Welcome Door with Spellbinders

Hello friends - and Welcome! This is my card submittal for 2 challenges today: The Sisterhood of Crafters, Anything Goes and

Happy Little Stampers: Anything Goes with Dies:

I have this great Large Die of the Month from Spellbinders called Always Welcome. It is available as a separate purchase now, so you do not have to be a monthly club member to purchase it.

It creates such a dimensional card, and for me, was really fun to put together. I wanted it to be for St. Patty's Day so I also used the Shamrocks from another Large Die of the Month called Festive Wreaths.

This die set makes a really easy slider card. You can see all the different holiday dies in the set, so imagine making a door card for every holiday! I have several seasonal door cards, that I've stamped our house number onto and have framed in a picture frame. This makes a great new home card, too!

The card has ink blending brick for the background and the door die is hinged so that it opens. I used white, black, silver metallic and silver glitter card stock for the door. I had watercolored a sheet of watercolor paper with various greens from which I die cut the shamrocks.

Now for the inside of the door, I purchase a digital stamp set from BaerDesignStudio on etsy. This set has 24 images and I used the sentiment in the upper left. Don't forget about digital stamps - they are great to resize for just that perfect fit. To have it fit perfectly, I resize it several times, print onto copy paper and try it out with the card. Once I know which size I want, I print off of my Brother Laser Printer onto 80 lb. cardstock and cut to size. 

This leaves room to hand write a sentiment on the door opening, but I also turned this into an A2 size card.

If you are interested in joining a Spellbinders Club here is the link. I belong to the Value Club, the Large & Small Die of the Month and the Glimmer Hot Foil Kit of the Month. It is a really good value if you're an avid cardmarker, too. You do get to preview the monthly release around the 1st of the month and skip a month if you don't particularly like it. They all work together and overtime it is so fun to make cards with all the parts like I did for this card!

Thank you for joining me and I hope "Nothing but Happiness Comes Through Your Door"!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

SugarPea Designs Breakfast in Bed

Do you love the color lilac? If so, SugarPea Designs Mix It Up Challenge Feb. 2021 is perfect for you! I was inspired by both the color challenge and the sketch challenge to create this card.

I am also submitting to a new to me challenge from Happy Little Stampers - Anything Goes With Dies:

To begin I used a retired set from SugarPea Designs called Breakfast in Bed. It is still available at the Not 2 Shabby Shop at a very deep discounted price:

How fun is this breakfast tray? So easy to put together and can hold breakfast items, get well soup, flowers and for my card, it is a tea tray!

To create the background, I smooched the lightest 4 colors from Altenew's Lilac Blossoms mini cube set onto the white Non Stick mat from my Tim Holtz Glass Media Mat. 

If you don't have a good surface to craft on this one is perfect. The glass is easily cleaned, has grid lines and on the right the white sticky mat that can be stored when not needed. It also comes with a left handed version.

Once the colors were smooched down I gave them a bit of a spritz with water. I picked up a piece of left over packaging and dabbed it into the ink and then on a piece of Bristol Smooth card stock. I also spritzed with water a bit, too so that the ink would move naturally.

Once dry, I gave it a good splattering with the same colors, just watered down using my Tim Holtz splatter brush and Splat box.

The tray is 3 dimensional cut from a kraft card stock. I did ink blend a bit of Walnut Stain Distress Ink around the edges. The tea pot, cups and flowers are stamped onto Ranger's Water Color Paper with Altenew's Obsidian Black Ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder. They were colored with Altenew's 36 half pan watercolors. 

The vase was stamped with one of the darker colors of Altenew's Lilac Blossoms mini cubes. All were die cut with the matching Sugarcut and adhered to the tray, some flat, some popped up. A couple of strips of Altenew's Sweet Pea Washi Tape helped complete the sketch.

The outside sentiment is from SugarPea's Floral Envie:

The inside sentiment is from Altenew's Dearest Friend stamp set:

I love this card and I think the recipient will, too. Thanks for joining me today and if you have a chance, join in one or two of the challenges, it is so fun and inspiring!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Peanut Butter & Jelly Friends

I am on a roll with SugarPea Designs Feb. 2021 Mix It Up Challenge. This card is just the color portion of the challenge. Loving these 4 colors:

Also submitting to Happy Little Stampers, Anything Goes with Dies:

One more submittal to NBUS for I have not used this stamp & die set before...not sure why for it is just darling! Now sadly it is retired.

