versatile greetings

Altenew Crafty Necessities: Colored Cardstock Instagram Hop!

August 23, 2024

Hi friends! I have some colorful projects using Altenew’s new Crafty Necessities Colored Cardstock, which I also shared as part of the Altenew Crafty Necessities Instagram Hop! I tend to be drawn to the cool blues, purples, and pinks, so I thought I would switch things up for these cards and go for an unusual color palette of coral, red, and aqua using the beautiful gradient shades in the Red Sunset and Sea Shore cardstock bundles. I have three projects to share with you today, so let’s get started with the details!

For my first card, I wanted vivid flowers to pop from a tranquil Volcano Lake cardstock background, so I die cut some Build-A-Garden: Fragrant Peony die cuts from Rouge and Crimson, cutting several pieces of foliage using the same Volcano Lake cardstock and adding some light ink blending for added dimension. I arranged the colorful die cuts on the Volcano Lake cardstock A2 card front, then added a sparkling and simple greeting cut using the Versatile Greetings sentiment dies and some coordinating turquoise Shimmering Shore glitter cardstock, finishing it off with some shining gems!

I absolutely love the incredible impact that colored cardstock makes with an embossing folder just by adding a few small details. I embossed a panel of Rouge cardstock using the Farmhouse Florals 3D Embossing Folder, offsetting it slightly to the side. I then blended Rouge and Crimson Fresh Dye Ink around the edges and swiped the raised, embossed areas with a white pigment ink pad to help make the gorgeous details stand out. I added another turquoise sentiment, cut from the Shimmering Shore glitter cardstock, vellum, and the Timeless Sentiments die set. The beautiful Rouge cardstock really comes to life even more with those little extra inky details!

For my final project, I used some leftovers from the previous cards to create a colorful striped background. I used my trimmer to cut different widths of Velvet, Crimson, Rouge, Volcano Lake, and Lagoon cardstock strips, as well as some glittering accent strips from the Shimmering Shore glitter cardstock. I cut down a sheet of double sided adhesive and began arranging my cardstock strips in a slightly random pattern. I die cut the detail layer of the Fragrant Flowers die from some pearlescent white cardstock and backed it with a vellum shadow layer, trimming it slightly to create a straight edge. I added a strip of Lagoon over the seam between the edge of the die cut and the Crimson strip on the bottom of the card. For the greeting, I heat embossed a sentiment from Classic Greetings stamps and dies onto Rouge cardstock and popped it up over the lacy die cut, finally finishing everything off with a couple of gems to accent the sentiment strip!

Well, that’s all for my projects today! If you head over to Instagram, you can enter to win some fabulous prizes as part of the Crafty Necessities Instagram Hop. (My Instagram name is @eamidgett.) I am one of many stops with tons of colorful inspiration, so I hope you will hop over there and take a peek! Thanks so much for stopping by today, and have a marvelous day!

Altenew April 2023 Marvelous Monthly Series Release Blog Hop + Giveaway ($300 in Total Prizes!)

April 18, 2023

Hi there! We are hopping along today to share inspiration using the brand new Marvelous Monthly collection for April 2023. You should have arrived here from the Altenew Blog and your next stop is Mindy Eggen. This release features some fun new Dual Tip Pens and a new series, called Dynamic Duo, in addition to the series regulars that we know and love! I have two projects to share with you today, so let’s get started with the details.

The new Dynamic Duo: Treat Yourself features some fabulous layering stencils and a small stamp set that you can use to create quick and fun blended birthday cards! I began by ink blending the sentiment from the Treat Yourself stencil set using Midnight Violet and Pinkalicious inks. I also blended a bunch of fluttering balloons around the sentiment, adding in some Dark Night ink to add a touch of drama.

I also blended several flowers and foliage using the same inks, then cut them out with my sharp scissors. I stamped a sentiment strip to coordinate with the happy birthday sentiment using the Dark Night ink, popping all of the individual elements up with some foam adhesive to make them stand out from the background. I also added a few gems to help add some sparkle! I love that this card was made almost entirely from ink blending… such a different look from my normal meticulously colored projects, but definitely a fun way to create a cute birthday card!

My next card features more of my traditional crafting techniques, this time using the beautiful new Spark Joy: Festive Flowers. The Spark Joy series focuses on hot foiling, and comes complete with a set of layering stencils to make adding color to your hot foiled images a breeze. I, however, prefer to use my favorite coloring mediums to add lots of vibrant color and shading to the images. I began by hot foiling the Festive Flowers image onto some white cardstock using Altenew’s Brass hot foil roll. I colored the images using the Mystic Garden Alcohol Markers. The lilies in the arrangement worked beautifully with the colors of the Mystic Garden set.

After I’d finished coloring the image, I used a blending tool to blend some Dark Night ink around the edge of the panel. Allowing the white to remain around the image itself while the edge of the card is dark and vibrant creates a kind of halo around the image, highlighting it.

For the greeting, I added a hot foiled “hello,” created using more Brass hot foil and Versatile Greetings hot foil plate + dies. I also heat embossed a sentiment strip using the Thinking of You stamp set. I popped both of these sentiment pieces up with some foam tape, finally adding a few more shimmering gems to add one last textural element to the card front.

