Sweet and Simple Note Cards

June 28, 2017June 28, 2017 Kimberly3 Comments

Well, summer has finally arrived here in New England! After weeks of some very uncooperative whether (hot, cold, rain, cold, warm, hot…etc., etc.) my flowers are all blooming and my vegetable garden is in full swing! And (!) I’m headed to the beach this weekend to celebrate my birthday, which is this Saturday. :)

These cards represent that nice summer-y feeling to me. I put them together pretty quickly, cutting some panels to about 4″ x 5″ and stamping an antique rose onto the bottom left corner of each card in various colors (Hot Mama, High Dive and Onyx Black). Then I cut each panel a bit smaller with a stitched rectangle die and stamped a greeting in a coordinating color.

The sentiments all come from my Doodle Buds stamp set (if you’ve been here a while, you know it’s one of my favorites!), and I thought the font matched the floral image nicely.

I mounted each stamped panel onto a white 4bar-sized card base. I kept these nice and simple – no sequins and just one layer. I really love how they turned out!

Some of these guys will be available in the shop soon!

Have a wonderful day, everyone!

Pretty Floral Patterns // Mother’s Day Card Post #3

May 12, 2017May 12, 2017 KimberlyLeave a comment

This is the final post for my little Mother’s Day “series.”

These last few cards were made using a floral stamp from Altenew’s Beautiful Day stamp set. For this first card, I just stamped out a simple pattern on some watercolor paper. I then went with a pink, blue and green pastel color pallet and painted the design very loosely. I think the color scheme and the floral image gives the card a very vintage feel over all.

I then decided to keep the rest of the card very simple by just adding “Mom” to the lower right hand corner. I did this using those good old Neat & Tangled Journaling Alphas and some multi medium matte glue.

I followed the same general design guidelines for the next card, except I masked off some space at the bottom, and decided to use my Copics to color this one in. I tried to stick to a similar color scheme, too. I used the Journaling Alphas again for part of the sentiment, and then stamped “you make my world brighter” from my Hello Sunshine stamp set as well.

These two card’s aren’t exactly a matched set because of the differences in coloring mediums, but I like the vintage-y feel that both of the cards have.

And lastly, here’s a bonus card! Again, I used the same image from the Beautiful Day stamp set, but stamped it using Pale Blush Pink ink. I masked off the lower portion of the card so that I’d have some white space at the bottom, and also embossed that line of demarcation using some gold embossing powder.

For the sentiment, I cut a medium-sized circle (using this die) and then stamped a sentiment from Wplus9’s Strictly Sentiments 4 set. I then embossed the edges of the circle with gold embossing powder, to tie everything together. I adhered the circle to the lower right of the card using some foam tape.

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend – and a great Mother’s Day!

Creating Simple Backgrounds with Watercolor Stripes // Two Mother’s Day Cards

May 8, 2017May 8, 2017 KimberlyLeave a comment

I’ve got big plans for this week! I’m going to share three different posts over the next few days full of Mother’s Day card ideas. First up: two cards I put together using the simple background technique of painting some stripes onto a panel.

I used two different paint brushes to add stripes to my panel – one large brush and one much smaller, and you can see that this allowed me to create two different striped patterns on each card. From there, layout and assembly was pretty much the same for each card.

For each card, I stamped and heat embossed several of the outline images from the Altenew Beautiful Day stamp set onto some heavyweight vellum paper using VersaMark ink and gold embossing powder. For the skinny-stripes card, I also heat embossed the Antique Rose stamp from Hero Arts with the same gold embossing powder.

Once I’d finished stamping and embossing the floral images, I arranged them in a cluster at the bottom left of each card. I used foam tape (placed strategically so that you can’t see it through the vellum) to add dimension to the larger central flower, and then used glue dots to adhere the foliage around the central image.

I followed the same “rules” for this card, except used a smaller flower from the Beautiful Day set for the focal point. Each sentiment comes from the Wplus9 Strictly Sentiments 4 set, and I stamped each one with VersaFine Onyx Black ink. I used my Mini Misti for this as well. Because watercolor paper can have a bit of texture to it, getting a clean impression the first time can be difficult. So, having a stamp positioner that allows you to stamp in the same exact place more than once, if needed, can come in really handy!

I also added a few clear droplets onto the wide-stripe card, just to finish it off. Thinking about it now, I might also go back and add some clear droplets or sequins to the other card, too!

Have a great week! I’ll be back with more Mother’s Day cards on Wednesday!

Simple Watercolor Wash Thank You Card

March 21, 2017March 21, 2017 Kimberly4 Comments

Last week we got a bit of snow here in central Massachusetts. Fourteen and a half inches, to be exact. It was quite a lot of snow for one storm, especially in March, and especially when you have a long driveway and are armed only with a shovel!

Thankfully, many of my neighbors have snow blowers, and during this last storm, several of them were kind enough to help me out by snow-blowing parts of my sidewalk and driveway. You know that dreaded area at the end of the driveway where the snow is super high because the plow has pushed all of that extra snow into it? That’s always the worst place to shovel, and I’m so glad we didn’t have to shovel it this time, because a snow-blowin’ neighbor helped with that! So, I whipped up some thank you cards to drop in their mailboxes.

