Birch Press Design

Category: Amanda Wilcox

  • Mosaic Watercolor | By Amanda Wilcox

    Mosaic Watercolor | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hey everyone! I’m so glad you’re here with me. It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook with a pair of beautiful watercolor slimline cards to share.

    These cards were complete created using just the Crystal Lingo stamps and dies. It was so therapeutic and relaxing to watercolor this beautiful image! Let’s get started on how I created them.

    I started by stamping and heat embossing the mosaic image on watercolor paper with clear embossing powder. You could use any color you like here for dramatically different results. The sheet I was using happened to fit the image twice perfectly so I thought, why not!?!

    I used my Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers and a waterbrush pen to color the entire panel and trimmed it down to 3×8.

    For my supporting panels, I have a black one measuring 3.25×8.25 inches, teal that measures 3.5×8.5 inches and a slimline card base from white that is 7×8.5 inches. Folding it in half at 3.5 inches makes it the same size as the teal panel.

    The black is adhered to the watercolor panel with liquid glue, as is the teal panel to the card base. Then the two are adhered together with foam tape.

    As you can see in the photo, I stamped and heat embossed my sentiments. Hello is silver on white cardstock while the secondary sentiment is white on black cardstock. For the other card, Happy is heat embossed black on white and vice versa for the secondary sentiment there too. I love this contrast!

    The sentiments are added with a combination of foam squares and strips.

    I didn’t want any distraction from the beautiful watercoloring so I didn’t add any baubles or sequins to these cards today.

    I just love how they turned out and would be really excited to give it a try again, maybe in an A2 size and totally different color combos too!

    Do you have a favorite between the two? I don’t think I can choose one.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    8155 Crystal Lingo clear stamp and die set

  • Easter Egg Hugs | By Amanda Wilcox

    Easter Egg Hugs | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone! It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook today and I have a trio of cards to share featuring the petal egg layering set and a few different backgrounds to pair it with.

    To start off today’s cards, I just pulled out a variety of cardstock colors – glitter and not – and started cutting the layers of the petal egg. It was so fun to mix and match, and just play, with all of them once they were cut out.

    After I decided on the layers that I wanted to use together, I ended up with three complete eggs and thought it would be fun to make three cards to share with you today.

    For my backgrounds, I used layer A and C of the Field of Blooms set. Then for my third card I pulled out the Memory Box spring plaid paper pad and chose one of the beautifully foiled pieces to use.

    I used liquid glue to adhere all of my egg layers together and decided I wanted the backs to be solid so the background panels didn’t show through. Since there isn’t a solid egg shape I traced one of the dies three times and cut inside the tracing line and glued it to the back of my layers. If anything hung over, I just used my scissors to trim off the excess. Super easy and forgiving if you don’t fussy cut well.

    I used liquid glue to adhere the Field of Blooms backgrounds to white card bases and then used foam tape to add the plaid paper, which I had trimmed down to 4×5.25 inches. Then for my sentiment, I went with the hugs honey script dies. I cut the shadow from vellum and then the words from the same paper as the bottom layer of the egg it was coordinating with.

    I adhered the sentiments with liquid glue and the popped the eggs up on each background with foam tape. For finishing touches I added baubles to each one. This first one has gold to play off the gold foiling in the patterned paper.

    Then I used silver baubles for this one because I thought the bright colors worked well with the bright silver.

    And for this final card, I chose pearls because it’s got a bit softer colors and I just loved how they worked with the pink glitter paper on the top layer of the egg.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    57369 Petal Egg Layer Set

    57300 Hugs Honey Script

    57357 Field of Blooms Plate Layer Set

    PP1012 Spring Plaid 6×6 pack

    GP1001 Delicate Pastel Glitter Pad

    SP1008 Twilight Purple 6×6 pack

    SP1005 Ocean Blue 6×6 pack

    SP1002 Sunny Orange 6×6 pack

    SP1003 Lush Green 6×6 pack

  • Enchantment meets Crystal Lingo | By Amanda Wilcox

    Enchantment meets Crystal Lingo | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone! It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook today with another pair of cards to share. I seem to have a hard time either making choices or letting die cuts go to waste so I rarely make just one card anymore.

