Christmas Cards 2021

I handmake around 50 Christmas cards each year with our boy's pictures on them to send out to friends and family. Besides those cards, I always end up needing additional Christmas cards to send, so I am trying to get a head start on those. Today I used Freshly Made Sketches #505 sketch to create my first Christmas card of the 2021 holiday season.

For my card, I wanted to go with a less traditional color scheme and ended up with Distress Inks in Evergreen Bough, Speckled Egg, and Iced Spruce. I used water on a large flat paintbrush to wet the entire piece of watercolor cardstock, then I brushed and dabbed each Distress Ink on using a round paintbrush. I made sure to blend the colors where they met. 

Once dry, I edged the watercolor piece with the same Distress Inks & then mounted it on a dark grey sparkly cardstock. The greeting is from a set I picked up at Michael's a few years ago. The large snowflakes were die cut from white cardstock and vellum. There are additional smaller snowflakes that were die cut from vellum as well. It felt a little flat and I wanted to add a little bit of color, so I added a little more texture with Tim Holtz Greens Mini pieces.

I finished the card with some Perfect Pearls mist, Stickles, and a few sequins.

Because I tend to reach for the more traditional reds, greens, and golds when it comes to Christmas cards, it was a lot of fun to step out of that mindset and try something different. I'm going to challenge myself to find other non-traditional color schemes and make cards with those as well.

Simon Says Stamp September Kit of the Month

 I have a deep love of sunflowers, so this Sunshine Flowers Simon Says Stamp card kit of the month was perfect. I spent this weekend using the card kit to create some much-needed thank you cards.

For this first card, I used the Freshly Made Sketches #503 sketch.

Using an older square punch I punched out three small squares out of Tim Holtz watercolor cardstock. I used Distress inks and water to loosely watercolor the background and then I spritzed the wet watercolor with Perfect Pearls water. Once dry each square was machine stitched with white thread.

I then stamped the single sunflower image from the SSS Sunshine Flowers stamp set in black ink. Once embossed in clear embossing powder, I then watercolored the image using Distress Inks. The center of the flower was then coated with Walnut Stain Distress Stickles which are sadly a discontinued product from Ranger and Tim Holtz. After fussy-cutting the image, I popped it up on the watercolored squares & added the Tim Holtz Ideology "Thank You" label sticker, and finished the card with a scattering of sequins.

Crackling Campfire

Today, I wanted to play with Tim Holtz's newest Distress Ink color- Crackling Campfire. I had seen it ink blended and I knew there was a yellow undertone. I decided to use it as an ombre gradient watercolor. I like how the color deepens as it moves from left to right across the watercolor cardstock. 

I used Freshly Made Sketches #458 as a guide as I created. 

Before I added the Crackling Campfire ink, I heat embossed the feather images in gold embossing powder. Both feather stamps are from an older Cocoa Daisy stamp set. Once I completed the embossing and watercoloring, I added a few water splatters and some Perfect Pearl splatters in Heirloom Gold to the piece. After drying the piece completely I used my fingernail to rough up and distress the edges. Using an ink blending tool, I went around the whole piece with Crackling Campfire ink. I adhered the panel to the kraft card base and added sequins and gold Stickles. The "thankful" sentiment is from an older Technique Tuesday/Ali Edwards stamp set. There is also a crosshatched background peeking out from behind the raised panel. It was created using an older Cocoa Daisy stamp. 

I am already making a list of more techniques to try with this beautiful color. 

 

Watercoloring & Embossing on Vellum

In my last post, I mentioned playing with older supplies. I enjoyed playing with my Twinkling H2O's so much that I wanted to continue using them. I am amazed at how much I have used them through the years and how much of them are still left. I'm not sure they are still be made, so I'm glad they don't get used up quickly.

I was excited this week to see Freshly Made Sketches #446. I have been intrigued by slimline cards here lately as I have begun to see more and more of them being made and shared on social media. I thought this was the perfect week to try one.

I pulled my inspiration from a decorative piece I made a few years ago that hangs on one of my inspiration boards. 

Using the same color scheme and vellum I created a slimline card with a similar feel.

