Card Making with 6x6 Paper Pads: Using Scrapbook Paper to Create Greeting Cards

1. Welcome: Hi, everyone and welcome to the class today will be making a batch off 12 greeting cards using a six by six mini scrapbooking paper. Pat patent paper for scrapbooking and crafting comes in lots of lovely colors and designs. So many that it's hard not to hold the mall in. This class will be working our way through a collection of pretty papers and exploring some different ways to use. The patterns will focus on a single set off six by six inch papers to create a range of beautiful cards. Looking at different ways to use the papers and a variety of greeting hard layout I did. Working with a pattern paper collection makes it straightforward and easy to create a batch of cohesive cards. You don't have to worry about matching papers and colors. The designer has already done that for you. Making a batch of cards is also perfect for events, celebrations or holidays, where you need to send out lots of cards at once. It never hurts to have some pre made cards on hand, either. For any time you need a last minute birthday or thank you cards. I hope this class today will give you lots of ideas and inspiration for creating hards of your own pattern paper collections. The class will start by taking a look at the supplies you need and then chat a little bit about the four layers that make up the greeting card designs that I create. After this will deconstruct the paper pad, separating out the papers and looking at which to use for backgrounds, which do use for four grounds and so on. I'll also be sharing some tips for fussy cutting the elements and working with different paper designs. The class will then dive into making lots of cards. Crafting ones were busy and detailed backgrounds, layered focal clusters, overlapping paper strips and more. I'll also talk about ideas for using up leftover paper scraps on the class. Includes a short bonus gift tag lesson. To make good use of those leftovers. Your project for this class is to create your own greeting card for cards. You could make a many as you want from a pattern paper pad of your choosing, and post a picture off that card or card to the student gallery. There. You can also get feedback. Ask any questions you may have. There is a print out to go along with this class. You can find that on the projects and resource is page as well as a place to upload your projects and share your work with assault. This class is suitable for beginners as well as more experienced creatives wanting to explore card making. With six by six paper pads, you can take the techniques, tips and process discussed in this class and apply them to your own cards and designs. I've been creating and designing my own cards for years, and I found card making to be an enjoyable and rewarding project as much fun to make as it is to send them off to friends and family. I hope you'll join me for this class and have fun exploring creating greeting cards using scrapbooking paper. Now let's get started 2. Supplies: here are the supplies that I'll be using in this class. Feel free to use whatever you have at home, and you can substitute any off the materials. There's a print out list of everything used in the resource section on the class page card making on the whole tends to use of a large variety of different supplies and so that this class does not become overrun with lots of materials. I'll be focusing on just a few basic tools. The pattern paper pad, a couple and a couple of embellishments. The amount of extras that you use on your cards is completely up to you. If you prefer a more minimal look, then feel free to skip the embellishments on overall, any of the supplies can be substituted with whatever you have on hand at home. You definitely do not need the same supplies I'm using to follow along with this class. So that said, let's take a look at some of the supplies. The first on most important supply for this class is a six by six inch paper pad off pattern paper. These parts are available from many brands, and they come in lots of different styles, designs and colors. They normally contain several pages of each design, and they're often double sided. Although you can work with single sided paper as well. I've chosen this lovely collection from Mente papers called Bloom Ville. There are 24 double sided pages with four of each design, plus two pages of individual elements. It has a variety off different page layouts, lots of pretty graphics and a cohesive color palette. You confined six by six paper pads in craft and scrapbooking shops, and when you're choosing one to use with this class, look for one that has a variety of different pages. So some will repeat patterns, some with large elements on pages off simpler designs that could be used as backgrounds. You want a selection of everything in your paper pat. Most pattern pads are designed to include a good variety already, but it is something that's useful to look out for when you're shopping. A variety of different paper layouts will also give you lots of design options when you're making your cards. Other than that, you can use papers from any brand that you like. There are so many pretty designs out there that it can be quite hard to choose, so just go for something that you love. You'll be making lots of cards from this paper pad, so it's important to enjoy what you're working with. So we have the six by six pattern paper purred. Next, you'll need card basis. You could buy card bases in a pack with envelopes, or you can make your own by folding paper into what ever sized card you want to make. I enjoy working with six by six inch card basis, and I'll be using both white and craft in this class. I also have a couple off five by seven inch card basis and a couple off 7.5 by 10.5 centimeter many cards as well. We'll be working on 12 cards in total for this class. Andi, I have 86 by six inch basis to five by seven ones, and then too many card base is ready to go. That's a lot of numbers. It really doesn't matter what size card bases you use, but those are the ones that I'm going to be using in this class. If you're unsure where to start or what size to start with, I suggest either picking a pack of pre made card bases. This could be more cost effective, and they normally come of envelopes or make your own cards to fit standard sized envelopes that you confined easily. If you're making your own card basis, then you'll need a thick card stock, 200 or 250 grams or so, and you can use whatever color or colors you like to make your card basis. Also, if you're worried about finding an envelope to fit your card, especially if the finish card is an odd size or it's bulky or its delicate, then you can also use a bubble wrap mailer instead to send your cards off, and that will help protect it better. The class also uses plain white card stock and a couple of sheets of colored card. Call it card is useful for creating matting. Layers on the white is handy for banners, text strips and layering. I'm using a light gray and a muted yellow card as they complement the colors in the pattern paper. If you don't have any colored card on hand at home, then grays and neutrals are usually a good place to start as they can work with lots of different designs