    This all started with my wanting to play with the Enchantment layering dies and create the card on the left. But I couldn’t let that ring go to waste so I die cut the middle portion a second time and created the card you see on the right. I made them simultaneously so forgive me if my tutorial today flips back and forth.

    I started by die cutting all the pieces from the three Enchantment layers once and the center portion a second time. My bottom layer is Thermoweb Deco Foil Flock, the middle layer is a textured cardstock and the top is a smooth cardstock. These three together look so cool in person! Definitely worth it!

    Once these were cut, I used liquid glue to adhere all the layers together and started playing with backgrounds.

    I ended up doing some ink smooshing with my Tombow markers for the first card. I always lay down one layer of ink, dry it with my heat gun and keep layering until I like it. Then I set it aside to dry.

    While that was drying I blended tattered rose and dried marigold distress oxide inks on a panel. Then I spritzed it with water and flicked pearl watercolor on it. Once that was dry I trimmed it down to 4×5.25 inches and lined the back with foam tape to adhere to a white card base.

    After adhering my backgrounds to card bases, I stamped and heat embossed sentiments from Crystal Lingo and used the coordinating dies to cut them out. Then I trimmed the smaller ones into strips.

    Assembly was simple using liquid glue for the layerd die cuts and a combination of foam squares and liquid glue for the sentiments.

    I did the same thing for both cards and then finished them both off with some pearl baubles for a little extra shine and interest.

    I hope you found some inspiration to create something wonderful today.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    56113 Enchantment Plate Layer Set

    8155 Crystal Lingo clear stamp and die set

  • Linear Triangle Duo | By Amanda Wilcox

    Linear Triangle Duo | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hi again! It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook today featuring a couple of new products available in the shop. I was very interested in this new linear triangle die so I cut a couple out and started playing around, which is how I figured out today’s fun design. I hope you like it.

    I started by blending distress oxide inks in aged mahogany, fired brick and tattered rose on 4×25.5.5 inch panels.

    Then I die cut the linear triangle from 2 shades of teal cardstock – twice each so I could make both cards at the same time.

    I spritzed the inked panels with water, glued down the linear triangles with liquid glue and splattered them both with gold watercolor.

    While the watercolor was drying, I stamped sentiments from the new Crystal Lingo set and heat embossed them. The big words are in gold on white paper and the smaller sentiments are in white on black paper. I die cut the large words, cut strips from the small ones and lined the backs with foam squares.

    Last, I just removed the release paper and attached my sentiments to the card fronts. Here is the portrait version.

    And my favorite part about this design is the linear triangle die is how well it works both ways. Here is a landscape one so you can see how the panels fit the card fronts.

    Such a fun combo to make. Also, very easy to swap out sentiments and colors for different occasions and needs. I love cards like that. Don’t you?

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    57393 Linear Triangle

    8155 Crystal Lingo clear stamp and die set

  • Sending Love Die Embossing | By Amanda Wilcox

    Sending Love Die Embossing | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone. It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook joining you for a new-to-me technique I wanted to share – embossing with dies. Such a simple idea but so cool and adds so much extra life to products you already have.

    I started today’s card by mixing some Ranger Alcohol Pearl Inks around on a piece of Yupo paper. I’m still very much into Valentine themed projects so I chose enchanted and villainous for my colors.

    Once those were completely dry, I ran the sheet through my die cutter with the embossing sandwich and the Kinsley Heart Plate Layer A. It turned out beautiful! Then I decided to trim it down to 5 3/8 x 4 1/8. This gives just a little border when attached to the card front.

    Moving on, I die cut all 3 layers of the Kinsley Heart from white cardstock and adhered them together with liquid glue and added foam squares to the back.

    For my sentiments, I chose the Big Sending Sugar Script dies. The shadow is cut from vellum while the word is cut from purple once and black 3 times and adhered together with liquid glue.

