Using My Silhouette Cameo For My Latest Card

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

It’s been far too long since I’ve used my Silhouette Cameo for anything. I decided to check out some designs that I purchased a while ago and that have just been sitting in my design library. I chose a beautiful sunflower design by Sarah Bailey (design #320672). Here’s what I came up with:

I started by cutting 3 of the outlines with some scrap brown card stock. Rather than dealing with individual petal cutouts, I just cut out a solid yellow piece to use as the background. For dimension, I glued all of the brown outline pieces together, and then I attached the yellow background piece.

To create the card background, I simply taped off a square portion (I just eyeballed it…no measuring here 🙂 Using a blending brush, I blended Distress Oxide Mermaid Lagoon. I wanted a bit of a fading effect, so I just applied the ink with a heavier hand at the top of the square. After the blending was done, I spritzed some water and blotted it off with a paper towel.

Before I adhered the sunflower to the card front, I decided that it looked a little dull. I blended some Distress Ink Ground Espresso to the center of the flower and added a bunch of dots with a black fine tip Sharpie. To give the petals more life, I just added some golden orange color pencil. Wink of Stella over the whole flower was the last touch. I attached the flower with foam tape.

The sentiment is from Taylored Expressions Simple Strips stamp & die set (This is one of the most clever sets I’ve seen in a long time), and it’s heat embossed onto black card stock. For balance, I added the corner frames with a fine line black marker and some Nuvo Drops in Bright Gold.

Thanks for visiting 🙂

8Dec2017

Loving the “Loose” Watercolor Look

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I see so many beautiful watercolor cards on Instagram, and I’m in awe of these card makers’ talents. I’m just not one of those free flowing card makers. I tend to stay within my comfort box. I love the look, but I struggle to achieve it. Kristina Werner’s blog post today gave me some inspiration—watercolor smooshing. I can handle that. All you do is put some color (I used Distress Inks) on a piece of acetate, wet it and flip it over onto a piece of watercolor paper and smoosh it around. It leaves you with a very free flowing colored background.

Here’s my finished card using Mermaid Lagoon and Tumbled Glass Distress Inks on a piece of Tim Holtz watercolor paper. I white heat embossed some snowflakes from Hampton Arts Snowflakes stamp set, and using Avery Elle’s Peace, Love & Joy die set, I cut the words out of Colorbok’s white glitter paper (I love it when I can use something that’s been in my stash for many, many years 🙂 I decided on only using peace & joy from my die cuts. After gluing them onto my watercolor base, I knew that I needed to balance the glitter out a bit, so I backed my base with a piece of the white glitter paper (unfortunately, the photos don’t really show it well). All that was left was to attached it to a Neenah Solar White 110# A2 card base…easy, peasy.

I really loved trying this “new to me” technique. Maybe this is just what I needed to get me to move out of my comfort box and give some other techniques a try, too. I’m off to check out Instagram, Pinterest and You Tube to get some more inspiration. Thanks for stopping by!

6Sep2017

Using Older Supplies for My Latest Freshly Made Sketches Entry

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

It’s been over a month since I’ve posted anything here. My creativity has taken a little bit of a back seat while we got our daughter back to college this fall. To give me some inspiration, I went to one of my favorite card sketch sites—Freshly Made Sketches.

Here is the latest sketch…

and here is my take…

I started with a 4″ x 5.25″ piece of white card stock. I masked off the top and bottom portions so that I could use some ink blending in the center. I used a light layer of tumbled glass Distress Ink and then used a more heavy hand with blueprint sketch. To give that area a little more character, I used an old toothbrush and splattered some watered down white paint. It still needed a little bit more, so I splattered some water, too. I just love how easily distress inks blend with water.

Next, using the Simon Says Stamp Funky Snowflake, I die cut it out of my ink blended panel. I knew that I was going to use the inlay technique, so I made sure to keep the center piece. I die cut the snowflake again, but out of fun foam this time. This was going to be the base for my die cut. I still needed a top layer, so I die cut it a third time out of shiny gold paper. Unfortunately, you can’t really see it shimmer in the photo 😦 After gluing them all together, I placed the dimensional snowflake in the die cut space on the panel, and glued it in place along with the blue center piece. The panel was then adhered to a top folding 4.25″x5.5″ card.

All that remained was the sentiment and some blue and gold sequins. The sentiment is from an older Hero Arts stamp set called Holiday Sayings. It was stamped with blueprint sketch distress ink a few times using the Misti stamping tool.

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies Used:

Simon Says Stamp Funky Snowflake die
Tumbled Glass and Blueprint Sketch Distress Ink
Hero Arts Holiday Sayings stamp set
Sequins

26Jun2017

Just Loving the Stampendous Fronds Stamp Set

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I have had this set for quite a while now, and I just love how versatile it is. For this card, I used several of the stamps to create a wreath. First, I lightly drew a circle using one of my circle dies as a template above center on an A2 size piece of white card stock. I chose a few of the stamps in the set giving the wreath a little more unique look and stamped in various shades of Distress Ink (Fossilized Amber, Abandoned Coral, Pine Needles, Forest Moss and Crushed Olive). The berries stamped in Abandoned Coral looked a little washed out, so I took a black fine tip Sharpie and outlined those.

