Friday, September 30, 2022

DOTS AND WITCHES

My last card for this week is made with one of my new favorite color combinations -- Parakeet Party and Night of Navy.  I was first going to use Black with the Parakeet Party, but the Night of Navy was such a happy combination, that I totally changed direction.  I can't help but smile when I look at this card, and I hope it makes you smile, too.


This card is all about the dots!  There are dots everywhere you look!  The little witch's hat was made with the Polka Dot Design.  It was stamped in Night of Navy and then the dots were colored with a Parakeet Party Stampin' Blend.

I decided that with a Polka Dot hat, my little Witch needed a Polka Dot Background to match, so I used the Dots & Spots Die to die cut Night of Navy Cardstock and layered it over a Parakeet Party card base.  A perfect complement to the hat, right?


But I wasn't quite done with dots yet?  I needed a few more.  So, I used one of the dies from Labels Ago Dies to create the perfect accent to outline my little witch's boots!  It is mounted on Night of Navy to provide Night of Navy dots and then matted to a slightly larger Parakeet Party Mat.


She looks like she is ready to kick up her heels and dance a little jig, doesn't she?  I think I can actually hear her yelling "WOO HOO!"

She is still dancing as she gets to the inside of the card to send her Happy Halloween wish.


Her boots were stamped with Night of Navy and then the buckles colored with a Daffodil Delight Stampin' Blend and her socks colored with a Parakeet Party Stampin' Blend.

I hope you have enjoyed my BEWITCHING cards this week.  I'll still need to make a few more Halloween cards, but at least I now have a start!

If you would like a detailed tutorial for today's card, you can use this link to download a FREE copy.

For more information on any of the products I used, please click on the images below.

Product List

Wednesday, September 28, 2022

A BEWITCHING JOSEPH'S COAT

I have a fun card for you today that uses the Joseph's Coat Technique to make a colorful Halloween card using the witch's hat from BEWITCHING!

Joseph's Coat is a fun technique, and if you have never tried it, I hope today's card inspires you to give it a try.  

In July I began collaborating with a fellow Stampin' Up! Demonstrator, Kathy Ondus from Simply Kards by Kathi to make short technique videos.   We call our collaboration Connect to Create and each week one of us develops a video to teach you a few tips and tricks.

In August I made a video demonstrating how to do the Joseph's Coat Technique and this card with the witch's hats from BEWITCHING was the card I used to demonstrate the technique.  If you missed the video, you can see it below.


I chose typical Halloween colors, Pumpkin Pie, Granny Apple Green, Highland Heather, and of course, Black to make my card. 


Since the BEWITCHING stamp set does not include any sentiments, I chose the simple "hello" from the Artistically Inked stamp set for my front sentiment.  I wanted to keep the sentiment small so I could show off as much of the Joseph's Coat background as possible.  After I die cut the sentiment with the small tag die from Heron Dies, there was just enough room to add the little spider from BEWITCHING.  This little tag die has small openings perfect for threading through the Black and White Gingham Ribbon.


In keeping with my mantra of "no naked insides" for my cards, I wanted to include another colorful hat, but didn't want to repeat the Joseph's Coat technique for the inside -- or for the envelope.  So, I just grabbed the sponge daubers that I had used to create Joseph's Coat and colored the polka dot hat stamp with the three colors used for the background on the card front.  I then houghed on the stamp before stamping the inside of the card.  Since candy is my favorite thing about Halloween, I grabbed the "WITCH way to the CANDY?" sentiment from last year's retired stamp set, Frightfully Cute.


In the first two photos, you can see that I used this same method for stamping the hat on the envelope.   

If you have any questions on the Joseph's Coat Technique Video, or anything else about this card, please leave a comment below.

I also have a FREE TUTORIAL available to download by clicking on this link.

A complete list of the Products I used for the card is shown below.


Product List

Monday, September 26, 2022

CELEBRATE THE BEWITCHING HOUR

Can you believe that it is already the last week of September?  Halloween is only a month away!

I don't send a lot of Halloween cards, but there are a few people I like to send them to, so I realized I better get busy and start making a few.


This week I will be using the BEWITCHING Bundle.  This is a really cute little bundle that includes the Witch Hat Builder Punch.  I love bundles with punches because punches make cardmaking easy!  

For today's card I combined this bundle with the Celebrate Everything Designer Series Paper (DSP).  You can get this paper for free as a Host Reward.  It includes 48 sheets of double sided 12" x 12" designer paper and has prints and patterns for all seasons of the year.  I chose several for today's card that I thought were appropriate for Halloween.

In order to show you samples of many different patterns I decided to use the smallest hexagon shape die from Beautiful Shapes Dies to cut out several different patterns from the DSP and combine them to create my card front.  I started with the cute ghosts and pumpkins pattern and then because that paper included Crushed Curry stars, I chose other designs with Crushed Curry and or black and white.


The witch's boots and stockings were stamped with Tuxedo Black Memento ink on a circle of Basic White cardstock which was die cut with the large circle die from Beautiful Shapes Dies.  I snipped out a short stripe from the Crushed Curry and White striped DSP, to give her something to stand on so she didn't look like she was floating in space.  The stripes on her stocking and her shoe buckles were colored with a Crushed Curry Stampin' Write Marker.


I stamped her hat on Crushed Curry Cardstock and punched it out with the Witch Hat Builder Punch.  Her hat band is punched from the Crushed Curry stars pattern DSP.  Because the hat had a big spider web on it, I thought I needed to hang the culprit who created that web from the top of the hat.  He was stamped on Basic white and fussy cut.

The BEWITCHING stamp set does not include sentiments, so, I needed to find those elsewhere.  I used the "hey, there!" from Charming Sentiments for the front of my card.  I love that these sentiments have their own coordinating dies.  It allows me to include a sentiment without it becoming the focal point of the card.


I wrapped the hexagon covered card front with three strands of Black Bakers twine and made a floppy bow, and then colored three Rhinestone Basic Jewels with my Basic Black Stampin' Blends to add a bit of bling.  If you don't have Stampin' Blends, you can also use Permanent Markers, like Sharpies, to color your Jewels.



To decorate the inside of my card, I added 4 more hexagons of the Celebrate Everything DSP.  The sentiment is from the retired Frightfully Cute Stamp set from last year.  

Since I'm not a huge Halloween person, I allot myself only one Halloween stamp set each year, and because my BEWITCHING choice this year did not include sentiments, I'm borrowing sentiments from other sets this week.


For more information on the products I used for this card, please refer to the list below.


Product List