    The second half of my sentiment didn’t go as smoothly. I stamped the word LOVE with the Mod Alphabet and used the coordinating dies to cut them out. Then I cut 3 more layers from black and the shadow from vellum. All the layers were adhered together and I started assembling my card. First, the shadow was lost because of the background so I added the purple from “sending” to the back of the vellum shadow and I liked that. Then, once everything was adhered together I didn’t like the black stamp lines so I cut the letters from white one more time and glued them over the top.

    This is a fabulous example of being flexible during a card design and listening to yourself when you don’t like something. Sometimes it’s best to walk away and come back later too. It’s amazing what you see or think of later on.

    Because I used alcohol pearl inks, the whole background is shimmery so I just added a little Wink of Stella glitter brush pen to the word “love” and let my card be finished.

    I do love how it turned out in the end. I hope you’ve found some inspiration to create something wonderful today.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    8139 Mod Alphabet clear stamp and die set

    Big Sending Sugar Script

  • Hugs and Hearts | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hugs and Hearts | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hi everyone! It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook joining you for the first time this year! Happy New Year and I hope 2021 is starting off well for you all. I pretty much dove in head first to love and heart themed cards since the new year and I’m loving it all! I have a pair of slimline cards to share with you today and I hope you enjoy them.

    When I can’t make decisions in the craft room, it either leads to making multiple cards or creating a rainbow of something. Today, it led to two cards which were really fun to create! I started by choosing colors and die cutting my hearts.

    Then I moved on to backgrounds. I settled on making an inky mess with the ink smooshing technique using my Tombow Dual Brush markers. I colored on my acrylic block, spritzed with water and smooshed it on my paper. When I do this, I use a heat gun to dry each layer so they don’t blend together.

    After these were done I used liquid glue to adhere them to card bases and also glued my hearts together at the same time. I put acrylic blocks on top of everything while it dried to help it flatten out.

    For my sentiment, I kept it simple using the hugs honey script dies. I love this font and it fits just perfectly across these hearts!

    I cut the shadows once and the words 4 times each and used liquid glue to adhere them all together. After they were glued to the middle heart I moved on to finishing touches.

    I used Nuvo Crystal Drops in a coordinating color for each card. On this one, I just used a like teal scattered across the background of my card.

    For the purple one, I decided to also add them to a few select spots on the hearts as well. This was totally new to me and I like how it turned out. Just a little extra interest.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    57399 Kinsley Heart Layer Set

    57396 Petal Heart Layer Set

    57300 Hugs Honey Script

  • Sending Winter Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Sending Winter Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone. This is Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook today getting a jump on winter thank you cards that I’ll be sending out after Christmas.

    For these cards, I die cut the layers for the Floral Star from two different blue cardstocks and then the bottom layer from white and silver glitter cardstock. I was playing around with different looks and wanted to see which I liked better.

    I used liquid glue to adhere the layers and put clear blocks on top to help them dry flat.

    Next, I die cut the Radial Pinpoint Plate from a light gray and white cardstocks and adhered them to white card bases.

    I knew I wanted these to be thank you cards so I pulled out the Big Sending Sugar Script word dies out and cut the shadow from vellum and white, and the word from white and the darker blue cardstock.

    I really like the look of the stacked word dies for that dimension and visual interest so I cut each word 3 times and glued them together. Once those were dry, I moved on to assembling my cards.

    I used liquid glue to adhere the floral star, then a combo of liquid glue and foam squares for the sentiments.

    For finishing touches, I added some white pearls to the gray card and clear gems to the other.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day.

    Supplies

    57384 Pinpoint Radial Plate

    Big Sending Sugar Script

    56118 Floral Star Layer Set

  • Merry Christmas Poinsettia | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone, it’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook joining you today for another idea to stretch the dies you may already have. I’m taking the Dahlia Mini Frame and choosing colors to make it look more like a poinsettia for Christmas.

    Isn’t the red and gold glitter a perfect combo to make this dahlia look enough like a poinsettia to use for Christmas? I think so. Here’s how I did it.

