A Simple But Elegant Card

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I have to admit that I’ve been in a creative rut lately. It happens to me quite a bit, but I have learned one thing…go back to simple. It works for me every time. So, that’s what I did. To help with a little inspiration, I checked one of my favorite sketch sites, CAS(E) This Sketch. I love their sketches because they are generally simple, but allow for a lot of creativity.

Here’s their latest sketch…

For my card, I started with a stamp set from Lil’ Inker Designs that’s been out for a while…Filled Heart. It’s such a beautiful stamp set, and the design practically makes your card for you.

I gold heat embossed the heart image onto watercolor paper. The light coloring is from my Light Violet Zig Clean Color Real Brush marker applied with my water brush. It is very subtle, but adds just the perfect softness to the image.

The greeting from the same set is gold heat embossed onto a strip of watercolor paper. I cut fish tail ends on both sides and attached it with foam tape to give it some dimension.

All that was left was matting the card front. I decided on a piece of Recollections gold glitter card stock. This was the first time that I have used this paper, AND I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT!!! It has a nice heavy weight (and it comes in silver, too)!! The photo doesn’t really do it justice. It sparkles beautifully.

After attaching the card front to a white, top folding A2 card base, I added a few gold and iridescent sequins to finish it off. Unfortunately, the photo makes the gold sequins look brown. Trust me, they are a beautiful, shiny gold.

I hope you like it. I’m thinking of adding it to my Etsy Shop.

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24Jan2017

CAS(E) this Sketch #205

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

Another one of my favorite card sketch challenge sites is CAS(E) this Sketch. Their sketches always challenge me to try and think outside the box (which is a pretty difficult thing for me).

Here is their latest sketch…

and here’s what I came up with…

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I started off with my favorite size card base–A2 4.25″ x 5.5″ made from kraft card stock. I then cut my patterned paper from 2 different 6×6 My Mind’s Eye paper pads by eyeballing it. I have to get better at being more precise when it comes to cutting paper 🙂

Using the Pierced Heart Stax dies from My Favorite Things, I cut the hearts out of the top kraft layer, the blue layer and the yellow layer, leaving the red layer alone. I adhered all of the layers so that the hearts lined up.

After seeing it all put together, I thought it looked a little dull, so I added the black strips along the outside cut edge because I knew that my greeting was going to be black. I triple cut the love greeting from the Simon Says Stamp Love die set and glued them together to give a little dimension to the greeting. Even after that, it still looked a little plain, so I pulled out my newly acquired black Nuvo drops and added those above the heart and below the greeting. I also added the small kraft heart in the center from the Pierced Heart Stax smallest die.

I hope you like it!

8Nov2016

CAS(E) Sketch #197

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’m so happy that I’ve gotten involved in a few card sketch challenges. It has really sparked my creative juices.

Here’s the latest sketch from the CAS(E) This Sketch Challenge…

I have to admit, I struggled with this sketch initially. It took a couple of “trial and error” cards to figure out what I really wanted to do. I think where I kept getting stuck was the uphill slant on the design.

Here’s what I decided on…

I started with an A2 white card stock base. I roughly masked off the bottom portion and stamped the Hero Arts Tiny Star background stamp with Versamark ink. I heat embossed with Recollections gold embossing powder. Then I did some ink blending for the sky using Chipped Sapphire and Blueprint Sketch Distress Inks. I was careful to be light handed near the bottom portion to give the idea of a slight glow from the lighted windows. I then die cut the houses using the Tim Holtz Townscape On the Edge die. I cut the houses apart and backed 5 of them with light yellow card stock. I glued them on the diagonal to represent a hill and then covered them with a basket weave embossed (We R Memory Keepers embossing folder) kraft piece. In order to match the greeting to the sky, I ink blended a piece of white card stock. After making sure it was completely dry, I stamped the words from the Waffle Flower Merry stamp set in Versamark and heat embossed with the gold embossing powder. As a final touch, I used my clear Wink of Stella marker on each of the windows.

I hope you like it!

28Oct2016

My First Card Challenge

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’ve been wanting to get involved in card challenges for a while now. It seems like the perfect way to help me grow as a card maker. I tend to create cards that are simple in design, so I thought that the CAS(E) Sketch Challenge would be a great one to start with.

Here’s this week’s sketch…

This week’s challenge has a little different twist. They are asking for pet themed cards to send to a shelter in Minnesota. Be sure to check out the CAS(E) blog for more details.

I’ve had a collection of digital stamps that I’ve been wanting to use for a while. This was my chance.

Here’s my take on the card sketch…

It really was a fun card to make. I printed out my dog image from Bugaboo Stamps and colored it with Copic Markers. I die cut the puppy just off the edge with my Spellbinders Pierced Circles dies. I took the paw prints from the image and printed them on a piece of 4.25×5.5 inch white 80# card stock and colored them with Copics, too. The background was a little too white for me, so I did some ink blending with Tumbled Glass Distress Ink on the top portion of the card. I stamped the “thank you” greeting (Fiskars Thank You Blooms) with Versafine Onyx Black ink. I mounted my pierced circle with fun foam to give it a little dimension. When I started to put my card together on the black card base, I realized that there needed to be some anchor on the left side of the card, so I trimmed my card front by .25 inches to give me that black border on the left side. I printed off an insert for the inside of the card (since the card base is black) with small paw prints.

I hope you like it 🙂

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