Hi everyone! Happy 4th of July to all who celebrate 🙂 It’s Bonnie here today. This past Saturday was also Canada Day where I live and my husband’s b-day so there’s been a lot to celebrate. Since that’s often the case, I decided to add to my cache of cards because I love to have some ready to go. Today I created cards using Dylusions Creative Dyary Die Cuts. They are so funky and fun and just scream for bright colours…can’t resist that.

I had a play with my 5 x 7 inch gel plate and a combination of Dylusions and Dina Wakley Paints. One of the backgrounds I created used Dylusions Squeezed Orange and Dina Wakley Magenta paint which were rolled together on the gel plate. TCW Mayan Calendar Stencil was placed over the top of the pink and orange paint and a print was pulled onto white cardstock. The second print taken once the stencil was removed is the one I used for one of the cards.

The second card background used the sheet of white cardstock where I cleaned off the orange and pink paint which was on my brayer. I then added Liquitex Black Paint through Joggles Mini Bubble Blast Itty Bitty ATC Stencil. The Ranger Texture Paste was scraped through TCW Mini Tile Mania Stencil and allowed to dry thoroughly.

Each gel print was cut to 4.5 x just under 6 inches and inked with Jet Black Archival Ink using a Mini Ink Blending Tool. I love re-purposing packaging from supplies and Carabelle Studio has this wonderful black with white checks background behind their stencils. I have saved every piece of it and decided that torn strips were just the thing to provide contrast to these colourful backgrounds. They were adhered with Scor Tape to give the die cuts a place to rest.

Two of the 12 die cut designs were chosen to star on the cards. They were coloured with a mix of coloured pencils including Derwent Coloursoft and accented with a white Sharpie water based paint pen. Black Faber Castell Pitt Pens in various sizes were used to darken some of the black areas where the coloured pencils had dulled them. The finished die cuts were then matted with black cardstock and fussy cut leaving a narrow black border. This helped them stand out against the coloured backgrounds better.

The sentiments for the outside and the inside of each card was printed on white cardstock. The outside sayings were cut into individual words, matted with black, and popped up on foam squares. A small die cut black arrow was added to the one above to balance the design.

Here is the inside of that same card. I often use scraps from the front design to makes a little collage in the inside. I find that it adds cohesiveness, uses them up, and makes for a quick and easy inside. The sentiment here was cut into segments and adhered flat to the grouping using Scor Tape. Black Pitt Pen was used to create the faux stitching and finish the inside.

The second card was done in the same way. The addition of two black punched corners were the details needed to balance the design.

And here is the inside of the second card with scraps from the front background forming the inside collage. Easy peasy!

Thanks for joining me today. On another day, I will feature more of these fabulous Dylusions Creative Dyary die cuts, only this time on a journal page or accordion book. They are both fun and versatile 🙂