embossed shape outlines on the cheap

Last week on the Gingerwood stamping forum we were talking about do-it-yourself embossing folders. Folks with Cricuts were improvising and embossing shapes similar to the Spellbinders Nestabilities shapes. The only drawback was that they said that they couldn't emboss the border of a die cut the way that you can with a Nesties die cut. I got to thinking about this, and I thought, well, why not? They can cut out frames--a 1/4" wide frame could give the same effect as a die cut with an embossed border. Now, someone may have done this already with their Cricut. I don't have one, so I don't follow those blogs or forums, but I thought that those of us who don't have an electronic die cutter for whatever reason shouldn't be left out. LOL!

I've made DIY embossing folders before. This time I wanted to see if I could emboss the outline of a shape--something similar to an embossed Nestabilities die cut look. I was gonna do it on the cheap, too. No Cricut. Hm, but how....

I knew that I'd make it out of chipboard. I needed a way to make an open frame in some kind of shape. I don't have one of those nifty tracing tools that will trace a design in a smaller or larger size. Wouldn't that have been cool! But hey, I thought of something that might work! So simple, too.


This is an octagon that I printed out on computer paper. Spellbinders will be offering an octagonal set of Nestabilities dies soon, but they aren't available yet for most of us.


I cut out my octagon.


This is my cut out shape laid on top of chipboard which I'd received courtesy of the USPS with a stamp order. Love to recycle!


I cut out shape from the chipboard.


Here is my makeshift tracer! Yep, two colored pencils held together by a rubber band. Woo! High tech stuff! You don't see this just anywhere! ;-)


Time to trace the inside border of my frame. One pencil rests on the chipboard, and the other one rides along the outside edge of the shape. I have that piece of scrap paper underneath so that I don't trace an octagon on my table.


Pull the pencils along one edge, like so. Then do the same for the other edges.


Here is my shape with all of the edges traced.


Now it's time to cut along the marks with my ruler and craft knife.


When I was finished it looked like this. Gee, aren't you glad that I'm not into making videos? No need to watch some of the more tedious parts of the procedure. LOL! But more seriously, that's why I use photos. It's like those cooking shows where they put a cake in the oven, then turn around and pull out the one that's all baked and ready for the next step. Some videos drive me nuts when they take almost 10 minutes to describe what they're doing and there's no good way to skip ahead. ARGH! But I digress.... :-)


This is my cut out shape (frame) which is on top of my multipurpose platform open to Tab 1, black silicone embossing pad, and card front. I placed my clear cutting plate and the backing from a Cuttlebug folder package as a shim on top of all of that, then ran the stack through. If you have an impressions pad, you probably could use that instead of the clear plate and shim.


This is the embossed border on the card front. It's not as crisp as what you'd get with Nesties, but it's not bad for a different, softer look. It's definitely not bad when you consider my materials, i.e. recycled chipboard, two pencils, a rubberband, a craft knife, a cutting mat, and a ruler. I think it took me longer to write up this blog post than to make it, too. :-)


And here is that border used as an accent on a card. The stamp is from My Favorite Things and stamped and colored using Memento dye inks and markers. I embellished the flowers with a bit of Flower Soft to add dimension.

stair step card

Okay, this is one of those card-making techniques that I'm late getting in on. It's a fun alternative to the regular A2 cards that I often make, and they fit inside the A2 size envelopes, so no extra fuss as far as that goes.

This is my first attempt at making one....


My apologies for the poor quality of the lighting. It was a gray day here, and even darker than usual because the ice and sleet were blocking my skylights.

I used the stair step base and added decorative wintry cardstock. The leaping deer was made using a Sizzix die. The snowflakes were made using Martha Stewart punches. The embossed dove is a Cuttlebug combo die. The label die cut and scalloped rectangle were made using Spellbinders dies. The Merry Christmas sentiment is by Cloud 9 Design. The remaining stamped images and sentiments are all by My Favorite Things and were stamped using Memento dye inks. The embellishments are Prima flowers, Flower Soft for the bath rug underneath the tub, clear Sakura Glaze pen for the bubbles and glass, Copic clear glitter pen for the mirror, and assorted sizes and colors of hot fix rhinestones.

