This week's Color Throwdown is to use the colors Teal, Olive, Rust, and Navy on a card. I pulled out Coastal Cabana, Old Olive, Night of Navy, and Gold Glimmer paper for the rust color. 

The So Many Stars stamp set has these pieces that I thought were just to make radiance lines for the stars. I had used them with some solid stars that I cut with the Stitched Stars dies, but since that die set was off the table, I tried stamping them with a stamped star image. The results were a little busy. 

You can see on the finished card that I used these stamps to make a pattern that accents the greeting I pulled from the Here's a Card stamp set. I'm so glad I sat down to really play with this stamp set. I can't wait to use these stamps on other cards!

I cut strips of Pumpkin Pie and Basic Black cardstock that were 8.5" x 2.25". Then I scored each strip at 4" and 4.5". Because the strips were 8.5" long - the width of a piece of cardstock - I only had to make one cut for each strip. 

I slipped each end of the strip through my Tailored Tag punch in order to create a pointed end on each side. You can see how this works in this photo from a previous project.
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I folded the sides up and stapled two mini starburst packages inside. Then I punched a hole at the top and closed it up with a piece of grosgrain ribbon from my stash. Instead of tying a knot directly, I used a second, skinnier grosgrain ribbon from my stash and tied a knot around the wider Old Olive ribbon. 

To finish it off, I added a piece of 2" x 3" patterned paper to the front and a "Happy Halloween" greeting. For a few of them, I also added a pumpkin stamp that I pulled from my stash. 
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​First up is the pirate duck. All set for Halloween, this cute little duck is dressed as a pirate. I simply stamped the duck on white cardstock, added a couple layers, and then put it on the Daffodil Delight card front. I stamped a few stars from the set behind the duck to add a little background interest and added strips of the Designer Series Paper at the bottom to pull in the colors from the duck.

The next card features a cute little chick decked out with a Santa hat and a star. You'll notice I used the same layout on all four of these cards. I simply changed the orientation. But each one features strips of the patterned paper along the bottom or side and the image stamped on white and mounted on coordinating cardstock.

For each one, I also stamped something on the card front using the same color ink as the cardstock. For the chick and duck, it was the stars, but for the turkey and the hen, I did something a little different. The set contains greetings for each season as well. For Thanksgiving, there is a stamp that says: "give THANKS." I carefully  inked up just the "THANKS" portion of the stamp and stamped it on my card front. (It actually wasn't hard!) I stamped it three times each inking to give different densities of color. 

I did the same on the Valentine's Day card, but instead of using one color, I used Poppy Parade, Gorgeous Grape, and Flirty Flamingo to tie in all of the colors of the card. 

These cards really were quick, easy, and fun to make!

First up is this cute little apple card. I actually made this back in September as a back-to-school card. All of these cards use the 6"x6" Designer Series Paper in Brights and Regals as a backdrop to the fruit. Patterned paper is a quick way to make a really sharp and pulled-together card. I love layering strips of the different designs like you see here! Since the paper is 6" x 6" and most cards have a finished size of 5 1/2" x 4 1/4", there always seems to be little strips of the Designer Series Paper left over. This is a great way to use them up.

If you look very closely, you can see some raised lines on the bottom edge of the card. These are just done with the scoring blade on my paper trimmer. Again, a quick and easy way to give my card a little more texture. 

The second card features pumpkins. I stamped them with Pumpkin Pie ink on Mango Melody and Pumpkin Pie cardstock. Once again, I used the 6"x6" Designer Series Paper to make the background and then tied it with linen thread in a simple bow. I love the contrast between these colors and how truly simple this card was to make. 

For the next two cards, I stamped the apple images directly on the patterned paper. This adds some great texture to the card. For this one, I layered the banner strips, but I put the skinnier banner inside the wider banner. And can you see the apple seeds stamped with Cherry Cobbler ink on the Cherry Cobbler cardstock?

The last card has the apples stamped on the 6" x 6" Designer Series Paper again. I stamped with Shaded Spruce ink on Granny Apple Green paper and with Cherry Cobbler ink on Poppy Parade paper. To give the linen thread a little more oompf, I frayed the ends.  I stamped the sentiment in two different colors and then cut out the words with my scissors. This card also features strips of cardstock that were in my scrap bin. I just layered them and used them to anchor my apples on the page.