Posted: February 6th, 2020 by helen

Handmade Cards | Sentiment Stamps | Part 1

Hi! Do you love making cards? If so, you are in for a treat as we have not one but two posts from Sharon Traynor today, as she showcases some really beautiful cards featuring our new sentiment and verse stamps…

Hello there. There’s some fantastic new stamps and stencils by Visible Image that are due to be released on 15th February (they are available on pre-order at the time of writing this post) and I managed to get my hands on 3 of the sentiment stamps and the accessory stamp set that compliments the sentiments. The accessory stamps are beautiful and they will also make some brilliant stand-alone cards.. watch this spot.. ;-).. but I had a play with all 4 of these sets yesterday and came up with 6 cards.

verse stamps | handmade cards

The cards in this post show that a beautiful verse is not just for the inside of a card….. they work equally well as the main focus. These verses are absolutely gorgeous!

My first idea was to make a ‘set’ of cards that it would be easy to replicate, but that had a timeless, elegant look, because I love to inspire people with cards that are easily achievable. I say ‘set’ because the basic design for these cards is the same, however I’ve changed how the accessory stamps are used as well as the shape of the apertures in each card.

ALTERNATIVE DESIGN IDEA: There are always new people coming into this wonderful crafty world and hopefully a set like this won’t scare them away. However, for people looking for something a little more advanced, it would be very easy to make these into shaker card.

TIP: Although I’ve used a lot of dimension on the layers in these cards, it would be really easy to omit the foam to make flat cards for posting.

Let’s take a look at how these were made.

Firstly, cut 2 pieces of card to size for the front layers and die cut an aperture in each one. TIP: If I made these cards again, I would arrange both layers and secure them with low-tack masking tape, place my die where I wanted the aperture to be and die cut both layers at the same time. That way you can be sure that the holes with line up beautifully.

Once you have the layers die cut, lay the larger one on top of a card blank and lightly mark the aperture opening on the card blank with a pencil.

If you intend to use an open image on the card blank area such as I have done here with the wedding rings, stamp and heat emboss that into place, then use some masking fluid (or a mask) to cover up any parts you wish to remain white. (You should be able to make out the pencil marks I made to mark the aperture in this photo.)

Tape the edges of the card blank with low-tack tape to stop them getting inky, then blend inks to create an ombre effect where the apertures will be. Make sure to leave a little area of white that will appear at the top of the aperture. Set these aside to dry completly.

Once dried, stamp and heat emboss the sentiments. To line up the sentiments into the apertures it is a good idea to place the card blank into a stamping platform, lay the largest mat on top and align the stamp with the opening before getting the stamp to stick to the stamping platform door. Remove the mat and stamp as normal then heat emboss.

You can always stamp some additional images for interest, as I have done on the green version before moving on to assembling the card.

If you are stamping images onto the very top layer do that next. I stamped the wings on the sympathy card, and the flower stalk on the thank you card and heat embossed those with clear embossing ink. I also added some sparkle to the wings with a gel pen.

Assemble the card by firstly erasing any pencil marks, then adding foam (either foam tape or fun foam) to each layer and adhere those to the card blank. Add any additional pieces of the accessory images, like the flower (which I heat embossed, water coloured and glittered with a gel pen)

Here are the cards with the products that have been used.

Stamps Used:

Other Supplies:

Papermill white hopsack card, Spellbindrs deckle edge rectangles and square dies, MFT stitched circles die, Distress Inks (tumbled glass, broken china, peacock feathers, bundled sage, twisted citron, mowed lawn, spun sugar, worn lipstick and picked raspberry), Distress Oxide Inks (tumbled glass, mowed lawn, wilted violet, shaded lilac), Versamark clear embossing ink, WOW! Embossing Powder (gold sparkle, primary ebony, clear gloss, platinum, metallic gold rich), waterbrush, Sakura Gelli Roll Pen (clear star), pencil, eraser, masking tape

You can see my second 3 cards (which have very different designs) by clicking HERE.

Hugs,
Sharon xx

These cards are all so gorgeous Sharon! We love how well our verses work for aperture cards, and you have used the accessory images so beautifully in your card designs. Thank you for your great tutorial too ♡

You will find more of Sharon’s fabulous cards and projects over on her blog.

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