Okay, so we are working on unfinished projects for awhile here. I hope that you are pulling out some of yours and I would really love to hear from you and see what you are doing. A couple of weekends ago I went up to scrapbook with my friends and the agenda went right out the window after I showed them the
Wishes card idea book from Close to my Heart. I explained how it contained the bulk card-making patterns and that was it, we decided to do one of them. The particular pattern we used made 20 cards and so I came home with them nearly finished but not decorated. Here they are:
I debated whether to use a stamp set or not and then I saw my brand new rubons sitting up on my counter. I received them for free in last month's exceptional Deal A Day promotion and I just felt they would be easy to use to finish these cards off.
I also had a few items that came in the mystery boxes I bought, ribbons, my accents and brads.
Window charms are the greatest accent for cards especially so I grabbed my square and circle charms too.
Here's the first card, very bare and in need of decoration. The pattern made two of each card so I will show the before and after cards.
Each pack of rub ons comes in three colors, this was came in brown, black and white, all three worked well for this paper set (
Back Country). This set has small sweet words so I used those as the "titles" of my cards, a few hearts and done, short and sweet.
Card two: I used both the white and the brown rubons and the card looks completely different from the other.
Sorry about the blurry photo, I can't tell you how easy it was to put together 20 cards quickly using the Wishes book. I do have some tips. Remember when you are following the cutting patterns that the measurements are also shown on each individual card pattern. My friends and I didn't realize this at first and were having trouble seeing the tiny numbers, if we had just looked ahead a page we would have seen them in much larger print, boy did we feel stupid.
The first card here looked great when I put the four corner rubons down, they framed the rectangle beautifully so all I had to do was to choose one centrail decoration.
I turned the second card vertically and added three "joy" rub ons at the top, then had the dragonflies zipping off the side.
Another thing you want to do when using the card patterns is to have baggies out to put each card's pieces in. As you cut them you can see that each pattern has a label for what you are cutting, A1, B2, etc. Card A will have a certain number of pieces, so will each other card. If you have enough baggies for each card you make (in this instance, 20) you can label your baggies A-J and simply put the cut pieces in the corresponding bag as you go. Once you are ready to put the cards together, do one baggie at a time and follow the directions in the book.
Again I turned this card vertically for a different look and added some simple hearts and a word.
Back to horizonal and this time I used stars, isn't this easy? It would be just as easy with one set of stamps too, the possibilities are endless.
I forgot to take a before picture on this card but you can see I had a lot of space to fill, perfect for the very curlique on the rub on sheet. Did you know that our rub ons don't cling to the paper until you actually rub it on there. I know you know a lot of rub ons that can't say that. I have had so many disappointing experiences with other rub ons that would grab anything they touched.
Same card, different butterflies. I moved the word up a bit and changed the color.
The first card was a simple design so I needed to dress it up. I love these Back Country colors. Another tip for using our bulk card patterns is to remember that the patterned pieces can be used front or back because our paper has two different looks that way, you'll need to turn some of your pieces over to provide variety on your cards. Because of that I recommend you don't label the patterned papers, the baggie idea works better.
The first card has a snowy look, save this one for winter!
Here's the same card though you could hardly tell, buttons, flowers and a horizontal turn makes it look completely different. See the square window charms?
Make sure you have a trimmer that has measurements all the way out to 12" when cutting in bulk. Also, an extra ruler is very helpful.
Here you can see that I used the circle window charm in the center of the flower.
Here I used a larger window charm over the whole flower.
When you use the Wishes bulk pattern you don't have to use pattern paper at all, you could just used cardstock, it saves money and gives you even more areas to fill with stamps. They are your cards, adjust the pattern to fit you!
I used the large flower rubon and then highlighted the small word with a circle window charm.
This time I highlighted the star rubons because the words stood out by itself. I used liquid glass for the buttons.
Besides the bulk card-making patterns in the Wishes books there are also tons of individual card ideas all organized by category, check it out.