The card looks rather busy in the photograph. It isn't so busy in real life where you get a better feel for the 3D effect and depth of the images.

This is a fun change from the usual and I'm looking forward to trying my hand at more of these.

many thanks

I've been remiss and have a couple of things that I need to give thanks for. So, first off, here's a card that fits the occasion.


The birds are by Stampendous. The greenery and the sentiment are by Verve. All were stamped using Memento dye inks. The flowers are just clear glue applied randomly with Flower Soft sprinkled on top. The embossing was made using a picket fence wood die cut and my Big Shot.

My apologies to the award-givers. I really appreciate the awards and I'd been hoping to find some time to link a number of blogs. Time keeps getting away from me though, and yesterday a Jeep Wrangler tangled with the back end of my minivan at a four-way stop. Probably wouldn't have been so bad if the jeep hadn't had the big winch on the front of it. ARGH! So now I'm dealing with insurance and repair estimates etc. Such fun. 'Nuff said about that though. I didn't want to let any more time go by without at least acknowledging the awards and the award givers.


This is the third time I've received this award. This time it comes from Heather G. Thank you so much, Heather!


This second one is from Lori, and isn't it a cute one! Thanks, Lori!

I appreciate the awards. Sometimes I still can't get over the idea that there are people who actually come by here regularly, so to be given awards on top of receiving comments or seeing the counter tick off visits is really kind of a thrill. Makes my day brighter. :-) Thanks again!

Now, back to making those phone calls....

using lots of my faves

Between the celebrating and the playing around with my Big Shot and Cuttlebug, I haven't posted any cards lately! Here's one that I've been working on intermittently.


The card is made from Core'dinations cardstock that I hadn't realized until very recently is now available at Hobby Lobby! Thankfully I had a 40% off coupon and got a nice big package of it. I creatively Cuttled with the Cuttlebug Floral Screen A2 embossing folder, then sanded the embossing to reveal the lighter color. I embossed around the unembossed area of the card front with a rectangle Nestabilities die, then stamped the Verve image and sentiment on white cardstock that I'd cut and embossed using the crease pad and a single pass through the Big Shot. I used Memento ink for the stamping.


This is a close up view of the flowers. I'd made these using floral wire, clear liquid glue and three colors of Flower Soft. It wasn't until I thought about my materials "list" that I realized how many of my current favorite things I'd used in making this card. Fun! :-)

two more flower soft cards

I just love using Flower Soft. It's so fun! Here are a couple more cards where I've embellished with it.


This first card was embossed with the new Floral Screen Cuttlebug A2 embossing folder. And hooray! I got it right the first time and embossed rather than debossed the card front.


For this card I partially Cuttled using the Tiny Bubbles Cuttlebug folder and then added the score lines with my Scor-It. Those are Robin's Nest dew drops embellishing that card.

All of the stamp images are by My Favorite Things, stamped using Memento ink, and colored with Prismacolor colored pencils then blended with the Goo Gone Mess-free pen. I used scalloped Nestabilities dies by Spellbinders to cut out the layers for the images, and by the way I did use the Sizzix crease pad again and it really does make using these dies more efficient if you plan to emboss after cutting.

flower-soft lilacs

Life has been busy because school starts back up here in another week. I had a fun package arrive in the mail today though, and I just had to put some of the contents to use.


This is a card that I creatively Cuttled using the new A2 Floral Screen Cuttlebug embossing folder. I did this in order to leave that unembossed area for my new lilac stamp from Flourishes. I stamped the image using Memento dye ink, then colored with Prismacolor colored pencils and blended with the Goo Gone Mess-free pen. But here's the really fun part! I then applied some glue to the lilacs and pressed Flower Soft into the glue. They're acid-free sprinkles that add really neat color and texture. Using it is much like using flock. The colors and color combinations are wonderful!


This is a close-up of the flower soft sprinkles. The sentiment is also by Flourishes, by the way. I can't wait to try using these Flower Soft sprinkles on some other projects!