September 7, 2017Celebrate, Create, Learn

Split Stamping Technique

Close To My Heartbaby, card, cardmaking, floral, flower, how, idea, split, spring, stamp, stamping, technique, to 20 Comments

In honor of National Stamping Month, we thought it’d be fun to share with you some stamping techniques on the blog—because no crafter can ever have too many stamping tricks up her sleeve, right? 😉

Today’s post is going to teach you what we call the Split Stamping technique.

This technique is exactly what it sounds like: You split your stamp image. There are a few different ways to do this.

One of the easiest ways is to stamp an image onto a piece of cardstock and then cut it into pieces, like the elephant below.

Cutting up an image and reassembling it on your artwork is a unique way to draw more attention to your stamping.

Another way you can “split” your stamp is with masking. Not sure what we mean by “masking”? Masking is when you cover up part of your stamp or paper before stamping an image.

Here, we attached a strip of cardstock across the center of our card with just a little bit of adhesive so it wouldn’t slide around. Next, we stamped our flowers along the top and bottom of the card, overlapping them slightly with the strip. We then carefully peeled off the cardstock strip, removed any leftover adhesive with our Rub & Remove™ eraser, painted our flowers, and then stamped our sentiment.

For a more advanced spin on this technique, try incorporating the piece of cardstock you use for the masking!

For this card, we cut both pieces of White Daisy cardstock, attached the smaller piece to the center of the larger piece with a little bit of adhesive, and then stamped our flowers over both pieces. Next, we carefully separated the smaller piece of cardstock from the larger one, painted our flowers, and popped the piece up on Bashful cardstock with 3-D foam tape. To add even more dimension, we also stamped some of the blossoms on scrap paper, painted them, trimmed them out, and then attached them over the matching blossoms with 3-D foam tape.

What do you think of the Split Stamping technique? Tell us in the comments below! And be sure to follow the blog all month long to see even more stamping techniques! 🙂

Recipes

4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″ Congrats Card (Vertical)
D1726 My Acrylix® Sweet Baby Stamp Set, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5941 Bashful Cardstock, Z3271 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z3361 Whimsy Ribbon Pack, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z3188 Paintbrush Set, Z1979 Marvy® Uchida® LePen™ Journaling Pen

4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″ Best Wishes Card (Horizontal)
D1747 My Acrylix® Happily Ever After Stamp Set, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z3271 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z4014 White & Gold Twine, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z3188 Paintbrush Set

4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″ So Happy for You Card (Vertical)
C1693 My Acrylix® Many Congratulations Stamp Set, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5941 Bashful Cardstock, X5953 Charcoal Cardstock, Z3271 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z3188 Paintbrush Set

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September 5, 2017Create, Learn

Step-by-Step Instructions: From the Heart Card Kit

Close To My Heartcard, flower, from, heart, how, instruction, kit, Month, September, stamping, to 19 Comments

September is National Stamping Month, and we’ve designed an incredible card kit with elegant, layered stamping to celebrate!

It’s called the From the Heart card kit, and if you love stamping, you’ll love all the ways you can play with the interchangeable stamp designs to achieve a variety of looks for your cards.

If the thought of creating cards like these feels a bit daunting, don’t worry! The kit comes with helpful instructions to walk you through the assembly—just take a look!

Here are the pieces you get in your kit. You get enough to create 12 cards, plus the beautiful From the Heart stamp set and 12 envelopes. Once you punch out these pieces, follow the instructions below to create your cards.

Step 1

All the folds come pre-scored, so all you have to do is fold along the score lines. Starting with your card base (A), turn the gold foil side down and sharply fold the two outside flaps inward. Add adhesive to the top of these flaps.

Step 2

Fold your card base in half along the score line, attaching the front of the card base to the top of the flaps. This will form a pocket.

Step 3

Starting with the detached end of the large flap, make sharp folds along the score lines, accordion style, as shown.

Step 4

Add adhesive to the bottom of first fold (the white side).

Step 5

Insert the pull insert (B) into the pocket in your card base (A), keeping B centered. Attach that first fold from step 5 to the edge of the pull insert, keeping the edges flush. Now when you pull on the insert piece in and out, the large flap should pop up and down!

Step 6

Slide your card closed and then add adhesive to top of first fold (over gold foil).

Step 7

Attach supporting piece (D) to the top of first fold. This supporting piece is a little bit larger than the area where you added the adhesive, so keep the top edge flush with the crease and center it on the flap. When it’s in place, the edges of the supporting piece should overlap the gold foil around the edges of your card.