and colors. You don't have to put text onto the front of your cards, but if you do wish to, there are a few ways that you can do that. I'll be using text stamps to create the sentiments on the cards. Today, thes ones are from American crafts, their little rubber stamps, and you can just stamp out any sentiment or phrase or word that you want. You can also use stickers. Many paper collections also sell matching alphabet sticker sets as well. On DYA can hand, write or print out the sentiments or phrases that you want from your computer to think my stamps. I'm going to be using the's memento ink pads in London folk, which is a light great and tuxedo black. Next, on two tapes and glues, the class uses double sided tape, three D foam squares, onda liquid glue. I mainly use double sided tape for attaching the papers on D three D foam squares to create dimension and to raise elements off the background. And then I use the liquid glue for growing buttons and other embellishments. You can also use a glue stick if you wanted. And if you don't have any three D foam squares, you can make little squares at a cardboard. Leftover shipping boxes are useful for this on. Just cut up the boxes into tiny little squares and glue them together to create little stacks so that you can use those stacks toe prop elements up off your card basis. No one will see them when you're finished. You'll also need a good pair of scissors. Small ones are better for fussy cutting and nail scissors also work well for cutting out small elements. A craft knife and a metal ruler or a paper tremor. A lot useful as well for cutting out the paper. If you don't have any of those, you can just use a pair of scissors on a bone. Folder is also handy as well. Finally, the embellishments. I keep a box where I store all the bits and pieces I collect to decorate my cards in the class. Today I'll be using wooden shapes. You can find these in craft stores, buttons string on artificial flowers, statements. These are my go to embellishments. But there are lots of other things that you can use as well to decorate your cards, ribbon, fabric scraps, stickers, glitter, sequins, magazine cut out Brad's paper, flowers and more. The class also uses nouveau drops to embellish the cards. This is a dimensional paint that can be used to create little raised dots. I'm using three colors today. Buttermilk Pioneer green and bubble gum blush. 3. The Layers of a Greeting Card: before we look at the paper pad and start thinking about backgrounds and focal points, I want to briefly talk about the way I construct a card. This background information will be useful later on when we start to make the cards. If you've taken my previous card making class, then you probably have heard some of these things before then. Feel free to skip this lesson, However, if you're new or you'd like a quick refresher, then let's take a look at the layers that make up a cod. I find it easiest to look at card making in layers toe work on one layer at a time and build them up. Card making, especially these sorts of cards that have lots of elements to them, can seem quite complicated, and it can be really hard to know where to start. That's where working in layers can be really helpful. So for me, there are four basic layers to a greeting card design. The base layer, the background layer, a foreground layer and then an embellishment layer. The's four steps are not hard and fast rules. They are what I use most of the time, but sometimes I do switch things up. There really aren't rules for card making. There's no one right way of doing anything, and you could make cards and layouts however you like. There are so many different approaches in order for me to break up the process so that it straight forward. I find working in four general layers to be a useful approach. First, there's the base layer. This is the card base and the matting paper. The base is the card based white or different color than on top of that are usually placed a matting layer. This is either a piece of colored card or pattern paper. The purpose of a matting layer is to separate the background panel from the card base toe, add an extra pop of color and to help frame the background layer. Normally, you only see a very small amount off the matting paper when I'm finished, but it adds a lot to the card. I usually go for a complimentary color to the other papers I'm using in the card, either in a darker or a much lighter shade. You want there to be some contrast between the matting layer on the background panel, then moving on to the background layer. This is normally a piece of pattern paper or a mixed media background. We'll talk more about working of busy backgrounds and simple backgrounds later on in the class, but a background panel can be a piece of pattern paper, a mixed media background. It could be one Peter paper. It could be several. Basically, this layer acts as a background to the focal point that will go on top of it. The foreground layer is where I place focal points. Banners and text banners and paper strips are often used to bring something forward off the background. I use a banners under text or under the focal point, just to help lift things up and to prevent everything from merging together. You can also add ribbon or string as well. The focal point is usually the star off the card. It's where you want people's eyes to go first. When they look at the card, it can be one element or many elements clustered together. Sometimes it can be just a simple bit of text or photograph or fussy cut elements. If your hand coloring something, the focal point is often where you put most of your time and effort. I often use three D foam squares to raise the focal point off the background layer to help add extra dimension and to make it stand out as being raised ads a day. Subtle drop shadow underneath the element. This layer normally takes me the longest to arrange, and to figure out the final layer is embellishments. This will be where I add buttons Nouveau drops wouldn't elements anything that I feel would add some extra interest to the card. I tend to find that less is often better at this stage, as you don't want to distract from the work you've already done on the card. However, these last few touches are very important, and they can really bring the car together at the end. So those are the four basic layers that I work in when I build up the cards. I also like to work like this for gift tags and other crafts as well. I find it's a general useful formula for breaking down projects into manageable steps. I'll be showing lots more examples and talking more about all of this as we go through and make the cards for this class, but hopefully this background information will be useful. And it's something that you can apply to your own projects and think about when you're making your own cards. It's also handy for designing card layouts as well. The idea of working in layers is to give you a starting point, a place to begin, and then you can experiment and change it up. However you want, there really is no one right way to create. And this is something I personally find helpful, especially for creating cards of lots of dimension. If you want more ideas and inspiration off different card designs and different