Sympathy Cards

 Sorry I have been absent for so long! I was having a dip in my mojo and then life got in the way. I recently was at a used craft product sale and saw lots of customers who used to come in to Art 'n Soul, the art stamp store where I used to work. I mentioned that I had not posted in my blog for awhile, and they said "yes, we've noticed." They told me that they enjoyed my postings and really liked the techniques. It was such nice feedback that I thought I would start posting again. I actually HAVE been making cards all along, and had some photos, so I will try to post more regularly.

One of the first cards I made after I stopped posting was unfortunately a sympathy card. I find this type of card to be the hardest I ever have to make, so when I make one I usually make several at a time. For sympathy cards I prefer to keep it simple.

I find that a  blended color background with a silhouette stamp added in black ink is a good combination for lots of kinds of cards. In this case, rather than doing all brush blending, I applied Distress ink onto an acrylic block and spritzed with water so that the water and ink do the blending for you.

I prefer to add the ink to the block with ink cubes, which will allow you to add more blocks of color. I did end up adding a few blending touches with small brushes. This is so easy to do, and with brighter colors, you could use this background technique for lots of kinds of cards.

The ones that show a grid pattern were done using Tim Holtz acrylic blocks, which contain an etched grid. I like how the grid adds extra texture and interest.

After cutting these out with a crimped edge die, I matted my selected panel with black cardstock and mounted onto a 110# cardstock base.

Products Used:

Distress ink cubes: Antique Linen,

Scattered Straw, Tea Dye, Shabby Shutters,

Barn Door, Forest Moss

The Greetery GD-M-016 Crimped Frame Die

Impression Obsession C13521 Heartfelt Sympathy

The Greetery Lovely Silhouettes Stamp Set

Neenah Solar White Classic Crest cardstock 80# and 110#

PTI True Black Cardstock

Various Acrylic Blocks

Spring Blooms Corner for Multiple Cards

I needed to make a sympathy card recently and I pulled out the Simon Says Stamp Spring Blooms Corner that I had not yet used. I really like these silhouette type of dies, and I'm planning to use it for more cards in the future.

I first cut a panel of 80# white Nina cardstock with The Greetery Crimped Frame die to get the size just right. I then cut the panel with the Spring Blooms Corner. I placed the cut panel over a background that I had previously made using alcohol inks and glossy white cardstock. I had not found anything to use the panel with until this card. It had just the right tones to create a colorful floral mix.

These are some of the things I used. The background showing below was one of the shaving cream backgrounds I made awhile back (you can see a post where I show how to make shaving cream backgrounds here).

I stamped the white panel with a Magenta Sympathy stamp, and mounted both pieces onto a white base card. I made two more, since Sympathy is the hardest kind of card for me to make.

I also had a birthday card to make, and this die can easily make a card for almost any occasion. The card this time is for a friend for whom I always make a black and white card. I actually think it looks classy in black and white.

At the end I added a few black acrylic dots from my stash.

Magenta Products Used:

07.928.I With Sympathy

Other Products Used:

Simon Says Stamp sssd112325 Spring Blooms Corner

Poppy Stamps 2437 Happy Birthday Poe Script

The Greetery Crimped Frame die

Various backgrounds from my stash

Neenah Solar White 80# & 110# cardstock

PTI True Black Cardstock

Versafine Onyx Black ink

Cards for Charity: Sympathy cards with Gelli Plate Backgrounds

I have been creating cards to give to my friend Pam for her church charity sales. They sell them for $5 each and the money goes to really good charities, like blankets for the homeless. She recently said they needed more Happy Birthday and Sympathy cards. I showed you the Birthday cards in my last post here. We are now making 15 of each design so that they can put them on their blog. You can see the blog here, and if you are local, you can order. They are not able to send orders out, so you would have to pick your cards up if you order any.

 The backgrounds of these cards were made one day when I was playing with my gelli plate (mono printing). I wasn't even using any images or stencils, but I used brayers and cardstocks with different textures. The medium was Distress Oxide inks, which I loved using. Cleanup was easy and there is a huge variety of colors. I was inspired by Jennifer McGuire, and you can see her post here.