Step 8

Stamp your choice of sentiment and flowers onto your card front (C). When stamping the layers of your flowers, add extra depth by using different colors for each layer.

Step 9

Stamp leaves and twigs in between flowers. Again, add depth by stamping all of the layers in different colors. This stamp set allows you to get incredible detail in your stamp images for a beautiful finished card.

Step 10

Set aside your card front and go back to the base for a moment. Slide your card open, and then stamp your choice of inside sentiment onto the card base. The From the Heart stamp set includes four large sentiments designed especially to fit this space.

Step 11

Once your stamping is dry, slide the card closed and add adhesive to second fold of large flap. This is the section right next to the supporting strip (D) that you attached, and it is where you will attach your card front.

Step 12

Attach your card front (C) to the second fold, lining up the edges with the supporting strip (D).

Make your own beautiful, interactive cards using this card kit, available only during September! If you have any questions about how to assemble these cards or about the card kit itself, tell us in the comments below!

Happy crafting! 🙂

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June 20, 2017Learn

New Spins on Old Techniques

Close To My Heartcard, how, New, old, scrapbook, spin, technique, tip, to, trick 14 Comments

Like the world of fashion, trends in papercrafting are always changing. One day it’s all about brads and buttons and the next it’s all about sparkles and shimmer!

Just because an artistic technique or aesthetic may no longer be “on trend” doesn’t mean that you can’t still use it. You just need to freshen it up!

To show you what we mean, we dug through our archives to find artwork created with some old-school techniques. We then asked our artists to create new artwork using these same techniques…with a modern-day spin!

They’ve come up with some amazing alterations to these techniques that will make your artwork amazing!

Old Technique:

Distressing the edges of your titles with ink. Remember when we did this for everything? Distress all the things! 🙂

New Spin:

Instead of distressing your titles, try stamping them using the rock n’ roll technique. It keeps your edges clean, which is the new trend, but just like distressing, it gives your titles dimension and color variation.

Old Technique:

Ripping and inking your edges, aka, making your artwork look like it’s 100 years old. And remember how burned edges were such a thing? Ripping and inking your edges with black ink mimicked that trend, which you can see on the card below.

New Spin:

Instead of inking your ripped edges, try leaving your ripped edges un-inked and inking your clean edges instead, using a color other than black or brown! The key is subtlety! You can see we added some faint pink inking to the edges of the pink paper here. It helps to add some depth to the paper without screaming “I’m distressed!”

Old Technique:

Stippled titles. Remember this one? You’d spell out your title with stickers, make a million little dots over the stickers with a marker, and then peel off your stickers to reveal your finished title.

New Spin:

Watercolored titles. Instead of stippling over your stickers with a marker, paint over them with a wide paintbrush and some watercolor paint. We used this technique with a “hello” sticker from our Springtime Complements to create the title below.

Pretty neat, right?

Just because papercrafting trends change doesn’t mean you need to throw out your bag of tricks. All you need to do is find a way to make your old tricks feel new again!

Which spin is your favorite? Tell us in the comments below!

Recipes

4 ¼” x 5 ½” Welcome Baby Card (Horizontal)
C1668 My Acrylix® Baby Bundle Stamp Set, X7219B Little Dreamer Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 1292 Crystal Blue Cardstock, Z2841 Glacier Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2895 Lagoon Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3189 White & Gold Ribbon, Z3247 Simple Chevron Embossing Folder, Z3285 Cricut® Flower Market Collection, Embossing Machine

Cricut® Shapes:
Flower Market
1″ Shift+Title <?> (p. 8)
1 ½” Shift_Title <R> (cut 4, p. 14)

4 ¼” x 5 ½” Happy Birthday Card (Vertical)
B1537 My Acrylix® Birthday Sparkles Stamp Set, X7219B Little Dreamer Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z2840 Thistle Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2896 Smoothie Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3189 White & Gold Ribbon, Z3312 Gold Glitter Gems, Z3285 Cricut® Flower Market Collection

Cricut® Shape:
Flower Market
2 ¼” Flower-2 <7> (p. 7)

12″ x 12″ Hello Page
CC1219 Swirly Seashells Stamp + Thin Cuts, x7221B Prickly Pear Paper Packet, Z3254 Enchantment Fundamentals Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z3146 Watercolor Paper, Z3271 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3307 Springtime Complements, Z3216 White Twine, Z3089 Grey Enamel Gems, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z3188 Paintbrush Set, 3505 Watercolor Pencils, Z3285 Cricut® Flower Market Collection, Pen

Cricut® Shape:
Flower Market
2 ½” Flower-2 <7> (p. 7)

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April 27, 2017Create, Learn

2 Fun Spins on the Classic Card

Close To My Heartcard, flap, fold, folding, graduation, interactive, pop, thank, Up 22 Comments

Looking for some cardmaking inspiration? We’ve got you covered! Today we’re sharing two awesome ideas to take your cards to the next level!

