It's the first of the month and that means another Senior Design Team Challenge for the Papertrey team. This month is all about "Dearest Dad", whether it be our own dad or a dad in our life. I've got a project for my Dearest Dad but first, I thought I'd tell you a bit about him. :) (He's gonna love this (NOT!) when my Mom tells him I wrote a whole blog post about him! Hee.)
I love my dad. He's mellow and down-to-earth and he'd do anything for you if he could. He's extremely patient. He's quiet and above all else, I have always known that my Dad loves me, he loves my siblings and he loves my mom. The above photo was taken of Dad and me a couple years ago. Thankfully, we both have much less of a double chin now! LOL.
Here's Daddy-o reading us The Christmas Story from the Bible on Christmas Day. It's a family tradition that we've had for as long as I can remember.....we always read the Christmas Story before we open gifts. (You can imagine how much it pained us, as kids, to wait on the reading of The Story while staring at all of those unopened gifts! Haha. I'm so grateful today though, for that beloved tradition.
My Dad is a grandpa now -- "Pops" as the grandkids call him. This is Dad holding his first grandson (and 2nd grandbaby) a little over a year ago.
And here's "Pops" w/"baby" Malachi at Malachi's first birthday a few months ago. My, how time flies. I have to say that it's really been the coolest thing to sit back and watch my parents become grandparents. It's so fun to see how they interact with the "littles" and how the littles talk to Grandma and Pops!
This is my mom and dad maybe a year or so ago. We all went out w/the Nikon and took a bunch of family pictures. Thank goodness for the invention of the camera remote. Anyway, aren't they cute? :)
Good grief, this picture makes me laugh out loud. Literally. As I was going thru my files and found this photo, I busted out laughing! For Father's Day last year, the whole gang went to my Dad's favorite restaurant -- Jumpin' Catfish! LOL! They serve things like catfish (obviously), crawfish, chicken livers, frog legs, etc. (EW!) But on Dad's Day, we go where Dad likes to eat.......so Jumpin' Catfish, it was. (I stuck with the catfish, thank you very much.)
Anyway, I'm not sure if that thing on the window is supposed to be a crawfish or a shrimp or what exactly, but we couldn't resist getting a picture of Dad with it! Haha.
I showed you this photo not too long ago, of my Dad performing a wedding ceremony. My Dad hasn't been a pastor my whole life.....but I think he's pretty much always had the heart of a pastor. I love that about him.
And this is a recent photo that Mom sent to me. This one is so funny to me. For my entire lifetime, my Dad has been a fisherman. Not a hunter. Everyone that knows him well, knows how much he loves to fish. In fact, before my brother came along when I was 12 years old, I was the daughter that opted to go fishing with Dad most of the time. We sure did have a lot of fun on those fishing outings. I'll never forget the time that he and I got caught out in a rainstorm.....I think I was about 6 years old. We came home SOAKING wet and when we got home, he realized that he didn't have his house key and the front door was locked. We had to stand on the front porch, DRIPPING wet, waiting for Mom to come open the door and I remember telling Dad that "WE" were gonna be in big trouble when Mom saw us. *grin*
I'll also never forget the trip when Dad and I went fishing with Grandpa (Dad's Dad) and Uncle Gary (Dad's brother). We were in the car on the way to the fishing hole, when we passed a farm. Oh gosh----I'm laughing out loud as I type this!! I looked out the window and commented (to my 3 grown-up male relatives in the car) about the horse that was up on top of that other horse and wasn't that funny??? "LOOK DAD! Did you SEE that?!" Obviously, I wasn't very old then either, and had no clue as to what those horses were REALLY doing! Hahahaha! But I did think it was pretty strange that my Dad, Grandpa AND Uncle all completely ignored me at that moment! No one said a word! Oh my goodness....I can only imagine what was going thru their heads at the time! Hahaha. I wonder if my dad remembers that.
