Birthday Card Using My Favorite Things Beautiful Bloom Stamp & Die

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’ve had this stamp & die set for quite a while, but had never used it before. You know how stamps can get to the bottom of a pile and are “still new to you” months after they were released. That’s what happened to this beauty! I needed a quick and easy birthday card for a friend, so I thought that this large flower would be perfect.

I started by stamping the image using Gina K’s Amalgam black ink (Copic friendly) and chose a pink combination of Copics for the coloring (RV02, RV04 and RV17). My coloring skills here were very, very simple. After coloring, I die cut the image out and put it aside.

I knew that I wanted to “pop” the flower up, so using the die and another piece of white card stock (4″x5 1/4″), I cut out another flower. Rather than glue that to the colored flower, I just put it aside and placed thin foam squares (these are new to me, but I LOVE THEM!) on the colored flower.

Before assembling the card, I stamped the outside greeting from Reverse Confetti’s Lots to Say stamp set onto the card front piece. Final assembly involved finding a matching piece of pink scrap card stock for my card front mat. After that was adhered to my white card base, I glued my white card front to the card. All that was left was adhering the colored flower in the open die cut space. (side note: that was probably the most difficult thing about the card…finding the right way to attach the flower).

I love how the pink mat peeks through underneath the flower.

I’m hoping this made sense, but if not, please leave me a comment with any questions. Thanks for visiting 🙂

9Mar2018

Another Sympathy Card with a More Masculine Design

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’ve made more sympathy cards in the last few weeks than I’ve ever made in my life. Here is a card that, at least in my eyes, has a more masculine feel.

My Empty Nest Creations Heartfelt Sympathy Card I came across the Northwoods Rubber Stamp Solid Fern wood stamp when I was cleaning out some of my craft things the other day. I have never used this stamp (it’s probably been in my stash for at least 5 years or so). I decided to give it a try.

Rather than try to mask this image, I simply stamped it several times with different green Distress Oxide inks–Twisted Citron, Peeled Paint and Evergreen Bough. The one thing about Distress Oxides, and Distress Inks for that matter, is that they take a bit of time to dry. I know because I’ve ruined a good many cards with ink smearing.

While the fern images were drying, I focused on the card’s sentiment. I didn’t want to use a black ink for the sentiment because I wanted the card to have a softer look. I did something that I’ve never done before. I stamped the sentiment from Reverse Confetti’s Lots to Say stamp set with Distress Oxide ink. It actually worked beautifully. I used my Tim Holtz Stamp Platform just to make sure that I would get good coverage. It turns out that it didn’t even need a second stamping.

All that was left was to mat the card front. I used Bazzill Tahitian Princess Swiss Dot card stock (I’m not sure that they even make this any more).

I think I need to make some happier cards next time 🙂

Computer Signature

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 🙂