For my daughter's first birthday we went with a cupcake theme.  In the hospital for her birth, my husband nicknamed her CupKate and it stuck.

I began the idea of a cupcake invitation with these die cuts that I first stamped with the coordinating frame and then with the cupcake image.  Thinking ahead I stamped extras just incase some didn't turn out right.

I colored the cupcake wrapper with Copics and used hot pink slick puff paint for the frosting detail.  After the paint was thoroughly dry, I applied purple glitter glue for the sweet star. When they were ready, I realized I had forty-eight cupcakes that were usable--way more than I needed.

This is the invite.  The aqua is glitter cardstock and it is a pain to adhere things to, but I really the sparkle it adds.  I used a ridiculous amount of Scor-tape on these to get the ribbon and Mat Stack to stick.

The inside had the party info and a cute little coordinating cupcake which I embossed with aqua embossing powder.

I was pleased with how the icing turned out.  It had a great subtle bumpy texture as if it was hand frosted. :) It dried much quicker than I thought it would so that was a bonus too.

With the extra cupcakes, I whipped up these thank you cards.  I used letterpress paper so it took the embossing folder nicely.  

I still had extra ribbon so I made these drink labels for the party.

And yes, we served cupcakes. :)

Paper: PTI - Raspberry Fizz, Plum Pudding, Stamper's Select White; The Paper Studio - aqua glitter cardstock; Lifestyles - white letterpress paper
Stamps: PTI - Tremendous Treats: Birthday & Tiny Treats: Birthday
Ink: Memento - Tuxedo Black, PTI - Raspberry Fizz
Dies: PTI -Mat Stack #5 & Modern Alphabet, Spellbinders - Labels 4
Embellishments: Tulip - pink Slick Puff Paint; Bo Bunny - striped ribbon; purple Stickles; Cuttlebug - thank you embossing folder; Fiskars - corner rounder

While talking with my best friend, she told me about a baby shower she was going to be hosting.  I offered to make her invitations and since she is my best friend I had to make the amazing.

I have been wanting to make invitations that pull out of a pocket for a couple years and decided this was my chance.  I learned quite a bit -- angels are not my friend while I am tired -- that will aid me in streamlining the process next time I make them.

I really like how the chalking around the edges looks like grass.  Can you tell I am enjoying using my KI Memories Classic Stack?  This zebra print paper has shown up in several of my recent designs.  The orange ribbon adds a nice detail and is also functional as a good way to pull the card out of the pocket.  

Of course the invites were cuter before I had to edit out information on them.  

Paper: Papertrey Ink - Dark Chocolate, New Leaf & Kraft, Staples - white cardstock, Doodlebug - juggle animals, Recollections - orange & light brown, The Paper Studio - medium orange & light pink, KI Memories - The Classics stack - blue zebra
Ink: Powder Puff Chalking Inks - Green with Envy
Embellishments: The Ribbon Boutique - orange grosgrain ribbon, googley eyes,
Other: Cricut, Create a Critter Cricut cartridge, Cuttlebug, The Paper Studio zebra embossing folder, Fiskars corner rounder, Crop-o-dile, Marvy Uchida paper cutter, brown ultra fine Sharpie, printer, Scor-tape

Hosting a baby shower for a lady that has a fun, vibrant style gave me a bit of creative lisence.  I went with a safari theme with some nontraditional, vibrant colors and a bit modern.  Usually people give the theme more subdued colors.  I also chose to use cheetah, zebra, and giraffe prints and splashes of color.

The embossed chartreuse cheetah texture with the textured gray of the elephant makes you want to run your fingers over them.  Papertrey Ink paper embosses beautifully.  Since I wanted to stay modern I found an elephant cut that did not require fussy layering or lots of intricate details.  I did scale down the onesie sleeves as I felt they were too long for the invite. 

Ripping the edges of the paper took quite a bit more time than cutting them quickly with a paper trimmer, but the overall affect is great.  I carefully ripped the paper (ha, yes, an oxymoron) to maximize the most exposure of frayed fibers.  The 'wanted poster' font fits with the jungle-ish feel.
Paper: Papertrey Ink - Blueberry Sky and Simply Chartreuse, The Paper Studio - textured gray, Georgia Pacific - white copy paper
Other: Cricut, New Arrival Cricut cartridge, Cuttlebug, Sizzix - cheetah embossing folder, printer

My good friend was throwing a wedding shower for friends of ours and I volunteered to make the invites.    The theme was shabby chic and black, white, silver, and red.  I used a regular white cardstock to help the stamped flourish get an uneven, slightly distressed look.  The vellum overlay softened the overall look too.

The number kept steadily growing so there ended up being three different versions of this invite sent out.  This was the simplest one to mass produce.  The others were this design with red satin ribbon either fed through holes I punched and tied in a bow or a strip of the red satin ribbon only at the top.

Paper: The Paper Studio - clear vellum and textured gray, Staples - white cardstock
Stamps: Basic Grey - Adornment stamp set
Ink: Memento - London Fog
Other: Cricut, The the Knot Cricut cartridge, Fiskars corner rounder, printer