Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit – Grand Bazaar – Simple Card Design – with Simon Says Stamp & Fiskars

So many birthdays! This is another birthday card, this time for a friend. I cut a card base 4 and 1/2 by 10 and folded it in half at the 5 inch mark but I decided I wanted to have a taller and thinner card so I cut another card base 4 and a 1/4 by 12 and folded it in half at the 6 inch mark. I’ll use the other card base for something else.

After that, I chose out the pattern paper which I thought the recipient would like. This card is for a boy so I wanted to have more boyish colours so I chose the nice dark blue pattern paper and I cut it 4 and 1/4 inches by 6 inches.

I turned the pattern paper over so the white side was showing. I chose out my sentiment stamps and arranged them on the wrong side of the paper to measure their placement. Both the stamps I used to create the sentiment are from the Simon Says Stamp Better Together exclusive stamp set. It’s one of my favourites and is really versatile.

Once I had measured the placement of the sentiment I drew a couple lines to mark the space I needed to leave for the sentiment. I cut along those lines with a pair of scissors to have a straight area to work from and to also have the two pieces to work with. I then used the Fiskars scallop border punch to create a scalloped border on both edges that would face the sentiment.

Here’s where I had to troubleshoot… I made one edge wonky, so I had to cut it back and re-do the scallop border but it meant that there was a larger gap between the scallops and so a lot more white space. To fix that problem, I used the bit of pattern paper that I had cut away from the middle of the two pieces and placed it at the very bottom.

 

I knew I wanted to have the scalloped pieces raised with foam tape, so I adhered this bottom piece with just normal tape runner glue and then adhered the scalloped pieces accordingly with the foam tape for dimension. Then to finish the card off and fill-in the white space next to the sentiment I tied a bow from some red and white polkadot ribbon and I adhered it to the card using glossy accents.

Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit – Grand Bazaar – Simple Banner Card Idea – Stash Busting

This is a look at a few of the scraps that were left over from some of the cards I had made using the Basic Grey Grand Bazaar Card Kit.

I used the Fiskars Paper Trimmer to trim weird shapes left over and create clean shapes that can then be used in more cards. It made all the scraps look a lot neater and more manageable.

I immediately grabbed the yellow and blue strip and thought they looked amazing together so I adhered the yellow down and then the blue on top, flush to the top of the card. There was gap or white space to the right-hand side that was uneven with the left so I used the strip of blue fox pattern paper and cut it into a ribbon, adhere it on the right-hand side to even the card out and bring some balance to the sides of the card but at the same time interest as it is shorter than the other two strips.

I used a yellow and introduced some pink with other scrap pieces that I had turned into the ribbon banners – such an easy to make element that’s versatile.

To finish the card off, I scrounged through my left over die cuts and transparencies and found a cut out of a fox in the same design as what’s on the blue pattern paper and a little spotted navy blue banner with a blank space where I mean to hand write a sentiment.

I think this card idea can be very versatile with the blank space banner as it can be a happy birthday card or a greeting card or even a thinking of you card. Let me know what you think of this idea by leaving me a comment.

Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit – Grand Bazaar – Simple Banner Card Idea – Amazing

Another birthday card! I’m really liking that I’m getting so many cards out of the one kit. This is another card using scraps from the Basic Grey Grand Bazaar Card Kit. This one is a simple banner card idea that I put together quickly on my lunch break.

I started with a block of yellow which I placed in the center of the card leaving a crisp white border. From there I cut a couple strips of left over pattern paper into banners by removing a triangle from one end to create the forks. I adhered these stacked on top of each other on top of the yellow background.

I then added the ‘today was amazing’ title sticker, which is also a scrap as the left-hand side banner piece had be cut off to make an element. The element I added to a greeting card I had made for my grandma also using the Simon Says Stamp Better Together Stamp Set, you can check that out by clicking here. I thought there was a little too much blue at this stage, so I cut a strip of yellow scrap paper into a banner and adhered that over the two blue banners. I really liked this effect as not only had I added more yellow to the card but I had added the third element to for the grouping.

I felt that the card was just little too straight at this stage so I scrounged through all the Grand Bazaar die cuts and transparencies I have left over and found three flowers in circles and I adhered them over of the banners to create a nice triangle. This is another quick and easy card design and best of all it’s stash buster!

