Cookies, Men, Glossy Cardstock, and Ghosting

Bet you are wondering what cookies, Men, glossy cardstock, and ghosting have a common huh?  Well, after this post, you will know how they are all related.  As some of you know, my dearest and I are about 1000 miles apart one direction while we transition out of the military and into a civilian life.  As that is the case, things can be tough, and I am constantly trying to find ways to let him know I care about him, even if I am too far away to do simple "little" things.  Recently, he has been talking about how he'd like some snickerdoodle cookies.  They are his favorite and by favorite, I mean obsession.  Case in point:

Me: I was thinking of baking something.
Him: Snickerdoodles?
Me:  I was thinking maybe a pie.
Him: Snickerdoodles?
Me: Or how about some chocolate chip cookies?
Him: Snickerdoodles, please?

We have this conversation EVERY time I bake something, which in my house is fairly often.  Cooking is another loved hobby of mine.  About a week ago, I got the idea in my head that it would be fun to bake him some snickerdoodles and FedEx them up to him. But, I could not just simply send the cookies, there HAD to be a card involved.

A while ago, I got the below stamp set from Paper Trey Ink .  It was the best decision ever.  Finding man themed, and good man themed scrap/stamp items, is like finding the perfect fitting pants the second time, or a real life Unicorn.  Talked about, never actually experienced.  Well, I cannot tell you how much I love this set.  It is one of my go-to sets for all things masculine.  With that said, there are still some images from the set that I had yet to use.  One of which is that lovely Koi you see in the bottom left of the image.

Related to this is the fact that I have been trying to expand my stamping repertoire.  Which is related to something else entirely unrelated to this post.  None the less, in my efforts to expand my card and scrapbooking repertoire, I decided that I wanted to try an awesome technique.  Ghosting.  Yep, that's right.  Ghosting.  This is where you take Glossy Cardstock and Versamark ink, stamp your image in versamark onto the glossy paper and then brayer over the paper with ink.  A complete how-to can be found here. 

So, armed with cookies, glossy cardstock, a new technique, and a masculine themed stamp,  I came up with this:

Supplies:  Gloss Paper (Ranger Inkssentials); Versamark (Tsukineko); Faded Jeans Distress Ink, Concord Grape Distress Ink, Pine Needles Distress Ink (Ranger); Masculine Motifs (Paper Trey Ink); All Year Cheer II (Stampin' Up!); Bazzill Cardstock; Rubber Brayer; Brown Cross Stitch Floss

And this:

Supplies: Gloss Paper (Ranger Inkssentials); Versamark (Tsukineko); Faded Jeans,Pine Needle, Antique Linen, Milled Lavender Distress Ink (Ranger); Masculine Motifs (Paper Trey Ink); Archival Ink (Ranger); White Pigment Ink (Colorbox); Brown cross stitch floss; Bazzill Cardstock

And let me tell you I LOVE them.  After making these cards, I seriously wish that I had more males in my family.  It is masculine and beautiful, things that men like very much.  Masculine beauty.  It is a thing of beauty for me.