Blue & Silver Flowers Thanks

One more book page for now..

When I was in Wyoming I found this awesome Scrapbook store called Scrap Tree in Laramie Wyoming and I bought the book pages there. It was perfect because the thought of me ripping up a book was kind of a tough one but someone else did and I got many pages from it. The paper is kind of delicate but fun to work with. If you try to cut it with a paper cutter with the sliding blade that does not work. I used either scissors or a guillotine type paper cutter. I made a few backgrounds and a few cards recently using this book page paper. Some of this is a repeat but maybe you did not see all the posts with the same info.

On this one I also painted over the book paper with gesso. I used a plant stamp which I am not sure where the plastic pouch is to put it away which also means I can’t remember who makes it. But anyway.. it is stamped with gray ink. Okay now I have it. It was in a pile with other stamps I forgot was right by me. The branch is from Rubbernecker and it is called Floral (496-03). The flowers are from Hero Arts stamp Small Striped Flower (CG256). I heat embossed them with silver and then colored them in with Copics. The sentiment is a from a Tim Holtz die set called Celebrations and cut out from dark gray card stock which the base is made from too.

Book Page Butterfly Thanks

Here is another card with some book paper on it which you can see. When I was in Wyoming I found this awesome Scrapbook store called Scrap Tree in Laramie Wyoming and I bought the book pages there. It was perfect because the thought of me ripping up a book was kind of a tough one but someone else did and I got many pages from it. The paper is kind of delicate but fun to work with. If you try to cut it with a paper cutter with the sliding blade that does not work. I used either scissors or a guillotine type paper cutter. I made a few backgrounds and a few cards recently using this book page paper. Some of this is a repeat but maybe you did not see all the posts with the same info.

For the background panel I first heat embossed some flowers on the book page panel.  I inked over the book paper with Oxide Distress Ink in probably Spiced Marmalade and Fossilized Amber.

The butterfly is a nice stamp from Stampendous set Butterfly Trio and it is heat embossed I am pretty sure. Now I can’t look at the card because I sent it out today.

The sentiment is from Hero Arts set Thanks a Bunch (CL663) and is heat embossed.

Yellow Flower Thank You

My inspiration for this card was this one.

Believe it or not the background for the flower is a book page. When I was in Wyoming I found this awesome Scrapbook store called Scrap Tree in Laramie Wyoming and I bought the book pages there. It was perfect because the thought of me ripping up a book was kind of a tough one but someone else did and I got many pages from it. The paper is kind of delicate but fun to work with. If you try to cut it with a paper cutter with the sliding blade that does not work. I used either scissors or a guillotine type paper cutter. I made a few backgrounds and a few cards recently using this book page paper.

So except for the lower right hand corner you can’t really see the book paper. In the photo probably not at all. So on this one I think I painted over the page with gesso and then sprayed some spray inks on it. It is kind of weird it came out with a bit of a plastic feel or something. I put some white ink on the back of a honeycomb stencil by Hero Arts and pressed that down over the panel.

The flower is a stamp by Stampendous called Fresh Bloom. I either have not used this before or have used it very little a long time ago. I really like it but I guess I just forgot about it. I colored it with Copics.

The sentiment is white heat embossed using a Hero Arts stamp from the Everyday Sayings (CL342) set.

Peachy Flower Thank You

Another one of my many Thank You cards. I stamped this Hero Arts flower called Stencil Flower (CG194) and embossed in gold. I had a lot of fun coloring it with Prisma pencils. I am pretty happy with how it came out. So then it was find a background that would go with it. I found this one in my stash. A Hero Arts stencil Long Leaves (SA062) was used along with some Heidi Swapp Color Shine spray. I used a die from Poppy called Vintage Thank You for the sentiment. After cutting it out I applied Versamark and then sprinkled some gold embossing powder on it and heat embossed it. I am not sure this was the right order of doing things. I was kind of wondering if I heat embossed an area and then tried to die cut would the embossing get all messed up. Maybe I should try that.

Butterfly Thank You

This card started with the watercolor panel after I watched and read Jennifer McGuire’s post about block watercolor stamping. The technique in case you don’t know is putting some ink on a acrylic block and then misting and putting that down on watercolor paper. Jennifer’s tip is you leave the block on top of the paper for 5 minutes. Yes folks that is the magic number.

For this card I think I put some Distress Oxide inks on the block and then did the misting. The interesting thing that I think added to this panel was I have a curved edge acrylic block so it makes a nice shape for the watercolor area.

I then stamped the butterfly using Versafine Onyx Black ink. This is a great one for a nice bold black image. The butterfly is from a Stampendous set Butterfly Trio.

The sentiment is from Hero Arts set You’re So Lovely (CL949).

 

Bright Butterflies Thank You

Here is another situation when I pulled out a background that I had for some time and did something with it. So the background is probably ink on a craft mat and probably Distress inks but not Oxides this time. I did this before Oxides were out at least I think that is how it went.

I colored one or two of these butterflies with Copics some time ago and then the additional ones when I decided to make this card. I added some Nuvo Crystal Drops in Morning Dew to highlight some spots on the butterflies and went over them with a clear Wink of Stella pen. The butterflies are from Hero Arts set Antique Engravings (CL383).

