variations on a theme

Printed papers are such an easy and fun way to make cards. It's hard for me to resist pretty paper. I'm learning to make several cards when I get papers so I'm not overwhemled with all that paper!

Graphic 45

Graphic 45 is my favorite paper company. Their papers are always rich in colors, beautiful, and unique. You don't have to do much to make a great card with their papers. In fact, as you can see, on the first card, I haven't done anything but put the papers together. No stamping at all. Ok, I did edge the papers with some ink, but no stamping.

Dry Embossing

There are two ways to dry emboss. One way is to use a machine to do the impression. The other way is to use a light box and stylis tool and do the impression yourself. Because I needed to get two different colored parts from one stencil, I found using the light box and stylis tool the best choice for this card.
After embossing, I ran a sander over the paper to highlight the image in white. I could do this because I used colored paper that had a white underside to it. Once you sand it, the white will show through. Double stick tape was used to mount the pieces onto the card slightly raising the image. The words were stamped with dye base ink.

embossing

I love my cuttlebug. I've used different machines to emboss but this is the easiest for me to use, and does the nicest job. I tend to crank out a bunch of embossed papers and then store them. Then they are available for a quick card or when I need an inspirational boost. After embossing the paper, I sanded the raised parts so the white shows the images more clearly. Then I layered the whole piece onto colored paper and then onto the card. The ribbon is tied around these two pieces before I glued them to the card. Flower parts and self adhesive gem finished off the card.

Embossed tree on vellum

This is a card I did a while ago, but it was on my computer and my patient friend, Laura is helping to get me up and going on my blog. This is a stamp from Paper Parachute. I heat embossed it on vellum with black embossing powder,and then painted on the back with twinkling H2Os.