Personalizing a card kit

When I assemble a card kit, it’s never as quick or easy as I think it will be. Mainly because I usually want to change up the designs or add details to make the cards more “me.” And that’s exactly what I did when I sat down to put together a birthday card kit I received recently.

The kit included five square card bases, five circle card bases, two sheets of patterned paper, pre-printed images, woven labels, and some other goodies. I used all of the square card bases for actual cards, but I ended up using two of the circle cards to die cut some stitched circles (on the pink card above and the two cards below) and the “happy birthday” sentiment on the orange card above. I could have used my own card stock, but this way I didn’t have to worry about finding a matching color.

I trimmed some of the pre-printed pieces to better fit my card designs. For instance, the cake slices had the sentiment “Make a wish” at the bottom, and the “Enjoy” piece (top photo) was originally a tag. I also swapped out most of the embellishments included in the kit for my own rhinestones and sequins. And I used some sequins, glitter, and a piece of acetate to create a shaker for one of the cards (below). It’s a pretty simple shaker because I don’t make them often, but I still think it’s cute.

I’m planning to donate the cards from this kit to a charitable organization, although I’m not sure which one yet. I received a few other kits along with this one, so when I have all the cards done I’ll figure out where I should send the cards based on the organizations’ needs at the time.

I did have some patterned paper and other bits left after I finished the pre-cut card bases, so I decided to make two cards for my own stash:

You can’t tell in the photo, but the black background in the right-hand card is embossed with a streamer/confetti embossing folder. That panel has been sitting in a scraps envelope for ages, and I finally had the right card for it!

I still have some leftovers from the kit, but I’m not sure if I’ll end up using them. For now I’m hanging onto them, just in case. Thanks for stopping by!

 

Quick and easy Halloween cards

As promised in my last post, here is my second (and last) batch of Halloween cards. These are pretty clean and simple note cards -- great layouts if you still want to make some Halloween cards before next week.

(I apologize that the lighting on these photos is not good. It was getting late in the day, and the mostly white backgrounds were not cooperating.)

My starting point for all of these cards was the Simple Strips - Halloween stamp from Taylored Expressions. I stamped and die cut the strips and then chose images based on the sentiments. For "merry scary season," I chose a haunted house. I stamped the card base with the Halloween Scene background stamp (Hero Arts) and then stamped the moon over the background. I stamped the house on separate card stock then used a very small blending brush to add a little glow in a few windows. I cut out the house and attached it to the card with foam tape. I added the sentiment strip and a few gold stars to finish the card.

The "happy meow-loween" sentiment obviously needed a cat image, so I pulled out this old stamp with the shape of a cat made up of different Halloween words. I blended a bit of yellow ink on the background to give the cat a glow and added rhinestones for the eyes and a bow near it's collar. I added the sentiment strip and finished by drawing a border around the card front.

For these friendly ghosts, I went really simple. I stamped the card bases with the Halloween Scene Background and used foam tape to attach two ghosts and a sentiment strip to each card. I finished them with a few sequins for a pop of color.

For the last two cards I blended some light green ink on two white note cards. I stamped three small images that coordinated with each sentiment and punched them out with a circle punch. Then I added a little color with alcohol markers and matted them with black circles. Using foam tape, I adhered three circles and a sentiment strip to each card and finished them with sequins and a hand-drawn border.

Thanks for stopping by!

Have a Dinomite Halloween

Halloween is right around the corner, so I thought I'd better share the Halloween cards I made this year. For today's post I have three cards made with the Dinomite Halloween set from Ellen Hutson.

For this group of cards I used the same basic layout with three different color combinations. I used alcohol markers to color the images, die cut them, and then adhered them to panels of white card stock (the dinos are popped up with foam tape). I scribbled a light gray marker to ground the dinosaurs, stamped a sentiment at the bottom of each panel and adhered the panels to layers of black card stock.

I selected coordinating green card bases and stamped a few bats and spiderwebs directly on the card bases and focal panels. I tied black-and-white baker's twine around each card base and attached the panels over the twine. I finished each card front with a few silver sequins.

Inside the cards I added white card stock stamped with "Happy Halloween" and a few more bats.

In my next post I'll share my second batch of Halloween cards -- a few clean and simple designs if you're still looking for quick and easy card ideas. Thanks for stopping by!

The Magic Is in You

Whenever I see a craft supply -- stamp set, dies, washi tape, etc. -- with mushrooms, I'm drawn to it. I don't know what it is, but they're always so darn cute. So when I saw The Magic Is in You layering stencils and die from Pinkfresh Studio, I couldn't pass them by.

