I blog every day, which means I design and make over 350 new projects every year, and I’ve been doing this for several years.  That’s a lot of papercrafting!  I’m not always sure where I get my ideas from, and sometimes it can be as simple as picking up a stamp set or piece of patterned paper and just starting to play without any specific idea where it will take me.  Other times it might be colours I’ve seen, or an occasion, often I’m influenced by my surroundings.

Today I was most definitely influenced by the weather.  It’s miserable.  My usually bright blue Nova Scotia sky is currently a dirty grey, the view of the bay has completely disappeared and it’s raining, hard.  I’m having to work with the lights on and it just doesn’t seem to make a difference.

So grey was the jumping off point for this morning’s project, and with a new stamp set from Stampin’ Up! called Kindness & Compassion yet to see ink, I was inspired to create a sympathy card.

I began by inking up both sides on the inside of the Subtle Dynamic Textured Impressions Embossing Folder by wiping a Smoky Slate ink pad all over the surface.  I placed a layer of Whisper White Card inside the inked folder and then ran it through my Big Shot twice with all the tabs open on my multipurpose platform and just one cutting plate (the folder is too thick for two plates).  I removed the inked and embossed card and set it aside.

Next came the ‘Our sincere condolences’ sentiment from the Kindness & Compassion Stamp Set, stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black Ink on a piece of Whisper White Card.  The ‘feather’ image comes from the Mistletoe Season Stamp Set (it’s designed to be pine leaves) and was stamped using Smoky Slate ink.

I was ready to start assembling my project and opted for Basic Gray Card as my card base.  I cut and scored the card using my Stampin’ Trimmer and then, having chosen which of the two sides of the inked and embossed layer I preferred, I fixed that to the front with Multipurpose Liquid Glue (Tombow).

Using more liquid glue I fixed the sentiment to to a layer of Basic Gray Card and added a piece of a Pearlised Doily to the back.  The assembled sentiment was then mounted to the front of the card base with Stampin’ Dimensionals.

On a separate layer of Whisper White Card I stamped a second sentiment from the Kindness & Compassion Stamp Set using Smoky Slate ink with the ‘feather’ stamped in the centre towards the top.  This piece was then fixed inside the card base with liquid glue.

Finally I stamped a single ‘feather’ in the centre of the flap on a Whisper White Medium Envelope and my project was complete.

Sympathy cards are often difficult to make and I find that less is more.  The simple inked and embossed background is the perfect compliment to the beautiful font of the sentiment, and the addition of the ‘feather’ image and tiny piece of doily adds interest without detracting from the message.

The Kindness and Compassion Stamp Set contains lots of different sentiments (and no images), and if you haven’t seen this one it’s definitely worth a look.

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