Create a Card Set with Seed Paper Flowers 3 comments  

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Today we are going to be making 4 Mother's Day cards using Crate Paper Bloom and seed paper for embellishments. You can change the card sentiments to anything that you like if you don't need Mother's Day cards.

There is a supply list HERE.

Here are the cards we are going to be making:

I almost always use sketches for my cards. I find that I just make better cards that way. Without a sketch I tend to slap something simple together. Here are the sketches that I used for these cards, in the order of the cards that they were used for in the above photo. I altered all of the sketches quite a bit - rotating the first, scrunching the second and the fourth because my cards are not square like the sketches. But I think you can still recognize the sketches in the cards. These sketches are all from the ICS - Inspirational Card Sketches blog.

The first step is going to be cutting and folding the cards.

These cards are sized to fit in the envelopes listed on the supply list. They will be 5.5 x 4.25 inches.

So first you want to take your kraft cardstock and cut 3.5 inches off one side. (you will use this 3.5x12 inch strip later)

Now you have a 8.5x12 inch piece. Turn it sideways and cut the long side at 5.5 inches and again at the 11 inch mark. (or 5.5 and again at 5.5 because after you cut the first 5.5 inches off it won't be 11 inches long anymore.) You will be left with 2 - 5.5 x 8.5 pieces and one 1 inch x 8.5 scrap.

Those 5.5x8.5 pieces are going to be folded into your two kraft cards.

Now repeat the above with the green cardstock.

Now, you can fold them any way you like, but what I usually do is use the lip of my paper trimmer and slide the top of the paper right up against that lip before bringing the bottom of the paper up to meet it. This keeps the paper from slipping and keeps my fold mostly straight.

Now set the folded cards aside and get out your punches and seed paper.

I have 4 different sized punches. - one plain 'large' 1.5 inch circle, one scalloped 1.25 inch circle, one small scalloped 1 inch circle and one small 1.25 inch flower punch.

I turned the punch over, like shown in the image below, to make the best use of my paper. By viewing the underside of the punch I can make sure that the newest punched image will be as close as possible to the previous one. Please note that some of the seeds in these papers are a little larger than the space allowed by the punch, so I had to sort of wiggle it to get it into the punch and in a couple of cases (on the white sheet mostly) I had to move my punch a little from where I wanted it because a particularly large seed wouldn't allow me to get the paper into the punch.

You will notice in the second picture below, that I made a row of flowers, but have a circle in the middle. That is because I found that some of the punches had a little bit more space for the paper to fit in. So, that spot where I punched the circle had a big seed in it and would not fit in the flower punch, but it did fit in the circle punch.

NOTE: I do not have a Cricut or an old fashioned die cut machine. I would assume that you could use either of those instead of the punches. However, old fashioned die cuts might be the better option becuase Im not sure how the blade on the Cricut would act if it encountered a large hard seed.  I do have a Slice, but I didn't want to chance my blade. Plus, I really wanted small shapes here and the Slice doesnt cut well at the really small sizes. Furthermore, the half inch increments on the slice are too large to give me a good layered look like I wanted.

So, go ahead and punch a variety of sizes and colors. Do maybe two rows from each seed paper (the white and the yellow). And make sure that you get some white and some yellow from each punch. So, for me, I have some white and some yellow flowers. You definitely need less of the largest circle though since they will only be on the bottoms.

Here is a picture of the variety of shapes and colors that I ended up with. Later, I found that I needed more of a certain size or color and had to punch them individually or in small groups, but this should get you started. Additionally in this photo, you can see that I trimmed the scraps of the seed paper off and put it in a baggie. I didnt want to waste any of that paper, so I kept it and plan to have my daughter plant the scraps in the pots that she will be giving her grandmothers for mothers day.

Also, you can see here how I started piling the shapes up to see how the fit together.

Now that you have those all ready - push them aside. And get two of your blank cards back out - one kraft and one green. You are going to want to cut a 3.75 inch strip from both the Wild Flowers and the River Rock paper. But first take a look at the two photos below.  In the first photo, the cut pieces are JUST SITTING THERE NOT GLUED YET, centered on the cards. You will notice that the kraft edge that is showing around the patterned paper in the first card is larger than the green edge that is showing around the patterned paper in the second card. This is because I wanted to give you an easy number to cut your paper at, so I cut the Wild Flowers paper first, to 3.75. However, I prefer a smaller border so for the River Rock paper I cut my strip just a hair over 3.75. That is shown in the second photo. See how the bottom paper is just a tad bit bigger - maybe 1/16 or 1/8 larger than the top paper. It is entirely up to you which you prefer. If you want simple, cut your paper at 3.75 inches.

Then cut each of those strips into 2- 3.75 x 5 inch pieces so you have two card fronts and one scrap of each pattern.

NOTE: I always position things first and glue later. Don't glue something down just because it looks glued down. I might move it later in the class. I will tell you when to glue.

Next I moved the papers around a little trying to decide which paper should go on which card. I ended up starting with the blue side of the River Rock paper on the kraft card. I inked the edges of both papers (and everything else in the class) with a brown (Chestnut) cats eye ink pad.

