DSP – ConstantlyCreating.Me

Made with Love and Sale-a-Bration Papers for Stamp with Amy K’s Tuesday Team Blog Hop

A quick-and-easy card using stamps, ink, paper, and a Sale-a-Bration item…all about love and friendship.

Hello at long last, readers! I haven’t been able to join the last several team blog hops because of an increase in the busyness of my schedule (which means I’m overbooked), but I really wanted to get back to participating, so here I am regardless. 🙂 It’s nice to be back! I’ve definitely been missing my cardmaking (and I’m still surprised by that, being a scrapbooker first and foremost…for years. LOL).

Our blog hop today is all about the theme of love. When I started looking at the “new things” I could share with you, I pulled out my Sale-a-Bration Designer Series Papers and just couldn’t put them away! I do love me some good paper. 🙂 So I came up with something quick and easy to showcase the lovely paper designs and specialty papers that Stampin’ Up gave us. Of course, I couldn’t use them all, so I’ll have to post about those later. 😉

For my card today, I’m using two new stamp sets, Garden Wishes (154408) and Punch Party (155300); two patterns of DSP from one sheet of Paper Blooms SAB DDP papers (155222); and one color of the Hydrangea Hill Mercury Glass Designer Acetate (154574). I used the largest cards in the Assorted Memories and More Cards and Envelopes pack (149710) as my card base. It uses the retired Whisper White color. (If you haven’t yet heard, the mill that made our Whisper White had to close down because of Covid, so we had to find a supplier who could make something similar. Our new white color is called Basic White…but I don’t have any of it yet myself. Supposedly it is a brighter white than the retired one.)

Did you know that you can use either side of the Mercury glass acetate? The back side is silver, and that’s what ended up going onto my card, since I deviated a little from my original plan. (Be sure to take off the plastic protective covering from the Mercury glass sheets after you order yours!) I cut the pink color of the Hydrangea Hill Mercury Glass for the left side block and later flipped it. I also started out with a 2” strip but ended up trimming off a half inch before I was done, for better proportions on the card.

I had also originally chosen two different papers from the same paper pack, but a friend and I decided that we liked the pink stripes better rather than both flowers on the card front (that’s why I flipped the Mercury glass to silver—-too much pink!). I cut and placed the stripes 2/3 of the way down the base and then fitted the top floral piece next to the other two already in place.

Side note here. I had intending on entering the hashtag simplestamping, as their current monthly challenge only allows for stamps, ink, paper, and any item from Sale-a-bration; therefore, I did not add a ribbon across the middle or dies for the sentiment (although I was sorely tempted to. I’ll save that challenge for later since I used one of the adorable Heart Charms (154282) inside my Seaside Spray cardstock heart for this card.

After affixing my three strips of paper or acetate onto my card, I then stamped the open heart from the Punch Party Host set in Night of Navy ink onto the Seaside Spray cardstock and fussy-cut around its edges, using the border as my guide. Then I glued one of the silver Heart Charms onto the middle. (By the way, these charms make great shamrocks and general flowers when several points are positioned toward the center).

For the banner, I stamped the “Made with Love for a True Friend” sentiment from Garden Wishes onto a piece of Whisper White in Night of Navy ink. Then I took my little Stampin’ Up guillotine cutter (something only demos and new recruits could get at the time) and sliced off the edges toward the sentiment until the space was about even on both sides above and below the sentiment. Then I cut up toward the middle and angled inward from the sides to make a long, narrow flag. Sometimes I like that style. It seemed to fit this card. After that, using my fingers, I just curled the banner a couple of different ways to give it a flowing, waving look. I tucked one end under the heart that I hadn’t glued down yet and added a little glue under the part of the banner resting on the card.

That’s it! Quick, easy, simple. I had planned on breaking up that same sentiment to fit inside the open heart, but I had trouble getting everything lined up and straight—twice. I decided that that process certainly would not be a quick and easy card. (Aren’t you lucky?) 😆 I’ll continue to work on that and see if time #3 will finally be the one that works out.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today! Be sure to visit my other team members below for their awesome cards! You can use either the Previous and Next buttons or click on the individual links themselves. I’ll try not to be too scarce again. 🙂

Karen Ksenzakovic: https://wp.me/paaNf4-3OO
Tara Carpenter: https://tarabethstamps.blogspot.com/2021/01/stampin-up-floating-fluttering-happy.html
Jaimie Babarczy: https://wp.me/p79UhD-4E3
Mary Deatherage: https://wp.me/p5snyt-gmE
Sue Prather: https://wp.me/p5yitZ-2mX
Leslie Larkin: https://leslielarkin.com/lots-of-heart-bundle/
Connie Troyer: https://wp.me/p8xvI6-zg
Donna Leonard: http://stampdabbles.com/?p=3890
Karen Finkle: https://karenscardkorner.blogspot.com/2021/01/stampin-up-forever-blossoms.html
Akiko Sudano: https://wp.me/paOv8E-2gS
Jillian Good: http://dyedwith.love/?p=54
Amy Koenders: https://wp.me/p2SFwf-lQ8

Thinking of You Card with Painted Harvest for Stamp with Amy K’s Blog Hop

Welcome to my blog for Stamp with Amy K’s Inkin’ Krew Blog Hop for Tuesday, August 13! We have a great lineup for you today. Thanks for stopping by to see what I created. 🙂

With the seasonal change coming soon, this month’s blog hop theme is “fall frenzy.” So I have a thinking of you/just for you sunflower card to share with you today using Stampin’ Up’s “Painted Harvest” and “Rare Blessings” stamp sets.

I decided to use last week’s Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge—Sketch #328—to give me a basic idea of construction. I don’t use sketches often because I usually just design straight from my brain based on what I’m feeling with the products I see in front of me, but I’ve had a busy weekend (okay, month). I’m thankful I can turn to a sketch or a Pinterest pin for less-than-ideal crafting times when I need to come up with something quickly in either design or time. So here is the sketch image I worked from.

And I was also inspired by a card from my teammate Leslie Larkin (leslielarkin.com) that was posted on our team Facebook page last month. After I saw her card, I wanted to make one immediately. I love the black-and-white flower with the color around it (she used Memento Tuxedo Black ink with Lovely Lipstick paper, cardstock, and gems).

So without further paragraphs, let’s get to my card! Although I had to create it in a crunch, I found several ideas vying for realization as I looked through my current DSP and video chatted with a crafty friend. I didn’t have time to make the five cards I wanted to, so I’ve had to back-burner most of them. I did pull out supplies to make a second card following the same sketch, so I’ll make that and post it another day. Here’s the one I put together for today. (Be sure to catch the updated picture at the end!)

What I ended up using was a Terracotta Tile card base, a sheet of striped paper from the “Come Sail Away” DSP pack (Mossy Meadow color), and a sheet of flowered paper from the Mosaic Mood Specialty DSP (Crushed Curry, Garden Green, Mint Macaron, Terracotta Tile, and Very Vanilla colors). It is a specialty DSP because half the sheets in the pack have Spot UV gloss on the paper to showcase various designs. In the paper I used, the flowered circles have the gloss on them.

