Matting Your Pictures - Cape Barron Goose

Matting your pictures doesn't always have to mean boring rectangles.  For this layout, I triple matted my main pictures.  They have thin white mats that are the standard rectangle, but then I made a large shaped double mat to mat both of them together.  The pattern in the paper seems to reflect the subtle pattern on their feathers and really helps draw the eye to the page. The title is double matted - all pieces cut with my Silhouette.

PW Technique Challenge Sept 2012

Today's card is another one that was inspired by a challenge on the Paper Wishes Message Board.  This time it was the technique challenge for September 2012.

I used a stamp from Hot Off the Press - from the Botanicals set.  I stamped it in black and then colored it in using metallic cream chalks, using my Dove blender pen for the small spaces.

The technique called for cutting 3 pieces of cardstock, each smaller than the last, layering them on top of one another and then stamping your image.  When you take them apart and mat them, you get a look something like what I have here.  Since I was going to cut my pieces with dies, I decided to save on cardstock. I just took one piece, stamped and colored it, and then cut it with a couple dies from my Marvelous Squares die set to get the 3 different pieces.  To get my mats, I traced around the outside of the dies onto teal paper and cut along the traced lines. Once again, I just cut the 2nd mat from the middle of the larger one to save cardstock.

September Elements Challenge - Thank You

Today's card was inspired by the September Elements Challenge on the Paper Wishes Message board.  It started with a die-cut piece of waxed paper like this (Spellbinders Fair Isle Pendant):

I placed it on a piece of white card stock, covered it with a piece of paper, and ironed it to transfer the wax to the card stock.  Then I threw away the waxed paper.  At this point, I wasn't at all sure the technique was working.  I had felt that there was less wax on the piece of waxed paper, but I couldn't see anything on the card stock.  Then I rubbed a distress ink pad (Dusty Concord) over the card stock.  Magic!  The wax kept the ink from being absorbed completely, giving a lighter color where the die-cut wax had been transferred to the card stock.  It looked like this:

I glued this piece it to my card front. Then, as you can see in the next picture, I added a couple more die cuts that had been stenciled with the distress ink. The top one was added with foam tape to give more dimension as you see here:

I created a greeting label by cutting, embossing, and stenciling the smallest die in the Resplendent Rectangles set by Spellbinders.  I then stamped the greeting (Tiny Words and Images from Hot Off the Press) with white opaque ink (Daisy White by Close to My Heart), and added it to the card over top of a piece of decorative ribbon.

To complete the card, as you see it at the top of the post, I used an opaque white gel pen to go over the stamped greeting and to hand draw a white border around the waxed image and the corner dots.  A few Jewel Dazzles completed the card.

Christmas Card with 3-d Ornament Stickers

Today is the last Thursday of the month, so it's time for another Christmas Card.  The holidays are getting closer now.  How are you coming on getting your cards done?  As you've no doubt figured out by now, I'm really enjoying my Resplendent Rectangles set from Spellbinders.  Here's another card that features them, plus one of their edgeabilities sets.

For this card I wanted to use this 3-d ornament sticker that I've had for who knows how long.  I'm not sure where it came from but I think it might have been K&Company.  Anyway, knowing I wanted to use it, and feeling less than inspired, I went looking for a card sketch that would show it well.  I found this one on Mojo Monday - sketch #45. The tan and the patterned paper is from a DCWV Holiday Collection stack. 

For ease in describing what I did, I'll once again number the dies in my Resplendent Rectangles set starting with the largest - biggest is #1, smallest is #5.  I cut a piece of the tan that was 1/4" smaller than my card and then cut and embossed it with the largest die in the center of it.  That gave me the large frame you see here, and an inside piece which I saved for the inside of the card.  I inked the edge with brown ink and then cut a piece of the patterned paper so it would fit behind the frame and glued them both in place on the front of the card. 

Next came the border that runs horizontally across the center of the card.  I cut and embossed it with the edgeabilities dies.  I wanted to mat it with paper to match the card itself - and found I didn't have cardstock quite that color.  But, I DID have some wallpaper from a sample book that matched well, so that is what I used!

To mat the ornament, I used die number 3 to cut and emboss another piece of the tan paper.  Then I drew around the inside of the die onto the patterned paper and cut it out so it just fit inside the tan mat as you can see in the picture.

