Enjoy {Mo’s Dream Team}

Another Wednesday, and another Mo Manning Cutie. This time I used Honey, and teamed up my image with a simple heat embossed sentiment and some hexagons.

I started by coloring up the cute little bear with my Copics. I haven’t used my markers in quite some time, so I felt a little rusty going in, but I took my time and it came together in the end.

I used a background die from Papertrey Ink to create my hexagons and stacked them five layers thick in three separate clusters on my card. I made the cardbase from Summer Sunrise cardstock (also from Papertrey Ink) just to shake things up a little bit, and glued some leftover hexagons on the inside.

I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from Mathia Design onto Hawaiian Shores cardstock from Papertrey Ink before gluing my sentiment strips to the card using foam squares and liquid glue. I finished it off with a few sparkling clear sequins from Pretty Pink Posh, and my card was done.

Pink floral birthday card

I recently received an order for a 70th birthday card for a lady from the Philippines who loves flowers, pink and purple. I didn’t really feel like coloring and had no idea what to do until Liz came to the rescue and offered me a few sheets from an old pad of images from Lili of the Valley. With the use of my trusted dies from GoKreate, the card actually came together fairly quickly once I sat down and started working on it.

Cards like this come together very easily, it’s basically a bunch of diecutting and you’re done. I use two full 12×12 sheets of patterned paper for cards like this, and the beauty is that there are no scraps left when I’m done. For this one I used two sheets from Papirdesign, one is Roseduft, and the other is stemorsblomst, blå.

I added flowers from Wild Orchid Crafts, Kort & Godt and Papirdesign along the edge of two opposite quadrants on my circle, used letter stickers from Papirdesign to spell her name and some diecut numbers for her age. I finished off the front of the card using diamonds from Kort & Godt.

I kept the insides pretty simple, with plenty of room for a personal message for the birthday lady. I added some more diamonds to embellish a tiny bit.

On the back of the card I used more flowers, more diamonds and stamped a Norsk Stempelblad AS sentiment using Autumn Rose ink from Papertrey Ink. “Happiness is the art of creating a bouquet of the flowers within reach.”

Happy birthday {Mo’s Dream Team}

Hi, everyone!

Another Wednesday, and another card with a Mo Manning cutie.

For this card i used Jessie, an image I colored during Kathy Racoosin’s 30 day challenge back in March. I haven’t really done any coloring since the last challenge ended in early May, but I still have images to use and I’ve even made quite a few cards lately with no coloring whatsoever.

I used a stitched circle die from My Favorite Things to diecut the image, used a bigger die to cut from Sweet Blush cardstock from Papertrey Ink and glued the two circles together. I used an embossing folder from We R Memory Keepers to create texture to my background by running it through my Gemini Junior. I love that little machine.

I used foam squares without too much dimension on the back of my circles, added them to the center of my card and added a stamped Mathia design sentiment with more foam squares. I finished off the card with a few pink pearls from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

I really like the peachy pink combo I used for this one and colored many images around the same time using that same combo.

Enjoy every second of your day {Hobbykunst}

Hi, everyone. I’ve got a birthday card to share with you today, but it’s not in my usual clean and simple style, it’s a more layered card. I used to make this kind of card all the time when I first started making cards, and it’s what I feel I have to go back to whenever I get an order for a card. It’s a good way for me to justify the price I set.

I was told that the birthday girl likes blue, pink and flowers. I knew just which papers to dig out from my stash. The paper I’ve used here is all from the Denim & Girls collection from Maja Design. I love their collections, the patterns are nice and small and the colors to die for. I mean, look at those blues!!! Amazing!!! I’ve predominantly featured two sheets on this card; Summer outfit (which is the blue with the flowers) and Romantic blouse (the pink one). The image comes from the Snapshots sheet.

I started by cutting down the patterned paper to the sizes I wanted, before using a paint brush with clean water to wet all the edges. This makes the paper more pliable, and I can curl the edges with my fingers, giving the paper some dimension and interest. The cool thing is that when it dries, it stays like that, it’s very sturdy. With Maja Design patterned paper it’s extra sturdy, because the paper is so thick you can actually use it for card bases. It’s really nice.

