And here's the rest of the cards in the shipment that went out today.  All told the this past shipment was 37 cards - No Place like Home and Father's Day primarily.  They are all on StampinUp base, and mostly stamped on Recollections shimmer paper with Memento inks. And a large portion of the papers used for the Houses, Trees, Bushes and Butterflies were those "A Pound of Paper" collections purchased at one of the chain craft stores. All the houses were cut with PoppyStamp/Memory Box dies, and the trees and bushes were cut with Sizzix dies.  The butterflies are from various manufacturers. 

I am drawn to the "There's No Place Like Home" stamp for Operation Write Home cards, and find myself using it a lot.	So this shipment had a total of 16 cards with that stamp.  Having spent time overseas, i believe the message is appropriate for our military...
The Country Houses diecuts are in different colors....	...and the Butterflies are also a mix of various color combinations.
The easel stamp is from VivaLasVegaStamps.  Background papers from StampinUp.
These are the oddball cards in the group.  I only had one bench die cut - it was a freebie from an online vendor. The Window diecut on the Birthday card is from Spellbinder and the rose stamp behind the window panes are from ArtKure.

Now i'm going to start setting up "kits" for me to work on while sitting in a hotel room for 10 days in May - well...the time in the room after work for the 10 days i'll be out of town in May.  Whether i sit and color in Pre-stamped focal pieces, or piece together precut, prestamped, precolored...i'm going to have to figure out how to keep busy...

Father's Day is coming, and the Operation Write Home deadline is the end of this month - so I focused on that - in between of long hours and trips out of town.

All cards are done on StampinUp Card Base, and the stamped images and sentiments on StampinUp Very Vanilla, and Memento Cocoa ink, unless otherwise identified. 

Browns are such an easy color for Father's Day - add some gold stickers and  heartfelt sentiments and I think it works.    Papers are from some leftovers i don't remember who from.	Teals too work for Masculine cards.  Papers again from leftovers, but i love these little "stamp" stamps - I think from StampinUp.  Hand colored.
Happy Father's Day again, in Ships.  This was a 2-fer and a 4-fer, all done with the same 'chain craft store bag of discount papers' backgrounds.	The background ships are StampinUp i believe, and the Tall Ships are done with a FlonzCraft stamp - and again - all hand colored.
Again my fascination with window cards - and the sentiments on the Window Shutters ...	Opening to reveal a great Northwoods stamp!  I did a 3-fer on this one!
Here's the other 2 window cards fronts.  Northwoods are some of my favorite stamps - but the only way i can think of to use the larger ones is to put the sentiment on the outside.	And here's 2 more versions.... I think ima stick with darker ink if i do any more of these.  I'm not particularly fond of the one stamped in the green.
Here's that 'stamp' stamp again - For A Special Father.	...and a few more Father's day cards, unremembered papers, gold stickers...
The group I'm finishing are all similar to these - all with the "There's no place like home" stamped with Memento, the Country House die cut by Memory Box, with the windows and doors that open (squeee!), and various trees and butterfly die cuts. These will all be shipping here shortly - to make the Father's Day deadline at Operation Write Home!

I have recently had the pleasure of visiting VivaLasVegaStamps (logo in Sidebar) - housed in a charming little building (house?) just one block off of East Sahara Blvd in, you guessed it, Las Vegas, Nevada.  I was actually in Vegas for a business conference - but took the opportunity when I had a break in schedule to run up the road to this quaint, and wholly underrated little piece of stamper's heaven.  

My first contact with VivaLasVegaStamps was an online order about a month ago - and subsequent email dialog with Jeff, their COO, as i was looking for something I thought I'd seen on their site.  When planning my conference trip I again visited their site, and found they closed too early for me to make an evening trip - but they did advertise that they would stay open late if requested.  When I realized early Wednesday morning I had a break in my schedule that afternoon I fired off an email asking if they would stay open later that afternoon for me.  And surprise! Jeff again responded very quickly said Yes! And followed that up with notes to help me find them - as they are set back off of Sahara Blvd.  

And they were open - and were watching for me when I got there.  This store is amazing, and I was completely overwhelmed!  It has the largest stock of rubber (and yes - even a few acrylic) stamps I've ever seen in one place! The business was, I was told by the young lady who assisted me, founded on the idea of doing something different than your typical cutsie stamps, although they are not lacking in them either! Their selection ranges from classy to cutsie, politically incorrect to humorous, and even quirky to off-color and adult themed, and everything in between.  As long as you don't get offended by the adult offerings, it's inconceivable to me that anyone could walk out of there without finding something!

There are a couple of everything on their shelves - and there are shelves! and more shelves! and yet more shelves!! Their stock is grouped, and then subgrouped - people, places, things, animals, sentiments, etc.  Nearly all is of their own design and manufacture - MADE IN THE USA! - as advertised on their website.  I mentioned while we chatted and I walked the aisles that i was looking for stuff for cards for OWH - and color me shocked when she not only knew of the organization, but also talked about Sandy, and how they'd crossed paths at various trade shows. She also explained their Angel Policy when i asked about possible use of their stamps for profit. 

The on-the-shelf stock is all mounted on wooden blocks, save the "pound of rubber" and sheets.  I suspect in deference to my space/weight limitations while flying, was given the opportunity to take down the numbers off of stamps I wanted and couldn't take with, and have them mailed to me, which I took advantage of.  I prepaid for everything then, and the stamps were received inside of a week from my visit!!!  And given they'd already stayed late for me, I just didn't have the heart to spend another hour to pick through the huge table piled full of used/recycled stamps - at a GREAT discount i might add!

It's not often I find myself as impressed with a business operation as I was with VivaLasVegaStamps. I spent a couple of hours strolling through the extensive selection - and wished I had more time - like a whole day - or Two!!  I know I missed half of what was there - and am already back shopping on their website.  Should I find myself back in Vegas again - I am definitely planning another trip to my favorite stamping store - VivaLasVegaStamps!  

Here's the last dozen cards going out in my next shipment.  And - bonus - they'll work for the "insects" challenge - so ima going to post a link on the OperationWriteHome blog to these pictures!

I've decided to take pictures of the cards i have ready to go - there's more on my table - but they're not finished yet.  Having watched a few videos at the OWH site  I figured I'd go ahead and do more cards in groups - color groups and design groups...

These 8 cards were done as a group	One of my favorites - from Corinthians
I'm hoping these appeal to someone...	Dreaming of you takes me home
Home is where the Heart is - Home is where love is ~ Miss You	There's No Place Like Home another of my faves
A trio of Thank You Cards Thank You for Being so Very Thoughtful	I thank my lucky stars for You Thank You So Much - You're Amazing
Hand Colored...I envy whomever receives one of these! I so enjoyed coloring them in.	I couldn't help but be in awe of how well I was able to capture what I had hoped to achieve.
Done on shimmer paper from Recollections...	They still hold the shimmer under the colors

I ran into someone today who also has been doing cards for OWH.  We swapped notes a bit.  I'll be seeing her again on Thursday and I'm hoping we'll be able to come up with something for May's Military Appreciation effort.