A large thank you card that features a delicate die cut, ribbon and a beautiful greeting

This card is for a special person who has been integral in getting a project I have been a part of off the ground by donating his precious time. 
I started with a large envelope and cut an ivory card to fit inside.  I found some scraps of this beautiful colour printed decorative paper (Morgue File) which I cut up and mounted to a layer of brown cardstock just a little smaller than my card front.  I die cut this embossed border (Spellbinders) and threaded through a coordinating green ribbon and adhered the ends to the back using double sided tape.  I added clear rhinestones to the top of each embossed section.  The greeting is one I created with the NOEL font and laser printed.  I trimmed it to size and then watercoloured the letters in green.  I mounted the greeting to a piece of the same brown cardstock I used for the background and mounted it using 3D foam tape.  I adhered this large layer to my ivory card front.  Very pleased with how this worked out!!  Most appreciate it when others offer their help with time and resources!!!  Therese

A birthday floral handmade card with a decorative paper focal element and a gauze tie

Another card for my stash!!  For this one I used an element which I found in one of my boxes of unsorted bits.  It had this wonderful piece of decorative paper which features watercolour and a stamped resist technique.  I love the colours.  It was framed in a neutral cardstock layer with swirly punched corners.  The bottom edge was ripped but it was mostly covered by the elements that I added.  I started by adding a sponged border on the bottom to which added the width I needed for this card front.  I chose to mount this focal element to a pink card, added a stamped & sponged label (SB) greeting attached with a gauze tie with a double knot on the left hand side.  This gauze is so soft that it ties beautifully and adds much texture to the card.  To finish it off I added two little rhinestones to the greeting!!  I love this colour combination and it was good to use this little bit from my stash.  Not sure what the original intention for it was but it worked perfectly for this card.  Therese

Christmas cards with a Bethlehem die and O Holy Night greeting

I am working on getting a backlog of card kits off of my desk!!  These started their lives in the process of finishing off some Wonky Tree Christmas cards. Needless to say, that by the time I was finished I had changed all the elements and those of the wonky tree kits has been relegated to my stashes!!  Funny how the process works sometimes!!  Anyway, I am happy with the cards I got made so it is all good!!

I made these one at a time but in the end I chose the same blue cardstock for all of them because it was the best match for the decorative paper (MF) I had chosen.  The decorative paper was already cut and in my stash - a laser printed background from Morgue Files. I love how beautifully it simulates a sky!!  The little Bethlehem die cut ( Taylored Expressions) in black was mounted to a larger piece in each case and a piece of ribbon was mounted to cover the joint.  On the lower right hand one I tied on another short length of ribbon using a single knot to simulate a bow.    I glued the background on first and then added the focal element over it.  On the lower left hand card I mounted yellow cardstock behind some of the window openings which worked quite well.  On the other three I filled them in once they were on the card using a clear stardust gel pen which was much faster with almost the same effect. On the top two, I embossed the greeting - one in white and the other in silver.  On the bottom two I stamped in black Versafine on the decorative paper.  

I bought the Bethlehem die cut last year after pining after the SU set for quite a while.  The SU set had many more elements than I really wanted so I started looking for a single Bethlehem die which was what I wanted and reduced the cost of the investment.  In the end, I did buy the Nativity one as well and combined my order with my sister to cut shipping costs.  Very happy with my investment and love the look!!!  Well worth the money I spent and I look forward to using it for years to come.  

So a few more cards for my Christmas card stash which will go well to getting me caught up with my January and February cards.  

Therese

A fun guy card

This card started as a sample for this class but when I failed to cut the decorative paper accurately I was forced to abandon it and start over.  It has been sitting on my desk and I decided that I would reinvent a sketch for it.  So I added a ribbon across the front of the layered decorative paper and then created a large focal element that features an old time bicycle along with a fun greeting!!  I watercoloured a bit of a shadow for the bicycle then I layered it onto brown.  Next, I cut a blue rectangle that would accommodate both the image and the greeting (Desert Diva) which I colour washed a bit to coordinate with the image.  I added a short piece of a die cut zigzag border in between which I found on my desk.  I used 3D foam tape to adhere this large element to my card front.

Therese

Beautiful cross on an Easter card

An Easter card with a beautiful cross!!  This image is from Art by Jean and she has a wide variety of beautiful images for download on her blog including backgrounds!!
I colour printed the cross on ivory cardstock and layered it onto a blue green cardstock.  I used a blue green card, added a yellow background paper to which I had adhered a lacy die cut and embossed border (SU) which was colour washed with yellow watercolour to tone it down a bit.  I glued the background to the card, adhered my focal element and then added a layered laser printed punchie greeting.
I really like that the darker edge of the decorative paper creates the sense of a line in the design and putting the cross askew a bit allowed my greeting to nest into one of the scallops.  Perfect!!

