I have been making greeting cards for years! I was using Perfect Paper Adhesive but here in Hawaii, unbenounced to me, there are little tiny almost invisible to the eye, BUGS! And, they ”continue to eat the flowers once sealed with PPA!“ I have found my best bet and failure free ”Mod Podge” is the BEST sealant! I use the matte, not the glossy and I must say my cards turn out beautiful and best of all, they last a lifetime! I have done a lot of experimenting with varios glues, adhesives and I always return to Mod Podge! As far as pressing flowers, try to use those that have the same thickness. This allows for even drying. The larger flowers with big, bulky centers, i.e,. cosmos cosmos, I take the centers out, press the petals and save the seeds to grow more cosmo’s. I am also a huge fan of placing the flowers beteen 2 pieces of Bounty paper towel. This is the only paper towel I can find that doesn’t have a design with depth to it. I am also a die-hard put my flowers in a big heavy book followed by several other heavy books then and I wait 4-5 days to check on them. I think the biggest thrill for me to this day is peeking under the paper towel to see how they’ve dried! Seriously, my heart flutters with joy when I first set look at them! I get giggly just before opening the book! As an added note, I seem to always use too much Mod Podge which nearly always makes me press the finished card back into the large book and stacking several more heavy books on top of them! This pressed flower card making has saved my life!! I have been suffering from debilitating fibromyalgia for over 15 years now and this is one thing that gets my mind off of the pain I feel every day! And, if I might be so bold, I have gotten better and better as the years go by! I hope any of the information I have shared will help or inspire anyone to make flowers which are already beautiful into a life-lasting treasure by turning them into something someone you love can have as a memory for life! Aloha * Liz

Happy Pre Thanksgiving everyone!! Or should I say Prep Thanksgiving, lol. Half the day we're chopping and getting ready for tomorrow. We have 9 coming for dinner tomorrow. Kids are so excited!! Jeanne, I want to add my THANK YOU!! for this wonderful swap!! Sorry for my delay in mailing, but, I did love it :D Annie, THANK YOU for jumping in with all the wonderful games :) So much fun!! I hung my sparkly Lady Liberty up so she can enjoy Thanksgiving. Tomorrow night we put up the tree with family. A tradition we have had since I was a very little girl with my grandfather. Don't know how much "Black Thursday" shopping I'm going to get done. Probably none. My kids want such off the wall things this year, that most stores don't even have what they are looking for,lol. Found a great science catalog for some of Billy's things, still looking for Taylor, lol. Love my unique kids :D Have a great day everyone!!! vina

I've been using Vistaprint exclusively since 2003 and have received nothing but excellent quality and professional looking products. I always order premium cards with a gloss finish and they look as wonderful, if not better, than any other business card I've seen. The colors are always spot on and I love all of the matching products you can order. I've ordered mugs, tote bags, t-shirts, post-its, note cards, business card calendar magnets, car door magnets, and memo pads - most of those were free or significantly reduced in price because I took advantage of one or their emails. The promotions they send are wonderful and it's a great way to brand your business on a budget. Just my personal experience, ymmv. :))

Yes Mary, you are reading right. There are several softwares that allow you to download free or purchased designs from the internet to your computer. Then you transfer from computer to the 'cardwriting box/card' for using in your machine. The most popular is the Brother PED Basic that I mentioned above. It only writes .pes format, which is what the 270 uses, and can be bought...sometimes used, from ebay. Normally, you can find new there, as well as Walmart on line, Allbrands.com, and other sites. You may pay from $50to $100+. Then you can download a free software to change other design formats to .pes for your machine to use. There are many many free designs available and a good place to start is to join Sewforum.com. It is a forum for embroiderers, where you can ask questions, request someone create a design for you free or for fee. It is not very active now as the site is also on Facebook, but still, there are thousands of free designs still there. I hope I have explained-helped you. Good luck!