For the sentiment, I cut and embossed a piece from the patterned paper using die number 4.  I then drew around the outside of the die onto tan paper and cut it out to form the mat you see here. I also cut and embossed die number 5 using the tan so I could stamp my sentiment on it. (The stamp is a small set from Studio G.)  I inked the edges of both of these tan pieces before gluing them to the center border.  TIP: Sometimes I don't have the right color of ink to stamp my sentiment.  As I did here, I find it works pretty well to stamp twice with different colors - the second one directly on top of the first.  The colors sort of blend to give me the color I want.  This is where clear stamps really come in handy because you can see to line them up just right.

As you can see from the picture, I finished off the card by adding a few jewel Dazzles in the bottom right hand corner and adding a hand-drawn line across the top from which the ornament appears to hang.

The inside of the card was pretty straight forward.  I just cut a piece of the patterned paper a bit smaller than the card itself.  This formed the mat for the leftover cut-out from the card front.  Now I have a pretty place to write my message.

Resplendent Rectangles

I LOVE these new dies from Spellbinders!  They nest and are embossible, but are not all the same shape, so provide more texture and interest.  Since I recently got my set, I've been using them a lot and today's card is another example of what I've done with them. 

The first thing I did was to cut a piece of the salted green paper that was just a bit smaller than the card and glue it in place for my background.

Next, I took a piece of white paper cut just a little smaller than the large green mat.  It was then cut and embossed in several pieces using ALL five of the dies in the Resplendent Rectangles set. NOTE: make sure you tape them in place with removable tape like stencil tape or painters tape or they may well move on you and give you a different result than what you had hoped for! I nested the two larger pieces as you see here, forming the large border.  The third piece was set aside for a different project. The next one was placed in the center, and the 5th piece set aside.  The 6th and smallest piece was stamped with my sentiment and stenciled on the edge.

Then I cut and embossed a piece of dark green paper using the next to the smallest die.  As you can see, this went inside of the smaller white frame before the small white sentiment piece was adhered with pop-dots.


For the tag, I wish I had used more of the salted green paper - though it matches better in person than it looks here.  After doing the stamping, I felt it needed a bit more white to tie it in better with the rest of the card, so I added some dots of white enamel accents. I'm not sure I'd do it that way again, but it was an interesting experiment anyway.  A small white bow also added a bit more white.

By now, my card was nearly finished. I wanted a bit more bling so added some light green Stickles accents at the corners. I love the leaf ribbon that I got from Paper Wishes, but mine will be all gone soon. (I wish I could get it by itself instead of part of the Botanical Etchings Ribbon pack.) The butterfly was a rub-on from my stash - no idea where I got it. I simply rubbed it onto a piece of the white paper, cut around it, and attached it with pop-dots.

Christmas Snowmen Use It Up

 I have a bunch of these old cards that I've been trying to use up.  I always find them a bit challenging to use.  Here are three different cards I made while using up my snowpeople cards.  You'll probably notice that one of the ways I handle these cards is to cover a large portion of it with a plain piece of paper or cardstock.  This helps make the card less "busy".

This first card (above) features a snowman printed from clip art I found on Scrapbook Flair.  The snowflakes came from Hot Off the Press, the white borders were outline stickers - probably Dazzles from Hot Off the Press.  The double-matted greeting was designed and cut with my Silhouette.

Next up is a card that also uses clip art found on Scrapbook Flair (the snowman in the snowglobe).  The border was cut and embossed with my edgeabilities dies from Spellbinders, and the greeting and mat were designed and cut on my Silhouette.

This last card once again has clipart from Scrapbook Flair and a sentiment cut with my Silhoutte.  The focal is matted with a blue piece of cardstock that was cut with a Spellbinders Nestabilities die.  That is then matted on a white circle with a punched design around the edges made with one of my multi-punches.

Embossing with Glued Additions

Today's card is one I made at a Stamp-in Up Party I went to recently.  It uses a technique which is pretty straight forward, but that I had never thought to do.  The green zig zag stripes are glued to the red cardstock before embossing the whole piece in an embossing folder.  As you can see, it makes it look like it was a patterned paper, when it is just plain cardstock glued together.  It's a fun technique, and one I'm sure I'll use again sometime.  Of course, all materials are from Stamp-in Up.