For the circle die cut, I decided on using Crushed Olive and the watercolor “smooshing” technique. I pressed the ink pad on my mat and sprayed it with water. I “smooshed” the circle die cut around until I got the coverage that I wanted. After it was dry, I sprayed a little more water on it to give it a more distressed look. To define the circle, I used my ink blending tool and blended some Vintage Photo lightly around the edges.

I popped the circle die cut up with some fun foam, and used the My Favorite Things Many Thanks die to cut out my greeting. I twice gold heat embossed the die cuts to get complete coverage, and glued them to the circle die. The card front need a little more balance, so I trimmed a little off of the top and bottom of the wreath card front. I gold heat embossed the top and bottom edges of a new A2 sized card front and glued the wreath card front on top. I think that last step just finished it off nicely.

Thanks for stopping by 🙂

18Jun2017

Reverse Confetti’s Bear Hugs Stamp Set

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I just recently purchased this set with the matching dies during the recent Reverse Confetti sale, and I’m so glad that I did. Koalas have always been one of my favorite animals ever since my husband and I held one during our honeymoon in Australia. They are just so adorable!

I started by painting some rainbow stripes on watercolor paper using my Gansai Tambi watercolors. While that was drying, I stamped those adorable koalas onto Bristol paper using my Versamark black ink pad. I heat embossed those images with clear embossing powder. (I love the way that gives me boundaries for my coloring.) Using my Zig Clean Brush markers and a waterbrush, I watercolored the bear images and cut them out with the matching dies.

I used my My Favorite Things Blueprints 13 large pennant die to cut the watercolor piece. For a little bit of dimension, I adhered the bear with the flower with fun foam and glued the other bear die cut with liquid glue.

For the background, I clear embossed a piece of Bristol paper with the Hero Arts Designer Woodgrain wood stamp and ink blended over it with Weathered Wood Distress Ink. I don’t think that I’ve ever used that color before. I love the blue/gray color! I balanced it out with a strip of black striped paper (I used my MFT striped background stamp and black heat embossed a large piece of paper to use for a bunch of cards.)

The sentiment is from the Avery Elle Simply Said: You stamp set and is white heat embossed on a stripe of black card stock. I added a few black Nuvo drops to finish it off.

Thanks for stopping by 🙂

9Jun2017

My First Cutsie Critters Card

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

For the past few years, I’ve seen these incredibly adorable “critter” cards all over the internet. I have admired/loved them, but never had any darling animal stamps of my own. Thanks to Butterflyreflectionsink and her tremendous sale, I was able to purchase some sets (and the matching dies) from W Plus 9 that I’ve had my eye on. They are the Friends for all Seasons sets, and they are just the cutest.

My Empty Nest Creations card using W Plus 9 Friends for All Seasons stamps

I started with a 4.25″ x 5.5″ piece of Bristol paper. Using Hero Arts Soft Sky shadow ink, I stamped several of the animals in all directions on the paper. I stamped them again slightly offset with Memento Tuxedo Black thinking that I was going to use Copic markers. Once I saw just how cute the stamping was with the black and white, I decided to leave them as is and just do a light blue watercolor wash using Tumbled Glass Distress Ink and my waterbrush.

I stamped a couple of the animals on Bristol paper and colored them with my Copic markers, and cut them out with the matching dies. My original thought was to just pop up the cut images with foam tape and place it on the black/white/light blue background. It was just too busy. The colored images didn’t really stand out, so I decided to cut a piece of velum using the Avery Elle Wonky Stitches die to place on top of the black/white/light blue piece. (Before I cut it out, I ran it through my laser printer with a cute “from all of us” greeting.) It softened the background just enough to let the colored images shine. Because velum is such a tricky paper to adhere, I just placed some liquid glue behind where the colored die cuts were on the back side of the velum. To finish, I white heat embossed the “Happy Birthday” greeting from My Favorite Things Birthday Bears stamp set onto black card stock. As usual, I thought the card needed just a little bit more, so I added some Nuvo drops in a few matching colors.

Thanks for stopping by 🙂

1Jun2017

Simon Says Stamp Star Flower Stamp

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

My Mother’s Day Gift

This year my children gave me a Simon Says Stamp gift card for Mother’s Day. I have to admit, I was like a kid in a candy store. My Simon Says Stamp wishlist is incredibly long (I’m talking hundreds of dollars long), so I it didn’t take me very long to blow through that gift card 🙂 The Star Flower stamp was my first choice. I have wanted this stamp since they introduced it months ago.

The design is so intricate that I knew that the rest of my card design had to be very simple. I decided to gold heat emboss it onto watercolor paper. Using my MISTI tool made it easy to get multiple stamps onto the rough paper. Rather than use traditional gold embossing powder, I came across a jar of Zing Brown Sugar powder that I’ve had forever. While it looks like gold, it actually seems just a little less brilliant. I LOVE IT and will definitely be using it a lot more.

