Cocoa & Crafts Grassy Grove 1

Hello there! I'm excited to start another round of Cocoa & Crafts today. I opted for the Grassy Grove stamp set for this class as I had special requests for either masculine or sympathy cards, and I thought this set could work well for both of those. You will notice as we go through the projects this month that each one uses a watercolor technique. When I designed the projects I had no idea that this month is World Watercolor Month. How cool is that? 

We're going to start off with a pretty simple card. The additional step of using a little water on the stamped image helps give it a watercolored look and also fills in the image making it look fuller. I kept my card blank, but there is space in the upper right to add a sentiment of your choice. 

Measurements:

• Card Base 5 1/2 x 8 1/2
• Soft Suede layer 4 1/2 x 3 1/2
• Watercolor layer 4 1/4 x 2 5/8

Supplies:

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

A Hand-Penned Partial Die Cut

Hello there! I have been having fun in the crafty space lately. I said I wanted to go through my sets, alphabetically, but that didn't work. Instead, I found some technique inspirations and then found a stamp set that would work with it. 

This card uses the partial die cut technique. Basically, you stamp the image on your card front, and then when you make your die cut "sandwich", you simply don't place the top plate across the whole image. The machine will only cut whatever is under the top plate, so by putting the plate across only part of the image, you will cut out only part of it. Then it's just a matter of using your paper trimmer or scissors to cut from the edge of your card to the die cut. Here's a link to a tutorial if you need a visual. 

The paper strip I used on the inside is 1 inch wide and comes from the Symbols of Fortune Designer Series Paper. It's on sale right now, but it retires in a couple days, so if you like it, don't wait! One other tip, I stamped the larger flowers in Calypso Coral, but I stamped onto scrap paper first to give me a lighter color. 

Here's what I used for this card: 

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Cocoa & Crafts Blessings of Home 4

 Hello there! Today we are finishing up this round of Cocoa & Crafts. I think this is one of my favorite sets to work with. These flowers are so pretty, and so fun to color. Speaking of coloring, you get to color yours with whatever medium you wish for this card, but I do have links below to the Blends that I used to color mine. 

Using the Basic Black marker to color the edges of the die cut really helps to make the flowers pop off the card. It's a rather simple trick that makes a huge difference. 

The measurements are pretty simple as it's just a basic card base (5 1/2 x 8 1/2) and the black card front is 5 1/2 x 4 1/4 with about 3/4 of an inch trimmed off with the scallop die.

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Artistically Inked Thank You Card

Hello there! I had some fun in my crafty space this week. It's been a long time since I've made a card just for the fun of making it. I'm generally designing cards for classes or kits, and there's always some limitations to those (simplicity, supplies, tools, etc.), but this time I got to just create and use whatever supplies, techniques I wanted. I simply love how this came out. 

I pulled out the Artistically Inked stamp set and decided I wanted to make something with it using Merry Merlot. This is a color I really don't use much. In fact, I don't think I've used it since Christmas. It's such a beautifully deep red color which was perfect for my "roses". I wanted something elegant looking so I pulled out Soft Suede and some gold to go with it. I die cut portions of the coordinating die from our Rose Gold Metallic Specialty Paper. I like that the pink color is a lighter shade of the Merry Merlot. I did opt to fussy cut the flowers and leaves rather than using the dies for those as I didn't want the white outline around the edges. 

The background paper I made by stamping the large texture image from the stamp set multiple times onto a piece of Crumb Cake. I used a blending brush to add shading of more Soft Suede all over, concentrating more color on the edges and then ran it through the Timber 3D embossing folder.  I lightly marked where the sentiment was going to go and tore the paper around that area and down the side. I used my fingers and bone folder to rough up the edges a bit and added some more color with the blending brush to the folded over parts of the paper. After I embossed the sentiment on the Merry Merlot cardstock I realized I wanted some gold accents elsewhere on the card, so I touched my finger to a Versamark pad and then lightly rubbed that in various places on the Crumb Cake layer and dusted it with gold embossing powder and embossed. I love how it just highlights some areas of the woodgrain. 

I hope you like this card as much as I do. I think I'm going to give myself a challenge to work my way through my stamp sets alphabetically. I have several that have not seen ink for quite a while, and I think it will be fun to pull them out and play with them again. 

Here's what I used to make this card:

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Cocoa & Crafts Blessings of Home 3

Hello there! Summer has finally arrived here in Wisconsin and I am so happy that my crafty space has air conditioning. This Grammy is not fond of hot weather, not at all. So, I spent as little time as possible in the garden early this morning, and planning on spending the rest of the day crafting in my cool crafty space. 😊

This week we are making this beautiful covered notepad. I think it's one of my favorite projects I've made in a while. I plan on making some more of these to sell at craft shows later this year. I do make a boo boo in the video, so you might want to watch first before you start assembling so you don't make the same mistake I did and have to disassemble to fix. 

 Measurements:

• Base: 8 1/2 x 11 scored on the long side at 5 1/8 & 5 3/8
• Petal Pink layer: 8 1/4 x 4 7/8
• Crumb Cake layer: 8 x 4 5/8

Supplies:

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Cocoa & Crafts Blessings of Home 2

 

 

Hello there! I'm back with project #2 for this month's class. We added a bit of the Petal Pink to our Soft Suede/Smoky Slate palette from last week. We are also pulling in some of the dies that coordinate with this stamp set to make a pretty bouquet of flowers. 

Measurements for this card:

• Basic Gray card base: 11 x 4 1/4 scored at 5 1/2
• Smoky Slate strips: 1/2 x 4 1/4
• Petal Pink layer: 4 1/4 x 4 1/4
• Sentiment strip 1/2 x 3 trimmed down
• Inside Basic White panel: 5 1/4 x 4

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!

Cocoa & Crafts Blessings of Home 1

Hello there! Today we are starting our June Cocoa & Crafts Class with the Blessings of Home stamp set. So, so pretty! I opted for an unusual color combination. Soft Suede and Smoky Slate give it a very vintage, sepia look. It's a simple card to put together, and really doesn't take too much time, even with the coloring. In the video, I show you a simple way to water color the flowers using ink and some water. 

The measurements for this card are:

• Card base: 8 1/2 x 5 1/2, scored at 4 1/4
• Soft Suede layer: 3 3/4 x 5
• Basic White layer: 3 1/8 x 4 3/8
• Sentiment and Smoky Slate strips: 1/2 x 5

I hope you have enjoyed today's post. If you decide to place an order through my website, if your order is less than $150, please use the Host Code listed above (on the right), so I can send you an extra free goody. If your order is over $150 don't use the code as you get to pick out the goody yourself when you place your order. 

Till next time...

God's love and blessings!