Memorabilia

 When making a travel scrapbook, there are often little bits of memorabilia that we want to include along with our pictures.  After our trip to New Zealand, I found I had several brochures I wanted to keep, but didn't want to take up page space for them.  The pages I'm showing today show how I handled this challenge.

This first page, "Left, Right, Left" had a large piece of paper overlapping a smaller piece that formed a border.  I decided this was a great place to hide my brochure.  I made a pocket behind the burlap paper that was the right side for the brochure and left enough of an opening so the brochure can slide in and out.  As you can see, I attached a file folder type tab (it says, "Brochure") to the top of the brochure for a pull-tab.

BUT, I wanted to have easy access to the pull tab, and still have the page in a plastic sheet protector.  So, I slide the page into the sheet protector and marked where the brochure opening was with a dry erase marker.  Then I took the page out, slid a small cutting mat inside the protector sheet, and cut a slit with my craft knife and a straight edge. Then I carefully erased any traces of the marker.  Before putting the page back into the page protector, I removed the brochure.  When the page was in place, I could then slide the brochure through the slit, back into its pocket.

I did something similar with this page.  In this case I created a collage of pictures and made my brochure pocket behind the collage.

PW Sketch Challenge for Sept

Today's card was inspired by September's sketch challenge on the Paper Wishes Message Board.  You can see the sketch we were to use, here.  I didn't follow it exactly (I seldom do).  I turned the sketch on its side and the proportions of the rectangles aren't quite the same (I just got my Resplendent Rectangles Dies and HAD to use them!)  The focal was cut with one of the Fancy Tags Two dies (all are Spellbinders Dies). The stamps used are from Hot Off the Press and the green patterned paper is from them as well - called "Green Salt".

This card is pretty self explanatory, but I'll point out a few things. For ease of explanation, I'll number the dies in the Resplendent Rectangles set from LARGEST to smallest.  So #1 is the largest one, and #5 is the smallest. 

I cut the large rectangle using dies number 2 and 3 TOGETHER to create the dark green frame.  Tape them in place with stencil tape or painter's tape so they stay put, and leave the tape on until you run them through a second time with the embossing mat.  I wanted the patterned paper to show through the cutouts in the frame, so I cut a rectangle from the patterned paper that was just a hair smaller than the frame and put it behind the dark green. (You can trim it with scissors where necessary.)

The frame for the smaller rectangle was cut using number 3 and number 4 dies TOGETHER - same method as before.  This time I was just able to cut the patterned paper with die number 4 and slip it into the center of the frame.

The focal was a little more challenging, but not too bad.  I cut and embossed the fancy tag die twice - once with the patterned paper, and once with the dark green, saving the innies.  Then I simply put the patterned innies into the dark green frame.  I then put white cardstock over the center of the die and ran it through to EMBOSS it.  Then I simply cut around the embossing line to get the center piece of the focal.  After stamping a sentiment and a couple of flowers, I was ready to glue it to the focal.

I matted everything with white cardstock. It was pretty easy - just draw around the die with a pencil and then cut along the drawn line. White brads form the centers of the flowers in the upper right corner, and white ribbon finishes off the design.

Enhance Your Focal

So often when I get ready to post a card, I discover that I wish I had done something different with it!  Today is no exception.  At the end of this post, I'll tell you what I WISH I'd done! :)

Anyway, today's card is an example of how small changes can make a significant difference.  Compare the card above with this previous version of it:

While the difference is more dramatic in person, I think you can probably see that the top one looks more finished.  There are two differences.  The first and most visible in the pictures is the addition of the ribbon bow.  So often I find a bit of ribbon can make a HUGE difference in a card!  Second is the flowers.  I wasn't happy with them, so stamped them again on white cardstock - and did NOT color them in the way I had done here.  Then I put them on top of these with foam squares.  These two things add quite a bit of dimension to the card and make it SO much better.

The card itself is embossed with an M-Bossabilities folder (Spellbinders) and then a piece of glitter cardstock (cut from my Cheery Lynn lattice die) was added.  I got the shape for the focal by tracing the outline of a die from my Spellbinders Fair Isle Pendants Set. I then hand-drew a second line just in a bit from the first (stay tuned for a tip on doing that).  The stamps were from K&Company (sentiment) and Hot Off the Press (flowers).