Let me know what you think in the comments below!

Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit – Grand Bazaar – Becky Williams Design – Good Times

There’s quite a few birthday’s happening this month which is calling for more cards to be made. Once again I’ve opted to save time and use one of the designs provided in the Basic Grey Card Kit. This time I chose one of the Grand Bazaar cards designed by Becky Williams. With this card it allowed me to use some scraps.

I used the yellow pattern paper strip and I had to cut the orange pattern paper into a strip and then I cut the triangle from the bottom of each to turn them into banners or ribbons.

I had a block of the blue fox pattern paper left over. It was the exact size specified in the instructions but I thought it was enough. I adhered it to the top of the card.

Then I layered the elements as instructed. I found I had cut the cut too short so the ‘good times’ note sheet on top of the blue fox paper was too long. I simply trimmed the bottom. The circles were fussy cut and were very difficult to fussy cut out without making them look wibbly-wobbly. It’s a bit hard to drag the big shot to work though for die cutting.

And then finally I used the ‘good times’ sticker and I decided to staple either side of the banner rather then as was instructed. And then I adhered the shiny, gold foil element. And that’s it! Such a simple card to construct and it came along really quickly. The thing that took the longest was fussy cutting out the circles but if a die cutter was used then I think this card would definitely be a 10 minute construction card. Very nice!

I sure had a good time!

Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit- Herbs & Honey – Arielle Gordon Design – Berry Sweet Triangle Card

 

This card I made with my mother-in-law in mind, as her birthday is in this month. Unfortunately, I have had very little time lately and I have been struggling to find even 10 minutes of spare time to do some crafts. So I made time to make this card while at work on my break. I have been very fortunate to have the Basic Grey Card Kits for the Herbs & Honey collection and Grand Bazaar collection as they come with card ideas and instructions to build those cards from designers. Designing a card and thinking of the idea is the the thing that is most time consuming for card making and scrapbooking – or any art, I believe. So it was great to be able to choose a design and just put it all together in a flash. It meant I didn’t have the stress of feeling like I was against the clock.

 

This card design is credited to Arielle Gordon and is very cleverly put together. First I read through the supplies list and gathered all the pattern papers listed and I prepared the card base. Then using the ‘berry sweet’ sticker from the title stickers which is in a triangle shape I cut a template. I then used that template to cut one triangle of each pattern and four triangles for the strawberry pattern paper. A strip of a bout an inch of red was also needed.

 

From there the triangles are used to form a pattern. When I was cutting out the triangles I tried to put the triangle over the parts of the pattern that I liked more. Such as the FR from the wood and red text pattern paper and the sweet peas of the green vegetable pattern paper. The strip of red paper was placed at the bottom as a border. The blank space is for the ‘berry sweet’ sticker that was used for the template.

 

The instructions called for using a striped bottle cap and the little yellow brad. I used the little yellow brad as instructed but decided to swap out the striped bottle cap for the yellow sweetness bottle cap instead. I thought it made the card a little sweeter. Tee hee (o^-^o)

 

I didn’t have my foam squares with me when I was at work so when I got back home I took 10 seconds to cut a square from my foam tape roll and used that to adhere the ‘berry sweet’ sticker. The instructions also advise to use a corner punch to round off the corners of the red border. But I liked the crisp edges so I left it angled.  I felt so inspired after making this card and I’d love to recreate this technique using different pattern papers and maybe different sized triangles or shapes. I think I might have to invest in a triangle punch or set of die cuts to speed the process along a bit.

Birthday Card Making – Basic Grey Card Kit- Herbs & Honey – Arielle Gordon Design

This card I made for my father’s birthday using one of Arielle Gordon’s designs from the Basic Grey Herbs & Honey card kit. I think it’s perfect as he’s really into the old school and retro. I began with a white card stock base and trimmed it down from the 12 inch by 12 inch included in the card kit.

I used the Martha Stewart Score Board and bone scorer and made the card top folding.

I gathered the pattern papers as advised in the instructions and then I trimmed them down. All the measurements are included in the design instructions.

Once I had the strips I adhered them to the card. But when I tried to place the banner sticker from the the Herbs & Honey Title Sticker Sheet, included in the kit, I found that I had the gaps between the strips to wide so I had peel the strips off and re-adhere them closer together.

