All Occasion cards for my exchange partners featuring collage paper backgrounds, punchies and stitching

I wanted to try something new when I was creating my Card Exchange cards so I decided to try a new way of making collage backgrounds - a hybrid between serendipity and the ones I have been making by adhering pieces together with tape on the back.  I started with a sheet of printed bond paper and started gluing paper scraps to it.  After filling the sheet I felt the collage needed more texture and interest so I glued on torn strips and pieces here and there at angles.  That was better!!  The cards I was using as inspiration had stitched punchies on them so that is what I added next.  I trimmed my backgrounds to fit on the ivory cards I cut to fit into my large envelopes.  

For my first card I chose 1 3/8" circles from my stash and arranged them on my background.  I played with all sorts and finally settled on red and white.  I embossed them with two different embossing folders, added a bit of glue in behind so they would stay in place and then used my sewing machine to  stitch across the lines.  That worked quite well.  I added a yellow handmade paper circle and a little green star to one of the circles to create a focal element.  Liked that!! 

For my second card, I trimmed my background to fit on my large ivory card.  I added green lace to the back of a green strip with torn edges and placed it across my background.  Next, I added three embossed heart punchies (SU) and stitched them in place with my sewing machine.  I die cut some smaller hearts from some green/gold paper and glued those in place over the larger hearts.  That was good!!

For my third card (below) I created my collaged background directly on my card front.  It is a little harder to get the pieces to be exactly the right size but in the end you only see the edges so whether they line up in the middle does not really matter.  I cut a piece of yellow cardstock just the right size to fit 12 1 3/8" circle punchies.  I chose white, red and warm red punchies and embossed them with three different embossing folders.  I used a bit of glue on the back to keep them in position and used my sewing machine to stitch them into place.  Liked that!  I adhered it to my card front over my background and decided to do something different to fill in the extra area on the right.  I punched little V's using my chevron punch (SU) from red cardstock and adhered them in place.  Liked that!!  I added an embossed 1.25" yellow circle punchie onto one of the red circles and added a tiny red star to the middle.  Really happy with this card too!!  The circles are very bold in solid colours.  My inspiration cards had been the opposite - decorative paper punchies on solid cardstock - and therefore more subtle.   Will try that next time!!  These are off in next week's mail!!

Therese