Tag: die cutting

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Happy Mother’s Day!

Happy Mother’s Day! Here in New Zealand, we are still in Level 3 Lockdown – meaning we can’t travel out of our region, retail shops are not open although online retailers are shipping. So today’s plan is to have cake with both mine and my husband’s mother via a Zoom meeting. Sounds fun right? Three cakes were ordered, but only one has made it to its destination so far – the couriers in New Zealand say their current workload is like Christmas on steroids!!

Anyway, back to the card my mother received in the post (sent in plenty of time for arrival prior to today!).

Close up of the rainbow sunflower – can you see the shine?
Adding colour to the die cut sunflower, this doesn’t need to be tidily done as it will be hidden by the layers.

I was inspired by Laura Bassen @laurafadora and her card made with the sunflower stem from Simon Says Stamp. I loved the rainbow idea and bought this die solely to create my own.

I cut the sunflower five times, and left the petals intact in one of them so I could colour my rainbow for the bottom layer. I used copic markers, but you could use any medium you prefer.

Three die cuts, with the petals punched out were glued on top. I used my Art Glitter glue for this as I really like the super fine tip. If I had thought ahead, I could have applied stick it adhesive to my cardstock first to make the job of sticking the delicate die cuts together easier!

I also coloured the petals with my Nuvo Glimmer pen, and then added Nuvo Crystal Glaze for extra shine.

The final die cut sunflower was added to the top for a nice clean and crisp finish.

The background is the Simon Says Stamp Festive Berries stamp, heat embossed with Hero Arts Satin Pearl embossing powder.

The sunflower panel is raised with craft foam. I used the MFT stitched rectangles on both the card front and sunflower panel to get a nice stitched border.

I added the sunflower to the front and found a suitable Happy Mother’s Day sentiment in Mama Elephant’s Mini Messages. I heat embossed in white on Hero Arts Pitch Black cardstock and carefully cut the ends to create the little banner.

If you have any questions regarding the putting together of this card, please feel free to message me – I’m only too happy to help!

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Shakers & Inlays

My first class for the year was held at Scrapbook Central, Petone, Wellington.

Today’s class focused on creating a shaker card, and using the leftover die cut pieces to do some inlay, thus creating a second card. We also looked at some basic copic colouring and introduced the class participants to two colour blends – pink and orange.

Butterfly secured inside the shaker in such a way that it remains upright, but can still move about quite freely.
Die cut inlay and butterfly built and coloured in layers.

A shaker is an interactive card, which has depth and a window to see tiny elements such as confetti, sequins, beads etc freely moving about in a contained space. They move when shaken. We stepped up the basic shaker to include a die cut butterfly inside that is secured in such a way that it will never flip, fall to the bottom, always remaining the right way up but still moving freely in the shaker.

Die cut inlay is a technique where a die is cut twice and the inner pieces transferred to the second die cut outer frame – usually with contrasting colour ways – creating a smooth surface with great interest.

Supplies List:

Both cards were constructed onto a Bazzill Marshmallow 4.25 x 5.5 inch card base. All supplies listed are available from Scrapbook Central – you can order online, or visit instore.

  • Memory Box Side Butterfly Frame
  • Memory Box Jotted Birthday Script
  • Lawn Fawn Happy Happy Happy Stamp & Die set
  • Echo Park Mini Blossoms Background Stamp
  • Kaisercraft Blooms Embossing Folder
  • Circle dies – 3″ and 3.25″. I used the Hero Arts Nesting Circle Dies set.
  • Distress Oxides – Squeezed Lemonade, Cracked Pistachio, Tumbled Glass
  • Copics – YR18, YR15, YR12, RV06, RV04, RV02
  • Textured Paper
  • Nuvo Glitter paper in Silver and Black
  • Acetate
  • Nuvo Sequins
  • Double sided adhesive foam sheets
  • Foam strips and squares

Class attendees were given a kit with pre-cut elements. And chocolate. (Who crafts without chocolate??!). They inked, heat embossed, die cut and built two cards over the course of the workshop.

Our class getting underway – we had a full class of 12 participants!

We looked at easy ways to keep die cut pieces together for simple inlay, using adhesive on tricky intricate dies, some fun products to create shakers with, and built beautiful butterfly embellishments full of colour and dimension.

Progress pictures – there were some beginner crafters having their first try at inking with Distress Oxides, and confident crafters learning new (or perhaps re-remembering!) techniques.

We also had an introductory lesson in Copic colouring and blending. For further resources on colouring (including copics, watercolouring and other mediums), you can find a list here of my favourite online classes, where to find downloadable charts etc. Also, my Colour Page has information about Copic markers and other ways to add colour to your projects.

Thank you to everyone who attended today, and to Philippa & Jonathan for hosting me! It was a great day, full of creativity and laughs.

As promised, there is a second blog post with the extra card examples using the same products featured in today’s class – click here.

For more in-depth information about the best value supplies for your craft table, from cardstock, inks, adhesives, to the handiest tools, check out my Best of the Basics series.