    I cut all 3 layers from white cardstock, then the bottom later flower from red glitter and the center from gold glitter cardstocks.

    I knew I didn’t want a white base for the Dahlia Mini Frame to be on so I pulled out my alcohol pearl ink in celestial and created a mini background.

    I glued the base layer to the alcohol ink background and treated it like a puzzle to insert all of the glitter flower pieces, adhering them with liquid glue. Then I also glued down the top two layers of the Dahlia Mini Frame.

    At this point I also cut a white card base and another white panel measuring 4×5.25. I used my scoring board to create some embossed lines in the extra panel 1/4 inch from each side. I added foam tape to this panel and popped in on the card base.

    I went with a sentiment banner from the Christmas Ornament and Banners stamp and die set. It is heat embossed in white on vellum and die cut with the coordinating banner die.

    I tied twine around my Dahlia Mini Frame and added foam tape to the back. I popped it in place on the card front and used liquid glue to adhere my sentiment banner.

    I don’t typically add blue to Christmas cards, usually just reserve it for more winter themed ones, but I love the contrast between the bright red and gold against the blue.

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    56092 Dahlia Mini Frame Layer Set

    8154 Christmas Ornament and Labels clear stamp and die set

  • Give Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Give Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello friends. It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook today and I wanted to pop in to share one more Thanksgiving themed card while there’s still time.

    To create this card, I started by stamping and coloring the images from Pumpkin Lacework with my copic markers. Then I used the coordinating dies to cut them all out.

    Next, I cut down a white cardstock panel to 4.25×5.5 and inked it up with distress oxide inks in peacock feathers, evergreen bough and pine needles. This is a different combo for me and I really like the look.

    I spritzed the panel with water and let it dry. Then I ran it through my die cut machine with the pinpoint radial plate. That looked a little flat to me so I pulled out some gold watercolor and flicked that over the whole panel. This adds so much visual interest and I just love it!

    I used liquid glue to adhere all of my images together and then backed them with foam tape. I popped them in place on the inked panel and adhered that to a white card base. Then I finished things off with some peach colored heart embellishments.

    Here’s a look at the card tipped in the light so you can really see the gold watercolor. It’s so fabulous in person!

    I’m super thankful to be here sharing this card with you and appreciate the time you share. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

    Supplies

    57384 Pinpoint Radial Plate

    8153 Pumpkin Lacework clear stamp and die set

  • Fall Themed Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Fall Themed Thanks | By Amanda Wilcox

    Hello everyone! It’s Amanda from Twiddler’s Nook and I appreciate you stopping by today. I’ve got a really pretty fall themed thanks card to share with you today. Let’s get crafting!

    I blending distress oxide inks on an A2 panel using Aged Mahogany, Rusty Hinge and Carved Pumpkin.

    I spritzed it with water and flicked a bunch of gold watercolor on the panel. Then, because I’m impatient, I hit it with my heat tool to speed up the drying process.

    Next, I die cut the inked panel with Autumn Breeze Plate A and a gold mirrored panel with Plate C. I also cut a brown piece of cardstock down to A2 size.

    When I layered them all together the brown looked really flat showing through so I decided to try inking up the colored cardstock. I used Ground Espresso and Gathered Twigs distress oxides. I spritzed it with water and didn’t like the look so I inked up over the top of it. I love the versatility of this!

    I used liquid glue to adhere my layers together and put clear blocks on top to help them dry flat. While they were drying I die cut the Thanks Honey Script from the same gold mirror and brown as the rest of the card. The words are cut 4 times and glued together with liquid glue.

    For a little dimension and interest I popped the sentiment up with foam squares and adhered the whole panel to a white card base.

    Here’s a different look at all that gold in the light. I just love the shimmer and shine from the mirrored cardstock and the metallic watercolor. They are beautiful together!

    I appreciate you sharing your time with me. Have a fabulous day!

    Supplies

    56130 Autumn Breeze Plate Layer Set

    57302 Thanks Honey Script