C is for CONGRATULATIONS

This is going to be a busy week and I am not sure I will get much done in the craft room, but on Saturday I made my C card to keep myself on track with this new goal of mine.  One thing I have discovered in the several years now that I have been making cards is that there always seems to come an opportunity to send a card for which I had not anticipated and for which I have no card.  Congratulations is one of those ... every time I have needed a congratulations card I have had to go in the craft room and make one because I had none on hand in my "stash" of extras.  This card is going to go into that box of extras so I can have it when I need one next time, and who knows when that time will come?!

Anyway, here it is:

I heat embossed two blossoms with black , cut them out, and just added a bit of Worn Lipstick distress ink to the centers.  The butterfly is from a die that I cut out from white card stock to which I had applied some Worn Lipstick and a tiny touch of purple.

The card is all red so on the inside I stamped one of the flowers in black and added some white word stickers I had (not sure where they came from).

Batik-style card

I watched a video the other day of creating a card using a style that created an effect that looks like batik cloth, and when I tried it out, it really did work!

It was quite a simple process although a bit time-consuming.  I stamped the flower images on a piece of white card stock with Versamark and embossed them using white embossing powder.  Then I crumbled the paper up into a ball and pressed it together to create the lines and crack the embossing a little.  Apply distress ink with a sponge and it came out darker on the crinkled parts of the paper, creating the batik look.  I am definitely going to try this again using other stamps and other colors.

Using Distress Inks

I had to make a thank you card this week and because I have been working at learning to make the best and most use of distress ink, I decided to use my new set that I found on sale several weeks ago.  Using white card stock, I embossed the entire piece I wanted for the front of the card using white embossing powder.  After heat embossing it, I shaded the embossed area with four shades of ink, then wiped it lightly with a cloth to clean the ink off the embossed parts.   Then I did the same thing with just one flower and some leaves and added them using puffy tape.

 
 I had done that before and love the results, but this time I added one other step;  I sprayed the entire paper with glittery clear spray and if you look hard at this side view of the card you may be able to see the glittering aspect, especially in the upper right corner, plus a better view of the raised flower.

I really like the springtime look with these soft colors, and I want to try another spring look today using another process I've been reading about using distress ink (distress ink is water activated so I hope to make a water-colored look on the next card).