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The patterned paper on the card today reminds me of the face of a sliderule. At least, when it is cut at this size. It also reminded me of construction so I decided to use it as backing for the three little birdhouses.
I repeated the house colors in the bordering color, the sentiment block and with three dragonfly brads.
Why dragonflies? 1) because I like them and 2) I didn't have any 'bird' brads.
Ddd
I was searching through my stamps for one to fit inside this diecut oval and re-discovered these praying hands. I stamped both diecuts with the same image and then liked the first coloring so much I did the second exactly the same. These involved a medium blue dot background colored over with a light blue solid.
For the first card I selected a green patterned background and a golden yellow for bordering. A single narrow strip of a coordinating patterned paper forms an L with the stamped sentiment.
For the second one I Used borders to focus on the blue and lots of soft tan and beige for a restful feel. I used one of my scripture stamps made in the Theresa Collins Stampmaker.
The landscape orientation of this card contributes to the serenity.
Ddd
This card did NOT go where I was steering it but I enjoyed the ride, anyway.
I started with one of the fancy diecuts, blocked out the filigree and stamped a little bird cottage in the center circle. I colored it with the custom palette in alcohol markers and toned the white filigree with Distress Ink.
Then I chose the striped paper and... nothing. I kept trying different arrangements of papers - both solids and patterns - to back the image but either the diecut was just floating out there or the mest of the filigree was covered somehow.
Then I looked at the sticker sheets in the kit and found this border sticker. By weaving it creatively throught the filigree and sticking it to the backing paper it held the diecut in place and featured it beautifully.
I cut the sentiment block to fit perfectly between the sticker strips. Foam tape is used under the diecut but only at the tips and the stamped center.
Ddd
On another of the fancy diecuts I blocked out the filigree and stamped a single flower stamp three times. This was colored with the custom palette and the filigree tinted with Old Paper Distress Ink.
Two papers from the Tea for Two 6x6 pad would have competed for attention but I used a dark green border on the colored piece and the pink sentiment. This brings the attention to these foreground elements and the background papers play nicely together.
To tie in the sentiment and backing paper with the illustration I added three pink heart brads as centers to the flowers.
Ddd
In a swap of stamped images some time ago I got several Magnolia kids. These are the ones that have no mouths and that creeps me out so I always draw in one. This image also had wings on it but I've never been big on angels - especially kids - so after doing the coloring with alcohol markers I clipped her wings.
these papers are from the Tea for Two 6x6 pad and I colored her with y custom palette. Even so, the purple of her vest didn't appear anywhere in the papers I chose. I just selected a sentiment stamped on purple and it all came together.
The end of the sentiment banner as well as the fussy-cut girl are popped up on foam tape. I added a block of plain cream paper behind her to separate her from the busy background. A broken line of doodling frames out the backing block.
Ddd
Here is evidence that one can use the exact same image and come up with a completely different card.
This time I stamped the flowering branch on the center circle of a square fancy diecut. I colored it with pastels from the custom palette. Yesterday's bordering pieces were a pale sage freen so today I chose a dark forest green. What a contrast this makes with the filigreed border!
The colors in the papers from the 6x6 Cosmo Cricket kit are brighter today, too and setting the feature panel on point really gives it some zing!
I added some tiny yellow brads as centers to three of the flowers. Too much?
Ddd
This card kind of came together in fits and starts but I do like the end result very much! The starting point was the branch I stamped on one of the fancy diecuts and colored with the custom palette. I had selected the paper strip and the background paper as well as the bordering color. Then I got stuck.
It just looked too blah when the diecut feature was plopped on top of the strip so I decided to open up the ends of the unit and weave the strip through it like a slider. Better, still not great.
Then I went looking for a sentiment in the bin of pre-stamps and this one looked so good with the sky color. I added enough of the same blue to go under the top part of the illustration and knew that I was on the right track.
I cut some of the green bordering material to back the oval part of the die cut so the blue would not show through the open dots. Then I raised only the center of the diecut up on foam and attached the ends of the strip with blue brads to continue the color theme.
YES! Exactly right!
Ddd
For the card today I went back to the Cosmo Cricket 6x6 pad to feature a diecut medallion I had stamped and colored with the custom palette.
After blocking the scrollwork I stamped the iris with a Stampin' Up stamp. I did the background in a new technique - dotting in close around the flower with a medium blue then coloring over this with the lightest blue. I like the result and will definately use this technique again.
I used green bordering to pull out the leaf color and a yellow sentiment, cut to a flag shape, to echo the flower. Three tiny blue brads echo the blue sky.
Ddd
I still had a bin of the diecut medallions and used black ink to stamp the centers. They were on white cardstock and since the Cosmo Cricket line does not have any white in it I used Old Paper Distress Ink to tone the edges to a cream color.
I blocked off the fancy borders with removable tape before stamping three birds on a branch. These were colored with the custom palette. When I went looking for backing papers I found that a couple from one of the other recent lines I was playing with actually went better with this illustration.
The yellow stripes echo the right bird, the sentiment echoes the center bird and the bordering papers echo the left bird.
The illustration block is popped up on foam tape.
Ddd
I had this hand carved lighthouse in my bin to color and decided to do it up pretty brightly. None of the papers from the Tea Time for Two kit really went with it so I pulled a woodgrain from the scraps bin and added a strip from one of the other recent pads to mimic streaks of light.