approaches than there are magazines, YouTube Channels blog's you can search on instagram or Pinterest, and you'll be able to find lots of results and lots of different styles. So now that we've discussed the four layers of a card, the base layer, the background layer, the foreground layer and the embellishment layer, we're now ready to move on and have a look at the pattern paper pad 4. Looking at the Paper Pad: The first thing to do is to look through the papers and to see the different types of designs that we have to work with. My goal today is to use all the papers in this set and see how we can use all the designs under the elements to make lots of cards. This particular paper collection has a variety of different layouts. There are pages with lots of elements, some individual and others arranged in clusters. There's a large reef. There are a few repeat patterns off leaves, butterflies and flowers. There's a page off little cards on several wood, grain and brick textured backgrounds. There's a lot to choose from and lots of ways to use these pages on the finish cards. I'm going to start by setting aside some pages for fussy cutting. These elements will be used to make focal points. Clusters and embellishments later on. The reef will also make a good focal point, so I'm pulling that out. It's pretty large and will fill up most of the Finnish card design, so it would be good for a more minimal layout. Next is this page with the clusters. Thes designs are arranged against the sides and corners of the page. This will give us a design guideline later on as well. Need to keep those straight edges in mind when we're arranging these clusters on the cards . The butterflies are a perfect page for fussy cutting lots of little elements that we can use as embellishments or cluster them together to make focal points. I have a butterfly cluster already in mind for one of the cards. I'm also going to use a page of these little cards. Paper sets like these often come with tags or journaling cards or quotes and boxes. They all make great focal points. They're also really quick and easy to cut out. This collection also comes with two pages off individual elements at the front and back of the pad. I'm going to be cutting out all of these elements from those two pages to use as well. There's also a page with a leaves repeat pattern, but I haven't selected that too fussy cut, as the leaves are a little bit too small for me to comfortably cut out. The other pattern with all the flowers could also be cut out. However, with this one the elements are a little bit too close together, really on. I think I have plenty to work with already. When you're looking at your own papers and deciding which pages to cut out, look for elements that have plenty of space around them on that are a comfortable size for you to cut around them. Trying to cut out elements that are tiny can be frustrating, and card making should be fun. So those are the pages that I'm going to fussy cut on when I have a new pattern paper pad. I always start by taking out pages to cut out there, an easy place to start when you're starting to deconstruct the paper pat. Next, I'm going to set aside a few busy backgrounds, starting with the page of cards. As this paper pad has four copies of each page. There are plenty of opportunities to use the same design in different ways. The busy backgrounds I'm picking will be used pretty much on their own on the finish cards . They will have a simple, more minimal layout, so this is an opportunity for you to pick out background patterns that are very detailed and very complicated because they're really going to shine on the finish cards, joining the page of little mini cards. I'm also choosing the butterflies pattern on the flowers pattern going for backgrounds that have lots of colors. Lots of elements and things going on in them is perfect. Basically, I'm picking out the designs that would be too busy to place anything else on top of I'm going to separate all the rest of the pages on most of these will be used as simply backgrounds as matting panels on to cut into strips for layering. There are plenty of simple designs here on in muted pale colors, so they'll make perfect backgrounds to put all the fussy cut elements on top of when you're making a card with a big focal point or cluster, you don't want the background to come forward. You want it there, but it needs to help the foreground elements to stand out so the background can't be anything. It's too busy or too colorful. Most of the elements in this collection have soft, gentle colors, so the pad also includes thes pale wood and texture backgrounds to compliment them. This is one of the reasons I really enjoy working with a set of papers because the designer has usually already balanced out the colors on the elements and provided everything you need. So I don't have to go searching for papers that will work together because they're already all there in the collection. So now that the paper pad has been deconstructed, next will move on to the fussy cutting. 5. Fussy Cutting: fussy cutting is a technique where you cut elements out off a page off pattern paper or a page of individual designs. It's a technique that does take some patients some time and a good pair of scissors. It's used in card making, scrapbooking, art, journaling and other crafts like quilting as well. I'm going to start fussy cutting elements out of the pages I've set aside. Andi. I'm going to share a few tips that I find helpful. The first thing I do is to roughly cut everything out. I'm not trying to aim for a perfect cut here. I just want to separate all the elements. When cutting, I find it easier to move the paper instead of the scissors, holding the scissors steady in one hand and guiding the paper round. With my other hand, I find that this helps to get a smoother cut line. Using a pair off small and sharp scissors can also make a big difference. If you don't have a pair of paper cutting scissors, then nail scissors could also work well. I try to keep my paper cutting scissors just for cutting paper, much like you'd use fabrics. Is is just for fabric. I also keep my paper only scissors away from tapes or anything sticky. I'm continuing to go very roughly round all the objects. As I mentioned earlier, I am not trying to get a smooth or even line here. I just want to separate out all the elements this will make going round them with the final cut much easier, as I don't have to hold the whole page in my hand as I'm going. Cutting everything roughly apart first can also make it easier to carefully cut around smaller elements, and it can also help you not accidentally cut through a neighboring object. Then I pick up each element and carefully cut a neat line all the way around. You can make a choice whether or not to leave a border around the object you're cutting out , and you can choose how thick of a border to leave. Leaving a border and a bit of the background color can add an extra layer to your object, and especially when you have an element that has lots of tiny details that are too small to cut around, it just makes it a lot easier just to leave a bit of a border and to go around everything. If you're concerned about accidentally cutting something off your element, then