Using my waterbrush, I painted small areas of the flower image with Distress Inks (fossilized amber, crushed olive, blueprint sketch, wilted violet, abandoned coral and tumbled glass). To enhance the card, I added a small strip of metallic gold card stock along the left edge. I struggled whether or not to add some sequins or Nuvo drops, but decided that I wanted the flower image to be the star (pun intended).

I hope you like it. I’ve added this set of note cards to my Etsy shop.

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2Apr2017

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #281

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I have been wanting to use my latest Simon Says Stamp Watercolor Friendly Flowers for a while now, and the latest Freshly Made Sketches sketch seemed like a good place to start.

Here is the latest sketch…

This is the card that I made…

I started by white heat embossing the outlined flowers in the set. I pulled out my Zig clean color markers and selected a few softer colors that worked well together. I used a water brush to disperse the color on each petal. Once they were dry, I heat embossed the center portions of the flowers with Zing Metallic Silver embossing powder using my embossing pen. They still needed a little something more, so out came my Wink of Stella clear glitter pen.

On to my card design…I knew that I wanted a little color on the white background where my flowers were going to go, so I lightly ink blended an area in the center with Tumbled Glass Distress Ink. I liked the 3 horizontal stripes on the sketch, but I really wanted my flowers to be the highlight. I found a very old stamp set from TPC Studio called Dots and Stripes. (I’m so glad that I dug into my stamp collection because these stamps are fantastic!) I chose one of the dot border stamps and stamped it 3 times with Versamark ink and used the same silver metallic embossing powder as before.

I fiddled around with my flower placement until I liked what I saw. I glued 4 of the flowers on to the white base and adhered 2 with some fun foam to give the grouping some dimension. For my greeting, I chose the “just for you” stamp from a 3×3 set from Lia Griffith (Hero Arts) and stamped it in black.

I knew that the card base needed to be something other than white, so I went with my next favorite, light gray. I think it coordinates well with the silver embossing.

I hope you like it!

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16Mar2017

Need Something to Brighten Someone’s Birthday?

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’m on a rainbow kick, and I’m pretty sure that it has something to do with this crazy weather we’re having. I really shouldn’t complain when I see pretty much everyone north of the Mason-Dixon line shoveling like crazy. As a former northerner, it gives me flashbacks!

I made this card (along with some others) to give to some friends as a small birthday gift. I wanted something that was pretty generic as far as birthday cards go. I figured that children or adults would enjoy receiving this bright, cheerful card.

I started off by heat embossing, with Recollections Gold Embossing Powder, the Hero Arts Tiny Star Background stamp. I used Barn Door, Mustard Seed and Broken China Distress Inks to ink blend the background. I just love Neat & Tangled’s Celebrate dies, so I knew that I had to gold heat emboss the detailed die cut. So that it wouldn’t get lost on the background, I also cut the die from black card stock and adhered it to the back of the gold die cut. It gave it a slight shadow–exactly what I wanted. To tie in the black shadow on the die, I white heat embossed a happy birthday greeting from the Altenew Birthday Greetings stamp set onto black card stock.

Because I’m so pleased with how this card turned out, I’ve included it in my Etsy shop. I hope you like it 😉

5Mar2017

Using Ink Blending with a Detailed Background Stamp

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

The Latest Freshly Made Sketch Challenge

I just love the Freshly Made Sketch Challenge blog. Their sketches are so wonderful because they allow for a lot of creative freedom. They never fail me when I’m in a little bit of a creative slump. If you’ve lost your creative mojo, you should definitely check them out! They even have all of their sketches archived.

Here is this week’s sketch… and this is what I came up with…

I started with an A2 size piece of Bristol paper and white heat embossed it using the Hero Arts wave background stamp. This was my first time using this stamp. I always worry a bit when I’m using a detailed background stamp, but let me tell you, it stamped beautifully! I just love Hero Arts stamps and my Misti of course.

Using Tim Holtz Distress Inks (Picked Raspberry, Carved Pumpkin, Cracked Pistachio, Mermaid Lagoon and Wilted Violet), I ink blended the whole piece in a rainbow like design. I die cut a frame from the Lil’ Inker Designs Dual Dotted Rectangles die set, and glued it on the left side of my card front. I cut away the part of the frame that wasn’t attached to the card front, and using the same Distress Inks, I ink blended the frame to match the base. I love how the frame got a little bit of the deeper colors. I think this prevented it from disappearing into the background a little.

Now for the sentiment…I’ve been wanting to try the Hello die from Mama Elephant for a while. I gold heat embossed it twice to give it a little dimension and adhered it in the bottom left corner of the frame. I cut off the front portion of the die cut that didn’t fit on the card. For a few final touches, I glued a some sequins just above the greeting. I trimmed the card front just a smidge (is that a word?) because I wanted the Neenah Solar White 110# card base to frame this colorful piece.

I hope you like it. Thanks for stopping by 🙂

Supplies Used:

Hero Arts Wave Background stamp, Recollections Snow and Gold embossing powders, Tim Holtz Distress Inks, Lil’ Inker Designs Dual Dotted Rectangles die set, Mama Elephant Hello die, Neenah Solar White 110# card stock