Cardmaking, EBE by Julie Ebersole, Essentials By Ellen

Small doses of colour for high impact cards

Looking for a technique that pack a lot of punch in return for a small amount of effort? If so, read on as Carolyn Peeler shares a project featuring a colour spotlighting technique that shows how a little dose of colour can make big impact.

While I love a good, fully coloured floral card, let’s face it, sometimes colouring blooms on the awesome Essentials by Ellen Mondo Floral stamps, can take a good chunk of time. Worthwhile? Unquestionably. But sometimes I just don’t have the time to fully colour and shade, and that’s when this technique comes to the rescue!

First thing to do is cut a 8″ x 5.25″ piece of white cardstock. Then, pick your Mondo Floral Stamp – for today’s card I used the Mondo Chrysanthemum – and randomly stamp it onto the cardstock using Twilight ink, creating a subtle background. Once done stamping, cut in half, giving you two 4″ x 5.25″ backgrounds – enough for two cards.

Next, stamp one of the Chrysanthemums, using Waterproof Ink (I used Potted Soil, a neutral brown ink), onto watercolour paper and then paint your flower. The good news? You don’t have to paint the whole thing – remember, we’re trying to save time here, So, you can paint about 1/3 of it, and you’ll be just fine, that will allow you enough painted area to choose your favourite part to highlight for the card.

TIP: paint the teardrop upper part of each petal with the most diluted shade of your petal colour. Then, deepen the colour as each petal goes back into the centre of the flower. This is an easy way to give depth to your flower.

Using your favourite die cutting machine, cut six of the Instant Photo Frames Die from white cardstock. Then, using the “Hello Friend” stamp from the “Small Sayings” stamp set, stamp it onto the bottom right of one of the frames. Stamp two of the greetings, one each onto a frame, choosing an ink colour for each that coordinates with your watercolored flower. Then, glue three of your six frames together for each card, with your stamped greeting being the top frame for each stack of three. This will give your frame nice depth.

Finally, choose the section of your painted flower that you want to highlight in the Instant Frame and glue it to the back of your frame, creating the focal point of your card.

The final steps are to bring all the parts together for your card front.

Choose a coordinating shade of coloured cardstock that echos your painted flower. Cut it 5.5″ x 4.25″ and glue it onto the front of an A2 card front.
Glue your stamped Chrysanthemum subtle background onto your coloured cardstock, centring it in place.
Add dimensional foam adhesive to the back of your Instant Frame, then stick it down onto the upper center of your card.

Here is that same technique, this time featuring a blue Chrysanthemum.

Thank you for joining me today. I hope you have fun trying this simple technique next time you’re pressed for time, but want to make a high impact card!