Creating Multiple Cards the Easy Way -

Hello again, friends! Whew! Happy to be on the other side of holiday craziness. We’ve been snowed in for a bit which meant e-learning fun while trying to occupy my 4 year old AND work my full-time job. Needless to say, I’ve been a bit stressed and needed some crafty therapy. Did I drink LOTS of coffee just to stay awake to craft? Yes. We do what we have to do for a little peace. I just recently completed another class with the Altenew Educator Program called Beyond Basic Backgrounds with Lydia Evans. One of the techniques was inlay die cutting and I’ve said this before but I LOVE die cutting. So I took that inspiration along with her ombre background from another lesson and ran with it.

As I said, we have lots of snow so I’m surrounded by lots of white and blue tones. I took that as my color inspiration for these cards. I actually set out to make just one card but then I realized I could easily make multiples and use up all the pieces from the die cutting. The Zero Waste Leaf Pattern die from Altenew is perfect for that. I grabbed four panels of Neenah Classic Crest Solar White 80lb cardstock. These measured 5 1/2 by 4 1/4 inches. On two of the panels, I created an ombre background using the Altenew Fresh Dye inks in the order listed below.

Using something like the Waffle Flower Grip Mat above is really helpful when ink blending because it will hold your paper stationary. It keeps your fingers ink free and lessens the chance that you’ll leave an inky fingerprint elsewhere on your project. I know I’m not the only one. As I said before, I blended two panels with the four colors listed above blending from lightest to darkest. I didn’t work too hard on the blend because I was going to be die cutting. It also smooths out as the ink dries back.

With my ink blended panels completed, it was time to die cut. To help with the inlay process, I applied Stick-It adhesive sheets to back of each panel. This essentially makes your die cuts into stickers that you can adhere to your project without liquid glue. I placed the Zero Waste Leaf Pattern die onto my inked panel and ran that through my Platinum 6 Die Cutting Machine from Spellbinders. The darkest area was at the top and the lightest at the bottom. I repeated with second ink blended panel with the gradient going in the opposite direction. This is what gave me the different color gradient for the circle die cuts. You have to be careful to keep the die cuts from each panel separate or you will pull your hair out trying to find which piece goes where. Then I die cut from my two remaining white panels.

TIP: When you have a large die like the Zero Waste Leaf Pattern that cuts lots of little pieces, it can be difficult to get a good cut from your die cutting machine. Using a piece of bubble mailer as a shim works miracles. Save those bubble mailers from all your crafty purchases or Amazon. Cut them down to around the size of your card panels. Use your regular die cutting sandwich but place one of those bubble mailer panels just behind your cardstock and run it through your machine. I’ve yet to have an issue getting a good cut this way. Leah Lawson shared this tip once and I’ve done this ever since. I’ve found that I can use the bubble mailer piece 2-3 times.

With my panels and pieces die cut, it was time to assemble. All my side-folding A2 card bases are Neenah Classic Crest Solar White 80lb cardstock (8 1/2 by 5 1/2 inches scored at 4 1/14 inches). I applied each background panel to a card base after removing the Stick-It adhesive backing sheet.

TIP: When adhering a card panel to a card base, use something like a scoring board or stamp platform to help you line up the panel with the base. I like to use my Altenew Crafter’s Essential Scoring Board for this. You just place your card base into the corner and then use the corner to line up the card panel onto the card base. Easy peasy.

Now comes my favorite part. Placing the die cuts into their homes on the card base. Remember, each piece still has the adhesive backing sheet still on it so I removed that before placing each piece. It’s like putting together a puzzle and I just find it so relaxing. Once my backgrounds were completed, it was time to choose my sentiments. I wanted to continue with the die cut theme so I chose Versatile Greetings. I cut the words from silver metallic cardstock and white cardstock. The shadow layers are from white. I adhered the silver layers to the white layers with liquid glue for a little extra dimension. To ensure the sentiment stood out on the white cards, I ink blended the sentiment shadow layer for those cards with Arctic Mountain Fresh Dye Ink.

When I temporarily placed the sentiments onto the cards, I realized they needed a little something extra. So I grabbed some vellum and cut some additional leaves to place behind the sentiments. I placed a couple leaf clusters behind each sentiment and then adhered the sentiment over the top with liquid glue. You don’t want to put liquid glue onto vellum unless you can hide it because it will show through and not look great.

For a final touch to the front, I used some dew drop embellishments from Concord & 9th. I placed most over the circles surrounding the sentiments using liquid glue. You’ll notice some look blue because of the blue circle underneath. That completed my card fronts.

Now you could absolutely call these cards done at this point but I like to do something on the inside of every card I make. So, to tie it in with the front, I ink blended one more panel of cardstock in the same order of colors I did for the front. Then I used the Zero Waste Leaf Pattern die again to cut some additional leaves and circles. I placed one leaf into the bottom right corner of each card and then placed some of the circles around each. That completed this set of four cards. For a complete list of supplies used, see the end of this post. I hope these cards inspire you to grab some of your own dies and play around with die cut inlay. Thanks for stopping by today! Now go get crafty!