MARBLING

After a longtime passion for viewing and loving others' work in this medium, I have decided to finally give it a try on my own. I present to you my very first 12 attempts, the good, the bad, and the ugly. I won't say anything further, just let the pieces speak for themselves.

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I appreciate and look forward to any and all comments -- good, bad, or ugly. Thanks in advance!

Marbled

Smiles.

FAUX ECLIPSE CARD

One of the big phenomena in the cardmaking world lately -- really for some time now -- has been the Eclipse Technique. 

A couple months ago, one of my Stamp-In girls asked me if I could create an eclipse card for the girls to make at one of my monthly Stamp-Ins. 

Not possessing the Large Letter Framelits (page 218), which is what most of the eclipse makers seem to use, and preferring to spend that money on other product, I ended up using other large letter dies that I'd had. 

With not-quite-the-right-letters, this is the card I eventually came up with:

In researching for this card, I checked out lots of tutorials and videos on the Eclipse Technique. I decided to do a few modifications on all the variations out there, and I came up with my own take on the technique. Thus, my name "Faux Eclipse".

And, yes, I did notice -- after the card was completed -- 

that I'd done my "S" upside down. Grrr.

My simplified version of the Eclipse Technique is quite easy and lots of fun to do!

 And, to me, the nicest thing about a card is when it turns out to be perfectly flat -- wonderful for sending through the mail without fear of needing to pay extra postage. Yay!

If you keep reading, I will present to you my tutorial on making this Faux Eclipse card.

SUPPLIES:

Whisper White cardstock

Basic Black cardstock

Large Alphabet dies

Painted Harvest (page 139)

Soft Seafoam ink

Flirty Flamingo ink

Mango Melody ink

Big Shot

Tombow Multipurpose Adhesive (Green Glue)

Post-It Tape

INSTRUCTIONS:

Fold a 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" piece of Whisper White cardstock in half, creasing it well with a bone folder.

YOU WILL BE DOING MOST OF YOUR WORK ON A 3 3/4" X 5" PIECE OF WHISPER WHITE CARDSTOCK: 

Stamp three of the flowers on the cardstock. (Try to do a better job of spacing them than I did in my sample. Several of the girls at my Stamp-In stamped the flowers randomly all over the cardstock and filled in with the little green dots. Looked great!) Stamp the larger, more solid flower first, followed by the smaller flower atop in Flirty Flamingo ink. Add centers in Mango Melody. 

Add a few of the dot clusters in Soft Seafoam ink to the rest of the background.

Once you are satisfied with your stamping, line up the dies to spell "hugs" pretty much centered. (Another change a couple of the Stamp-In girls made was to add the letters in a less than straight line -- much happier and less formal looking!) Once you have the letters spaced the way you want them, you can hold them in place with some sticky tape. 

At the Big Shot, run the piece through.

Mount this piece with the letters missing onto a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of black cardstock. Using miniscule dots of glue, add the letters back in, but shifted just slightly to the right.

Adhere the finished piece to the card base.

Hugs

and

Smiles.

WORMY APPLE

The July 2018 Paper Pumpkin kit, Picnic Paradise, is cute-ness overload. Every time I look at the components in the kit, my thought is, "FRUIT SALAD"! 

One of the projects in the kit is a set of darling 3" square fruity cards to make. While that size card is adorable, I don't find myself in need of them too often. So, I elected to make at least one of my cards into a traditional A2 sized card. 

Below is what I came up with eventually.

What the cards in the kit are meant to look like if the instructions are followed. 

Please take note of the white envelopes sticking out behind the stacks of cards:

Since I was planning on creating at least one A2 sized card, I wouldn't need one of the envelopes, right? 

I opened up one of the apple envelopes and cut it up. Yup! Courageous, huh? I used just the decorated front of the envelope, adding  the greeting, which came in the kit, in Granny Apple Green ink.

I then trimmed down the envelope front just a bit so I could mount it onto the Crumb Cake card base in the kit. I cut that card base in half, then mounted my envelope piece to it. That was adhered to a 3 3/4" x 5" piece of Crumb Cake cardstock (from my stash) with Stampin' Dimensionals for a bit of pop. Then onto a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of Whisper White cardstock, and finally atop a Granny Apple Green card base (both also from my stash).

