Krafty Tips and Tutes-Putting It All Together

So, I get asked a lot, and so do my other Krafty Girls, how do you all decide what all to put on your card? Well, I can't speak for everyone, here is a brief, and hopefully helpful overview of my thought process for how I decide what I am going to do when putting together a card. 

First, start with the theme of the card, or it's purpose. Now, by purpose, it could be that you are making a card for a birthday, or for a challenge, a wedding, what have you, but for whatever reason you have for making it, begin there. 

Since you have that starting point, you're going to have to pick what stamp you want to start with, so chose the image you want to use. Make sure that if you are going to be doing a sketch, you chose an image that fits that sketch....nothing is more frustrating than trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. You will get to the end of your card and no matter what you do, you will not be happy with the end result, trust me....been there.  

At this point I ALWAYS decide what paper I am going to be using because I am a firm believer in coloring my image to match my paper and not the other way around. Again, nothing is more frustrating than trying to do it the other way around. Don't make your life any harder than it has to be....stamping is therapy, not torture....allow it to soothe you, not drive you insane. :)

So, now we've chosen our paper, our theme, our image, and she's nice and colored. Now to make the card. Some people are blessed with the ability to see a card in their head and be able to make it come to life with little to no effort. Others, take a bit more work. If you are one of those that take a bit more work, don't worry....those people have developed their own personal style over years of card-making, and you will, too!!

Any-who, at this point, I start by choosing the card-stock colors that best co-ordinate with my paper. Now, if you are someone like me, who likes a LOT of layers, chose 3 colors max, if you are someone who likes simple, go for less, there ARE NO RULES!!! This is art, and YOUR art more importantly, YOU make the RULES!! Layer as much, or as little as possible. 

For me, I like to play off of the patterns in the paper, if they are circular patterns, I chose square shapes, if they are more squarish patterns, I chose more round shapes when I cut my paper. I find the contrast between the two makes it stand out more. Have fun with it. I almost always use designer paper, and go for minimum of one pattern, but no more than 3....I don't know if you are sensing a pattern here...3 is kind of my limit for most things. Again, there are exceptions to all rules, and IT IS ART, and YOUR ART more importantly, have fun!!

The next part, as you can see by my finished card is the embellishing. Yes, I have my go to's, and my Krafty Sisters have theirs. They love flowers, I love buttons and brads, you may love eyelets and metal, burlap and twine, whatever your heart desires, there's no right or wrong answer, but the key to everything is balance. I almost always ground my card with something in the four corners. but as you can see, if I put something big on the right side, I try to counter that on the left.  So with this card, I chose to put a big orange bow on one side, and buttons on the other....I never would have put them on the same side, because it would have thrown the card off balance...does that make sense? 

A spiral clip near the top, and to balance it out, one at the bottom. Basically, you don't want to throw every embellishment you have on one side of the card, and then leave the other side completely naked, it would make it look completely unbalanced, and draw your eye to that side. With a balanced card, your eye is drawn in all directions and pulled towards the center to where your image is, which is where you want your main focus to be.

To put it all simply, making cards is supposed to be fun, and for me it is therapy. It relaxes me. I love it, and it has been a huge part of my life for so many years. DON'T LET IT GET TOO TECHNICAL!! Have fun with it!! Play with color, play with shapes, go outside your comfort zone!! Use balance, especially if you are like me and have a life that basically has none, lol!! My rule with embellishing is, add stuff until it feels right, then stop. You will know when you are done. Trust your instincts, develop your own style, love your art, and share it with the world. 

I hope this helped you in some way!!

Have a Krafty Day!!