Pink Floral Birthday Card

I made this lovely pretty birthday card for my Mum, using my Cricut. I used a textured cream card as the base, and cut it using design #M21136F in Cricut's Design Space. I also cut it out again in a dark pink pearl paper, and cut out individual flowers for highlights. I even used some leftover flowers to pretty up the envelope (apparently I need some cream envelopes, I could only find white in my cupboard!) I used my Cricut to write "happy birthday" on to pale pink paper in Cricut Sans, and added miniature silver gems to the dark pink flowers for added interest. I love how effective and feminine this card is, and I love that my Cricut allows me to guarantee neat writing on my cards - no more slipping hands!

Totally Turquoise

When I was very young, I was convinced the word "turquoise" had the letter 'b' in it. Odd, I know.

Anyway. Have you ever finished several card making sessions only to realise all the cards you have made are in the same colour scheme? That was my accident last month. Not that I'm complaining, they're rather pretty! Turquoise is a lovely colour, it's soft without being overtly feminine, and it's fresh without being garishly bright.

I found that this embellishment was a great size to use with my circle punch. The great thing about printables is that you can adjust the scale when printing if it's not quite fitting right! I layered it up with some other circles, including some I cut from a silver glitter tape that I love and some small gems.

I forgot to properly photograph this card, so I'm afraid this is just a snap from my phone. I used an amazing glitter embossing powder which happened to match perfectly with my pearlised deep turquoise paper! These mini gems are great for adding extra detail to cards, and rather than mounting the stamped card on top, I punched through the turquoise to see the flower below - it's a small difference but it made a nice change for me!

Turquoise carries the neutral tones of grey, brown and cream beautifully, and this time I added some "bling" with Liquid Pearls. This is another great product for adding to cards, especially when you want a thin card to travel through the post!

I used the glitter tape again with this card. By simply sticking lengths of it to a piece of card, it becomes something you can use as a paper, for example with punches. It's so sparkly the joins aren't obvious! I love how this card plays with different scales of the same pattern.

I think most of the imagery I've used in these cards, for example the embellishments and patterned papers, were all free printables found online. I'm not sure of exactly where, but Sizzix is definitely worth checking out :)

Elegant 30th Birthday Card

When it comes to friendship groups, I have a tendency to be the youngest. Maybe it comes from being the youngest sibling, but I have always gravitated to those older than me. To this extent, over the last few years, I have watched those closest to me turn 30, whilst I'm still a baby at 26! It's interesting how quickly we as humans change from being so excited as youngsters to be a year older (my nephew's biggest complaint on his 3rd birthday was that he wasn't 4!) to fearing that extra candle on the cake. Anyway, I wanted a beautiful, classy card for a dear friend who recently hit that milestone (30, not 4), and this is what materialised on my desk.

I used an oval template to draw the zero, and designed the "3" myself - I had a vision in my head! I cut the numbers out from a pearl card, and mounted them on the beautiful floral paper using 3D sticky pads. I wish I could tell you where this paper came from, but I received it from someone else's stash - it's beautiful! I mounted this on white corrugated card (I really need to find somewhere to buy more of this) before affixing to the card. I thought the card needed some sparkle, so I attached mini gold gems to finish. I used a product called "micro glue dots" to attach the gems, and my mind is blown away by how much easier it was than using glue, and also how firmly they stuck!

Cards with Flowers

Some more feminine card designs of late... I've enjoyed playing with some beautiful colour palettes, and layering different shapes and patterns :) And you can't have too much sparkle!