leaving a border can help you avoid this as you're not cutting right up against the line of the element. For most of these little individual elements here, I'm leaving a tiny white border. I like the white outlines around. The objects on DIT will also help them to stand out better later on, when I'm clustering them on a background. But there were also some designs here that have lots of little leaves, sprigs and grasses and other tiny details that are too small for me to cut around. Depending on the design you have, you can choose whether to cut right up to the edge or to leave a border. You can always do some of each and see which you prefer. If I'm unsure, I usually cut everything out with the border because it's much easier just to trim the border off later if I need to. If you do end up trimming your objects right to the edge and then you find out later on that they're blending too much him of your background or that you find out that you actually did want that white outline there. After all, you can just glue or you're fussy, cut elements down onto a piece of white paper and then cut them out again with that border . When I have an element that I need to cut the center out of, like this large reef here, I tend to use the tip off the scissors to poke a hole and then to start cutting out from that whole off course, you need to be careful when you're doing this. And if you are more comfortable using a craft knife to cut out elements than feel free to go ahead and use that I tried to take my time fussy cutting elements out on. I find it very relaxing. If you don't have a large chunk of time, this task can be done little bit by little bit. You could have a tray or a box where you keep your scissors and your papers and just cut a few minutes elements out at a time. Batch cutting also really helps to make the rest of the card making process much easier, as you can just look through your box of pre cut elements, and you don't have to keep stop and starting to cut things out as you're making your cards . At least when I'm making a set of cards like I am today, then batch cutting is really useful. It's also something you can do in front of a movie or worth listening to. A podcast on audiobook. You want to go carefully and take your time. But also don't worry. If you're cutting is not perfect. Mine never is on. The more you practice, the better you'll get a fussy cutting. You don't always have to follow the exact shape of an object, either with the butterflies, for example, the antennas I think they're called. They were so finely drawn that I just ignored them and cut them off completely. So please don't stress about getting a perfect cut. Just enjoy the fussy cutting rhythm. Once everything is cut out, I put it all into a tray, and then I'm ready to start making the cards 6. Busy Backgrounds: we're now going to begin with the busy background cards. These have the simplest layouts and are a good place to start. If you're new to card making or need to make a card quickly, I have my three card bases ready. I'm using six by inch square cards, too, and white and one in craft and the three busy patterns we set aside in lesson. For now, I'm going through the papers and finding a matting layer to go with each background. I often go back and forth a bit and test out the different designs until I find ones that I like together for the flower background on the butterflies, I chose to use a couple of solid colors for the matting. There. I decided to use a solid color because the rest of the papers in the pack were either too light or too busy. The flowers have a white background, so I didn't want the background of the flowers to merge with the matting layer. It also needs to push the flowers forward, and so the pale colored put papers that came with set were not working. The yellow also picks up the green and the yellows in the flower pattern, and it makes them pop. The butterflies have a gray matting layer, and for the same reasons, the gray works nicely here with the blues and the grays and the bodies of the butterflies. If you're working with very busy backgrounds and you're finding it hard to frame the panel aunt to have the panel stand out enough from the card base, especially when working for white card base, then going first solid color Mattingly is often really helpful here for the last card here , I chose the orange spotted pattern paper because it provided enough of a contrast with the background panel foot to stand out, and it also picks up some of the color in the panel itself. As there are some orange spots in the design, this Mattingly emerges a little bit more than the 1st 2 did. I don't always want to go for a big contrast. What's important is that the orange spots still help to bring the page with the cards and the birds forward. A lot of the process that I'll be discussing in this class revolves around balancing colors and balancing elements. It might seem a lot to think about or complicated when you're starting out. But as you go on, a lot of these decisions will become second nature. I'm trying to go into detail with each step and talk a bit about why I've chosen one paper over another, just so that it helps to explain the thought process behind each choice. And so, hopefully you can then apply the tips and the process to your own cards and papers. I am now trimming down the panels so that they stack on top of each other with a little of the matting layer on the card based showing through. I just roughly take a pencil and mark on the paper where I need to cut. Generally, I cut the matting layer 3 to 4 millimeters smaller than the card base, and then the background layer another 3 to 4 millimeters smaller than the matting panel. That's a rough guy. I very rarely use a ruler. I just measured by I and line everything up. If one side is a millimeter larger than the other, it doesn't bother me, but you can measure all your papers if you want. I'm also using a small guillotine cutter to trim the papers, you can use a craft knife and a metal ruler or just a pair of scissors. Whatever is easiest for you. Once everything is cut, I attached the layers with double sided tape, pressing everything down with the bone folder. You can also use glue or whatever you have on hand to attach the papers if you don't have double sided tape. So now I'm going to stamp out some sentiments to go on the finish cards. I'm using this mini set of rubber stamps and stamping one letter at a time. The letters won't be lined up perfectly, but I like that hand stamped look for these sentiments. Andi. It also fits the vintage hand painted feel of the papers. When I'm making a batch of cards, I often stamped out a load of sentiments in a batch as well. Generic sayings A great if you're not sure what you're going to end up using the card for, so words like Hello, hi, there thank you is also a good one. Congratulations. Or even just random words like pretty lovely flowers. Butterflies bloom Adventure travel Wonder if I'm using those sorts of more random words than I try to match them to the card or to the theme of the papers that I'm using. Some paper pads would also come of a page of sayings that you can use and you can always search online. Pinterest is a good place to start for sayings and quotes. I also find Happy