At this point, I was stumped. Whoa. It was so naked and unfinished looking.

I added the row of vertical lines (stamp in the kit) in Crumb Cake. Well, it balanced it somewhat. But .  . . Not good enough. 

The kit came with diecut apples, strawberries and blueberries. I added one of the apples over the vertical lines. Huh. 

I called it finished at this point. Still not crazy about it. But, what else could I do?

I was sleeping that night, when what to my dreaming eyes should appear -- an APPARITION! This apple desperately needed a WORM! And I had the perfect stamp!

So, the next day I took the poor card back down to my Creation Station, stamped the cute worm on Whisper White, fussy cut him, 

and added him to the bottom of the apple:

Say hello!

After the worm was added, I also stamped in the row of dashes below the sentiment. There! Now I was happy(-er)!

I'm curious: What are your thoughts about 3" x 3" cards? Although the envelopes are simply adorable, they cannot be mailed without putting them into a larger envelope. I see them as being the most useful as enclosure cards for hand-delivered gifts. Please share your thoughts!

Wormy

Smiles.

RHINO WISHES

 Right now, through the end of July, Stampin' Up! has a great promotion going. Basically, any of the Designer Series Papers that are priced at $11 per pack, namely on pages 189, 190 and 191, are BUY THREE, GET ONE FREE! 

Well, if you haven't taken a look at this year's offerings of Designer Series Paper (DSP), quick log on to Stampin' Up!, click on my blog's Shop Now button, or whip out your hard copy of the catalog! QUICK! The DSPs this year are wonderful!

In fact, I ordered my four packs (one free!) immediately: Underneath the Mistletoe, Nature's Poem, both on page 189, Animal Expedition, page 190, and the 6" x 6" pack, Tropical Escape, on page 190.

When Mr. Brown finally delivered my package, I was awestruck as I ripped open those packs and flipped through the many designs! Even though I love each and every pack I'd gotten, I was most anxious to cut into Animal Expedition. You see, there are two sheets of larger-sized animals that I was just longing to take my Paper Snips to.

So, I proceeded to carefully trim one sheet in half. 

From just that portion of one sheet, I got all these animals. I even cut out the tiny flying birdies and the cool chameleons (I think they are).

Notice that the animals are turned both left and right, so that gives even more opportunity and variety for use. 

In getting started making a card, it was a hard choice to decide which of the animals to use. Loving each of the larger animals for a focal point, I decided to go with the laid-back rhino, since I'd cut three of them. Great reasoning, eh?

And this is the card I came up with featuring Mr. Rhino:

I took a short length of the 5/8" Burlap Ribbon (page 200), and fringed both ends. The ribbon is held together with thin nylon (?) filament, so I snipped the filament in order to do some fraying. I added this piece to a 2" circle punched from Crumb Cake cardstock, then popped up Mr. Rhino on top with some Dimensionals.

To continue in the same vein, I added a sentiment from the Happy Birthday Gorgeous set on page 72, added one end of frayed Burlap Ribbon, and flew one of my cut-out birds in the upper left corner. The sentiment was stamped in Call Me Clover to match the solid cardstock upon which our rhino guy has taken up residence.

These few elements popped up give the card nice dimension, although it isn't too thick to send through the mail. I always like when that happens!

I added the rest of my greeting inside the card -- Call Me Clover on top of the Crumb Cake cardstock -- plus one of the chameleons.

Just two more photos showing the soft dimension:

I wanted to specifically point out the wonderful texture on the Call Me Clover cardstock. Nope, that's not the way it came! I used the new Subtle Embossing Folder, found on page 223. This is the one that lots of people are questioning the looks of, since in the catalog the texture doesn't show up very well at all. The texture created by the Subtle Embossing Folder is simply marvelous, and already I've used it many many times!

 Please note the left side of the card. Don't you just love that sheet of the DSP? 

It features leaves, little swatches of triangles, a few flying bugs and 

some of the precious birdies!

After I finished taking photos for this blog post, I went out to the deck and started to demolish the remaining portion of the DSP. Those animals are treasures.

