September 2024

The first card uses one of my favorite prints - the "boot bouquets".  As my favorite, I didn't have much of it left.  I used an oval die to create the focal panel from the larger scraps.  A white woodgrain print is used for the background and a strip of the salmon pink lattice for the strip across the card.  I used pink cardstock to mat the focal panel and the sentiment.  For the strip across the card I used gold holographic Love from Lizi peel-offs.  To finish the card I added a few Echo Park enamel dots.

For this card I used a large floral print as the background.  The lattice print for the 2 small vertical panels are left over scraps from previous cards.  I used more leftovers, cardstock scraps from the previous card, for the horizontal strip.  Everything is matted with black cardstock.

The next card uses more of the white woodgrain print for the background.  The focal panel uses more of the large floral print and was cut strategically to include the most floral images.  To add some interest to the floral panel I used a white gel pen to add some "doodles" to the corners.  The 2 pink circles were die cut from small scraps of the pink lattice paper.  

For this card I combined 2 large prints.  A white and green leaf print as the background and the black floral print for the focal panel.  I think it works by keeping the layout simple with a single large focal panel and minimal embellishments.  I used a die to create the "label tag" on the right side of the focal panel.  I used a bright green cardstock for most of the matting.  Looking at the card now, I'm not sure why I went with black cardstock for the sentiment panel, maybe to break up all of the green.

Since I was making "cat" cards I started with the cat print paper.  For the first card I paired the cat print with a bright tone on tone yellow zig zag print.  I found adding another print for the background was too busy and took focus away from the main cat panel.  Instead I went with a textured cardstock in a dark teal color which coordinated with several of the images in the cat paper.  I added a fishtail banner in the same dark teal cardstock and stamped a "happy birthday" sentiment.  I was mindful of where I placed the sentiment strip to avoid covering up too much or many of the cats.

The next card uses the same cat print paper paired with a wide striped background.  The background is double matted, first on a rusty red cardstock and then a black cardstock.  To help the cat print panel stand out on the busy background I matted it on black cardstock with a wider 1/4 inch border.  I cut the 3 flags under the focal panel from leftover dark teal cardstock, rusty red cardstock and tone on tone yellow zig zag print paper.  The "just for you" sentiment is stamped in Versafine Onyx Black ink and die cut using a set of nesting circle dies.  For an embellishment I sprinkled a few yellow star brads around the card.

The first card uses one of my favorite pattern papers - the multi-color cameras.  I thought it was perfect to use with Honey Bee's Smile Buzzword stamp and die sets.  For the background I used the bold black and white stripes.  For the diecut "smile" I picked a color that appeared the most in the camera pattern paper.  For this card it was yellow, for the next card (below) it was blue.  For whichever color was used, all of the accents and embellishments were the same color.

This card uses the same paper combination but a different layout.  The blue strip across the card was created using a Fiskars border punch die.  To separate it from the striped paper I added a black glitter Love from Lizi pinstripe peel-off.  For both cards I stamped a sentiment using the Buzzword stamp set.  I decided not to matt the sentiment as I think there enough contrast with the papers.

This was a very simple card using up smaller scraps of pattern paper.  I used a solid color cardstock for the background.  To add some interest and keep the background from being too plain I used a quilt coverplate die.  Bright color matting and a fishtail banner complete the card.