Birthday to be a useful sentiment toe hand stamp, a swell. And if you're making a batch of cards for an occasion, then you can multi stamp whatever you need out at once. Of course, you don't have to put any text on the front of your cars. You can just have the papers. It's up to you. So now we're on the foreground layer, and for these cards, the foreground layers are very minimal. Usually, when I choose a busy background pattern, I pick a very simple focal point, a wooden element, a single fussy cut object or even just some text, something that can stand out well from the background pattern, but nothing that's going to distract too much. I don't want anything that's going to pull interest away from the background, as the whole point of these cars is that they really let the background shine. Each card is going to have a banner on these banners will somewhat sandwich the background in and help the text to be readable. I'm using white card banners for the two white card bases and for the craft banner. I've cut up a spare card base to USA's banners and strips. I'm cutting up card bases here because I want the banner to match the color of the card base Exactly, and I don't have any craft carload card stock that matches that color. A few layout ideas for simple banners is to bring them in from the sides, either horizontal or vertical, or you can span a strip of card across by one of the coolness, along with the banners. I'm going to use a few of these leftover strips of paper just to bring certain colors through. And to add an extra layer. I've used three D foam squares to lift the banners off the background and to attach them to the card. Next, I'm going to add the text as the stamping has a slight, uneven field to it. I'm not going to worry about cutting the paper to straight, so I'm just using my scissors to trim the little boxes onto the last layer for these cards . Embellishments. When I'm making these busy background cards, I try to keep the embellishments to a minimum. As again, I don't want to distract from the background Onda. I also want to add embellishments that will make a difference to the card. For the first card, I'm simply adding a small wooden flour and a button gluing both of those down with liquid glue. That's the first card complete for the butterflies card. I'm going to add three buttons down the banner arranging a slightly off centre. Sometimes I find, when arranging an object that having them off center or slightly uneven looks more pleasing than having them all completely lined up. Another general tip for arranging objects is toe work in odd numbers. So 135 and so on. That, and not having everything lined up perfectly, I feel looks much nicer. I'm also going to add a few off the fussy cut butterflies to the background, placing them over the matching butterflies in the pattern with a three d foam square. This adds a little subtle dimension to the pattern on the race. Butterflies have a little drop shadow under them. This technique is fun for these sorts of backgrounds, especially when you have multiple copies of the same design, and you can cut one page up to use and to add on top of the background. It's subtle, but it adds a fun touch to the card for the final card here, I'm going to add in a small extra strip of the orange spotted paper. I keep all the scraps out on my table west. I'm working as I often go back and forth and need little bits of the matching papers. And on top of that strip, I'm adding three little wooden butterflies. I felt that they were standing out just a little bit too much, so I took three of the fussy cut butterflies from earlier and added one on top off the wooden butterflies of with the liquid glue that just helped to blend them in a little bit more. The final step was to add a few new very drops, one in one corner and three in the other. Those are three layout. Ideas on some tips were working with busy background patterns. This style of cards is also perfect. If you need to get the most out of one part of paper with the different styles and layouts that I'll be demonstrating during this class, I only end up with 12 finish cards by the end, as some of the cause used, three pages eat. But if you've made all your cards like the ones here, you'll end up with a lot more than 12 when you're done. So busy backgrounds are quick and simple to make, and it doesn't use too much paper per car. Next, I'll be putting together cards that have focal clusters. 7. Focal Clusters: these cards are perfect for those that enjoyed the fussy cutting. Here we will layer and build up clusters with all of those elements that were carefully cut out. I have the tray with all the cut up elements, ready to look through and to pull out what I need. I'm going to be working on three cards to square one in white and wanting craft and then won five by seven inch rectangle card in craft as well. There will be one cluster with the little illustrated cards that have the birds and the flowers on them, and then they'll be a cluster of butterflies on another and then a cluster with lots of general elements from this collection. On the third card, I've started by taking out a few off the illustrated many cards, and I'm going through and seeing how they look on the different papers, seeing how well they stand out on just looking and seeing what feels right. I'm going to go through, and I'm going to do that again for the butterflies and for the last card as well. Once I've picked the papers I'm going to use, I'm going to trim them all down once again, remember, not just throw away. The extra strips of paper will find ways to use them as we go along, and they're really useful as banners and borders. But the first card I have a bright white textured matting layer. This is going to go on top of the craft card base on. We'll have a darker color pattern. On top of that, I particularly like using craft colored card basis so that I can use paler colored matting layers and they really pop and stand up well on the craft. On top of that, for the background layer, I have the orange spots again. These went really well with the little cards, so I'm using that combination again For the second card in this group, I'm using a page that has elements on it as the matting layer on all those little bits will peak through when I'm finished and tie together with the big focal cluster. Then on top of that, I have the page with the wood texture, and I'm running it horizontal because I feel that it looks nicer behind the elements and will not distract too much when you have a page that has lines or textures going in one direction. It's good to pay attention to which way round you're placing your page on to turn it around a couple of times to see which way round looks best. The wood is also pale enough in color for my focal cluster to stand out and for the butterflies card. The matting layer I have is this blue leaf print. This will tie in with the blue butterflies. I'll be adding to the card a bit later on on as I'm also going to be using a plain background layer, it will provide some extra interest is well. The background layer also has lines on it. I think it's an old door or a window shutter on. This time, I'm going to arrange it so that the lines run vertically. That way, the butterflies can look