With my fingers still on the mend, it will probably be another week until I can get back to knitting. After cutting the one, I smashed another. So, there’s that. The sewing is mostly on hold until Earl and I can get the craft stuff organized enough that I can find what I need when I need it. In the meantime, I’ll continue posting these smaller crafts that take me only an hour or two to complete here. In truth, it’s what I’ve been using my free time to do anyways.
This Saturday something special happened. Two dear friends of mine, Kassie and Adam, were married. I love everything about weddings except that there are too many people there and I’m often expected to dance. Kassie is such a social butterfly though, and she’s always so happy; it was really an honor to be able to celebrate with them.
Earl and I had spent some time thinking about what to get them, and we ended up getting them a copy of 7 wonders. It’s a really fun board game with many different ways to win, and we’ve recently gotten Adam hooked. We also found some gorgeous skull paper to wrap it in. If you know Kassie, you know that it is right up her ally. Kassie focused on physical anthropology, in particular zooarchaeology (the study of bones) for her undergraduate. Currently she has a collection of bobcat skulls on her parents porch weathering. The one thing I hadn’t had the chance to think about was the card! I like to make cards in general, and especially for weddings, so I wasn’t about to run to a card shop.
When I woke up on Saturday and realized I didn’t have a card for them, I was really glad I had my silhouette. I went to my pinterest silhouette board for inspiration and found a style that I liked. I also found a really cute vinyl photo frame project that I made for them that morning. The negative die cut of the card below with the watercolor behind was really pretty. I needed a wedding appropriate image though. For some reason, scherenschnitte came to mind. Scherenschnitte is the art of cutting delicate paper figures by hand. A few years ago I did a scherenschnitte cut from Cindy Bean’s scherenschnitte blog. Her designs are really pretty, and it seemed like the perfect pattern source for the cameo! She offers a number of really nice free patterns, and her Spring Love template fit the bill perfectly.
Watercolor Birthday by Loll Thompson
Spring Love by Cindy Bean
Inspiration in hand, I converted the pattern to a silhouette cut file. Since I knew I wanted to do a negative cut, I needed to find a pattern for the back paper. I didn’t have anything I liked on hand, so I went to the silhouette store and found two patterns I liked. Both were water color, one a white/grey water color and the other a green/brown gradient. I also found a really nice vinyl cut that I thought would work great as a greeting. The text is: “Live Simply, Dream Big, Be Grateful, Give Love, Laugh Lots.” I thought it was great advice for a wedding card. Simple and to the point.
Once the cut file was done, I used the print and cut feature to print the patterns on some calligraphy paper. I’ve decided that I really like calligraphy paper for paper projects. It has a delicacy to it that cardstock doesn’t, but still feels a bit sturdier than printer paper. I ended up with 3 4×6 pieces: the cut out, the watercolor background, and the saying. Originally I had been planning on making 4×6 cardstock card to adhere these to, but ended up deciding I liked them as a single piece, like a little print. Or you could call it a post card, but I like print better.
First I cut out the image for the negative die cut.
Next, I used some transfer tape to remove the paper from the mat while keeping the separate bits in the same place.
With the other two pieces cut, I sprayed on just a little 3M spray on the cut. With some careful positioning, I was able to adhere the cut to the gradient paper.
The same process was used to adhere the saying to the back of the gradient sheet.
I made an envelope with some Tim Holtz craft resist paper, placed the card in, and signed the flap of the envelope. I think the project took about 2 hours including setting up the silhouette, finding the files I wanted, and the actual paperwork. I made a second one during that time as well. I think that took about 20 min. for printing, cutting, and adhering.
Thanks for reading! Are there any cards that you like to make?
