Hello, and Welcome!

(Click for a larger photo)

Hello! It has been YEARS since I've had a blog, perhaps because I eventually ran out of things to say. Well, that's not really true, but things certainly changed in my life when I decided to put my stamp business, Hambo Stamps, on the back burner and focus more on my family. My stamp biz was taking over the house, right at a time when my kids were entering their teenage years, and needing more space. So while I didn't close my business completely, I DID quit promoting it, and spent my energy instead on my kids, a partial house renovation, and eventually -- as I began to itch to stamp again after taking so much time off -- the creation of a card ministry for my church.

I've been leading out in this card ministry for a few years now, and as my profile on the right says, I learned some things in the process. My hope is that the things I have learned will benefit others who might be doing a card ministry themselves, or wanting to start one. No sense re-inventing the wheel, right? Let my experience help you sidestep the potholes that I fell in, and one-up my successes.

I will share some cards with you along the way so you'll have something to look at instead of/in addition to reading my ramblings. You'll note that my card style is CAS (clean and simple) for the most part, which actually works quite well for card ministry, because you'll want those cards to fit in an envelope and be sent at regular postage rates!

Today's card has layers though, and was made with a GORGEOUS designer paper that was included in the spring edition (Apr/May/Jun 2018) Stampers' Sampler magazine. It is called "Budding Thoughts" by Eirene Nguyen. This was the background paper for my card. I had a piece of scrap paper with what looks to me like dogwood blooms, which I coordinated with the background. The papers were so pretty, I didn't want to cover them up, so I used a vellum tag with a Hero Arts "Hello" die and a rose gold brad. The brad will cause a small bump in the envelope, but it shouldn't cause any mailing problems.

I hope you'll check back in from time to time, and be sure to let me know if you have any specific questions about card ministries that I might be able to answer by email or in a later post. I'm not claiming to be an EXPERT, but hopefully the experience that I DO have will help!