as if they're flying upward, and it helps with the general sweep and the eye gets drawn up in one direction. I've also this time cut the background panel smaller than the others so that a little bit more off the blue leaves matting layer is showing through the last step for the background layer on this card is to add the front flap from an envelope. I've just simply cut the front flat off the envelope, and I'm attaching it to the car. This layer will really help the butterflies to stand out. A lot of them are very small, and I really want all that hard work, fussy cutting to be shown off so the craft layer under them will make me show up even more . This is also a fun way to use any spare envelopes you have lying around. If you're careful when you open them, you can also use any envelopes that have been sent to you and recycle them in your car. Making the foreground layer is where most of the funnest I think for these cards. Andi, When you're making a focal cluster, you can really go to town and make it full. I had lots of elements and build up the layers before I bring over the objects. I want to add some paper strips to the cards to help lift the clusters off the back grounds and to provide a visual break between the foreground and the background. You're not end up seeing much of thes strips but they do make a difference for the butterflies card. I've added a banner made from the blue Leaves pattern for the second card. I've used a strip off the flower patterns left over from the previous lesson, and for the final card, I've added two strips off the white texture pattern paper. This is one of the reasons why I keep all the paper scraps because they're great for making these little banners. I'm going to start by constructing the clusters and beginning with the set off small cards . The first thing I found was that even with the difference in colors between them and the background, I wanted a little bit more definition. So I attached all the cards down to a piece of white card stock and cut them out again with a white border. This is a good way to help elements stand out. Giving something a white border instantly makes a big difference. You could also stick elements down onto black card stock or other colors as well. If you're having trouble making your elements stand out on your cards than adding a whiteboard underneath, um, or another color can really help to push them forwards. I then started to build up the cluster on the card, using three D foam squares to attach each of the little mini cards. I placed one down and then another and built it up. I used 10 cards in total to make this vocal cluster. As I'm building up with three D foam squares, I want to keep the level of each of the little cards balance. So as I go on as I'm placing one on top of the other, I sometimes have to put to foam squares on top of each other at one end and one of the other, just to make sure that all the cards are level. In the end, I'm also slightly rotating some of the cards and scattering them around so that they're evenly spread, but not to make them lined up or centered. Moving on to the butterflies focal cluster using three D foam squares, I'm placing one down at a time. I'm generally putting the foam square in the centre off the butterfly and then using my fingers to bend the wings up and towards the middle of it. That way, they look a bit more like they're flying on the card, and the wings are not completely flat. I try to place the larger butterflies down first and then cluster the smaller ones around them when you're working with elements of various sizes, starting with the largest elements, and using them as an anchor could be really helpful and building your clusters. There is a rough CenterPoint for this cluster, and then I'm thinning out the butterflies as I scattered them to the top and the bottom. I like not to have everything perfectly lined up. As I mentioned earlier on, I'm rotating each butterfly in a different direction as I'm placing them down just so that they look as natural as possible. Once I have a main base of butterflies down, I'm going in and layering a few more on top for the last cluster. I have a variety of objects, lots of flowers, birds of bicycle, more butterflies, of course, Bird's Nest and so on. These were all cut from the page off. Individual elements we looked at in lesson for the layout is similar to the last two cards , largest elements generally first, then building up and around them with some of the smaller elements and then using the tiny ones to sit on top or to fill in the gaps. This costume is very dense. You can also make a cluster like this and then at the end, place a large object in the centre as the main focal point with in the cluster. This one doesn't have a star object like that. But if you have an element you really like or wanted to stand out in a cluster, then I would leave that element last and then place it right on the very top at the very end. Once you've built up or your other elements. As the cluster gets built up, some of the elements can get a little lost. So if there are any ones you don't want to lose, then leave them towards the end as well. I left tour of the little birds to add on at the end of the process just because I wanted them to be nice and visible. The last stage with these cards is to add the text and the embellishments for the first card. I'm adding a few wooden sprigs and leaves, glowing them into the cluster, poking them in so that they're coming out from underneath the paper Cutouts Nouveau drops the next I'm using green and white, and I'm keeping the drops around the cluster, and I'm also adding a couple into the crust of itself. I then glued down the text box, and then that card is finished. I decided to leave the text simple without a matting layer here, as there is already plenty going on in the card to go on to the next card. I have some artificial flower statements on I'm folding these in half, making little Bunches of a mix between yellow and pink and then blowing them down behind the cards so that their coming out from behind the general cluster. There are lots of straight lines and corners on this card, and I felt that the round shapes of the stamens contrast ID nicely but also fitted in with the flowers and the leaves that were printed on the papers. Sometimes when you have lots of straight edges or lots of curves, it's nice to contrast that with an embellishment that's the opposite. I'm adding a couple of little butterflies. This is why I cut out a whole page of them earlier on. I knew they would be really useful as I made the cards and then I've added in the text. This card just says bloom and grow. It's fairly general and it could be used for lots of different occasions at the end. I've also added in the nouveau drops, scattering them around the cluster for the butterflies. I've taken the happy birthday sentiment and used a little bit of the envelope I cut up earlier to create a matting layer under the text boxes. The white door in the background was merging a little bit too much with the white text boxes, so the matting layer helps them stand out. Then, of course, I added nouveau drops, clustering them into the main cluster, as I did with the other cards. And those are the focal cluster cards