WOYWW #381: Birthday card from recycled cardboard

Happy 381st WOYWW! Today happens to be my son's 12th birthday. Yesterday he asked me if I was making him a personalized card. I realized that I'd totally forgotten all about it. Eeks, how is that even possible? Luckily, I had enough time yesterday to create one. I was a little stressed because I had no idea what I could do to surpass, or at least match, the success of his 10th and 11th birthday cards, but I just let the process carry me. I hope he likes it - he'll get it, along with his present, when he gets home from school.

I moved my workstation to the kitchen counter expecting this to get very messy and I was right! This is what it looked like at its initial stages. Cardboard gessoed on both sides along with the large number shapes I cut from the leftover cardboard. It's one of those foldout mailers you get from Amazon when you order books. I had to alter the photo and make it look more artsy because my kitchen counter looked a bit naff.

I used heavyweight gesso to stencil some textures on the cardboard flaps and the cut-out numbers. It took absolute ages to dry, even with the help of a hairdryer. I dry-brushed some Prussian Blue acrylics all over the stencilled textures, followed by some Sunset Gold by Lumiere. I went back with the Prussian Blue in places to tone down the gold a bit and finished off with some rust paint around the edges. I did the same on the back, without stencilling. The paint picked up the subtle texture in the cardboard quite nicely. I simply stuck some photos on the inside with a birthday message. I'm pretty happy with the results!

We also designated September 21st as Oreo's birthday. We don't know exactly when he was born, but it must have been around this time because he was eight or nine weeks old when we got him in November last year. We gave him his present yesterday, as we couldn't wait! It's a cat tree! Here he is modelling it, though I must say he hasn't been on it since, preferring to climb on top of the kitchen cupboards instead. That was 30 pounds well spent then, LOL! We like it, even if he doesn't!

Thanks for visiting folks! 

I'm off to bake a cake now but will be back

to do my rounds while it's in the oven!