Hi, crafty friends! I haven’t shared one of my “signature cluster” cards in a while, so I thought it was about time. I thought the Cupcake Thief image from Mo’s Digital Pencil would be perfect for the occasion, and by opting for a black dress, I could pair the image with a recently acquired black and white patterned paper pad that I’ve wanted to use for a while.
This is Cupcake Thief. I’ve used the image once before. This time, I flipped it so she’s facing right, it’s one of the many advantages of using digital stamps. I colored her with Copics and cut my panel down to a width of 3 1/2″. I put it aside, covered a white card base with the black and white plaid patterned paper from My Favorite Things, then mounted the colored panel on foam tape, leaving a little bit of the patterned paper showing on one side, and more showing on the other.
On my desk, I keep storage pockets of die cut patterned paper scraps that I use on my cards. I keep them organized by color family, and pulled out the pink, orange and yellow ones for this, as well as a grey/white/neutral one. The great thing about this system is that everything’s already die cut (using the Happy Days Ticket Stubs die from XCut [which cuts 9 different tickets with one die] and the Fishtail Flag Frames die set from My Favorite Things), so I just play with sizes, colors and composition of the different pieces until I’m happy with the result. For this particular card I used a combo of patterned papers from Sunny Studio, P13 and Bo Bunny. Onto one of the die cut banners I stamped a sentiment from the Little Birthday Notes stamp set from My Favorite Things using Obsidian ink from Altenew. I finished off the card with a few sequins from the Sweet Shop mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards and some Stardust Stickles to the dress.
Quite a few Copics for this one. I also used B90, which is a color I’ve made myself, for a subtle hint of a sky.
Once I colored the first of these elephant stamps blue, I just couldn’t stop, so here’s another blue one for you. I chose a very similar color palette to what I’ve used for my other cards with this set, but this time, I opted for a yellow card, creating a top fold card base from Bright Buttercup cardstock from Papertrey Ink.
I colored the image with Copics, and created a large polaroid frame using a rectangle die from Waffle Flower, as well as a square die from Lifestyle Crafts. I taped the two dies together and die cut several layers of white cardstock that I stacked for a dimensional look. I love dimension on my cards. I used the Sweet hello die from My Favorite Things to die cut three layers of Periwinkle cardstock from Hero Arts, which I also stacked. I added the die cut at an angle and paired it with a sub sentiment from the Itty Bitty Basics stamp set from My Favorite Things, stamped in Blue Yonder ink, also from My Favorite Things. I finished off the card with a visual triangle of sequins from the White Orchid sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Like I said initially: similar color palette to the ones I’ve used for the previous elephant cards. I also used B90, which is a color I’ve created myself.
I printed the image near the bottom left of my panel and colored it up with my Copics, before trimming off a little bit on one side. I used the Slimline Cloud Edges stencil from My Favorite Things, along with Eastern Sky ink from Altenew, to softly ink blend the clouds in the background.
I stamped a couple of sentiments from the Bitty Birthday Wishes stamp set from My Favorite Things using Obsidian ink from Altenew. I adhered my panel directly to an A2 card base I created from Periwinkle cardstock from Hero Arts. I then used a scripty die from Mama Elephant to die cut the word wishes four times from Amarena Cherry cardstock from My Favorite Things. I stacked them together and added the word to the card, nestled in between the stamped sentiments, before finishing off the card with a few sequins from the White Orchid sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Some vivid colors for this one.
Lili of the Valley critters are among the cutest in the stamping world, and I just couldn’t resist these bunnies carrying a big cake. I colored the image with Copics, before die cutting it using the largest die in the A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX die set from My Favorite Things. I adhered the panel to a card base I created from Autumn Rose cardstock from Papertrey Ink.
I used my Quickie Glue pen on the flames and sprinkled on Rock Candy distress glitter for added sparkle. Using foam tape, I popped up a sticker sentiment from Kort & Godt before finishing off the card with sequins from the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Very soft color palette for this one.
I stamped and colored my images, before fussy cutting them, leaving a bit of a white border around them all. I put my colored pieces aside and started working on the rest of the card. I decided to do a bit of ink blending with the Paint Strokes stencil from My Favorite Things. I thought the brush strokes would be good for a background for my colored images.
I started out with Coral Bliss and Pink Pearl inks from Altenew for the pink, but wanted a little more oomph and went over them with Picked Raspberry and Worn Lipstick distress inks, which gave it the pink I wanted. On the orange paint stroke, I only used Spiced Marmalade distress ink, and for the yellow, I chose Mustard Seed and Squeezed Lemonade distress inks. I then stamped a sentiment from the 
For such small images, I used a lot of colors for this card.
