Butterfly Valentine Card

Valentine cards are so much fun to make.  There are lots of types, from the cute kid valentines exchanged in school to the super elaborate multi-layered lace and bead creations dripping with vintage elegance.  I eventually get tired of red and pink but I do love making valentines.

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you know that I have a slight (well more than slight) "addiction" to the Memory Box dies.  Every time new dies are released I am like a kid in a candy shop.  I just bought this butterfly heart die and I couldn't wait to try it out.

My first Idea was to simply cut the heart shaped group of butterflies into the front of a pale pink shimmer card and add embellishments.  I wanted to keep the die centered so I taped it to the cardstock (total fail! - I forgot that I actually bought the Sizzix magnetic plate so I wouldn't have to do this...!).  

The tape left marks on my card front so I moved on to Plan B.

Fortunately, I already own the die that coordinates in shape to the butterfly heart - it is called the "Cupid Heart" and it matches a few other heart dies from Memory Box.

I cut a heart shape in the center of a 5 1/2 x 4 1/4 piece of red cardstock.

This overlay fits perfectly around the butterflies.  I trimmed the pink cardstock to be a bit smaller than the red card top.

I thought the plain red cardstock was a little too simple for a Valentine so I looked through my Anna Griffin embossing folders.  I was sure that there would be one that would work nicely for this card and the "Reflected Damask" was just what I was looking for.

The symmetrical pattern lined up perfectly with the heart cut-out.  These folders cover the full front of an A2 card.  I usually make my card toppers a little smaller than the card to leave a thin border but I decided to show off the entire embossed design and have the topper completely cover the white card front.

I used 1/8 inch ScorTape to adhere the overlay to the pink butterfly layer.  By putting the adhesive on the pink piece I could be sure that the top layer would be easy to place over the butterflies.

The butterflies are pretty but the three dimensional effect was rather subtle with just a white card base behind the image.

I tried putting a piece of gold metallic cardstock behind the butterflies and if really made them pop!  The butterflies need to have their wings lifted after cutting and you might not want to mail this card unless you put it in a box - otherwise the wings might get crushed down.

Here are the pieces of the card front - the base is white cardstock from Papertrey Ink.  I really like using this for card because it is very thick.  The back of the folded card can take the weight of this multi-layered front.

After I added the full front to the card all I needed was a sentiment.

I decided to pull out an older Cricut cartridge called Sentimentals and look for a quick cut for this card.  I found the "For You" on page 64 of the handbook.  It has a shadow layer so it worked for my card.  (I could have created the sentiment with my Silhouette but sometimes a quick Cricut cut is just faster and easier).

I reversed the colors for the sentiment, using gold for the top layer and the pink shimmer for the  shadow.

If you don't have a clear layout ruler, you might want to pick one up.  They can be found in art supply stores or craft stores and usually cost less than $10, depending on the length.  I use mine all of the time for paper scrapbook pages and a shorter ruler is great for keeping things lined up on a card.

I adhered the sentiment directly to the card instead of using a foam dot to raise it as I often do.  I didn't want the words to take away from the fluffy butterfly wings.  The words are slightly off center because I wanted to line up the slant of the "F" with the angle of the heart.  This also gives me a bit of extra room if I decide to add a ribbon to the side of the card.

It is very hard to capture the effect of the shimmer and metallic cardstock in a photo.  This darker photo gives you a better idea of what it looks like in person.

I haven't added a sentiment inside but an appropriate one (though slightly corny) might be "my heart flutters for you!"

Thanks for all of the good wishes for my sister - she is out of the hospital and recuperating at home. We that our new kitty might end up being called "Dorabella" - we just have to try it out for a few more days.  We like it because she is adorable and Dorabella sounds like it could be Italian for adorable - or maybe it's Italian for "doorbell?"

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12 on the 12th and the Pixie card

  

Guess what?  It is the 12th of the month again.  For those of you doing the "12 on the 12th for 2012" project, today is the day to take those 12 (or more) photos.

Here is my little eight year old neighbor with her special birthday card.  Everyone loves to see their name in print.  It is also nice to know that the card you give is custom made just for the recipient.

