Simply Sketches #11

Onto the next version of Simply Sketches!!

I think I’ve collected enough evidence to prove that the simpler the card the more time it takes for me to design it! For this card I knew the elements I wanted to use- a bird holding a note; I wanted it to be suitable for the men in our life and I wanted it to be as white as possible. Well I guess I put just too many restrictions on one little card! I think (gasp! after two days of designing it *all* I can say is think) I like the way it turned out…

I stamped the bird with brilliance black ink on white CS. Colored it with Prismacolor pencils. Filled up the gaps in black ink with a black marker – so that the black in the image was rich. Printed the sentiment on white CS using my computer. Cut it out and adhered to the card base. Popped up the bird on foam dots and glued the beak to the note so that it looked like the bird was carrying the note in its beak.

• Stamp: Inkadinkado Patterned birds and bugs
• Paper: Papertrey Ink White CS
• Others: Prismacolor pencils, foam dots

Simply Sketches sketchbook

Some of you had asked me to compile all my sketches in one document and am happy to say that I finally got a chance to do that! If you look at the right side bar, under the section “Shortcuts” there’s a link to Simply Sketches Sketchbook. I’ll try to update it now and then. Please let me know if you have any issues accessing/viewing it.

Happy card making!

Simply Sketches #10

This week’s sketch is super simple and hope you love it as much as I do!

I realized that I neither have any manly card nor any general occasion like all the best, farewell, etc in my stash. Thus whenever a non-birthday occasion comes up and I want a card – there’s none! So I’m going to try make cards to fill those needs. It’s so so so hard to make a masculine card!!! I find it so much easier to make a girly one – coz I love to add glitter, pearls and flowers! You can imagine how hard my life’s going to be for the next few days/months/etc – however long it takes to add variety to my pile!

I was at a loss of ideas for manly cards so I decided to take some inspiration from a photo.

source: apartment therapy

Argyle is my favorite!! My DH says that I’m a walking advertisement for Argyle! And nothing says a man better than a nice argyle pattern! So there I’d my design! I *love* how my card turned out!!

I cut the diamonds using Cricut and SCAL. It’s probably not easily visible but the diamonds in between blue and green is cut from Soft Stone CS. Are you wondering how I made all those lines? I hand dotted that line! Yes, unbelievable but I did and it’s so totally worth it looking at the card. Maybe I could’ve made my work easier by drawing a solid line instead of a dotted one but you know what – I don’t think it would’ve been the same! Then I cut the happy using the vladimir script just like here and used the “for you” part of a sentiment from the “Cuckoo” Hero Arts stamp set on vellum. Attached the vellum to the card base using brads.

• Stamps: Hero Arts Cuckoo
• Paper: Papertrey Ink white, New Leaf, Enchanted Evening and Soft Stone
• Others: vellum, brads, brilliance in, black pen, cricut, scal

Tablecloth and placemat set

I’d been long wanting to make a tablecloth and placemat set – mainly because you get many choices of colors and patterns. The readymade ones are so limited in those terms. Especially the patterns. They just don’t appeal to me. I’d promised my DH quite sometime back that I would make one but wasn’t getting time to start this project. Ultimately I decided that I just had to do it. So here it is:

The tablecloth is made from Amy Butler’s Love collection – I bought the home décor cloth. It’s a little heavier than the regular cloth and I like it for a tablecloth – gives it a fall. I made the tablemats from double sided quilted cloth that I bought from Joann. I bound it using bias tape. Doesn’t it look beautiful?!?!? I was lucky in that I got the perfect color for the mats – there are very few color choices in double sided quilted cloths. As you can see I made 4 placemats and for the center I made kind of like potholders. I absolutely love how it looks!

Video game controller card

This shape card was on my list for a long time. Finally it made it’s way to the top, pushing others!

I took a picture from the web and created my SVG. I love creating these one of a kind SVGs and cutting with my Cricut!

The card was cut at 5.5 inch width. Cut all the circles. Then marked A, B, X and Y on the colored ones with sharpies. I kept referencing the actual picture to make sure it was as close to the original as possible. I tried some color pencil shading to make it more natural but alas my shading isn’t all that great so I backed off. I cut the sentiment in Century Gothic font.

You can download the SCUT file here.

• Paper: Papertrey Black and miscellaneous others.
• Others: Cricut, SCAL.

Simply Sketches #9

Winner of Simply Sketches #8 is Neha! Congratulations Neha! Your glitters will be on the way to you very soon!

Sketch for this week:

Why do simple cards take soooo long?!?!? It took me one ruined card and some more minutes to reach to this card! It looks so much better IRL. I especially like the way “you” came out. I looked for fonts and fonts and more fonts till I was satisfied with this! Since I’d seen the Papertrey dies for Wonderful words I ‘d been planning to try out something similar with my Cricut! Love how it turned out!

I embossed the circle using the Nestabilities Circle die. Masked the circle using a die-cut and stamped the polka dot background (had to use my new stamp !) with versamark. Using the negative mask I stamped the flowers and leaves. Cut out “you” on Cricut. I used the Vladimir font. Stamped the sentiment in black.

• Stamps: Hero Arts Blossom Art, Hero Arts Frames and messages
• Paper: Papertrey Spring Moss, Enchanted evening
• Others': Versacolor inks, Versamark, Cricut, SCAL

If you use the sketch to make a card, please leave me a link and I would love to see your creation!