The stencil set comes with five layering stencils, and you use one ink color with each stencil. I don't buy a lot of layering stencils, but I like that these are small (all the images fit on a quarter sheet of card stock) and not overly detailed. Here is my first try with the stencils:

The coordinating die cuts out all the pieces -- even the little yellow dots and stars -- at one time. Unfortunately with this first try, I didn't have the stencils lined up exactly right, and those little bits are so tiny that they didn't die cut properly. But that's ok; I really wanted the main focal images. I'll try to be more accurate next time, but I also figure that if I ever want to include those little accents on a card I could just stencil them directly onto the card base.

Here is the completed card I made with the die-cut pieces. I die cut a stitched frame to coordinate with the mushroom tops and adhered that to a light-colored card base. Then I added the greenery pieces and attached the mushrooms with foam tape. (I had one piece of foliage left over, so I used that inside the card.) I stamped a sentiment in dark brown ink and finished the card with a few brown pearls.

Thanks for stopping by!

Lil' Squatch

Today's card is one I made ages ago -- maybe a couple of years ago, I'm not even sure. I love the card, but I never shared it because the photo isn't great and has a lot of shadows. But then I thought that it kind of looks like the sun is streaming through trees, which fits with the theme of the card. At any rate, here is the card:

I made this card to send to a friend's father, who was having health problems at the time. It's not your typical get-well card, I know, but I think if I were in that situation, I would like a card that made me smile. And this little sasquatch and punny greeting definitely do that.

The main products I used on this card were the Wood Grain Planks die (Memory Box) for the background and the Lil' Squatch stamp and die sets (Ellen Hutson) for the focal images. I used colored pencils and Gamsol to color the images. I added the sentiment on a white banner and kept the embellishments simple -- just a bit of hemp twine and a small red brad in the upper left corner. 

Thanks for stopping by -- and may the forest be with you!

Gel print cards

Happy World Card-Making Day! I made a few cards today myself, but I'll be sharing them another day. The cards in today's post are ones I made last weekend, using some gel press prints from my stash.

I started with an autumn card because I wanted to use these watercolor leaves. I created the leaves a few months ago during the 2023 Fodder Challenge, but I hadn't decided what to do with them yet. I love how they look on this card, and I think the colors work really well with the gel print. I attached the leaves to the card with foam tape and added a small twine bow to the green leaf. I stamped a sentiment directly on the gel print and finished the card with several metallic sequins.

The next cards feature pieces of the same gel print. The first card has a pink watercolor leaf as the focal point, and since the leaf had black details, I used that as the accent color and added a black card stock layer, a black sentiment, and several black enamel dots. For the second card I die cut a circular "hey" sentiment out of gold and white card stock (two white, one gold) and layered them together. I love how the sentiment looks with the pattern in the gel print. I also added a layer of gold card stock behind the gel print and finished the card with a few sequins.

The last two cards are two-for-one birthday cards. I die cut the Birthday Message Cover Plate (Hero Arts) out of black card stock and glued it over a gel print. I adhered the panel to a card base and added  sequins for a little sparkle. Then I used the letters from the cover plate and glued them to another gel print for a second card. (Tip: Cut the cover plate with a piece of scratch card stock to use as a template for gluing the letters.) Of course, I had to add a few sequins for the finishing touch.

Thanks for stopping by!

Harvest Silhouettes

Our temperature dropped about forty degrees this week, so I think we are finally into autumn. Thank goodness! The beginning of this week was entirely too warm for early October (although I may change my opinion in a few months when we're in the throes of winter). So it seems fitting to share two more fall cards, this time made with the Harvest Silhouettes stamp set from Gina K Designs.

I love the look of an ink blended sunset, so that's what I wanted to try for my first card. I started by stamping the mountains and ground at the bottom of a white panel. I stamped the mountains again on masking paper, cut it out, and adhered it over the mountains on the panel. I blended five colors for the sunset: peach, pinkish red, lavender, medium blue, and just a tiny bit of dark blue along the top edge. I used dark brown ink to stamp the flowers and sentiment, then added a few gold sequins, and adhered the panel to a card base.

For a different look with the same stamp set, I used the three leaf images to create a simple stamping card. I stamped each leaf with a different color (they are the same colors I used in the first card; it's funny how different they look when stamped compared to blending) and then used a splatter stamp from my stash to fill in some of the empty spaces. I left one small area clear for a simple "happy fall" sentiment (from a different Gina K Designs set) and added three gold sequins. The card still felt like it needed something, so I finished it off with a length of hemp twine wrapped around the card front and tied in a bow near the card fold.

Thanks for stopping by!