Happy Birthday Card with Tips for Easy and Fast Die Cut Coloring!

Hello crafty friends! Today I'm sharing a card to add to my birthday card stash that I've made with more of Honey Bee Stamps previously released products! I've used the beautiful Lovely Layers: Tulips along with a few other favorite sets. If you would like to learn a couple of tips for quick ink blending for your die cuts, read on!

My tip for faster ink blending for your die cuts is instead of inking each individual die cut, take a strip of cardstock and do your ink blending on that! I used a coral ink and a yellow ink and two blender brushes. To get the gradient, I overlapped the two colors in the middle of my 80# white cardstock strip, like this:

Then I just lined up the dies from the Lovely Layers: Tulips and cut them out with my die cutting machine. Easy and fast! If you want a bit more depth, like I did, it was easy to ink on more coral ink along the bottom of the die cuts!

Another quick way to color your die cuts is to begin with colored cardstock! I die cut the Lovely Layers: Tulips leaves and stems and the Lovely Layers: Spring Greenery (I used one of the dies from this set) from green cardstock. I used a darker shade of green ink to quickly add ink to the pieces for more depth.

I used glue to adhere the layers together. Next I adhered a blue cardstock panel to my A2 card base. Then I added the flowers and leaves to my card base with glue and foam dots.

I die cut the bee in the Lovely Layers: Bugs dies from 80# white cardstock and the bee's wings from vellum. I used my Copic markers to easily color the two layers of the bee's body. To get the "fuzzy" look on the bee, I used a black Micron 005 pen and added tiny lines along the black stripes.

I glued the bee layers together and adhered it to the card with foam squares. The sentiment is from the Inside: Birthday Sentiments stamp set and stamped in black pigment ink. I cut it out with the coordinating die and added foam strips to adhere it to the card.

For a bit of embellishment, I dug DEEP into my stash of older products and pulled out my Prills. Who remembers these?! I added dots of glue to the Tulip center and adhered the Prills.  And I can't believe I found where these are still available!  Check the link in the list below.

I really do enjoy pulling out some of my older and favorite products and hope I've inspired you to do the same! Thank you so much for stopping by today!

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Die Cut Spring Flowers Card

Happy spring crafty friends! I love springtime and we have beautiful tulips in bloom and bright green leaves showing now!  I was inspired to use some of my favorite floral Honey Bee Stamps Lovely Layers sets and make a springtime card! My card features three Lovely Layers sets:  Lovely Layers: Tulips, Lovely Layers: Roses, and Lovely Layers: Spring Greenery.

My tip for today is to die cut your flowers and greenery from colored cardstock, then use a few inks to add a bit of shading. This saves so much time! I used yellow, pink, and three shades of green cardstock to cut out the layers of the Roses, Tulips, Spring Greenery, and Grass Border. (Note: I only used the closed tulip and tulip bud and one die from the Spring Greenery for this card.)

Then I used blending brushes to blend on coordinating pink, yellow, and green inks to the layers. This detail adds so much depth and dimension! Then I used glue to adhere the layers together. Don't forget that the Lovely Layers sets have downloadable Layering Guides to help you layer the flowers.

Before I adhered the flowers to my card base, I added Tumbled Glass Distress Oxide ink to the card with a blending brush. I added the ink from the center out, but not all the way to the edges. Then I added water drops and used a paper towel to dry it.

I played around with various arrangements of the flowers and greenery. When I was happy, I used a piece of Press N Seal to pick up the arrangement and flip it over. I added glue to the back of the elements, then picked up the arrangement and adhered it to the card. I added a foam dot to the back of the tulip and rose buds. Then I used scissors to trim off the Spring Greenery that was hanging over the edges. I used foam dots to adhere the Grass Border at the bottom of the card.

Next I diluted a few drops of Bee Shimmery liquid shimmer watercolor with water. I used a paint brush to add splatters to the flowers and background.

The sentiment from the Squeeze The Day stamp set is stamped in black pigment ink and cut out with the coordinating die.

I just had to add some adorable little bees from one of my very early Honey Bee sets I bought:  Busy Bees stamp set. These were previously colored and cut out with coordinating dies. (I saved a bunch of these finished bees to have on hand to use when needed.)

I sure hope you are seeing signs of spring where you are! If not, I hope my card reminds you that it's not far away! I always appreciate your visit to see my cards! Thank you, and have a wonderful, crafty day!

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Happy Birthday Card With Layered Tulips

Happy first day of March!! With spring just around the corner and tulips springing up, I was inspired to use the beautiful Lovely Layers: Tulips for my birthday card. There are so many pretty tulip colors and I had a hard time deciding what color(s) to use! So I decided to use one of my favorite colors for my monochromatic card!  I have a reel posted over on my Instagram showing some of the fun process too!

