Clarity Matters Blog Tutorial: Children’s cards

Hello hello! Grace here.

I hope this finds you safe, happy and enjoying your Sunday morning!

Firstly, don’t miss Barb’s TV show tomorrow (July 7th) on Create and Craft. It’ll be fantastic!

Secondly, it’s very almost July now. Many of you already know what that means! Wooooooo… The Summer Half Price Club Member’s sale! YEP. It’ll be starting very soon, so make sure your club membership is up to date 🙂 And if you’re not a member yet? Why not?!

You can explore more about that, HERE.

If you’re having any issues joining, or finding out if your club is active, please feel free to email me (Grace@claritystamp.com) and I’ll get back to you when I can.

Aaaaaand now back to our regularly scheduled programming…

We are joined today by the brilliant Clarity Design Team member, Tina Morris. You’ll have likely seen her gorgeous artwork all over the place. She has very kindly put together an inky/stampy/stencil step-by-step blog tutorial for us.
I’ll hand you right over to our teacher…

Ingredients

Card Blanks 8″ x 8″ White x20 (ACC-CA-31673-88)
Card Blanks 7″ x 7″ Black & White x10 of Each (ACC-CA-31672-77)
Great Lakes Designer Paper Pack 8″ x 8″ (ACC-CA-30851-88)
Wee Folk 2 Stamp Set (STA-PE-10019-XX)
Occasions Sentiments – Happy Birthday A6 Stamp Set (STA-WO-11638-A6)
Block Print Alphabet & Numbers A4 & A6 Stamp Collection (STA-WO-11614-XX)
Distress Ink Pad – Picket Fence (INK-DP-50350-XX)
Distress Ink Pad – Mustard Seed (INK-DP-50089-XX)
Distress Ink Pad – Seedless Preserves (INK-DP-50100-XX)
Distress Ink Pad – Peacock Feathers (INK-DP-50091-XX)
Nocturne Versafine Clair (Tsukineko) (INK-VE-50520-XX)
Clarity Stencil Brushes (Set of 4) (ACC-BR-30006-XX)
Abstract Squares Aperture Mat A4 Stencil (STE-PA-00952-A4)
Circle Aperture Mat A4 Stencil (STE-PA-00938-A4)
Roll-A-Tape Super Strong Permanent Glue Tape Runner (ACC-MS-31065-XX)
Pack of 5 Vertical Long Mounts (ACC-MO-30564-XX)
Clarity Low Tack Masking Tape (ACC-AD-31211-XX)
Micron Pen Set of 7 (ACC-PE-30778-XX)

This is where we are heading…

This time we asked you what you’d like to see from the step-by-step and blogs. You guessed it, someone asked for children’s cards!

I have a lot of children in my extended family and make cards for all of my cousins and their children, so I gladly volunteered to do this step-by-step project. I hope you enjoy it! I know all of my lot love a personalised card, especially when their names are not the most common.

This card can be done for girls or boys, or even teens, by just changing which wee folk you use. Change up the colours, choose their favourite colour to match their bedroom or favourite football team/sport, adapt your own makes, it doesn’t have to use the same stencil background either. Clarity has a plethora of beautiful suitable stencils. It’s your Art. Make it work for you and the recipient. Most of all, enjoy the journey!

I would really love to see your versions on Clarity Worldwide.

Step 1. Take a white piece of 7 x 7 stencil card. Using the circle aperture mat A4 stencil, choose the 3 size circles you wish to be the foreground circles on your work. Tape to the card with Clarity Low Tack Masking Tape, if you are not confident when brushing through. This will prevent slippage.

If you are working with the Abstract Squares Aperture Mat A4 Stencil, choose which way you want the squares to sit on your card.

Step 2. Load up your brush with the Distress ink (colour of your choice) and wipe off excess ink on some copy paper/towel. Apply brush to one half of the circle in a crescent moon shape and, with the remaining ink on the brush, go round the outside of the circle once or twice lightly.

*For the Squares apply to one side, then sweep in the same direction with one colour.