After that I could place the banner down. In the instructions and the example image they use the whole sticker, but as most of the right hand side of the sticker is covered and you can only just see the bottom spike on the right hand side sticking out I decided I’d cut the banner in half and only use half the sticker.

The instructions called for the two of the bottlecaps, one made from chipboard and the other metal. And then strategically placed in the middle of these two bottlecaps was a sticker also from the Title Stickers Sheet. The photo doesn’t show it but there was also a small brad placed between and below the green bottlecap and the good times sticker.

My younger brother and I signed the inside and wished my father well for his birthday and then it was speedily posted off. Even though we tried to get it all done on time, it is going to get to him late, especially as he lives three states down and has an ocean border.

I’ve really been enjoying making these card kit cards and it really helping me get a greater feel for designing as a lot of the times it takes me ages to come up with an idea and I always forget about the principles, such as the rule of threes, when designing.

I think I should study the principles of design more in order to make the simple & clean designs that I love and gravitate to so much.

Happy Birthday Dad! Hope you had a great day!

Thinking of You – Get Well Soon – From All of Us – Basic Grey Grand Bazaar Card Idea with Lawn Fawn Hedgehugs Hedgehogs

 

 

This card is very special and I’m very proud of it. I made this card for a workmate and his son who is very ill and has had the sickness since he was very young. The son is only 13 years old and the dad is very hardworking. I was diagnosed with cancer in 2008 so I know how hard it can be constantly going to the hospital for treatments, the stress it can put on family, and the financial strain.

The dad is the sole earner as the mother is caring for the son. As such, I would expect that they wouldn’t have a lot of spare money to waste on entertainment as a lot of the funds would go to medication and treatment. My idea was to take $1 and $2 donations from the other employees at work (as that’s only like a chocolate bar) and it would all add up and then we could get a gift card so the son could buy a video game.

Everyone’s really jumped on board this idea a lot more than what I originally thought and the bosses have said that whatever the employees raise they’ll match it, which is really incredible!

 

For the design, I started with a base white card, standard size, and I cut a strip and two squares of Basic Grey Grand Bazaar pattern papers from the Grand Bazaar Card Kit. This is inspired by a Becky Williams design which is included in the kit. I did have to alter it to suit quite a bit though. In the card kit supplies are envelope pockets and there were only 2 spares after taking into account all the designs, which I really want to try them all so didn’t want to use up. The 2 spare pockets weren’t in a pattern that I wanted or looked good with the front design of the card.

So I took a 12 x 12″ sheet from the papers I have stored and I unstuck the glue of the pocket size I wanted and laid it flat on top of the 12 x 12 inch sheet and I cut around the edges. After cutting it out, I used the Chomp-a-Dile Corner Cutter to make the corners rounded and then I used the Martha Stewart Score Board and the bone scorer to score lines to fold the sheet into the pocket. I adhered the pocket together and voila!

I decided I wanted to use the two foil arrows spare from the card kit and I had the idea of embossing ‘from all of us’ onto the pocket. As the pattern paper was dark, I decided to use a strip of vellum which I wrapped around it and adhered at the back.

Next I stamped the two adorable little hedgehogs from the Lawn Fawn Hedgehugs Stamp Set using Memento Tuxedo Black Ink. I stamped the ‘thinking of you’ speech bubble using what I thought was Spiced Marmalade but what turned out to be Pickled Raspberry. The lids had somehow become mixed up. I had to stamp the Spiced Marmalade twice in order to get the really full colour. The stamp is from Lawn Fawn Chit Chat set.

I also have the dies for the hedgehogs and the speech bubble so I placed them over the stamps and held them in place with washi tape. After that I ran it through my Big Shot to die cut them out.

After colouring the hedgehogs using my Faber Castell Connecter Pens, I went to adhere the hedgehogs to the card, however the hedgehogs and sentiment did not look good simply on top of the rectangles so I decided to add a space for them to sit. I used the Sizzix Stackable Circles Dies and I cut out a larger circle from the yellow Grand Bazaar paper and a smaller circle from the blue pattern paper also from the Grand Bazaar 6 x 6 pad. I adhered the blue circle onto the yellow circle off center and then I adhered the circles to the center of the card. Then I adhered the hedgehogs and the sentiment and the golden foil arrow all onto the circles. I think it looks great!