I thought the Mosaic Mood paper would work for the scalloped piece on the sketch because the flowered circles are all in a row and have radiating circles around each flower. I just took my scissors and fussy-cut around the largest circle of each flower in the row, up to where it touches the next circle. It seemed the fastest way to move forward on the card and stop all the overthinking I was doing.

The striped Mossy Meadow paper from “Come Sail Away” pulls out the Garden Green from the “Mosaic Mood” paper and balances everything visually. For some reason, I always think stripes go on the bottom. I suppose that’s one of my “ruts” in card-making. However much I tried to argue with that while designing the card, in the end it was easiest to cave and promise myself that I’d try something new later.

Once I had the stripes glued down and the top portion cut, I tried to find a way to use the beautiful 1/2″ Poppy Parade Textured Weave Ribbon in my “current product accessories” bin. I began using the ribbon the way it comes off the roll but didn’t like how it was the same width as the flowered/scalloped border. I needed something thinner, but I only have so many ribbons and twine options right now. So I put some heavy-duty Tear & Tape Adhesive down on one side of the ribbon and did my best at folding it over in half (it’s kind of tricky, actually). And then I located the 1/8″ Glubers glue line I’d cut in half previously for another card. It comes in 1/4″ strips, but as I’ve mislaid my 1/8″ red-line tape, I made do with the other—twice now. Tear & Tape Adhesive would have worked for that as well, but I already had the other one cut and waiting for me.

The metallic brads are basically just decorative. Since I hadn’t yet adhered the flowered piece to my card base, I could still punch a tiny hole on each side of the ribbon, place the brads through the holes, and fasten them at the back before gluing the paper. I’m considering them to be two of the gem places in the sketch, with the third located on the tag. My brads are miscellaneous from my stash, but Stampin’ Up has a great set of Metallic Brads in the current catalog, so I’ll add them to the list of supplies at the end.

Then came the tedious part of the card—figuring out which colors to use for the two-step photopolymer “Painted Harvest” sunflower. I know I’ve saved some color swatches for this sunflower in Pinterest, but for some reason I thought it would be faster to use the colors I’d narrowed down and stacked on my table rather than search in my Color Combos and Sketches board. Hindsight is 20/20.

I wasn’t entirely sure how the stamping was supposed to go, so I got some scrap paper and started “playing” with the two darker ink colors I’d pulled—Early Espresso and Soft Suede. I did several of both colors as the base. Then I opened the two ink colors in my stash that matched the paper the best—Terracotta Tile and a very old (but perfectly juicy) Ruby Red. I need to get a Poppy Parade ink pad yet. I wasn’t sure which color would work best with both the Poppy Parade ribbon and the Terracotta Tile in the paper.

After too much experimentation, including tone-on-tone and color mixing in the brighter colors, I chose to go with the Early Espresso/Ruby Red combination. The Terracotta Tile is more orange than Poppy Parade, and the Ruby Red has a better balance of an orange and something rosier or pinker when both Terracotta Tile and Poppy Parade are on the same card. The flower spots that have Terracotta Tile in them on the DSP are small enough it doesn’t seem to matter much. I had originally picked a Soft Suede/Terracotta Tile combination, but I didn’t stamp the center quite right on the best piece and royally messed it up when trying to fix it, per my usual. Anyway, that color combination works too.

The center of the finished flower is tone-on-tone Early Espresso. Stamping the center of the sunflower was a little challenging to line up at first, but the more I “practiced,” the better I got at it. So just keep trying while you figure out how it works. After I chose one of the images I’d stamped, I then fussy-cut around the finished sunflower and added pop-up foam dots to the back of it. I’m just now realizing that I probably should have added leaves as well. But I’m calling this card done. Maybe I’ll add leaves before I send it. That’s for another day.

For the “Just for You” tag from the “Rare Blessings” stamp set, I used Early Espresso ink and a scrap of Crumb Cake cardstock. The stamp set is one of the new cling sets, so I had to put it together first with the new stickers (that actually stick to the block!). I actually kind of love doing that with the new stamp sets. 🙂 After that was done and I stamped it on the Crumb Cake, I cut down the tag and snipped up the middle at the left with my scissors to make a banner end. Then I took a Really Rust Stampin’ Write Marker (retired) and added some faux stitching in a thin border just inside the edges of the tag. I would have used an Early Espresso marker, but something happened to mine and I no longer have one. The Really Rust is close enough to the Terracotta Tile that it still matches. And, finally, I added a Terracotta Tile gem from the 2019-2020 In-Color Faceted Dots embellishment pack to the tag as one of the gem spots in the sketch.

I’m not sure what is going on the inside yet. The card is going to a friend who recently lost his mother. I need to look for the right sentiment before I send it with a delayed memorial gift. It’s been a busy year here. But at least I’m one step closer in getting the card and gift sent out the door.

UPDATE!: I decided to add some vellum leaves from the Magnolia Lane Memories and More Card Pack around the flower. I fussy-cut them and colored them on the front and back (to make them darker) with my Dark Old Olive Alcohol Blend marker. (I don’t have the Mossy Meadow Blends yet, so I made do.) The sentiment on the inside reads “With Deepest Sympathy” and is from the current Golden Afternoon stamp set. I stamped it in Crumb Cake. I also ran one of the sticker border strips across the bottom of the inside from the Magnolia Lane Memories and More Card Pack. NOW I’m finished with the card. 🙂

That’s all for today. Stay tuned for the next card using “Painted Harvest” and Sketch 328. Thanks again for visiting! Feel free to post questions or comments. Below the list of blog hop participants of my Stampin’ Up team members are the products I used in my card. You can purchase any of them through my online store here—or just click on the picture—and if you use the host code 3W7RXKCU when you check out, I’ll send a free gift your way! Also, if you happen to need a current Annual Catalog or the upcoming Holiday Catalog (which should arrive on my doorstep tomorrow), I’m happy to send you one! Just use the Contact Me link at the top of the main page.

To continue with our blog hop using the arrows, click Previous to view Paula Vincent’s offering or Next to view Karen Ksenzakovic’s card. Or you can click any of the links below to go directly to any demonstrator’s blog.

Jaimie Babarczy: https://wp.me/p79UhD-32A
Terry Lynn Bright: https://wp.me/p8fxPh-ak
Mary Deatherage: https://wp.me/p5snyt-8YX
Akiko Sudano: https://wp.me/paOv8E-hO
Shirley Gentry: https://stampinwithshirleyg.com/?p=6855
Karen Finkle: https://karenscardkorner.blogspot.com/2019/08/stampin-up-accented-blooms-thinking-of.html
Paula Vincent: https://cockeyedcrafter.com/?p=160
Connie Troyer: https://wp.me/p8xvI6-E
Karen Ksenzakovic: https://wp.me/paaNf4-RH
Amy Koenders: https://wp.me/p2SFwf-gGt

Product List

Plus the Golden Afternoon stamp set and Magnolia Lane Memories and More Card Pack!