Step 3. Place the circle about 2-3 mills outside of the circle you have just inked and ink with the same colour, not adding any further ink, just to give an echo of colour on one side, preferably the side to which you applied the most ink.

Step 4. Repeat step 2 & 3 with the other two colours, making your 3 Circles/bubbles your focal point.

*With the squares choose the opposite direction for a 2nd colour and sweep towards the first layer of colour. Do the same for the 3rd colour and come in from the other side.

Step 5. Using your Wee Folk 2 Stamp Set, choose your required wee folk and mount on the Vertical Long Mounts, inking up your stamp with Versa Clair Nocturn, decide where to add the wee folk.  (Versa Claire is a longer drying Ink so you have more time to plot)

Are you standing them on a ball? Are they holding a ball? Or are they sitting or dancing within a square? The choice is endless, just remember you need room for your sentiment and personalisation. 

Think about the balance of the positioning. You could put a piece of tracing paper over the top of your background and plot your stamping of the images using this or use the stamp indexing sheet.

Step 6. If your stamping for your Wee Folk is not as dark as you would like it, remember a micron pen is your friend. Go in and darken any light or missed areas.

Step 7. Taking the sentiment, add this to your mount, ink up with the black versa clair and using another small word from the same set (use this as an anti wobble device, take care not to ink this word), position where you feel best.

With the square boys card I have inked up and only used half of the Happy Birthday sentiment in different fonts, building up a little block of words.

Step 9. At this point select your personalisation. Make sure you have stamped this on copy paper, so you can judge the length and positioning on your original card.
Using the Distress inks, ink up your letter and plot. If you’re adding the age, position and stamp at this point. Use a spot on sponge to get a smoother ink effect on your lettering, I didn’t and wanted the more mottled look.

For the boys card I used Versa Clare for the sentiment, names and positioned my Wee Boys sitting on or among the words, for added interest.

Step 10. For the background circles, do not re-ink your brushes. Randomly choose different size circles and fill your background. With inkpad Picket Fence, also do a random few smaller circles. These will hardly show but if you catch these with the other inks, you will get a coloured more opaque effect.

Step 11. Once your composition is balanced, and you have stamped your personalisation either in black or distress ink, choose a background paper. This could be a companion colour, a designer paper, Brighton Rock Great Lakes or toffee apple, the choice is yours. Make sure it compliments your chosen colours. Cut this background paper to 4mm smaller than your 8×8 card.

Step 12. Sharpie the edge of your 7×7 card, digging in with the pen and running this down the side in one long swoop. I use my glass mat  to achieve this and then just wipe up the mess.

Step 13. Stick all your layers together and there you have a card fit for your little prince or princess.

I hope to see your versions of this card on Clarity and Groovi Worldwide facebook pages, it’s always interesting to see everyones twists, on our blogs. 

Thank you for joining us for another inky arty Clarity Blog. I will hand you back to our beautiful Grace who puts our blogs into this version for you all to enjoy.  Thank you Grace, for all your hard work.

Lots of love Tina. Happy weekend crafting. xx

Such a BRILLIANT project. Two for the price of one! And the price is… free! 😉

Thank you, Tina, for sharing this bloggy tutorial with us. Another epic and easy to follow project that we are sure will encourage and inspire you at home!

Everything that Tina has used in this particular project is available in a shopping list, HERE.

Right, let’s have a look at what’s happening in the week ahead…

Monday 1st July:
Barbara in the SHAC – 10am Live on Facebook & YouTube
Tuesday 2nd July:
Groovi Tuesday with Paul – 10am Live on Facebook & YouTube
Thursday 4th July:
Craft Along with Barbara and the Hippie Chicks – 7pm Live on Facebook & YouTube
Sunday 7th July:
Crafting with Clarity with Barbara on Create & Craft – 3pm-5pm

Really looking forward to Mum’s show tomorrow afternoon. See you there!

Travel gently, friends.
Lotsa love, Grace & Tina xoxo

Clarity – The Home of Art, Craft, and Well-Being.