Altenew’s Happy Bloom Birthday Card

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I’m not sure how new this stamp set is, but it is certainly new to me. I just love the floral arrangement and the banner that’s perfect for the sentiment.

My Empty Nest Creations Birthday Card using Altenew's Happy Bloom set I’m not the best Copic colorer (I definitely need to watch more videos and practice a lot!). I just used two or three color blending for each flower and leaf, and put a few gray shadows on the banner. For a little interest, I used my white gel pen to give a few of the flowers a bit more detail. Some black sequins finished it up. I struggled with what color to mat the flower image and decided on purple to bring out the largest flower. The sentiment is from the same Altenew Happy Bloom stamp set. After all of that, I felt the flowers looked a little flat so I pulled out my Wink of Stella pen and sparkled them up!

Happy spring everyone!

Computer Signature

2Feb2018

A Simple Cut Edge Card Front

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

I think I’m kind of obsessed with the popular emboss resist technique partnered with Distress Oxide inks. With that said, I figured I needed to come up with something just a little different from my normal card fronts.

My Empty Nest Creations Rainbow Emboss Resist Technique using Distress Oxides I started with one of my favorite large stamps—Simon Says Stamp’s Emma Background. I white heat embossed it onto the front side of an A2 top folding card base, and ink blended it with Candied Apple, Spiced Marmalade and Fossilized Amber Distress Oxides. They just blend so smoothly and don’t leave any kind of harsh lines or marks. They are definitely easier to blend than the traditional Distress Inks. To emphasize the beautiful stamp image, I lightly wiped away any ink that was sitting on top of the embossing.

To change things up a bit, I decided to fussy cut around the bottom portion of the embossed image and stamp my greeting from Altenew’s Adore You stamp set below my cut edge. All that was left was to add a few matching sequins.

Thanks for visiting 🙂

Computer Signature

17Nov2017

Non-Traditional Christmas Colors for the Latest Freshly Made Sketches Challenge

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

It’s been quite a while since I joined in on a card challenge. I’ve been busy making my Christmas cards for this year. Since they are almost finished, I thought I’d create a card for one of my favorite card challenge sites, Freshly Made Sketches.

Here is the latest sketch…

and here is my entry.

Any holiday card that I’ve made usually has red and green on it, so I decided to leave my Christmas comfort zone and do something a little less traditional. How about light blue and light green? I really like that color combo, so I went for it.

I started with Ellen Hutson’s Mondo Poinsettia stamp set. I gold heat embossed the images onto Bristol paper, and water colored them with Peeled Paint and Broken China Distress Oxides. I really love the Distress Oxides. They stamp beautifully, and they are wonderful as watercolors. After the leaves and flowers had dried, I cut them out with the matching dies and put them aside.

My Merry Christmas sentiment is from WPlus9 Hand Lettered Holiday stamp set. I just love the pairing of the script and capital letters. I cut Merry out of some silver metallic card stock and heat embossed Christmas with silver embossing powder onto a velum strip. Once that was done, I needed to do a little something with my card base. Plain white just wasn’t going to be right. I decided to do a little light stenciling using the Broken China ink and a Gina Marie Designs stencil. All that was left was to put the card together. I adhered the velum strip just between the two flower groupings and popped up the flowers with some foam tape. The final touch was to add a few sequins and some Nuvo gold drops on the flower centers.

I hope you like it. Thanks for stopping by. Happy Holidays!

28Apr2017

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.

Save

19Apr2017

My Apprehension with Large Floral Background Stamps

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

Let me start off by saying that I absolutely love all of the large floral background stamps out there. I really do. I am in awe of the beautiful cards that card makers create with these large stamps. That said, I’m also a little bit nervous to try and make a card using them myself.

It was The Ton’s Peony Crush Cling Background stamp that got me to give it a try. It is probably one of the most beautiful floral background stamps that I’ve seen. This is the card that I made…

My Empty Nest Creations Purple Peony Card using The Ton's Peony Crush cling background stamp

I started off by stamping the stamp onto Bristol paper with Versamark ink. I heat embossed it with Zing Silver Metallic embossing powder. For coloring, I decided to use some Zig Clean Color Brush Markers—Deep Violet for the flowers, Olive Green for the leaves and Light Blue for the empty spaces. I have to say that I’m still learning how to use these markers. It’s definitely going to take some more practice until I’m completely happy with my results.

For my greeting, I cut a strip of velum and chose some sentiments from Technique Tuesday’s Fringed Dahlia stamp set. I heat embossed it with the same silver embossing powder.

I trimmed the floral piece down to allow for some matting. I adhered the velum strip to the floral piece by attaching it on the back side. Using fun foam for dimension, I attached the floral piece to a piece of white card stock. For the final mat, I used a piece of Swiss Dot card stock in a light purple. All of this was attached to a white, top folding card base.

Once it was all put together, I realized that it needed just a little something more. I found a few light purple sequins, and attached them to the velum strip. That was exactly what it needed.

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

2Mar2017

Need Creative MoJo?

Posted in Cards by My Empty Nest Creations

CAS(E) this sketch #211 To The Rescue

Here’s their newest sketch…

This sketch is perfect for so many beautiful floral stamps out there. Because I just received my first Unity Stamp Company order, I was excited to use one of them. I chose their Steps of Courage set for my floral image.

Here’s my card…

I started with a 4.25 x 5.5 inch piece of Bristol paper. I white heat embossed my floral image on the bottom right corner. I knew that I wanted a soft look, so I pulled out my Zig Clean Color markers and used a water brush to apply the color. After coloring the flowers, leaves and stems, I applied a very light wash of light blue around the image. I drew a rough square around the card making sure to leave a space where the flowers met the bottom.

It took me a while to decide on where to place my greeting. I knew the sketch had the sentiment closer to the bottom, but I felt it detracted from the pretty flowers. I decided to place it higher on the card. I white heat embossed a greeting from Technique Tuesday’s Beautiful Bouquet stamp set on to black card stock. I felt it was a little plain, so I added a slight lavender mat around the fishtail greeting. I then adhered it with fun foam to add dimension.

For some final touches, I glued a few sequins (2 black and 1 iridescent) near the flowers. To soften the brightness of the card, I sprayed some black watercolor over the whole thing to get those small black flecks. I attached the card front to a top folding gray card base.

I hope you like it! Thanks for stopping by 🙂

Supplies Used: Unity Stamp Company “Steps of Courage” stamp set, Technique Tuesday Beautiful Bouquet stamp set, Recollections snow embossing powder, Versamark ink, Zig Clean Color markers, Craft Medley sequins, Bazzill Alpaca card stock, Bristol paper