Galentine's Day Cards 2017

February marked that time of year again! Galentine's Day was (unofficially) officially the day before Valentine's Day, when friends celebrated female friendship (& hopefully got brunch). 

Inspired by the "Parks & Rec" holiday, my friends & I try to exchange hugs & Galentines in the month of February. This year, I decided to cut up a floral tissue box that I'd been moved to save.

Voila! Floral accents for my cards:

I glued the flower emblems to the front of my card stock cards, wrote in my captions & message, & then trimmed the edges to be more even.

Then I put the cards between protective cardboard & added professional weights (coasters & glue bottle) on top, to flatten the cards while the glue finished drying.

The finished cards:

For the inscription on the back of my cards, this year I though that the "Parks & Rec" Pawnee Goddesses' Pledge (the show's answer to the Girl Scouts) would be both entertaining & inspiring. 

A couple Galentines that I got from friends:

Hope you had a nice day (or week) with friends, wherever you were!

To check out previous years' Galentines, see my 2016 Space-Themed Patchwork Cards or 2015 Initials Cards, as well as my friend's Mixed Media Cards.

"What's Galentine's Day? Oh, it's only the best day of the year! Every February 13th, my lady friends and I...just come and kick it breakfast-style.  Ladies celebrating ladies. It's like Lilith Fair...minus the angst...plus frittatas." --Leslie Knope, Parks and Recreation

Happy New Year

Galentine's Day 2016

"What's Galentine's Day? Oh, it's only the best day of the year! Every February 13th, my lady friends and I...just come and kick it breakfast-style.  Ladies celebrating ladies. It's like Lilith Fair...minus the angst...plus frittatas." --Leslie Knope, Parks and Recreation

As promised, here are the photos of this year's Galentine's Day.  This year we hosted, and I was able to document a lot more of the food and the decorative themed stations (beautifully arranged by my intrepid co-host).

We had a Chocolate Station next to a table with name cards where guests could leave Galentines for the other guests.  

Our Scone Station.  My friend made berry scones and chocolate chip scones, which were offered with fresh fruit, whipped cream, lemon curd, and passionfruit jam (it was all suuuuper yummy when piled together).

Our seating area featured a beautiful glass and roses theme.  We served food on glass dishes and "crystal" plastic party trays to match the place settings.  In addition to the scones, we offered cucumber sandwiches, lox sandwiches, a caprese salad (fresh mozarella, basil, and tomato drizzled in olive oil), and a cheese plate.

My place setting:

After brunch, we watched "A Tell-Tale Vlog" on YouTube (featuring Edgar Allan Poe, aspiring vlogger, as well as Lady Ghost Lenore, and a random girl scout), while we digested.  

Then it was time to open our Galentines. 

All of the Galentines were super sweet, and some were also funny.

This homemade Galentine features a cut-out of a teacup that functions as a pocket and holds a packet of "Well-Rested Tea"--and a caption with a related play on words:

Another of our friends bought used books and wrapped them in brown paper as her Galentines.  She wrote a different quote on each cover, and added fun stickers.  We each chose a quote that we liked and gained a mystery book:

My mystery book ended up being "The Blind Assassin," by Margaret Atwood:

My beautiful Galentines (complete with a bag of dark chocolate!):

We had a lot of fun, just hanging out and talking about books and catching up.

By the end of the day, I had eaten so much rich food that I was a bit queasy (have I mentioned that I'm lactose-intolerant?)...  My breakfast of leftovers the next day was much more restrained, but still delicious: Lox and tomato on bread, and whipped cream, lemon curd, and passionfruit jam on the penultimate scone (a word I will always remember, thanks to Lemony Snicket!):

So that was our beautiful and tasty brunch!

Already craving scones and looking forward to next year...

Galentine's Day Cards

"Galentine's Day" is a time when ladies get together to have brunch and socialize and show their appreciation for each other.  This unofficial holiday of "ladies celebrating ladies" was started in the  TV show "Parks and Recreation," by the character Leslie Knope (see Leslie's explanation in this helpful YouTube clip).  Galentine's Day is celebrated on February 13th, the day before Valentine's Day (although last year we celebrated it Valentine's Day morning because that morning worked best. So you do you.).

