“Clean and Simple”…..
This blog is a shared blog with two of my sisters. Carina and I are the paper crafters. And we decided to challenge ourselves to create cards that require minimal supplies, layers, embellishments, inks, etc. It’s interesting, because in some ways, I find it is more difficult to come up with a simple card. I will be curious to see how Carina feels.
When we started this blog, we had agreed that at times, we would include a how would Carina make it and a how would Colette make it. So this is our first. As we shared pictures and texts last night, it has made me more curious to see what we come up with.
My blog post has three cards. I am still working on my clean and simple journey, so this may be a blog post of multiple entries, but to date, I have created three. This doesn’t count, of course, cards I have previously made that would fit this category.
The first one I created ended up moving in a slightly different direction than I had planned. I had envisioned a straight line of graduated circles, with the largest in the middle. But I forgot, my strength does NOT lie in straight lines….. so after one attempt, I finally decided to forego straight lines and went with a more random placement of the circles. Which worked out much better for me! I used four different sized circles from the Essentials by Ellen, Bokeh dots stamp set (I love this set, as is probably evident from my IG and blog posts!). I alternated inks, using Gina K’s Christmas Pine and Red Velvet. I finished the card with a simple Merry Christmas from a Honey Bee stamps set. I trimmed it slightly smaller than A2, then inked the edge of the card front with with Christmas Pine ink. I added a layer of craft foam to give it some dimension, then mounted it on a card base I had previously made from Neenah Classic Crest Solar White. Done.
My second card uses a metallic shimmer paper from my stash, in a soft green. I liked the vintage feel of this color. I then used the set of four thin lines stamp from a Mama Elephant stamp set, Basic Borders three times at the bottom of the card front using Hero Arts unicorn pigment ink. . I used Gina K’s Scripty Holiday stamp set to stamp “Season’s Greetings” in her amalgam Jet black ink. I liked how the line echoes the lines at the bottom, it the curvy script softens the card. I then decided it needed one more thing, so I masked off three of the lines on the Mama Elephant stamp, and stamped one thin line of unicorn ink toward the top of the card. Finished! I trimmed it down slightly smaller than A2 and mounted it on a white card base as above. This card does not photograph well due, I think, to the shimmer of the card front. I am including two pictures, one of it still in the Misti, and the second is if the completed card.
My third card uses all Gina K stamps from her 2017 collection, Merry and Bright. I used her holly leaf stamp to stamp in all four corners, but made two corners second generation stamping, to give the appearance of having used more colors. I used her Christmas Pine and Red Velvet inks for the jolly leaves and berries. I used a post it note to cover the berries while I inked the leaves, then removed it to stamp the image. I then used the same post it note to cover the leaves while I inked the berries, and removed it before stamping. I repeated this process in all four corners, using a scrap piece of card stock for the first generation stamping. I then stamped the sentiment in Gina K her black amalgam ink. I trimmed the card front slightly smaller than A2, and mounted it on a piece of red velvet card stock, then secured all of that to card base made from Neenah Classic Crest Solar white. This card went super fast and would be easy mass produce. Here is the finished card:
As always, thank you for reading our blog, and I hope this inspires you to go out and create something!
