Valentines Day

Our A-Mazing Heart Valentines Day Card Contest Winners

A-Mazing Mom accordion fold card all tied up for presentation.

Card unfolded reveals three generations of loving memories.

Back of card, "Happy Valentine's Day!" and space for personal note.

Congratulations, Jill! Your card and explanation brought back many fond memories of my own. I bet there will be a few tears when your mom opens this card.

Here's what Jill has to say about this beautiful scrapbooking-type card.

"Our mom has been so incredible to us it's hard to put into words. When I saw your A-Mazing Heart graphic, I knew just what to do. Put my feelings into pictures!

I wanted her to have something she could enjoy for more than just Valentines day; something she could display and enjoy for a long time. So I made the card accordion style and used double thicknesses of card stock.

The card can stand on a mantle piece or dresser to be enjoyed daily.

With four panels and pictures, I wanted a four-word statement and decided on We love you always, with one word on each panel. The first photo is Mom, Dad and my husband, Tom, as a baby. The second is our wedding day. The third is the two of us with our son, John.

The last is our most recent family reunion just last May. Mom was present at all these events so I hope they will bring back many happy memories for her."

Runner-Up: A-Mazing Find
by Pat Sommers

Isn't it A-Mazing?

I had intended to feature only one winning entry, but thought this Valentines card and its clever use of computer graphics software deserved to be shown. Congratulations, Pat! We also thought you would get a kick out of Pat's story.

"I've always been amazed at how my husband and I met, so your heart in a maze graphic just called to me for this year's Valentine's Day card.

You see, Patrick and I met when I absentmindedly walked into the men's bathroom in college. The men's was on the fourth floor and the women's on the third. I beat a hasty retreat, blushing about the color of the card.

But other students had apparently seen me go in and a crowd had already gathered to see what would happen. That gave Patrick time to - uh - get his act together and follow me out.

So a year later Patrick and Pat were married. We now live on Patrick Lane and have a son, Patrick Jr. Oh, by the way, Patrick's birthday is Saint Patrick's day.

To make the card, I copied your heart graphic three times and added a drop-up shadow to the three hearts and the first line of writing. This ties things together visually.

I found a graphic of a deliriously happy couple and cropped it to a heart shape to fit into the center maze. In the other mazes, I printed me and you in white so the words would show up against the dark colors of the maze.

Finally I used the pencil tool in a matching green to draw one arrow from me to us; then copied it, pasted it, reversed it horizontally and move to over to go from you to us.

I thought of saying How A-Mazing - that I found you. But Patrick always tells me I don't get all the credit. As soon as he saw me, he knew he'd never let me get away."

Congratulations to our winners and thank you to all the other contestants. I hope that these cards will inspire you to come up with some A-Mazing ideas of your own.