Punched Rectangle Frame from Border Punch

This card makes use of a technique I saw on a u-tube video, for creating a rectangular punched edge with a standard border punch. You can watch the video to see the technique, but basically you:

• Punch on a scrap piece of paper so you can measure the depth of the punch (how far it is from inside punched edge to the edge of your paper).
• Starting in one corner of your paper or card stock, draw a line that is the depth of your punch in from the edge along both the vertical and horizontal edges.  (For example, if your punch is 3/4" deep, draw your line 3/4" in from the edge of the paper or card stock).
• Using your drawn line as a guide, flip your punch over so you can see the line through the hole in the bottom of the punch and line it up so your punch is along the vertical edge and your horizontal guide line is right along the edge of the punch area. Punch your first set of motifs.
• Continue punching along the edge as for any border until you have it the length you want.  NOTE: If your punch punches 3 motif's at a time and you only want one more, you can flip your punch over and line up so that two of the motif's on the punch exactly match what you've already punched.
• Do the same thing along the horizontal side, once again using your drawn line as a guide for your punch placement.
• Now, draw a line on the other vertical edge, right along the edge of your last horizontal motif. 
• Trim this edge to the depth of your punch, and then punch this edge as you did the other.
• Now, you just have one edge left.  Draw a line from one edge of the two vertical punched edges to the other, and trim this edge to the depth of your punch as before.
• Punch your last edge in a similar manner to those you've already done.
• Now, trim the corners to create your frame.  Note that depending on your specific punch, it sometimes looks better to trim them farther from the corners than others.  This is one where it would have looked better if I hadn't trimmed as close to the corners. Experiment!

The focal is a Serendipity Square I got from Nancy in a swap (thanks Nancy!).  I added a little bow and finished the card with a stamped sentiment.

Thanksgiving Card with Inchie, in Non-Traditional Colors

This card, recalling Thanksgiving traditions, is done in non-traditional colors for the inchie challenge on Ellen Hutson's website. The inchie features a colored section of the birdhouse stamp and is popped up on foam tape.  The only color on the rest of the stamped picture is a bit of Flower Soft.

Christmas Card with Glitter Ombre techniques

This card was made for a World Cardmaking challenge from Ellen Hutson's website.  It uses a glitter blending technique.  In this case, purple and turquoise glitter are solid at the edges and blend in the middle of the stocking (made with a Double-Stick Dazzle).  Papers are from a Paper Wishes Christmas paper set and are finished off with white gel pen, stamps, and ribbons.

Challenging Papers Part 5 - Castles

This pair of scrapbook pages was made using paper from a "Once Upon a Time" set of papers that I was given.  I don't have much to scrap that relates to princes and princesses and castles (maybe one or two pages of a star-eyed little girl dressed up like a princess), so even though the pages are pretty, I wasn't sure what I could do with them.

One of the principles for using Challenging papers is to look at the colors - not just the theme of the paper.  In this case, the colors looked very vintage to me and I decided they would make the perfect backdrop for these heritage album pages.  I positioned the photos such that the more obvious castle turrets aren't very visible (you can see a little on the 2nd page) and become more like buildings seen while the newlyweds explored the city around them.

Here's what I did:

• 12 x 12 pages were cut to 8 1/2 x 11 - with selvage edge on different sides so the pages are not identical.
• Center page borders were cut from leftovers of the 12 x 12 pages.
• The titles were cut from cream-colored card stock with my Silhouette and glued to the borders.
• The ovals were cut from the background paper with a Spellbinders Nestability die and from the cream-colored card stock in a smaller size (which was then glued BEHIND the background paper).  The tricky part was figuring out how to cut the 8 1/2 x 11 background paper in my Big Shot!  I did it by cutting the paper in half, cutting my holes, and then taping the paper back together - then gluing the border (described above) over top of the join!
• The circle within the square was made by mounting black cardstock behind a square hole cut with a square Nestability die.  Then another Spellbinders die was used to cut the cream-colored decorative circle.  Since I don't have the circular nestabilities yet, I had to cut the center out of the decorative circle by hand so the photo could show through.
• All photos were mounted BEHIND the page using photo corners with the sticky side UP.