Creative Stamping

Hello again Everyone!

I wanted to share with you a couple of creative ways to use those tiny stamps in your collection! I have many stamps sets in my collection that have tiny coordinating stamps to go along with the larger ones. A lot of times (unfortunately) we crafters overlook these smaller pieces, as they don’t fit in with the project we are making. These stamps are unique unto themselves, with lots of beautiful designs, and could be used in many ways to either compliment your card, or even stand out as the focal point!

First up is this holly leaf Christmas tree… I love how the gold is primarily the only color used in this card, with just a splash of red here and there to accent. I sketched a tree shape using a pencil onto my cream cardstock card, and lightened the lines with a kneaded eraser, so they could act as a simple guide…

Taking a mini holly leaf stamp set from Studio G, I started at the top and began stamping various holly leaves, with Versamark ink, inside my sketched tree. Once I had all my holly leaves stamped, I sprinkled on some Ranger Princess Gold embossing powder and heat set it.

The sentiment is also heat embossed with the same embossing powder, as well as the edges of the card. I really like how the embossed edges really add some elegance to this card.

Some red glitter glue randomly placed in between the holly leaves adds just a bit of sparkle and the red twine bow tied at the fold of the card finishes off the card.

Next up we have this beautiful star-filled Joy card, which could easily be turned into a New Year’s card as well! I sketched the sentiment out onto my card base using my Silhouette Cameo, a silver gel pen and the font “Antrokas“. Once sketched out, I took the gel pen and filled in the font; I then quickly sprinkled on some Stampendous Detail Silver embossing powder and heat set it.

The star stamps are from two of Hampton Art’s Christmas Outlines stamp sets, “Snowman Joy” and “Reindeer Joy”, and I stamped them in a random pattern across the entire card with Versamark ink. The stars were then heat embossed with the same silver embossing powder used for the sentiment.

Taking my silver gel pen, I filled in a few of the stars to add a little interest, and then with my gold and tinsel Heidi Swapp Color Shine spray inks, I flicked on droplets of the ink across my card. With a white gel pen I also drew a bunch of little dots and faux stitching, just to add some lighter tones to the card.

The final touch to my card was a ribbon I tied in a diagonal along the top left and bottom right portions of the card…

Isn’t it fun to see what you can create with those teeny-tiny stamps?! There are so may possibilities for our perhaps-forgotten stamps… I hope this has inspired you to try some stamping of your own with all the little stamps in your collection! :)

Inspiration

The inspiration for the Holly Leaf Christmas Tree card was from Muse’s current card challenge (#98). Instead of a square card, as in the muse for this week, I enlarged the card base to accommodate the tree I was creating, keeping the image above the sentiment.