Card making is becoming more and more popular among crafters and non-crafters alike. The reason for this is that it is easy, affordable and anyone of any age can create a handmade card. I have included a list of items that you will need to get started a little further down and with those you can produce a beautiful handmade card, using items that you will find around the house all you will have to purchase is a sheet of good cardstock or cardboard.
Often folk are faced with the only option being a store bought card and with the choices that are available on the shelves, it is not surprising why so many people are making their own cards, in my personal experience I often find a card with a beautiful picture on the cover and have to settle for the impersonal wording hidden inside, or on the rare occasion I find one that has the perfect message inside and then a tacky picture on the front. It is almost impossible to find a greeting card that, with it send the true feelings of the sender.
A handmade greeting card on the other hand sends a very clear message "you are special and worth all the effort that was put into this card" it says that you were prepared to put in a little more thought and time into this persons handmade card than popping off to the shop and grabbing the "best" one off the rack. People can't throw a handmade card away and if they do you know for next time that they get a card from a pack you bought at a white elephant stall 10 years ago. No one I know ever has the heart or wants to for that matter toss a handmade card. They tend to treasure them for years and I have seen many a handmade carddisplayed in a frame proudly in the recipients home.
I have been making cards for over 20 years now, my non-school made card was for my mother who's birthday is on the 10th of May, and that particular year fell on mothers day. At that time in my life I earned a whopping R2.00 pocket money a week and had to save for months to afford a present and a card for my precious mom. She is worth every cent, however this year I had to buy two cards for her n the same day and hopefully squeeze a gift into my already WAY over budgeted plan. At 8 I impressed myself with my utter genius, in asking the lady behind the counter at the local stationary shop for a card with flowers on, that says Happy Birthday and Happy Mothers day on the same card. To this day I will never forget the look on her face she must have thought what a moron you don't give birthday cards to your mother on mothers day and snapped "you have to buy to cards".
I went home really sad, and sat in my room for a while before the lightbulb ignited above my little head. I will make a card and that way I can write what ever I like on it! I raided my moms scrap paper (the olden day term for ofcuts of card and paper:)) And found a huge piece and decorated to my hearts content, and that was the last time I bought a card for my mom.
After "mastering" the card making thing and offering workshops on cardmaking which my mom attends, she has learned all the different techniques and I am now faced with the challenge on mothersday, her birthday and Christmas, of coming up with something she can't do. This has led to lots of experimenting and even more imagination on my part. I enjoy it more on every occasion my mom celebrates.
Everyone has there favourite - favourites when it comes to card making, my absolute fav is embellishments, I can proudly say I have an embellishment addiction. I collect them, I use them, I share them, I play with them, I sell them and I love them, of all the different cards I could make I don't think any have gone unembellished. I have many techniques that I love stamping and embossing, serviettes, handmade paper and painting but ontop of all these techniques lies a little embellishment. I have a couple of my absolute favourite stamps by best is the pear from Best Rubber Stamps, it has millions of uses and can be used to achieve many different effects.
Peel offs are another real treat for crafters who make there own cards, they are easy to use, re-postionable, come in fantastic words and phrases and have the most beautiful colours. They are perfect, if like me you struggle to write all your letters perfectly. They are also great if you want a metallic font which cant be acheived on a printer, or neatly with a two way glue pen. Peel offs are a really handy product I definatly include in my cardmaking box.
The list of tools you require as a card maker is endless and evergrowing, there are new products on the market on an almost daily basis. And yes they are always cuter than what you have in your collection. It starts off with a cute handy little craft box, then very soon progresses to a set of drawers, then a cupboard then a room and then your whole house, and in mycase then a shop. You only need a couple of absolute essentials to get started but as time goes on you will wonder how you ever got by with so few cardmaking or crafting tools.
If you are wise you will try to add craft tools and craft products to your collection that can be used in many different crafts, all the craft goodies you use for card making can be used in scrapbooking and visa versa. I use alot of decoupage stuff in my card making and love sticking embellishments on my decoupage items.
#6aa0f2There are a couple of things I will list here that you NEED if you are going to make more than one card, I have found that I cannot do without them -
They are;
This is a very valuable piece of craft equipment that i could never do without, I cut, make cards, do scrapbooking, stamp and emboss, fold, score and everything "clean" on the graphed side. And all the messy stuff like painting, glueing and modge podgeing on the back. I started off with an A4 mat and have recently bought an A2 mat it is WONDERFUL as it cover my entire work area and is a protective cover for my whole desk / counter / workspace. I recomend that to start off you don't go smaller than A4, even though there are A5 mats on the market. Don't get me wrong i would NEVER part with my A5 mat as this is where I hammer in eyelets and eyelet holes.
My metal ruler is a tool I could not do without, I had to learn the hard way, years ago when I first started I used a plastic ruler and after a while noticed that my cards were getting more and more wavey and could not understand why. I would hold the ruler tighter and harder and cut slower with no luck they gained a more curvy edge as I went along. I finally relaized that i was acctually cutting the smallest slices of plastic off the ruler everytinme I cut. And this was lending to the odd curves my cards had. I invested in a metal ruler and havn't looked back - straight cards all the way.
A sharp craft knife is invaluable, you cannot hope to acheive a straight clean cut if your knife is blunt, and because you are cutting paper and cardboard you can expect it to get blunt quicker. My personal favourite cutting tool is a plastic craft knife. The craft knife should have a good grip and preferably be the type where the blade is made up with separate little blades that you can snap off, you will find that you will be doing this often when cutting paper and cardboard.
Cardboard is the most important part to making a handmade card, you have to make sure that your cardboard is of a really good quality and that it will be strong enough to support all you plan to do on the front of the card. If you are just stamping and embossing you don't need card that is as strong as it should be if you are sticking on embellishments, and additional layers of paper. I recomend that no matter how you plan on making your card, that you don't use any cardboard less than 160gms, this will be strong enough to start with. As you make more cards you will get the feel for which cardboard you prefer for different projects. Cardboard is available up to about 800gsm but it would probably be a good idea not to go over about 300gsm. When buying cardboard for your handmade cards look out for card wit ha good texture and possible a little off white. Save the pure white card for weddings and Christenings. You can change the colour of the front of your card by adding assorted coloured mulberry paper, serviettes and interested sheets of normal paper.
This is my favourite part of cardmaking as I mentioned above. I love embellishments so much I have hundreds in my collection and in my opinion they are what makes the card! They make your handmade cards different to the boring 2D ones you find in the chain stores, they make them unique abd with the huge amount of embellishments on the market you can personalize each card specifically for the lucky person who will be receiving your special card. In my shop alone we have over 600 different embellishments that range from babies bottles to soccer balls - lions heads to fairies and everything in between.
Here is the part where i throw in a little advertising for my shop! I have been to many different crafts shops, craft shows and craft websites and I can safely say that i have yet to come across a shop that sells as many different embellishments as we do. With over 600, and new ones being added on a weekly basis it just keeps growing. We have buttons and flowers and little creatures and really anything else you may be looking for. You can use our embellishments in many other crafts such as scrapbooking, decoupage and general crafts and the best news of all is, THEY ARE CHEAP!!! From 10c an item you can stay far within your budget and still acheive the perfect look. Visit ourstunning online craft shop on our websiteor be the first to see the new goodies at ourlovely little craft shop
You can send any cardmaking queries to cardmaking@craftynook.co.za we would love to hear from you!!
