Metallic Mother's Day Cards

This week's party continues here.

Not happy w/ the photography here but these cards have been mailed already so...

I always make a few Mother's Day cards for special friends. This year I went with a palette of grey, white, black and gold.  The grey floral paper is actually from a Valentine's collection but works so well here I think. 

The focals for each card are from the DCWV Eclectic Chic stack I picked up at JoAnn's. Each is a panel from a 12x12 page of sentiments. 

There was a sentiment perfect for each of the women I was sending cards to. 

I layered each with gold glitter and white papers and then attached them to a gold and white polka dot panel on top of the grey floral panel. Gotta figure out how to get better at photographing metallics. 

Sketchy Floral Cards

I feel like I always make cards in pairs. It's not intentional, just works out that way. This time for a couple of family birthdays this month. Funnily enough I got the color inspiration from a piece of paper I ended up not using. 

The floral paper in the upper left is what I thought I was going to use and then ended up not. As I was staring more at the light blue paper with the black and white florals, I remembered some clear stickers in my stash and decided to make them the focal of  my cards. 

 

Supplies and Steps: 

• White Stardream Cardstock 
• Assorted Scrapbook papers
• Clear Stickers
• Spellbinders Nestabilities  Label Dies
• Cuttlebug
• Embellishments

Basic Steps: 

• Cut white cardstock for 5x7 card, score
• Cut scrapbook paper panel 4.75 x 6.75 and a coordinating piece 4x6, layer as shown
• Cut 2 sets labels using Label Dies ; cut in half ; layer on top and bottom of 4x6 panel as shown
• Layer clear stickers on white cardstock and trim. Mount to front of card using foam dots.
• Embellish with self adhesive rhinestones, sequins, and Stickles 

I liked how the simplicity of the clear stickers went with the sketched look of the floral paper. 

For this one the stickers were one big cluster but I cut them apart and then re-grouped three of them together as the focal. One went directly on the paper and the other two I elevated with foam dots to give some dimension. Now I need to do something with the "inspiration" paper!

Card Making: Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

One upside to our snow day last week was it gave me a chance to finish this year's Valentine's Day cards. Fortunately I'd already cut out my focal images using my Silhouette Cameo since the power was out. The rest didn't require any electricity!

My colors this year were black, cream and fuschia. 

Here are the papers and supplies I used: 

• Black metallic Stardream cardstock 
• Cream Cardstock
• My  Minds Eye "From the Heart" gold foil heart paper
• Craft Smith gold foiled paper 
• Recollections gold mirror and fuschia glitter paper
• Watercolor paper 
• Watercolor paints 

I chose an image from the Silhouette Design Store and cut it from gold mirror cardstock. Waste not want not, this image resulted in a positive and negative so I had the hearts that were leftover from the middle of the framed image if that makes any sense, and used those as well. 

For the "framed hearts" as I'll call them, I mounted on cream cardstock, then the fuschia glitter paper. I cut a panel from the gold foiled heart paper ( 4x6) and mounted to the Stardream black card (5x7) and then mounted the focal as shown.

For the cards I made using the center hearts, I played around with some watercolors I picked up recently on a BOGO ( buy one get one free) at Aaron Brothers. Cone to think of it , the watercolor pad was from a previous Aaron Brothers BOGO. Spotting a trend? 

I just played around and made some background paper ( oh I added some gold mica inks): 

I trimmed this , mounted on black then gold paper and attached the gold mirror heart with a foam dot. 

I finished each style of card with gold sequins!

Hand Lettering Practice ... Happy Valentine's Day  

Cardmaking: Sympathy Card

"I feel a card coming" is what Mr. Chocolate said the minute we got an email about the loss of a friend's beloved canine companion Freddie. Being married to a card maker, he knew that went without saying. 

For so many people their four legged friends are so much more than pets. I know our little girl is. She's been my constant companion for the last 15 years and I dread the inevitable day .  Like our friend's dog, ours knows when someone's sick or hurt or just having a bad day and knows when we need her to just sit w/us. The increase in therapy animals and hospitals bringing pets in to see patients suggests that there's some science behind this. When my son was in undergrad, his college brought puppies in during finals to reduce stress. 

Naturally I wanted to acknowledge this loss and send some small comfort to our friend. 

I save all of my scraps so I went to my scrap bin and pulled out some coordinating pieces along with some angel wings from my embellishments stash.  When working w/ scraps they sometimes dictate the design.  

Layered the pieces as shown and punched a heart from a scrap of black glitter cardstock.  I wanted to show that Freddie's heart will always be w/our friend even now that he's a guardian angel. 

PS

Here's my little baby. She's old, she's toothless, she can barely see and she has our heart! 

2017 Cards: Life Is Great Birthday

I have a few January birthdays to celebrate so this is the first of the cards I'll be making for them. For this one I went with foiled black white and gold papers, along with a wintry blue glitter scrap and black glitter paper. 

The focal sentiments were straight off the page. Literally. The DCWV Decor Noir  Stack they came from includes a couple pages of them so I chose two and put them together. 

Supplies: 

• DCWV Decor Noir Stack
• Craft Smith Gold Foil Stack (Numbers Sheet)
• Cordenons Cover Weight Cardstock: Crystal
• Gold Mirror, Blue, and Black Glitter Scraps
• Strong Double Sided Tape ( I used Scor Pal / Sookwang)
• Foam Dots 

Cut card base (5x7) from cover weight card cardstock. Score, fold. Cut base panel from gold and white Numbers paper. Layer onto card.

Trim sentiments and layer as shown. Adhere top sentiment to card using foam dots. Adhere bottom sentiment to card. 

The ScorPal / Sookwang brand of tape is great for glitter papers which can be a challenge to get things to stick to. Love this stuff. Most scrapbook and stamp stores sell it or of course there's Amazon! 

Easy, clean, fast! My kind of card.