Doily Topped Card Mat

I like to "doodle" on the computer and create designs.  The Silhouette Studio software has several features that make it possible to produce new patterns very easily.  You can mirror, duplicate and rotate a shape to create intricate patterns quite quickly.

I welded a doily shape that I drew in the Silhouette Studio software to a rectangle and resized the layer to fit on a standard A2 card.  I eliminated some of the extra inner shapes to make a tiara effect for the top of the card mat.

Next, I cut a piece of patterned cardstock at 3 3/4 x 3 3/4 inches to fit on the mat with an even border on three sides and the bottom edges aligned.  The paper with the delicate floral pattern is from the English Garden stack by Making Memories.  I inked the edges just a bit with Vintage Photo distress ink.

Two Prima flowers layered and joined with a jeweled brad from Creative Charms make a pretty accent on a piece of ribbon with an extra piece tied on to imitate a knot.

The brad is pushed through all of the layers of ribbon to keep things neatly in place.  I used a pointy tool to start the hole for the dull brad ends.

I placed the embellished ribbon across the floral layer and taped the shorter side to the back of the paper.

Then I added a bit of 1/8 inch Scor-Tape to the ribbon to secure it to the layer and taped down the other end on the back.

I wanted to add a sentiment to the front and, since I was feeling a bit lazy, I quickly checked my library of files to see if I had anything appropriate.  I could have simply chosen a font and typed my words if I didn't see anything I liked.

I discovered this set of words and shapes and thought that "sweet" would suit my card nicely.  I wanted to shadow the word to make it stand out a bit more against the busy floral background.

One of my favorite feature in the Silhouette software is the ability to create a shadow or "Offset" with just a few clicks.  The shadow can be adjusted in width to suit your design preference.  On the Cricut fonts that have shadows, the width of the shadow varies proportionately with the size of the image so you can't make a very thin shadow for a large word or a thick shadow for a small word.

 I adjusted the size of the offset and cut the shadow for "sweet" from the same cardstock that I used for the doily topped mat layer.

A couple of foam dots help raise the matted word slightly above the ribbon.  I nestled it in place right beside the flowers.

The card base is cut at 11 x 4 1/4 inches and folded at the top for a tent style card.  Simple and sweet - this card could be used for a baby, birthday or thank you.

Be sure to check out the information about the Spring Training 2012 course that Ella Publishing is offering from April 23 to May 4th.  Check the post HERE to get more details and to leave a comment for a chance to win a free spot.  Only the comments left on the original post will be included in the random drawing.  There are five great instructors and access to the videos will never expire.  If the random number generator doesn't pick your number, I think the course will be well worth the price - so sign up and join in the fun!

I hope you are having a lovely weekend!

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Butterfly Thank You Card

I am sure some of you were starting to wonder when you'd see another paper project on my blog.  Things have been hectic with travels and family but I did find time to make a card today.  I used Design Studio to help me plan the card - by choosing and sizing the elements on the computer I can experiment without wasting paper.  

 
Here you can see the Design Studio preview of the card.  The only item on the preview that is cut with the Cricut is the sentiment.  The other shapes are simply used to represent the pieces that I will use for the card and to try various color schemes.

The color scheme for the card was determined by the patterned paper from the "Chloe's Closet" collection by Making Memories.  I found some of this paper at Tuesday morning recently.  There were six sheets each of four designs and one shaped and pierced page in the package, a total of 25 pieces for $3.99 and I was helpless to resist!  I don't use a lot of orange but the bright citrus colors appealed to me along with the great price.

Here are all of the pieces of this card.  The card base, cardstock layers, ribbon and butterfly were represented in the Design Studio preview, however, only the sentiment (and the sentiment shadow) were actually cut with the Cricut.

This is an A2 card (8 1/2 x 5 1/2 piece of cardstock folded to form a 5 1/2 x 4 1/4 inch card).  The first layer is cut at 5 1/4 inches x 4 inches.  I tried plain white but it was too stark a contrast with the shiny floral cardstock which has more of an off-white shade around the flowers (you can see the white at the top and the dotted cardstock I chose at the bottom in this photo).  I remembered the DCWV Citrus Stack which has similar bright colors and I found this off-white dotted with orange cardstock in the stack.  The two lines work together nicely.  The floral cardstock is cut at 3 3/4 x 5 inches.

The ribbon is from American Crafts.  I cut a piece to wrap around the floral patterned layer and simply added a bit more adhesive with my ATG to hold the ribbon.

This basic layering is a great start for many cards - all you have to do now is add an embellishment and a sentiment for a quick and easy card.

In my preview, I used only the top layer of the sentiment.  I didn't have the option of adding the patterned paper to preview the effect (one of the things that I really like about the new Craft Room online design tool is the ability to fill images with patterned paper - I just wish we could add papers other than the ones available on the Imagine cartridges).  By looking at the sentiment on the card front it is obvious that I needed to add the shadow layer.

You can see what a difference adding the layer makes - the sentiment is easy to read now.  I used the same DCWV paper that I used for the first layer for the shadow.

 

I added a butterfly instead of a bow on the ribbon.  This butterfly is from the Creative Charms Kit of the Month for April (available for just a few more days).  I used a large dimensional glue dot to hold the bulky butterfly securely.

Here is a closer view of the butterfly - the colors work together perfectly.

The dots in the first layer and the sentiment shadow also coordinate with the dots in the floral patterned paper.  This cardstock is shiny but not glittered.  The card base and the top layer of the sentiment are Bazzill cardstock which also coordinates well with the blue color in the design.

 

I would probably send this card to a crafty friend and hope that the butterfly would be plucked off and reused for another crafty project!

I have explained about the use of color previews before - here is a LINK to a post from last fall.  I'll try to post another explanation of exactly how to plan a card in Design Studio tomorrow.  I have been doing this for years to save paper and help myself make color choices.  This is something you can do with just the trial version of the program if you want to have a better idea of the proper size and placement of your cuts.  I'll be driving back to New Jersey for a quick trip to attend an award ceremony at our son's college - he was chosen to receive the Annual Award for Music and we are very proud of him!  If things get too crazy it may take a day or two to add this post.

link to Discussion Day 2 - How much is enough?

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