Are you sure you’re a year older? {Mo’s Dream Team}

April 28, 2021April 25, 2021 ElinLeave a comment

Hi, there! It’s Wednesday again, and you know what that means. Time for another Mo Manning creation around here. This time, I’ve kind of gone back to my roots, but not really. It’s a layered card, which used to be the norm for me, but the image is fussy cut, which most certainly has never been my signature.

I received an order for a 50th birthday card for an electrician. The card needed to be “messy”, which is kind of difficult for me. My usual style is pared back and very simple, I just don’t have enough elements on my cards to be able to make a mess of any kind. Thus going back to my roots of using lots of patterned paper. I colored up Mr. Fixit in my favorite colors and fussy cut him.

I had to go looking for inspiration online. The last “old style” card I made was in June of last year, which means I’m rusty. I found a card I liked and used it as a guide to create this one, which is actually an A7 card (5×7″). I dug through my patterned papers, both 12×12″ sheets and scraps, and found a few from Papirdesign, Maja Design and a small scrap from My Mind’s Eye that I used to die cut the gears and numbers. I arranged all the elements on my card, some using foam tape and others adhered straight down, and wound up with this. I used old dies from Sizzix for the gears, forcing me to pull my BigShot out of retirement for a few minutes. Those dies are too thick for my Gemini Jr., which is the machine I use for nearly all my die cutting. The last time I used my BigShot was over two years ago, so there’s a reason it’s retired in the closet. I added a piece of Snip Art chipboard and a film strip piece from Tim Holtz for a little bit of added interest and something that wasn’t just made of paper.

On the inside, I adhered left over pieces of the gears, just to use it all, and stamped a sentiment from Norsk Stempelblad AS using Dark Indigo ink from Papertrey Ink. There’s plenty of room on the right for a personal message, this is a side fold card (another anomaly from me, I prefer top fold).

On the back of the card, I repeated a lot of the elements that I used on the front. The tag dies I used are from My Favorite Things, and I used my recently acquired personal stamp from Create a Smile on one of the die cut tags, stamped in Dark Indigo ink.

Not a lot of Copics used for this one, I mostly stuck to blues.

Birthday card galore {Hobbykunst}

April 26, 2021April 3, 2021 ElinLeave a comment

Hi, there! Remember the 4 bar birthday cards I shared a couple of weeks ago? Well, I have another batch today. Still using the Happy birthday collection from P13, still all 4 bar cards.

I’m starting with what’s probably the simplest one, certainly the cleanest one. I die cut a wonky grid from white card stock and adhered it directly to the card base, before adding the fussy cut bunny with foam tape.

I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from the Bitty Bears stamp set from My Favorite Things and popped it up using foam tape, before adding some clear crystals from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards in clusters to the background. I even fussy cut another, smaller bunny and glued him to the inside of the card, which you can sort of see in this photo.

This card looks a little bit busier, simply because I added some patterned paper to the background. Once again I adhered the fussy cut image using foam tape.

I white heat embossed a sentiment from the Pawty Time stamp set from My Favorite Things, added it with foam tape and finished off with a few clear crystals from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

This is probably the most involved of the cards, simply because I created a faux stitch rectangle from the patterned paper in the background, instead of just leaving it plain and letting it cover the entire card base.

I used a Papirdesign die to create the white die cut going across the center of the card, and added my fussy cut piece using foam tape. The sequins used for this card are from the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

An elephant with some balloons, ready to party is next up. I used part of a die cut to span across the card for a little texture in the background, before adding the elephant with foam tape.

The sentiment is from the Bitty Bears stamp set from My Favorite Things, and I added a few pearl white crystals from Pretty Pink Posh for a finishing touch.

Die cut patterned paper in the background for this one, with that faux stitching I love so much. Once again, lots of foam tape behind the image.

Sentiment from the Bitty Bears stamp set added using 1 mm foam squares, with a few Papirdesign enamel dots to finish.

Christmas time {Mo’s Digital Pencil}

April 21, 2021April 21, 2021 Elin1 Comment

Hi, there! Another Wednesday’s come around, which means another Mo Manning creation. Today, I actually have a Christmas card to share. Christmas is only 8 months away, time will fly.