After I chose the blue sentiment strip I went looking for a way to tie the elements together. To the rescue was the sticker sheet in the Cosmo Cricket kit! There are three sheets of stickers and each had a scalloped rectangle. I used one under the sentiment and two for opposing corners on the illustration.
The sentiment led me to use three more stickers from the sheet - the hearts. I also added a yellow brad to serve as the light in the tower.
Ddd
I have one more new paper kit to play with and I approached this one completely differently. The kit is one I got for my birthday and it includes a pack of 12x12 papers, scaled down patterns for 6x6 papers, tags, chipboard diecuts and stickers. This set is by Cosmo Cricket and is titled Tea Time for Two.
My approach was to use one of the 6x6 papers that featured stripes of several of the designs to view the entire color palette of the line. Then I got out my alcohol marker color reference cards to find all the matches for the papers. I created a special color chart using only these colors and pulled the markers from the bins to restrict myself to using only these.
You can see on the chart I placed them in color range groups and labeled them with the color code (number or name) as well as the brand, for ease in finding the one I wanted to use.
I started by pulling a digital image from my bin and coloring it using the custom palette. Then I selected a couple of papers from the line to mount it on. Look how nicely the colors coordinate! I added a sentiment stamped on a piece that matched the color of the dock.
The sentiment is popped up on foam tape and I used forest green as a bordering color to go with the evergreen trees in the illustration.
I will be coloring lots more images with this palette to use on cuts from the 6x6 pad.
Ddd
I needed just three more cards to round out a box of 40 to go to Operation Write Home so I decided to break out the third of the 6x6 pad I picked up at the Tuesday Morning store.
This one is a Crate Paper set called DIY Shop. It has rulers, wood grains, typewriter, vintage florals, music, ledger and sewing patterns.
For two of the cards I started with a number background and the third uses a burst. I selected a ruler paper and a couple of small patterns to mix and match with these. All of the cards got brown bordering papers, although each is a different shade.
When I got this far I went looking for a diecut of Happy Birthday and discovered that I don't even have one! WHAT? So I went with Celebrate instead. There was going to be a lot of open space and all of the cards has a bit of muted red so I pulled some cardstock of that tone and hand cut two balloons for each card. I attached twine to the back of them and tied a knot near the bottom. the tails were then tucked and adhered on the back.
Finishing details included catching the C of the diecut word in the balloon strings before gluing it down, popping the balloons up on foam tape and adding some balloon highlights with gel pen.
With the generic text these can be used for birthday, anniversary, gradulation, or any other achievement.
Ddd
Oh what fun it was to create today's card. I started with the stamped image in the diecut and colored with some bold purple and orange. I picked two papers from the Snippets Collection pad but there was no purple in the pad so I pulled some chevron papers from another set to use.
I reached back to the orange flower center to get the rhinestone color for the bling around the diecut.
Grey bordering used throughout softens the look slightly.
Ddd
Oh look! The same diecut, the same image - wait... this is way different.
I went with bold yellow coloring for the rose and grey dots for background. Soft colors for the backing papers give the rose an elegant resting place.
I pulled th green from one backing paper into the stamped sentiment which I cut into a tag, punched and tied to the diecut with yellow and white twine.
Ddd
This oval diecut was just the right size to stamp my large carved rose. I colored this one up in tones of orange and added the blue dot background and the dew drop stickers on the petals. Yummy!
With such a bold image I kept the supporting papers pretty calm. This allows the image to be the true star.
Ddd
Ooooh, I love this die cut shape (all these fancy ones I've been using were given to me as a gift) and used my medium-sized handcarved rose as the feature image.
Nothing like a velvety red rose, is there? I added some 'dew drop' stickers to the petals and blue dot sky background.
I vascillated on a bordering color until I picked up the black and WOW! I love this black, red and white combo.
Ddd
This large die cut allowed me to select another large image to stamp. So I used my hand carved hummingbird. Colored with Copics, I used light blue dots to represent the sky.
The roses run toward the brown in this which supports the sentiment block. I used some patterned paper with blues and greens that pick up elements of the bird's coloring.
A blue base card is enough without adding borders to all the patterned papers throughout.
Ddd
This stamped rose appeared in duplicate the other day, but I gave this one a soft pink coloring. A light grey dotted background set the tone for choosing one backing paper and the base card. I went with multiple 'rose' papers for the theme.
The lacy border of the diecut was masked at the bottm to keep it free of the ink and then I wove ribbon through two of the slots to attach the image to the backing.
I stamped the sentiment on another rose paper and cut it like a tag. A pink twine tied through the tag and a part of the diecut adds a bit of whimsy.
Ddd
I stamped one of my hand carved images for the card today. I had fun blending the shades in this image and I love the result. I used libht blue to dot the background.
I did a little slice in the lacy border of the diecut to weave some of the papers through. These I held to the background with orange brads.
An orange sentiment block was bordered in blue to match the other borders on the card.
Ddd
For today's card I used that temporary tape to block out the border again before stamping the image. I actually stamped the image twice and colored with Copics. I created the background with dots of cool gray marker.
I was surprised how well the peach in the roses went with the yellow and gray chevron paper. Dark gray bordering unifies it all, but I didreverse this in the sentiment where the stamping is on the gray and white was used to border it.
Ddd