Up first is this card that opens in the middle, like a beautiful set of French doors 😉 . To create the base for this card, cut a piece of cardstock that is 4″ x 11″. Fold the ends in until they meet in the middle, about 2 ¾” from each end, and then add patterned paper to the inside and outside of the “flaps” for more personality.

You can also have a lot of fun with the outside of this card. We created two halves of a flower on the flaps, strung a cute sentiment on some twine like a tag, and tied it around the card so opening this card feels like opening a present!

If you’re feeling really adventurous, try making a pop-up card! There are a bunch of free tutorials on the internet. We modified this one from craftsy.com for our card.

Like our first card, we finished off the card by wrapping twine around it. This is an especially great idea for pop-up cards because it holds the card closed nicely.

Which of these two cards is your favorite? Tell us in the comments below! 🙂

Recipes

“Thanks” Card
D1646 My Acrylix^® Finding the Words Stamp Set, X7217B Some Kinda Wonderful Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5788 Raspberry Cardstock, Z2812 Raspberry Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z1799 Silver Shimmer Trim, Z1151 3-D Foam Tape, Z3285 Cricut^® Flower Market Collection

Cricut^® Shapes
Flower Market
2 ½” Flower-1 <Daisy> (p. 46)
1 ½” Icon <1> (p. 1)
1 ¼” Icon <1> (p. 1)

“Graduation” Card
B1480 My Acrylix^® Diploma Day Stamp Set, X7217B Some Kinda Wonderful Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z2805 Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3216 White Twine, Z3274 Clear Sparkles, Z1204 Bone Folder, Z1151 3-D Foam Tape, Z3285 Cricut^® Flower Market Collection

Cricut^® Shapes
Flower Market
3 ½” <Daisy> (p. 46)

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February 2, 2017Create

Valentine’s Day Ideas for School

Close To My Heartcard, cupcake, day, emoji, gift, ideas, kids, Rush, school, Sugar, teacher, valetines Leave a comment

Valentine’s Day holds a special place in our hearts because it’s a celebration of card-giving and gift-giving—two of our favorite things! Combine that with loads of sugary sweets, and we’re in heaven! 🙂

Since we love both sweets AND all things paper, we’ve whipped up a few fun ideas for your kids’ school valentines that combine the two—and of course, we’ve also got a cute gift idea for school teachers as well! For these Valentine’s projects, we turned to our treat-themed Sugar Rush papers and embellishments.

If you’re looking to make lots of cards for your kids’ classes, try making smaller 3″ x 3″ cards. Small cards will help make your paper stretch further, and you can decorate them much quicker! Attach a treat to the inside or back of each card, and you’re set!

We chose to use the Emojis stamp set because we wanted our cards to be playful—and what could be better for that than silly faces? 🙂 To round off the cards, we used some of our Sugar Rush Complements and dots, which perfectly match the papers. Easy peasy.

Have fun “testing” your kids’ candy while designing your own mini card designs—and maybe even let your kids get in on the fun!

Don’t forget to give those school teachers something sweet, too! A little thoughtfulness can go a long way!

How about a cupcake with a cute tag? This tag uses our Sugar Rush—Cardmaking stamp set, which has sentiments that are perfect for pairing with desserts.

When you’re done using this stamp set for creating a school teacher gift, use it to create Valentine’s Day cards and gift tags for your sweetheart, kids, and friends. Then use it again and again for birthdays and other occasions all year long wherever a sweet dessert is involved. 😉

Recipes

3″ x 3″ Valentine’s Cards
C1669 My Acrylix® Emojis Stamp Set, X7215B Sugar Rush Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X7215C Sugar Rush Complements, Z3271 Archival Black Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2810 Blossom Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z2843 Canary Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3310 Sugar Rush Dots, Z3311 Sugar Rush Washi Pack

3 ¼” x 2″ Valentine’s Tags
C1671 My Acrylix® Sugar Rush—Cardmaking Stamp Set, X7215B Sugar Rush Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X7215C Sugar Rush Complements, Z2810 Blossom Exclusive Inks™ Stamp Pad, Z3310 Sugar Rush Dots, Z3216 White Twine, Z3286 Adventure Ribbon Pack, Z3169 Cricut® Artbooking Collection

Cricut® Shapes:
Artbooking
3″ Photo Mat 1 <AllStar> (cut 2, p.83)

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November 17, 2016Celebrate

Free Thanksgiving Printables!

