Time to Party trio

 I have another group of birthday cards to share from my October craft weekend. Today's festive trio was made with the Time to Party stamps and dies (Simon Says Stamp).

I love the graphic style of these bold, solid images. For the first card (left), I stamped, die cut, and glued together the pieces for three cupcakes, complete with cherries on top. I die cut a white stitched rectangle, stamped "happy birthday" in the lower left corner, and adhered it to a dark brown card base. I arranged the three cupcakes on the white panel and added a red card stock flag.

For the second card I used a kraft card base and stamped the asterisk/star images across the background using kraft and white ink. I stamped four balloons on white card stock, die cut them, and decided where I wanted to place them on the card front. When I was happy with the arrangement, I stamped the balloon strings with black ink on the card base and adhered the balloons. I added a sentiment strip and finished with three white enamel dots.

For the third card, I stamped and die cut three polka dot party hats: one pink, one purple, and one teal. I used black card stock for the card base and added a die-cut, stitched white panel in the middle. I die cut "celebrate" from black card stock a few times and layered them together to make the sentiment thicker. Then I arranged the hats, sentiment, and a sentiment strip on the card base and finished with several sequins scattered to look like confetti.

Thanks for stopping by!

A bunch of Birthday Stacks

I need to catch up on posting some cards I made a long time ago, so today I'm sharing a bunch of cards made with the Birthday Stacks stamp set (Concord & 9th). The stamp images include rows of four different shapes -- candles, triangles (pennants or party hats), circles (balloons or ice cream), and presents. You can also get coordinating dies that allow you to make cool, dimensional cards, but I decided to skip the dies and just focus on the stamped images for these cards.

For the candle image, I created two cards by repeatedly stamping the row of candles to make a background; one of the cards was stamped with black ink on white card stock, and the other was  tone-on-tone with the same color ink and card stock for a more subtle look. I added splatter, a sentiment, and a few embellishments to finish the cards. For the third card, I stamped a single row of candles in the middle of a piece of white card stock. I used the fill-in images from the stamp set to add color to the candles, then stamped a sentiment underneath and finished with three clear droplets.

For the triangle image, I created one card with pennants and one card with party hats. To make the pennants I curved the stamp before placing it on an acrylic block. Then I stamped the image three times on a piece of white card stock. For the party hats, I used a stamp-alignment tool to stamp the straight row of triangles five times on white card stock. I also stamped the little pom-pom image at the top point of each triangle for the hats. For both cards I used the fill-in stamps to add the color to the images. I finished the cards with sentiments and enamel dots.

For the circle image, I created one card with ice cream cones and one with balloons. (The stamps for the cones and balloon strings are also part of the stamp set.) For the card with ice cream cones I wanted to add a little white to the ice cream after I had stamped the solid fill-in circle, so I used a white paint pen to color in some of the stripes and dots (maybe it's strawberry swirl ice cream?). I embellished each card with some small clay circles to look like confetti.

The presents were surprisingly the hardest image for me to use. For one of my cards I went very clean and simple by stamping a row of the presents near the bottom of a white card base. I stamped the solid square in different colors to create a rainbow of presents, added splatter, a sentiment and a few sequins. For the second card I went back to the tone-on-tone technique I used with the candles, but it's really hard to see on the red card stock. This closer shot makes it a little clearer:

Once the background was done, I struggled with how to finish the card. Finally I settled on using gold accents, so I added gold splatter and a die-cut gold border and sentiment. The final detail was three red enamel dots. (To be honest, this was my least favorite card of the bunch. I think the red was just too much.)

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February Christmas cards: Vintage style

After my vibrant, colorful northern lights cards in January, I decided to do something completely different for February. So I used one stamp set and a couple of ink pads to make these vintage-style Christmas cards:

I made eight of these cards (and one prototype that had a few differences), and I think they turned out pretty good. I always try to have different styles in my Christmas cards, and I like the slightly masculine feel of these cards.

I used the Home for Christmas stamp set (Stampers Anonymous - Tim Holtz) and stamped the car and tree image on a piece of cream card stock using Soft Suede ink. Using a blender brush, I applied Crumb Cake ink to the panel around the outside of the stamped image. Then I blended a bit of Soft Suede ink just around the edges of the panel for a little more depth. I matted the panel with a piece of Early Espresso card stock and set it aside.

For the card base, I used Crumb Cake card stock and stamped pine branches and a pine cone with Soft Suede ink in the upper left corner. I stamped more branches and pinecones around the card base with Crumb Cake ink to add subtle interest to the background. I also blended a bit of Crumb Cake ink around the edges of the card base.

I wanted a little something else in the background, so I added some Liquid White Snowflake Paper Splatter (Picket Fence Studios) to look like falling snow. I adhered the stamped panel to the middle of the card base and then stamped the perfect sentiment -- "Dashing through the snow" -- in the lower right corner. For the last touch I added two metallic enamel dots on the focal panel.

I didn't take a picture of the inside of the cards, but I added a layer of cream card stock stamped with a sentiment in Soft Suede and a couple of pine branches and a pinecone in Crumb Cake.

Thanks for stopping by!

