Balloon Celebration

Good afternoon!

I hope you are all well. Sorry I haven't posted sooner, but I have quite a few magazine projects to get in before the deadlines. Can you believe I am designing for Halloween and Christmas? Yipes!

Moving away from halloween and Christmas, I have a lovely, bright card to share with you today perfect for a celebration or birthday and it features balloons!

I've used a lovely rainbow palette and the techniques used are ink blending, stamping, die cutting and layering.

Here it is...

What you need...

Stamps:

Birthday Bash - Paper Smooches

You Said It - Doodlebug Designs

Dies:

A2 Layers - Waffle Flower

Say Cheese, Again - Lawn Fawn

Ink pads:

It's a Girl - Catherine Pooler

Garden Party

Pixie Dust

Cantaloupe - Memento

Buttercup Make Art - Wendy Vecchi

Garden Patina

Onyx Black - Versafine

Embellishments:

Pearls Glossy Porcelain Mix - Little Things from Lucy's Cards

Card stock:

White

Extras:

Sparkle Crystal Clear Shimmer Pen

Adhesives

Tools:

Big Shot - Sizzix

Blending tools

What you do...

1 Die cut the large photo frame from white card. Cut a panel of white card slightly smaller than the frame.

2 Blend Garden Patina ink at the bottom of the card panel fading to white.

3 Use the aperture of the frame as a guide and stamp the trio of  balloons twice. Use the solid balloon stamp to fill in the colours. Stamp dots above each balloon in the same colours.

4 Die cut the 3¾" x 5" layer in white card and blend the six colours in rainbow order.

5 Mat the rainbow panel onto a card blank 4¼" x 5½". Attach the balloon panel centrally at the top.

6 Stamp the 'Celebration' in black ink across the base of the photo frame and attach to the blank with foam tape, making sure it lines up over the balloon panel. 

7 Add some shimmer to each of the balloons and add some pearls to the blank.

Even though I do use some new products, I am trying to use some of my older stash too, hence the Paper Smooches and Doodlebug stamp sets. Of course you can use any balloon themed stamps in your stash to re-create this card. 

Top tip: If you don't have any balloon stamps, but you have solid balloon dies, cut balloons from foam sheets. Attach to an acrylic block/stamp platform with glue stick or double sided tape, apply ink and stamp!

I have used the A2 Layers die set which is measured in inches. The metric equivalent of the rainbow panel is approximately 9.5cm x 12.5cm and the blank is 11cm x 14cm.

I hope you like this pretty, cheerful card. You can of course change the colours for a card suited to a male recipient.

Thank you for popping by and I'll be back soon.

Love Ya!

Hello there!

I'm back with another cute cactus card. I had a lovely time looking through the Silhouette store and came across some images of adorable cacti. I picked some that had lovely bold outlines, perfect for painting in. Rather than cut the outline from black card, I cut it from black vinyl and attached it to a piece of mixed media card. I used Catherine Pooler dye inks to paint the design.

What you need...

Digital image: 

Cactus with Hearts by Angele Kamp (#270153) - Silhouette

Font:

Funtasia by RVST (#313670)

Card stock:

Mixed Media Pad (A4) - Faber-Castell

White

Ink pads:

Aquatini - Catherine Pooler

Lime Rickey

Party Dress

Vinyl:

Midnight - Cricut

Patterned paper:

Sn@p Teal Chevron/Mini Dot - Simple Stories

Extras:

Adhesives

Tools:

Silhouette Cameo

What you do...

1 Load the image onto the Design Studio and re-size to approximately 2⅛"x 4" (6.5cm x 10cm).

2 Type out the wording, change the font to Funtasia and re-size to 66.42pt. 

3 Place the vinyl onto the cutting mat, send the image to the Silhouette, set the material to Vinyl,Matte and adjust the blade if necessary and cut.

4 Remove the image and stick onto a piece of multi media card and fussy cut out. Smoosh some inks onto a multi media mat and with a wet brush paint the cactus, hearts and pot. Allow to dry.

5 Create a mini slimline blank 3⅛"x 6¼" (8cm x 15.5cm). Mat a 1⅝" (4cm) deep piece of chevron paper across the bottom and add a narrow strip of vinyl along the top edge. 

6 Stick the lettering to the chevron paper and the cactus above.

These inks were a joy to paint with. I was debating whether to do the cactus in watercolours, but I thought I would try inks for a change. I'm glad I did play around with the inks.

There are a few cacti in this set and they are all adorable, so I think I will have to make a few more cards like this and play with some more inks/mediums.

I love the crisp, clean look that vinyl gives to images and as it is plastic it's great for painting within the lines. Wording also works well with vinyl, again for the crisp lines and you don't have to worry about applying glue and making a mess. I would think that you can cut vinyl with a manual die cutting machine, I might have to experiment.

Well, I am going to sign off now. I do have another couple of cactus themed cards to share,so I'll be back soon. Take care and thanks for stopping by.