Hi friends! I am happy to be joining my friends at Trinity Stamps as a guest for this month’s release! The images in the February 2024 release are chock full of lovely springtime images, beautiful typography, and sweet dies. I was especially enamored of the Brighter Days Ahead stamp set and the Irish Blessing Blooms stamps and coordinating dies. I have been reminded of how much I love my colored pencils recently, and so thought that these two sets would look fabulous with a chalkboard effect using my Caran D’Ache Luminance colored pencils. Let’s get started with the details!
For both of my cards, I stamped the images to be colored onto black cardstock using white pigment ink. This is my favorite ink to use to do no-line coloring with my colored pencils on colored cardstock. Because the ink sits atop the cardstock rather than seeping down into it, I find that it blends very nicely in withe colored pencils without leaving any lines leftover on the finished image. I used Caran D’Ache Luminance colored pencils for both projects, making sure to have extra sharp point on my pencils especially for the edges of my images so that the exterior lines were nice and crisp.
My first card is a completely flat, one layer card using the new Brighter Days Ahead stamp set. I stamped the large focal point image using white pigment ink on the center of my A2 black cardstock panel, then selected some colored pencils to use to create a hand-drawn chalkboard effect. I kept the color palette minimal, using light blues for the lettering to allow it to stand out nicely. I almost always do a double layer of colored pencils when working with super intense colored cardstock like this black cardstock, which helps to ensure even, full coverage on all of the images.
After I had finished coloring the image, I didn’t want to cover it up with any die cuts or additional embellishment, so I simply added a few coordinating blue gems from the Cornflower Opaque Embellishment Mix. I could easily have left them off to make this card super easy to mail! I am absolutely obsessed with how vibrant these colored pencils look on this image.
My second card is another chalkboard look, this time featuring the Irish Blessing Blooms stamps and coordinating dies. I stamped the floral accents from the Irish Blessing Blooms stamp set on black cardstock, again using white pigment ink. I used the Caran D’Ache Luminance colored pencils to add some delicate, springy color to these images, making extra sure to keep the points on the pencils sharpened to a very fine point so as to keep the edges distinct and crisp.
Once I had finished coloring, I die cut the floral images using their coordinating dies. I also heat embossed the lovely greeting onto some more black cardstock using white embossing powder, trimming the embossed piece down with my trimmer and softening the piece by rounding the corners with a corner rounding punch. I also cut a smaller-than-A2 panel of more black cardstock and ran it through my die cutting machine using the A7 Diamond Eyelet cover plate. This cover plate adds a delicate pattern, made even more subtle by layering the piece on another piece of black cardstock to create a tone-on-tone background. I popped up the sentiment focal point with foam adhesive and accented it with the two floral die cuts. The final touch was to add a few Sugar Plum Dance Glass Rhinestones beneath the bottom floral embellishment. (Side note-I am absolutely smitten with the stunning glass rhinestones from Trinity’s December release. I use them on almost every project! Check them out HERE.)
Well, that’s all for my projects today! I encourage you to check out the darling new release from Trinity Stamps. So many adorable new goodies, perfect for getting you into a sunny springtime mood. Check out the full release HERE. Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!