Close To My Heartcard, dinner, download, free, name, party, place, print, printables, setting, thanksgiving 2 Comments

Thanksgiving is right around the corner, but it’s certainly not too late to add some personal touches to your dinner plans.

Last year we created three free printables for you to use at your Thanksgiving feast:

Dinner Party Thank You Card
Dinner Party Children Conversation Starters
Dinner Party Adult Conversation Starters

These printables are generic enough to use year-round, but they’re also really fun for your Thanksgiving dinner.

You can see a fun way to use the conversation starters in the paper pumpkin above. To create the pumpkin itself, we cut 12 pumpkin shapes from our Cricut® Artistry collection, folded them in half, and attached them together to create an accordion effect. Then we looped some Fern ribbon together, tied it together with Fern twine, and attached it to the top with glue.

We also have this dinner party thank you card. Again, it’s generic enough to use for any formal dinner party, but it adds a beautiful, personal touch to your Thanksgiving place settings.

We hope these printables make your Thanksgiving one to remember! Click on the links below to download and print these free printables!

Download Dinner Party Adult Conversation Starters
Download Dinner Party Children Conversation Starters
Download Dinner Party Thank You Card

Tell us in the comments below how you like to personalize your place settings. The more ideas we share with each other, the better!

Recipes

3″ 3-D Pumpkin
X7211B Jeepers Creepers Paper Packet, X7212B Swan Lake Paper Packet, X5777 Fern Cardstock, Z3288 Enchantment Ribbon Pack, Z3247 Simple Chevron Embossing Folder, Z3190 Cricut® Artistry Collection, Z3285 Cricut® Flower Market Collection, Embossing Machine, Calligraphy Pen

Cricut® Shapes:
Artistry
3 1/2″ Icon-2 <Hlloween> (cut 12, p. 43)

Flower Market
1 1/2″ Shift+Flower-2 <O> (cut 2, p. 19)

Thank You Card
X7211B Jeepers Creepers Paper Packet, X7212B Swan Lake Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, 1243 Goldrush Cardstock, Z3288 Enchantment Ribbon Pack, Z2445 ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Barely Beige Marker, Z2452 ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Golden Yellow Marker, Z2467 ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Warm Grey 4 Marker, Z2457 ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ Marigold Marker, Z2060 Thin 3-D Foam Tape, Z3169 Cricut® Artbooking Collection, Calligraphy Pen, Hole Punch

Cricut® Shapes:
Artbooking
2″ Icon <b> (p. 72)
2″ Shift+Icon <B> (p. 72)
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October 28, 2016Celebrate, Learn

Embossing with Two Powders

Close To My Heartcard, christmas, embossing, how, powders, stamping, technique, tip, to, trick, two 7 Comments

If you’re a big fan of embossing, we’ve got a fun idea to share with you today: using TWO different embossing powders on the same stamped image!

We decided to use this technique on our My Acrylix® Yuletide Joy stamp set because it has so many intricate designs—and maybe we wanted an excuse to start making Christmas cards. 🙂

So let’s dive in to the technique. The star and stocking cards above both use the same basic technique. We simply stamped the image with VersaMark™ ink, added the two embossing powders, and then set the images. This was easy enough because of where we wanted to put the powder and the look we were going for, but the present card required a little more precision, so we decided to use masking!

We taped off everything but the ribbon, inked the image, removed the tape, stamped, added silver embossing powder, and then heat set the powder. We repeated this same technique for the gold wrapping and ended up with a wowie finished product.

What fun embossing ideas do YOU have? Tell us in the comments below! And be sure to share your artwork using the hashtag #ctmhembossing.