Here's the tip I promised:  If you're not sure about your ability to draw that line in from the edge of the focal, use an erasable pen!  I've recently gotten several sets of the FriXion Pens by Pilot.  (I ordered mine from Staples on-line and picked them up at my local Staples store to save on shipping costs).  They really do erase pretty well - just don't press hard when writing, they can't erase the indentations you might make in the paper! They come in an assortment of pretty colors - one of which is pink as you see here. You can get them in .5mm and .7mm tips.  I use them a lot when I'm going to hand-write something on a card - just in case I don't get it centered the way I want it or make some other mistake.  Anyway, after getting my line the way I wanted it on the focal, I went over it with a sparkly gel pen to bump up the bling factor. :)

Now for what I WISH I had done.  I would like to see more of the dark pink around the focal in some way.  I'm thinking a couple inch strip of it running horizontally across the center of the card. Or perhaps a larger oval behind the diamond.  Maybe a narrow strip running horizontally across the card near the top of the diamond to anchor it?  I hadn't done any of these because I really like the way the diamond shape fits so nicely into the lattice shape, so perhaps the narrow strip would be the best.  Hmmm, still thinking about it.  What do YOU think????

Thanksgiving Card with Outline Stickers

Fall is here and I REALLY have to get moving on creating my Thanksgiving cards for this year - so here's one.  It's a little hard to tell from the picture, but the strip at the top is brown like below - with gold ribbon (I've got to get a better light set-up for taking pictures!).

This was a pretty quick card to put together because the focal and greeting are outline stickers.  I'm not sure who manufactures them, but I got them from Pop-Ups Etc.  The gold border around the brown rectangle is made with Peel-Off stickers.  The focal is framed with die cuts from a Nelly Snellen Die set, and the frame for the greeting is cut from the Respendent Rectangles set from Spellbinders.  The patterned paper doesn't show up as well as I would like.  It's shades of orange with small falling leaves here and there.

Marvelous Squares Dies from Spellbinders

Today's card was inspired by one made by Becca at Amazing Paper Grace, and uses my new Spellbinders Marvelous Squares dies.

The basic card is a 6" gate-fold made with two 9" x 6" pieces of cardstock in contrasting colors.  Each are scored and folded at 3" to form a 6" square piece with a 3" flap.  The two square parts are glued one on top of the other so the flaps form a gate-fold.

The rest of the card front consists of a larger frame, and inner focal piece.  Both are made with the Marvelous Square die set.  For ease of description, I'll number them from LARGEST to smallest.  Thus, die number 6 is the smallest die in the set, while die number 1 is the biggest one.

Make the larger frame:

• Cut 3 squares from cardstock (smallest can be paper if you wish): one that is 5 1/4" square (teal here), one that is 5" square (tan here), and one that is 4 1/4" square (striped).
• Cut each of these squares in your die cutting machine, using the largest die centered in your square.  Run through again with an embossing mat to emboss them if you wish. 
• Set aside the inner cutouts and glue the outer frames together - layered largest to smallest with the smallest on top.
• Set frame aside.

 Make the focal:

• Choose two of the cutouts from the previous step (I used the striped and the tan).
• Cut each of them them with two dies at the same time (die number 2 and die number 4). You will want to tape the dies to your cardstock with removable tape (try stencil tape or painters tape).  HINT:  These two pieces must match when you are done, so I recommend cutting one and then using it as a "template" for the second.  To do this, place your dies on the second piece of cardstock, then place your first cutout on top, adjusting the dies until they line up just right. TAPE IN PLACE!  You will probably also want to run them through a second time to emboss them before removing the dies. Make sure you save the "innies".  You'll need some of these leftover pieces later!
• Before gluing these two pieces together, take the one that will form the outer frame of your focal and snip out the center part with a pair of small scissors (striped one in this example).  Now when you glue them together, the back piece (tan) shows in the center, and the front piece (striped) is what you see around the edge.  
• Stamp your sentiment in the center of your focal.  Set aside.