You’re So Cool Card

This fun summertime card uses some retired Stampin’ Up DSP—Tasty Treats and Cupcakes & Carousels—along with an unnamed stamp set featuring puns (I used the sentiment and the small popsicle here), and I even incorporated a large popsicle from an adult coloring book. I colored the small popsicle with Stampin’ Blends alcohol markers (Balmy Blue, Light Calypso Coral, and Light BlackBerry Bliss) and I used Tuxedo Black Memento Ink for the sentiment and small popsicle. The Decorative Label Punch was used around the sentiment (which I then inked the edges of with a Crumb Cake Stampin’ Write Marker).

www.facebook.com/339078276585787/posts/617132958780316

A Masculine Card with the Come Sail Away Suite (2019-2010 Annual Catalog–Sailing Home stamps)

Let’s all say hooray that I can finally blog again! I started this masculine card while in Charlotte at OnStage with Stampin’ Up in mid-April but didn’t finish putting it together until the preordered corresponding dies arrived at my house after vacation and I had some time to do sit down with them. The Stampin’ Up team gave us precut pieces in a kit to use with supplies on the table, though we could change it any way we wanted to. I did end up varying my card a little from the picture they included with the kit.

This card features the Come Sail Away suite, which will be new in the 2019-2020 Annual Catalog (available to customers June 4). What I used from the suite is the Sailing Home Stamp Set, the Smooth Sailing Dies, some of the Come Sail Away DSP, the Sail Away Trinkets, and a bit of its Sahara Sand/Night of Navy Baker’s Twine. The suite itself also includes the Come Sail Away Memories and More Card Pack and the High Seas 3D Embossing Folder—and let me tell you, this suite is awesome. I will be making up some cards with the Come Sail Away Memories and More Card Pack soon as well (there are laser-cut specialty cards in the pack of 50 double-sided cards!).

The stamps, dies, twine, trinkets, embossing folder, and Designer Series Paper. A must-have!

The cards in the Memories and More Card Pack…one of my all-time favorites! Look at those laser-cut designs!

These trinkets are flat enough to mail and lightweight!

So, for this A2 card, I glued some Come Sail Away DSP onto the card base first and then placed the smaller piece of DSP cockeyed at an angle for its position behind the focal piece. For that focal piece, I used Balmy Blue ink with an AquaPainter to create a light wash of blue sky in the background (technically I did that last, but it’s smarter to do it first).

I stamped the lighthouse onto the Whisper White focal piece with Night of Navy ink and then stamped the compass off to the right of it with Early Espresso ink the way the kit photo suggested. Then I stamped and fussy-cut another lighthouse on scrap Whisper White and placed it atop the first one with foam dots so it became 3D. (The kit also suggested we add a die-cut ship’s steering wheel here with the lighthouse/compass/sentiment area, but I moved my wheel to the inside of the card instead—and left plenty of room for an overdue message.)

I stamped three flying birds in Tuxedo Black Memento Ink in the sky and distressed the edges of the Whisper White piece with a distressing tool. Then I die-cut a piece of rope with some dark brown (Soft Suede?) cardstock to lay across the bottom under the lighthouse (it embosses while it cuts!), and I die-cut a sentiment spot out of Balmy Blue cardstock after that. The sentiment die has a wonderful dashed or stitched outside border that is pressed into the paper as it cuts the die-cut.

I then stamped the sentiment (“Let Hope Be Your Anchor Through the Storms of Life”) in Balmy Blue. Since this is a cling stamp set, it is much easier to line up visually, so the stamping went well the first time through, even if I probably should have used Night of Navy ink instead. 😉

To finish off the card, I tied a bit of the Baker’s Twine through one of the anchor trinkets (there are both anchor and ship’s wheel trinkets) and glued the ends of the twine up under the sentiment spot, as if it was dangling there or laying near the lighthouse.

Here are some snapshots I took at OnStage including the display boards of the Come Sail Away suite. Our presenter in Charlotte was the incomparable Mary Deatherage, who happens to be one of my team members! She created the samples on the display boards for this suite as well. It was so much fun (and a bit awe-inspiring) to see her demonstrating the products right up there live in front of us, and she did an amazing job.

Suffice it to say I will be using these again soon! I think the “Set Sail in the Direction of Your Dreams” sentiment is going to be great for masculine graduation cards this season. They hit a home run with this bundle.

Although the new catalog isn’t available to order from until June 4, I’m happy to send one your way once I get them. If you’d like a catalog, just email me! There are also still a lot of great things carrying over and retiring from the two current catalogs. If you need a demonstrator, you can use host code RRCMHZ4E when you shop with me (catch the direct store link in my sidebar at the right or click http://www.stampinup.com/ECWeb/default.aspx?dbwsdemoid=2202334!). I’m happy to answer any questions you may have. Thanks for stopping by! Let me know what you think of this product suite!

“Feminine” Blog Hop for Amy K’s Krew (If Friends Were Flowers…)

I’m part of Amy’s Inkin’ Krew Blog Hop with a “Feminine” theme for Tuesday, April 9. See what I created with some paper and dies for friendship and Mother’s Day!

Hello, and welcome back to Constantly Creating/The Little Whatnot Shop! I’m blog hopping with Stamp with Amy K’s Inkin’ Krew today, and our topic is “feminine.” That gives a lot of options for card creation (men being much harder to design for)!

This is really the story of two cards. I’ve been traveling and freelancing again lately, so I haven’t had a lot of time in the craft room. But before I left the state, I started thinking about several different cards I need to send, and I decided to use a flowery piece of the Share What You Love Specialty Designer Series Paper (DSP) as a background for all of them. (I confess, I was also hoping to meet a 4-6-card “use it up” challenge on a Facebook group by doing so. Ambitious for someone who hasn’t been home!)

Last week I cut three card fronts out of one 12×12 sheet of the DSP and still have a couple of scraps leftover for another smaller notecard yet—maybe a thank-you. Of the cards with the bigger sections, one will be for a belated birthday, another became a Mother’s Day card, and the friendship card I’ve used for today’s blog title will likely go to the local gift shop upon my next delivery. I love how the same piece of paper works for each type of card.

I’ve acquired a few off-brand things recently as well, so these cards are not entirely made up of Stampin’ Up products (as my demo status would prefer). But the bulk of them are SU, and you could easily substitute SU’s vases or flower stamps or another sentiment where I’ve placed mine; the design works regardless. I grabbed the “other” products because they were near me (read: not yet put away) and I’m always trying to use up my consumables. (Plus, I needed to finish a card quickly to be able to blog!) In the products list at the end of the post, I’ll add some Stampin’ Up product suggestions you could use to change this card into one of “theirs” entirely, alongside what I did use from SU’s line. 🙂

So, diving into the cards I’ve finished…I have to confess first that I began a card for friendship, forgot what I was doing with it, and turned it into the aforementioned Mother’s Day card. I had the sketchiest of ideas when I started pulling things together—which is probably why I got distracted and it became something else—but sometimes one just has to go with the creative flow. After I finished the Mother’s Day card, it was easier to just emulate the structure for the actual friendship card, only tweaking the materials. As the two are similar, I’ll show the Mother’s Day one here as well. In the pictures, you can see how the flowers and leaves in the Specialty DSP have a pearlized, translucent finish.

For both the blog card and the Mother’s Day card, I began with a Mossy Meadow card base of 80-lb cardstock in an A2 (4.25″ x 5.2″ finished) size, and I cut down the Crumb Cake background with shimmery Rich Razzleberry/Mossy Meadow flowered piece from the Share What You Love Specialty DSP to mostly cover the card front, with a little Mossy Meadow border showing all the way around. The Mother’s Day border is slightly larger than 1/8″, whereas the friendship border is slightly smaller than 1/8″.

