Same layout---Different look

One of the deacons at our church celebrated 55 years of marriage the other day. They are such nice people and have been great advisors and friends to our family. I set out to make them a card and this is what transpired.

The numbers are embossed in gold EP. They are the retired Headline Numbers, but there are some wonderful new ones in the Spring/Summer Catalog that would work just as well if not better. The "Congratulations" is also embossed in gold. Again from a retired hostess set. It was just perfect for this card. The paper and embelishments are all current. Gold brads, River Rock Designer Prints, Brushed Gold paper, and cream Grosgrain Ribbon. The "55" is up on dimensionals.

The layout is SC157 from the Wednesday sketch challenges. I liked it so much I made another card. This one features the Flower Fusion felt flowers. The stamped swirl if from "Priceless" and is done in white craft ink. The "cherish" is from "Warm Words". The papers are Pretty in Pink, Rose Red, and Berry Bliss DSP. There is also some Chocolate Chip thrown in for contrast. I love this color combination. A few pastel brads and Pink ribbon and I am done.

More Rub-on ideas

Here are a few more projects that you can do with rub-ons.

The candle has two separate rub-ons. They are also from the Eastern Elegancy like yesterdays projects. I got the candle from the dollar store. The area around the rub-on is clear so it doesn't interfear with the candle colors underneith.
The fishbowl is also from the dollar store. I wrapped a piece of wide old olive grosgrain around the jar and then placed the rub-on just above the ribbon. The fram is also from the dollar store. (Do you see the trend?) I covered the frame with paper from "Berry Bliss". The flower in the 5 petal punch. It has a rub on in white placed on it. There is a rhinstone brad in the center and it is held to the ribbon with a glue dot. The design on the ribbon is also a rub-on. When putting rub-ons on ribbon the grosgrain works the best. I also found it helpful to rub across the ribbon instead of long ways.

Have fun with your rub-ons.

Rub-ons

I had stamping club last night. One of the techniques we used was rub-ons. Rub-ons are very versitile. We used them on baby food glass jars. A couple keys when using rub-ons on glass items. Make sure the item is clean and dry. After you put on the rub-on you will not be able to wash the item, so they need to be for decoration or packaging of small gifts. Nothing liquid. You can experiment with coatings over the rub-on if you want to wach the item. I have not done this yet. I am also leary about putting a coating on something I may eat or drink from.

I used the Eastern Elegancy rub-on on both the jar and the card. The rub-ons come with two sheets, one black and one white. I placed a piece of paper in the jar to make the rub-on stand out better.

Masculine Card??

What really constitutes a masculine card? This is an interesting question. Is it all about the color? Is it about the images you use? Is it about the types of embelishments or techniques you use? Each person may have their own answer to these questions. My opinion is that each of these things has their importance. My DH is nice enough to look at my cards when I am done making them. He will comment if he likes it. That does not mean however that I think he would like to receive the card. I am also not talking about a boys card, but those we give to our older members of the male race.

I don't think he would like to receive a pink card unless it was to congratulate him on a new baby girl. I don't think he would like to receive a card with lots of frilly flowers on it. Flowers maybe if they were used in a subtle way, perhaps for a sympathy card. Same goes for embelishments. Ribbon is fine if it doesn't have lots of ruffles or bows.

So what would be good choices? Hardware is always good. It can surround a sentiment or just brads to embelish a corner. As for colors, darker shades are my choice. It doesn't mean I don't use red or yellow, but not the bright tones. Rich Regals or many of the Earth Elements are top on my list when choosing for a masculine card. I personally like green for masculine cards. Even Certainly Celery from the Soft Subtle family can be nice if used properly. Dark outline layers/mats can give a darker sence to a card also. Selection of paper can also come into account. Textured paper would be good as opposed to just flat cardstock.

As for image I go one of two ways. There are the typical images like vehicles. I like to go also go for the items that are of significance to the person. My dad for instance has a number of apple and cherry trees that he likes to pick fruits from. I like to use images of piles of these fruits on cards for him.

With Valentine's Day soon approaching I wanted to have something to select from for my DH, dad and maybe brother. I made this card the other night. I think it has a nice balance of male colors, images, and embelishments. It could go to anyone as it doesn't lean too heavily to one side, but I would like to think one of the men in my life would like to receive this card.

The image was colored with my Stampin' Up! Certainly Celery Marker. To get the shaded effect I carefully colored the image with the marker so I didn't overlap any of the strokes. Then I went back and colored again the areas I wanted a little darker. Here is a great tutorial for how to this further. The hardware piece around the sentiment is Hodgepodge Hardware Pewter. The Regal colors of the Real Red and So Saffron are not that bright even though red and yellow would normally be considered a girly color. The black mats also help to give some depth, definition and darken the card. The only part I may consider changing is the ribbon. I think it either needs to be shorter on the tails or maybe a different color. I might try a black one there before sending the card.

