Stampin’ Up!’s Papers Make Cardmaking Easy

Aloha, all!

It’s the last Wednesday of the Month of June. So it’s time for Island Hopping, my monthly online get-together with my Maui sister Stampin’ Up! Demonstrator, Cheryl Hamilton. This month we chose to feature Stampin’ Up!’s Designer Series Papers –because Stampin’ Up! papers are going on sale tomorrow!

Designing  with  Papers  is  Fun  and  Easy

With all the fuss I make about designing layouts for greeting cards, one of the simplest ways to make a good-looking card is just to cut out some strips of Stampin’ Up!’s Designer Series Paper and layer them up on some coordinating cardstock. Today I’ve got two cards to share with you where I did just that. Not only that, I used the same basic layout to create what really look like two completely different cards.

What  to  Call  the  Papers

Stampin’ Up! calls its patterned papers, “Designer Series Papers.” In demonstrator circles, we tend to shorten that to DSP. But I am absolutely not fond of acronyms. So, in an effort to keep this article acronym-free, from here on out I’m calling these papers, “Patterned Papers” (or something in that range).

The  First  Card —  Hand–Penned

My first card has three strips of paper across the top. Each of them comes from one of the sheets of paper in the paper set called Hand-Penned.  In fact, both the top strip and the bottom strip are from the same sheet, just opposite sides. Stampin’ Up!’s regular patterned papers are printed on both sides. There are some specialty papers that are only printed on one side. But they don’t come up all that often.

When I use a set like Hand-Penned to create a card with different patterned papers on it, I try to pick out prints that complement each other. Most of Stampin’ Up!’s paper sets have not only image prints -such as the print on the top strip. But they also have some prints that are monochrome coordinating prints. For this card, I picked out the floral print at the top, which has several colors in it. Then I picked out two other prints, each with a monochrome design that coordinated with the floral print. The middle print is Mint Macaron and the bottom print is Highland Heather. Both of these are colors in the floral print.

For the background layer in this card, I chose Highland Heather Cardstock. This seemed to work all right as the print in the patterned paper was quite a bit lighter than the solid color of the cardstock. Then I added another featured color, So Saffron for the featured element.

Rather than stamp a sentiment for this card, I went in search of my Hand-Penned Memories & More Card Pack. Did you know that these card packs have stickers in them? They do and that’s what I used for the sentiment circle on this card.

 

The  Second  Card — You’re  a  Peach

Yes, this card has the very same design as the first card. It’s the card orientation that is different.

And I used the same steps in choosing the patterned papers for this card as I did for the first card. While the word, “Peach,” is in the title of this set of papers, there’s not a peach to be found in this card. Some of the prints are strictly floral in nature, though they have the same color scheme throughout the whole patterned papers set.

The second and third strips have two of the colors that are featured in the floral print at the left. Those colors are Calypso Coral and Pear Pizzazz. Rather than choose one of those colors as the background color, I picked another color that’s represented in the floral print – Pale Papaya. There’s just a hint of it in the shading of some of the flowers. But I think you can see more of a hint now that the Papaya color is in the background.

When it came to the sentiment circle for this card, I didn’t have a Memories & More Card Pack to use. What I did use, though, was another of the prints in the patterned paper set. I hand-cut a sprig of flowers and leaves out of the paper and used that to accent the single stamped sentiment, “hello.”

 

Starting  Tomorrow — Stampin’  Up!’s  Papers  Are  On  Sale

From July 1st to August 2nd, select Stampin’ Up! Designer Series Papers are 15% off the regular price. Among the selection are the papers that I used for today’s cards. And I’ll be sharing some more papers over the next few weeks. You can be sure I’ll remind you about the sale, as I know you’re going to love the papers!

Now  Check  Out  Cheryl’s  Blog  Post

I can hardly wait to see which set(s) of papers Cheryl’s going to feature in her blog. Please join me and visit her blog by clicking here!

Happy Stamping!