Have you ever given fussy cutting a sheet of Designer Series Paper a try? Many of them are conducive to doing so. Just think of all the little separate focal points you'll have to play with! 

Wild

Smiles.

THREE PENS

There is a little story behind this woefully out-of-date card. I mean, Father's Day was a month ago, right??

Well, my Stamp-Ins are always held the second Monday of each month. So, the June workshop was scheduled for Monday, June 11. The Monday before Father's Day. I thought the timing was perfect to make a Father's Day card. And, those who had no use for such a card could make it -- a welcome masculine-toned card -- for any other occasion.

Unfortunately, much to my chagrin, the Stamp-In had to be cancelled for the month. 

Well, to be honest, I really liked the four cards I'd created for the girls who were to attend the Stamp-In. So, I decided to hold them until the July Stamp-In, which SHOULD have been held last Monday, July 9. However, I needed to re-schedule it to a week later, which fell on (yesterday) Monday, July 16. 

Even though Father's Day was not an upcoming occasion anymore, I decided to still go with the card, but selected a variety of sentiments (other than Happy Father's Day) that the attendees could replace it with, fitting nicely inside the same parameters.

So, that's my story. And I'm sticking to it. 'cause it's the truth and nothin' but the truth.

The focal point of this card is the trio of pens that comes in the Crafting Forever set found on page 179. Rather than just stamp the pens onto plain Mint Macaron cardstock, I decided to dress it up a bit and go with the torn edge technique. Keep reading!

One of the highlights of the card is the use of papers from the beautiful Wood Textures 6" x 6" Designer Series Paper on page 191. This set of woodgrain papers is nothing short of spectacular. If you haven't seen it in real life, you are missing out!

Now, how would you like the secret recipe to make this timely card yourself? 

Here you go:

SUPPLIES:

Mint Macaron cardstock

Very Vanilla cardstock

Wood Textures DSP

Mint Macaron ink

Black ink

Crafting Forever (page 179)

A masculine sentiment

Torn cardstock

Stamping Sponge

Brown 1/4" Ribbon

INSTRUCTIONS:

Fold a 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" piece of Very Vanilla cardstock in half, creasing it well with a bone folder.

Roughly tear a few pieces of scrap cardstock that will fit across a 3" wide piece of cardstock. 

You will be doing this next step on a 3" x 4" piece of Mint Macaron cardstock with Mint Macaron ink. 

OK. Look at the sample: the darker portions of the cardstock? That is the inked area. The lighter portions are where the torn strip was lying. 

Lay one of the torn strips of cardstock near the top of the piece. Using a Stamping Sponge, gently sponge at the tear line. Remove the torn piece, and taking another piece, or reusing the same one, reposition it, and do another line of sponging. Continue on down the cardstock until you have sponged wavy areas top to bottom.

In black ink, stamp the three pens about 1/2" from the top. 

Add a 1" x 3" strip of Very Vanilla cardstock about 1/2" from the bottom. BEFORE adding the wood strip, adhere a piece of the brown ribbon onto the center of the wood, tucking the ends to the back and taping them in place. NOW add the wood strip on top of the Very Vanilla strip.

Add a piece of the wood DSP that measures 2 1/4" x 5 1/4", butted up against the green piece.

On a 1 3/4" square piece of Very Vanilla cardstock, stamp your sentiment in black ink. Fold a 3" piece of the brown ribbon in half and tape it to the back of the sentiment square so it hangs down in two tails. Now add this piece to a 2" square of Mint Macaron cardstock. Use a few Stampin' Dimensionals to attach it over the wood piece.

Masculine

Smiles.

GELLI PRINT CARD

If you've been following Paper Seedlings for more than a few months, you are already aware that I am completely obsessed with Gelli Printing.

Sometimes I get prints that are not quite good enough to keep and cherish, but are appealing enough to be used in another way -- namely in cardmaking. I had accumulated a stack of these prints, so I thought it would be a good thing to incorporate Gelli prints within one of the projects I created for a Stamp-In.

All the prints were different. So, to have one common denominator, I used a combination black/white color palette for all the cards. No matter which of the prints was chosen, the finished card would have a uniform look and work well.