I used digital papers and embellishments from the Cosmo Cricket "Pixie-Licious" line to create the card.  I'll do another post explaining how I used the digital elements to create all of the parts of the card.  Once I had everything set up in the Silhouette Studio software, I printed two sheets of white cardstock with registration marks for cutting.

Here are all of the card pieces after cutting.  I chose a blue card base from my stash of Papertrey Ink cardstock, this color is Spring Rain.

I continue to be impressed by the detail and accuracy of the cuts I get with the Silhouette Cameo.    The narrow frame that I cut from the sentiment page is nearly perfect.

I left a thin white border around the Pixie image to help it stand out on the card front.  Some parts of the design needed a little added sparkle so I went over them with the Sakura Gelly Roll Stardust glitter pen.

I also added some sparkle to the words with some glitter gelly pen touches on the curves of each letter (the font I used is called "Curlz").

 

The spots around the circle are actually tiny flowers and I added some sparkle to the center of each flower.

I even added a bit of sparkle to the tips of her toes!

I cut four pixies so I would have a few extras.  I did notice that the calibration was off a tiny bit on a couple of the images.  I'll have to work through the calibration process to see if I can fix the errors.

I added large foam squares to the back of the printed scalloped circle to raise it from the first layer of pattern on the card front.

I wanted the pixie to "float" above the circle so I added a second layer of dots to all of the spots on the back except the one for the heart.  I wanted the images to work together and stay level.

This side view shows how the stacked foam squares work to raise the pixie higher and keep the images level.

The inside of the card has an inner liner that was adapted from a large square piece of digital paper.  I got the Pixie-Licious paper and elements in digital files from Jessica Sprague.com, you can find them at the top of the page HERE.

This card was a lot of fun to make.  It amazes me when I do a print and cut to see how easy it is to just start with white papers or cardstock and produce all of the pieces for your card.

If you'd like more information about how to take the digital images into the Silhouette software and create the cutting lines, please leave a question or comment.  I'll try to do another post to show the step by step process.

In other news...our world travelers are home - we picked them up at the airport last night and we are all looking forward to some fun times together before they head out to California.  My crafting and blogging time will be limited while they are here but I have lots up my sleeve for later this summer!


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Cheerful Spring Card

This cheerful card doesn't take very long to make but it could certainly brighten someone's day!  My friend Mandy at Scrappy-Go-Lucky sent me some cute spring embellishments.  They were sitting on my table along with various other bits and pieces that hadn't been put away as they should have been.  I live in fear that if I get too organized, I will no longer have the "happy accidents" where I discover pleasing combinations of elements just because they have been left sitting around on my cluttered work island!

Last month I shared a tip on punching wide borders - you can click HERE to read the post (scroll down a bit past the Easter eggs).  The punch I used was the Martha Stewart Deep Edge Garden Gate punch.

I picked up one of the sample border punched panels, a card base in New Leaf cardstock from Papertrey Ink, and added the cute gingham bird and daisy from Mandy's package along with three colors of twine.  The stamped sentiment is from Studio G.

I tied a bow at one end of the three lengths of twine (green , white and green/white twist) and trimmed off the end.

 A little fluffing and shaping to round out the loops and a second trim of the ends and my bow was ready to add to the card.  I used glue dots to hold it securely.

I think that the fresh gingham and bright colors are a nice counterpoint to the more formal border punched layer.

Once you have carefully punched the edges of the white cardstock, this card will go together very quickly.

I've been doing some more shopping at Blitsy - three times every week they add new items to the store and the sale lasts for one week or until the item is sold out or "blitsed."  Last week I got some Tim Holtz embossing folders and yesterday I ordered some Scor-Tape and the Scor-Buddy mini score board ($12.95).

If you haven't tried this site with great deals on all sorts of craft items, why not check it out?  If you click the image above or this LINK, you will go to the sign up page as my referral.  Once you join (it's free), you can get your own referral code and invite your friends and family.  When they make their first order, you will get a $10 credit in your account.