Therese

Handmade paper and stitching

When I was preparing the kits for this class I came across this beautiful handmade paper!  It was very thick and therefore I set it aside because it would not glue well. Yesterday, I created a card with it.  I cut the elements and stitched them in place instead of using glue.  That works very well!!  I love stitching handmade paper!!  I stitched the center to the flower then the border to the background paper.  I positioned the flower, situated the leaves and stitched them into place.  I repositioned the flower and stitched all around the center to anchor it to the background.  I positioned the greeting and stitched it into place as well.  Lastly, I stitched this large element to the front of an ivory card!!  LOVE IT!!               Therese

All Occasion Stack Class - handmade paper

I just taught a cardmaking class featuring all occasion cards as a fundraiser!!  The two classes went very well and I had some very creative participants who were not at all afraid to do their own thing so there was a wide variety of cards produced from the kits I prepared.  It is one of the very best things about teaching is that others will create with the supplies you provide things you would never have thought of doing!!  So much fun!!!
For this set of cards I decided to continue the theme I started with my middle of the week class and feature my own handmade paper.  

 So I trimmed down my handmade paper to 4" x 5.25" and glued it down with a generous layer of regular glue to a neutral card - white or ivory.  Handmade paper is very textured and requires a substantial amount of glue to be effective.  I die cut two different borders for the cards using a large Sizzix die.  You can see one of on these cards.  The other was a little zigzag.  The borders were glued to the cards using regular glue.  The large focal elements were layered & glued if need be and then glued over the border.  The little coordinating laser printed greeting punchies (SU) were also glued in place.

The cards really need some pressing to ensure a good adhesion of all the layers so I recommended that they be set  under weight when they got them home.
I created several focal elements - hearts, flowers, leaves and butterflies which were cut from coordinating handmade paper.  The flower were embellished die cut centers, the hearts had an extra little heart cut from cardstock, the butteflies had tied cording which created a body and antennae and the leaves had knotted twine as an accent.
I really love handmade paper and am glad that I decided to check out the papers I had in my boxes.  I will continue to feature handmade paper on my cards as time goes on!!!  Will consider making more this summer when the weather outside is warm and sunny and the sheets can dry outside.
Therese

Cards from kits - changed up the sketch and added images

 Still making up kits from my last class.  These ones were heart themed for Valentine's so needed to be changed up to be appropriate for another occasion.  For the first one, I combined the decorative paper from two kits which provided me with a full 4" x 5.25" background.  I simply taped them together on the back before gluing it to the coordinating card front.  I watercoloured a cupcake image (Melonheadz) from my stash and added pearly paint to the icing and the star.  Fun!!  I layered it onto a green rectangle and added a border die cut to which I added gold glitter glue dots and some green watercolour half circles.  I glued this focal element to the front of my card.  I layered my colour laser printed greeting and added it to the bottom of my card below the image.  My favorite colour combo - pink and green!!  For my second card, I added the piece of decorative paper from the kit then added a piece of white vintage seam binding gluing the ends to the inside of the card.  I snipped a slot on the spine of the card using my slot punch (SU) to allow the end of the seam binding to be glued to the inside.  I found this coordinating vintage birthday image in my stash (clipart CD) so I trimmed it and added it over the seam binding using 3D foam tape.  I tied a short length of seam binding to the length on the card using a single knot to simulate a bow!! I had embossed borders on these card kits which you can see on this card.

It was really hard to change up this kit because the paper had hearts on it and it was red!!  So I decided to layer the greeting over gold embossed mesh (window screening)  then onto a trimmed (decorative scissors) rectangle of red and flagged all the ends.  I plucked these watercoloured and gold embossed hearts from an old card.  They worked really well for this anniversary card!!
The polka dot papers are from Digital Graphics Cafe and the heart one if from the Morgue File.
Again it was a fun challenge to use up these supplies to make up some new cards!!

Therese

A blingy card for a special girl!

My oldest granddaughter is having a birthday and she will be celebrating with her friends and family with a Minecraft party!!  I know she loves Minecraft but I decided to celebrate her artsy side and made her a blingy purple card for her birthday!!!  I started with a purple card, added an embossed resist flourish (IO) background (white embossing powder and watercolour) and then layered on two die cut scallop borders which I blinged up with purple rhinestones and clear glitter gel pen dots.  I trimmed the fairy image (Graphics Fairy) using an oval Nestibilities, hand cut a purple oval with scallop decorative scissors to layer below it and added another white oval below that one to nicely frame the image.  I layered a laser printed oval greeting punchie (SU) over a scalloped oval (SU) in the same colour as I used on the focal element and added two tiny rhinestones the same colour as the larger ones I used on the scalloped borders.  Thrifty Tip: I actually punched it from the center of the fairy oval to ensure it was the same colour,  I added a length of white vintage seam binding over the center portion of the card and adhered both ends to the inside of the card using double sided tape.  I adhered the fairy image over it using 3D foam tape and then adhered the layered greeting just below it on the right.  I tied on another short piece of seam binding using a single knot to simulate a bow!!  I did add some glitter gel pen dots to the scallops on the fairy oval just to finish off the bling properly!!  I am sure she will love it!!

