Sometimes people ask me,”Where do you get your ideas?” What a great question! I’ve asked other people the same thing sometimes.
So where DO I get my ideas? Well, of course the images in a stamp set are a good place to start. Many of the stamp sets are what I call ‘nature based’ – flowers, trees, animals, landscape scenes. Look around your own garden or your neighbor’s garden or a park or nature trail to see how you could incorporate a stamp set into something you are seeing in real life.
Look out your window and match your design to the season – is it snowing? Or do you see pretty Summer or Fall colors?
Whimsical designs are great for children’s cards or light, humorous cards to brighten someone’s day. Look in stores and catalogs or even the sales ads that you get in the mail to see what decor is trending use your stamps sets to mimic what you are seeing.
“Oh, but I never know what colors to use” is something else I hear from others. Go realistic! Or pick your favorite color and go monotone. Be wild and crazy and and play with bold colors then try the same design with soft pastels – you’ll be surprised at how different the exact same card looks with different colors!
While the Beautiful World stamp set is generally used for more masculine looking cards, nobody says you can’t use bright colors! As I was walking through some of the home decor stores recently, I ran across a section of globes that were not the traditional colors of blue for water and browns/green for the land masses, but rather had a bright pink color with gold accents – and that’s where I drew my inspiration for this card.
Cut Cardstock:
- Card Base: Whisper White – 8 1/2″ x 5 1/2″, score at 4 1/4″
- First Layer: Magenta Madness – 5 3/8″ x 4 1/8″, cut two
- Second Layer (front): Sahara Sand – 5 1/4″ x 4″
- Second Layer (inside): Whisper White – 5 1/4″ x 4″
- Third layer: Whisper White – 3 7/8″ x 3 1/8″
- Fourth Layer: Magenta Madness In-Color Designer Paper – 3 3/4″ x 3″
- Globes and Squiggles: Gold Foil Paper – 3″ x 6 1/2″
- Globe Backgrounds: Sahara Sand – 2″ x 4″
- Inside Strips: Sahara Sand – 4″ x 5/8″, Magenta Madness In-Color DSP – 4″ x 1/2″
Note: All stamps and dies are from the Beautiful World Bundle
Assembly:
Adhere one piece of the Magenta Madness cardstock to the card base. Use the Old World embossing folder to emboss one piece of Sahara Sand cardstock and layer it onto the card front.
Adhere a 3 3/4″ x 3″ piece of Magenta Madness In-color Designer Paper to a 3 7/8″ x 3 1/8″ piece of Whisper White cardstock.
Using the dies from the World Map die set, crop the two globes, globe stands and three squiggles from Gold Foil paper.
Crop two circles out of Sahara Sand cardstock.
Glue the circles to the back of the gold globes.
Glue the globes and globe stands onto the Magenta Madness DSP layer. Use Dimensionals to attach this layer to the card front. Arrange the squiggles onto the card front, having part of the squiggles on the on the card base and part of them on the Magenta Madness layer.
Add a few small Gilded Gems to complete the front. Refer to photo for placement.
Inside:
Using Versamark ink, stamp the sentiment and a few small squiggles onto the remaining piece of Whisper White cardstock. Sprinkle with Gold Embossing Powder and set with heat tool.
Adhere the Magenta Madness strip onto the Sahara Sand strip, then attach to the top of the stamped piece. Adhere this to the inside of the card.
Envelope:
Use Versamark ink to stamp a couple of small squiggles to the lower left corner of the envelope, sprinkle with Gold Emboss Powder and set with heat tool.
I hope you enjoy this card and that it inspires you to think outside the box when choosing colors for your own designs!
Product List