Finished. Working with focal clusters is lots of fun, because you can really add lots to the card on while other card layout to look great with a minimal amount of embellishments and objects. Thes focal clusters work in the opposite way, and you can really go to town with layering and adding things. Next, we'll be working on cards with paper strips 8. Paper Strips: the three cards I'm using for this lesson. Our two square and 15 by seven card base. This time I'll be flipping the rectangle so I have a landscape card toe work with. If you're working with a rectangular card based, remember, you can work with them vertical or horizontal. The design feature of these cards is that the backgrounds and made up off multiple paper strips. This is perfect for working of a set of papers and making good use of all of those coordinated designs. And it's also a great way to use up any paper scraps as well. Working on a paper strips background is exactly what it sounds like. You're layering different strips of paper together on the card. The cards in this lesson have fairly simple focal points and embellishments, as the backgrounds already have lots going on in them, so there's not too much need for much else. I've started with the matting layer for each of the card basis and then started trimming down the papers for the backgrounds. When designing these cards, I often start with the focal point that I want to use an image, a wooden element or a piece of text and then designed the background to fit the focal point . In a layout where you have strips of different papers, I find that it's effective. Place the strip with a simpler or less busy background on the side of the card, where you're going to place the focal point. That way, they'll stand out enough and not blend into the background. Keeping this in mind as you're building up the background is useful. So if you're planning to use a focal point on your card, make sure you know where on the card you want it as you start to build up your paper stripped back ground. I started first with the butterflies pattern on started layering it up with the leaves, a white brick design and a tiny strip off the orange circles. A couple of tips that I have for creating these paper strips backgrounds is to stick to three or four different papers. Too many can make the card look cluttered, so keeping it to a limited number can help with giving the card a balanced look. Varying the thickness off the paper strips can also be useful and adding more interest to the card. I like to have a variety of thick and thin strips. Usually, the thicker strips are whatever pattern or design I want to stand up the most on the card. When you're looking at the card that I'm making here, the butterflies pattern is the one that stands out the most, and it's the one that I have used the thicker strips off. Another tip is toe have a balance of busy and simple papers. I've talked about this before, earlier on in the class, but these pattern paper designs usually have a good variety of prince. Some plane in some detailed, so it's usually fairly easy to balance out the cards. With this background, I have the butterflies on the leaves, both of which are full of details. So to balance that out, I've picked the planer white bricks pattern. One last tip would be to repeat the patterns across the card and use multiple strips of each varying the size of the strips As you go. You can also flip the patterns in the paper strips as well. You're still working with a vertical paper strip, but you can cut the strips so that the pattern is horizontal or upside down just to create some more interest on the card for the next card. I'm just using three very plain texture designs on this is because the focal point I want to use later on are in very pale colors, and I want them to stand out easily from the background. It's always important to keep the focal point in mind when you're picking your backgrounds on again here, I'm varying the size of the paper strips and loaned to create a texture background. The nice thing about this particular paper pad is that there's plenty of these Plet, pale colored backgrounds to complement all the details and the focal points. The last background is constructed the same way, using a large detailed panel on one side of the card and then layering smaller strips on the other as well as balancing the colors. It can also be effective to place a couple of contrast ing papers on the card as well, especially in the areas you want. The focal point to stand out from a tiny strip in a contrast in color or design will immediately draw the eye to that area, so I often use a tiny strip of paper, but like that behind a text block or a focal point or on Element. For example, when I'm planning out my card, I would try to keep any papers that go behind the focal point simpler and less busy than papers in the other side of the car. But sometimes that's not an option on even sometimes with a simple background behind it. The focal point doesn't stand up quite enough, so a very small strip, in a contrast in color, can really draw the eye to that area. Moving on to the focal points, I'm starting with the's side clusters as the designs are right up against one corner off the paper. This dictates where on the card I can place the cluster. I'm going to line up the edge of the focal point with the edge of the card base. Generally speaking, I tend to find these types of designs a little harder toe work with, as I have less flexibility where to put them. However, they are a nice challenge as you have to take into an account the paper edge. As you're designing the card, I'm going to create a layered three D dimensional effect and used the foam squares to layer three clusters on top of each other, placing down the first layer. I can move and flip around each piece to create the layout that I want, and I keep going backwards and forwards and testing them out to make sure that they're all in the right place before I glue them down. I want a little bit of the 1st 2 layers peeking through from underneath the top layer. When I place it on, it takes a little bit of time moving things around to make this work. But layering is a great way to use elements that are a bit harder to fit into your car design. And as most of the elements here are flowers, it doesn't matter if they're upside down. The rest of the focal points are simple. A banner on one card, another banner and a square of paper on the other. I added some string as well, wrapping it round the inside of the card and tying a small not on the inside string. Twine or ribbon are lovely ways to add not only embellishments but also to add some different texture to the card. A few buttons were added to each card, as well as wooden elements, flower statements, some text and nouveau drops. When I'm adding nouveau drops, I'm working as I worked with the buttons, and I try to add odd numbers ones. Threes, fives. Normally, I work in threes. I find that odd numbers are just generally more pleasing to the eye. If you're new to nouveau drops, it's also useful toe. Have some paper towel on hand. Onda Scribble a little bit of the paint out first to get any air bubbles out of the tube. Otherwise, you could end up with a large blob on your card when you first go to make