8 Days of Holiday Cards! Day 8: Wedding Snowglobes!!!

Oh my goodness, friends! Today's card is quite possibly my favorite for this season, and is a very special card for my friends who just got hitched!!

I knew I would be making this awesome couple a card, and decided to head straight to Paper Source to buy a stamp I'd been eyeing for quite some time! This fantastic scripted Mr & Mr stamp is one of my favorites from Paper Source both because it is beautiful, and because it speaks to their support of the LGBTQ community. I've appreciated this so much about the company, and love that their support feels genuine and authentic, and not just another marketing ploy to get more money from another niche audience.

I wanted to make these fantastic gentlemen a somewhat rustic card, and opted for a buffalo check background, made with the Lawn Fawn Gingham Backdrops stamp set using Memento Tuxedo Black Ink over a Paper Source Red piece of cardstock cut to 3.75x5.5 inches. I mounted the background to my Paper Source A2 Paperbag folded card base, leaving the 1/4 inch strips on the left and right of the panel.

Once I'd decided on the use of the Mr & Mr stamp and the buffalo check, I wanted to find something Christmasy to class up the card so it was appropriate for both a congrats wedding card and a Christmas card - which brought me to the BEAUTIFUL snowglobe from Stampin' Up's Sparkly Seasons!

I stamped the base of the snowglobe with Memento Tuxedo Black Ink on a scrap of Paper Source Superfine White paper, and fussy-cut it out. I used Moonlight Gel Pens for the holly and berries, a white ball-point pen for the year, and a gold pen for the branches, which helped soften the base of the snowglobe, and make it look less blocky.

For the globe itself, I diecut a circle from vellum, and positioned it where I wanted it on my card, to determine placement of the snow stamp from the Sparkly Seasons set with my MISTI tool. Once I'd positioned the stamp, I stamped it directly over the buffalo check panel where the globe would sit, using Frost White Pigment Ink. I then moved the panel off the MISTI and stamped the snow again directly on the vellum circle. This way, when I mounted the globe over the buffalo check, it adds two layers of snow that are facing each other, which gives more snow and more dimension to the finished image. Because the frost white was a very wet pigment ink, I ran the heat tool over the vellum carefully to help it dry without warping the vellum, and over the buffalo check background.

Once the snow was dry enough on my vellum circle, I flipped it upside-down and stamped the Mr & Mr stamp with a clear VersaMark ink pad, and then added copper embossing powder and heat-embossed the sentiment. I then mounted all of the pieces to my card using my tape runner delicately around the outside edge of the snowglobe vellum piece.

On the inside of the card, I stamped this beautiful scripted Merry Christmas sentiment from Paper Source's 2016 Christmas line. I'm still SOOOO happy with this card, and can't wait to hear their reaction!!

We also went to a wedding of another couple this past weekend, and I wanted to use the snowglobe again since it's a December wedding! I don't own the Mr & Mrs stamp from Paper Source with the same scripted font, so I couldn't stamp a sentiment that would make sense for this couple directly on the vellum, so I had to change it up a bit. I followed a similar process for preparing the snow globe base and the snow on the inside of the vellum and the outside of the card base, once again creating two layers of snow here - but the snow this time was with silver pigment ink. I also stamped some tiny hearts from the Lawn Fawn Party Animal set with a bright pink pigment ink. I initially finished this card with a scripty Congratulations sentiment from Paper Source, heat embossed with copper powder, but then wasn't completely satisfied. Because there wasn't a sentiment on this snow globe, it felt like it was missing something inside. I carefully peeled up the globe and added in five die cut hearts that I'd previously die cut with coordinating Lawn Cuts dies from You're Stinkin' Cute and Stuck On You. I added some pink watercolor to it via watercolor pencils, and then carefully adhered the snowglobe again. This helped finish off the card.

I'm still not sure if I like the card better with or without the larger hearts inside, but I'm definitely happy I could use Christmas-y themed fun with these wedding cards!

Well, friends, that wraps up my 8 Days of Holiday Cards for 2016! I hope this gave you some fun inspiration for your holiday season!

Happy Holidays!
-JBJ

Party Animals! Expanding Card for New Baby

One of the pastors at our church just had a baby (Everly Grace), and gave me a great reason to create a fun expanding card! I'd never made an expanding card before, and I wanted to use all of the great little party animals I have in my stash, as I just got the Party Animal and Holiday Party Animal sets in recently. I also wanted to try the partial die-cutting method again, as my previous attempt yielded poor results and I learned a new technique for getting it right from Jennifer McGuire's "Rainbow Stamping and On the Edge Die-Cutting" tutorial.