First I created my card base and layer. I embossed some mint green cardstock (linked below) with the Clover Petals 3D embossing folder. But wait! Before embossing, I used a brayer to add coordinating ink to the more flat side of the embossing folder. Using a brayer will give you the smoothest layer of ink versus inking directly with the ink pad. After embossing it may look a bit blotchy, but give it time to totally dry and the ink smooths out leaving the raised portions looking more highlighted. Trim the panel to 3-¾" x 5" and adhere to an A2 card base with glue.

Next I die cut three of the closed tulips and the buds in the Lovely Layers: Tulips Honey Cuts from textured white cardstock. I used the same mint green ink as above to add shading to the tulips. I die cut the stems and leaves from green cardstock. Then I used Bee Creative glue to adhere all of the layers together.

I arranged the tulips on the card then used a piece of Press N Seal to pick the arrangement up. I flipped it over and added foam dots and small square foams to the back of the flowers. Then I added glue to the stems and picked it all up (still adhered to the Press N Seal) and put it on the card front.

The sentiments are from the Birthday Wishes stamp set and stamped in mint green ink, followed by Clear Embossing Ink. Next I added clear embossing powder and heat set it. I cut them out with the coordinating Honey Cuts and then added foam squares to pop them up on the card.

I always have to have my sparkle, so I added some Crystal Glimmer Enamel Stickers to the flowers and near the sentiment.

This was such a super fun, quick, and easy card to make!! Thank you so much for stopping by today. Have a wonderful and crafty week!

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Lovely Layers: Tulips Card & Hot Foiling on Ribbon!!

Today I'm sharing my card using the beautiful Lovely Layers: Tulips Honey Cuts by Honey Bee Stamps; and I added a bow that has foiling on it!!  I finally jumped on the hot foiling train and really love it!!  I had been wondering if the Small Card Hot Foil Plates would work on materials other than card stock, and much to my delight, they do! I tried out a few different types of ribbon and found I got the best results on the smooth satin type ribbon. I have some photos below to go along with my tutorial for the process.

First I die cut the Lovely Layers: Tulips from some coral, yellow, and green card stock. I added some shading to the pieces with Distress Oxide ink and a Detail Blender Brush. I used Mustard Seed, Squeezed Lemonade, Mowed Lawn, and Rustic Wilderness. I used a coral ink from my stash for the shading of the coral card stock pieces. I used pieces of foam strips between all of the layers for extra dimension. If you need help with the layers, check out this layering guide:

Before I adhered the leaves and stems to the assembled flowers, I spritzed a bit of white ink spray onto the flowers and set them aside to dry. I die cut some beautiful paper from the Modern Spring paper pad with the largest Sweet Stacks: Rectangles and adhered it to an A2 card base. Then I added a frame I die cut from white card stock where I taped together the two largest A2 Double Stitched Frames dies. I used Bee Creative glue to adhere the frame, tulips, stems and leaves.

As I mentioned above, I used the Small Card Hot Foil plates to experiment foiling on various types of ribbon. I wanted to foil on the bias tape type ribbon as that's what I have most of. The looser weave of that ribbon just didn't produce a very smooth foiling though. The tight weave of this satin ribbon is what has worked best for me. I didn't want to have to guess where to do my foiling, and then tie the bow, so I tied the bow first. These next photos show how I foiled it.

First, with the bow right side up, I laid down the foil (shiny side up) and then placed the sentiments from the Small Card Hot Foil Plates set face down onto the foil. I used small pieces of removable tape to hold it all in place.

You need the tape, because now you will turn it over so the plates are touching the heating plate of your machine. (If the ribbon is on the bottom, the plates will not get hot enough--ask me how I know!! LOL!) Following the directions for your machine, let the plates heat for the required amount of time. Leave the tied portion of the bow off the edge as you see below.

When the heating is finished, add the shims required for your machine, and run it through your die cutting machine with the tie bow hanging out. Like this:

I was SO thrilled that this worked! I think it adds such a unique touch to a project!

I trimmed the edges of the bow into a fishtail shape and adhered it with a glue dot. There are so many sentiments in the Small Card Hot Foil Plates set that provide lots of different options, depending on the width of your ribbon.

Oh, one last thing. In the photos you may have noticed that, yep, I foiled my plates! Evidently, just about everyone does that at some point, but good news: it does not affect the plates at all! You can remove the foil, but I just went ahead and used them and there's no difference in the results!

Foiling on ribbon? Yes, please!! This was lots of fun and has my wheels turning wondering what else can be foiled? I hope you’ve enjoyed my process and have found some inspiration too! Thank you so much for stopping by!

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