Well, that’s all for my projects today! Now for some fun giveaway information:

$300 in total prizes! To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a *$100 gift certificate to 1 lucky winner and a $20 gift certificate to 10 winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew Card Blog and/or each designer’s blog post on the blog hop list below by 04/24/2023 for a chance to win. Altenew will draw 11 random winners from the comments left on each stop of this blog hop and announce the winners on the Altenew Winners Page on 04/26/2023. *The winner of the $100 gift certificate will be chosen from comments left on the Altenew blog.

Your next stop is Mindy Eggen. Here’s the full hop list:

Thanks so much for stopping by today, and happy hopping!

Altenew February 2023 Boho Chic Stamp, Die, Stencil & More Release Blog Hop #1 + Giveaway ($300 in Total Prizes!)

February 1, 2023

Hi there! Today, we are celebrating the release of Altenew’s new Boho Chic collection, a new array of products that have so many unique subjects/styles and can work seamlessly together or on their own! You can check out the full hop list HERE on the Altenew blog or check out the link list at the bottom of this post.

My projects for today’s post feature an interesting, new-to-me color combination: rose gold, blush, and teal. I began by doing some hot foiling with the new Delicate Floral Motif hot foil plate. I loved the look of the contrast of Altenew’s Rose Gold Hot Foil roll on some intense teal cardstock, so I used that as my color inspiration for both projects today, keeping the colors intense and vibrant on the hot foiled card, juxtaposing it with a lighter, more pastel version for the second project. Let’s get started with the details!

To start, I hot foiled the new Delicate Floral Motif hot foil plate with the Rose Gold Hot Foil from Altenew on some intense teal cardstock from my stash, centering it a bit to the left of the center of the A2 card front and using some low-tack tape to keep it in place when using my hot foil machine. I love how beautifully the contrast of colors showcases details from the new Delicate Floral Motif hot foil plate. To highlight the details even further and direct the eye towards the hot foiled focal point, I blended some Emerald ink around the edges of the card front, then splattered some coordinating rose gold metallic watercolor around the edges.

While my panel was drying, I hot foiled greetings from the Versatile Greetings and Sweet Sentiments hot foil and die bundles. I used the same teal cardstock and Rose Gold Hot Foil to keep the color scheme completely cohesive. I love the combination of fonts with these two sentiment sets; the chunky type font contrasts beautifully with the delicate script of the handwritten font. Once I had hot foiled and die cut the greetings, I popped them up on the card front using some foam adhesive.

Once I had added the foiled sentiment die cuts, I almost called it good, but the more I looked at it, the more it felt like I needed just one more element of that metallic rose gold. One of my favorite ways to accent a focal point is to add a rectangular frame around the edge of my card front, and the Fine Frames Cover Die creates perfectly delicate accent frames that fit so many different styles of card. I die cut the Fine Frames Cover Die from some glittery cardstock in a shade almost identical to the rose gold foil. I adhered one around the blended edge of my card front using some liquid adhesive. The rose gold foil, rose gold splatters, and rose gold frame contrast so beautifully with the dark teal background!

My second card is a light and airy version of the same color scheme used before. I know that the new Swamp Buttercup is probably meant to be done in shades of yellow, but I was in “rose gold mode,” so I took some artistic license and blended the flowers using the muted pinks of the Woodland Escape Fresh Dye Ink collection. I blended the leaves using Lagoon and Emerald inks, lightly blending a touch of the darkest shade from the Woodland Escape quartet on the edge of the foliage to add extra dimension and interest. I die cut the finished floral bouquet using the coordinating die.

For the background, I die cut the new Rattan Stripes die from two A2 panels of pale peach cardstock, rotating it 90* the second time to create a plaid pattern. I adhered them both to a white A2 card front using liquid adhesive around the edges. The pale peach cardstock creates such a subtle background, but with tons of texture to keep things interesting. I added the die cut stenciled bouquet to the plaid card front using foam tape.

For the greeting, I used the Sweet Sentiments dies to die cut a glittery greeting. I die cut the solid background piece from some heavyweight vellum, then die cut the detail layer once from plain white cardstock and once from the same glittery rose gold cardstock used on the previous card. I adhered it to the card front, nestling it amongst the flowers with some dots of liquid adhesive. The final touch was to add a few peachy gems for some sparkle.

Well, that’s all for my projects today! Now for some fun giveaway information:

$300 in total prizes! To celebrate this release, Altenew is giving away a *$100 gift certificate to 1 lucky winner and a $20 gift certificate to 10 winners! Please leave a comment on the Altenew Card Blog and/or each designer’s blog post on the blog hop list below by 02/07/2023 for a chance to win. Altenew will draw 11 random winners from the comments left on each stop of this blog hop and announce the winners on the Altenew Winners Page on 02/08/2023.
*The winner of the $100 gift certificate will be chosen from comments left on the Altenew blog.

Here’s the full hop list:

Thanks so much for stopping by today, and happy hopping!