Wedding Season in India
When my parents headed to India for multiple weddings, they asked me to put together some cards for the different couples. Knowing they needed fancy cards for five weddings in a short time frame was a bit overwhelming. Luckily, I was quickly inspired by some of my favorite crafters’ cards (blogs linked below).
Of the five cards I made, the navy/red card using Spellbinders’ Bella Rose Lattice die set and the wine/gold card using Spellbinders’ Majestic Ovals die set ended up quite different from my initial plan (based on the inspiration cards). The navy/red card also was the only one where I limited the dimension and created a custom envelope rather than a box. I’ve put more details below…
Inspiration
Bella Rose Lattice in Navy & Red
Once I chose a die as the central element for each card, I used the wedding invites to pick colors. My cardstock swatch ring and ink swatch book were extremely helpful for this part since I could quickly compare the swatches with the invitations side-by-side. [Part 1 of my cardstock swatches post is here; part 2 coming soon.]
For the first card, the couple had a deep red and navy color scheme on their invitations. Gina K Blue Denim cardstock was a very close match. I glued a piece of fun foam with Stick-It adhesive to a 5″x7″ piece of card and cut the main oval shape from the Spellbinders Bella Rose Lattice Layering Frame die. For the background, I cut a 5″x7″ piece of Gina K. cardstock in Cherry Red. I used a tone-on-tone technique to stamp a script pattern (Elegant Script rubber stamp by Darkroom Door) with Ranger dye ink in Classic Cherry.
For the center of the Bella Rose oval, I cut a panel out of Neenah cardstock in White Gold, ink blended with Broken China distress ink, and finally embossed it with a floral embossing folder I received free from a magazine. Neenah’s White Gold cardstock is beautiful, especially for any kind of western wedding or event, but it can be difficult to find in my experience. I think you can get it more reliably online or at Office Depot. Two good alternatives are the shimmer cardstock from Tonic Studios and Papertrey Ink. I prefer Papertrey Ink, but they have fewer colors.
I die cut the Papertrey Ink Congratulations die as the focal sentiment but it faded into the background. To make it stand out, I heat embossed it in Ranger’s Silver Pearl embossing powder three times to make the entire sentiment much more prominent. Darice’s navy flat-back pearls in my stash matched exactly so I used those to finish the card. These pearls are another hard to find item so I now prefer to use Gradient Flatback Pearls by Picket Fence Studios and Trinity Stamps’ Baubles Embellishments.
For the envelope, I used the We R Memory Keepers Envelope Punch Board and the negative piece from die-cutting. I stamped a Simon Says Congratulations sentiment in VersaMark ink and heat embossed with Hero Arts Silver embossing powder. On the inside, I used the same embossing powder & ink combo to heat emboss a greeting from the Simon Says Congratulations clear stamp set.
Lattice Hearts in Gold & Wine
For the second card, I actually picked two dies that I wanted to use: Spellbinders’ Majestic Ovals and Spellbinders’ Lattice Hearts from the Large Die of the Month Club. I think the Die of the Month Clubs from Spellbinders are probably the best monthly sub I’ve tried to date – both quality and price have been great. The themes aren’t always exactly to my taste, but I’ve learned to be more creative in how I use the dies.
The card box was simple and straightforward as I used the 5″x7″ Box die from Card Making Magic to create the box from Bazzill Card Shoppe cardstock in Mulberry, then cut the largest lattice heart (without using any outline dies) from the top. By the way, I absolutely recommend every cardmaker who likes dimension pick up the Card Making Magic Box die sets. They save so much time when you are making any kind of standard card with dimension. I have the 5×7, 6×6, and A2 boxes from the collection and definitely plan on picking up the Slimline set soon.
I ran an empty laminating pouch through my laminator to create an acetate sheet. I taped it to the inside of the box top so you can see the card but there’s no worry about something damaging the card inside. Normally I would use leftover packaging for this, but had run out so the laminating pouch works just as well. Finally, I cut the Simon Says Congratulations die from Bazzill’s Gold Foil cardstock and glued it to the top.
Majestic Ovals in Pale Gold & Fuschia
Once the box was ready, I worked on the card. Here I knew I wanted to use Majestic Ovals, but also wanted to replicate the lattice effect. Since I didn’t have a lattice oval, I actually just cut the inside oval from a piece of Neenah Cream cardstock. Then I positioned the die cut oval under the largest lattice heart die and ran that through my Big Shot. This ended up giving me the effect I was going for. Neenah Cream is again a harder to find cardstock – I almost always use Papertrey Ink in Vintage Cream now since I can buy it in bulk and it lasts for ages.
I used Tonic Studios Gold Mirror card for one of the 5″x7″ matting layers, the main Majestic Oval shape, and the ‘for you’ sentiment (die from Lawn Fawn). The card base and the middle mat are from Neenah Cream. The top fuchsia mat is Tonic Studios mirror card in Electric Purple. When I put the mats on the card base, I used foam tape under the gold and fuchsia mats to give the card even more dimension. I generally get my foam tape from Amazon in bulk and haven’t had any issues with the off brand ones.
Inside the gold majestic oval, I placed the cream lattice oval and layered a vellum oval over top. Then I glued the gold ‘for you’ in the middle. Since I used a 5″x7″ card, the majestic oval element didn’t quite fill out the whole card front.
For visual balance, I layered a piece of Offray 1 1/2″ Double-Face Satin Ribbon in Wine underneath a strip of lace ribbon from the Spellbinders A Gilded Life collection. Finally, I used an assortment of Prima flowers plus Ranger Liquid Pearls in Ivory to embellish the main element. On the Darice hat pin embellishment, I sorted through my bead stash and layered a variety of beads on that matched the overall color scheme.
Remaining Cards
The cream and navy/gold card ended up similar to the original inspiration cards – so I recommend checking out the original designer’s blog posts/videos (linked above). For the aqua/gold card, I mainly used CardMakingMagic’s Hexagon Nesting die set and just made many layers. This is a design I’ve since used on a few other cards as it is quick to put together but looks like more effort was needed.
