Super Saturday at Magenta: Watercoloring Embossed Leaves

Hi everyone! I'm on the Magenta blog today, and you can go to that post here.

One of my favorite collections from Magenta is the last Fall and Winter series. Many of the images in that collection can be used all year long. I chose the Leaf Branch Trio as a lovely image for a sympathy card. Sympathy cards are one of the hardest cards for me to make. I prefer to make some up in advance, and I like them to be simple and classic.

For this card I used Strathmore Tone Blue Mixed Media paper. This is a  nice heavy cardstock, and it comes in a variety of colors or tones. I stamped the leaf image in Versamark ink, and embossed it with JudiKins Silver Detail embossing powder.

To add some color, I used a Zig Clean Color Real Brush Marker in 038 Peacock Blue, and added color to the open areas of the leaves. I used a water brush to spread out the color in the leaves. The embossing resisted the color and added a nice contrast.

By the way, to find the right color, I swatched all of the darker blues that I had, and determined that the Peacock Blue would be the best color for my project. Here are the swatches, along with others that I have swatched in the past. The Peacock Blue surprised me, because I thought it would be more green, but holding it up to my paper, it was the clear winner. 030 Blue would have been the second choice. I'm really going to have to take the time to swatch all of these great markers at some point!

I cut the image out using Hero Arts Infinity Circle dies, and cut a piece of dark blue cardstock with the next larger size circle to mat it. I cut a rectangular piece of the Blue Tone paper using the Die-namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die set, and stamped and embossed the sentiment in the lower right corner. I mounted the panel it to a dark blue cardstock that was cut to 5.5" x 4.25". The entire panel was then mounted to a base card.

This was a very easy card to make, and could be accomplished with most any color of cardstock you may have, using this versatile stamp.

Magenta Products used:

0793.O Leaf Branch Trio

07.984.E With Sympathy

Other Products used:

Versafine ink

JudiKins Detail Silver embossing powder

Zig Clean Color Real Brush Marker:

038 Peacock Blue

Strathmore Toned Blue Mixed Media paper

PaperTrey Ink Dark Indigo cardstock

Die-namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die set

Hero Arts DI199 Infinity Circles die set

Quick Cards for a Good Cause: Thank You Cards

This is my second post regarding making cards for a charity sponsored by some of my friends' church. I am going to try to make 10 cards per month to donate to this cause. The cards for February are all pretty much the same except for colors.

As stated before, I am making only card tops, since they will be adhered to card bases with the charity information printed on them. My friend Deb Kuttel collaborated with me on these cards. She did the color blending on many of them, and I did most of the die cutting and putting together. I blended the one above, because this is one of my favorite color combinations (Distress inks: Twisted Citron, Peacock Feathers, and Wilted Violet).

Deb blended the one above, and I like it a lot. I believe the colors are Distress inks: Squeezed Lemonade, Shabby Shutters, and Ripe Persimmon. The background stamp is from Impression Obsession - Cover-a-Card CC303 Spring Garden. I stamped and embossed them using Versamark ink and JudiKins White Diamond embossing powder.

This one was made using the Impression Obsession background Cover-a-Card stamp, Floral Lines CC089 that we used a lot for the January cards. The colors in this one are Distress inks: Blueprint Sketch and Wilted Violet

The colors in this one are Distress inks Mustard Seed, Twisted Citron, and Mowed Lawn.

The "Thank You" sentiment used for these cards are from the Simon Says Stamp die "Thank You" czd74. It comes with a background and the outline sentiment. I cut the backgrounds out of silver glitter paper and colored them with very light Copic markers to coordinate with the colors in the cards. I don't think that coloring on the silver shows up super well in these pictures.

This is one I colored, and I used Distress inks: Spun Sugar, Picked Raspberry and Candied Apple. The detailed part of the sentiment is cut out of Black Ranger Alcohol Ink cardstock. This cardstock is a matte black that is so dark, and really looks good in real life. I got the tip to use this for sentiments from Jennifer McGuire.

All of the top panels on these cards were cut to size using the Lawn Fawn LF768 Stitched Rectangle Stackable die set. The largest die in this set cuts a panel to 3.75" x 5". This size allows a mat sized 4" x 5.25", and that is a good size to adhere to a base card.

Here are all of the card toppers we made for February. I hope you like them!

Quick Cards for a Good Cause

Hi everyone! I have been busy behind the scenes, catching up with life in general. We traveled to Iceland for Christmas, New Years and our grandson's first birthday, and since we got back, I just seem to be behind in everything. Early in February, I went to a gathering of women from my friend's church. The goal was to put together Valentines for the church to sell to buy blankets for accident victims and homeless people.

The woman who had organized the gathering said that she had wanted to also have some cards that were not Valentines, for people who don't give Valentines. I thought of how I am able to make a large volume of Christmas cards by starting early and making cards each month towards that goal. I decided to try to produce at least 10 cards per month for this cause, and that means that I should be able to contribute at least 120 cards by next February. Since I wanted the 10 per month to start in January, I was already behind.

I have not taken time to properly photograph the cards I'm making for the blog, but I will try to do that sometimes going forward. Here are a few rather poor quality photos, so you can see what we've been doing. My friend Deb Kuttel and I collaborated on all of these cards, and we will be joined by Pam and maybe others as soon as tax season is over.

Part of what makes these quick and easy is that we did not have to mount them on base cards. These are just card tops. The base cards are printed with the charity name, and will be done later.

For the designs of the January cards, we were all over the place. There are a few that we made just alike, but most of them are different. This took more time, and for February, the cards are pretty much the same except for color. The colors on all of these cards are Distress inks blended with brushes.

These first cards were done with a Simon Says Stamp center cut card (SSS101805 Center Cut Heart). This is a large background stamp, and there is also a die that coordinates with it 

(Deco Heart sssd11935). We used the Sugar Pea Designs SPD-00113 Thanks die on these as well.

We stamped and embossed all of the Center Cut Heart cards using Versamark ink and either JudiKins White Diamond embossing powder, or Ranger Gold embossing powder.

Sorry for the poor lighting on these. We made a couple of each one of these last 3. For the card above we used the fairly new Hero Arts Thinking of You Stamp & Cut set (DC273); the Simon Says Stamp Scollap Stitches die set (SSSD111612); and the Impression Obsession Cover a Card background stamp CC089 Floral Lines. We stamped and embossed the background using Versamark ink and JudiKins White Diamond embossing powder. We were able to make 2 cards with each stamped panel. I added a heart to the card above from my stash, saved from a previous project.

For the card above, we used the same exact dies and stamp as the one before, which shows how versatile they are. I love dies that I can use over and over and still get a different look.

For the card above we also used the Floral Lines Impression Obsession stamp and JudiKins White Diamond embossing powder. The die on this card is the Simon Says Stamp "Thanks Scallop Border" SSSD111508. I love this versatile die, and use it quite a bit. I added a little heart about the "Thanks" that I had in my stash from a previous project.

These are just some of the cards we made. We only spend a few hours working on these, and I think they will make a great first batch of cards for this very good cause. I did not take the time to write down all of the products we used, but have tried to list most of them under each card above.

I also had some leftover stamped and colored panels that I plan to make into cards just like these for my own stash of cards to use for various occasions.

I'll try to post the February cards in a few days. Thanks for stopping by!