This card was fairly simple and straight forward. I started by stamping several floral images from the Hello Sunshine stamp set, using Intense Black ink on to Canson watercolor paper that I had but to about 4.5″ x 6″ or so. I then painted a watercolor wash over the top and cut out a 4.25″ x 5.5″ panel using a stitched rectangle die. I used the Hand Lettered Thanks die by Wplus9 for the sentiment, along with a secondary sentiment from the coordinating stamp set (which I stamped with embossing ink on black paper and heat embossed in white).

After arranging everything on the panel, I decided the sentiment needed a bit more separation from the panel itself, so I die-cut a circle of vellum and then embossed the edge with some white embossing powder, and added it underneath my sentiment arrangement. A few sequins and I was finished!

In related news, I’m asking for a snow blower for my birthday.

Smile Three Times // Second Generation Stamping

March 13, 2017March 13, 2017 KimberlyLeave a comment

Three happy cards seem like a good recovery from last week’s sympathy card post, don’t you think?

I have been making lots of card sets lately (see here, and here…and here) and this Punny Produce: Pear set from Wplus9 was so cute and simple I couldn’t stop with just one card, so I made three! I started by stamping the pear outline in a medium-tone brown ink onto three different scallop-edge card panels. Next, I chose three colors of ink and stamped the solid image inside each outline. I did something a little different for the stamping this time, though! I used second generation stamping for each solid filler image. So, I’d stamp off once (using varying amounts of pressure) onto some scrap paper before stamping the image onto my project. This created a nice effect along with some variation of tone on each image, which I really like.The ink colors I used were: Appletini, Old Gold and Cranberry Crush, all of which are dye inks from Wplus9.

The stamp set also includes a solid image to fill in the stem and leaf outline, but I decided to skip it for this design.

I kept the sentiment fairly simple, using only the Smile Circle wafer die and some vellum (cut into a circle using this die set). I cut the die twice for each card, and sandwiched the circle of vellum between each smile die cut with some Multi Medium Matte glue before adhering it to my panel with the same adhesive.

I mounted each panel onto an A2-sized card base made of Neenah Desert Storm card stock and then added a few sequins in coordinating colors to finish each card!

Purple Watercolor Card + a Video!

February 4, 2017February 16, 2017 Kimberly6 Comments

It seemed to me that the first post after the name change should be a watercolor one, and I’ve had some requests to show a bit more of my water coloring process, too. I thought the best way to do that was to make another of my most favorite doodle buds watercolor cards and to capture a bit of the process in a video!

I followed the same technique that I outlined in my previous post, stamping multiple images from the doodle buds set onto Canson Watercolor Paper and not worrying about making them off before I layered images on top of each other. Then I got out my Gansai Tambi watercolors.

All the while, I had my camera and tripod set up on the top of my desk so that I could capture what I was doing. Basically, the video is evidence that I have a very disorganized and erratic way of stamping and painting (but I edited out most of those parts, haha). Once I was finished, I mounted my panel to an A2 card base and took some still shots. Then I got to editing the video…

….And I basically had no idea what I was doing, which made me feel very un-hip! It took me quite a while to snip and rotate and condense everything into a video that is about one minute long. I also sped up the video quite a bit, to fit the bulk of the painting process in. And then I inadvertently ended up with a YouTube channel so that I could share the video here. Phew. Overall, I had fun making the video and I’m sure the whole process will get much less frustrating if I have a bit more practice. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!

Happy Weekend!

Woodland Basics Spinner Card!

January 6, 2017January 6, 2017 Kimberly1 Comment

My 90 year old grandmother once told me that cardinals (one of her favorite birds) represent visits from loved ones. So, whenever one catches my attention, I always like to think that someone I’ve lost is paying me a special visit in that moment. I suppose that’s why I decided to cut the bird image from Wplus9’s Woodland Basics die set from some red card stock to create a spinner card that focused on a pretty cardinal image.

This is the first spinner card I’ve ever made, so I decided I should keep it pretty simple. I first cut a 4.25″x5″ panel of card stock and used a stitched circle die to cut out a circle from the front of the panel. I also cut a circle out of the A2-sized card base in the same position, so that I could layer the panel on top of the base to sandwich the spinner string (more on that later). I then cut a bunch of images from the Woodland basics set in various colors of green and from some red and craft card stock.

I cut the bird twice so that I could adhere a thin piece of string between the two layers. I then pulled the string taught, from the top and bottom parts of the bird, and affixed the ends of the string to the edges of the circle window with some double sided tape. I then adhered the panel onto the card base. I feel like I’m not doing a great job of explaining the process, so here’s a link to a good how-to spinner card video! After I had the bird positioned, I arranged the rest of my floral elements around the circular window.

When you’re ready to give the card to the recipient, just twist the spinner element around and close the card. When the recipient opens it, the spinning starts!

Happy weekend, ya’ll!