Want To Make Your Cards Stand Out? - Cut, Color, & Create

Everyone wants their Easter cards to be really special. Learn a couple of techniques in this article to make yours stand out.

There's something about hot foiling that takes a card to the next level. And that is what we're doing on both of our cards in this article. But, I've got a couple more tricks up my sleeve that will help you to make your cards even more special.

I've got two cards that I'm sharing how to make today. They feature Daffodil Spray and the coordinating gold foil roll that comes with Spellbinders Glimmer Hot Foil Kit of the month. The monthly clubs are a wonderful way to get beautiful new products.

The way it works is that very talented, crafty people create projects with some, or all of the monthly kits. And they share what they have made on their blogs and on social media for the first five days of each month. This is to introduce you to the kits and to give you ideas of what you make with them. Then, you can register for the monthly clubs that you're interested in from the 6th to the 27th of each month. That is, if you haven't already. You can learn more about it HERE.

So, let's get started with our cards.

Stand Out Colored Daffodil Spray

A card with yellow daffodils on it that is sure to stand out.

Hot Foiling

The first step is to do our hot foiling. And, there are a couple of things you can do to help with the quality of your foiling:

Use very smooth cardstock
Add a shim if you need one
Make sure that your foiling machine is hot enough (let it warm up even longer than the manufacturer says to)
Take your time

For this card, we're going to use the gold foil that comes with the monthly kit and a piece of 5″ x 7″ white cardstock. Follow the manufacturer's instructions for your foiling machine to do your foiling. You might as well foil the sentiment too while you're at it.

Stand Out Coloring

After the foiling is done, we can now begin to color the image. I like to use water-reactive colored pencils to do this because you can achieve vibrant colors and beautiful blending. To achieve bright colors like mine, you'll want to add a lot of pigment to the images. Color them in like you would in a coloring book. These are the Derwent Inktense colors that I used:

Cadmium Yellow
Golden Yellow
Cadmium Orange
Beech Green
Hooker's Green
Felt Green

Additionally, you can add detail and shading by blending different colors. For example, add a little of the yellow-orange pencil that you're using on the center of the daffodils on the petals where they meet the center. And then, color the rest of the petals with yellow. When you add water to activate the pigment, you'll blend the two colors to create beautiful shading.

Same with the leaves, I always add a little bit of yellow at the tops of my leaves to make it look like the sun is hitting them.

Die-cutting and Assembly of the Stand Out Daffodil Spray Card

Make sure that your panel is good and dry before going on to the next step. Go ahead and die-cut the sentiment with the coordinating die that comes with the glimmer plate. And then, cut three more from white cardstock.

I like to use rectangle dies to trim my card panels. As a result, they are perfectly square. This is important to me because I have a hard time getting things lined up as it is. So, I used a stitched 4 1/4″ x 6 1/4″ die to trim the foiled card panel. Then, I used a plain 4 3/8″ x 6 3/8″ rectangle die to trim a saffron panel.

Now, all that is left is to assemble the card.

Fasten the foiled and colored panel to the saffron one with a tape runner. Then, center it directly onto a 5″ x 7″ white card base using the tape runner again. Now, layer the sentiment pieces together with liquid glue making sure that the one with the sentiment on it is on the top. And finally, attach the sentiment to the card base with liquid glue.

Stand Out Burnished Gold Daffodils

A black and gold card with burnished daffodils that make them stand out.

As part of the foiling process, you peel away the carrier sheet to reveal the pretty foiled design. And you're left with all the foil that wasn't used. I hate to see that go to waste, so I use a solid plate to create another card panel with it. And that is what we're doing for our second card.

All you do is use a solid rectangle plate instead of the glimmer plate. You heat up the system and then add the foil with the negative foil on. And then for this card, we'll add an A2 size (4 1/4″ x 5 1/2″) piece of onyx cardstock before we run it through our Platinum 6 die-cutting and embossing machine.

Now, there's nothing left on the carrier sheet when you pull it up off of the cardstock. However, our card panel now has the outlines of the daffodil spray in black and everything else is gold. It's just beautiful. But, we're going to burnish the daffodils to make them stand out just a little bit more.

This kind of makes it look like etched glass. To achieve this look, all you do is lightly brush a sand eraser in the same direction as the petals. It scratches the surface which makes the light reflect differently on it.

Assembly for the card is the same as for our first card. First, we'll attach an A2 piece of black cardstock to an A2 card base with a tape runner. Next, we'll trim down our foiled panel to 3 3/4″ x 5″ and attach it centered on the card front, also with the tape runner. And finally, we'll make the sentiment just the same as we did for the first card and attach it to the card front with liquid glue.