Recipes

4 ½” x 4 ½” Star Card
S1610 My Acyrlix® Yuletide Joy, X7212B Swan Lake Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, X5929 Whisper Cardstock, Z891 VersaMark™ Ink Pad, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z2066 Ranger™ Princess Gold Embossing Powder, Z2067 Ranger™ Silver Super Fine Embossing Powder, Z555 Craft Heater

4 ¼” x 5 ½” Noel Card
S1610 My Acyrlix® Yuletide Joy, X7212B Swan Lake Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z891 VersaMark™ Ink Pad, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z4014 White & Gold Twine, Z2066 Ranger™ Princess Gold Embossing Powder, Z2067 Ranger™ Silver Super Fine Embossing Powder, Z555 Craft Heater

4 ¼” x 5 ½” Stocking Card
S1610 My Acyrlix® Yuletide Joy, X7212B Swan Lake Paper Packet, 1385 White Daisy Cardstock, Z891 VersaMark™ Ink Pad, Z1263 Bitty Sparkles, Z3274 Clear Sparkles, Z3289 Uptown Ribbon Pack, Z2066 Ranger™ Princess Gold Embossing Powder, Z2067 Ranger™ Silver Super Fine Embossing Powder, Z555 Craft Heater
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September 26, 2016Learn

4 Ways to Color Your Create Kindness Cards

Close To My Heartbrush, card, coloring, Create, help, idea, inspiration, kindness, kit, marker, paint, pencil, shimmer, stamping, technique, watercolor 2 Comments

One great thing about our Create Kindness cards is how easy it is to add your personal touch to them before giving them to others in a personal way. Today we want to inspire you with even more ways to color these cards that you may not have thought about before.

1. Watercolor Pencils

You can use our watercolor pencils wet or dry to color in these cards. If you use them dry, they work like colored pencils. If you want to use them wet, you can do it two ways: Either get the tips of the pencils wet or use a waterbrush to blend the colors afterward.

2. Watercolor Paints

Watercolor paints are another great way to color these stamps. The circles that come in the kit are regular cardstock, not watercolor paper, so just make sure you use more paint than water if you choose this route. Our waterbrushes make this easier. You also might find that you’ll need a bit more adhesive to attach the circles this way.

3. Monochromatic

Here we used our ShinHan™ Touch Twin™ alcohol markers to color in the cards so they match the card bases. Going monochromatic gives the cards a unique look!

4. Sparkles & Shimmer

Jazz up your cards with our bitty sparkles and shimmer brush. Bitty sparkles are just the thing to up the drama on these bitty cards! And if you’ve never used the shimmer brush before, it’s a lot of fun! Follow these steps to get started:

Remove the neon clip, twist the lid on, and squeeze the pen while brushing onto a scrap piece of paper.
Once you get the amount of shimmer on your brush that you like, start brushing over your flowers!
Since the shimmer brush tends to smear watercolor pencils or paints, be sure to color your stamped images using markers.

There’s only one week left to purchase the Create Kindness card kit (or more card bases if you already have the stamps), so hurry and get yours today! We know you’ll love finding new ways to personalize these cards and to leave them for others to brighten their day.

Happy coloring!

Recipes

3″ x 3″ Watercolor Pencils Cards
CC1145 Create Kindness Card Kit, 3505 Watercolor Pencils, Z3224 Waterbrush—Small Round

3″ x 3″ Watercolor Paint Cards
CC1145 Create Kindness Card Kit, Z3132 Watercolor Paints, Z3226 Waterbrush—Medium Flat, Z3224 Waterbrush—Small Round

September 15, 2016Celebrate, Community, Create

31 People Who Could Use a Few Kind Words Today

Close To My Heart31, card, cardmaking, could, Create, idea, inspiration, kind, kindness, people, today, use, who, words 12 Comments

Cards are about so much more than words inside pretty paper. They are a way to brighten someone’s day, to show you appreciate the way in which someone has touched your life, to acknowledge what someone does to make the world a better place. That’s what our Create Kindness card kit is all about—using cards to spread kindness, especially to those who may not expect it!

Here are some people that you may not normally think to give a card to but who would certainly appreciate some words of encouragement or an unexpected “thank you”:

Mailman
Barista
Babysitter
Housecleaner
Principal
Child’s school teacher
Your old school teacher
Church leader
Janitor
Police Officer
Fireman
Carpool driver
Crossing guard
Bus driver
Cab driver
Pilot
Hotel housekeeper
Nursing home patient
Restaurant server
Old high school friend
Nurse
Hair stylist
New mother
Soldier
Veteran
Cashier
Widow or widower
Former roommate
Gym instructor
Childhood friend
Coach

Take a moment TODAY and leave a card for someone on this list. Who knows, you could be exactly what they need to get through a rough day.

Who else would you add to this list? Tell us in the comments below!

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Make It from Your Heart

Tag Archives: card

Split Stamping Technique