragement card.  Death is always a hard subject matter to talk about especially when making cards but for those who put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, death is not a means to an end but merely just the beginning of eternal life.  So, I told her about the sentiment I wanted to incorporate and she approved of it.  So, here's the card that I came up with.  Size is 5.5 square.

Here, I used my Wall Decor and More Cricut cartridge for the first time...I've had it for a while but just not enough time to check it out (like all the other 70+ cartridges I haven't used yet...LOL).  I saw some nice images here and decided to go with the ship, the clouds and the waves.  You all know how difficult it is to make a manly card so, I was careful on the colors and the amount of blings and embellishments to use.  Selected a couple of DP's and matted almost everything in black.  It's funny because I didn't notice that there's an option to shadow in the cartridge (or should I say, I didn't see it right away because it's not in those usual function buttons that most cartridges had them on) so, I hand-cut all the shadows of the die-cut elements and did some distress inking on the die-cuts for added dimension.   The sentiments were from Printworks Clearly Defined Stamps.  A few more brads, gems and loads of stitching and I was done. This card is entered into the following Challenges:

1.  Simon Says Stamps featuring "Stitch in Time" 
2.  Cute Card Thursday featuring  "Technology"

 BLUE SKIES AHEAD SHIP EASEL CARD:

BLUE SKIES AHEAD SHIP EASEL CARD WHEN FOLDED:

  

 

 BLUE SKIES AHEAD SHIP EASEL CARD LAYERS:

 BLUE SKIES AHEAD SHIP EASEL CARD WITH MESSAGE SPACE:

BLUE SKIES AHEAD SHIP EASEL CARD WITH ENVELOPE-BOX:

My friend has not seen this yet and I can only hope that she will love it when she picks it up later on.  She always trust my judgment when she ask me to make something for her.  I can say that I was also surprised because it came out wonderfully.  I can only thank God for downloading the lay-out as I was putting this card together (I am not the type that has a lay-out planned ahead).  So, I am grateful to God for all the talent He gave me to share this wonderful creations to family, friends and a loads of people online.  I give Him all the glory!