Vintage Style Easter Card

 

If you need to make a lot of cards it is always a good idea to figure out a formula that can be easily repeated.  One of my favorite ways to do this is to design a "card topper" with an interesting inset design cut and use simple layers to complete the card.  Add a pretty vintage image and some layering mats and your cards will come together very quickly.

Another way to save time but still make the card look "fancy" is to use specialty cardstock with glitter or shine.  Here I used a plain lavender card base, then a layer of Core'dinations Core Couture glitter cardstock cut at 5 1/4 x 4 inches, the decorative card topper in yellow, another layer of the purple glitter cardstock and a lovely vintage Easter image.

This adorable chick in a basket of flowers is one of the images on the Vintage Easter Volume 2 CD from Twisted Papers.com.  You can see all of the images offered on this CD HERE. 

I was able to fit six of my decorative mat designs on a 12 x 12 piece of cardstock.  The design I drew was originally created as a square shape but I resized it to 5 x 3.75 inches to fit a standard A2 card.

To determine the size for the center image you simply draw a rectangle in the Silhouette software and center it within the cut pattern.  The space available was about 2 by 3 inches.

I used my Storybook Creator 4.0 software to lighten the background of the image, brighten the colors a bit and resize the image to 2 x 3 inches for printing.

The image is printed on matte photo paper.  Adding the pale yellow background helps you to see where to trim the image since the background of the image is white.

Creating the design as a cut out in the mat makes it much easier to assemble the card.  Here you can see how pretty the glittered cardstock looks through the cuts.  It saves wear and tear on the blade to just use the glittered cardstock as a backing instead of cutting it with the Cameo.

The central image needed just a tiny edge of purple to help it stand out on the yellow card topper.  I cut a piece of cardstock at 2 1/8 x 3 1/8 to add a 1/16 inch border.

The glittered cardstock makes the card look very pretty but I thought the central image needed a bit of sparkle too.  I used a Sakura stardust clear gel pen to add shine to the flowers - first the centers and then some lines along the flower shapes.  I hope you can see the effect in this photo.

I cut all six card toppers on one mat and I'll use them with different images for a series of cards.  I was very pleased with the clean cuts the Cameo made with these tiny shapes.  This is the mat after I lifted the card toppers - no need to "poke out" bits of the design, they all stayed on the mat!  I use a Cricut mat most of the time with my Cameo.  I have lots of them and they are sturdier than the Cameo mats.  You just need to place the paper a bit higher on the mat to align it for cutting. 

If you place the paper so it covers the small white area above the 12 x 12 grid on the Cricut mat it will be properly positioned for cutting with the Cameo (you can see the area I am referring to on the side of this mat - the sides should be in the normal position).

I didn't add any gems to the card but you could put them in the four corners.  I wanted to keep the card totally flat for mailing and the sparkle of the cardstock and the gel pen were enough to make it pretty.

If you love vintage images, be sure to check out Twisted Papers.  They offer digital downloads of single images as well as images on CDs and DVDs.   There is a special deal this month - when you purchase the Turn of the Century Art and Illustration DVD, they will automatically include the new Vintage Easter Volume 2 absolutely FREE (regular price $9.95). This offer expires the end of March.  You can see thumbnail previews of the images included on each disc on their site - just click the red links above.

Please be sure to leave a comment if you have any questions about how to adapt the images for your projects.  Do you like working with vintage images?  I find them fascinating, especially some of the old advertising images.  It is also fun to see the fonts and word choices on some of the cards. 

The snow is melting quickly and I think spring might finally arrive.  I have a lot to catch up on here before our next trip.  I am trying to get back through all of my email and comments - if you have been waiting for an answer on something please don't hesitate to send a reminder message.  I need a few more hours added to each day (don't we all!).

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