A simple window charm really makes the snowflake rub on pop on this card, did you notice that I used a lot of dry embossing on these cards? Remember I showed you that the easiest way to do this is with a crimper but if you are looking for a larger space between your lines, use your handy dandy dry embossing stylus (shown in the picture above).
Turn the window charm and it's a diamond shape enhancing the snowflake. Make sure that if you use brads that you put them on BEFORE attaching them to your card base. You don't want the back of your brad showing inside your card.
You don't have to follow the paper choices in the Wishes book and you also don't have to follow every pattern to the nth degree either, move the square over or down, turn it diagonally, it's up to you, the pattern is just a guide.
Are you starting to see how easy these rubons can make your card-making? It takes less than a minute to decorate this card.
All the rubons come with a little cuticle stick (that's what I call it). I actually like to use my dry embossing tool instead. It seems to really go smoother and I don't like that wood on paper sound, cringe.
Last card! I really love when I see lots of layering. Someone told me the difference between a good card and a great one was all in the layer. Plus, it's a great way to use your scraps!!
The window charms are amazing, aren't they? Love them!
I had four words left on the black set, so easy to use them all by just outlining the square with them.
Here are the finished cards, it took me about an hour, I watched one whole episode of Lie to Me while doing it so I didn't even really have to concentrate much.
Now let's talk about you. What can you finish this week? I know I'm not the only one who has a stash of sort of finished projects that I've been putting off. I know you've all been hoarding your supplies forever, time to use them. Share with me, please, I'd love to post a few projects of yours, we're all in this together!
I used the Gear Up set to randomly stamp the 5 3/4" by 5 3/4" paper but I haven't taken you through it step by step for a good reason. This very set and random stamping are taught on our Close to my Heart Art and Soul online tv show this month!! You can see exactly how to do it here!
Now that you've followed the random stamping tutorial on the Art and Soul program, attach it to a 6" by 6" piece of juniper cardstock.
We're using some of the Key to my Heart paper on this card again. Cut a piece of patterned paper from the set, 5 1/4" by 3". You will also need a piece of tulip cardstock cut 2 1/2" by 2 1/2" and three long strips of paper (sorbet) 11 1/2" by 2 1/4", (juniper) 11 1/2" by 1 1/2", and (tulip) 11 1/2" by 1/2". Cut a colonial white piece of cardstock 3 inches in diameter and a tulip piece of cardstock, 3 1/4 inches in diameter (not shown).
Take a border punch of any type and cut along the sorbet strip and distress all pieces.
Using your dry embossing tool and trimmer lay your juniper strip down so that you can press the paper down lightly into the groove on the trimmer, do it every half inch then turn the piece over and sand to make the white core of our cardstock show. Attach it to the sorbet paper letting the fancy edge show on the top.
Glue the tulip strip on the juniper on the opposite end of where you have the ruffle.
Put the larger patterned piece 1/4" from the left hand side and 1/4" from the top of your random stamped paper.
Glue the tulip paper square piece about and inch and a half from left side, two inches from the top of the random stamped paper.
Fold your long strip around the back of the card with the ends on the front (you'll notice I turned the card this time so the strip is vertical). Glue it about 1/2 inch from the right hand side. Glue your white circle to the tulip circle and stamp a set of the "gears" from the Gear Up stamp set in the middle, you can use any of the matching colors, tulip, juniper, creme brulee or sorbet. Attach circle where the strip meets in front of the card.
Add a window charm to the middle of your circle to really make it pop! Take the "gear up to party" stamp and stamp on the polka dot paper and you're finished. Now see how three cards can look so different even with the same pattern, it's really amazing and we even used the same color and paper set on all of them and they still each look unique. There is no excuse that you need to buy a ton of stamps, paper and inks to make great cards. A few stamp sets, a set of good ink colors, papers of your choice and the Wishes book are all you need. In the next few days I'm going to recommend my favorites if you are just beginning to make cards. Tomorrow I will give you the top ten stamps I can't live without to get you started!
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