that first drop. Nouveau drops are, however, easy to wipe off on their wet. If I want to remove any, then I just take a little scrap of paper and gently scraped the wet paint off the surface of the card. You do want to be quite quick if you want to remove the nouveau drops as they tend to harden from the outside in. And if you're too slow and removing them and you can often end up with a ring left over on your card. These are the paper strip cards. Living different designs and patterns is one of my favorite card layout. It makes great use off the coordinated papers, and it's also a really good way to use up any leftover papers as well. 9. Single Focal Points: the final set of cards in this class are single focal point cards. These are good for small cards where you only have enough room for a single element. Or if you have a large scale or very detailed element that you want to showcase all the cards in this lesson, use a light gray card stock as a matting layer Andi, then panels and strips of the plain brick and wood texture backgrounds for the large card. I simply place down the background panel and for the too many cards I used to strips one larger on one smaller off the brick and wood textures and let a little bit of the grey matting layers show through between the strips. I then added the focal points. The large card has the detailed cluster that I cut out at the beginning of the class. As the cluster is very large and very detailed. I don't need to do anything else to it, except added to the card with a few foam squares. I went through the tray of leftover cut outs to pick out some focal points for the smaller cards, trying out different ones and just seeing what I feel like using its very nice at this stage toe have all the elements pre cut, so I can just go through and see what works. I chose a corner coster with a bicycle for the first card and then a vase of flowers. For the second, I added a little banner behind the flower vase just to bring it forward a little. And I'm still using that same spare card base that I've been cutting up to create all the craft banners and strips. The final step for these cards was to add the text boxes and a few nouveau drops. I place the text boxes directly onto the backgrounds and kept the nouveau drops in a simple line on the small cards and scattered a few into the reef. A swell if you're making a batch of cards, perhaps for a party or an event or a celebration than thes. Single focus point cards are very quick and very easy to make. Having pre cut elements ready to go when you assembling the cards makes the process even quicker. I think the small or many cards would work really well for batch making for thank you's or invitations Sometimes you need a card, but it doesn't need to be really big or complicated, so these little ones work really well for that. 10. Using Up Scraps and Gift Tags: Now that we have all 12 cards made and ready to go, we're now going to take a quick look at using up any of the paper scraps that you might have left over from your projects. I personally like to use up any paper scraps that I have at the time, as it will be much harder to match them to future cards and projects. A couple of ideas for using up the leftover fussy cut elements is to use them as you would use stickers. Sometimes I glue them onto the insides of my cards off onto the envelopes. Here I'm going through and gluing the elements into the cards just to add an extra special touch on the inside. I also use leftover cutouts in my planner or journal. You can also give them a coat of varnish to make them more durable and then glued them onto the front of your sketchbook. Some of these elements could also work well for other projects. The butterflies, for example, could go well with lots of different themes, and I use them a lot so these could be set aside into the embellishment box for later. There are lots of ways to use up any leftover, fussy cut elements. So don't worry if you have some left over for any leftover paper scraps you can use thumb up on a card background by layering or making matching bookmarks or gift tags from the leftovers. There are lots of other stationary ideas for using the scraps as well. I mentioned bookmarks. You have to keep these fairly flat so you can't have too many embellishments, but they do work well with the paper scraps. You can also make bunting or garlands. If you have any of the little cards left over, you can use the papers to decorate notebook covers or boxes. You can use the paper scraps in mixed media or art journaling. There are lots of ways that you can incorporate any paper leftovers into other projects and other crafts. I'm going to make three gift tags with the paper scraps that I have left over from this class. I'm starting by cutting white card stock down into roughly 2.5 by 5.5 inch rectangles, and then I'm used a tag punch to create the ends. But you can also snip the corners off one end and use a hole punch to create the tag shape . Once I have the basis, I went to the box of leftovers and layered up all the papers to create the tags. All the little bits can be used no matter how small they are. I keep layering and layering the papers until I like how it looks. Keeping in mind the general tips that we discussed in the previous lessons about distributing the papers and balancing the colors on the designs. There's no right way to make thes ka large is. If you feel like yours is not working, then I would just keep going and keep adding more, moving the papers around, cutting them up into different shapes in until you like the result. Once the main backgrounds were finished, I cut one of the leftover reefs in half, placed one on one tag on one. On the second, I added some string and buttons and floors stamens and any of the other little embellishments that I had left over. Another advantage to using up your scraps as you go is that you have all your matching embellishments and supplies out at the time, and it's easy to create matching accessories for your cards. The finished tags match the cards perfectly, and if you were giving someone a gift than having a matching card and a matching gift tag is a really nice set to make. 11. Final Thoughts: Those are the 12 cards and three gift tags that we made with one pack of six by six inch patterned paper. I really hope you enjoyed the class and had fun card making and looking at the different layouts and ways to use scrapbooking papers. There are lots more ways to use the scrapbooking papers in card making on this class was aiming to provide a place to start when you have your paper pad in front of you and you're wondering where to begin, which papers to use, how to construct a card, how to pick a focal point and all of that. I hope this class provided a few ideas and inspiration to get you going. Or if you're already well into card making, then I hope you enjoyed the crafting session today and found a few new ideas to try out along the way in your own projects. Make sure you post a picture off some of your own cards that you've made to the gallery and let everyone know which paper collection you're using. There are so many lovely papers out there to using card making, and I look forward to seeing which you choose. Thank you for watching and have a creative day