Heat embossing on vellum can be really tricky. The best advice I can give is to go slow and hold the embossing gun as far back as possible from the vellum while you are embossing. That way it will reduce the warping or burning of the vellum. 

The stamped leaves came from an older Cocoa Daisy stamp set and are no longer available. They are stamped with Versamark ink & embossed with white embossing powder. My favorite white embossing powder is Hero Arts White Embossing Powder because it is a crisp, clean white. The leaves are watercolored with Twinkling H2O watercolors. Once dry, I buffed the images to remove any watercolor that bled onto the white embossing. 

The sentiment is from the Simon Says Stamp Thanks and Leaves stamp set and is also embossed in white embossing powder.

I used foam tape behind all the bigger leaves to adhere the vellum piece to the white card base. I finished the card with a sprinkling of sequins from my stash. 

This card made me question why I don't play with the vellum in my stash more often. It was a fun card to make and makes me yearn for the cooler temperatures of fall. 

Sunshine Card

This week I spent some time playing with brighter colors that have a summery feel. One of the cards I created using the Freshly Made Sketches #436. This is such a versatile & fun sketch, that I have more cards planned using it.

Here is what I came up with:

The card also has a matching envelope design, which was created using the same Tim Holtz Rays stencil along with Distress Ink in Mustard Seed and Carved Pumpkin. The blue background patterned paper is from an older 6x6 paper pad and it is layered on top of a Neenah 80lb card base. The shaker is filled with a mix of iridescent & Simon Says Stamp Summer Gold sequins. The sentiment is from an older Simon Says Stamp set & is stamped in Archival Jet Black ink. 

I love the summery feel of this card and it will soon be headed to a close friend who always makes me feel better when I'm feeling down.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you are getting a chance to feel warm, sunny days in your part of the world.  

Embossed White Backgrounds

Today's cards were made using a sketch from Freshly Made Sketches (#435)

Both of these cards were created using embossing folders to create a simple white embossed background. The embossed background adds another element to the cards without adding another color or distraction.

I created this first card using an older stamp set from Simon Says Stamp. The background is embossed using an embossing folder I picked up at Michael's a year or so ago. All the stamped images are watercolored with Distress Inks. The patterned paper pieces are remnants left over from a Simon Says Stamp Card Kit. Sequins are from my stash. I love how this one turned out with the little popsicle images as the diagonal piece.

This card is created much the same. The paper pieces are remnants from older kits or from my stash. The embossed background is from Michael's, I picked it up when I bought the ice cream embossing folder. I have a hard time passing up "summery" products. The stamped sentiment is from an older Simon Says Stamp set. The sequins & rhinestones are from my stash, I think the rhinestones are actually from Hero Arts, from their first line of rhinestones they put out ages ago.

Each card has a matching envelope.

I love digging through older stamps/supplies and using up my stash of stuff. It's a really big stash & I feel very accomplished when I use things up. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Bit and Pieces

Last week I cleaned out my scrap drawers. I have a three drawer plastic storage container that I bought at Walmart years ago. It will hold 12x12 paper, but I use it strictly for scrap pieces. Occasionally I go through it and cut down the scraps and move them to a box on my desk. When I am working on cards, scrapbook pages, or other projects, I then try to reach into that scrap box to find pieces to use rather than cutting down more 12x12 paper.

To make my scrap creating quicker and easier, I used a sketch from Freshly Made Sketches for my card design.

 Today's card comes completely from that scrap box and from card bases I had cut down and made a while back. The stamp I used is an older 3x3 butterfly image from Jenni Bowlin & is no longer available. 

 It feels good to use up scraps that have been around awhile. I also used colors that I don't always reach for. It was a good opportunity to step out of my comfort zone and create something from older bits and pieces.

Fussy Cut Distress

For this week's Freshly Made Sketches #401, I wanted to create a repeated stamped leaf wreath as my focal point.

I realized very early on in this fussy cutting that a leaf die would have made this process much easier, so now I'm on the lookout for a set of leaf dies. 

I needed a simple circle as a guide for my leaf wreath, so I decided to use the Simon Says Stamp Solar Burst stencil and Perfect Pearl Mist in Biscotti to create a pattern on the background of the card. Part of the stencil has a circle, which was perfect as a guide for my leaves. 

