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Oct 18
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Holiday Card Using Gouache

By Cards

Hi All,

I’m back with my final project that I made for Merry Making. The lesson included some absolutely stunning painted cards using gouache. I was fortunate to be gifted a set last Christmas, but I have not had the best results with them. I think this lesson really brought up some great tips and tricks to using gouache. I think one major problem I had in previous attempts was that I treated the paints more like watercolor. Although it’s just fine to do that, it doesn’t produce great opaque results. So this time around I used minimal water. Also, since gouache dries opaque, when painting it is easier to cover up mistakes and add layers of color.

I have yet to master this, but I think as far as achieving opaque results, I am slowly on that track.

Here’s a closer look at the wreath-like card I made.

To finish off the card I used a sentiment from Simon Says Stamp and added some gold embossed edging to the layer of the card.

Thanks for checking out all my projects this past week for OCC Merry Making. I’ll be back real soon with more holiday projects!

Last one for #occmerrymaking @onlinecardclasses 🙂 Tried using some gouache and free hand simple stroke painting.

A post shared by Handmade Cards and Paper Goods (@joliesamuel) on

Oct 18
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Holiday Gate-Fold Card Using Embossing and Dies

By Cards

Hi All,

I’m back with another card for OCC Merry Making. For today’s card, I created a gate-fold card that was inspired by a project shared by Jennifer McGuire. She used a gorgeous detailed die to create her background image. Unfortunately, I don’t own very many background dies, so I decided to go with an embossed background instead. To create this background I used a Darice birch wood embossing folder. The folder is really narrow and measures 2.5″ wide so I had to use it twice to create this background. To give some emphasis to the embossing I used Tim Holtz distress ink in Iced Spruce to give a light shadow to the embossing.

The interactive part of the card is very simple. To open the card, you have to remove the red belly band that has a simple holiday greeting. I also stacked several layers of a reindeer head silhouette. Both the sentiment and reindeer are from a Hampton Art set.

The reindeer silhouette was attached to just one side of the folded card so that it opens up to reveal the sentiment, but also closes the card nicely.

I added the coordinating sentiment to the interior of the card and then die-cut it to give it a bit of a border.

To finish off the entire card I added a tiny red gem to the silhouette of the reindeer.

Hope you enjoyed reading about the process of creating this card. I’ll be back tomorrow with my last and final project for OCC Merry Making.

Oct 12
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Holiday Card Using Non-Traditional Stamps

By Cards

Hi All,

Welcome back! Today I’d like to share a card I made for OCC Merry Making. This card was inspired by a card demonstration in the class that used non-traditional images to create a holiday card. The demonstration used some non-traditional colors as the card base and I wanted to give that a try as well.

For this card, I used images from 3 different stamps sets. The gold floral embossed image is from Inkadinkado Flowers stamp set. The background tone-on-tone images are from Altenew Vintage Roses and the sentiment is from Little Yellow Bicycle Faith (CSS-104).

I love adding extra embellishments with white gel pen and typically do so by just creating lines or faux stitching. This time I took a note to try some scattered dots similar to the card demo as well. I think using the white is a simple and easy way to bring in some nice contrast.

Here’s a closer look.

Thanks so much for stopping by and I’ll see you again real soon with another project.

Oct 10
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Holiday Card Featuring Stamped Background

By Cards

Hi All,

I’m back to share another card featuring a technique from Merry Making. It’s is a very simple technique that is simple to do, but it is more focusing on the overall aesthetic than the technique.

The technique shared featured a layered stamp image that crosses over solid white score lines.

I wanted to give this a try, but I put a bit of a twist on mine. I went with an outline stamp from Concord & 9th and colored it in with my pencils.

I used several different hues to achieve this look. I also made sure to keep my strokes in the same direction so that you could see the veins of each petal.

Here’s a closer look.

Yesterday's #whatsonmydesk for #occmerrymaking was some Christmas florals using pencils and score lines. 🖌

A post shared by Handmade Cards and Paper Goods (@joliesamuel) on

To finish off the card I added another layer of cardstock trimmed at the opposite angle and a simple holiday sentiment.

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