The other day, I sat down with my Cuttlebug, my Stained Glass Thinlits and Stitched Labels Framelits die sets, and pieces of Rich Razzleberry cardstock and a random cardstock I ended up with in an order that reminds me a little of Crumb Cake. It is just a shade lighter, so it matches the Share What You Love paper quite well (and it’s another consumable I can use up! Yay!). I made off several die-cuts out of the cardstock and put them on the desk with the rest of my card pieces until I had more time.

On Monday, I tried several of them (unglued) with different flower stickers to see what I liked best together. The Mother’s Day card uses two Stitched Framelits, one of each color, layered together perpendicularly so that the lighter cardstock has a bit more weight to it on the busy background. The additional Rich Razzleberry die-cut seemed to ground the top one and give a fuller look even though I also liked the simplicity of only one Framelit.

For the friendship (“If friends were flowers, I’d pick you”) card, I had originally chosen the vase idea (before I forgot what I was doing) because I saw the sentiment and the vase/flower stickers about the same time, and they made sense to use together. Since I had used the Stitched Framelits on the first card, I used one of the Stained Glass Thinlits Dies for the second. I adhered some sticky adhesive to the back of the die-cut and replaced the square that comes loose when first cut, and then I backed both the “stained glass” piece and the solid square onto some Rich Razzleberry cardstock, using my micro-tip scissors to cut around the edges once they were stuck.

Note: Keep track of how the solid square comes out of the die; it’s not completely symmetrical, and there is a spacing difference when it’s turned the “other” way.

When I positioned the flower/vase sticker and temporarily placed the diagonal onto the DSP, I then felt it was too simple (story of my crafting life), so I cut down a couple of the gorgeous Pearlized Doilies and glued them to the back of the sides of the diagonal, which fluffed out the center in a similar style to the Mother’s Day card. I got three out of one doily the way I cut them, and the center circle is still able to be used for something else.

I wanted to make sure I left room for a sentiment across the bottom on both cards, so I tested the placement and figured out how big the border strip at the bottom would need to be. For the Mother’s Day card, I added 1/8″ above and below the sentiment ribbon I planned on using to darken the ribbon a bit and make it look more finished; then I cut some vellum adhesive to fit inside the ribbon and carefully merged the two. Ribbon is tricky to glue, the way it’s so flexible. It’s not my favorite way of doing it. I was going to wrap the edges behind the DSP, but because of where I’d trimmed the ribbon around the words on the next repetition, I didn’t end up having enough room to tuck it around. So I took pinking shears to the ends instead since regular scissors and a straight cut would cause it to fray.

The solid Mossy Meadow border for the sentiment on the friendship card is about 3/8″, though I didn’t measure. Because the letters are close together on the stamp, I was leery of using embossing powder or getting things too juicy in case they would blur or blend together. I fell back on some old Craft White pigment ink to stamp it, and then I heat embossed it, hoping it would turn slightly puffy but still be readable (I remember doing that once somehow, but since heating it this time did nothing except dry it, I’ll have to figure out the “puffy” process again). And then because I had room at the sides of the sentiment for geegaws, I trotted out my new Heart Epoxy Droplets and colored them with my Light Blackberry Bliss Stampin’ Blends alcohol marker, the way I’ve heard others have done. It actually works!

I’ve made the inside of both cards the same—white paper to stamp and write on, an old random wooden stamp sentiment that fits both types of cards, a little writing room, and a strip of Specialty DSP running along the bottom. And I used some retired heart epoxy sticker gems on the inside of the Mother’s Day card as well. Both cards flip up to open rather than right to left.

I also added DSP to the envelope flaps since the cards are the nicer sort.

Now that both are done, I might like the simpler Mother’s Day card better, though I do love the Stained Glass die. But I’m thinking I should have kept the doilies closer to the diagonal on the friendship card so the overall look wouldn’t spread out so much. Well, next time, I guess. The sentiment may be my favorite thing about them anyway, the way it uplifts and encourages the recipients. The older I get, the more I see how important it is to do that for others. Whose day can you brighten this week?

Thanks again for stopping by to read and say hello! The products I used or suggested will be at the very bottom of the post, after the linked list of hop participants. Clicking on any of the thumbnails will take you right to my online store if you see something you’d like to purchase.

We have a great group with much talent hopping with us today! Be sure to go to the other blogs and see what my team members have created too. 🙂 You can follow the linking list through each person on each blog you visit.

To see what Terry Lynn Bright made this week, click the Previous button. To jump to Sue Prather’s blog, click Next.

Karen Ksenzakovic: https://wp.me/paaNf4-wU
Karen Finkle: https://karenscardkorner.blogspot.com/2019/04/stampin-up-tropical-chic-for-amys-inkin.html
Akiko Sudano: https://stampininthemeadows.com/2019/04/09/beautiful-bouquet-mothers-day-for-the-inkin-krew-blog-hop/
Mary Deatherage: https://wp.me/p5snyt-7OG
Jaimie Babarczy: https://wp.me/p79UhD-2E8
Shirley Gentry: https://stampinwithshirleyg.com/?p=4726
Julie Johnston: https://wp.me/p8SzmQ-2db
Terry Lynn Bright: http://tlsbrightspot.com/2019/04/09/country-floral-embossing-folder/
Connie Troyer: https://constantlycreating.me/2019/04/09/feminine-blog-hop-for-amy-ks-krew-if-friends-were-flowers
Sue Prather: https://wp.me/p5yitZ-17P
Leslie Larkin: http://leslielarkin.com/wonderful-romance-with-amys-inkin-krew-team-blog-hop/
Amy Koenders: https://wp.me/p2SFwf-evn

Product List

Mossy Meadow 8-1/2″ X 11″ Cardstock

[133676]

Rich Razzleberry 8-1/2″ X 11″ Card Stock

[115316]

Rich Razzleberry Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147091]

Share What You Love Specialty Designer Series Paper

[146926]

Stitched Labels Framelits Dies

[146828]

Stained Glass Thinlits Dies

[146347]

Pearlized Doilies

[146936]

Heart Epoxy Droplets

[148583]

You Light Up My Life (Throwback Creation)

A throwback to a masculine lightbulb card I made previously.

Since I’m recovering from being sick and haven’t been in the craft room, I thought I’d take the next few posts to show cards I previously created and didn’t post to social media. Some of them were or are listed on my Etsy shop and some have sold privately. . . . I had fun creating this masculine card with retired materials from SU. I inked and distressed the edges and used Distress Stickles on the filament inside the light bulb. Thought I’d “grunge” it up a bit. . . . #thelittlewhatnotshop #constantlycreating #masculinecards #lightbulbs #youlightupmylife #summerstarfruit #sudsp

View on Instagram https://ift.tt/2UeMYmo

Red Foxes in Winter Special Birthday Card

Back in the summer, I was asked to make a special birthday card for a special friend’s son who has a fondness for foxes—all shades and types. She gave me free creative rein and said she didn’t care what I did with the idea, but that he might like a red one. I considered several different fox stamps and stickers but finally chose a particular stamp that shows foxes in a wintry scene since his birthday was in February (“300-16 Red Foxes and Birches,” Stampa Rosa).