Inspiration file

Whenever I come across something that strikes me I either save the project to my computer or write it on my list of ideas/tips. Then there are the ones that strike me so hard I just remember them. I have had this tip in the back of my mind for sometime now. When I saw it I immediately put the item I needed on my next order. I have tried before to use it, but the timing wasn't right. It just sat there in the back of my mind everytime I came across the item that I ordered. Well, I finally got around to using it.

What was the item?

It was the "My ABC's" Stampin' Around Wheel. The one that looks like the old grade school paper you used when you learned how to write. Someone had used it to make a their own plaid style background paper. I had out my In Color stamp pads from some previous projects. I started with the Wild Wasabi and Blue Bayou. I rolled each one alternating colors in both directions on the card stock. Then I went in between each pass(actually overlapping) with my Purely Pomegranate ink in both directions.

I loved the way the paper looked. I still wasn't sure how to use it the best still. I looked through all my stamp sets and pulled out the ones new to my collection in the last month or so. I looked at them all and nothing still came to mind. I looked on my bullitan board. I have all the old sketch challenges hanging up their. One stood out to me. I looked again through my stamp sets and found "Unfrogettable" I havn't used it in awhile. The paper looked like it was perfect for a masculine card. The frog would be perfect for a Valentine. A few stamps, some aqua painter watercoloring, and a quick embelishment later and you have my take on a Masculine Valentine card using sketch SC155 and my very own designed background paper. I had actually intended for more of my wonderful paper to show in the background when I got the vision, but the tag needed something else, so it got a strip of Purely Pomegranate underneath the ribbon.

Stamps: Unfrogettable, ABC's Wheel

Paper: Whisper White, Soft Sky Textured, Wild Wasabi, Blue Bayou, Purely Pomegranate

Ink: Basic Black, Wild Wasabi, River Rock, Blue Bayou, Purely Pomegranate, Soft Sky

Accessories: Aqua Painter, Wild Wasabi DS Ribbon, Slot Punch, 1-3/8" & 1-1/4" circle punches, dimensionals

Don't forget to check your inspiration file for some ideas you might have forgotten or start one of your own today.

Bleaching

I havn't done anything with this technique in some time. Bleach can be used a couple of ways when paper crafting. You can use it to actually stamp with just like ink. (I will admit to not always getting the best results with this) OR you can use an aqua painter with bleach to discolor the paper after you have stamped on it.

The second would be the technique I used for this card using the SC152 sketch challenge. I first stamped the large flower from "Time Well Spent" onto the Groovy Guava card stock with Versamark ink. I then embossed it with Black EP. I wanted to add a few leaves to my card, so I masked off the flower and stamped/embossed the leaves.

Using my aqua painter I dipped the end in a small container of fresh bleach. Using frech bleach is important. Bleach goes bad over time and will not work as well. It is also not advisable to leave the bleach in your aqua painter. It can ruin the brush tip. Some have had different experiences with this, so it may also have to do with the weather in your area. I then colored with the bleach wherever I no longer wanted it to be Guava. I did this on most of the outline type areas and the leaves.

Each color of cardstock will react differently. Some will change color others with turn a white/gray shade. The Guava turns white. I wanted the leaves to be Wild Wassabi. I let the bleach areas fully dry and cleaned my aqua painter. I went back with my aqua painter dipped in water and colored the leaves with ink from my Wild Wassabi ink pad. To finish off the card I colored the little flowers on the sentiment Groovy Guava. The ribbon is the new stripped grosgrain ribbon. This one is Wild Wassabi.

Sketch Challenges

I am working on some projects for my club next weekend and a Cricut swarm I am going to. I don't want to show those projects just yet. In the mean time here are a couple of cards I made while trying to also catch up on some SCS sketch challenges.

I worked on SC147 first. I don't use the "Define Your Life" stamp set near as much as I would like to. I fit wonderfully for this challenge. I wanted to pull the main image into the rest of the card a little more, so I stamped the "Ll" a few times in the background. For an added embelishment the double stiched ribbon and a pretties flower were a simple choice. I used a little crystal effects to put the half pearl in the middle of the flower.

For SC149 the only thing I knew was that I wanted an image too big for the diamonds. The "Time Well Spent" had a few choices. My DD loves the butterfly. I stamped it out onto some Whisper White card stock. I started to color it in with various In Colors and my aqua painter. I originally thought I would color the main part of the wings, but I didn't want to have all that white area around the butterfly. I had already used the Soft Sky for the wing edges. Groovy Guava was the next lightest In Color I had. I decided to color around the butterfly with that and then decide what color to do the butterfly itself. I really liked the white wings after coloring around it.

The main panel has Soft Sky flowers stamped all around the saying, but it doesn't show on the picture. It looks really nice IRL and help to tone down the large blank area. I played for a while with the mat and ribbon colors. I debated using Purely Pomegranate, but settled on the Soft Sky mats and River Rock DS Ribbon.