Stamps, Paper, Scissors: Punch Art

It's a puzzlement.

How do you wish a ninja happy birthday?

Do you say, "Happy Birthday and may you find much gold as you kill people this year"?

The reason I was wondering this today was that today was Will's birthday. Yes, the boy with the wayward finger is getting older at a rapid rate.

For some reason, which I cannot fathom, Stampin' Up! has not come out with any ninja stamps! What is up with that, eh? It is a puzzlement.

So, when making a card for a ninja lovin' boy, what do you stamp?

I decided, after noodling this for a while today, that my best bet was to make a punch art ninja, in particular, Hiro from Will's favorite Wii game, Mini Ninjas.

Mini Ninjas is a totally addictive role-playing game that has really fabulous graphics and a cast of extremely cute little ninjas. It's a game I have been playing too, just because a) I am a kid at heart and b) it's what Will is into right now. He has finished the game a number of times already since Christmas, so he enjoys mentoring his much more inexperienced mother in the intricacies of the game.

So after much fiddling around to get something that looked decent, I finally achieved a decent looking Hiro. Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - Inspired by Nature; Paper - Green Galore, Real Red, Basic Black, Blush Blossom, Going Grey, Basic Grey, Brushed Silver; Ink - Green Galore, Glorious Green; Other - Basic Grey Taffeta Ribbon, Basic Black & Creamy Caramel markers, white gel pen, dragonfly brads (dunno source); Punches - Notch Corner Punch (retired), Small, Large, and Wide Oval punches, 1 1/4 & 1 3/8" circle punches, Large Flower punch, 1/2" circle punch, Curly Label punch, Round Tab Punch, Butterfly punch, Photo Corner punch

Was William impressed by this amazing feat of punch art skill?

I'd have to say, "not really." The first thing he did when he opened it was to shake it and see if any money fell out. Yep, he's a ninja all right. There is no money in there, young ninja. Otherwise, the horrible carpet you are kneeling on would have been replaced a long time ago. Children are expensive, especially around their birthdays. So after spending all the money on your presents, there is none left to buy carpeting or put inside of cards. But, as you can see, if we had had new carpeting a few months ago, it would have gotten nasty blue ink spots on it anyway. Because of some ninja with a marker who wanted to know what was inside it. Ninjas are curious that way. Might as well wait to buy carpeting until the ninja is not so curious.

However, the ninja was much more pleased by the presents he opened after the card, especially this one:

For those not in the know, it's a Nintendo DS lite, a gizmo Will has been campaigning for for many months now.

He was excited.

For those not in the know, this is what a ninja looks like when he is about to jump for joy.

I foresee that this is going to be a good thing, particularly since the accessory kit we bought for it has headphones.

'Cause I don't know about YOUR ninja, but mine can be pretty darned loud, when he's not in stealth mode.

And he's almost never in stealth mode. But that's okay. I love him just the same. Observe the hair. Nice and clean and free from inhabitants. Observe the fingers, none wayward, all standing nicely in a row. Dang, he's cute.

And all I can think of is how much he looks like my dad.

Dad is the kid with the big grin, third from the left in the middle. And yes, those are all his brothers and sisters. Grandma was a woman of character and great fertility. There are two sets of twins in that picture.