I colored the elephant with Copics, stamped a Norsk Stempelblad AS sentiment inside the balloon using Altenew Obsidian ink, then used a die from the A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX 1 set from My Favorite Things to turn it into a panel with that nice faux stitch line that I use a lot on my cards. In my stash I had a white card base with a stamped background (the Scattered Triangles Background stamp from My Favorite Things, stamped with Sour Apple and Blue Yonder inks, also from My Favorite Things) on the front that I decided to also make use of. The colors match my elephant nicely. I was actually planning on using this card base for my 
On top of my scattered triangle background, I adhered a strip of a patterned paper from the Party Patterns paper pad from My Favorite Things, mounted my colored panel using foam tape and embellished near the sentiment using the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
Simple card means simple color palette.
I colored the image in a very pastel color palette, before trimming the panel down to 3 7/8 x 5 1/2″, added foam tape on the back and mounted it on an A6 (4 5/8 x 6 1/4″) top fold white card base that I covered with a piece of Aqua Sky cardstock from Concord & 9th.
This card was a bit of an evolution. I originally wanted to use a bigger kite and a different sentiment, but the larger kite was too big for my image (AND for my card) and the sentiment I initially wanted to use was too big for this smaller kite, so I had to improvise. I used a die from the kite builder die set from Concord & 9th, and stamped a sentiment from the Kite Strings stamp set, also from Concord & 9th, using VersaFine Onyx Black ink. I then die cut the word hello twice from white cardstock using the Sweet Sentiments die set from Altenew, stacked the two together and added the word above the stamped sentiment and popped the kite on some 1 mm foam squares for a tiny bit of dimension.
My card felt kind of empty at this point, I had even more white space than I wanted, and I needed a fix. My color buddy and general crafty assistant Liz suggested adding clouds. Using the Cloud 1 & 2 die set from Papertrey Ink, I die cut three clouds from vellum. I tucked one behind the kite and added tiny slivers of 1 mm foam squares behind the other two for a little bit of dimension, before strategically placing sequins from the Ice Water mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to hide the foam squares and finish the card.
This card didn’t turn out the way I planned, but sometimes, that’s actually a good thing. I like the clouds, the sequins and my other revisions to my original idea. And I will never cease to be amazed at how good clouds always look die cut from vellum. It’s the best!
I didn’t use a lot of markers for this one.
This set offers so many possibilities for customizing your card to suit your needs. I colored the letters to spell happy and fussy cut them, leaving a thin white border and put them aside while I worked on the rest of the card.
Onto a piece of Stamper’s Select White cardstock from Papertrey Ink, I ink blended Sno Cone ink from My Favorite Things using the Geometric Landscape stencil from Altenew. It’s a 6×6″ stencil, but it was easy to create a longer section with a little bit of masking and moving the stencil. I then diecut the panel using the Slimline Double Stitched Rectangle STAX die set from My Favorite Things and adhered it to a card base made from Cotton Candy cardstock, also from My Favorite Things.
I popped my colored, fussy cut letters on foam tape in the center of the card, heat embossed a sub sentiment from the Bitty Birthday Wishes stamp set from My Favorite Things and finished off the card with drops and sequins from the Ice Water mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
I did fairly simple Copic coloring for this, die cut my panel and added it to a white card base I’d covered with a quarter sheet of Winter Wisteria cardstock from Papertrey Ink.
This image with its sentiment deserved to steal the show on its own, so I embellished very sparingly with a few sequins from the White Orchid sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.
I stamped the cute mouse using Memento Rich Cocoa ink onto Classic Kraft cardstock from Papertrey Ink, before covering the image with a mask and running the cardstock through my printer to add the lyrics to a Norwegian Christmas song all about mice. I thought it was a fitting background. I colored the image with Prismacolor pencils (not Copics, I know, it’s rare), heat embossed a sentiment from the B04 stamp set from Norsk Stempelblad AS above the cutie and used a die from the Stitched Traditional Tag STAX die set from My Favorite Things to turn it into a tag. I then die cut a label from the Everyday Gift Box die set (also MFT) from Wild Cherry cardstock from My Favorite Things, and used the tag die again to turn it into the top piece of my tag. I also used a reinforcer die from the Fold-Up Tags die set (also from MFT) and die cut that from Dark Chocolate cardstock from Papertrey Ink. I added a ribbon, a couple of bells and some Cherry twine from Whisker Graphics to the top of the tag, before adhering a few snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to finish.
Papirmølla 