For some reason, it seems like I never have enough birthday cards! Sometimes it seems like I could just get by with a ‘Happy Birthday’ stamp and leave it at that. Just kidding! You know I couldn’t do that. Yet it brings up the question of selecting greetings if you are trying to make up a batch of cards in advance. How do you decide what and how many to make of your greetings? Actually, you don’t have to make it such a hard decision!
One way to deal with this problem is to go ahead a make a bunch of cards and leave off the greetings! When you find a stamp set that has a lot of different greetings or sentiments they usually tend to be a similar size. That makes it easy to make cards and just leave off the sentiment, and stamp it later! Then all you have to do is have the stamp set easy to find, grab your ink pad and stamp an appropriate sentiment!
Here is an example of using this technique, using a double-sided, printed paper.
- Cut the paper to fit the front of the card. Cut a strip 1″ to 1.25″ wide. Make sure your strip is large enough for the sentiment if your stamp set has larger stamps. You could also use the busier side of the paper for your bottom strip, leaving plenty of space to stamp above the dividing line of your papers.
- Now you can use both sides of the paper on your card, and coordinate the top and bottom.
- An additional strip was added from coordinating paper on one card, and some shimmer trim on the other. I love shimmer trim! It has an adhesive side, and quickly jazzes up a project!
- Next, add any other embellishments. The flowers and leaves were made using the Springtime Wishes stamps and Thin Cuts.
If you want to stop here, you can put your cards away, and keep you stamps and an ink pad handy to stamp an appropriate sentiment as needed.
Here are a few great sets you may be interested in because of all the occasions they will cover. Plus, Close to My Heart is having their Stampaganza during the month of March. It’s a buy 2, get 1 free. You all know the rules… the free one can’t cost more than the one’s you purchase. But this would be a great time to stretch your dollar for purchasing some of the larger sets.
This could also be a great time to share stamping with a friend. Make up a few cards and help her get comfortable with basic inking and stamping techniques. Then she could use a set of greetings and an ink pad to take this idea home. What is better than a new crafting buddy? You can’t convert everyone to enjoy your favorite hobbies, but you never know who will find out they enjoy sharing in a fun pastime with you!
Be sure to come back to see another One Sheet Wonder this week! We’ll take one sheet of printed paper to create a stack of cards! Links to products used today are below, for your convenience. But first….
It’s Make it Monday! Alison, over at AlisonDayDesigns.com, is prepping for Easter. Remember it comes kind of early this year, March 27th! Hop on over and see what she’s doing!
Here are some quick links to the main products used on today’s cards:
Finding the Words Occasions stamp set
Until next time…
Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures!