Special Birthday Delivery

I've spent the last 2 days working on this card, and while the front is sort of plain, I'm very happy with how the inside turned out.  I needed a birthday card for a co-worker, and this Kenny K image was perfect, as it allowed me to do a more creative inside than usual.

I'm submitting it to Kenny K's Birthday Challenge.

For the outside, I printed and cut the image using my Silhouette, then coloured it with pencil crayons.  For the blue and brown, I also used gamsol with blending sticks, to give it a more uniform look.  I embossed the card with an oriental weave plate.  The sentiment is a mix of Snell Roundhand (on my computer) and Cast Iron (downloaded from dafont).  I printed it on tan paper and die cut it out using Spellbinder's Labels 18.  I then attached both pieces to the card with pop dots.

For the inside, I started with the idea that the box has now been opened and balloons are flying out of it.  The box pop-up required two slits in the folded cardstock.  I then added the box flaps (glueing a small panel inside to hold the flaps in place).  The center balloon is rainbow honeycomb paper, which fans open with the card.  The other balloons were stamped and coloured with markers.  I added a few shiny sequins to add to the 'popping open' idea.  The sentiment was also printed on my computer and cut out with a craft knife.  I inked the edges a bit with tan die ink before attaching it to the card.

The honeycomb paper makes the inside rather large, so it didn't fit all the way in the back of the card base, which means the card won't open beyond a certain point.  I'll have to work on that on my next card as it does dampen the honeycomb effect if you can't open it all the way.

Peace on Earth 3D Nativity Card

I bought the cut file for this 3D card from the Silhouette store.  It was made by Samantha Walker.

All I had to do was put the paper in the machine, peel off all the tiny stars from the Silhouette sheet (which took forever), scored the fold lines and put it together.  I added text in silver pen after taking the photos.

The front of the card.

The inside, a 3D pop-up nativity!

Wedding Card - Inside

I did the inside of this card first, and it took quite a while, both to come up with the idea and then to execute it.  The couple met while Salsa dancing, so I took that as my cue.  I did a card a while back with a pop-up curtain around a dancer and had the idea to do something similar here.

So, the first step was to google salsa dance silhouettes and pick a nice image to make a cut file for.  I found one and traced it into Silhouette's studio program.  Since it needed to be larger than the silhouette on the front of the card, I spent a long time making sure it looked good as a cut file, modifying all the lines and curves so it looked really good.

After getting the dancers, I realized my curtain idea was a bit lame and looked into making the dancers themselves the pop-up.  This was easier to learn how to do than I expected (here's the tutorial I adapted).  The execution, however, was hard.  I had to watch that video numerous times and redo steps several times to make it work.  I also decided to take out the perforated fold lines as the joins were so small I was afraid they would rip if I kept those in.

I cut out my pop-up, made some corrections, and cut it out again a bit smaller (so it wouldn't stick out of the card when folded).

My husband suggested doing the pop-up in gold to match the background and then add the black silhouette on the front to add contrast.  I think it was a good plan, as the non-shiny backing made a good 'sand' for the front of the card.  You can't see it very well in this photo, but the gold really shines  (I used Michael's brand, Recollections cardstock.  The metallic pack is cheap, includes 5 colours and are all very shiny on one side).

I glued the black dancers to the gold paper, then the entire pop-up to the backing paper, one side at a time to make sure it would open properly.  The rest of the card was just a matter of cutting a frame for the 2 stamp sentiment.  I curved the white edges and used an embossing edge punch on the black paper.  The sentiment was stamped with gold ink.   

Sorry, I used so many materials for this card I can't even remember them all, so I'm not doing a supplies list.

And here it is, the inside of my pop-up wedding card, the most difficult card I've done to date.

Pop-Up Train Birthday Card

I've had a busy few weeks, so I'm afraid you're just getting a quick card post today.  This is a birthday card I made for a friend's son.  I hand wrote the messages with gel pens.

I used a cloud punch for the front and a Silhouette cutting/scoring file for the pop-up train.  It was one of the first files I bought from the Silhouette store, and I was very happy with it.  I made the card smaller than I should have (I still find seeing it on the screen hard to reconcile with the cut dimensions, not sure why), but it worked.