Occasionally they offer a week when you get $1 in credit for anyone who signs up from your link (up to 25 people) whether they order or not.  This offer is on right now and will last until May 1, 2012 at 12 PM Pacific time.  Thanks for using my link to join and helping me keep up with my craft supply addictions!

I hope you are having a great weekend. 

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Celtic Medallion for St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  I hope you have fun celebrating today.  If you find that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, let me know!

I wanted to make something that "looked Irish" for the holiday.  When I saw this design in the Dover Sampler offerings, I had to give it a try as a cutting file.  (Remember, you can sign up for the Dover Sampler here - it's free.  I have no connection to the company - just a happy customer).

There is actually a vector file that you can download.  I could tell it was too finely detailed to cut well at a small size but I tried to cut this directly from the Dover file in a larger size (about 8 inches) using the Make the Cut program and my Silhouette SD.  It worked pretty well except for one segment where the paper pulled up from the mat and the blade and carriage then chewed up the cut.

In this closer view  you can see just how tiny some of the cuts are - particularly the cuts inside the "pretzel" shape.  I decided to bring the file into my Silhouette Studio software, trace it and eliminate areas that I knew would cut poorly.

I eliminated many of the interior cuts to come up with a design that I hoped would be "cuttable" in a card size.  Then I created layers so I could add colors to create the interwoven effect of the image.

I was very happy to see how cleanly the design cut after I had modified it.

 A lot of the lines in the design are less than 1/16th of an inch!

Most of the inner pieces stayed on the mat when I gently lifted the top layer of the cut.  Sometimes I save the negative space pieces to make a second image but I decided this would be too fiddly to try to adhere to another card.

I tried several color combinations, adding in some orange and yellow but I decided it would be best to use just shades of green.  I found two glittery sheets of Core'dinations Core Couture - one light and one dark green - to coordinate with the two solid shades I started with.

Once I had all of the layers cut, I did a "dry fit" to stack them up and create the design.  This design is not totally symmetrical and I wanted to be sure I had it lined up correctly.

I flipped the pieces over and made a light pencil mark on the back of the same point on each layer.  This gave me a quick reference when I was adhering the pieces together.

I used the Letra-Tac adhesive sheet for the delicate top layer.  These tiny dots are great for holding the thin layers together.  (Click to see my first post about this adhesive with more details).

Here is the adhesive side of the second layer after I burnished it on the Letra Tac sheet.  The adhesive holds the cut very well but you can peel it up and realign the layers if you get a bit off.

Each of the layers fills in a section of the design - the first two alternate with three triangles each and the last is for the connecting "ribbon" that weaves through all of the sections.

The second layer adds the darker green glitter cardstock.

Finally, the shadow background fills in the "ribbon" and adds an outer border.

For a little more sparkle, I added a light green Vintage Gem from Creative Charms in the center.  (These are included in the Inventory Clearance right now).

I looked around a bit more and added some gem stickers in three shades of green at opposite points.

I used lots of foam circles to lift the heavy layered medallion off the front of the card.  The card base is Papertrey Ink cardstock in "New Leaf" from the Perfect Match series.

 

I didn't want the medallion to just sit alone on the card front so I added a punched ribbon that I made with my Martha Stewart Infinite Loops punch.

I do not recommend using this punch with the glitter cardstock - I had a very hard time getting the punch to release and had to use a tool after each punch to pop it back into starting position (fortunately it only took three punches to get the border piece long enough for the card).

I cut the strip a bit longer and then trimmed to bottom to match the card.  At the top, I wrapped it over just a bit to avoid the "not quite long enough" look that you sometimes get when you try to cut the border flush to the fold.

I punched a four leaf clover from some of the dark green cardstock and added it to the back to finish the raw edge.

The width of the loops is about the same as the width of the lines in the medallion so I thought they went together nicely.

You could stamp a sentiment on the lower right corner...

...or add a couple more shamrocks.

You could also make this a vertical card.  Once you have the medallion made, there are lots of possibilities for using it.  I think it would also look pretty on a scrapbook page.

If you have questions about how I used the sample image to create this final design, let me know.  I'll add it to the list of videos I need to make!

Have a great weekend - we expect some nice weather from Sunday into the middle of next week (in the 70's!).

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