Little Hands, Little Feet, Big Love Card

These two cards use the teddy bear from the All For Baby stamp set and coordinating Baby Clothes Dies.  But the card styles are polar opposites.

I've cut out the letters using the Playful Alphabet Dies, which has 58 dies including letters, numbers, punctuation and symbols.  I particularly like that there's a few of the same letter so you can make multiples quickly with just one pass through your die cutting machine.

This card feels super stylish with it's gold accents and Expressions In Ink DSP.  The accents are part of the Ephemera pack from the bundle.  Love the colour combo of Polished Pink and Pale Papaya.  What do you think?

More thanks go to Carole for sending me the two frames used in these cards.  There's something very pleasing about a square card with square windows.

Swing by tomorrow to see a completely different look using the same stamp set!

Step It Up Saturday with Color & Contour

 One of the many advantages of being a Stampin' Up! demonstrator is access to so many amazing design ideas and a fantastically talented craft community.

This week in our demo-only email there was a beautiful step it up project that I just had to CASE.  They used the Nature's Harvest set that I don't have - oh dear, I might have to splash out....hahahahaha!   

Anyway, I re-created the project using the Color & Contour bundle.  Take a look:

CASUAL

To make the casual card, stamp the image once in Evening Evergreen, then use the two-step method to ink in the flowers in Pale Papaya.  I stamped the greeting and cut out using a die from Tasteful Labels - there I go getting more bang for my buck again!

AVID

I love the Expressions in Ink DSP, and added an extra strip to make the panel pop a bit more & trimmed the corners on one end.  The gold accents were made using the Sprig punch.  There's a bit of background stamping on the back panel too.

ARTFULLY AVID

My artfully avid version includes a wash of colour across a piece of canvas - I really wanted to use the linen paper from the catalogue, but I don't have any and this layer called for texture. I used my aqua painter and Evening Evergreen ink to create the wash.  You have to let it dry - preferably for an hour or so and weight it down so it doesn't curl when it's drying.  Use a distressing tool, or your scissor blade to "rough up" the edges.

I hope you like this project, and feel inspired to have a go at stepping it up.

Love You Party Puffins!

 What do you think of this background paper?  It's from Expressions in Ink.  It's very soft and pretty, but those gold accents make it feel really special.  I've layered it onto some Gold Foil Board.

The word 'love' is a die cut, it was from a kit, and I can't remember which one....hahahahaha!  But the large heart is cut from Polished Pink cardstock using the Sunshine Wishes dies, long retired, and so pretty I can't part with them.  

It seems that our happy little puffin goes with just about anything.

Tip - if you want to stamp a word precisely into a small area, stamp first, punch second. Like the ‘You’ in the small heart.  That way you'll know that you've got perfect placement and that the punch is the right size for the stamp.  Of course if you're doing a whole lot of the same stamp, then you could also use a Stamparatus.  Well worth the investment if you like to mass produce cards.

Happy Monday! 

Karen

Step It Up Saturday

Today I've got an absolutely gorgeous step it up project for you.  And I confess, I may be falling in love with this stamp set!  

Its called Dragon Fly Garden, and you can find it on page 23 of the Annual Catalogue, Item #154411.  

It coordinates with the Dragonflies Punch.  And if you want to save money, they are available as a bundle.

Anywho, without further ado, let's look at the project!

Casual

The first card was inspired by something I saw on Pinterest.  It's what I call Basic Stamping and it has a very clean and simple style.  I've used the script stamp from Very Versailles stamped in Crumb Cake.  I then stamped the flower image from Dragon Fly Garden in Evening Evergreen - good heavens that's a stunning colour - ever so slightly over the top of the script stamp.  The greeting is stamped in the same colour.  Then for added interest, I stamped the small multiple butterflies in Crumb Cake, again over the top of the script.

Avid

To take my first card to the next level, I've added layers.  The script stamp and butterflies are stamped on a Basic White mat, which is adhered to the card front.  The flower image is stamped, coloured with markers and matted onto an Evening Evergreen layer.  The greeting is stamped, die cut using Tasteful Labels and layered onto Evening Evergreen.  I also stamped the butterflies in Pale Papaya to pick up the colour in the flowers.

Artfully Avid

To go the "whole hog", I added a strip of Designer Series Paper - Expressions in Ink.  And I stamped the large dragon fly onto the same DSP and used the punch to cut it out and raise up using Dimensionals.  I then punched a small dragonfly out of DSP (no stamping) and added to the sentiment panel with a glue dot.

I hope you're inspired to have a go at making one, two or all three cards using the Step It Up method.

Please leave me a comment and let me know what you think!

Happy Stamping!

Karen

Main Supplies & where to find them:

Dragonflies Punch on page 147, item #154240.  And if you want to save money, they are available as a bundle item #156224.

Very Versailles item 149275), page 101 

Tasteful Labels page 166 item #152886 

Designer Series Paper - Expressions in Ink item 155464 page 131.

Ink & Paper - pages 122 & 123.