Sweet and Shabby Chic

I have two cards to share tonight with two very different looks. I'll start with the one that's pretty much my typical style. Here’s my card for this week’s My Favorite Things Wednesday Stamp Club sketch. It’s been so damp, chilly, and dreary here this week that I really wanted to make a bright, cheerful, spring-like card. The Pure Innocence You're So Tweet set was perfect for that.

I stamped the little girl on a white panel and colored her with Copic markers. I picked colors to coordinate with the patterned papers I chose for the card from one of the Stella and Rose paper pads. The colored image and the striped patterned paper panel are both matted on rose cardstock. It’s hard to see in the photo, but I machine stitched around the edges of the striped paper before wrapping a piece of yellow grosgrain ribbon around it. The pieces are set on a yellow card base that’s covered with a yellow dotted paper.

For the sentiment, I did a little creative stamping. The sentiments in the set were all too long for the size banner strip that I wanted to add, so I ended up sifting through my Pure Innocence collection until I found something that worked. I combined the word “heart” from the You're So Tweet set with the word “tweet” from the Apple for You set and stamped them both on the banner strip in rose ink. I attached the strip to a felt heart and anchored it with a button, then attached that to the card.

Materials Used:
Pure Innocence You're So Tweet and Apple for You stamp sets, Hearts Aplenty Die-Namics die (My Favorite Things); white cardstock (Taylored Expressions); Memento Tuxedo Black ink (Tsukineko); So Saffron and Regal Rose cardstock, Daffodil Delight grosgrain ribbon (Stampin’ Up!); Stella and Rose-Gertie paper pad (My Mind’s Eye); Cotton Candy Stickles (Ranger); pink button (Michaels); pink baker’s twine (Divine Twine); pink felt; sewing machine; foam tape

This card's totally a (big) step out of my comfort zone. It's for this month's MFT guest designer challenge to make a shabby chic card. Me and shabby chic don't mix too well, so this was a big challenge for me.

I started by selecting a patterned paper with a feminine, soft, distressed pattern and built the card around that. The edges of the patterned paper are distressed and softly inked, then machine stitched. Once all that was done, I set the panel on a pink card base and worked on arranging the rest of the elements I included on the card.

I set a paper doily on first, inked a bit for an aged look. Next came a wooden heart, cut from a piece of thin balsa wood with the Hearts Aplenty die. I added subtle color to the die with some pink and brown inks. A sentiment from the Happy Thoughts set is stamped a on a cream panel in pink pigment ink. Its edges are inked up, too, for an aged, distressed look. A pink felt rolled rose with a pearl center anchors the sentiment. I tied a piece of olive green seam binding around the panel, finishing it with a double-looped bow. The final touch was a pair of pearls in the upper right corner of the card.

You probably won't be seeing many more cards like this one here, but at least I know I can pull it off!

Materials Used:
Happy Thoughts stamp set, Hearts Aplenty and Rolled Rose Die-Namics dies (My Favorite Things); Regal Rose Craft ink, Very Vanilla and Pink Pirouette cardstock (Stampin' Up!); Tea Dye distress ink (Ranger); Porceline-Rochelle patterned paper (Basic Grey); paper doily (Wilton); self-adhesive pearls (Queen & Co.); balsa wood; seam binding tape; sewing machine; foam tape