So it happened. Overnight someone stole an hour and I’m now playing catch-up. Thankfully my #simplestamping project was already made but I still had the blog post to write. I shouldn’t complain as I much prefer the lighter evenings we’ll now have in Nova Scotia. However it would have been nice if ‘summer time’ brought with it summer weather, but I suppose that will come eventually. For now though I’ll stay in and continue to create one last project using stamp sets I think may retire soon, like Watercolor Shapes.

SHAPES WITH SHADING

The Watercolor Shapes Stamp Set is an image only set with 9 stamps. The square, rectangle, oval and circle shapes are made to give a watercoloured look with variations of dark and light areas. For my card today I chose the smaller of the two circles, a Starry Sky ink pad and a simple design.

On a 4″ x 5-1/4″ piece of Basic White Card I began by stamping rows of circles making sure to reink the stamp after each stamping. Then between the dark circles I stamped lighter ones. This was achieved by inking up the stamp, then stamping-off onto scrap paper to remove some of the ink, before stamping onto the card layer. As before, after stamping onto the card I always reinked the stamp to prevent any hard lines.

I really liked how quickly and easily the design came together and decided that this would be my coordinating feature. So I took another 4″ x 5-1/4″ piece of Basic White Card and covered all but a 1″ strip down the right-hand side. Then I stamped my design in the 1″ strip that remained visible. After that I stamped my design onto the flap of a Basic White Medium Envelope.

QUICK LAYERING

Next I used my Paper Trimmer to cut a 5-1/2″ x 8-1/2″ piece of Thick Basic White Card. Then with the long side at the top I used the scoring blade to score the card at 4-1/4″. After folding the card along the scored line I sharpened the crease with a Bone Folder to create my card base.

Turning to the two stamped Basic White layers I used Multipurpose Liquid Glue (Tombow) to fix the main one onto the front of the card base. Then I glued the layer with the stamped strip on the inside.

For my sentiment I reached for probably my most favourite stamp set from the current Annual Catalogue, Go To Greetings. Using Starry Sky ink again I stamped the largest “Happy Birthday” onto a 1-3/4″ x 4-1/4″ piece of Basic White Card.

To finish I glued a 2-3/4″ x 3-1/4″ piece of Starry Sky Card onto the centre of my card base. Then I added the sentiment layer with Stampin’ Dimensionals. And just like that my gender-neutral birthday card was complete. Let’s hope the rest of the day goes as smoothly.

For another simple card using the Watercolor Shapes Stamp Set see my earlier blog post Nature’s Prints for silhouettes.

PRODUCT LIST

IN COLOR ALERT – The 2021-2023 In Colors from Stampin’ Up! are due to retire at the end of the current annual catalogue period. Traditionally retiring In Colors sell out very quickly once the Retiring List is published and there’s always some customers who get caught out by this. So for this reason I wanted to warn you that the 2021-2023 In Color ink pads are already showing as ‘low inventory’. It’s possible that more are on order, however with ongoing global shipping and supply chain issues I wouldn’t want to rely on that. So if you want anything from the 2021-2023 In Color range I would strongly suggest that you place your order right away to avoid disappointment. As a remimber the 2021-2023 In Colors are: Evening Evergreen, Fresh Freesia, Pale Papaya, Polished Pink and Soft Succulent.