Anyway, the funny thing about the photo above is that while my Dad was never a hunter and was always a fisherman, in recent years, he's taken to hunting. It's so hard to picture my Dad in hunting garb and it's even harder to imagine him actually HUNTING (and all that hunting involves - ahem), but he's really begun to enjoy it in recent years and I have to say that I'm really happy for him. You see, my Dad was always the type that when he would get birthday money from relatives, he would pay a bill with it or buy something "for the family" rather than splurging on something for himself. He's always been an extremely hard worker and was always the first to sacrifice so that we would be taken care of.
This brings me to my project. Now that my siblings and I are all mostly grown (my "baby" sister just started driving....Eek!), we've discovered the perfect gift for Dearest Dad. We have all started buying him gift cards to Bass Pro Shops!! We get him gift cards to Bass Pro for his birthday, for Father's Day, for any time that warrants giving Dad a gift! It's perfect because he's pretty much forced to spend them on himself for a change and we love that! This way, he can buy whatever fishing OR hunting gear he wants and we aren't trying to figure out what in the world to get him. It's a total win-win!! Even Dad says that it's really THE thing he would most like to have so we're all happy.
Since Dad's been getting Bass Pro gift cards from all of us for a couple of years now, we've often teased him that if he saved them long enough, he'd be able to buy a boat! So.....I thought this year, for Father's Day, it'd be fun to package his gift card in one of Papertrey's nugget tins, so that he can not only store all of those gift cards he'll receive inside it, but he can also track how much money he's got in gift cards as he collects more and as he spends some of them. He saves those cards and saves them and he'll go in and shop around and not buy anything for 2 or 3 visits until he finally decides on just the perfect thing. This will allow him a handy little place to store the gift cards until he's ready to bite the bullet (no pun intended!) and buy something new. I couldn't resist, however, putting "Boat Fund" on the front of Dad's gift card holder!
I stamped "boat fund" using the Outlines Alphabet stamp set with versamark ink and then heat embossed the letters with clear embossing powder. Then, I took my E57 Copic marker and colored the letters in. On the bottom part of the aqua mist card stock, I stamped some Background Basics: Woodgrain with versamark ink. The fish from Masculine Motifs was stamped in dark chocolate ink, cut out and after I punched a small hole in the fish, I threaded it on a bit of rustic jute button twine to look as though it's a fish on a stringer.
Inside the cover of the tin, I adhered a piece of Ledger Paper that I printed off from the Color Couture Vol 1 Download. This will give Dad a place to track how much money he currently has in gift cards as he adds more cards and/or spends some! Handy, right?? I stamped more fish with versamark ink on the kraft card stock that I used to line the bottom of the tin. As you can see by the photo, the tin is large enough to accommodate two stacks of gift cards so Dad will have plenty of room to store his gifts.
As for the card I made to coordinate with this gift, I wanted to use a lot of the same elements so I started with a kraft card base and added a bit more ledger paper as well as a strip of dark chocolate card stock. The sentiment is from Masculine Motifs.
I chose to stamp 4 fish and thread them on the twine to look like a whole stringer of fish. That's what every fisherman hopes to bring home after a day of fishing, right....a stringer full of fish?? :)
You won't want to miss visiting Nichole Heady today to see her post about this challenge, as well as the other girls on the Senior Design Team.
Betsy Veldman
Heather Nichols
Mish Wooderson
Lisa Johnson
and our guest designer, Ashley Newell
Thanks so much for popping in today! Hopefully your creative juices are flowin' just a bit, with ideas for projects you can make for the dad in your life.
Have a goodie!
{Boat Fund gift card holder supplies}
Paper: aqua mist, dark chocolate, kraft, vintage cream, Color Couture Vol 1 Download-Ledger Paper
Stamps: Background Basics: Woodgrain, Masculine Motifs, Outlines Alphabet
Ink: versamark, dark chocolate
Other: nugget tin, rustic jute button twine, E57 Copic marker, corner chomper
{Happy Father's Day card supplies}
Paper: dark chocolate, kraft, vintage cream, Color Couture Vol 1 Download-Ledger Paper
Stamps: Masculine Motifs
Ink: versamark, dark chocolate, hawaiian shores
Other: rustic jute button twine, corner chomper