Mo Manning Winter Delivery front

I’m getting close to the end of the alphabet of my previously unused images from Mo Manning. I have close to 400 digital stamps from Mo, and it’s a pretty good feeling to have used nearly all of them. This is Winter Delivery, a cute hatted squirrel carrying a bag of acorns through the snow.

Mo Manning Winter Delivery flatllay venstre

I colored the image with my Copics, before taking out my most used cluster dies and scraps of patterned Christmas paper from Maja Design (and that sentiment strip from Papirdesign) to create a tiny cluster in the top right corner. I used part of a Doodlebug doily at the bottom, a branch die cut with a Papirdesign die, as well as tickets die cut using the Happy Days Ticket Stubs die from XCut (Docrafts) and the Fishtail Flag Frames dies from My Favorite Things. I used another favorite MFT die to die cut the panel with the squirrel, before adding it directly to a side fold landscape card base made out of Soft Stone card stock from Papertrey Ink. I rarely make side fold cards, but I had a piece of card stock already cut to 4 1/4 x 11″, and it made more sense to fold that down the middle rather than pulling out a new sheet to make a top fold card.

Mo Manning Winter Delivery Copics

Simple color palette today.

Quick, simple birthday cards {Hobbykunst}

April 16, 2021April 3, 2021 ElinLeave a comment

Hi, everyone! I have a few cards to share today, mostly focusing on patterned paper from P13 and their Happy birthday collection. All the cards are 4 bar size, and they’re all pretty similar, using sheets 1-6 from the collection from P13. They number their patterned papers, they don’t name them.

My first card is the only landscape one. I covered the card base with that yellow patterned paper and added a white die cut on top. I fussy cut the boy with the present and mounted the image on foam tape, before adding a sentiment strip with additional pieces of foam tape for even more dimension. The sentiment is from the Pawty Time stamp set from My Favorite Things. I finished off the card with a few sequins from the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

Card number 2. Covered up the card base again, this time with a patterned paper that barely even has a pattern on it. It’s white with a dotted grid printed in yellow. I die cut the wonky square grid pattern from some of the red patterned paper and adhered it in the center of the card.

I mounted a fussy cut image onto foam tape in the center of the card, and a sentiment strip on top of that with even more foam. The sentiment is from Mathia, heat embossed in white on a piece of red pattened paper. I added a few Pearl White crystals from Pretty Pink Posh to finish the card.

This one is pretty similar to the last one. I die cut the wonky grid from yellow patterned paper, and adhered it directly to the card base on the left hand side of the card, before adding the fussy cut image with foam tape.

I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from the Bitty Bears stamp set from My Favorite Things and added it with foam tape on top of the image, before finishing off with some raindrops from the Crystal Collection from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

How festive is this elephant balancing an ice cream cone? I used the white patterned paper with the yellow dotted grid lines for this one as well as a die cut hole pattern that I tore at the egdes.

I adhered the fussy cut elephant using foam tape, and a sentiment strip using some 1 mm foam squares, before finishing off with a few sequins from the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

This last one also has the hole pattern with torn edges, I think it adds a little more playfulness and interest to these very simple cards. I adhered the fussy cut image with foam tape for this one too. I like that little bit of dimension. I even used my thick foam tape for the sentiment on this one, so this card is extra dimensional.

Heat embossed sentiment strip once again, and as with so many of the other cards, I used the Bitty Bears stamp set for that. Finished off with a few Pearl White crystals from Pretty Pink Posh.

Christmas greeting

April 7, 2021April 6, 2021 Elin2 Comments

Hi, there! You probably aren’t thinking of Christmas cards yet. We’re still in early April and Easter just ended, but I looooove making Christmas cards all year and have one to share today. Not very traditional with a sheepdog on the front, but I know just who to send this to.

I colored up Christmas Sheepdog (with hat) very quickly using my Copics. There’s also a version without the hat. I colored the fur uneven and streaky on purpose. I didn’t want to take the time to do real fur, but I also didn’t want it completely flat.

After die cutting my colored piece to a rectangle with faux stitching around the edge using a die from My Favorite Things, I adhered it directly to a top fold card base made out of Soft Stone card stock from Papertrey Ink. Initially, I wanted green, but none of my green card stock colors were a good match (green is tricky), and this grey from Papertrey Ink is beautiful!