The card I made is a little longer than 11 inches long, but folds down to a standard A2 size so it'll fit in a standard A2 envelope. I cut an 8 1/2" x 11" Superfine White coverstock paper from Paper Source in half lengthwise, to create a 4 1/4" x 11" panel, then scored it at 5 1/2" for the first fold. I then determined where I would want my racoon, and completed the partial die-cut using the tutorial from Jennifer McGuire. After the partial die-cut, I scored the card and ran my bone folder over both score lines I'd created to make crisp folds.  I then stamped all of my fun party critters across the full card, being careful to stamp the raccoon over the die-cut portion effectively. I had to mask off the raccoon stamped on the inside in order to fit the stubborn skunk from You're Stinkin' Cute in there, as their tails go different directions. 

With the card folded shut, I then picked my colors for the bear, raccoon, and skunk and colored them in with just the pink, purple, blue, and grey colored pencils. I stamped and die-cut the gift from Holiday Party Animals for the Raccoon and colored it in, too, before adhering with a foam square. I opened the card and continued to color in the remaining animals, deciding to add in orange and green for some of the critters that were hidden inside the card to help make it pop more when you opened the card. (sidenote: All of my stamping for this card was done with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, and the coloring with various Prismacolor colored pencils.)

I initially planned to have the critters holding letters from Owen's ABCs with maybe the baby's name, or "Welcome!" or something, but realized quickly that I needed to ensure the three animals showing before the card opened would need to spell something out with their three letters alone before opening it up, or it would look weird. That's when I realized I could use the baby's middle name and still ensure the letters didn't show until you open the card. :) Once I'd decided on this, I stamped and heat embossed white letters on Peacock Paper Source coverstock paper, then die cut and adhered them to the card with foam squares. I then stamped the baby's first name, Everly, in Quinn's ABCs, being careful to keep the name from showing when the card was shut (which resulted in that slightly squashed ev at the start...). I opted to color this in with orange and pink to ensure the new colors still popped inside the card once opened.

I decided to add the party banners from Birthday Tags after looking at the card and feeling like something was missing. I added them so that the first banner would only show when the card was opened, and I colored this banner in with all five of the colors, and decided to only use pink, blue, and purple on the other banner so that when it was closed, it still kept the orange and green on the inside only. I added the Cheers to a happy life! sentiment inside the card, and then decided to add "Let's Celebrate!" to a strip of Peacock Paper Source coverstock paper, and adhered this to the back of the top flap (which is what makes this card a little longer than 11" when opened). At this point, I thought I was finished, but felt again like something was missing, mostly when the card was shut. I settled on adding the two birds to the card, which show when the card is open and closed, and colored them in with pink/blue/purple once again, since they're on the unopened portion.

This card is being entered in to the Lawnscaping Challenge #129: Calling All Critters. http://lawnscaping.blogspot.com/2016/05/lawnscaping-challenge-calling-all.html

Buffalo Check Birthday!

One of my best friends turned 30 recently, and is obsessed with buffalo check, so of course, I had to make her a card with the pattern!

I taped off the rectangle on the card with blue painter's tape before using a wide paintbrush with red and black watercolors to create the background. I wanted to ensure the background would pop so I went with a black-and-white skunk from Stinkin' Cute instead of a more colorful creature, and decided to use glitter paper to die-cut the heart it was holding, since my friend loves a little bling! I added a black-and-white party hat from Hats Off to You, sticking with the simple B&W theme from my skunk. The sentiment is from Avery Elle's Party Animal.






My friend is also a big fan of social media and hashtags, so I made sure to incorporate this with the #awesome images inside the card, die-cut and popped up with foam squares, placed around the curvy sentiment from Pizza My Heart. I also kept up the hashtag fun with the envelope liner, using a # stamp from Paper Source. This stamp is my newest obsession for making backgrounds for cards and signs, envelope liners, and I'm sure some wrapping paper soon! The card and liner are from superfine white text-weight Paper Source paper, and the envelope is Paper Source persimmon.

If/when I make another card with the buffalo check background, I'll probably either make a larger card and/or make the checks a little smaller, so there's more of the pattern to see. (I'll also work on my taping and tape-removal, as you can see that the ink bled slightly and the paper ripped a little...)

Treat Yourself & You're Stinkin' Cute Gift Tag

I put together this gift tag using the Treat Yourself and You're Stinkin' Cute mini sets from Lawn Fawn, and loved the finished product! I stamped each image with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, then colored in the images using watercolor pencils. I die cut a circle using a circle stackables die set, and mounted the images with foam squares. I finished the tag with blue and white bakers twine from Paper Source, and wrote the to/from info on the back of the tag, for my sweet niece!

This tag is being entered into the current Lawnscaping Challenge #126: Sweets.