I’d appreciate it if you hit Follow below, and/or follow my Facebook page so you’ll be kept up to date with upcoming classes. I regularly share other cards, along with tips, hints and ideas.

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Support the Designers

One of the main reasons I wanted to set up this website was to make it easier for New Zealand craft shoppers to find the good quality, genuine products our favourite YouTubers like to use in their videos.

I have created pages on my website, listing my favourite and trusted stores both in New Zealand, and internationally where you can be sure you are purchasing the stamps, dies and stencils that are original, thereby supporting the designers and companies creating them. We certainly want them to be able to continue creating these things! These pages will be updated as I discover new places, so be sure to check back regularly.

New Zealand is a small market, and I noticed within some of my crafting communities that counterfeit stamps and dies are freely being imported, without knowledge of why this is not a good thing. I really want to be supportive of my crafting community, both locally and worldwide, as this is such an amazing hobby, full of kind and generous spirited people. What other hobby encourages happy thoughts, kindness and giving such as this?

Over the past few years, crafters worldwide have started a movement #isupportdesignnotcrime and I am a happy participant.

Counterfeit product has become a real problem – the practice of stealing other people’s art and design to make money, using low quality materials, is literally closing business doors. In our industry, our crafting businesses are often just small, and most likely operating from a garage or kitchen table.

Art and design, including photography and other art forms fully deserve to be credited and compensated. We wouldn’t dream of knowingly purchasing stolen goods in our daily lives otherwise, and this is no different.

Our stamp companies pay their artists and designers, choose to use quality photopolymer, rubber and metals in most cases, pay for advertising, marketing, store and staffing overheads, taxes, shipping, and are generous with us crafters by sponsoring gifts, giveaways, collaborations and design teams etc. Counterfeiters literally steal the images from online, and recreate using inferior products, often with spelling mistakes and smaller images with little to no overhead.

By ordering and purchasing genuine product through our local retailers, you are also supporting New Zealand businesses too, so that’s a win-win!

NONE of the genuine stamp companies sell their stamps via AliExpress, Alibaba or Wish. You can report listings if you spot copies – stamp companies are having to expend a lot of time and effort into getting counterfeit links taken down, creating a real legal headache! and this is taking time and money away from creating fun products for us.

If you are at all in doubt whether the stamp company you are purchasing from is legitimate or not, you can check the isupportdesign website – they have listed every known stamp company, with a link so you can view their online store. If the company you are looking for is not in the list, you can flick a quick email to them to ask.

If you have any questions regarding the above please feel free to message me – I’m only too happy to help!

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Sweet Celebration Wishes

I’ve had my eye on this stamp set by Stacey Yacula for some time, and was pleased to finally have time to get it out and do some colouring! This card has been gifted to a crafty friend celebrating her birthday.

Supplies Used:

Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes
  • Tim Holtz Watercolor Cardstock
  • Glitter paper from stash
  • Lawn Fawn Mermaid & Black Licorice cardstock for card base and sentiment strip
  • Nuvo Silver glitter cardstock
  • Ranger Clear embossing powder, Ink on 3 Arctic White embossing powder, and Versamark Ink
  • My Favorite Things Diagonal Design Background stamp (retired)
  • My Favorite Things Stitched Rectangles STAX
  • My Favorite Things Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes Stamp and Die set
  • My Favorite Things Celebrate die
  • Copic markers: R24, RV14, R22, R20, R00, E43, E31, E41, E40, E59, E25, E23, Y38, Y15, Y21, BG49, BG45, BG53, G28, YG67, YG63, YG61, G43, G21, G40
  • Distress Oxide Inks: Tumbled Glass, Peacock Feathers, Mermaid Lagoon, Chipped Sapphire

I started off by ink blending with Tumbled Glass and Peacock Feathers, lighter in the middle and darker on the edges of the watercolour cardstock. I heat embossed the Diagonal Design background stamp (just about any background stamp would be suitable for this technique) with clear embossing powder, let that cool, and then continued inking with Peacock Feathers in the centre, Mermaid Lagoon and Chipped Sapphire, again getting darker towards the edges of the panel. Distress Oxide inks are great for this technique as the ink is opaque and you can add layers of colour very easily.

I buffed the ink with a cloth. The clear embossing resists the additional ink, leaving a cool flow of colour blending within the pattern.

I cut the panel down with a MFT stitched rectangle. I actually used a smaller rectangle from the nested set than I originally intended, and had to back the panel with some glitter paper in my stash! Whoops, but it turned out well in the end!

I had fun colouring these little guys and added fun fluff to their hats and the bunny’s tale using Neon Radiance Amplify.

I die cut the Celebrate three times from white cardstock, and once out of Nuvo Silver glitter cardstock and stacked these together for a little dimension.

I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment from the Sweet Celebration Wishes stamp set onto Lawn Fawn Black Licorice cardstock.

The critters were placed above the Celebrate using foam tape strips cut to fit, and the whole front is mounted onto the card base which completes the card.

If you have any questions regarding the putting together of this project, please feel free to message me – I’m only too happy to help!