Therese

Women & lacy embossed metal on colour printed backgrounds

A couple more cards with these cool colour printed backgrounds on book pages!!  You can click here to see the other ones I created for guys!
I decided to feature yet more embossed metal on these cards so this time I cut a strip from a metal foil pan and used a scallop Thinlits die (SU) to cut the edge and the coordinating embossing folder (SU) to emboss the design.  I went through my stash of images and found these stamped images of 1930 women and they worked perfectly with the strong background and the lacy border.  

I mounted the backgrounds to the blue card fronts - I left the bottom one whole and cut the top one into four pieces before I glued it into place.  Once I started working with my pieces I decided that the lacy border was a bit too bright so coloured the whole surface with a black permanent marker and then sanded it.  I like the way the recesses are darker and the embossed areas have a bit of a satin finish from the sanding. I used an eyelet punch (SU) to create a subtle blue border and mounted that to the back of my metal border.  I sponged the cardstock edge just a bit to tone it down and then trimmed it to fit on my cards.  I added vintage gray seam binding to both elements and used double sided tape to adhere them to the fronts of my cards.  I softly watercoloured the edges of my images after I cut them into circles with my Nestibilities.  I cut larger circles from black cardstock and mounted my images to them.  I adhered the images to my cards using 3D foam tape.  I added a layered laser printed greeting to the portrait card.  I also tied a short length of seam binding to each of the ones on my cards to simulate a bow!  I will be printing more backgrounds onto book pages!!  It is a great way to reuse your art in your creations!!  I suppose it would be possible to print onto dictionary pages, music sheets, maps or even gift wrap!!!  Oh, the possibilities!!
You can check out my embossed metal tutorial by clicking on the featured post or by clicking the TUTORIALS tab just below my header!!  If you give it a try, come back and leave a comment with a link to your creation!!!  Would love to see what others are doing!!

Therese

A fun baby card!

This large card features another portion of the cover of a pad of decorative paper and features a row of bird houses!!  I added a brown scalloped border at the top of the trimmed decorative paper and then layered behind it a layer of green textured cardstock.  I found a scalloped greeting punchie that coordinated in my stash and layered it over a brown circle, a blue scalloped circle and a large vellum circle.  These were all glued to each other and mounted to the card using 3D foam tape!!                     Therese

Birds and flowers for this fun card

This large card was fun to make.  It actually uses the cover from the pad of paper!!  I layered a greeting in the glittery green frame where the name of the paper "Songbirds" was printed.  I added a green layer that filled the area and then added a layered oval greeting that was embellished with watercolour and mounted onto a red scalloped oval (SU).  I die cut the scalloped border for the top(SU), butted it to the trimmed decorative border and taped them together with regular tape.  I cut a strip just the size I needed for the bottom and taped them together.  I glued this large element to a white card front.  To continue the glitter theme of the paper I added dots of iridescent glitter glue to the scallops and two rows along the bottom.  It still needed a bit of something to I dug out some red daisy flowers and glued them into the scallops and then added a dot of glitter glue to their centers. That was better!!  Love this paper!!!!

Therese

More baby cards!

These are the other set of baby cards I made up. The decorative paper is from a set of paper announcements I bought a few years ago.  Pink and green makes them just perfect for baby cards!!
I cut the original panel in two and die cut the bottom edge with a thin wavy die.  I trimmed the other edges just a little bit so they would fit nicely on my green card fronts.  I stamped the baby saying (SU) on the tags provided in the kit and added a section of ribbon which was also included.  I attached the tag using 3D foam tape and added some faux stitching along the wavy edge using a white gel pen.  It was just as easy to make them portrait as landscape.
Love making cards - baby ones are fun!!

Therese

Cardmaking - April - earth friendly flowers

Guess what these flowers are made of???

Plastic bags!!  So cool!  I die cut them from plastic shopping bags using the Tattered Flowers die (TH)!!  The white one is from SU and the pink ones I am not sure as there was no advertising on them.   I found several different colours in my stash - lime green, purple, gold  - all bags I received from my local scrap booking store!  Got the idea from my sister and you can check out her flowers here on her blog.
I layered several plastic flowers, added a cardstock mini flower and punchie and held them all together using a brad. The leaf was die cut from cardstock using the Tattered Leaves die and embossed.  The edge of the top layer was cut with a Border die (TH) and then embossed.  I added a strip of decorative paper below the die cut edge which finishes the card off very nicely!!
Love this simple design!!  Would make a wonderful Mother's Day card!!

Therese