The sentiment is from a Clearly Besotted set called Say What?.

This one is also fairly bright colors for me. This one caught my son’s eye. He is 26 and sees many of the cards I make. My husband thought it looked kind of retro maybe a 60’s look.

Colorful Roses Thanks

This card started with the watercolor panel after I watched and read Jennifer McGuire’s post about block watercolor stamping. The technique in case you don’t know is putting some ink on a acrylic block and then misting and putting that down on watercolor paper. Jennifer’s tip is you leave the block on top of the paper for 5 minutes. Yes folks that is the magic number.

I am not sure but I think I put some Distress Oxide inks on the block and made several panels during that session. I then cut out the pretty result with a Spellbinders die called Large Deckled Rectangles (S4-202). I cut a mat for that panel with the next size up die. The roses are part of a Heidi Swapp panel that I cut apart. I have had that rose panel quite awhile and really wanted to use it so there it is. I went over it with a Spectrum Noir sparkle pen. The thanks is a die from Altenew. It is also sparklized with a Spectrum Noir pen. I usually don’t work with fairly bright colors but I love the coloring on this one.

Special Creative Young Man

I would just like to talk about a very special and creative young guy that I ran across yesterday. This guy designs greeting cards and sells them to raise money for Stanford’s Children’s Hospital.

I went to the Farmers Market just like I do many Saturdays in a town next to mine. When I saw greeting cards on a table I had to check it out since I love making cards. This young man told how he designed all of his cards. They appear to be drawn and water colored or pen colored. He does reproduce them by scanning them and printing them out but they are all his designs. He explained how he had collected some money from his cards to donate and he wanted to help kids that were ill. Many places he called said just send the money to us. Stanford Children’s Hospital said come on down and visit us. That is so nice of them to be personally involved. So after he saw the kids he decided that was where he wanted all of his donations to go. I was so impressed by him and it is super cool that he keeps doing this to help these kids. He has a goal for money to raise during the summer and money to raise by the time he gets done with high school which is four years from now.

I hope that I have the story details correct but you can check this out on his website. You can order cards from him on his website or locals can go to the San Ramon Farmer Market and get cards there on Saturday until about 1 pm.

https://www.kidtokidgreeting.com/

Owls on a Branch

Another one of my many thank you cards I made recently. I had a lot of fun making another card recently putting layers of ink on watercolor paper from a craft mat. I made this a few weeks ago so I don’t remember all the colors of ink that I used. It looks like probably Spiced Marmalade, and Peeled Paint and Fossilized Amber Oxides. I did a couple of layers of putting the ink down on a craft mat and spritzing with water and dipping the paper in it. I used a couple different stencils with brown and white ink over the background. The white streaks are wood grain.  There is a couple of leaves in there somewhere also. The leaves are from a SSS set called Summer Garden.

I colored the owls with Prisma pencils. They are from Hero Arts called Owl Trio (LP167). The owls were stamped on the background and also stamped on white paper, colored and then were cut out.

The branch is also Hero Arts and I cut some of the leaves off to make room for the owls to stand on the branch which is called Spring Branch (DI087).

The sentiment is from Hero Arts set Many Everyday Messages (CL954) and heat embossed with brown powder.

Glittery & Plaid Thank You’s

So this is kind of the start of making a whole bunch of thank you cards. I was trying things that I saw online, trying new things I had and trying to use up the bunches of stuff I have set aside. For these cards I got a Sizzix die recently called Thank You Drop-ins designed by Stephanie Barnard. The two pink cards were for my friends who walked with me to raise money for the fight against breast cancer. Most of my thank you’s are going to people who donated for the fundraiser.

Here is our outfits for the walk. The theme was Pearls of Wisdom so we decided to dress like Minnie Pearl. The deal with this walk is everyone wears a decorated bra on the outside of their clothes. The first year my friends and I felt weird doing that but quickly realized everyone does and we were the weird ones for not having one.

So back to the cards. With this die you cut out the back of the card and a front panel that folds all at once. You have to get two die pieces lined up really well so that you have a fold and things are looking ok. Hard to explain but it takes some lining up. The next layer you cut is the hearts and a panel that goes on top of the base. I liked the idea of having different colored components for the different parts of the card. On the right and left card I also glued a colored piece of paper on the back piece which is not part of the die but when I looked at cards online most did that and I liked that look. The purple base does not have that added piece.

Left card – I cut the heart panel out of some pink glitter paper. I cut some hearts from pink paper and inlaid those. A few hearts have glossy accents or clear Nuvo on them. The thank you is part of the die set and cut from a glittery pink plaid which is kind of hard to see in the photo.

Middle card – Pretty straight forward. No hearts inlaid. I used plaid paper from a Lawn Fawn pad to cut out that heart panel.

Right card – I made a plaid piece of paper by using Oxide ink and a stencil by Carta Bella. I then cut out that heart panel. I cut some hearts and the thank you from glitter paper. The hearts got inlaid as you can see. A funny thing happened though. I did not notice at first that the two glitter papers did not match. They were supposed to be the same paper but I didn’t pay close attention. Ooops! I just went with it anyway.