Assemble your card:

• Take your larger frame and center it on the front of your card.
• Glue it to the LEFT FLAP ONLY. (picture below shows what the left side looks like with the left flap open)

• Now, center the focal on the closed card and glue it to the RIGHT FLAP ONLY (see picture below)

These two pieces will interlace as you open and close your card:

Now for the fun part - decorating!  I took some of the "innies" from the previous step and ran them through my Xyron Sticker maker.  I then used the striped pieces to decorate the frame and the tan pieces to decorate the focal frame as shown.  Crystal flowers from my stash, and a bit of ribbon completed the front of my card.  Here's a picture of the card when it is closed so you can see the detail a little better:

You can probably tell what I did for the inside of the card just by looking at the next picture.  The teal frame was cut with die number 1 from a 5" square piece of cardstock.  The tan was also cut from die number 1, but this time I used the inner part.  I embossed both pieces, and glued them as you see here.

After I had my card finished, I realized I didn't have an envelope that was big enough for it!  This is one of those times that the Enveloper on my Ultimate Crafter's Companion comes in so handy.  I have a chart of what I need to do to make envelopes in all sorts of sizes (get yours here), so it's pretty easy.  EXCEPT I didn't want to use up my scrapbook paper to make an envelope and I needed a piece that was 9 1/2 x 9 1/2 to make my envelope.  Easy enough.  I grabbed a sheet out of a wallpaper sample book!!!!  Here's my finished envelope.

More Techniques for Newspaper Clippings

Yesterday's post shows some scrapbook pages where the main focus is a newspaper clipping or two.  Today's pages also have newspaper clippings, but they are not particularly focal points.  

On the first page (above), the newspaper clipping is a nice addition, but it takes a back seat to the photo and my own journaling and title.  This was achieved mostly through the use of color.  The white really pulls the eye, so the tan of the clipping fades to the background.  You'll notice I used tan decorative elements, however, to help pull the page together.

This blue page, isn't my favorite.  If I were doing it now, I think I would have tripple-matted the focal photo by adding a second mat in white and then a third mat in tan.  This would have helped draw the eye and make the focal photo appear larger.  As things stand, there's a bit of a fight for focal point, despite the addition of the decorative corners & flower.  The addition of the additional mats would also have helped pull the page together.  If that had been done, and the newspaper clipping moved down a bit, I think this would have been a great page. I like the way the title was done in colors similar to the newspaper clipping.

This third page is a bit busy, but it contains some wonderful items about my grandmother's engagement party.  Here you see some newspaper articles, along with a couple of momentos from the party.  The napkin has been discolored because of adhesive someone used on it in the past.  As usual, I chose to mount it with no adhesive actually touching it, so I won't be making the situation any worse.  My grandmother had written a bit about the party on the napkin.  It's fun to have her handwriting on the page.

This final page also has a newspaper clipping, but once again, it is not center stage. On the actual page, the colors of the clipping and the tans used in embellishing, blend better than it looks like here.

I hope these pages have given you some ideas for incorporating newspaper clippings into your scrapbooking.

Scrapping with Newspaper Clippings

Recently someone asked about scrapping with newspaper clippings, so I decided to go back through some of my heritage albums and look for examples.  First a quick note about my scrapping philosophy when it comes to Heritage Albums.  I choose to avoid using adhesive directly on any of my heirloom photos or documents.  This has required creativity on my part, but even with "acid free" adhesives, I feel my heirloom items are safer this way.  I routinely use clear photo corners - sometimes mounted with them showing, sometimes mounted to the reverse of a frame to hold an element in a way that will be invisible behind the frame.  I also recommend spraying your clippings with archival spray to help protect them.

These first two pages make use of punched borders and punched/cut elements (stars, ghost, arrows, titles).  The ghost and titles were cut with my Silhouette.  I hand-cut the arrows.  As you can see, I cut the arrows long enough so I could anchor them to the paper beyond the clipping (no adhesive touching the clipping itself).  The arrows point to the names of people of interest in the articles. As you can see, the paper I used for the second page was sort of "color blocked" in the way it was designed, and I made use of that in my layout.

This next example is a page that is pretty much all newspaper clipping!  As you can see, I printed my title on a coordinating strip of paper (actually printed the title, then cut it into a strip!) and punched a couple of shapes out of it (letting the background show through).  These shapes, along with a couple of others, form a bit of a border at the top of the page.