 

Finally, I used the new orange embossing powder for the ‘from all of us!’ sentiment on the vellum. This sentiment is from the Lawn Fawn On The Mend stamp set. And I used the second gold foil arrow to start the sentiment. Then I cut a whole bunch of strips of paper so that all the people that donate can write their names on the strip. And the pocket will hold all the names and the gift card. This is very exciting and I can’t wait for everyone to finalize their donations so it can be handed to him.

Greeting Card – Basic Grey Grand Bazaar Card Idea – 6×6 Papers & Die Cuts with Simon Says Stamp Sentiment

 

This card I made for my Grandma just as a general greeting card as she sent me card and I needed to send her a card in reply. I started by using some of the scrap pages from the card I made for my workmate, you can check that out by clicking here. And I used the Sizzix circle cut dies with the smallest die and I cut and cut out nine circles from different pattern papers. The yellow pattern paper was actually a plain yellow and I’ve used a Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Seedless Preserve to stamp the circle ‘hello’ stamp inside. The ‘hello’ stamp, the cursive ‘sending’ and the ‘lots of love’ sentiment are all from the same stamp collection from Simon Says Stamp ‘Better Together’.

 

I used embossing ink to stamp the ‘sending’ and lots of love’ and then used black embossing powder and heat set it using the Ranger Heat It Craft Tool. After that base of the card was done, I used the embellishments from the Grand Bazaar dies and transparencies pack that I had in my stored collection and I went nuts and had a lot of fun layering the elements.

And that’s it! I’m really pleased with this one, the simpleness and ease of construction merged with the brightness of the papers and the fun of putting all the elements together. This was a great card to make and I’m excited to try this design idea out again.

Basic Grey Clearance Warehouse Box Haul Shipment Package

For midyear, Basic Grey had another Warehouse Clearance Box sale. I was lucky enough to grab one of these for Black Friday and whoo boy was excited for another chance as that Black Friday box was pretty epic. I was so stoked as the boxes are loaded with goodies and it’s a saving of $100’s of dollars.

Basic Grey really spoiled me with this haul. I got little snippet journalling cards from the Highline Collection, a set of stamps, alphas, borders, posies, buttons and lots of bling!

Now for the really exciting part, this really blew me away and I was so happy with the items that had been chosen for me. Did I mention that I have no idea what I get? Basic Grey just fill a box up with random goodies, you have no choice in what you get. I love that part of the sale too, as I get a surprise! It makes the unboxing that much more thrilling!

Look at how thick that stack of scrapbooking papers is! I received so many papers from many collections which I’ll picture all below. I received lots of elements stamps which are like $6 each! Amazing! And not only that I got not one, but two card kits! I love card kits, especially for the design ideas, but I was especially excited for the Grand Bazaar card kit as Grand Bazaar is hands down one of my top, favourite ever, Basic Grey collections. I’m too lucky!

So I’ll start with the papers! Three papers from the Mint Julep Collection. I have quite a few papers still left over from the Mint Julep Collection I got on sale at Spotlight, so I’ll probably add these papers to that.

Three papers from the Herbs & Honey Collection. I love that yellow/gold pattern paper.

Two scrapbook papers from the Spice Market Collection.

Four papers from the Second City Collection designed by Kelly Purkey a great source of scrapbooking inspiration and knowledge. I love the colours in the collection and super stoked to have gotten one of the journal card pages.

Two pattern papers from the 25th & Pine collection. I’m going to store these away ready for Christmas. I would like to do some really neat and special layouts for Christmas this year!

I wasn’t as excited for these two papers from the Fresh Cut Collections, but that’s only because I still have about 50 pages from this collection left from when I went nuts on Fresh Cut supplies for my scrapbook journal I was doing. I filled the journal up and I have heaps of supplies left. I’m thinking of making a second journal to use up those papers. It’ll just mean I’ll have a couple gap months between journal 1 and journal 2, but I think that’ll be fine.

Three pattern papers from Carte Postale. As nice as these papers area, they don’t actually inspire me much. I’ll have to have a good think about what I’m going to do with these ones.

Five papers from the Soliel Collection. Really digging the bright colours and love the blue and yellow pattern papers. I can see those two being used as bright backgrounds for a couple of layouts.