The SugarPea Designs Better Together and coordinating SugarCut are just so cute:

The stamp is available at a few shops I found online such as The Frantic Stamper and the matching Sugarcut is deeply discounted at the Not 2 Shabby Shop:

I started with the idea that I wanted to use the SugarPea Designs Large Striped Cover Plate. I have had this for a while and wanted to get more use out of it. I decided that upside down worked better for this card designs. I die cut this from Bristol Smooth card stock, as well as, a piece to layer underneath.

I simply ink blended Distress Inks in the colors of Wilted Violet and Twisted Citron using Scrapbook.com's Foam Blending Tools. I kept the colors separate and had very little overlap. The 2 panels were layered together with Tombow Liquid Adhesive, my preferred adhesive - thin enough tip, the right viscosity (not too thin, not too thick) and never gets blocked up.

The little characters were stamped onto Ranger's Watercolor Paper (I use the smooth side for stamping images)with Altenew's Obsidian Black Ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder. Then they were watercolored with Altenew's 36 Half Pan Watercolor set and die cut with the matching Sugarcut. The color challenge colors were perfect for the cream color of peanut butter and grape for jelly!

I am planning this to be another Friendship Day card, so I wanted the sentiment to reflect that "togetherness". I stamped the sentiment on one of the negative stripes and popped it up with foam tape. The jars were also popped up, after I stamped the peanut butter & jelly words.

So I got to play with a new to me stamp & die set and have some fun entering challenges at the same time...all good Thanks for visiting, friends!

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Tea for Friendship Day

Mixing it up with the Feb. 2021 SugarPea Challenge! Both the color and the sketch in an almost one layered card:

Also playing along with AAA Cards CAS Game #183: One Corner:

I started with SugarPea Designs' Breakfast in Bed Stamp & coordinating Sugarcut. They are retired now, but available at a deep discount at the Not 2 Shabby Shop:

In addition to cutting out the images in the stamp set the SugarCut has a 3 dimensional tray and a tissue box with a die to cut the tissue, too (see bottom left):

I knew I wanted to use a stencil in the corner with the circle mask from Taylored Expressions. If you haven't used these masks you are really missing out on an easy way to create background shapes in your cards, positive or negative. The stencil masks have etched lines on them so it is easy to center your card.

For the CAS design I kept the circle in the corner and laid another Taylored Expressions' stencil over it - Double Diamond.

Now here is the tool that I have found invaluable in crafting: Wendy Vecchi's Make Art-Staytion. You can see below it is a metal gridded board with large magnets. They hold well, but don't crash together and break like some of the magnets do.

So, to create a really easy design here is the set up I use with the Make Art-Staytion and magnets:

1) scrap copy paper first;

2) the card panel (Bristol Smooth Card Stock);

3) the circle mask;

4) the stencil with a design.

Now I just blend color through the stencil. I almost always use Scrapbook.com's Foam Blending Tools and generally Distress Ink, for I like the brightness. For this card I used Distress Ink Wilted Violet. I have the scrap paper right there to blot off the ink and it all is fast and easy. I love the faded look, so I try to keep the dark in one area and blend to almost nothing.

The tea pot and cups are from the SugarPea's Breakfast in Bed stamp set. I did my normal stamping onto Ranger Watercolor Paper, the smooth side, with Altenew's Obsidian Black Ink and heat set with clear embossing power. They were watercolored with Altenew's 36 half pan set. After they were dry, I cut them out with the coordinating Sugarcut and popped them up with Journey Foam Squares by Spellbinders.

For the sketch design, I used Altenew's Sweet Pea Washi Tape with all the beautiful colors of the challenge and gold, too:

The sentiment on the outside came from SugarPea Designs' Floral Envie set:

I've got more fun cards coming with this set and its matching die, too!

A few enamel dots from Altenew's Green Fields set finished the front of the card:

The inside sentiment is from Altenew's Dearest Friend stamp set...another card for Friendship Day (July 30th).

I know I wrote a lot to describe the process for this CAS card. It is actually faster to make than it is to write about! Go figure...but I thank you for joining me.

*Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive a small affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.