Danny's Cards Blog

Halloween is approaching (as is my Blooming Hill Farm card show), so cards are in abundance. At this point, I'm not even sure what to make. I have cards for nearly every occasion, so you might see me making stranger things than usual. If I've learned anything from card shows, it's never one particular thing that becomes a best seller, it's a wide variety. The more different items--the better. So what's better than a whole bunch of unusual looking cards. Over on the Sweet Stampin' Challenge Blog , they had one idea in mind: "The Colours of Autumn." That couldn't have been any easier to work with. Here are a few autumn flavored Halloween cards I made yesterday: I learned this technique of card from Jackie Bolhuis. You can watch the full video tutorial on her YouTube .  Here is a full Halloween card that I'm not submitting to any place in particular: If you don't know what these card looks like when they're opening, take a look at my video...

There are few cards I love making more than Washi cards. One: ease of making. Washi cards are so easy to make. Even when you do the most intricate of designs, Washi cards are easy to make and a card can be done in as little as 10 minutes. Second: they always look unique. There's so many ways to approach Washi cards. You can alternate strips, use all different kinds, layer and crisscross etc. And if you're like me, you have more Washi tape than you know what to do with. This week I used Washi tape for two different challenges. Let's take a look. Over on Scrapping4Fun Challenges , they had a simple task: Gladly! This is a simple design with an assortment of different brands of Washi tape. For my second challenge, I was inspired by Just Us Girls Challenge blog. The task was wholly unique as they celebrate their 600th challenge! I used the same ideas as the card above but embellished it with 6 pumpkin stickers. What you can't see here is the way these pumpkin stickers come...

I'm working on a whole slew of Halloween and Fall cards as my card show is around the corner (September 26th). I've never done a card show during the Halloween and Fall season so it will be interesting to see how it plays out. Anyway, I was in need of inspiration and Color My Heart Color Dare Challenge Blog had the perfect colors to get me going. The colors to work with were white, black and gold. Perfect! I recently acquired my Anna Griffin Scaredy Cat dies . Currently, they're only available on HSN, but I will also note to other Griffinites looking for that Halloween spirit that she dropped her Halloween Cut and Emboss Folders on her website just this week. Anyway, on with the show. The card I'm submitting I'm super proud of--let's take a look: I used a black and white feathered background to give a spooky appeal. Then I used an assortment of different black white and golds for the desired effect. The gold is extremely reflective so you can see my shadow of ...

What I love about the Joy of Sets blog is that there Tic Tac Toe challenges are just that, a challenge. While other card making blogs give variations on the same color, emboss, and ribbon styles, Joy of Sets often offers unique counterpoints that make card creating tricky in its own right. Take a look at October's challenge: Unique ideas like silhouette, checks, script, torn and stitches means you can't rely on the conventional. I won't lie, I'm waiting for my new card die set to come so I can make my across the bottom: Ribbon, Window and Glitter.  As it stood, I was a bit perplexed, and I decided that my Cricut Joy might actually be the way to go for this. While originally I felt more tepid towards my Cricut Joy, in recent months, I pull it out when I need a card quickly. I knew the diagonal black, silhouette and glitter would be the perfect way to go. So here were the results: I wish you could actually see the card in motion, as the glitter cardstock captures ever...

At DannysCards.com, we're in the midst of Halloween extravaganza. Over on The Color Throwdown blog , the challenge was focused around the perfect set of fall colors. Here were the colors for their newest challenge: Immediately, I knew I was going to pull out my brand new bat and pumpkin dies. The results were a bit mixed, but the bat card came out better than expected. Here were the results: By embossing the background and using 3D dot adhesives, the card ended up with more dimension than I expected. Here's the card from a different angle: The Halloween Bats Metal Dies  are available from Michaels.com. My original plan for this challenge was this pumpkin concoction. The results were solid, but it lacked the depth of the bat card. I would describe it as ho-hum. I'm going to have find a different way to utilize these pumpkins. I tried to off-set the pumpkins to give it another layer. Here you can see the 3D dot adhesives working overtime: These pumpkin dies are also availabl...

Halloween inspiration continues this week. I've been waiting for a more open challenge to finally pull out my Anna Griffin Haunted House Easel Card Die . Knowing how time consuming these types of dies are, I needed a challenge with plenty of flexibility. Thankfully, I found one from the Hand Stamped Sentiments blog. This week, the blog featured this inspiration photo: In the bottom right corner stood the Haunted House. Needless to say, I knew what I was doing with my Monday. As usual, these types of dies are time consuming, not because of the initial cut, but all the little intricate pieces, of which you only get a few dies to help cut. I spent most of the time recutting shutters. Is the die worth it? Only for those really special people in your life. Nevertheless, here are the results: I am always making in two, but I wasn't sure what color combinations would stand out. While the black house with white shutters looks sleek, I'm super fond of the purple house with orange s...

Here at DannysCards.com, we love a good Tic Tac Toe board to get our thinking going (see our first set of Halloween cards ). Sure enough, another Tic Tac Toe board served up inspiration this week from the blog Joy of Sets . This one proved a bit more challenging.  I recently acquired Anna Griffin's Easy Easel Cut Dies (see my previous Halloween Easel card ) and was excited to use them again.  For the Tic Tac Toe challenge, I was a bit stumped on where to go. I opted for center across: Black, Science and Blending. I knew exactly what to do for Black and Science. Blending is trickier. Since I personally don't blend ala some famous crafters like Tim Holtz, I used blending in a couple different ways. One was in my firm card stock, while the other was blending with my Copic markers for my die cuts and stamps.  This was the end result: The totally creepy card was exactly the vibe I was going for. The stamps came from Michael's 2020 Halloween collection. The From Regions Beyond...

This week's challenge came courtesy of Color My Heart which showcased a Color Dare challenge. The task involving using only three colors. Let's just say, there was a certain fall theme, perfect for continuing my Halloween inspired cards. So let's take a look at the colors: I immediately went for the Black, French Vanilla and Nectarine colors. It's just the match for the spooky vibe I was hoping for. Using my new Easy Easel Cut and Emboss dies from Anna Griffin, I got to work. Here were the results: I ran both the black and nectarine paper through different emboss folders. Because of the size of the black card stock (5" x 7") I had to double press the paper. To make sure it didn't feel flimsy, I double backed the paper with nectarine to give it a strong feel.  I stamped and cut the different Halloween stamps and colored them with my copic markers. Using a light shade of grey on the mummy gave him a little extra dimension. Then I used 3D adhesive dots to g...

Here on DannysCards.com, it's been a minute since I've worked on cards. That's for an assortment of reasons (mostly because I'm a teacher and school is my new top priority). But I also lost a bit of my inspiration, giving some way to other hobbies. But thankfully, with fall around the season and the holidays gearing up, there's no shortage of inspiration around here.  This week's cards come courtesy of International Art and Soul blog  and one of my favorite types of challenges, the Tic Tac Toe board . Let's take a look at the board: For my first card, I went across the top, focusing on a bow, red and embossing. The red and embossing was easy, but for the bow, I went with twine on the side. I used a general stamping technique and here's the results: The blood emboss folder is a creepy one with blood oozing down. I stamped the image several times and used 3D adhesive dots to give a white cut out a little pop. I colored it in with my copic markers, and voil...