I added a paper doily, some pink lace, some May Arts natural twine, a bow, a couple of diecut numbers and a few paper roses from Papirdesign, in addition to a couple of sentiment strips. I stamped the Mathia design sentiments straight onto the pink patterned paper using Enchanted Evening ink from Papertrey Ink, distressed the edges of the strips slightly with a finger nail and mounted them on foam tape. The top sentiment translates to “Enjoy every second of your day” and the bottom one says “Happy birthday”.

When creating this type of card I go all out and decorate all four sides of my card. I used the same layout on the insides, but skipped all the embellishments. The kraft panels are actually removable. I added double sided tape to the back in generous amounts, but left the release paper on, and glued the panels on using just a glue dot. Glue dots are a nice temporary solution, and it enables you to pull the panels out fairly easily, write your personal message, remove the release paper from the double sided tape and glue the panels back where they belong. It’s a great way to not have to write inside a bulky card.

I had to decorate the back, too. I just had to. Same basic layout on the back. Not as heavily embellished as the front, also not as bare as the insides. I stamped a birthday sentiment from Norsk Stempelblad AS using the same color ink as the sentiment strips on the front, and added a few blue roses to finish the card.

With cards this thick, they don’t fit in regular envelopes, so I usually make simple envelope boxes to match. This one is 1″ high, and it actually could have been a little higher, it was a little bulgy when the card went in. I diecut the blue patterned paper with a Simon Says Stamp label die and added pink diecut letters from Scrapmagasinet to spell the name of the birthday girl. I did two layers so the name wouldn’t get completely lost with that busy background.

Thinking of you {Mo’s Dream Team}

Hi,everyone! Another Wednesday, and another Mo Manning creation. This time I’ve colored up I forgot with my Copics.

This is another one that I’ve colored for Kathy Racoosin’s 30 day coloring challenge. I’m getting better at putting my colored images to use. I colored this one for day 13 of the challenge back in March, so this cute little elephant hasn’t had to wait too long.

I used the largest of the dies in a faux stitched rectangle die set from My Favorite Things to create my panel and glued it onto a scrap piece of patterned paper from Pion Design that I’d already cut to fit the size of my card. I added a cluster in the top right corner, I’ve got part of a Doodlebug doily, a couple of patterned paper banners (also diecut with dies from My Favorite Things) and a few enamel dots from My Mind’s Eye.

That light pink paper is from the same paper collection from Pion Design as the darker pink (Vintage Garden collection), and the green one with the dots is from Inkido. I stamped a Norsk Stempelblad AS sentiment using Autumn Rose ink from Papertrey Ink, and that finishes my card.

Lots of greys, greens and even blues for this one, even if the card mostly reads as pink. 3

Good luck… {Mo’s Dream Team}

… with new challenges! Another Wednesday, and another Mo Manning creation. I’m trying to be better at using all the different images I have from Mo’s Digital Pencil, and I’ve kind of started at the beginning of the alphabet when coloring up previously unused images. I colored up this one for Kathy Racoosin’s 30 day coloring challenge back in June 2018, so it’s about time Alice with Baby made it onto a card.

This isn’t exactly the easiest image to add to a card. I decided to stamp and heat emboss a couple of sentiments from a Huldra designstudio stamp set. The top one says Good luck… and the bottom one says “with new challenges”, which I thought was very fitting with the image. That red cardstock is Pure Poppy from Papertrey Ink, and I added foam tape behind both strips to create a little bit of dimension.

I added the colored image to the center of the card front and a strip of Kaisercraft patterned paper (P214 Periwinkle) on either side. I topped everything off with a few blue enamel dots from Papirdesign.

Baby card

Hi, everyone.

Last Tuesday, Lisabeth and I decided to get a little crafty the following day and participate in the sketch challenge over on the My Favorite Things blog, no matter what the sketch would look like. As always, I’m getting my creation in just under the wire. Turns out I wasn’t in a creative mood on Wednesday. Or Thursday, Friday, Saturday… you get the gist. It was only when I got home today that the ball really got rolling. I did sort of start yesterday, but I couldn’t for the life of me find the right color cardstock to use. I wound up using Tumbled Glass Distress Oxide ink on top of diecut pieces of Aqua Mist cardstock from Papertrey Ink to get a color that matched my little dragons, which I colored up for Kathy Racoosin’s 30 day coloring challenge way back in February 2018. These puppies have been laying around for a while.