When I'm making multiple cards, I make a prototype first, then I like to prep all the pieces and sit and listen to audio books or podcasts while I'm putting them together. I was able to cut the gelli plate panels in half and get two cards out of each one.

This was my prototype. I like how the Distress colors in the gelli plate panels are soft and not too bold for a sympathy card. The die for the flowers and leaves is from Poppy Stamps, 2319 Leafy Garden Border. I added a strip of the blue cardstock I used for the mat under the border. The sentiment die and stamp are from Avery Elle, ST and D-17-16 Sentimental Too Stamps and dies.

I have really enjoyed making cards for this worthy charity. It keeps me busy doing what I love.

Products Used:

5" x 7" Gelli Plate

Various Distress Oxide Inks

Various brayers and textured cardstock

Poppy Stamps 2319 Leafy Garden Border

Avery Elle ST-17-16 Sentimental Too Stamps

Avery Elle D-17-16 Sentimental Too Dies

Malmero Blue cardstock

Neenah Solar White 80# cardstock

By the way, I have been using a glue that I really do love. It's called Bearly Art Precision Craft Glue, and I've been using it for awhile. I used it on this project to stick down all of those leaves. I usually use Elizabeth Craft Be Creative tape for my card panels, but when I need glue, I use this one.

The set I bought has a bottle of glue, with another larger bottle for refilling, and also a little jar with these pieces

The green cap acts as a stopper. To use the glue, you take it out and put in one of the black nozzles. I have never used the larger one. The smaller one is perfect for me -it's really tiny, and I can apply small amounts of glue in small spaces. I use the pin as a stopper if I'm leaving the glue open for long periods while I'm working. When I'm finished, I take off the black nozzle and put the green stopper back on. I clean out the black nozzle every time, and when I want to use it again it works perfectly with no clogging issues. This is the best glue I have found. You can get it directly from the company here, or at Amazon. I receive nothing from the company for this recommendation, it's just a product that I think works really well.

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

Die-Cut Mini Masterpiece: With Sympathy

I hope you all are not tired of the mini masterpiece masterboards and all that you can do with them. I have been having lots of fun experimenting with making these and then die-cutting them to change up the look of the cards. Over the course of several posts I will share these with you.

First off, you need to look for dies that have a lot of surface area that you are cutting out, without a lot of holes in them. I'm sure you probably already have some dies in your stash that would work.

I absolutely love how this card turned out. There is enough surface area in the leaves to see the progression of the paint lines from one leaf to the next. The masterboard that I made for this wasn't really my favorite.

But then this amazing thing always happens when you cut it. It becomes this beautiful work of art. I have to say that making these masterboards is really a lot of fun too. There is a freedom in the scribbling and slapping paint down. I added copper Deco foil to this masterboard, and you might be able to see it in the leaves above. I matted the card with copper Stardream cardstock. The green square is just from a pad of textured colored cardstock that I picked up somewhere.

The With Sympathy stamp is by Gretchen Ehrsam and was made by RubberMoon. Gretchen Ehrsam's designs are no longer available at RubberMoon, unfortunately. You could go through your stash for a similar stamp, or you could also get this favorite from Magenta. This is a direct link to this item at the Magenta online store. Magenta kindly made this stamp at our request when we were at Art 'n Soul, and it is still available for sale.

07.928.I with Sympathy

This card design is based on the Mini Masterpieces that we did in a class by Sally Penley. You can look at my Mini Masterpieces here, here, here, and here. Sally is still teaching the Mini Masterpiece class, so if you are local, I highly recommend it. You will get so much from this class. You can access her website here to sign up for her classes or buy her beautiful artwork.

Products Used:

Penny Black leaf die 51-120 lively

Die-namics MFT463 Blueprints 13 - stitched rectangle 5.25" x 4"

Copper Deco foil

Stardream copper cardstock

Neenah Solar White 80# & 110# cardstock