For this year's Galentine-making party, I decided to go with a more retro ocean/space/patchwork theme (you can see last year's card-making blogs here and here).

I started out by cutting out rectangles of cardstock that would fit into my envelopes:

Next, I set up a crafting station with cardstock, fabric, blue, and scissors.  And I knew from last year to have a couple sheets of scrap cardboard to protect the table from glue!

I cut out scraps of paper and fabric and glued them onto my cardstock. I found that by working on multiple cards at once, I could play around with my space-meets-patchwork theme.

I decided to use the polka dots from my rocket ship fabric to add some eyes/satellites to some of my planets (always important to up the cuteness factor...).

I then added scalloping along the sides of the cards, for a little extra flare.

The final products:

In honor of Galentine's Day, I wrote an affirmative quote from one of the "Parks And Rec" ladies on the back of each card:

In Part 2, I'll show you this year's cute Galentine's Day set-up.  Enjoy your Valentine's Day and President's Day Weekend!

Happy Galentine's Day, Redux

Happy Valentine's Day! Happy Galentine's Day, Redux!

Yesterday, I showed you my little Galentine's Day Initials Cards.

Above, you can see some of the lovely cards that my friend made for Galentine's Day.  She used cardboard, ribbon, glue, fabric paint, and a lot of patience with these tiny foam petals (I think they were originally confetti?):

To make the large hearts, she glued short lengths of ribbon onto a cardboard base.  Then she cut a heart shape out of a top piece of cardboard and sandwiched the ribbon between the two layers.  Frame the opening with fabric paint, and voila!  A perfect fabric heart!

To create the flowers, she laid down a dab of glue, and then using a toothpick, she transferred the petals to the card one-by-one to create a flower shape.

Some close-ups of the action (the glue dried clear):

We had a lovely brunch that featured Tea, Friendship, and Delicious Food.

I hope you all enjoy your Galentine's Day, or Valentine's Day, or President's Day Weekend.

And, one last time!

Happy Galentine's Day!

 

Last weekend, a friend and I got ready for "Galentine's Day," a time when ladies get together to have brunch and socialize and show their appreciation for each other.  This unofficial holiday was started in the popular TV show "Parks and Recreation," by the character Leslie Knope.  Galentine's

Day is officially (unofficially?) the day before Valentine's Day, but I and some of my friends will be getting together tomorrow for brunch and games, seeing as how tomorrow will be a lovely Saturday.

 

I went an unorthodox route with my Galentine's Day cards, as you'll see below.  I decided to make a little card for each person, like those mass-produced Valentine's that we used to exchange in class in elementary school.  Each card featured the recipient's first initial.  I made mine out of cardboard, fabric scraps, lace ribbon, colored duct tape, and fabric paint.  So they're a mix of traditional and non-traditional materials to create a non-traditional party favor.

 

I started out by stitching triangles of my two base fabrics together with my sewing machine.  Then I laid each square of fabric over a smaller square of white cardboard.

 

Next, I dabbed glue on the underside of  my lace ribbon--I used a thick machine-knitted lace, with threads that are almost like yarn, and I dotted glue where the pattern wove the threads more thickly together, to keep the glue from seeping up onto the front of my card.  I pressed the ribbon down along the diagonal join of my fabrics.  Pro Pointer: As you can see, all of my gluing was done on a sheet of cardboard, to protect the table.

 

I wrapped my fabric squares around the cardboard and taped them in place with my blue-green duct tape, lining up the tape so that it framed the front of my card.  I then left the cards to dry for a bit, and socialized.

 

When my fabric cards were ready, I laid out my fabric letters.

 

Looking good!  I dabbed glue onto the letters, and pressed them into my fabric.

 

For a final, whimsical touch (inspired by the glue!), I added white polka dots to my letters, to brighten the cards up.

 

The finished product! 

My friend's cards followed the slightly more traditional route of featuring hearts and flowers (some adorable little sheep made appearances, too, as you can see above).  I'll show you some other examples of those tomorrow.

 

Happy Galentine's Evening!

 

And Happy Friday!