I’ve never really thought much about foxes in my life, other than thinking they’re beautiful animals in general, so I had no idea how to shade one. Coloring is something I’m still not comfortable with, because I feel like the concept of shading is one I haven’t begun to learn. Luckily for me, the wooden stamp I was using had a colored picture on the front that I just had to attempt to recreate! 🙂

First I had to choose the right paper, though, which evidently was not the bumpy watercolor paper I tried to stamp on first (twice). I knew that, but I was thinking of using my water-filled Aqua Painter on it and felt the paper would handle it. I liked the textured look of the watercolor paper too, but the image was too detailed to stamp cleanly with the bumps in the paper. Then I remembered Stampin’ Up’s Shimmery White cardstock, a must-have in my collection. It’s not any thicker than the rest of their cardstock (other than the aptly named “Thick” cardstock in the line), but it’s smooth and somehow holds up great with watercoloring–and it’s sparkly to boot (hence the “Shimmery” part of the name). Bonus for me was that the paper helped my snow scene sparkle.

Once I had the paper figured out and the stamp stamped correctly, I took my watercolor pencils and tried to emulate what I saw on the wooden stamp block. I had to mix a few shades to get that red fox coat color with the darker spots. After using the watercolor pencils, I took my Aqua Painter to it as planned and went back and forth between the two tools a few times until it felt right (because I have no idea what I’m doing, really. I’m assuming I’ll get better as I learn by trial and error).

After I was satisfied with the colors and the paper had basically dried, I went over the snow and snow-covered branches with my Clear Wink of Stella brush marker to bring back the sparkle to the snow that I’d ended up coloring over with the white pencil. (The sparkle shows through the color a little, but I really wanted the snow to glimmer.) Then I set aside the piece to dry while I figured out the rest of the card.

My favorite crafty thing to use these days are metal cutting dies. They’re simple, quick to use, and make things prettier or more elegant than I could come up with on my own. (They’re also faster for me than my Cricut.) I hang most of them on my wall and the back of my door on large magnetic sheets or vent covers so that I can easily walk over and try different sizes and shapes with whatever I’m wanting to cut out, rather than taking time to flip through a box and take die sets out of envelopes.

For this card, I looked at a bunch of large shapes, trying to decide whether to cut it into a type of oval or a fancy square or a rectangle. I ended up using one of my new sets from Spellbinders that hadn’t yet made it to my wall (Art Nouveau Designer Series “Water Lilies Decorative Element”), because it fit the image perfectly without making me cut it down too much (after all that hard work in coloring, I hated to do that!).

I debated whether to use a SU Cajun Craze cardstock base or a white base and which color to set off where. I ended up cutting several different colors of cardstock with the frame die to test them and see what worked. The card finally fell together color-wise when I brought in the darker wood-grain paper (SU “Country Lane” DSP) as a background to echo the dark shading in the picture. The dark complements the darker orangish-brown Cajun Craze well enough while keeping the same tones. With the white base, there was too much contrast and the frame jumped out at me rather than letting me focus on the colored image. So I ended up using a Cajun Craze base but covering the entire front with the wood grain and using a Cajun Craze frame on top and beneath the white colored image. (It’s a solid piece that gives a mat to whatever is inserted into the sides.)

This particular frame die acts like a gift card holder where the center flowers are, gently opening up and holding whatever is placed in the solid middle. That took some thinking, trying to measure and cut down the colored image so that it fit into that space under the flowers just right. The opening/middle rectangle is much larger than a gift card, but it’s the same idea…though this is only one way to use it.

The one thing I forgot to do to the test pieces was to make sure they were embossed well also. (One reason I love Spellbinders is because they have awesome sections of the dies that are intended to be embossed to give it a little something extra. I miss that feature when I use other brands.) So the embossing could have been done a little better in parts here, because I forgot to take that step to make it pop. I didn’t remember it until I’d mailed the card and noticed it in the pictures. In the photos above, perhaps you can see that the center flower pieces are more deeply etched than the corners above and below them. Next time…I shall remember next time. 🙂

My customer wasn’t picky about what to say on the inside either, other than asking me to write his name and theirs in it and mail it straight to him. So I had to dream up something based on other things she had said to me. After adding fox washi tape to the bottom of a white piece and then matting the paper onto a different kind of wood-grain patterned paper from a 6×6 pad (can’t remember which one now), I used three different stamp sets and another die to make the sentiment section. “A little expression of love” is from SU’s “Painter’s Palette,” “just for you” is from SU’s “From the Herd,” and “Happy birthday” is from MFT’s “LJD For the Boys” (part of the “Happy Birthday, Handsome” stamp). The die is among those in a retired nested set from SU called “Deco Labels.”

I used my stamping platform and its grid to line up the sentiments on the die-cut and stamp out a couple of test pieces in Cajun Craze ink to make sure they sat where I wanted them. (I had tried stamping right on the matted liner paper but I accidentally got ink where I shouldn’t have, so at that point I just had to cover it up because it was already adhered.)

After the sentiment box was stamped, I edged around the die-cut with my Cajun Craze Stampin’ Write Marker so it would stand out against the white paper. And, once again too late, I saw that the double fox spot on the washi piece. I didn’t create that intentionally; it’s just how it came off the roll. I wish I had seen it sooner; it bothers the part of me that prefers symmetry. 🙂 I also added two gold glitter hearts from MME (“Niche/On Trend Foam Stickers”) in the white space of the sentiment box.

I like how this one turned out even though it tested me at times and there are a couple of things I wish I could do differently. It’s always easier to make a similar card a second time. Maybe I’ll try to do one for the local gift shop. After all, I’m not completely convinced that winter is over with where I live.

Some of the Stampin’ Up items I used on this card are retired, but you can purchase the ink, cardstocks, and other current items through my online store if you want to try them (please use code 6WPHJ2MC at checkout unless your order is over $150). The thumbnails below will take you right there…and this is an awesome time to get them since Sale-a-bration is still going through the end of March. For every $50+ order before tax and shipping, you get to pick an item out of a select group of almost two dozen items and Stampin’ Up will send it to you for free with your order! Plus you’ll also get a free gift from me. 🙂 Please contact me if you have questions.

Thanks for visiting my blog! I truly appreciate my readers. ❤️ Have a lovely day! #neverstopmaking #mftstamps

Product List

Shimmery White 8-1/2″ X 11″ Card Stock

[101910]

$9.00

Cajun Craze 8-1/2″ X 11″ Card Stock

[119684]

$8.50

Cajun Craze Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147085]

$7.50

Cajun Craze Combo Pack Stampin’ Blends

[147931]

$9.00

Wood Textures Designer Series Paper Stack

[144177]

$11.00

Clear Wink Of Stella Glitter Brush

[141897]

$8.00

Watercolor Pencils

[141709]

$16.00

Aqua Painters

[103954]

$17.00

Blender Pens

[102845]

$12.00

You’re Not Old…You’re Retro! (“Free Cake” Birthday Stamp Set from Stampin’ Up)

Hopping with Amy’s Inkin’ Krew for a Birthday Theme!

Hello again! It’s “birthday month” for Amy’s February blog hop! 🙂 I’ve made a card using the “Free Cake” stamp set to show you this time.