I pulled out my usual cluster supplies – mini paper doily from Doodlebug Design, the Happy Days Ticket Stubs die from XCut and my Fishtail Flag Frames dies from My Favorite Things. They’re staples whenever I make embellishment clusters.

Rummaging through my drawer of Christmas patterned paper scraps, I found these lovely green ones from the Christmas in Norway collection from Pion Design, and used the dies to cut out a few pieces to go on my card. I also used a die from Papirdesign to die cut a pine branch, just to add something different to the mix.

I stamped a sentiment from Norsk Stempelblad AS onto one of the banners, heat embossing it in white, before assembling my cluster and adding it to the card with foam squares to build up the layers. I added a few snowdrift sprinkles from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards, and the card was finished.

Very limited color palette for this one.

A little princess {Lili of the Valley}

April 3, 2021April 2, 2021 ElinLeave a comment

Hi! I have a simple baby card to share today, featuring the adorable Baby Scales image from Lili of the Valley.

I colored the image with Copics and fussy cut it, leaving a thin white border. Normally, I’d cut right up to the stamped lines, but with the baby’s strands of hair sticking out from the top of its head, that wasn’t going to happen.

I ran a piece of Lilac Grace card stock from Papertrey Ink through my Gemini Jr. with the Linen & Canvas impression plate, also from Papertrey Ink, for a little bit of subtle texture in the background. I love this particular impression plate, but it’s the first time I’ve used this side of it, I usually use the other. I cropped the panel down significantly and added it with foam tape to my card base. I used 1 mm foam squares behind the image, and adhered that to the bottom left.

I used a stamp from Norsk Stempelblad AS with Altenew Amethyst ink to create my sentiment strip. I found a scrap corner of a mini paper doily from Doodlebug Design that I adhered directly to my textured panel, before mounting the sentiment strip on top with more of those 1 mm foam squares, finishing off with a few enamel dots from Papirdesign.

Not a whole lot of Copics used for this image, it IS simple, after all. I also used V97, which is a color I’ve made myself.

Easter treat

April 1, 2021April 1, 2021 Elin2 Comments

Hi, there! I’ve got an Easter card to share today, with a little bit of a treat inside.

I actually made this card last year, for an Easter card swap. Easter cards aren’t really a thing in Norway, but because of lockdown last year, I figured what the heck. Easter to me is ten glorious days spent in the mountains. Skiing and playing in the snow all day, card and board games at night. Reading crime novels (a uniquely Norwegian Easter tradition), eating oranges and chocolate; it all belongs. Obviously there was no trip to the mountains last year, and I knew that it wouldn’t really feel like Easter for me at all, but I wanted to try to make someone else feel like it was still Easter.

I colored up this bunny from Lee Holland using the no line technique, and made an oval frame around him using a die set from Neat & Tangled. Using the same die with some patterned paper from Sunny Studio, I created a window for my oval frame to sit in. I also used a faux stitch rectangle die from My Favorite Things to get the nice detail on the edge that I love so much.

I stamped a sentiment from Papirdesign onto a piece of yellow cardstock from Papertrey Ink using Fossilized Amber Distress Oxide ink, and die cut it using another die from that same set of dies from Neat & Tangled as the ovals. I added the die cut banner on foam tape and adhered a few sequins from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to draw attention to the sentiment.

The inside of the card is where the magic is. It hides chocolate! Not just any chocolate, either, this is as official of an Easter chocolate as you get in Norway. This particular chocolate is a symbol of Norwegian culture. The average Norwegian eats 9 Kvikk Lunsj bars a year, 3 of them at Easter. You don’t mess with a Norwegian and his/her kvikk lunsj! 😉 I blurred and smudged the personal message in this photo. I don’t have a Copic color palette to share for this card, it’s been a year since I made it, after all.

Time to celebrate {Hobbykunst}

March 26, 2021March 26, 2021 ElinLeave a comment

Hi, everyone! I have a few cards to share today, all of them using just a few products. The Happy Birthday collection from P13 has some great images that are perfect for quick, easy birthday cards.

I’m starting with this bear, ready for a party! The papers in the P13 collections don’t have individual names, they just have numbers, and I fussy cut this bear from 05. I die cut a piece of 01 using a die from Papirdesign, tearing the edges for an uneven look and glued it straight onto my 4 bar top fold card base, before adding the bear with foam tape for dimension.

