Jazz it up

I have been wanting to do something to show how you can take a simple, basic design and jazz it up with just a few little touches. So here goes my first attempt.

This is a basic card. The image is stamped in a single color and mounted on a card with some colorful DSP. The sentiment is simply stamped and mounted. A nice looking card and would definitely brighten someone's day.
All of these cards use these products:
Card Stock - Very Vanilla, So Saffron, Cajun Craze, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip, Autumn Spice DSP (retired)
Stamp Set - Lovely as a Tree
Ink - Chocolate Chip
Tools - Word Window and Modern Label punches

So this is jazzing it up a little. I used two colors for the stamping by rubbing the stamp pad against the stamp in the specific areas. I added a ribbon (Old Olive 3/8 inch taffeta) and I used dimensionals to pop-up the sentiment. I did turn the card sideways just to make it a little different.

Here I have jazzed it up another step. I colored the image using chalk pastels. To do this I stamped the image in a lighter color (Crumb Cake) and then using cotton swabs (had to steal those from DH's vanity in the bathroom) sponged on some autumn colors among the leaves and added some brown to the trunk and green to the grass. Then using the Stamp-a-ma-jig, I lined up and stamped the tree in Chocolate Chip over the chalked image.
The Very Vanilla 3/8 inch taffeta ribbon has a little strip of 1/8 inch Old Olive taffeta ribbon tied into the bow.
I added a Cajun Craze brad to the sentiment.

These next two cards are not necessarily 'jazzed up' versions of the previous (more like the same level) but show other ways to make your card special. For this one I used So Saffron card stock for the image background instead of the Very Vanilla and since I did not have any So Saffron ribbons that would work I dyed a piece of Whisper White 3/8 inch taffeta ribbon using the So Saffron stamp pad and a sponge.


This was my attempt for a truly masculine version. I used the pastels to color the image as before. To distress the edges of the Very Vanilla card stock, I took the scissor blade and ran it along the edges. This breaks down the fibers and gives it a ragged texture. Then I rubbed the edges along the Chocolate Chip ink pad. I added some Hemp Twine instead of a ribbon.

Hope you like all of my versions of this card. Each one uses the same design, dimensions and supplies - but all have some unique features.