The leaves were created using an older Cocoa Daisy leaf stamp and Distress Inks in Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Fired Brick, Crushed Olive, and Seedless Preserves. Each leaf was covered with a lighter Distress ink and then edged with a darker Distress ink. That gave each leaf a two-tone look. I stamped all the leaf images onto a piece of watercolor cardstock and then sprayed the whole piece with Perfect Pearls Heirloom Gold Mist. Once completely dry, each leaf was fussy cut and adhered to the base with a mini glue dot. 

I used a sentiment from Simon Says Stamp Thanks and Leaves Stamp Set. To add interest, I added hand stitching to match the mat. Clear sequins and red gems complete the card.  

Off to ice my scissor and search for leaf dies!! :)

Freshly Made Sketches #400!!!

Here is the 400th Freshly Made Sketch! So much fun to play along with such a milestone sketch.

This one came together pretty quickly.

 I had stamped, watercolored, & fussy cut a bunch of the Tim Holtz flowers and had them in a dish on my scrap desk. One of those became the focal point of this card. The card was built on a white card base. I added a tan-colored piece of cardstock to the base and used foam tape to pop up the Blue Swiss Dot patterned paper. The green loops were created with ribbon sandwiched between the tan piece and the blue patterned paper. I created a tan frame using two stitched rectangle dies. The background behind the frame was created using an older Hero Arts background stamp, and the sentiment is from an older Hero Arts stamp set as well.

I finished the card with sequins and a bow.

Freshly Made Sketches #400 Week 3

Here is this week's Freshly Made Sketches sketch:

Since it is beginning to cool off a little here in the South, thanks to a few thunderstorms, I decided to start working on a few more fall-themed cards. 

I used one of my favorite woodblock stamps from Hero Arts called Design Block Tree (S5037) to create the larger rectangle. The tree was stamped with Versamark and then embossed in WOW regular embossing powder in Rose Gold. The ink blended tree colors are Scattered Straw, Wild Honey, Crushed Olive, and Fired Brick. The olive green rectangle is a piece of scrap cardstock from my stash. The sentiment is from Simon Says Stamp Thanks and Leaves stamp set. 

As always, I finished the card with a few clear, iridescent sequins from my stash.

Freshly Made Sketches #400 Week Two

Freshly Made Sketches is celebrating 400 Sketches by revisiting earlier sketches. Here is this week's  sketch:

This one was fun, and I had several different ideas before I settled on the card I made today. I made a list of some of the other ideas I'd like to try based off this sketch. Here is the card I finally decided to make.

I used a leaf image from the Simon Says Stamp Delicate Flowers stamp set. I stamped and embossed the image randomly on a piece of Tim Holtz watercolor cardstock. I then watercolored the leaves using a mix of Mustard Seed, Crushed Olive and Peeled Paint Distress Inks.  I mixed the Perfect Pearls powder with water. Once I completed a leaf, I went back and added drops of Perfect Pearls to cover the leaf and let it dry. I like how the greens are not all the same and how the Perfect Pearls dried differently on each leaf. It adds interest and depth to the background. I also splattered the Perfect Pearls on the completed background. It dried with a green tint to it because I was using the same brush to paint both green leaves and add Perfect Pearls. Love!

I then added a black strip to divide the background and to ground the die-cut Thanks sentiment, which is from the Simon Says Stamp Beautiful Flowers 2 stamp set. 

I added additional leaves to the die-cut sentiment and then added sequins to complete the card.  

Freshly Made Sketches #400

I found a new-to-me card sketch challenge blog. Freshly Made Sketches stretches my creativity because I'm not a "clean" cardmaker. I am a splatter and Distress Ink kind of card maker most of the time. Here is the sketch for this week and then my card:

Since I am a school Library Media Specialist, I decided to create a card that I can give to a colleague when she needs encouragement.  This card was made using patterned paper scraps from my stash. The apple image is from an older Hero Arts woodblock stamp set (LP125: Four Apples) and is watercolored with Distress Inks in Fired Brick, Barn Door, Shabby Shutters, Mowed Lawn, and Vintage Photo. The sentiment is from Simon Says Stamp Thank You Teacher stamp set (SSS101749).