Some crafters seem to just know how to pull together pattern paper perfectly. I struggle with using bold pattern paper. I’ll gather a few with matching colour tones and see if I can’t lay them out, but it always seems so busy and not pleasing to the eye. I’ve managed to find a way to make pattern paper work for me; I follow the keep it simple rule. This card is simple with 3 elements, bold pattern paper, stamped image and sentiment.
Read MoreThe Mini Foliage Dies are perfect for creating wreaths, but the small size also make them perfect for overlaying on a background to step it up and extend the use of your dies. In addition to the Mini Foliage Dies, this technique is perfect to do with any small floral or foliage dies such as the florals in the Floral Scallop Slimline Dies and Floral Foliage Slimline Die. I have chosen to use this pretty set of leave over a water coloured background. Combining the foliage background with the Wishing You A Very Merry Christmas Die gives a traditional festive red and green holiday card a modern touch.
Read MoreI know for some it maybe too early for Holiday Cards, but I love making them all year long. I also tend to make a card design once so I need a whole year to make enough cards to send to friends and family around the Holidays. Here are a couple of ideas for the upcoming ‘Holiday Floral Stamp set and Floral Die set‘ that are releasing next Saturday, September 10th. I have a sneaking suspicion this may become one of my favourite items of the new Halloween/Christmas release. I paired these cards with the ‘Large Word Christmas Die’ set, which will also be apart of the same release. If you looking for some additional ideas on how to use this set, stay tuned, next week I will also share a different method for using this stamp set and dies.
Read MoreSharing a card with the new Summer Collection Dahlia Layering Dies . Isn't the die gorgeous. I just love Dahlia’s and paper ones are no exception. I paired it with the new Natural Granite 6x6 background stamp. I chose to ink blend all of the layers. I found the beauty when you are ink blending the petals and leaves is that you don't need to be precise or perfect. In fact I think that being a little hap hazard with the ink blending and doing a little of one colour here and little bit of another colour there, makes for the perfect layered look and it gives you amazing contrast and depth of colour that makes the flowers stand out - 3D like. You just can’t get the same effect with solid card stock. Kept the background simple with some basic embossed texture and chose to keep a sentiment off the front so as not to take away from the gorgeous flowers.
Read MoreSometimes a release is overflowing with an abundance of fun cute critters that screams colour all of us!! Well at least, to me thats what the characters seem to be telling me to do. Perhaps because colouring was and still is my first love when it comes to card making. Don’t get me wrong, there are so many ways to enjoy this hobby and wonderful techniques to play around with (trust me I have spent many hours playing with a plethera of different techniques) but sometimes it is about getting back to the core of what made you fall in love with Cardmaking. For some that may be ink blending (which I also love) or die cutting or paper piercing or any number of fun things, but for me it is laying out some critters and grabbing the colouring medium of choice and simply relaxing and colouring.
Read MoreI love shadow box cards; they stand up well, the frame border creates perfect white space around a scene and the layers provide wonderful depth to the scene. The Gone to Maui Exclusive Kit with its adorable critters and elements combine perfectly with the beach scene from Scenic Backgrounds II to create the cutest little shadow box card. This type of shadow box is fairly simple to build once you’ve worked out the dimensions. The first time I made this shadow box it took a little while, fiddling and some trial and error to make the dimensions work to fold and fit into an A2 size envelope. Lucky for you I have all the dimensions all worked out and laid out below.
Read MoreContinuing on with this weeks birthday celebrations Your Next Stamp latest challenge is all about birthday. Birthday is always a fun theme. I don’t know about you but I can always do with another birthday card. In addition to all the birthday theme stuff this past week, my cards have been following a rainbow pattern. I think birthday and rainbow certainly go hand in hand.
Read MoreFor the month of May I had the honour of guest designing for Your Next Stamp. I really enjoyed using their stamps and dies to create several blog posts. This one I shared a few weeks back using one of my favourite YNS items: ‘The Wave Panel Die Set’. It is such a versatile die.
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Jane’s Doodles Challenge Team - Jan - July 2020
