How to Make an Amazing Card-on-Card

This card-on-card design has been around for a while and I have seen it in all shapes and sizes. I was looking for a good design to showcase the lovely large stamps in the Mixed Florals stamp set and settled on this one. Doing a bit of ‘fresh’ research to see what was rolling around out there these days, I came a cross a video by Makingcrafts and loved the addition of the triangle pocket to hold the mini card closed. So I borrowed the idea to use here. I did not use her card measurements because they seemed quite small to me and did not make use of our nice big A4 card stock. The card demonstrated here was re-designed to create a larger card (for both metric and imperial) using the same single piece of card stock.

Supplies

Mixed Florals Photopolymer Stamp Set
Basic Black Card Stock
Basic White Card Stock
Mixed Media Florals Designer Series Paper
Fluid 100 Watercolor Paper
Watercolor Pencil Assortment 1 & 2
Stampin Spritzer
Tuxedo Black Memento Ink Pad
Multipurpose Liquid Glue
Stampin Seal
Stampin Glass Mat Studio or a *Waterproof Surface
Paper Trimmer
Fine Grit Sandpaper*
Artist’s Masking Tape*

Directions

Card Base

Cut a piece of basic black card stock to 16.5cm x 14.85 (6-1/4″ x 5-7/8″). Score at 11cm (4-3/8″). Fold and Burnish on score line.

Cut a small square from basic black card stock to 4.5cm x 4.5cm (1-3/4″ x 1-3/4″). Cut this piece diagonally so you have a triangle. Discard one of the triangles as we will only be using one.

Mini Card Base

Using the same basic black card stock cut a piece to 14cm x 10.85 (5-1/2″ x 4-1/4) Score at 7cm (2-3/4″). Again folding and burnishing on sore line.

Decoration for Card Base

For the larger side of interior base cut a piece of Mixed Media Florals Designer Series Paper to 10.5cm x 14.35cm (3-1/8″ x 5-5/8″). Adhere to card base leaving an equal border of base showing.

The narrow inside piece can either be left plain or decorated with a piece of Mixed Media Florals Designer Series Paper cut to 5cm x 14.35cm (1-3/4 x 5-5/8″). The narrow front side will accommodate the same size piece of Designer Series Paper you can either cut one from the same pattern or choose an alternate pattern.

To decorate the triangle cut a piece of the Mixed Media Florals Designer Series Paper to 4cm x 4cm (1-1/2″ x 1-1/2″). As we did above cut this square in half forming a triangle and discard the extra piece.

Place glue on the right and bottom edges of the triangle and adhere down to the bottom right of the front flap. Line up the triangle over the DSP so that it does not interfere with the card base border. See photo.

Decoration for Mini Card

Cut two pieces of basic white card stock to act as a card ‘liner’, 10.35cm x 6.5cm (2-1/2″x 4″) to give you a place to write or stamp an additional greeting. If your mini card is white these pieces will not be necessary.

For the exterior of the mini card I cut a piece of Fluid Watercolor 100 paper to approximately 9cm x 13cm (3-1/2″ x 5″) This piece will be trimmed down to 10.35cm x 6.5cm (2-1/2″x 4″) when we are finished.

Tape the watercolor paper down to a firm water resistant surface like a glass mat or a plastic cutting mat. Be sure to tape all sides. This will help the paper to dry flat and make it easier to do any blending you might want.

You will need three or four colors of water color pencil, here I used Calypso Coral, Balmy Blue, Flirty Flamingo and Granny Apple Green. And a piece of fine sand paper.

Rub the pencils over the sand paper and allow the pigment filing to fall in little piles over the watercolor paper. Gently rub or shake the filings so that they cover the paper. There should be thick and thin spots, don’t worry there is no right or wrong way to do this. You can leave the pigment in little piles (as I did here) or you can gently rub the pigment into the paper for a softer more blended look.

Mist water over the paper. You want to dampen the entire piece. From here you have several options, if you like the way it looks leave it to dry. You can achieve different looks by lifting the glass or cutting board so the color runs and/or mixes.

To achieve lighter spots you can spray again after the paper has dried. Instead of misting, you can actually puts drops of water onto the paper, just be aware the drops of water will move the pigment and create a circle-like effect with the center being lighter than the edges.

When the paper has completely dried, stamp your image using Memento Tuxedo Black. Trim to the measurements listed above.

Place dimensionals to pop-up this piece and place on the front of the mini card.

Finishing

Dry fit the mini card to the base before gluing down. The mini card should be able to be placed in the center of the card base. This will allow the right edge to tuck into the small triangle.

Note 1: In my samples, the mini card did not always have a equal border when the card was opened, it sometimes needed to be placed slightly closer to the fold line for the card to look nice on the side. I doubt this would be noticeable to any one else but I wanted to mention it in case there were other perfectionist like me out there.

Note 2: Multipurpose glue was spread over the back of the mini card to adhere it down to the card base. You can use most any adhesive here but I wanted the slight ‘slip’ that using glue can give you.

Thank you so much for reading here with me today. I hope you enjoyed this simple fun fold card and the fun and interesting water color background. I do hope you give this card go, I could (and did) play for hours with the sandpaper and water color pencils. Every background I did turned out differently. I will be definitely be using this idea again. Want more information about this technique? Check out the wonderful Painting & Chocolate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0q1C0j7s3U&ab_channel=PaintingandChocolate I love this channel and am subscribed, if you are interested in doing more with your watercolor pencils and maybe even exploring some fine art, Painting & Chocolate is your place to begin!

If you have time in your busy day you should check out Makincraft’s video and give her some thumbs up love https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPvylH5Y9F8&ab_channel=Makincrafts. Not only does she demonstrate her version of this card but she makes some totally cool see-through butterfly stickers. I have tried this for myself with limited success. The problem is finding good quality clear packing tape locally (UK). I can attest the cheap stuff does not work very well and tends to tear when you are trying to remove the stamped paper. Look out Amazon here I come.

*Items not available in my online store.