Lots of hearts

I'm back to share the rest of my valentines. This year I was more interested in doing mixed-media projects than making "cute" cards, so that's what I did. (I love cute cards, but that's what I usually make for Meals on Wheels, which I didn't do this year.) Today's cards have stamping, texture, drawing, and definitely lots of hearts.

These are the first three mixed-media cards. They are 5" x 7" rather than the usual A2 size (for the U.S.), which I think is easier for me when it comes to mixed media. I used lots of supplies, and I even tried to keep a list this time, which is at the end of the post. The middle card in this group has clear glossy hearts. Here is another view:

It's hard to detail the steps for making these cards. I started by stamping the hearts on the tan panel and then just started applying different "stuff." I tried to just create and not overthink anything, but I'm a chronic overthinker, so I don't know how well I succeeded with that. Most of all, I just wanted to enjoy the process, which I did.

These are the last two cards in this style. For these two I covered the middle panel with clear gesso after I was done with the stamping. I wanted to try adding water to the Distress Crayon (the red and pink) instead of just smudging it with my finger. It didn't turn out exactly as I had hoped, but the nice thing was that I could just wipe it off the gesso'd surface. It did leave a hit of color, though, which is why the card on the left has a bit of a red tint to it. I tried using rub-on transfers on the right-hand card, but it was really hard to get them to stick, and I think that may have been because of the gesso. There's always something new to learn!

Before I go, I meant to include these cards in my last post, but I forgot. Oops!

I guess they are mixed media -- at least in terms of the textured backgrounds made with stencils. The two outside cards used foil with Deco Foil Transfer Gel Duo. The middle card used a glitter texture paste. Die-cut hearts and sentiment strips make up the focal images. And that's it for this year's valentines!

As I mentioned, here are (most of) the supplies I used for the tan mixed-media cards:

Stamps: Love Notes (Stampers Anonymous - Tim Holtz), Well-Read (Altenew), Beautiful Soul (Taylored Expressions), Zen Messages (Hero Arts)

Paper: Tan mixed media paper and tan cards (Strathmore), black card stock (Taylored Expressions), Poppy Parade card stock (Stampin' Up!), white card stock (Neenah)

Ink: Toffee (Taylored Expressions), Versafine Onyx Black (Tsukineko), Abandoned Coral and Worn Lipstick Distress Crayons (Ranger - Tim Holtz)

Accessories: Sketched Hearts dies (Taylored Expressions), gold Hero Paste (Hero Arts), transparent gloss texture paste (Ranger), clear gesso (Prima Art Basics), white Collage Backgrounds Hero Transfers (Hero Arts), Fluttering Hearts stencils (Honey Bee Stamps), clay hearts (HAI)

I'm going to try to get back to a more regular blog-posting schedule. Nothing set in stone, but I'm planning to do one post each weekend and at least one post during the week. That should help me catch up on the back log of cards I have to share and hopefully keep me on track. Thanks for stopping by!

Gel print valentines

Happy Valentine's Day (just a little late)! However you spent the day, I hope it was lovely and filled with kindness. I had hoped to share the valentines I made before the actual day, but here we are. File the ideas away for next year -- or modify them to make a card for a different occasion.

This was the first year in a long time I didn't make cards for our local Meals on Wheels organization. I had planned to, but I never heard back from my contact after reaching out to her three times during January. So instead I focused on my own cards and a festive project for work (and I still ended up rushing at the last minute).

Last year I made some inspirational hearts for my coworkers, and I decided to do that again this year, with a few tweaks. This year I used gel prints for my hearts and added phrases to the hearts instead of just a single word. The rest of the process was basically the same: make heart templates, trace on gel prints, cut out, adhere coordinating card stock on the back, add sentiment, finish with twine.

I chose twelve different sentiments and used each sentiment on five hearts. So there's some variation, but I didn't have to spend time trying to find sixty different phrases.

I put out containers of hearts in our office and break areas. I debated whether it was too similar to last year and thought maybe people wouldn't take them. There were still quite a few left at the end of the day on Friday (I left them out for next week), but I know some people enjoyed them.

After I had cut out all the hearts, I used various heart punches on the left-over parts of the gel prints so I didn't waste them. I used the larger punched hearts to make eight valentines with my all-time favorite layout for Valentine's Day cards.

There's something about those six hearts lined up that just speaks to me. I've used this layout with different textured papers, different colors, different prints, etc. Sometimes I worry that it's too simple, but that hasn't stopped me. I think I could make this card every year. I had planned to make something similar with the smaller hearts I punched out, but I ran out of time. I saved them, though, so maybe next year.

I needed a few more cards after this bunch, so I went looking through some pieces I'd saved to use "sometime" and found a few that worked perfectly for valentines.

The card in the left is the only one that uses gel prints (see Crazy Quilt Scrap Papers for more details). I think the backgrounds for the other two were from a play session when I first got some Distress Oxide inks. But any colorful background -- patterned paper, gel print, ink blending -- would work. I just added die-cut hearts, a sentiment strip, a few black heart embellishments, and a doodled border.

I have a few more valentines to share in my next post, so stay tuned! Thanks for stopping by!