One pattern paper from Kelly Purkey’s Mon Ami Collection and one pattern paper from the Capture collection. I think these will be very versatile and useful papers.

Four papers from the RSVP Collection. I think I’ll put these papers together with some mini kits. I’m going to have to crack open the rest of my scrapbooking supplies and put some more kits together. Putting the kits together also helps spur some inspiration and project ideas.

Four pages of the Evergreen Collection another one of Basic Grey’s Christmas Collections. Again these papers will be going away into storage along with the 25th & Pine papers.

Three Basic Grey Grand Bazaar papers. Super happy to get some more of these papers. I want to finish recreating some of Kelly Purkey’s designs from her Craftsy Course – as with everything, it’s about finding the time.

Five papers from the Highline Collection. Again, super stoked about these pattern papers. I actually wanted to get this collection to do some layouts with my crafting friend as I think these patterns would be right up her alley.

I have quite a few Persimmon papers already, getting most of them in a previous Basic Grey sale and also snagging the Collection Kit for around $10 so I’ll probably add these in with those as spares.

I was surprised to get these three papers. Even though there’s only one of each as these are from the more recent collections, I wasn’t expecting to get any papers from these three collections: Adrift, Aurora and Vivienne.

And lastly to finish off the papers, one more from Kelly Purkey’s Mon Ami Collection and one sheet from the Capture Collection. I think this scrapbook page is really awesome as it has lots of elements I’ll be able to cut up and use.

This is the contents of the Herbs & Honey Card Kit: 6 x 6 pattern paper pad, brads, bottle caps, title stickers and a design sheet by Arielle Gordon. There’s enough supplies to make one of each of the cards.

This is the contents of the Grand Bazaar Card Kit: 6 x 6 pattern paper pad, title stickers, foils, envelopes/pockets and a design sheet by Becky Williams. I really like the simple and clean designs. As with the Herbs & Honey Card Kit, there’s enough supplies in the Grand Bazaar kit to make one of each card.

And finally the wowzer. Twelve sets of element stickers including ones from recent collections such as J’Adore and Vivienne. The other collections are: Fresh Cut, Jovial, Clippings, Paper Cottage, RSVP, Highline, Grand Bazaar, Herbs & Honey, Spice Market and Capture.

To summarize, I could not be happier with the selections made by the Basic Grey staff and I’m super grateful that I was able to snag one of these epic deals. I won’t have to get any scrapbooking supplies for years!

Special Occasion Card Making – Baby Welcome Card – Lawn Fawn Hello Baby Acrylic Clear Stamp Set Card Idea

This card was a bit rushed which I’m sure is noticeable in its simplicity and lack of design flow.

One of my workmates has a girlfriend who is due to have a baby really soon and I’ve been meaning to make a baby welcome card for them for a few months but it’s just a matter of finding the time.

As I was quickly running out of time, and I wasn’t sure when the baby would actually come and I wanted to have this card delivered before the baby arrived, about five minutes before I had to leave for work I threw this card together before rushing out the door.

I cut the card base from white card stock, used the Matha Stewart Score Board to score the center and fold it into a top folding card. I then adhered a scrap piece of paper from the Basic Grey Fresh Cut Collection I had laying on the table from when I was working on my Scrapbook Journal (which I don’t believe I have shown on the website yet).

Onto the left over pieces of white card stock I stamped the chubby bunny and the little bundle from the Lawn Fawn Hello Baby Stamp Set using Memento Tuxedo Black Ink. Because I was rushed it didn’t stamp well, so I rushed over it with the Memento Tuxedo Black Ink Pen – it was messy. I fussy cut them out and adhered them at the bottom with foam squares.

Using the sentiments ‘Some Bunny’ & ‘is on the way’ from the Lawn Fawn Hello Baby Stamp Set, I stamped each stamp next to each other on a coordinating strip of scrap paper from the Basic Grey Fresh Cut Collection to create the sentiment banner which was adhered using foam squares.

To finish, I stamped ‘Hello Baby’ as a sentiment inside the stamp and that was it! Then it was time to run out the door. I will organize the other workmates to sign inside and give their well wishes and congratulations before handing the card over to the soon-to-be-dad.

How would you change this card for the better? Do you like this card the way it is? Let me know in the comments below!