I all too often create on a quick timeline, but I had to fly at double speed that night so I could first listen in on our team meeting (while driving home…shh!) and then get my blog link up to the group before the deadline. And I had to create the card, or at least know where I was going with it, before I could do the link. What that means is that I made a REALLY SIMPLE CARD that any of you can recreate. 🙂 #simplestamping for the win.

I guess I have a wacky sense of humor. I like puns and sarcasm and slapping-my-knee funny and maybe slightly snarky stuff. I have several stamp sets in my possession that reflect this. And I recently acquired another one—the “Free Cake” set. It is current in the 2018-2019 Annual Stampin’ Up Catalog (page 70, to be precise). I was a little torn about which combination of stamps to use, so I just had to pick one and start. The good thing about owning the stamp set is that I can make the other card percolating in my brain at any time. 😉

I’m actually making this one for our team swap, which requires me to use current products in case the receiving demonstrator wants to use it on display. This is a big one for me to remember, because I have lots of retired products at my fingertips that I still love to use too. I use things up sparingly. 😉 And I confess that the one I’m sending for the swap is actually my second attempt. I didn’t like how I forgot to turn one of the radios when I was stamping, so I redid it since it may be used for demonstration. Not that it really matters. Either card is fine. I’m merely fighting my perfectionistic streak. 🙂 (And it was such a quick card that I had time to make a second!)

I’ve used the 2018-20 In-Colors (Lovely Lipstick, Grapefruit Grove, Pineapple Punch, Call Me Clover, and Blueberry Bushel) for inks, as well as our Archival Basic Black. I’m just now realizing that the Archival pad retired. I should have used the Memento Tuxedo Black ink. Oops. 😦 I also used the fantastic Thick Whisper White cardstock for my card base.

I’m a child of the ’80s…mostly. So I remember the big boomboxes and all the other fun things we grew up with. It is unfathomable to me how I could be so OLD already—like, practically middle-aged. Ugh. I don’t even like typing that. But I do love the big transistor radio featured in the stamp set probably because of it. I stamped with the radio rather randomly (with a bit of placement 😉 ) in most of the In-Colors mentioned above. I saved the Pineapple Punch for the stars around the radios on the swap card (though the first card has both). If I make it again, I think I’ll stamp the stars while I’m stamping the radios. It was a bit tricky to place the stars afterward. Sometimes I wiped off part of the stamp so I could work around the radios and not be stamping so many stars at once. (You should see my inky fingers!) I did also use a bit of Lovely Lipstick Stampin’ Write Marker to one of the radios on the initial card when I didn’t get it inky enough the first time, though that card is pictured at the end.

I had already decided to split the matching sentiments between the front and the back, so I knew I was going to put “You’re not old…” on the front and “you’re RETRO!” on the inside. That meant I could keep the front simple and place the opening phrase underneath the featured black radio, which I then stamped on a separate piece of paper, matted with a scrap of Classic Garage Designer Series Paper (the oil/gas can sheet), and popped up with Stampin’ Dimensionals. I chose this DSP because it reminded me of the ’80s stonewashed look up close and was also black, meaning I wasn’t featuring one color over another.

Before I glued the stamped black radio to the DSP, I distressed the white edges with my scissors first. I love the distressed look and don’t always remember to do it. But since this is a gender-neutral card and could go to men, it seemed appropriate. Truthfully, it was also because I need to change the blade on my trimmer, so I was either going to have to trim off the leftover fuzzies with my scissors or make them worse intentionally. 😂

Stampin’ Up has been asking us to create simple cards anyone can make with just a few supplies and to hashtag it with #simplestamping…so this is my first try at that. This month they, too, are focusing on birthday cards and suggested that we use only ink, paper, stamps, and some DSP…so I intentionally didn’t embellish the card further. The front was done.

For the inside, I had to add the “you’re RETRO” saying, but I didn’t want to put only the words, and I also wanted to vary how I do the insides of cards. I tend to default to a fancy-edged die-cut with the words inside and DSP scraps. To change it up a bit, I chose one of the IC inks, Lovely Lipstick, and stamped off on scrap paper first to lighten it up before stamping it straight onto the card (skewed). Then I used my stamping platform to line up the “retro” sentiment and added the “Happy Birthday” from the same set as well. I stamped the words in the Archival Basic Black again and then stamped two star bunches to frame the entirety. (For the inside of the first card, which was now being made simultaneously with the swap card, I used Grapefruit Grove ink without stamping off, and that actually turned out better because it’s a lighter color than the stamped-off Lovely Lipstick.)

I attempted to pretty up the blank envelopes as my team members do. The front turned out great with a Lovely Lipstick tilted radio and two bunches of stars near it, but the flaps–nothing but stars–gave me some trouble. They’ll pass, but I’d redo them if they were more important.

As far as that other card goes, it is not spoken for yet…though I’m tempted to give it to my also-aging brother when his day comes around. What are siblings for, right? 😂😜

The products I used for these cards will be at the bottom of the post. If I can help you order or if you need a Stampin’ Up demonstrator, please feel free to comment or email. I’d love to be of assistance. Sale-a-Bration is the best time of the year to shop because you earn free products with every $50 spent. New choices hit the website on February 15, too. 😁 You can shop with my direct store link in the sidebar.

Thanks for joining me on the blog hop today! To continue “hopping” with our birthday blog group, click the Previous button to go visit Karen Finkle…or click Next to see what Sue Prather created. Links are below as well. Happy crafting!

Karen Ksenzakovic – https://wp.me/paaNf4-nC
Jaimie Babarczy – https://wp.me/p79UhD-2xd
Karen Finkle – https://karenscardkorner.blogspot.com/2019/02/stampin-up-high-tide-for-amys-inkin.html
Connie Troyer (you are here!) – https://wp.me/p8xvI6-gY
Sue Prather – https://wp.me/p5yitZ-10K
Mary Deatherage – https://wp.me/p5snyt-7lk
Shirley Gentry – https://stampinwithshirleyg.com/?p=3927
Amy Koenders – https://wp.me/p2SFwf-dpz

Product List

Whisper White 8-1/2″ X 11″ Thick Cardstock

[140272]

$7.75

Free Cake Clear-Mount Stamp Set

[146440]

$19.00

Free Cake Wood-Mount Stamp Set

[146437]

$27.00

Classic Garage 6″ X 6″ (15.2 X 15.2 Cm) Designer Series Paper

[148482]

$11.00

Classic Stampin’ Pad Assortment In Color 2018-2020

[147153]

$33.75

In Color 2018–2020 Stampin’ Write Markers

[147159]

$15.00

Coastal Cabana & Lovely Lipstick Stampin’ Write Markers

[147526]

$6.00

Lovely Lipstick Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147140]

$7.50

Pineapple Punch Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147141]

$7.50

Grapefruit Grove Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147142]

$7.50

Blueberry Bushel Classic Stampin’ Pad

[147138]

$7.50

Call Me Clover Stampin’ Pad

[147139]

$7.50

Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad

[132708]

$6.00

Paper Snips Scissors

[103579]

$10.00

Stampin’ Dimensionals

[104430]

$4.00

Mini Stampin’ Dimensionals

[144108]

$4.00

Wonderful Moments Bride Card for Bridal Shower, Wedding, or Anniversary

A bridal card for love-themed needs!