03 in this collection from P13 has wide, diagonal stripes in different colors. I cut it down to strips, and used them to emboss my sentiments to get the perfect color matches. The sentiment on this card is from the Bitty Bears stamp set from My Favorite Things. I added the sentiment strip using foam tape, and finished off the card with some sequins from the White Orchid Sequin mix from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards.

For my second card I covered the entire card front with the back of the 05 sheet. Most of the papers in this collection have lots of images on the front, and are more plain on the back, of course with colors that coordinate. The little mouse on a unicycle is from the 02 sheet, and again I used 03 to stamp my sentiment on. This sentiment is also from My Favorite Things, it’s from the Pawty Time stamp set.

I die cut a chevron pattern from white card stock using a die from Papirdesign and adhered it directly to my patterned paper card front, before popping up the image on foam tape, and the sentiment on even more foam tape. Again I added sequins from the White Orchid Sequin mix to finish the card.

Card number 3. Now, I’m not sure whether this is a cat or a tiger, but whatever he is, he’s definitely ready to party. I fussy cut him from the 02 sheet, and I used the back of the same sheet to cover the card front. Once again, I popped the image on foam tape for dimension.

I used the Happy Birthday sentiment from the Bitty Bears stamp set again, and this time I used some clear gems from the Crystal Glass collection from Little Things from Lucy’s Cards to embellish.

I made the last card for today very simple. I die cut the same hole pattern as I used for the first card, only this time in white card stock for a bit of textured interest in the background. The cat is from the 05 sheet, which I used a lot of for these cards.

I added the cat using foam tape, the sentiment using more foam tape and those white sequins once again. These cards were so much fun to create, and I’ve got more in upcoming posts.

Hey, you! {Mo’s Dream Team}

March 24, 2021March 24, 2021 Elin1 Comment

Hi, everyone! New card from me today, and it’s one that features the best color of all – BLUE!!

I colored up the boy version of Stock’s Up from Mo Manning (you can find the girl version here), using mostly the Copic B10 series, but adding a couple of colors from other blending groups to get it dark enough in the shadowed areas. I die cut my colored piece down to a faux stitch panel using the largest of the A2 Stitched Rectangles STAX dies from My Favorite Things. In honesty, it’s probably my most used die of all time, I love that die!

Near the top right corner, I randomly stamped part of an old background stamp from Tim Holtz and Stampers Anonymous. I thought the small text on the stamp would pair well with the newspaper in the image and stamped pieces of it at an angle with Memento Espresso Truffle ink. I didn’t even put the stamp in my Misti or on an acrylic block, I bunched it in my hand and stamped, giving it less of a rigid feel, since the stamping is uneven. I added my colored and stamped panel onto a card base made from Blueberry card stock from My Favorite Things, and a small cluster on top of my stamping.

I die cut some patterned paper scraps with a couple of dies from XCut and My Favorite Things to create my cluster. The blue piece is from Papirdesign, the other two from the Happy Birthday collection from P13. I stamped a sentiment from the Bitty Bears stamp set from My Favorite Things onto the orange banner using Hero Arts Soft Granite ink. I finished off with three enamel dots from Papirdesign and added Glossy Accents to the boy’s glasses.

Not a huge amount of colors. For the soles of his slippers I actually used the two lightest colors that I used for his hair (E31 and 30).

Smile – it’s spring {Lili of the Valley}

March 19, 2021March 19, 2021 Elin1 Comment

Hi, everyone! I have a quick and easy card to share today, featuring Balancing Bunny from the upcoming release from Lili of the Valley. Lots of Easter themed images, which is perfect right now, don’t you think?

I colored the image in with my Copics and used partial die cutting with a die from My Favorite Things to turn it into a tall, slim panel. I stamped and white heat embossed a stamp from the Pinstripe stamp set from Altenew repeatedly on a card base I made out of Winter Wisteria card stock from Papertrey Ink, and added my colored piece in the center using foam tape. I stamped and white heat embossed a sentiment from Papirdesign onto a scrap piece of card stock, die cut it and matted it with a white circle, before using 1 mm foam squares to pop it off the colored piece just a bit. And that finished the card for today. Super simple.