Today's examples show pages where there isn't much besides the newspaper clippings.  My next post will show some pages that combine photos with newspaper clippings.  

There are also a few other posts on this blog that use newspaper clippings or old documents, check out the following links:

Newspaper clippings: 

• Here's a layout that has the newspaper article from when my grandmother was hit by a car as a child. I used the actual newspaper clipping here - spraying it with archival spray and attaching it with clear photo corners so it wouldn't be ruined by the addition of adhesive. 
• Here's a scrapbook page with a newspaper clipping that had a photo (though it's a copy of the clipping and much more recent).

Other old documents:

• Here are some other posts with fragile documents. "In her own words" and "Family Bible" put them into vellum pockets. "Make Your Own Faux Ribbon" shows an example with an old graduation leaflet (my grandfather's - scroll down to the bottom of the post).

In the Pink!

Today's card is shows the 2nd pattern my new M-Bossibilities folder makes (see yesterday's post for the first one and the "sandwich" I used with my Big Shot).  It really IS nice to be able to emboss a full 5" x 7" card!

Since some of you like to see a bit about my process in designing cards, I have an interim picture on this one.  I started by embossing the card and then lightly inking the raised areas with a makeup sponge.  I had these pink glitter "innies" from a cut I made with my lattice die (that card next week), and I liked the idea of placing them and some sparkley stickers over the embossing pattern in certain spots.  The pink glitter innies were attached with foam tape for more dimension. You might be able to see what I mean better in this picture I took part-way through:

As you can see if you compare this picture with the one at the top of the post, I decided the focal didn't stand out enough and was a bit small, so I double matted it.  That meant I also needed to move some of the sparkley stickers.  The mat was attached with some double sided tape and some foam tape so that it sat at the same level as the other pink glittery pieces.  The "Thinking of You" was then added with more foam tape so it stands out from the mat a bit.  I case you wondered, the focal was cut with one of Spellbinders "Fancy Tags" dies.

Thank You!!!!!

Today's card comes with a BIG thank you to my brother & his wife who gave me a gift certificate for my birthday.  Today's card - made for them - showcases elements from the products I purchased. 

The embossing is done with a Spellbinders M-Bossabilities folder.  I LOVE the 5" x 7" size and it worked great in my Big Shot.  The folders themselves are a bit thicker, so I couldn't  AND I just put the whole card in it so the lightweight cardstock was double thickness. I found that I couldn't use both cutting plates in my embossing sandwich.  I created my sandwich by placing the folded card in the folder (this made a double-thickness of the lightweight card), placing the folder directly on the multipurpose platform (closed) and placing a cutting plate on top.  It worked great!

Another great feature of these folders is that you get 2 for the price of one.  This same folder does a different emboss design!  Watch for my next post which will showcase the other emboss design.

As you can see, I inked the embossed design.  I used a makeup sponge dabbed into an ink pad and then rubbed lightly over the card. 

The card focal is another Spellbinders Product - a nesting die set called Splended Circles.   They really ARE splended, aren't they! :-)

Gingerbread Foil Die Cuts Challenge

Today's cards were the result of a bit of a challenge I set for myself.  I received a sheet of die cuts as a VIP gift from Paper Wishes (that means they recognize I've spent a lot of money there!). It was to give me a sneak peek at their new Gingerbread Foil Artful Card Kit.  The kit comes with 3 sheets of these foil die cuts, along with coordinating papers and greeting cutouts.  I decided to see what I could do with this ONE sheet of die cuts and papers from my stash (mostly Hot Off the Press).  Look for a bit of a surprise at the end of the post!

On this first card, the focal is based in one of the tags from the sheet.  I added ribbons on the sides & placed a 3-D Christmas Tree Dazzle in the center of it.  The Stamp was also from Paper Wishes.

My next card uses red glimmer paper and one of MaryAnn's wonderful cutting and embossing dies.  The tag looks great here, but I made a couple of modifications to it.  I cut a piece of the red paper that was small enough to show the silver foil outline of the tag, but large enough to cover the other colors that didn't go so well with my card.  I stamped a snowflake and sentiment on it with white pigment ink and added a foil star (also from the foil die cuts page). 

