Mucking around with my stamps

So I have been inspired lately by all things Pinterest.  In particular I have been enjoying seeing some 'clean and simple' cards and cards with stamping on them.  I have limited stamps at home, I really must make a few more purchases because I am really loving all these cards that I am seeing.

So it is this whole 'clean and simple' thing that has got me intrigued.  I love all the cards on the clean and simple stamping blog, they are so beautiful.  I also love to look at the Less is More blog, which also has beautiful cards.  They look so simple, so quick and easy...but they're not that easy to make!  There is a real art to making a clean and simple card look so good.  It's all about the white space, the clever design, the particular choice of stamp or embellishment...anyway, this is all a big learning curve for me and I hope to improve in this area over time.  For now, I think I will stick to being inspired by the cards I love!

So here are a couple of cards that I have been making today, mucking around with ideas that I have found online and seeing how they turn out.  Some are kind of clean and simple, others not so much, but all of them were quick and easy, that's the main thing for me!

 This card was pretty easy but I'm happy with how it turned out.  This photo is a bit dark, the actual card looks nicer in person (of course!)  I simple stamped my flowers, stems, leaves and sentiment and ran the white piece of card through my cuttlebug with my swirly embossing folder.  I tied a piece of sheer ribbon around it, then attached the white piece to a slightly larger pink piece of cardstock, then stuck that to my white card base.  Voila - we have a card!
I got the idea for this card by watching a great tutorial on Stamp TV.  They used different stamps but the end result is pretty much the same.  Great tutorials on this site. A direct link to the tutorial I watched is here. 

How cute is this twine!  I just purchased five spools of twine from Whimsy Farm Twine, an Australian owned and run business.  They sell 100 metre spools of twine for $5!  Bargain!  No, I'm not paid to promote them, I found an ad for their business in a cardmaking magazine.  I just thought I'd give them a shout-out because their service was very friendly, their delivery was super fast (and postage was very reasonable), and their product is fab!  Oh yeah, and did I mention they're Australian?!!  Looking forward to using all my other coloured twine on later projects.  (Oh and they also make tri-coloured twine).

Another simple, stamped card, run through the cuttlebug and attached to a card base.  So simple.  Love this embossing folder.  This card was inspired by a card I saw on...wait for it...Pinterest!  I found the card that inspired me, but unfortunately when I clicked on the link it just took me to flicker, not to the actual card, so I don't have a link to share for the original card and I have no way of finding the original person's blog.  I can tell you though that their card had butterflies, embossing and a sentiment. 

Stamps: Basic Grey
Embossing folder:  Tim Holtz
Sentiment stamp:  Amy R Designs
Twine:  Whimsy Farm twine

Thanks for looking!