The card below is the one I used for my sample for my May Stamp-In. 

In case you are not familiar with Gelli printing, the mishmash of prints shown in the following photo are what I've been working on for about the past week or so. 

My favorite size Gelli plate to work on is 3" x 5", so the prints are the perfect size to use in creating cards. I have been experimenting with various types of papers, including music, notes from my notebooks while I was taking classes a year ago, small notebooks where I kept track of ATC swaps I'd been involved in about ten years ago, old dictionary pages, the Yellow Pages!, anything I can get my hands on is fodder for my printmaking. I especially love it when little elements -- music, words, stamping -- poke through some of the designs. 

To add some Stampin' Up! flavor to my Stamp-In card, I used the beautiful sentiment from the Colorful Seasons set (page 161), the maple leaf die from the Seasonal Layers Thinlits (page 219) that coordinate with Colorful Seasons, and a gorgeous square using the Stitched Shapes Framelits on page 220. Plus Stampin' Dimensionals, of course!

By adding elements that are not too overpowering, it is possible to still enjoy the design of the print.

Following is a tutorial on how to make this card. In lieu of Gelli prints, this section can always be replaced with some beautiful Designer Series Paper (on sale now! Buy three, Get one FREE!)

SUPPLIES:

Gold Foil Paper (page 192)

Basic Black Cardstock

Whisper White Cardstock

A 3" x 4 3/4" Gelli Print or Designer Series Paper (DSP)

Colorful Seasons stamp set (page 161)

VersaMark ink

Embossing Buddy

Heat Tool

Gold Embossing Powder

Seasonal Layers Thinlits (page 219)

Stitched Shapes Framelits (page 220)

Big Shot

Stampin' Dimensionals

INSTRUCTIONS:

Fold a 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" piece of black cardstock in half, creasing it well with a bone folder.

Add a 4" x 5 1/4" piece of white cardstock to this card base. Before you forget, add a piece of white cardstock in the same size inside the card for writing your message on.

Mount your chosen Gelli print (or DSP) onto a 3 1/2" x 5" piece of black cardstock. Add this to the card base.

Using gold foil paper, die cut a maple leaf. Set aside for now.

With the Stitched Shapes Framelits, cut a 2 1/2" square from Whisper White cardstock. Run the Embossing Buddy well over this piece. With VersaMark ink, stamp the sentiment in the center of the square. At the Heat Station, cover the stamping with gold embossing powder, tapping the excess back into the container. Use the Heat Tool to emboss the words until they are shiny and set.

Use Stampin' Dimensionals to adhere the sentiment to the card, leaving even margins at the sides and top. 

Attach the gold leaf to the lower left portion of the sentiment piece.

Gelli

Smiles.

JAR OF CREATIVITY

Since Stampin' Up! is now carrying their Glossy Cardstock (page 192) once again, 

I decided that I should try that as a base for using Brushos. 

Depending on how you use the Brushos, it always requires a certain amount of water. Even though I taped my Glossy Cardstock to a firm surface and used water sparingly, the finished product is quite warped and wavy. In order to alleviate that problem somewhat, I firmly adhered it to another layer. That's the perfect description; the warping was alleviated only somewhat. 

Because of this curling problem, I probably won't use Brushos on Glossy Cardstock again. Or, if I do, I will be sure to dry it underneath something heavy in hopes of flattening it. Whether I try it again or not, it was really a lot of fun to experiment with this surface that was new <to me>.

Shown below is a photo that shows the background more close-up and personal. 

Looking at it now, however, makes me wonder if it would resemble one of those galaxy techniques if I used a darker color palette. Hmmm. Now I AM going to try it again on Glossy Cardstock! 

Anyway, back to earth. This glossy background made a wonderful surface on which to stamp my jar of creativity in black. 

I made it as an inspirational piece to set in my work area. I love that sentiment! Both 

the sentiment, as well as the jar of creativity, are from the Crafting Forever set on 

page 179.

Have you tried the Brushos yet? What is your opinion of them? Do you find them easy to work with? What is your favorite surface on which to work with them?

Creative

Smiles.