The Open Sea - Simple Card

I am often asked for help making thank you cards for men. I love making rustic, vintage style cards but sometimes customers ask for quick, clean and simple cards because they want to make them in a hurry.

Here is a card that meets that brief:

Stamped on Whisper White with a Midnight Muse back board. I stamped the ship from The Open Sea in Staz On Jet Black ink to make the image more stark than the surrounding colours.  The compass and anchor are stamped in Cherry Cobbler.  The world map and bill of lading are stamped in Crumb Cake ink.

The square smudge image behind the ship is stamped using a clear acrylic block with Midnight Muse ink.  I wanted the image to seem like a bromide photo negative.

Cherry Cobbler Bakers Twine makes for a good textural contrast.

Bon Voyage!
Shanni x

Wildflower Meadow & Washi Tape

I love it when Stampin' Up! release co-ordinating products and this Annual Catalogue has so many to choose from.

Everyone knows that I am not a huge fan of pink but there are times when I simply put myself out there and sacrifice myself for my customers lol!

This is a card that I made for a small class:

 

Melon Mambo is the base card and I chose it to match the gingham print in the Gingham Garden DSP (a strip of which is on the bottom of this card).

 

I inked the Wildflower Meadow stamp with Pink Pirouette and Melon Mambo ~ because I wanted to include two colours on the stamp I used Stampin Write Markers. I find that in order to get a sharp image it is important to huff on the stamp before you stamp.  The moisture in your breath ensures that the ink is uniformally damp and that means that you get consistent colour.



 

You should be able to see the embossing on the card around the stamped image. This has been done using the Wildflower Meadow Embossing Folder which "pops" the images beautifully.

 

I could not resist adding some Gingham Garden Washi Tape as a contrasting focal point beside the greeting to balance the card design.

 

The greeting was stamped in Melon Mambo on Whisper White and mounted on Daffodil Delight to add a contrast to all that pink!

 

Hope that you like it

Shanni x

Umbrae Inking

The chevron stamp from the Oh Hello stamp set is brilliant to use with Umbrae Inking.

Umbrae is a term borrowed from astronomy which basically means from shadow to light. It is usually used to describe the light and reflection on the moon or a planet.

So when you apply the term to stamping you refer to the graduation of a colour from a darker tone to the lighter tone.  It is very popular and a great background for cards, scrap book pages and off the page projects alike. 

Here is a clean and simple card that I have made using the inking technique:





Midnight Muse is the base card stock here. I mounted Whisper White on top which I stamped the chevron stamp on in Midnight Muse, Pacific Point and Marina Mist. The piece of ribbon running alongside the stamped image is Stitched Satin Midnight Muse ribbon.

I embossed the larger oval stamp from the Oh Hello stamp set in white on Midnight Muse and then cut the oval out with Oval Framelits. The greeting was stamped on Whisper White and punched using the Wide Oval Punch. I punched the same size in the Silver Glimmer card stock to add a bit of bling.

To balance the bling I positioned diamante rhinestones on the card in three spots.

Clean and simple and a great card for a catch up message!

Shanni x

Oh Hello - For Something Different

I have been falling in love with the beautiful chevron patterns that we have been seeing in crafting products of late.

Chevron designs are clean cut, distinctive, attractive and versatile.

Here is a different approach to using the chevron stamp from the Oh Hello stamp set which could be applied to scrap booking, off the page projects and of course cards (as I have done here):

This is stamped using the umbrae method of layering colours from dark to light or the opposite. The ink colours from darkest to lightest are Midnight Muse, Pacific Point, Marina Mist and Tempting Turquoise. 

 

I used a Stampa-ma-jig to line up the chevron stamp which actually only has two zig-zags on it. I was nearly going cross-eyed by the end. . .

 

The greeting is stamped in Pacific Point from the Oh Hello set and I simply cut the card into a pennant shape to break it up from the background and marry it into the white spaces between the stamped images.  A piece of white Bakers Twine adds a touch of texture.

 

The base card is Tempting Turquoise and the stamped card Whisper White.

 

Back later

Shanni xx

Secret Garden Swap for North American Convention

My sister attended the North American Convention with me and because she had marking and reports to do in the lead up to our leaving she was really strapped for time so I put together a quick swap for her.  She had to stick the last components together on the plane. . . a good thing that we had 24 hours of flying to our destination. . .

Here is the simple but hopefully effective card:



Base card is Crumb Cake mounted with Whisper White.  I have generation stamped the leaves in Old Olive, the flower stems were also stamped in the same colour. The little fill flowers are stamped in  Daffodil Delight. These stamps are in the Summer Silhouettes set.  I also stamped the grunge splatter in Crumb Cake ink ~ it is from the Gorgeous Grunge set.

I stamped the solid flower from Summer Silhouettes in Tempting Turquoise and the centres in Midnight Muse.

Finally I stamped the little scatter flowers from Summer Silhouette and the large solid flower from Secret Garden in Melon Mambo (I also took the flower centre stamp from Summer Silhouettes and stamped the centre of flower in Midnight Muse ink).  The large flower was cut out using the Framelit Dies which match the Secret Garden stamp set.

I wanted to add some texture hence the Crumb Cake strip embossed using the Delicate Designs Embossing Folder.  The greeting was punched out using the Large Oval Punch and the base the Scallop Oval Punch.

I snuck in some divine Washi Tape from the Gingham Garden Collection and the Epic Day This & That Collection to add further texture.

Soho Subway - So Awesome!

I am loving the Soho Subway Designer Series Paper - it is grungy, graphic and gorgeous. I am yet to make a project that disappoints!

Here is one of my recent creations:

The base card is Summer Starfruit - I love this colour! The piece of DSP is mounted on a piece of Early Espresso Core 'dinations card stock which I have embossed using the Square Lattice Embossing Folder with the Big Shot.

The stamped background is in Baked Brown Sugar for the large splotches (which remind me of blood splatter at a crime scene), Early Espresso for the smaller splotches and Summer Starfruit for the skid marks. I adore the Gorgeous Grunge stamp set!

I stamped (the Baked Brown Sugar), embossed (with black embossing powder) and fussy cut the greeting and small arrows from the Hello Lovely stamp set. I mounted these with dimensionals to give the card some depth.

Hopefully the card has a retro feel to it as well as a grunge feel.

See you soon
Shanni x