NOTE: Inking is optional, but I ink EVERYTHING. If I forget to add that as an instruction somewhere and you see something not inked, go ahead and assume that I meant for you to ink it. I think the only thing I didn't ink was the ribbon and the tiny alphas.

Next you will want to cut the blue cardstock. I cut a 3.5 inch strip then cut the strip down to 4.75 inches long. I then used my scallop border punch along the bottom before inking the edges.

Next I cut a piece of ribbon just a little larger than the blue cardstock, so I could wrap the ends under.

I adhered the ribbon to the blue cardstock by running a thin line (a little dab will do ya) down the ribbon before prositioning it from the front to make sure it was straight. Finally, I wrapped the ends around to the back and held them in place until they dried. Fabritac dries pretty quickly so you could just hold it but I used magnets on my metal desk. Sitting something on top would work too.

NOTE: I pretty much always use my ATG gun adhesive because it is what I prefer. Feel free to use whatever adhesive you prefer. But I find that liquid glue, especially fabritac, works best for, well, fabric - like ribbons. I also use fabritac for things like mulberry paper flowers and fabric flowers, and glitter papers.

Now we will go back to the punched flowers.

The first photo shows how I just set the flowers there to figure out how many I needed and where I wanted to put them. (I don't know why there are only two piles of punched shapes in that photo, because in the end there will be 3 flowers on the card) I decided that the big white circle was just a tad bit too big. Since I don't have another size punch, and I didnt feel like trimming it by hand, I decided to distress it instead. I used my tonic edge distresser, before crumpling it up a few times.

NOTE: Tonic/Tim Holtz makes an edge distresser as does Heidi Swapp, they are pretty much the same except the tonic one is more expensive and has more blades in it. More blade options = longer time before you need a new one. So I figure in the end they probably cost about the same. Alternately you can use the blade of scissors - or so Im told, but Ive never actually done that. Seems a tad bit dangerous to me. In essence the distressing tools are just little blades hidden in plastic that you drag across the edge of the paper to make it shaggy or distressed.

I thought for a while about how to adhere the seed paper flowers to the card. I do not usually use brads on my cards and if I do, I NEVER let the backs show. Which is, incidentally, why I had not glued down the patterned paper yet. I learned the hard way many times that it is best to wait until the card is almost finished to glue the background piece to the actual card, that way you can use that piece to hide brad backs, or ribbon ends or whatever. Anyhoo, I had not originally planned to use brads on the cards. But I decided that it might be more 'user friendly' for the card recipients if they could just undo the brads and take the flowers off as opposed to feeling like they are literally ripping apart this gorgeous handmade creation. So, I dug through my stash and pulled out a variety of brads in coordinating colors.  (I added some brad options available in the store here to the supply list for those of you who would prefer that option.)

Then I ... everyone say it with me - inked the edges. Liberally and with two tones of ink. I used a lighter brown and the same brown as before, in no particular order. Sometimes light brown was on white, sometimes on yellow. I just wanted more variety and visual interest.

NOTE: along with thinking long and hard about how to adhere the flowers, I contemplated what sorts of altering would work for the seed paper. In the end I decided that stamping and all manner of physical distortion was probably fine. Yes, punching and cutting and distressing might break some individual seeds, but in the end the bulk of the paper remains intact. However, I think it might be ill-advised to use glimmer mist on the seed papers. They are, after all, designed to biodegrade in moist soil and to allow the seeds to germinate. I didn't try it, so I can't really say, but I didnt want to chance it. Normally, instead of all this labor intensive inking I would have glimmer misted. Although, you know? I probably would have inked after the glimmer mist anyway.

Next I used my paper piercer to make holes in the stacks of flowers, and pushed the brads through. You will notice here that I used one yellow flower, one white flower (which is hard to see) one yellow scallop circle and the one large white circle. I really wanted to load up on the seeds. Since I only put three see flowers on here, I wanted to make sure there was plenty of plantable paper included, so I made them a little thicker more for that reason, than for how they look.

Aww and there they are sitting on the card all ready to go. You may now glue down the patterned paper and the cardstock. (where is my wink icon)

After the papers were glued down, I rearranged the flowers how I wanted them, and used the ends of the brads to make impressions in the cardstock, so that I know exactly where to make the holes.  (see the tiny dot in the corner of the blue paper?)

Now, MAKE SURE YOUR CARD IS OPEN. Then use the paper piercer to make a hole through all three layers of paper (card, patterned paper, and carstock) Then push the brad through and secure it.  Repeat for the other two flowers.

Now onto the sentiment. I used a scrap of the brown patterened paper. (leftover from cutting the card fronts) I used the paper because I was worried that the sticker letters would not stick to the ribbon very well. Also, it makes it easier for placement. It was just a happy coincidence that my title fit almost perfectly across the brown paper. If you have space leftover at the end, don't worry you can trim that off after we cut it into a strip.

So after sticking down the stickers, trim the paper so that the edges are small and uniform all the way around. Then adhere it to the middle of the ribbon, off center to the right. It sticks over the edge and that is just fine. (I used fabritac to adhere it to the ribbon.

DONE WITH CARD 1 - but dont worry, the others are going to go faster because we did a lot of prep work already.

