Whether it’s a journal page, a card, or a scrapbook page, we often like to add that little extra element of a border. One of my art friends, Tammy Northrup, has some great ideas for some ways to add borders to your creative projects!
Tammy’s love of flowers and gardening show in her work! Take a peek here on her website, MyFlowerJournal.com and give it a try! Don’t forget to share your Artful Adventures with us over on our FaceBook Group!
For those of us who love to create and enjoy making cards, sometimes we may not have as much time as we would like to get them done! This past weekend, I was going to swap cards with my Stampin’Up! friends, and knew time was going to be tight to get my 17 matching cards completed. You may not need 17 matching cards to swap with friends, but what about a holiday card, party invitation, birth announcement, or some occasion or event you want people to know about!
Making a hybrid card can be the best of both worlds, paper and digital. One idea is to just print out your digital image as a regular 4×6 picture which you have the option to print at many locations. You can print them out at the drug store or wherever your favorite place is to make prints. If you plan ahead, you may be able to order them or use an online coupon and save even more. Of course, it will depend on how many you need as to how economical it will be to order and pay shipping, you’ll have to be the judge of that.
My Digital Studio (MDS) is a great digital software program which is easy to use and extremely economical. It even comes with a Free Trial. MDS has been recently updated and the price lowered to where I think it is such a value, especially for beginners! MDS is what was used for this card, and it only took two digital “stamps” to create this card.
If you plan to print on 4×6 photo paper, make sure to plan your design around combining that photo with your card size. Since we often create a card that is a half sheet of an 8.5×11″ paper, your finished card front is 4.25×5.5, so you’ll need to plan your photo accordingly. I find it easiest to make the size of what I’m working on a 4×6 and just watch my rulers for the sizing I will use for the finished card. After printing, they only need to have a little bit trimmed off, usually about
The digital images on this cards are:
Also, during the digital design process, you can play around with adding embellishments and get an idea of what you want to do as you assemble the card.
The card base is a half sheet of an 8.5×11 piece of cardstock, folded for a final card size of 5.5 x 4.25 inches. After the “photo” portion of this card was printed, I trimmed the 4×6 because photo so that it would fit my card front, and adhered it. Now the embellishments of a rhinestone in the center of the “o” in the word “mother,” and bit of ribbon simply knotted in the center and adhered with a glue dot! That’s it.
My Paper Pumpkin Welcome Kit
It really was fun to have a little box of fun delivered! The Paper Pumpkin kits, by Stampin’Up! are such an easy way to get your craft on. You just open the box and it is ready! Everything is measured, cut, and scored. Ink, stamps, and even embellishments are included! You just add adhesive (and I found scissors useful!).
Watch this video and see what is in the first kit. Even though this video is kind of long, there are tips you may find useful; but if you must leave before it is finished, the included project is complete within the first 10 minutes. The rest of the video shows other ways to create cards with the supplies that were in the box. I really hope you’ll join me, and play along!
Flower colored with watercolor technique.
As scrapbookers, stampers, carmakers and just crafters in general, we are often looking for ways to use products in our stash! Join me on another artful adventure this week at we explore some water color techniques. Today we’ll look at ink pads and re-inkers and using a water brush.
This is an easy way to add a little different look to some of your projects.
Stamped flower colored with watercolor technique, cut out and applied to card.
Thanks for joining me again this week! Our Artful Adventure today continues with ideas to jazz up a word art digital download. Digital downloads can make quick word of creating something special, whether you want a piece of decor or a card to send.
Here you can see the original version of the template. Since this version is able to be quickly transformed, you’ll see that it was easy to tweak the color just a wee bit. Only the green has been changed. This makes it such an easy way to personalize it in a way that best fits your color needs.
Original colors of download
The green color was tweaked just a wee bit.
One way to change up your printable is to print it out and then use a fine tip marker to outline some of the words. If you don’t really feel confident with your hand lettering skills, this is a perfect way to have a little practice.
Remember, it doesn’t have to be perfect. Note to self, don’t have so much caffeine before you do this again! Some of my lines are less than desirable, but that’s okay. I was rather pleased with the outcome.
This was meant to show you a quick project, so I only did some of the larger words, which I knew would be much easier to outline. When you try something like this, you’ll begin to notice the little nuances of the particular font of the word you are working on. That is what lettering is all about, the little things that each letter has in common.
Pick some of the words with larger lettering to outline! Glad this isn’t under glass yet, I see I forgot to do part of the “k” in “lucky.”
As long as you are going to print it out, why not make a smaller size and create a card? Here is a card that was created from the same template.
Reduce the template before you print and you can create a card!
Just a little embossing can really jazz up a quick card! The Hollogram Effects embossing powder combines a bit of glitter in a clear embossing powder, which will let the ink color show through!
Card Recipe
TaDah! You are done!
Okay, now that the card is finished, I realized that the Hollogram embossing powder is no longer available! SO….. some other ideas to add a quick bit of sparkle or shine (these are options, not steps):