This particular die cut page had several tags.  Here's another one.  Though the papers are not from the kit, I thought they went pretty well with the other elements.  The border at the bottom of the card is a portion of a border from the kit.  The three elements in the upper right are as well.  The layered snowflake on the upper left is made using outline stickers - probably Dazzles.

Here a couple of tags are combined with Dazzles and mounted on a glittered cardstock background.   There's also a Dazzles Christmas Tree coupled with a peppermint candy and star topper (both from the die-cut sheet).

 This card makes use of a couple small tags and a peppermint from the die cut sheet, but pairs them with a clear overlay (from one of Hot Off the Press Christmas sets) that was layered on a white background.

The next card makes use of a VERY cute gingerbread house that comes on the sheet. There are a couple of candy canes and a star that are also from the sheet and were mounted in place on the house with foam tape.  The star then has a small Dazzles star on top of that.   The sentiment is stamped on a piece of coordinating paper, backed with white and trimmed with fancy-edged scissors before being added to the card.  The rest of the die-cut border runs along the bottom of the card.

Here's a really cute tree with a couple of snowmen - all from the die cut sheet.  I think the white Dazzle borders add a great touch.

I was nearing the end of the elements on my die cut sheet.  This brown and red tag was mounted on some cream paper (that was inked along the edges). I added a second tag which I created with stamps I had from Paper Wishes.  

By this time I just had one die-cut left, and decided to make a card for an occasion other than Christmas!  I needed a birthday card, so that's what I decided to make.  I stamped on the die-cut tag with red StazOn ink (because the tag has a bit of a shiny surface to it).  Then I stamped it a second time with a slightly different color to try to make it look a bit more like the color of the outline.  I added another element at the bottom with little word Dazzles.

Coloring and Shading - Aqua Painter

This card is one I made at a recent Stamp-in Up Party I went to. The basic elements of this card were provided by the instructor and I just adapted it a bit to suit myself. 

I love the embossing folder we used to make the embossed frame.  I used a make-up sponge and inked the raised part to help it stand out even better.

The stamp was great for creating a focal.  I like my colors to match well, so I love the way that they have inks that match the papers/cardstock/embellishments.

We used the aqua painter with the dye-based stamp pads to color in the stamped image. It worked great! I was glad to see how well it worked for shading as I just used less water with the ink where I wanted darker areas, and added more water to the ink to draw out lighter colors. I love being able to make my stamp pads do double duty - providing color for stamped images & for coloring them in.

Inspired by Color

Usually I choose my papers to go with the colors in my photos, but sometimes the papers themselves serve as inspiration.  I found this paper in a book about heritage photos, and just HAD to use it.  I loved the way the turquoise perked up the otherwise drab photos and pulled the eye to my focal photo.

Love a Cat Focal

Today's card is one I made for my daughter who loves cats.  The cat was made with a parchment embossing technique. I embossed the cat using a stencil, then colored in the ears, eyes, nose & mouth with Smooch paints.  I then stamped the sentiment with white pigment paint and added a bit of pink to the hearts after it had dried.  The vellum is attached to the rest with 3 heart-shaped brads.

Flower Multi-frame Die Set

Today's post showcases one of my new toys - Nellie Snellen's Flower Multi-frame die set.  It give's the cute doily-like effect that you can see on this card focal.  Looking at this card again, I realize how well this die would pair with my favorite lace border punch by Martha Stewart.  That would really have enhanced this card if I had thought about it BEFORE I finished it! Just imagine a white strip of paper behind the "tis the season ribbon" border punched both sides with the lace border punch! 

Anyway, this Flower Multi-frame die set comes with a couple of smaller doily dies - one of which I used on the first card I showed in this blog post, three plain circle dies, and a cute little button die. I love die sets and Nellie Snellen makes some really cute ones - and I find they're often less expensive that those from some of the better known die makers.

Outline Stickers Scraps

On this card you can see several techniques shown in posts over the last month - stamping with white opaque ink and then coloring it with chalks, papier piecing the border of the mat, and embossing the die cut.

But there is one more money-saving idea on this card.  The sentiment is the OUTSIDE of an outline sticker - the leftover.  It was originally silver, but was colored with alcohol inks to better match the card. The cream from the background shows through to form the actual words.