AHSC635 Land of the Free

Happy HOT Monday, everyone! Phew, what a scorcher of a weekend! Hope you are all staying cool here in the US!  It's time for a new Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge, and here's the sketch:

My card deviates a wee bit from the sketch but hopefully you can see it!  Here we go:

I have had these patriotic stamps from Waltzingmouse, which has sadly closed, for years and I think this might be the second time I've used them!  (I did do a shadow box recently with them, so stay tuned!)  I stamped the Statue of Liberty on a piece of Very Vanilla cardstock, isolated the torch, then diecut the remaining image with the Everyday Arches dies.  I used my Sanded background stamp again to give it some "aging" like the Honey Bee paper I used for the background:

I stamped and diecut the sentiment on another piece of the Honey Bee paper, then added this on the inside of my Misty Moonlight card:

This is a lovely sketch and I hope you'll hop over to the AHSC blog to play along!

On a personal note, I don't normally send out July 4th cards, but I might just send this one to my second cousin's son  (I always jokingly tell my cousin, if I ever had a son, I would want him to be just like his son Jonathan)!  Jonathan is a godly young man who loves the Lord and is also a Civil War reenactor, along with his dad Steve, (my second cousin). Jonathan found out we have a relative who fought in the Pennsylvania 56st Regiment, so he asked several of our family members if we wanted to take a trip to Gettysburg, which is only a couple of hours from our home, so we finally made the trip on Saturday.  It was HOT, let me tell you! We had a tour guide who was extremely knowledgeable, and we visited various sites around the battlefield, most importantly the Pennsylvania Memorial where we found our relative's name listed under the 56th! Coincidentally, John found one of his relatives listed under the 121st!  Here's Jonathan with the flag he made (or maybe his mom made it), replicating the original flag of the 56th:

Here's my cousin Steve, his grandson Oliver, and Dana, listening to the tour guide:

Some of the info went over Jameson & Sawyer's heads, but they will grow to learn more about it as they get older.  I believe they've been to Gettysburg before, so I am sure they'll be back!

Maven was interested in the cannons!

She was also fascinated by my water bottle and the cookies I brought! Jameson was being funny, wearing her hat:

Cassidy was a great help with the kids too!

Thanks for indulging me!!  Although it was a hot day, it was great to get together with our family, even though the solemnity of the battlefield was constantly on my mind. To have a country divided is a sad thing.  And I cannot imagine how hot those soldiers were in those woolen uniforms!  God bless America and those who fight for our freedoms!

Thanks for visiting today, enjoy it and be blessed.

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Sanded (ret), USA1776 (Waltzingmouse, ret)
Card stock & Papers	Basic Beige, Real Red, Misty Moonlight, Americana (Honey Bee)
Ink	Night of Navy, Crumb Cake
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Everyday Arches Dies, Banner Dies (Pink & Main), Iconic Imagery Dies, 1" Circle Punch (ret)