I’d already fussy cut my dragons, but I used the Stitched Rectangles STAX sets (both sets, actually) to create my little frame, and glued them both straight onto my card base. I also diecut a scalloped eyelet circle using a CottageCutz die and mounted it on thin, black foam tape from Gina K. Designs for a little bit of dimension. I used the same foam tape on the back of my dragons and glued them to the circle. I created a stacked diecut sentiment using dies from Papirdesign and stamped a small sub sentiment from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Hawaiian Shores ink from Papertrey Ink. I embellished very simply with some sequins from Pretty Pink Posh, and that finishes my card.

Wishing you a wonderful birthday celebration {Hobbykunst}

Hi, everyone! I’ve got a simple, yet colorful birthday card to share today, featuring stamps from Mathia design. I was actually inspired by a card I made a couple of years ago for this one. It featured a couple of Papirdesign stamps, and I made the card very similarly to this one. You can find that blog post (written in Norwegian) here.

This time I used a Gratulerer sentiment and plenty of inks. From top to bottom they are Plum Pudding (Papertrey Ink), Autumn Rose (Papertrey Ink), Picked Raspberry (Distress Oxide), Worn Lipstick (Distress Ink), Spiced Marmalade (Distress Ink), Fossilized Amber (Distress Oxide), Twisted Citron (Distress Oxide), Cracked Pistachio (Distress Oxide), Peacock Feathers (Distress Oxide), Salty Ocean (Distress Oxide) and Blueprint Sketch (Distress Ink). Distress ink and clear stamps aren’t the best of friends, but if you put VersaMark on the stamp first, then distress ink, you’ll get a better result. The distress ink will stick to the VersaMark and won’t bead up as much.

I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from another Mathia design stamp set and popped it up on black foam tape from Gina K.

Behind the black cardstock piece I put a nest of angel hair. It’s a very very thin thread, and it has actual silver in it. I buy mine at the flower shop, one bag will last a looooong time. I finished off my card with some crystals of unknown origin. I know the brands of most of the stuff in my craft room, but these are a mystery.

Hip hip hooray! {Mo’s Dream Team}

Hi, everyone! Another Wednesday, and another Mo day around here. This time I have a little bit of Alphabet Soup to share with you.

I printed my image onto X-Press It blending card towards the bottom left corner of a quarter sheet. I colored it in with my Copics, before trimming it down to 5 3/8 x 4 1/8″. I wanted the Melon Berry cardbase from Papertrey Ink to show around the edges, and this size panel creates the perfect 1/16″ border on all four sides.

If you’ve seen a card or two from me previously, you’ll no doubt know that I’m a fan of adding clusters on my cards. They vary in size and some are simpler than others, but they tend to have three things in common: a piece of a paper doily, fishtail banners and enamel dots or sequins. I also usually put my elements on straight, but this time I went for a less rigid look. I went through my patterned paper scraps and found a green piece from the Vintage Garden collection by Pion Design and diecut it using a fishtail flag frame die from My Favorite Things. I thought I’d have to go for just a piece of cardstock for the other banner, but then I remembered that I have a paper pack from Sunny Studio with pastel colors, and one of them fit perfectly.

I stamped a Norsk Stempelblad AS sentiment onto the green banner using My Favorite Things Extreme Black ink and stapled the two banners together before gluing them onto the card. I added a string of Green Apple divine twine to the top of the card and a few My Mind’s Eye enamel dots to finish it off. In real life, the green dot looks closer to the greens I used in my image. Photos sometimes lie.

The color palette doesn’t lie, these are the Copics I used to color my image.

Happy birthday! {Hobbykunst}

Hi, everyone! I’ve got a super clean and simple birthday card to share today, featuring a cutie patootie bunny from My Favorite Things.

I colored up this image from the Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes for day 8 of the last round of Kathy Racoosin’s 30 day coloring challenge on Instagram. I’m not usually good at turning images from that challenge into cards, but I’m trying to be better. I decided to fussy cut this one and put him on a vellum circle.

I followed a sketch from MFT and glued a piece of patterned paper from Sunny Studio onto my cardbase, before cutting a white cardstock piece from Papertrey Ink on an angle and adding lots of foam adhesive on the back. I am not shy with my foam adhesive, I tend to cover the entire back, which I did this time as well. I stamped a sentiment from the same stamp set in VersaFine Onyx Black ink. I like the color and the crispness of this ink, but am no fan of that hinged lid, it’s a pain to work with.

I glued my vellum circle to the white cardstock (I put my liquid glue strategically behind the bunny) and added a couple of Papirdesign enamel dots for a finishing touch.