Simple stamping is so satisfying. (So is alliteration but that’s a different blog post.) Which is why I love Stampin’Up. Each stamp set comes with multiple images that stand beautifully on their own. As a crafter and card maker I find myself adding more and more to my projects until sometimes I spend hours making one card. While this is defiantly fun for me it is not always practical. So in this post I am challenging myself to make a simple card featuring stamping only. Then a second card that adds just a little bit more and a third card that I go all out on. I hope you are inspired by this post to dig out your favorite Stamp Set and Simply Stamp.
Supplies
The Queen Bee Stamp Set
Basic White Cardstock
Pecan Pie Card Stock
Glorious Gingham Designer Series Paper
Pecan Pie Stampin Ink
Blending Brushes
Memento Tuxedo Black Ink
Cane Weave 3D Embossing Folder
Baker’s Twine Essentials Pack
Iridescent Pastel Gems
Stampin Dimentionals
For this card I used Basic White Card Stock for the base (cut to 14.85cm x 10.5cm) and stamped the images in Pecan Pie Stampin Ink. I used a blender brush and the Pecan Pie Stampin Ink to brush the edges with a bit of color. The result is a sepia toned, distressed card that would work for any gender or age. Or almost any age, I think maybe the under 10 years old crowd might prefer more color, although I have it on good authority that they do like bees.
For the stepped up card above I used the same Basic White Card Stock for the base (cut to 14.85cm x 10.5cm). Except for the card base this card is made up entirely of scraps of the Glorious Gingham Designer Series Paper and Pecan Pie card stock.* The larger patterned piece is cut to 3.9cm x 10cm, the two strips are 5cm x 10cm. The scrap of Pecan Pie card stock is cut to 6.3cm x 10cm. I stamped on the solid card stock with the Pecan Pie to get a tone on tone effect. The greeting is stamped directly onto the white cardstock with the Pecan Pie Ink.
This version is the ‘all out’, ‘full metal jacket’, ‘every trick in the book’ card. (Except no singing and dancing because that might be just too weird.) To make this one I started out by stamping the large bee image with Tuxedo Black Memento Ink. I used the Queen Bee die set to cut the bee out. This set is no longer available but to be honest it is just as easy to fussy cut the bee out. I also cut the wings out of velum with the same die set. Again you can lightly trace around the stamped wings onto the velum and fussy cut them out. I cut a tiny heart out of a pecan pie scrap and glued it to the velum to cover up the glue dot used to hold the wings on. This was probably not necessary as I wound up putting one of the awesome gems over it.
The greeting was carefully stamped onto white card stock, I masked off the ‘birth’ part of the birthday stamp with a little piece of post-it note and only stamped the ‘day’ part. I replaced the ‘birth’ with the tiny bee, so I had Happy Bee Day. (Yeah I know, it’s a bit corny.) I used one of the squares from the Stylish Shapes Die cut set to cut out the greeting. I next used the slightly larger square to cut a mat for the greeting out of Pecan Pie.
Time to assemble. I put the bee in place to determine where I wanted to end the ‘split’ in the gingham mat. I marked it and then cut a line between that mark and the mark I had placed on the lower right side (at 3.5cm). I folded each side back and glued the flaps down. The upper flap extended beyond the mat so I cut it off even. I placed the gems onto these flaps so it would look like the gems were holding the flaps open. I popped the bee and the greeting up on Stampin Dimentionals and added a small bow tied with white baker’s twine in the corner of the split to cover the slightly ragged edge.
*A note, I had actually cut out the pieces for the ‘all out’ version of the card first. The idea for the post came to me as I looked at the scraps of pattered paper left over after I had done this. I could not let those beautiful scraps go to waste. I am happy to report there was absolutely no waste, only one piece of the gingham paper was used for both cards.
Product List
