Welcome baby card

While playing around with the stamps from the Stampendous Baby Invite set, I noticed that a lot of the little objects fit perfectly in a 1.5" circle. So, I stamped some baby clothing and colored it in with my watercolor pencils and a water brush.

I tried to keep the card gender-neutral, so I choose a dotted brown background pattern paper, and a green washi dot tape (on the right). I added the light green ribbon at the last minute, and I'm actually really glad I did, because it is probably the best bow I have ever tied.

The pennants are from Ki Memories 6x6 birthday pattern paper. I'm not sure whether you can buy Ki Memories paper pads anywhere online, but I found a whole bunch of them at my local Walmart. They are heavy cardstock, and I think I have 8 or 9 different pads right now. I like the patterns and colors in quite a few of them, and they're double-sided. Plus, they're cheaper than the paper pads I've bought online and at Michael's, so I feel more comfortable experimenting different things when I use them.

Sweet little one was hand-written with a white gel pen. The pen I use is a Sakura Gelly Roll pen that I bought at Michael's. I actually wasn't sure what kind of white pen to get, so I bought it along with some opaque white markers. The gel pen works great, the markers just get soaked into the paper and don't actually appear white.

I got a whole bunch of new stamps on Friday, so expect a lot more cards from me soon! I'll mainly be focusing on holiday cards, as I have to make them for several family members as well as a gift I want to send to my sister-in-law.

Holiday Card #3

This is the second card I made a few days ago. It also features the Gnome for the Holidays stamp set, and I've also added the tree from Merry Trees set. One of my favorite parts of the merry trees set is that it has these small dots that can either be used as ornaments, or just to make a cool polka-dot pattern. There are 3 sizes of dots, and also 3 sizes of stars.

The sentiment is from Lawn Fawn's Winter Gifts set. I find myself gravitating toward this set often. Like all Lawn Fawn sets, it has a ton of small stamps that add the perfect amount of detail. And I just love how the letters in the sentiment look. They just seem so joyful.

I also don't think I mentioned it, but the brown and white paper is from a Recollections Bright Basics paper pack I got at Michaels'. There are many fantastic papers in that pack, and each design comes with 3 8.5x11 sheets -- which makes it very useful when creating matching cards.

Holiday Card #2

Actually, it's technically card #5 or 6, but it's currently my absolute favorite, so I just had to show it off.

This card uses the Gnome for the Holidays stamp set. It's a really adorable set, and I keep wanting to use it again and again.

I've colored the reindeer with my watercolor pencils. I've been trying to practice so the colors have more dimension, and I think it's working pretty well.

I've also used Tea Dye distress ink around the edges of the watercolor paper for a bit of an aged look. The stark white was creating too much contrast otherwise. I need to get a few more colors of distress ink. I only have 2, and they're both on the warm side of the spectrum. I think it would be useful to have some cooler colors - probably blue, since I seem to gravitate toward that a lot in backgrounds.

Holiday Card #1

I've started on this years' holiday cards.

This card is actually created on a kraft carstock base, with the red cardstock layered over it. I cut out a window in the middle and decorated with the green & polkadot pieces.

The green polkadot cardstock is actually shiny, and did not come out very well in the image. I just could not get the right angle for it. But it's a lovely dark-ish olive green, and the cardstock is actually not from a holiday pack. It's from Kaiser Craft's Secret Admirer paper pad. It reflect to a kind of golden color, and I think it went perfectly with the card - adding just the right amount of shimmer.

The red and green cardstock is from a Recollections colors pack I got at Michael's. It's rather thin, but it has quite a few colors - which makes it useful for layered cards or just adding a bit of plain color. I also used a recollections stamp set for the bows (stamped in Ranger's Archival Plum ink). I hand-drew dots and white lines with a white gel pen.

The sentiment is hand-written in white gel pen.

And, lastly, the bakers' twine is from Hemptique. I just received it today, and added it to the card at the last minute. I really like the quality and the color is just great.

Welcome Baby Card

Halloween was yesterday, and while I was sitting around waiting for trick-or-treaters, I whipped up this new baby card.

It's hard to see in the picture, but the card base has these adorable raised dots that give texture without adding color (Sea Salt by Bazzill). I cut a piece of watercolor paper to size and rounded the corners using my EK Success corner rounders - using the 1-inch rounder. After stamping the images with Ranger Archival Jet Black Ink and letting it dry, I colored the images in with watercolor pencils and went over them with a water brush. I then blended some Broken China Distress Ink around the sides of the image, just to make it stand out a little better.

The sentiment (Celebrate) on this card comes from Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler, and I just love how fun and joyful it looks. One of the things that's really awesome about the sentiments in Paper Smooches sets is that they go perfectly with many other stamps and styles. I actually have 3 sentiment sets from Paper Smooches and I'm always looking for ways to incorporate them into my cards. I've ordered some of the holiday sets from Paper Smooches and I'm waiting (impatiently!) for them to ship. Can't wait to use them!

The elephant, flowers and stars are from the Stampendous Baby Invite set. I picked my set from the local Michael's store, but I think it may be an older/retired set - as I can't seem to find it in online stamping stores. The animals in the set are so sweet and they just seem perfect for a new baby card. The stamp was small enough to fit into the corner of the card envelope (that's what you see sticking out on the left side of the card). I think it ties the card and the envelope together fabulously.

The fun ribbon is from Stampendous Party Invite - which is another set I picked up from my local Michael's.

The dots above/below the sentiment and the hearts are from Lawn Fawn's Winter Gifts. Many of the Lawn Fawn sets have small stamps that can be picked up easily and used as a decoration all over the card, which makes them super useful. The other half of my recent order has a few Lawn Fawn sets. So excited to get them and start making cards with them.

The twine is from Ki Memories that I bought at Walmart and the buttons are from Favorite Findings (Pastel).