Welcome to another post for Amy K’s Inkin’ Krew Blog Hop for Tuesday, January 8! This month we are featuring the theme of love with Stampin’ Up products. I’m making wedding and anniversary cards for my local gift shop right now (along with other themes and random custom orders), so I was very excited to join this hop!

For several days now, I thought I knew what I was going to create for this blog. In the end, I did stick to my original (barely fleshed-out) idea, but did I ever find ways to complicate it. (I always do.) I definitely should have started on it earlier. But I had craft room organization on my mind this week and I got to it when I got to it.

I was able to use several current SU products as well as a couple of retired products and ones from other companies (oops!). The focal point of the card is the bride stamp from the “Wonderful Moments” stamp set, set off by a lace oval from the Delightfully Detailed Laser-Cut Specialty Paper pack and a background of Petal Promenade DSP.

The laser-cut paper is vanilla on one side and white on the other. Since my card base was white and the bride’s dress would be too, I chose to use the vanilla side of the lace oval. And then I decided it needed something else. It felt too plain and too neutral. I kept “seeing” pink with this stamp and card, but the last two wedding cards I created had pink hues in them, so I tried to use other colors.

I have to keep trying. I did manage to sneak in an orange and a dark purple…but there’s still pink. So when I was looking at the oval and trying out colors in my head, I started sponging Bundled Sage Distress ink onto it, thinking winter colors. But then I picked up Tattered Rose and sponged it on too. (Evidently those colors should have gone on in the reverse order.) I added a second layer and different sponging before I was done. And then I got an idea, when I realized that the ink was drying slowly enough to get onto my hand as I held the card. (This is subconscious Pinterest at work in my brain, I think. Lol!)

One of the retired products in my stash that I need to use more of is our Iridescent Ice Stampin’ Emboss Powder. I’ve only used it in small bits until now…but I remembered seeing others do a whole-scene kind of treatment with it. I wasn’t even entirely sure I remembered how this product worked since I bought it late in the game, but the paper was definitely ready to be treated – it was still inky. My friend E assured me that I could indeed use Distress inks for embossing. So I got out my catch-all tray and my coffee filter and proceeded to pour the Iridescent Ice powder overtop (hoping I was making the right decision and not ruining a lovely piece of paper) and then heat embossed it, as the label suggested, three times before I finally saw the powder changing and understood what it was going to look like or do.

Turns out I love this look. It reminds me of our Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer Paper except it’s not as thick and has slightly different colors. I’ll have to try this technique again sometime. I also appreciate how the pink and green sponged inks are still coming through the translucentness of the embossing powder. It’s faint, but it works.

With the lace oval paper finished, I turned my attention to the bride stamp. I chose Archival Basic Gray ink because it felt like black would be too harsh and bold against the soft oval. I had to stamp the bride several times with my stamp platform because it was the first time I’d used the stamp and I hadn’t prepared it even though I know better. So my outline got a little thicker than I’d intended.

After she was stamped, I watercolored the bride’s hair, skin, bow, and flowers with watercolor pencils and used an AquaPainter on those places afterward. For the dress, I decided to experiment with some Nuvo Crystal Drops (Ivory Seashell color) new to my stash. Since that is also translucent, I was hoping it would soften the lines of the dress if I covered them with the liquid. I later went back over the dress again, using a paintbrush to smooth out the Drops on the paper. I also took Wink of Stella to the bride’s bouquet (though I erred first and grabbed my White instead of my Clear. Once it dried, I realized what I had done and went back over the bouquet with Clear as well.) It sparkles more in person than in the photo.

So I had one finished oval and one watercolored, Nuvoed bride. I wasn’t sure how to treat the background behind her. In my mind I had seen her on white, but that seemed far too plain now. I thought of putting a watercolor pencil down as a background but couldn’t settle on which color. Blue for sky? (So she’s out in the open, looking at nothing?) Or some kind of background stamp to imitate wallpaper or wood planks? I then decided to think about the Graceful Glass vellum and hit upon an idea I’ll use at a later date, before the vellum led me to looking through my current DSP. I ended up fussy-cutting around her and placing her on patterned paper so I wouldn’t have to mask her for a background stamp or risk ruining something.

The paper I chose to use feels most like a sunset in front of my bride, and it even matched the flowers, hair, and bow I had colored before viewing this paper pack. (That actually happens to me a lot!) Because that was my best background option thus far, I cut (and then recut, due to first error) a notecard/A1 size of paper where the jagged stripe in the paper best flowed beside her dress and body posture. Once I had the background paper glued to the notecard card base, I played with the placement of my bride, attempting to center her and play off the “sunset stripe” to its best advantage while trying to cover the bottom of the dress with the sentiment I intended on using. (Many thanks to patient E for this stage, who was with me on video chat while I created the card!)

Something then made me think about the Rose Metallic Thread I had stored with my baker’s twine, and I decided to do a bow of some sort. I’m not very good at bows with delicate threads yet. I ended up laying ATG tape on the back of the sentiment and looping it around and sticking to the tape however it looked the best to me.

The gold-and-white “Best Wishes” sentiment came from a resist coloring pack from another maker. I just left it as is, since I had enough color going on already. It fit with the “brown” tones of the card anyway. The gold on the sentiment appears to have been embossed, though it came that way in the pack and I merely cut it out. I popped up the sentiment with its new metallic loops with Stampin’ Dimensionals foam dots, placing it right above the hollow circles at the bottom of the oval.

The last touch on the front of the card was the tiny little mini pearls I used on the buttons of her bridal dress. I had SU’s white mini pearls from the Notes of Kindness card kit on her dress originally but later changed to even smaller ones from Recollections.

The inside of the card has been kept simple to be size-appropriate for the notecard and also to leave room for the sender to write. I used the retired Petite Pairs stamp set with its “for the new Mr. and Mrs.” sentiment on a bit of the Petal Promenade DSP (from the first piece I’d cut the wrong direction by accident), the current Fresh Fig ink pad, and the gorgeous Stitched Labels Framelits Dies. And then I added two more mini Recollections pearls on the sides of the inside tag. 🙂 (Side note: the Petal Promenade DSP pack is one of my favorite things in this catalog. The papers are just so beautiful!)

If I had set out to create this exact card, even with all the detail, it wouldn’t have taken me very long. But creating from scratch and using trial-and-error means that sometimes happy accidents have to happen to lead the creator to the next step, which later seems so obvious. 🙂 I’m really quite happy with this card now, but there were moments when I wondered where I was going with it. Maybe you’ll find even faster ways to recreate this card. I’d love to see what you come up with! I think this card could be used for a bridal shower, a wedding card for the couple, or an anniversary card. It just depends on which sentiments we use.

Below are the current Stampin’ Up products I used on this card. If you need any of the supplies, just click on the thumbnail to go to my store or visit this link. I’d be happy to become your demonstrator! Sale-a-Bration (from now until March 31) is the best time of the year to stock up on products and earn others for free! Please use code JJBCPS4W for a free gift when you shop with me! (You can continue with the hop participants below the thumbnails.)

Delightfully Detailed Laser-Cut Specialty Paper, 146907

Petal Promenade Designer Series Paper, 146913

Thanks for stopping by my blog! To continue with the hop, see what Karen Finkle created by clicking on the Next button or visiting her link below. To go back to see Sue Prather’s card, click Previous or her link above mine. See you next time!