CARD 2

I decided to make both of the kraft cards first and both the same direction, so that the inserts will fit in them nicely. I used the front side of the Wild Flowers card front, and cut a 1.5 inch strip from the Sunshine paper. I used a pencil to mark where to cut the yellow strip so that it will go all the way across the card, cut it and inked it.

Next I pulled out the smaller leftover piece of blue and arranged my letters in the corner to create the sentiment. Then I trimmed the blue down around the sentiment and grabbed the scrap of the Wild Flowers paper and matted the blue on the brown. I trimmed the brown down similarly, inked the edges of both and glued them together.

Next I wanted to add just a bit more visual interest to my flowers. So I got out my stamp. Bare with me here because this may seem like sacrilidge to some of you. and if you are uncomfortable with it, you can skip the whole stamping flowers part, or find a different stamp that works for you. I cut my stamp apart so that I could stamp with just the one flower bloom. I could have masked it, but , well, I stink at masking. And as I will show you later, I was still able to put the stamp back together and use it as all one piece.

Next I laid out my flowers as before to see how many I needed. Then they all were inked, the large one distressed and the small ones got a stamp in the center with the newly cut flower stamp.

Next I moved back to the sentiment, wrapped the brown twine around it twice and tied it in a little knot. Then I glued down the large patterned paper rectangle and the small strip, before adhering the sentiment with some foam tape and fabritac. The fabritac is mostly to keep the twine secured, and the foam tape is to keep the sentiment level on the card, since one side has the twine around it and the other doesnt.

This is how I placed the sentiment, and then the flowers. (again be sure that your card is opened before you poke the holes for the flowers.)

Card 3 - moving on to the green, vertically oriented, cards. Here I used the back of the yellow paper - I cut a 3.25 inch strip from the yellow paper- and just freehanded a large curve in pencil, Then cut it out, inked the edges and glued it to the patterned paper card front. Then I tied the twine around it as shown, wrapping it 3 or 4 times. In this photo it looks like the knot is in the back, but it isn't. The knot should be visible on the front lower right hand corner. Then I glued that to the actual card using fabritac.

The flowers got the same, inked, distressed and stamped treatment. Then I just stuck the sentiment stickers on. I sort of centered the 'mothers day' part between the knot and the flowers, before adding the 'happy' so I could more easily center the 'happy' above the 'mothers day'

Card 4

I used a scrap of the yellow to create the sentiment - trimming and then inking the edges. And laid out the flowers as before. nothing is glued here in the second photo.

I wanted to add some ribbon, so I cut a 4x1.5 inch strip from the yellow patterned paper, inked the edges and wrapped the ribbon around it, using fabritac to secure the ends on the back. Then I put my stamp back together and stamped a row of flowers, so that the bottoms of the stems stopped right where I planned to glue the ribbon wrapped paper. Glue the ribbon wrapped paper. Tuck the sentiment just a tad bit behind the ribbon and glue it. Then Glue the whole piece to the card base, before adding the flowers. Again, ink, distress and stamp the flowers and make sure not to punch your holes all the way through the other side of the card.

and Voila!

but we aren't done yet! I made up some little poems for you to print out and add to the insides of the cards. Remember at the beginning I told you to save those 3.5x12inch strips of cardstock. This is why.

Now, I use photoshop to do my printing, but Im sure pretty much whatever program you have will be just fine. They are JPG images sized 3.5x12. You will notice that there is a box drawn around the poems. That is just to show you where to cut. You don't really need to have those lines. As you can see by this photo, the lines were cut off when I printed. That is because my file and my paper size were both set to 3.5x12, so I got that warning about part of my image being cut off because it was outside the printer margins. Don't worry about that just say ok. But you probably want to test out the print settings on a scrap paper first. You can totally just cut a regular 8.5x11 down to 3.5x11. The printer won't know that your paper isnt 12 inches long, and the image isnt that big anyway. Since every program and printer and computer is different. I can't really help you much, you will just have to play around with it until it works. One thing to try is to make sure that the paper size is set in your print properties. If the computer thinks that you are printing on 8.5x11 it will try to center the image and you will see just a tiny sliver of it (or none at all).  The landscape orientation image is pretty much the same, I even rotated it for you. So once you get the first one working, you can print the second one exactly the same way. I printed on the back of the green paper so that the printing would show up better. I couldnt get that little sticker off neatly, so I just fed the paper in such that the printing didnt end up on the sticker.

After printing, I cut along the lines, inked the edges and matted the poems on some of the leftover patterened papers. (but first you might want to cut a 3.5x12  inche strip off of the yellow patterend paper and set it aside, because I used that to print poems for the 'bonus' cards.)

Here are how my card insides look. I had some extra flowers laying around so I stuck them on the insides with little glue dots. That is totally optional.

Finally, I noticed that I had the makings of at least 2 more cards laying on my desk so I made two more, out of the blue cardstock. See - the blue cardstock 'scrap' was already 8.5x12, so it is all set to make into two cards. (go back to top if you need those instructions again)

Then I just took some scraps, inked the edges, glued them down and added a row of flowers between them, to sort of cover up the seam.