Cherish

New card with Baroque Motifs:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, Purely Pomegranate, Versamark
Paper: Purely Pomegranate, Elegant Eggplant, So Saffron
Accessories: Tag Punch, Paper Snips, Gold embossing powder, Elegant Eggplant and More Mustard ribbon, Double Circle punch, Stampin' Dimensionals

Now this is a card that I really love! When I saw the new Purely Pomegranate color for this year, I fell head over heels with it and I want to use it all of the time.

It's hard to tell in the photo, but for the motif on the tag, I stamped in pomegranate on saffron cardstock, and trimmed that out around the dots. Then I stamped the motif again in eggplant on eggplant and trimmed that out closer to the main part of the image. This way, you get a border around it in a totally different corner. I love the look of torn paper, and it's fun to use it as if you're revealing a little secret on the layer beneath, like the "cherish" that's on the lower right corner. And of course, ribbon is one of my favorite accessories to just add a little extra something to almost any card.

Colors from Stampin' Up!'s Rich Regal color family are a natural for a vintage set like this, and the eggplant and pomegranate might be my favorite color combination. At least for this week, until I see something different.

Next up will be an example of how to adapt an idea from a scrapbook page into a card. Stay tuned!

Thinking of You

Today I have 2 cards that are almost the same, just slightly tweaked colors and accessories. I hesitated to put these up, because to be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I like them. Maybe you won't either, or maybe you will. In any case, at least I'm stamping, and maybe I can learn from mistakes. Feel free to tell me what you think about them, what you do and don't like, what I might tweak to make 'em better.

Card #1:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs (love this new stamp set), Sincere Salutations
Ink: Handsome Hunter classic pad, Very Vanilla craft pad
Paper: Handsome Hunter, Blush Blossom, Elegant Eggplant card stock
Accessories: embossing powder, paper snips, dimensionals

Technique: embossing. I just inked up the stamp with vanilla ink, poured embossing powder over it, ran heat tool over that to melt the EP, let it cool (important step - stamping injuries can be surprisingly painful!), then trimmed the edges with the paper snips. Those little scissors are great, because you can trim so closely to edges and they're super-sharp and cut all the way to the tips.


Card #2:



Stamps: Baroque Motifs, Sincere Salutations
Ink: Handsome Hunter, Sage Shadow, Perfect Plum classic pads
Paper: Handsome Hunter, Blush Blossom, Perfect Plum, Sage Shadow card stock
Accessories: Metal Edged Tags - square, Crystal Effects, paper snips, dimensionals


No interesting technique on this one, but I did remove the paper from the middle of the Metal-Edged tag, then cut a square of Blush Blossom cardstock and mounted it underneath the tag with a little Crystal Effects (this stuff is so versatile). The trick to getting the paper out of the tag is to cut a big X through the middle of it. Once you pull out the first triangle, the rest are easier to remove, and then you can customize the paper. It's an easy way to give something a little extra highlight on your work, but without letting the background show through - if I'd just taken out the paper and not replaced it, you'd see the background on the main layer. Plus, the edge of the tag by itself would be harder to mount, because how do you attach such a thin piece of metal to the paper so it's popped up, but without your adhesive showing?

Actually, there is a little trick to these cards - on most of my cards, the largest layer is actually the card "base" where I'd eventually write something. If this were a "normal" card, that would be the Handsome Hunter layer, but to write on that, you HAVE to have a gel pen or something similar, or else you won't be able to read the words. For this card, I cut a piece of Handsome Hunter into a 5.5" x 4.25" rectangle - a quarter sheet of cardstock. Then I cut the Blush Blossom cardstock so that it was 5.25" x 8", folded it in half, then mounted that on the Handsome Hunter. Now when you go to open the card, you're not opening a Handsome Hunter card, you're opening a Blush Blossom one, and you can use almost any pen to write on that!

Polka Dots & Paisley

I made this card a couple of months ago, but apparently never posted it. Whoops!




Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley
Ink: Pretty In Pink, Certainly Celery, Regal Rose
Paper: Pretty In Pink, Certainly Celery, Whisper White
Accessories: Hodgepodge Hardware - Aged Copper, Certainly Celery ribbon, Mini Glue Dots, Stampin' Dimensionals


I love to add ribbon to cards, and the Mini Glue Dots are a great way to add a little bit of it anywhere. Just tie a simple knot in the ribbon, press it to the glue dot, then stick it on the card wherever you like. This accessory really helps odd-shaped or textured pieces like a ribbon stay on a card, and ribbon is an easy and inexpensive choice for jazzing up your work.

Happy Birthday!

This features the new "Year After Year" stamp set - I love sets like this that contain multiple images where you can swap them out with the same template if you need a quick card. Here's an example:




Stamps: Year After Year, It's Your Birthday, Itty Bitty Backgrounds
Ink: Basic Black classic pad; Real Red, Brilliant Blue, Glorious Green, Yoyo Yellow, Only Orange markers
Paper: Basic Black, Whisper White, Yoyo Yellow
Acessories: Circle Rhinestone Brads - Fire; square punch, Dimensionals

Fairly easy card, and really, if you just change the greeting and the image used, you've got a whole new card. That set has 8 to choose from - the gift above, a mortarboard (grads), flowers (friendly pick-me-up, just a note, etc.), a tree (holidays), a cake (birthday or wedding), heart (lovelovelove, Valentine), elephant (welcome new baby, kid's birthday), and pumpkin (fall, Halloween). The tree would be great with lots of rhinestone brads on there - I love this new accessory!