Shirley Gentry: https://stampinwithshirleyg.com/?p=3079
Jaimie Babarczy: https://wp.me/p79UhD-2sD
Julie Johnston: https://wp.me/p8SzmQ-29L
Karen Ksenzakovic: https://wp.me/paaNf4-h4
Mary Deatherage: https://wp.me/p5snyt-70J
Sue Prather: https://wp.me/p5yitZ-XU
Connie Troyer: You are here!
Karen Finkle: https://karenscardkorner.blogspot.com/2019/01/stampin-up-nine-lives-for-amys-inkin.html
Amy Koenders: https://wp.me/p2SFwf-cTD

Yes, Another Sympathy (a Decoupage One This Time)

A dry decoupage sympathy card using Stampin’ Up for everything but the main image (at last!).

The hits keep coming. Two more sympathies on my to-do list, along with a celebration theme for a blog hop. For these two, at least it’s a celebration of sorts, though sad now. Still, I feel muddled. My heart aches for them, so I went looking for something that spoke to me and seemed to reflect the people I’m thinking of. My “card toppers” bin bailed me out for the one I’m blogging about today. (The other, yet unmade, will focus on Stampin’ Up’s Graceful Glass vellum DSP and alcohol markers, so stay tuned for that.)

My mother used to say that I was “an accident waiting to happen.” She’d probably still say that, given the chance. That phrase came to me as I wrestled with this card. I began to feel like it was one accident after another. I love how it turned out in the end, but my goodness, the process! (This means there’s hope for me, right?) Another case of “when things don’t go well.” Please tell me you’d never know. 😉

One of my husband’s coworkers lost her dear husband last week, and it’s been such a sad thing. I wanted to make a beautiful card – part masculine in remembrance and part feminine for her – but had no idea where to start. Since I often clean or organize when I have a problem to mull over, that’s what I ended up doing, which led me to the main cross piece seen on the front of the card today.

Finding a brown card base to match the topper was easy; Stampin’ Up’s Baked Brown Sugar, a retired color, matched the foiled copper/silver/gold/burgundy/blue cross the best. I only have so many browns, and I usually use SU for my card bases since I like how the 80-lb weight cardstock stands. (I grab premade bases only if I start with the base first rather than the main image. It’s just easier to match it that way rather than working in reverse.)

During my cleaning spree, I was also looking at and putting away some new SU Designer Series Paper. So when I tried to find paper the cross could match, the blue piece was fresh in my mind and looked prettier than any other neutrals I put next to it. The blue paper is from the Tranquil Textures DSP pack in the current Annual Catalog from Stampin’ Up. It’s not a solid blue, but it it hard to tell that with the dry embossing I put on top of it to give the card some texture. I used the “Oxford” Cuttlebug folder for the textured design. I wanted something light and barely textured like Stampin’ Up’s Subtle embossing folder, but I don’t own that particular one yet.

Here’s where things got tricky. The card is a 5×7 because the cross is so tall. But because it’s narrow, there was a lot of “white space” around it. I don’t like white space (even if it’s blue). So I started to wonder what I could do or put next to the cross to take up the width. A sentiment would only be so big, as well as being awkward to work with around the 3D leaf layers toward the bottom, so I wasn’t sure that was the answer. I thought maybe I could make a decorative edge to the card front at the right instead. I could see it in my mind but wasn’t sure how to achieve it (story of my crafting life, btw). That seemed to be the best thing to try…but all my dies were too small to stretch across 7 inches. Nothing felt right. So that night I went to bed frustrated, having made only the card base and embossing the paper.

The next night I attempted to keep going on the card while I was on the phone. I should have known better. I spotted a long Spellbinders die on my die wall and got all excited because it would fit lengthwise. I didn’t think about the fact that ALL of the edges of the die does indeed cut…until I wrapped a card base around a Cuttlebug plate (so that I didn’t cut through the second layer), positioned the die, and wondered why an inch of the card base separated from itself after I ran it through the machine. (*insert facepalm here*) To my defense, I was still on the phone. LOL

So suddenly I had a card base with one side shorter than the other. That was not what was supposed to happen. Not to mention, the magnetic plate dinged up the middle of the card base, and the B plate left marks on the back side of the base, making it warped and weak. Sigh. Time to rethink. Maybe I needed to make a new card base.

I tried to process where to go next. The decorative edge thing hadn’t worked and I couldn’t think how to make it work other than an edge punch – if I made a new base. I’ve never tried the popsicle sticks I’ve heard about, to keep part of it from cutting, so I wasn’t sure how to do that either (again, on a new base). But I hated to destroy the one I’d just cut. What I did manage to do after thinking was flip the card base around (even though I’d folded it correctly after scoring the first time). That would give me a chance to add paper atop the marked-up part to hide it and also add some stability with the extra paper layers. I hoped. I also took my bone folder and tried to work out the middle bumps and crease it sharply.

Once the base was salvaged, I decided to play with the pieces and arrange them just to see what I could do. I ended up liking a little bit of breathing room between the die cut and the now-shorter edge of the card base, rather than placing the die cut right up against the piece it had just been cut from. And obviously if there’s a peekaboo die, something needed to peek through it underneath. I grabbed more blue DSP and left it as is on the inside of the card rather than embossing it for texture like the front.

I also realized that I needed to run the textured piece through the Cuttlebug again, as one side has trouble with a piece of paper I got stuck in the roller years ago. Part of the paper was hardly embossed, so I realigned it in the folder, flipped it around to the other side that impresses better, and ran it through again. Came out perfectly that time.

The trouble was that when I left that breathing room space between the die cut and the base, it was not centered once the card was opened. I didn’t like that. But it looked like I had enough room to add 1/8″ of ribbon or something else. I chose SU’s gold and white ribbon to match the cross and the browns and loved how it looked.

But then I couldn’t get it adhered. The ribbon is thin enough that the line of Art Glitter liquid glue I laid down soaked right into the ribbon. I wasn’t confident it wouldn’t end up slightly sticking to the inside of the card once it had been closed for a while. But as I told a friend last night, when a person has too much product in her house, she will find a way. I decided to use my Cosmo Cricket Glubers Adhesive Strips. I rarely use them, but sometimes they’re just the best option. They are 1/4″ strips, though, so I took my nonstick microscissors from CutterBee and cut right down one of the strips, eyeballing it to just under 1/8″. And then I placed it with my tweezers and stuck a new piece of ribbon to it. I was much happier with the inside then.

I decided not to stamp a sentiment on the inside yet. I needed to finish up and get to bed and I wanted to really look through my stamps to figure out what I wanted to say on the card. I will probably go back and add one later, but right now it’s blank.

I’ve spoken about dry decoupage in past blog posts. A reader had asked me to do a tutorial on how to do it, and I am working on that currently. I hope to post one soon. For now, here are a couple of closeups to be able to see the decoupage layers that make up the cross. I should have trimmed off the little perforation bumps more as I was making the topper, but it’s probably too late to fix it now.

The cross has several layers of dimension to it in the squares as well as the leaves, which made it interesting to put together. And the leaves are the top layer.

Thanks again for coming to visit my blog! I appreciate your readership!

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