Category: Concord & 9th

Paper crafters unite

6/27/2020

Paper Crafters Unite Against Racism

Hello and thank you for joining me today for this very special blog hop to stand up and show our unity against racism. You should have come from Juliana Michaels. Your next stop is Betz Golden. What I love about paper crafting, besides getting to play with stickers and fun stamps, is the supportive and inclusive community. When Justine Hovey asked for participants to this blog hop I did not hesitate to sign up.The goal of this hop is to come together to stand with our crafty sisters and brothers of color not just in the paper crafting community, but also to show our support in the never ending fight for equality all over the world. I hope you feel inspired today and unite with the papercrafting community to stand against racism. Please continue reading to find out how I made three encouraging cards. Affiliate links are used at no cost to you. If you choose to shop through these links, I will receive a small commission. I am pledging my affiliate sales to Black Table Arts which organizes and brings in black artists into communities and provides creative spaces for leadership. Thank you for your support today.

Paper scraps Twofer and EDS awareness

5/24/2020

Instagram Hop to raise awareness for EDS

Hello crafty friends.
Thank you for joining me today on this blog hop to raise awareness for Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. EDS is a rare connective tissue disorder that can go undiagnosed and untreated. I want to thank my crafty friend, Natasha of Handmade by Tasha who organized this hop.
If you are interested in more information about EDS, please check out:

Thank you for your time and I hope this hop helps you to understand this rare condition.
To honor people to live with EDS everyday, I wanted to make some happy encouragement cards. Nothing says happy and shares hope like a rainbow. I made the rainbow paper using paper scraps. Please read along to learn how I made these cards.

Spring Fling Instagram Hop

3/22/2019

Celebrating National Craft Month

Hello friends. I am participating in my first ever hop! On Instagram! I regularly post on Instagram and I’d love it if you join me there @sevenscrafts. The hop today has a $50 gift certificate to Scrapbook.com where I do regularly shop for my card making supplies because I like their prices, selection and fast shipping. If you are hopping along, you came from Anna Komenda @moriony and your next stop is Nicole Watt @pixelmavensretreat. For today I am sharing an adorable love you card made with the Monster Love stamp set from Concord & 9th along with other supplies that are all available at Scrapbook.com. Please read on for how I put together this cute card.

Masking two ways

2/8/2019

Masking Unleashed

My final class in the Altenew Educator Program, Level 2 is Masking Unleashed. And Unleashed it was! The instructor had some different ways of masking and I was inspired to try positive and negative masking. Positive masking is using a mask of a specific image to cover that image so you can stamp or color around it. Negative masking is using the negative space so you can color inside a stamp or die cut. I wanted to try both of these to see how they worked out. I have two cards for you today using both of these masking techniques. Both cards use Altenew Blooming Bouquet stamp set which is a great floral image perfect for coloring with any medium. I recently purchased the Altenew Watercolor Brush markers and I have been looking forward to trying them out. Please read on for how I put together these two cards.

Different coloring mediums

8/20/2018

Watercolor vs Colored Pencils

Recently I’ve been using colored pencils as my go to coloring medium because I can take them on the go. I love the look of watercolor and have wanted to increase my practice of this medium in coloring my stamped images. In this post, I make two sympathy cards using the same stamp sets but coloring the images in with different media. Let me know in the comments which medium you prefer.

Birthday Book Bags

4/26/2018

Personalized Birthday Gifts

I love birthdays ... from cake to presents to celebrating with friends and family; birthdays are just a lot of fun. Having two kids means lots of birthday parties which means lots of buying birthday gifts. For birthday gifts, I prefer to give something that is personal and can be used over and over. This cycle of birthdays, I’m making personalized tote bags. I already posted on this, here but I have another example including what I put into the whole gift. For this project, I used my Cricut Explore Air, Cricut Iron On Lite, Cricut Vinyl to make: a personalized tote bag, pencil box and bookmark. I also made two birthday cards to go with these presents. Lots of ideas here so I will break them down as I hope this post will leave you inspired to make some birthday gifts.

Thankfulness series, pt 1

2/19/2018

Thank you cards

Sometimes in your life, the right person comes around just at the right time to help you continue on your journey. I recently had this happen to me and it inspired me to do a series on Thank You cards. It is important to let those people in your life know what you mean to them and how they have helped you along on your path; either to get you back onto the path or to help you continue your path.

Thinking Inking

10/29/2017

Texture play with ink and stencils

What I have been discovering in card making is a sense of freedom to try new things. I am more willing as a card maker to attempt a new technique or practice with a product with the understanding that I will mess up but each mistake is a step in the overall journey. To that end, I recently went to Jenn Shurkus' Creative Journey: An Art Retreat on Cape Cod. At that retreat, I was able to play with some stamps and techniques I do not normally try and get some ideas. My friend also won a Tim Holtz Plaid Layering Stencil which I am highlighting in today's card. I am also highlighting some techniques that may seem a bit daunting but I encourage you to try them and take a step forward on your creative journey.

A great background can sometimes be all you need to make your card. I started with a piece of Neenah Solar White 80lb paper cut to 5 3/4 x 4 1/2. I applied Distress Inks with my Mini Blending Tool by starting off the paper and moving in a circular motion onto the paper. This process takes patience as you build up the color layers. Wanting to create an ombre effect, I chose three pink colors: Spun Sugar, Worn Lipstick and Picked Raspberry and three orange colors: Dried Marigold, Wild Honey and Carved Pumpkin. Visually dividing the paper into halves, I applied Spun Sugar to the top half, Worn Lipstick to the top third and Picked Raspberry to the top quarter of the paper. After drying the ink, I turned my paper 180 degrees and in the same manner created an ombre of Dried Marigold to the half, Wild Honey to the third and Carved Pumpkin to the quarter of the page making sure to blend between colors. I then used my lightest shade: Spun Sugar and Dried Marigold to go over their respective halves of the paper and blend them into the middle.

Birthday Balloons

10/1/2017

Birthday card with masking

Papercrafting and making cards is so much fun. I really love how an idea pops into my head out of nowhere and then all of a sudden it's realized onto a card. Ultimately paper crafting is a two dimensional medium so even though I may have the grandiose of ideas, it's still got to fit in a 2-D medium. Enter: Masking. Masking allows for a bit of depth to your scene and especially if you have coordinating dies is simple to do.

Globe Greetings 3 ways

9/25/2017

Concord & 9th stamp sets

The new Concord & 9th stamp sets are absolutely fantastic and I was so excited for them when they came out. The designs of the Globe Greetings stamp set made me think would be great for masculine cards and for all occasions. For this card today, I wanted to try out flocking which I haven't done before but I thought would give great texture to the land forms on the earth image.